“No, I don’t think so,” Jaden said.
“And why not?” Kelsey asked.
“Because this reliquary is a fake!” Jaden announced, sitting back, flushed and triumphant.
“What?” Liam, Kelsey and Avery asked simultaneously.
Jaden reached into her bag again, producing a little gold ball. “This is your gold ball, Kelsey, or the gold ball from the reliquary. It’s really perfect. The workmanship is incredible. It’s worth ten to twenty thousand, so it seems that a thief should have taken it. But it’s nothing next to the diamond. I don’t know who made this, or why, but our tests have dated it back to the early twentieth century. So, the thief must have figured out that Cutter didn’t have the real reliquary, and so he left it.”
Kelsey stared at her blankly. “That doesn’t make sense. If you were a thief—why not at least take something that was worth twenty thousand dollars or so?”
“I don’t know that,” Jaden said. She fell silent as their drinks were delivered. “I can only tell you what I discovered. There was no sign of bone or ash in the little gold ball.”
“So what was in it?” Liam asked.
Jaden grimaced and produced her last object from her bag. It was a little swastika on a gold pin. “Worth something, I imagine, even if distasteful,” she said.
“None of it makes any sense,” Kelsey said.
“Actually, it does. It makes perfect sense,” Liam said.
They all looked at him. He didn’t explain right away. “Hey, Jaden, I saw that you and Ted visited the rare-book room at the library recently,” he said, sipping his iced tea.
They both looked at him blankly, and then at each other. “Recently, and always,” Ted said. “How do you think we do research? Online, yes, but we have to look at rare books for the pieces we’re asked to restore. Why?”
“Just think back for a minute, did you ever take out a book called Key West, Satanism, Peter Edwards and the Abel and Aleister Crowley Connection?” Liam asked.
It seemed as if the entire table was looking at him as if he had lost his mind.
“I’ve never even heard of such a book,” Jaden said.
“Someone has. It’s missing from the library,” he said.
“And you’re accusing us—of stealing a book?” Ted asked, sitting back.
“No, I was asking if you happened to have it,” Liam said. He noted that Bartholomew was sitting at an empty table near them, studying the reactions everyone had to his questions and comments.
“I have never taken a rare book from the library, and I don’t even know why I would want the one you’re talking about,” Jaden said. “Nor would I know why you would want it, Liam!”
He didn’t rise to the bait. He leaned back casually himself. “I’m interested in the book because it supposedly has a reference to Cutter’s book, In Defense from Dark Magick,” he said.
“Where did you even hear about it?” Ted asked.
“Oh, some old-timers mentioned it. Apparently, there was a connection to Crowley and his interest in dark arts.”
“Aleister Crowley was in Key West?” Jaden asked, still confused.
“No. A supposed relative. I was just asking because your names were on the list of people who had been in the rare-book room. It wasn’t an accusation,” Liam said.
They both still appeared to be confused. “Well, you had best ask the rest of the people on the list,” Jaden said. “I didn’t take it. And if Ted has slipped it out for any reason—which he wouldn’t have!—he’d tell you straight away.”
“Hey! I didn’t take the book,” Ted protested.
“Of course not, dear,” Jaden said, squeezing his hand.
“Who else was on the list?” Kelsey asked him.
“Mary Egans—” Liam began.
“A high-school teacher,” Jaden said, dismissing the possibility.
Liam shrugged. “Barney Thibault.”
“He’d die before he’d steal a piece of gum!” Ted said.
“I agree,” Liam told him. “Someone named George Penner—I don’t know the name, and neither did the librarian. Jonas—”
“Our Jonas?” Jaden demanded.
“Let him talk, please,” Ted said.
Liam nodded. “Yes, our Jonas. Oh, and Joe Richter.”
“Richter!” Kelsey said.
Liam studied her. “What?”
“I—I’m not sure.” She shook her head and hiked her shoulders. “Richter can’t be guilty of anything. He had free access to Cutter’s place. He was the attorney. He had the only access, really, for a while. I mean, once you reported Cutter dead.”
There was something more there, Liam thought, but he’d ask her later.
“Then there was someone named Bel Arcowley. Do you know him—or her?” he asked.
Ted and Jaden looked at him solemnly, shaking their heads.
“Why is the book so important?” Kelsey asked.
“I don’t know,” Liam said. “I’d just like to find it.”
“You know, I can do a rare-book search for you tomorrow. There has to be a copy somewhere else,” Jaden said.
“I can do a search,” Liam said.