“I don’t want to think about him right now,” Jane said, waving his image away as she closed her eyes again.
Something occurred to me. “Do you think Cuckoo could’ve been the one who was tearing Jesse’s house apart?”
Jane’s eyes popped open. “Oh my God, Shannon. Yes. Why else would he approach me like that if he wasn’t anxious to get his hands on that necklace?”
“If it was him, he obviously didn’t find it. Otherwise he wouldn’t have tried to buy it from you.”
“Wait.” Jane pressed her hand to her lips. “What if he threatened Jesse?”
“Let’s take our time and think this through.” I sipped my wine and mentally went over everything that had happened recently. “Suppose Jesse really did find the necklace while scuba diving. The first thing he would do is try to sell it, right?”
“Wouldn’t that get him into trouble? Aren’t there salvage laws involved?”
“I don’t know.” I squeezed my eyes shut. “I’m trying to remember our sixth grade history class.”
In our local schools, every child learned the history of Lighthouse Cove and the Glorious Maiden, the clipper ship that sank off the coast in 1839.
The fast sailing ship had made regular round-trip runs from British Columbia down to San Francisco, and while it was purported to carry tea and textiles, its main cargo was often opium. They also transported wealthy travelers along with their money, jewelry, and other valuables. Legend had it that a Spanish princess and her royal entourage were passengers on board that fateful night, and when the ship sank, the princess and all her jewels were lost at sea.
Allegedly.
In the aftermath, a number of gold coins washed up onshore, bringing an onslaught of treasure hunters to town. After a time, the gold fever died down, but every once in a while, another gold coin would show up and another wave of treasure seekers would inundate the area.
Pawnshops and curio shops cropped up around town to provide seekers with a place to trade their worldly goods for cash to last them another few months while they tried to hunt for more treasure. But except for the occasional gold coin, no fancy jewels were ever found.
A few of the shops were still in business, though, and one of them was owned by Cuckoo Clemens.
Two local scuba diving shops and a company that specialized in geocaching, or treasure hunting, continued to thrive as well. The lure of finding treasure was no longer the draw, of course. Now our bay was simply a popular diving spot for the fun of exploring a nineteenth-century sailing ship.
But none of that information answered Jane’s question about salvage rights.
“I’m no expert in maritime law,” I admitted. “But if the legend is true and a Spanish princess really did die on that ship and Jesse found her necklace, I imagine it would rightly belong to Spain.”
She opened her eyes and sat up. “Maybe Jesse did the right thing and contacted the Spanish embassy.”
I thought it through. “I doubt it.”
“Me, too.” She smiled ruefully. “Jesse wasn’t exactly the type to follow through on the kind of complicated paperwork that would entail. He might’ve planned to do it, but whether he ever got around to it . . .”
“Right,” I said. “So maybe in the beginning he just wanted it appraised and figured Cuckoo’s shop was as good as any to get it done. Once Cuckoo turned him down, maybe he sold it somewhere else. Or not.”
“It’s too complicated,” Jane said, reaching for her wineglass.
“My mind is spinning with several theories.”
“Do share.”
“What if Cuckoo kept offering to buy the necklace, but Jesse always said no? But then, just recently, Cuckoo offered him money again, and Jesse told him that he was planning to give the necklace to Althea?”
Jane stared at me for a long moment. “Oh, that’s good. Althea’s presence could’ve changed everything. Cuckoo realized he was running out of time to get his hands on that necklace.”
“He grew desperate,” I speculated.
“Cuckoo went cuckoo.”
I laughed. “It’s all ridiculously hypothetical, of course. First of all, Jesse wouldn’t give a priceless treasure to a woman he just met a few months ago.”
“I hope not,” Jane muttered.
“It’s more likely that he went ahead and sold the necklace to another antique dealer a few years ago and that was the end of it.”
“So why was his house torn apart?”
I frowned. She had a point. “Good question.”
“And if he sold it, what did he do with the money?”
“He didn’t spend it on himself—that’s for sure.” I looked at her. “Did he leave a will?”
Jane thought for a moment. “Not that I know of. He mentioned a while ago that he wanted to hire a lawyer, but I don’t know if he ever did.”
“Did he tell you why he needed a lawyer?”
“No, darn it. But I’ll bet it’s about this necklace.”
We drank our wine in silence for another minute, and then I asked, “Are you going to talk to Cuckoo?”