He relaxed, clearly relieved. “Hidden Treasures?” he asked. It was a good guess: Emma’s favorite vintage store was well known to the family. Every time she went she picked things up for them: a bow tie for Tavvy, a flowered headband for Livvy, an old horror movie poster for Dru.
“Yep. Do you want anything?”
“I’ve always kind of wanted a Batman clock that says ‘WAKE UP, BOY WONDER’ when it goes off,” he said. “It would liven up my room.”
“We’ve got it!” Livvy said, bounding into the kitchen. “Well, some of it, anyway. But it’s weird.”
Emma turned to her with relief. “Got what?”
“In English, Livvy,” said Julian. “What’s weird?”
“We translated some of the lines in the cave,” said Ty, trailing in on Livvy’s heels. He was wearing an oversize gray hooded sweater that swallowed up his hands. His dark hair spilled over the edge of the hood. “But they don’t make sense.”
“Are they a message?” Emma said.
Livvy shook her head. “Lines from a poem,” she said, unfolding the paper she held.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in Heaven above
Nor the demons down under the sea
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee. . . .
“‘Annabel Lee,’” said Julian. “Edgar Allan Poe.”
“I know the poem,” Livvy said, scrunching up her eyebrows. “I just don’t know why it was written on the walls of the cave.”
“I thought maybe it was a book cipher,” said Ty. “But that would mean there was a second half of it. Something in another location, maybe. Might be worth checking with Malcolm.”
“I’ll add it to the list,” said Julian.
Cristina stuck her head in through the kitchen door. “Emma?” she said. “Are you ready to go?”
“You look worried,” said Livvy. “Is Emma taking you somewhere to kill you?”
“Worse,” Emma said, heading over to join Cristina at the door. “Shopping.”
“For tonight? First, I am so jealous, and second, don’t let her take you to that place in Topanga Canyon—”
“That’s enough!” Emma clapped her hands over Cristina’s ears. “Don’t listen to her. She’s lost her mind from all that code breaking.”
“Pick me up some cuff links,” Jules called, heading back toward the sink.
“What color?” Emma paused halfway out the door with Cristina.
“I don’t care as long as they hold my cuffs together. Otherwise they’ll be sad and unlinked,” Jules said. “And get back as quick as you can.” The sound of the water running in the sink was drowned out by Livvy, who had already begun reciting more of the poem.
It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea . . .
“This is where you want to buy clothes?” Cristina asked, her eyebrows arched, as Emma pulled the Toyota into a dirt parking lot surrounded by trees.
“It’s the closest place,” Emma said, turning off the car. In front of them was a single freestanding building with a sign boasting foot-high letters in glitter that spelled out the words HIDDEN TREASURES. A massive red-and-white popcorn machine stood next to the store, along with a painted model of a curtained caravan, advertising the services of Gargantua the Great. “And besides, it’s awesome.”
“This does not look like a place you buy glamorous dresses,” Cristina said, wrinkling up her nose. “This looks like a place where you are kidnapped and sold to the circus.”
Emma grabbed her by the wrist. “Don’t you trust me?” she wheedled.
“Of course not,” Cristina said. “You’re crazy.”
But she let Emma drag her into the store, which was filled with kitschy knickknacks: Fiestaware platters, old china dolls, and, up by the register, racks of vintage jewelry and watches. A second room opened off the first. It was full of clothes—amazing clothes. Secondhand vintage Levi’s, fifties pencil skirts in tweed and bombazine, and tops in silk and lace and crushed velvet.
And in a smaller second room off the main one, the dresses. They looked like hanging butterflies: sheets of red organza, watercolor-printed charmeuse, the hem of a Balmain gown, the froth of a tulle petticoat, like foam on water.
“Didn’t Julian say he needed cuff links?” Cristina said, pulling Emma to a stop by the counter. The salesgirl behind it, wearing a pair of cat’s-eye glasses and a name tag that said SARAH, studiously ignored them.
Emma ran her eyes over the display of men’s cuff links—most were joke items, shaped like dice or guns or cats, but there was a section of nicer ones: consignment Paul Smith and Burberry and Lanvin.