Miranda James - Classified as Murder

I glared at her. “I will be its custodian, yes, for as long as I work at the college. But it will belong to the college, not to me.”

Kanesha shrugged. “That’s all I meant.”

Sean and I exchanged looks. She had deliberately provoked me, and we all knew it.

“I take it, then, you’re willing to finish the inventory?” Kanesha relaxed enough to let her arms down into her lap.

“I am. Sean’s going with me as my assistant.” I sipped some tea. “Mr. Pendergrast also asked me to be present tomorrow morning when he reads the will to Mr. Delacorte’s heirs. Then he wants me to continue with the job as soon as possible. When will I be able to get into the library again?”

“Tomorrow afternoon, possibly. This is an unusual situation.” Kanesha paused. “You’ll be in the house for quite some time, then. That’s not such a bad idea.”

“What do you mean?” Sean spoke rather sharply, and Dante sat up and barked. Sean shushed him, and the poodle put his head down between his front legs.

“I mean I think it will be helpful to the investigation to have someone inside the house. A person who isn’t an official investigator.” Kanesha directed her words to Sean, but she glanced quickly at me as if to gauge my reaction.

This was certainly a switch. She hadn’t been all that happy last fall when I was in the middle of another murder investigation. We had finally managed to get along, but it wasn’t easy.

And now here she was, practically asking me to snoop on her behalf.

I put my thoughts into words, rather more tactfully than I might have. “You want me to be alert to anything that might have a bearing on the investigation, right?”

“Yes, exactly. I know from past experience”—and here she flashed me a brief smile—“that you’re observant, and frankly I could use all the help I can get on this investigation. I can’t get much sense out of any of them. I’ve never seen a family like that.”

I shook my head at Sean, because I could see he was ready to protest. “Thank you for the compliment. I will pass along anything I think is pertinent, naturally.”

“I really don’t like the idea of my father putting himself in harm’s way by becoming a part of your investigation.” Sean radiated disapproval.

“I understand your concern,” Kanesha said, “but as long as your father confines his assistance to observation , he should be in no danger.”

“I agree,” I said, noting her emphasis on one word. “Sean, you’ll be there with me, and I promise I won’t do anything foolish. Just observe.”

Sean didn’t appear convinced, but he didn’t protest again.

I turned back to Kanesha. “Was this what you wanted to talk to me about?”

“Partly.” Kanesha picked up her briefcase. “There’s something I’d like you to take a look at.” She opened the case and delved inside. “We found this on Mr. Delacorte’s desk.”

“Where exactly was it?” I had been too rattled to pay attention to anything other than his body.

“Under his right hand.” Kanesha pulled out a file folder encased in plastic, closed the briefcase, and set it on the floor. “I believe it has something to do with his collection.” She handed the folder, still inside the plastic, over to me.

I accepted it gingerly and examined it. The only thing I noticed was the word Tamerlane printed neatly on the label tab.

It was very light in my hands. “Is there anything inside the folder?” I handed it back to her.

“No, it’s empty, but I suspect it might have contained something.” She paused for a moment. “There was a letter from an antiquarian bookseller in London, dated July of last year. It was underneath this. The letter advised Mr. Delacorte that a copy of Tamerlane was coming up for sale at a private auction in November and invited him to participate.”

“What is Tamerlane ?” Sean asked. “It sounds familiar.”

“Edgar Allan Poe’s self-published book of poetry.” I shook my head in amazement. “It’s incredibly rare. About fifty copies were printed, and only ten or twelve are known to exist. It’s worth a small fortune.”

“Was it listed in the inventory that Alexandra Pendergrast gave you?” Sean asked, his interest obvious.

“No, it wasn’t. Perhaps he didn’t participate in the auction, or if he did, he didn’t win.” I shrugged. “Or the list needs to be updated.”

“I believe he did win.” Kanesha spoke with quiet confidence. “There was a second letter from the bookseller under the first, thanking Mr. Delacorte for his patronage and for allowing him to represent Delacorte ‘in a most satisfactory and successful transaction.’ That’s a direct quote from the letter.”

“Sounds like he did win the auction after all.” Sean leaned back in his chair. “I wonder how much it set him back.”

“That’s an interesting question,” Kanesha said. “But a more important question is, where is it?”

SEVENTEEN

“And you think it was in that folder?” Sean didn’t bother to hide his disbelief. “Why would it be in a folder anyway?”

“I’ll answer that for you in a moment,” I told him with a frown. Kanesha had already bristled at his tone, and I didn’t want him to antagonize her any further. “May I see the folder again?” I held my hand out to Kanesha.

Kanesha passed the folder back to me. I held it close and examined it through the plastic as well as I could. I handed it back to her.

“It’s an archival folder, made from acid-free paper,” I said. “It’s exactly the kind of folder I would use to hold something old and valuable to protect it.”

“How big is this thing anyway?” Sean prodded. “You can’t tell me someone would stick a book in a thing like that.”

“No, you wouldn’t. There are specially made boxes for books, if one needs to be protected like that.” Before I could continue and answer Sean’s original question, Kanesha spoke up with one of her own. “When was Tamerlane published?”

“I’m pretty sure it was in 1827. Poe was only eighteen at the time.” I paused while I dredged up what details I could remember. “It’s an epic poem, not really a book—about forty pages, the size of a pamphlet. Something that would fit in an archival folder like that one.” I remembered a bit more. “There are nine other poems besides ‘Tamerlane.’ ”

“You’re really up on your Poe.” Kanesha sounded impressed, albeit a bit grudgingly. “But I guess that’s the kind of thing you’re supposed to know, right?”

“Librarians tend to pick up all kinds of information.” I offered a self-deprecating smile. “In this case, useful information. Sometimes it’s merely trivia.”

Sean laughed. “Don’t let the modest act take you in, Deputy. He’s a mine of all kinds of information to do with books.”

I smiled briefly at my son, silently thanking him for the compliment.

“The folder,” Sean said. “It could have contained this pamphlet, then.”

“Yes. There are some tiny chips of paper in the folder. Both letters are intact, and the chips are a different color paper than the letters anyway.” Kanesha shrugged. “We’ll have to wait till the state crime lab can examine those chips to see how old the paper is.”

Those little bits of paper were not conclusive at this point, but the romantic in me wanted to believe that they came from an original copy of one of the rarest American literary works ever published. I could easily imagine Mr. Delacorte’s excitement when he held such a precious object in his hands, knowing that it was now a part of his collection.