Of all the people who could be trusted with the books, a restorer has to be high on the list, but of course I wasn’t good enough for them.
I only knew what she’d told me about it and what I’d read about the collection online. “Not a lot,” I said.
“It was world class. The medical books dated back to the ancient Greeks and possibly earlier. Your grandfather had also managed to bring together some of the lost volumes from the library of John Dee. Books on alchemy and sorcery. He had some exquisite texts in Arabic. Early treatises on mathematics. Books on Jewish mysticism. The collection was eclectic and esoteric. What your great-grandfather, grandfather, and father all had in common was that every book they acquired was the very best. So the loss was unimaginable.”
I heard your grandfather collapsed when he saw the burnt out library, and your father refused to talk about it for a long time.
“I know,” I said.
“Of course.”
She leaned forward, a new intensity in her eyes. It reminded me of the first day we met. She said, “How would you feel if I told you that the collection survived the fire?”
“I would tell you that you’re wrong.”
“I’m not. The core of the collection survived. Some of the best books had been moved to another location before the fire. Afterward, it was decided to keep them there and to tell no one, because it was such a lucky escape. Your father and grandfather were terrified that whoever burned down the library would come after the books again.”
“No. That can’t be.” The total destruction of the collection was part of the lore of the Beaufort family.
“It can and it is. Your father’s family are very good at keeping secrets.”
That was true. My father kept me a secret. I wasn’t mentioned in any of his official biographies.
“What you showed me at Tracy’s, was that—”
I remembered every detail of those manuscripts. Their quality and rarity had been exceptional.
“They were part of his original collection, yes.”
“How many books survived?”
“About two hundred. Ten percent of the collection, but the finest ten percent. If you agree to work on your father’s collection, you’ll have access to them all. They’ve never been properly looked at, certainly not published on.”
This I knew to be true. My grandfather had famously kept the collection closely guarded, which had appalled Mum.
Your father’s library contained extraordinary books. Books that were believed to have been lost to humanity. The Beaufort men had no problem believing themselves to be worthy keepers of the manuscripts, and they alsobelieved nobody else was worthy of seeing them. The manuscripts were for their eyes and the eyes of their heirs only. That was the scale of their self-importance.
Diana took a piece of paper from her bag and passed it to me. “This is a comprehensive list of the surviving manuscripts.”
I took it from her and read it. I was amazed.
“They’re your birthright,” Diana said. “Now, tell me I did the wrong thing getting you and him together. Tell me I was wrong, and you’ll never see this list again, let alone any more of the manuscripts.”
Chapter Seven
Sid
Sid fetched himself a coffee, then dove deeper into the mystery of Minxu Peng and found more interesting results online.
He discovered that she’d published some papers that had some crossover with his concept for Lucis. Unfortunately, they were in Mandarin, so he couldn’t read them, but it deepened his feeling that she was someone of interest specifically to him.
He remembered a Chinese colleague at Oxford complaining about how hard it was to get Westerners to write his name consistently, and Sid wondered if Minxu Peng had the same problem. He tried searching again, using variations of her name, and stumbled on a headshot attached to the name Peng Minzhu. Her eyes danced with intelligence beneath a thick fringe of hair. If the photo was recent, she couldn’t be much older than him and Anya now.
The caption read: “New Appointment to the FX Trading Team.” He read the article. She’d got a job at a foreign exchange trading desk within a major investment bank, where she was working as a security analyst in the in-house red team. It made sense, given her background. She’d likely be testing the exchange’s security controls.
His doorbell rang. He jogged downstairs to answer it, but frozewhen he saw it was his neighbor again. She was peering through the front window, trying to see in. He cursed and wondered if he could make himself invisible if he stood very still, but it was too late. She waved at him.
He opened the door, thinking that he must order a doorbell camera.
