“It’s called ‘consequences.’ My boss doesn’t trust me anymore, and this is exactly why.” I pointed at his chest, then poked him over the heart. “Dr. Fanshawe is convinced you and I are still involved and obviously, she’s right.”
“Miss March, your mother’s book has been stolen from the safe,” Mrs. Turner reminded me. “Someone needs to find it, yes? And with your grandfather away, we could use the assistance—”
“Your grandfather’s away?” Duke repeated. “Where?”
I didn’t answer at first. Then I had to say it. “Some off-the-books mission. But he’s been gone a week, and he’s almost never gone that long.”
“You mean your grandfather is missing?”
“I don’t know, but I have a bad feeling.”
“First, your grandfather’s gone off to whereabouts unknown and now your book? Rainy,” Duke said, “that isn’t simply a case anymore. That’s what we in the business call abigcase.”
“Mrs. Turner?” I said.
“Yes, Miss March?”
“Can you leave us alone for the next few minutes. I don’t want any witnesses.”
“Of course,” she said. “Come along, Master Koshka. I don’t want you involved in a rumble.” With a curtsy to Duke, she wheeled the tea trolley out of the library, Koshka at her heels, then shut the door behind her.
Duke looked at me. “Darling, you know you need my help.”
“Entirely beside the point. You have to go. Now.”
“Rainy,” he said, looking me deep in the eyes. “Please, let me help you. Allow me—for once in my useless, imaginary life—to solve a real case. I’ve been in print for eighty years and never once had the chance to help a real person before. Please. For your grandfather’s sake, if not mine.”
My shoulders slumped. “Duke…your books help real people—”
“No, no they don’t. They distract real people from their real problems. Or entertain them for a few hours. But I solve paper murders committed by paper criminals and mend paper hearts and restore paper justice. Do you understand what it would mean to me to solve a real crime?”
“Your books mended my paper heart,” I said.
“You’re being very kind.”
“I’m not being kind. It’s true. And you don’t have to prove your worth as a detective.”
“But I want to, love. Here. Look.” He gestured to the portrait over the fireplace. “They went to the trouble of cracking the safe. The thief took only your mother’s book when there are several dozen expensive first editions strewn about in plain sight.”
Duke ran his fingers over the spines of a dozen rare books on a nearby shelf.
“You know what that means, don’t you?” he continued. “It means that book is not simply a book.”
“Then what is it? Because I’ve read the thing a few billion times, and there’s nothing there except a fun little mystery where Nancy Drew and her father find a dead guy’s missing will.”
“Are you certain?” he asked.
I dropped down onto the sofa. “Trust me, we looked.”
“Where? How?”
“Everywhere, I promise. In the words, on the endpapers, behind the endpapers, hidden between the lines, in a cipher, or in invisible ink. Pops even broke the rules and snuck into the story to ask if anyone knew Ellery March. Nobody had ever heard of her.”
“Did he go missing before or after your book?”
“He left over a week ago saying he had to go on a top secret mission. That’s all. Except Penny, the new apprentice, mentioned tonight she wasn’t aware of any missions or assignments he’d been sent on. And it’s her job to know,” I said. “Not five minutes after she told me Pops wasn’t on an assignment, I find out my mother’s book has been stolen.” I held up my hands, empty of answers. “Honestly, I’m more worried about Pops than I am about getting the book back.”
“Unless they’re related.”
