“What was that crashing sound?”
“He swept one of Mr. Sidney’s Tiffany vases onto the floor.”
“I’ll send you contact info for a good friend I have at Sotheby’s. She can give you an up-to-date replacement cost. Then create a bill for that and your time cleaning up and send it to me. I’ll make sure Aaron gets it.”
“Really?”
“Of course. Actions have consequences.”
“Oh, I like you, Mr. Barrington.”
“Why, thank you, Kevin,” Stone said.
“I just remembered you called me,” Kevin said, a bit embarrassed. “Is there something you need?”
“As a matter of fact, there is.”
Ten minutes later, an email arrived from Kevin, with a copyof Samuel Jones’s personnel file attached, which included a headshot of the steward.
Stone recognized him immediately. Jones had served him multiple times during the voyage.
Stone cocked his head as he recalled a memory of Jones bringing drinks to Trenton and him on the deck. Had that been on the night the boat went down? If so, it must have happened right before the other memory he’d had of him and Trenton.
He tried to remember anything that would connect the two events, but whatever else happened remained elusive.
He looked up Jones’s address. Instead of an apartment building like Stone expected, the address belonged to a mailbox business in Queens.
He called Dino.
“Yes,” Dino said.
“Yes, what?” Stone asked.
“I’m free for dinner.”
“Good to know. I’m not.”
“Then why did you call?”
Stone told him about Whittaker’s failure to find any of Jones’s family.
“You think he might be the pro?” Dino asked.
“I have no idea, but he seems to be a better bet than anyone else at the moment.”
“Do you have a picture?”
“I do.”
“Send it to me. I’ll run it through the FBI system and see if I get a hit.”
“Thanks. I was hoping you’d say that.”
“You can thank me by buying me dinner next time. That makes three you owe me.”
“Three?”
“The dinner you were supposed to buy me that you slept through. The dinner I brought you because you were sleeping. And now this.”
