The phone rang the following evening just as Matthias was preparing to sit down to dinner with Amalie, Hazel, and Willa.
“Probably another reservation,” Willa announced.
She jumped up from the table and disappeared into the lobby, only to return a moment later. She looked at Matthias.
“It’s Luther Pell,” she announced. “He wants to talk to you. Says it’s urgent.”
“With Pell, it’s always urgent,” Matthias said.
He got to his feet, went out into the lobby, and picked up the phone.
“Considering the fact that you’re calling during the dinner hour, I’m assuming that whatever is in that notebook, it isn’t poetry written by a depressed rogue agent.”
“No,” Luther said. “The verses are definitely some sort of code. My expert hasn’t been able to decipher the encryption. He’s still working on it. But whatever the case, I don’t think those poems were written by Smith. It’s a good bet that he stole the notebook.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because the Broker just called. He says he’s got a client who is extremely eager to recover a notebook full of poems that went missing a few months ago.”
“What makes the client think the notebook might be here in Burning Cove?”
“I don’t know. But something tells me Calloway’s death may have opened a door into a very dark chamber.”
“That sounds like a line out of a horror movie.”
“Calloway did promise me a sequel.”