When we got back to the guesthouse after grabbing a pizza for dinner, all of us piled into Beattie’s and my room again. This time, I set the laptop on my bed, and my three friends sat around me so they could see my screen. And as soon as I opened my new email account, I found two messages, one about each of the book inquiries I’d sent.
My initial messages had just expressed interest in each book and suggested a place and time we could meet—the café across the street from where we’d met Swagley, at 10 a.m. and 11 a.m., respectively—and offered a cash purchase at that time if the books were to my liking. I would have to work out how to get the cash, but I presumed that Weber could get me anything I needed.
The first email agreed to my terms and said they would meet me at 10 a.m. “I’ll be wearing a purple pocket square,” the message said. I was relieved to have fifty percent of the plan down.
Unfortunately, the second message wasn’t as accommodating. The seller demanded to know more about me—my actual name and the supply of a photograph—as well as a meeting, on their terms, only after they vetted me. I didn’t like the sound of that, and apparently, Aaran didn’t either.
He uttered a few explicit terms under his breath. Yet the whole time, he kept his face neutral just in case anyone was watching, not just listening, or so I assumed.
“I don’t like that at all,” Beattie said.
“Me neither,” Adaire added. “That doesn’t sound safe in the least.”
“I’m not telling them my real name, especially since I only know them as BooksAreLife2233. And if they want to see my actual face, they can come to the café tomorrow to meet. I feel like that’s reasonable,” I said, trying to feel confident even as I heard the wobble in my voice.
“That’s more than reasonable,” Adaire said. “Swagley wouldn’t gain anything from you being in harm’s way, and I’m certain, given what he said this morning about the exception he made about seeing us in person, that he wouldn’t make this arrangement either.”
“That’s a good point,” Aaran said. “Maybe you should explain the situation to Weber?”
I thought about that for a moment. I decided Aaran was right and picked up my phone. Once again, Weber answered on the first ring. “Give us a few minutes. I expect you will hear from the seller shortly.”
I don’t know what happened in the next seven minutes, but when my email dinged with a new message, the seller had suddenly become quite amenable to my terms. Just like that, I had two new appointments to buy two books, and I was about to get Swagley that much closer to being arrested.
Another quick call to Weber confirmed that I could pick up the cash for the purchases tomorrow before the first meeting, and she also assured me that there would be “more than adequate” security available for the meetings. “In a quiet way, of course,” she said.
I thanked her for that assurance and hung up. A few minutes later, the men headed to their room, and I went into the bathroom to brush my teeth. I ran water over my brush, put toothpaste on, wet it, and moved the brush to my teeth. And froze.
As quickly as hygienically possible, I brushed my teeth and washed my face, then raced out and hauled Beattie into the bathroom to ask her the question that had stopped me cold.
I turned the shower and sink on full blast, said a silent apology to our host for using so much water, and said, “How exactly is all this going to help anyone catch Swagley?”
Beattie sighed. “I have been thinking the same thing all afternoon. Is he using counterfeit money? Is the money marked somehow so that the authorities will know it’s dirty? And will they come busting in to get the money before we make the deal? Are they going to confiscate the money we already have?”
“Oh Lord, I hadn’t thought about all that yet. Do you think they’ll want our money?” I asked as I glanced out the bathroom door to my suitcase that I had chained and padlocked to the leg of the bed with the fireproof book safe and Uncle Fitz’s money inside. “Because that’s it, isn’t it? The only way this is going to get Swagley caught is if there’s something about the money that the authorities can use.”
“That’s what I think, too.” She sighed. “That, or—” She stopped talking abruptly.
“Or what?” I said a little too loudly and then repeated it in a whisper. “Or what?”
“Or this is just one more step in the process,” she said. Her eyes were as round as an owl’s. “Poe, what have we gotten ourselves into?”
I shook my head and swallowed hard, determined not to cry. “I don’t know, Beattie, but I think we may be asking the question a little too late.”
I hardly slept at all that night, and after breakfast, when we were walking to meet Weber outside Swagley’s café before our first meeting, Adaire asked me if I was okay.
“I just didn’t sleep that well, is all,” I said. “Nervous about today.” I couldn’t very well tell him that I was anxious not only about today’s meetings but also about what was going to be asked of me next, especially when his brother was probably part of the plan to get me deeper into Swagley’s organization. “I’ll feel better when this is all over.” I wasn’t lying, not really.
All night, I had tossed and turned as my brain tried to sort through who was really setting the parameters here and who I could really trust. As I drifted in and out of half-sleep, my mind jumped from thinking that I was in good hands with Officer Jonsdottir and Aaran involved to thinking that perhaps Swagley and Weber were, ironically, more trustworthy because they hadn’t pretended to be anything other than what they were. By the time I finally decided to just get up, my mind was buzzing like an old fluorescent lightbulb.
Adaire looked at me closely, but he didn’t say anything more, and I was grateful. I wanted so badly to trust him, but right now, I didn’t know what to do. And I couldn’t lose track of what was happening this morning in my confusion. I had to get through these two meetings, and then whatever came next, Beattie and I would handle it.
Weber was waiting for us when we arrived, and without a word, she handed me two briefcases just like the one I had received yesterday. Then she turned and went into the café.
For a second, I just stared after her, and then I headed across the street, where my friends had already secured two tables. The plan was for me to sit at one to wait for each seller. Beattie, Adaire, and Aaran would sit at the next table over and not engage with us unless something looked fishy. Otherwise, they’d just be friends enjoying coffee and pastries.
I so badly wanted to sit down with them and chat, pretend all this wasn’t happening, eat an entire one of those napoleon-like bars, and then do something completely fun. But instead, I sat down alone, ordered a coffee with a lot of cream and sugar, and prepared to wait.
Fortunately, the first seller was right on time. I recognized her immediately because of the purple pocket square tucked into her lovely pin-striped suit jacket. Her hair was jet black and thrown back in a way that looked carefree but had probably taken seven products and a team.
When she looked my way, I raised a hand, and she smiled and joined me, setting her small attaché case on the table between us. “Thank you for meeting me here,” I said.
“Of course, Ms. Baxter. Your reputation precedes you.” Her accent was Icelandic, and somehow, I found it a little less disturbing that she was from here. That little bit of comfort did not, however, make up for the fact that she knew my name. I didn’t like that one bit.
“Thank you, um . . .”
“You can call me Kiki.” She smiled and opened the attaché. “I must not dawdle, I’m afraid. I have another appointment shortly. Please, examine the book as you’d like.”
Earlier this morning, over breakfast, Beattie and Adaire had coached me on what to look for to be sure the book was authentic. I studied the spine of the book and the binding, estimated the weight of the paper and thought it matched what was appropriate for the time period, and looked closely at the ink to see if it had the brown shade with hints of red that Adaire suggested would have been the natural dye of choice for this era.
All of those things were in order, so I made my first offer, $10,000 below what Swagley had authorized.
Kiki studied my face a moment and then countered at $2,000 higher. Beattie and Adaire had said that what Swagley was offering was more than fair for the book, so I gladly accepted her counter, especially since it was still well below the maximum.
Kiki and I shook on the deal, and I quickly turned, took out the cash I hadn’t needed, and then slid the briefcase filled with my first offer plus the $2,000 for her counter across the table.
“It was nice doing business with you, Ms. Baxter.” She stood and walked out. The entire exchange had taken less than ten minutes.
After Aaran casually went out to smoke a cigarette on the sidewalk and to be sure Kiki had gone on her way, he came back in and said, “One down. One to go.”
I nodded and glanced at Beattie, who was studying her fingernails very carefully. I expected she was as twisted up about this whole situation as I was.
“Do you want something before the next meeting?” Adaire said as the waitress approached. “Maybe just to keep yourself busy.”
“Oh, okay, yeah, that’s a good idea,” I said as I shifted the leftover $8,000 Swagley had given me into the bottom of my bag.
“Can you recommend something sweet?” Adaire asked when the waitress arrived.
“Do you want very sweet or a little sweet?” she replied.
Adaire looked at me, took a deep breath, and said, “Very.”
“I know just the thing,” she said before taking everyone else’s orders for coffee refills and their own pastries.
My fiddling and stalling had run their course, so I said, “That was easier than I thought it would be.”
“It does help to have a”—Beattie lowered her voice—“mob boss grease the wheels for you.”
“True,” I said. “Maybe he should help with all my acquisitions.” I had meant it as a joke, but it fell completely flat and landed on the table like a miss-tossed crepe. “I’ll be glad when this next meeting is over. What are we doing after?”
“Want to see a volcano?” Adaire said as the waitress brought our order.
She spoke up in response to Adaire, saying, “Oh, the volcano tours are really fun, but they can be crowded. My cousin does private ones. Want his number?” she asked as she handed me a pastry and several extra napkins.
I set down the plate and noticed writing on the napkin beneath it. I slid the pastry aside just a bit and read, “Inga will meet you at two.”
“Yes, please. Let’s do it, guys. I like the idea of a private tour.” I tapped the napkin gently, as if for emphasis, and then slid my plate back over the words.
“All right, let’s do it,” Aaran said. “If you don’t mind giving me his number . . .”
The waitress took a pen out of her apron and wrote the number on the back of our receipt. “His name is Alex. Tell him Ingrid sent you.” She smiled, then walked away.
As I watched her go, I wondered if this entire café was staffed with operatives or if it was some innate talent of baristas to be really good at passing notes. They probably never got caught by their teachers in school.
Aaran made the call, and within ten minutes, we were scheduled and provided, via email, with a list of gear. Because the list was pretty extensive, Beattie and Adaire decided to go buy what we needed while I had the next meeting, leaving Aaran there as my backup. I didn’t love that because it was really only Beattie I felt like I could trust at the moment. But I couldn’t very well say that, nor could she, given the situation.
So with our pastries eaten and coffee drunk, I moved back to my table with my phone and a game that was so mindless I could win levels without thinking. Aaran took out a book from his pocket and read.
At precisely 11 a.m., a man in a dark hat and a very old-fashioned trench coat came into the café. Unlike the other person I’d met, this guy hadn’t provided any identifying information, but given how squirrely he was and the strangeness of his getup, I knew it was my seller from the minute he walked in.
I raised my hand to wave him over, and he scowled at me before stalking over and saying, “Must you be so obvious,” in what was a very English accent. “I am not happy about these meeting circumstances.”
“As you said, Mr.—”
“No names,” he spat. “Let’s just get this over with.”
I couldn’t argue with that, so I said, “Please, may I see the book?”
“Lower your voice,” he said in a whisper that carried far more than any normal tone would have. “Yes, you may see it. But first, you must put on gloves.”
I resisted the urge to say, “Have you not heard that gloves typically harm old objects more than prevent their damage?” and put on the blue latex gloves he handed me.
Once he was satisfied that I had complied, he took a box out of his briefcase, slid out an object wrapped in blue velvet, and handed it gently to me. “It is fragile, so please be careful.”
I nodded and set the book on the table before slowly unwrapping it. What I saw took my breath away, even though I had read the description of the book and knew it was illuminated.
The phrase illuminated manuscript was nowhere near adequate for this gorgeous work. The images were so brightly colored they could have been photographs if not for the richness of the tones. The gold outlines of the various figures and letters were exquisite and didn’t look like they had faded at all over the centuries, and the text itself was written in a block handwriting that was not only legible but beautiful, too. To say this book was gorgeous was to say that Elton John sort of liked interesting glasses.
I turned each page with absolute awe, and when I finally looked up, I could see that my appreciation of the book had eased the seller’s nerves just a bit. “What can you tell me about the book?”
At the table next to me, I saw Aaran glance up at me. I was going off-script, but I couldn’t help myself. I had to know more about this gorgeous work.
“It’s something my father found years ago in an old bookshop in London. He had no idea about its actual value, but he loved the images. And when he found someone who could read Latin, he realized it was old folktales, stories about Iceland that had been written by the Irish monks who first visited.” The man rubbed his chin. “I grew up looking at these illuminations and making up my own stories to go with them.”
He reached over and gently flipped the book open to a page with a lion roaring behind what looked like the letter R. “This one was my favorite. I used to tell my father a story about the brave lion who defended the village from people who wanted to steal their children.” The seller shook his head. “I don’t know exactly where that story came from, but it gave me great comfort as a child.”
“I imagine so,” I said. “Who wouldn’t want a lion to protect them from all the evil things in the world?” I could completely understand where this man was coming from. I’d grown up with a polar bear formed in the grain of my bedroom door. He was my protector.
The seller looked at me carefully. “My name is Hugo.” He sighed. “I’m sorry I was so worried. You seem like a nice young woman. If I may ask, what do you plan to do with the book?”
Suddenly, I felt pretty horrible about my role in all this. I sighed but tried to keep my face neutral since I knew Swagley’s people were nearby. “I’m acquiring it for a collector, a man who appreciates and cares for old books like this one.”
“That man wouldn’t be, by chance, a man with a certain type of, shall we say, reach, would it?” Hugo leaned in and studied my face. “Is he holding something over you, too?”
I shook my head. “No, sir.” I met his gaze and held it, willing him to see what I was trying to convey. “But if you need more time to think about the sale, I understand.” I paused for effect. “We could meet back here tomorrow to finalize the decision.”
Hugo sat back just slightly as if he suddenly understood, and then he nodded. “I do think that would be best. The book is very special to me, and I need to be absolutely certain I want to sell.” He stood up and folded the book carefully back into the velvet wrapper before holding it to his chest once again. “Thank you, Ms.”
“Poe,” I said. “You can call me Poe.”
“Named after one of the greats, are you? Excellent.” He put his hat back on, tipped it toward me, and then left the café.
As soon as he was out of sight, Aaran slid into his chair. “What are you doing?” he asked in a breathy whisper. I supposed he didn’t think it would bother Swagley if someone seemed to be acting in his interest.
Fortunately, my mind had been quickly thinking as I talked to Hugo, and I had come up with a reasonable explanation for giving Hugo an out. “I am certain Mr. Swagley wants the seller to be sure of their decision so as to avoid, um, messy situations or unreasonable public claims in the future,” I said with far more certainty than I felt. “I didn’t want this seller to regret his decision and then try to get the book back through means that might draw more attention to my employer than he would like.”
Aaran studied me for a second and then smiled. “Wise, lass,” he said. “Very wise.” He looked down at his phone. “Adaire and Beattie have finished our shopping. They’ll meet us at the house so we can all ride together to the tour’s starting point.”
“Excellent,” I said as I gathered my things. “I hope they packed snacks.”
It turned out that our barista’s cousin was actually a helicopter pilot, and we were going to be beginning our volcano tour with a flight over the crater. When I learned about our means of transport, I realized that this was, once again, our overseers providing an opportunity for us to communicate with each other and with them without being watched. So far, we’d gone by boat, and now air . . . would a train be next? Hovercraft? Dirigible?
As soon as we boarded the helicopter and donned our headphones, Aaran caught Adaire and Beattie up on my interaction with Hugo. When the pilot, Alex, piped in after Aaran’s monologue and said that he was relaying our conversations to Inga, Gunnar, and to Officer Jonsdottir as well, I wasn’t sure whether to feel more secure or slightly violated. I opted for secure because there wasn’t much I could do about the situation anyway.
“But why not buy the book today, Poe?” Beattie asked. “Get it over and done with.”
I shook my head. “It was something Hugo said about if I had been threatened as he had.”
Adaire sighed. “Swagley threatened him to get him to sell.”
“Hugo said Swagley had something over him, so I think it’s more like blackmail.” I shuddered. “If that’s the situation, I wanted to be sure that whoever is running this show we’re involved in is going to return the books I’m acquiring to their rightful owner once Swagley is sentenced for his crimes.” I looked up at the pilot. “Could you be sure everyone hears that question and gives me an answer?”
Alex nodded.
“It’s one thing for me to help catch someone who is a little shifty by acquiring marked money or something—like we were talking about, Beattie—but if people are being threatened or blackmailed, I don’t want any part of that.” I felt a little nervous being that bold with my position, but it also felt good, too. I had my limits, and the violation of other people’s welfare crossed one of mine.
Beattie leaned over and hugged me. “Good for you, Poe,” she said.
Aaran turned from the front seat and said, “I admire you for that stand, but it may have put you in more danger.”
“More danger than defrauding a crime boss and working as part of a sting operation to catch him?” I raised one eyebrow. “I don’t think so.”
“You have a point,” Adaire said. “But still, let’s not take any more risks, okay?” He snaked his hand behind Beattie and squeezed my shoulder.
“I’ll do my best,” I said. “But no promises.”
Our pilot spoke up, “They have every intention of returning the books,” he said. “And you have uncovered just what they’d hoped you would—threats and blackmail.”
Aaran nodded. “So now you just have to close the deal with Hugo to solidify the case.”
Once again, I was left feeling both relieved and full of foreboding. “We’ll hope that Hugo comes to sell tomorrow, then.”
“Somehow,” Beattie said, “I don’t think he’s going to be given too much choice.”
For the rest of the flight, we were mainly silent except to exude awe over the amazing crater below us. It was remarkable, a deep hole in the ground with a pristine lake at the center. I’d seen images of lakes like this before, but this one took my breath when I saw it in person. It felt magical with the steep sides and the reddish vegetation growing amongst swaths of green leaves. Somehow, just seeing it made me feel calmer, maybe because it reminded me that there were forces beyond the control of human beings.
My sense of peace was fleeting, however, when Alex left the crater, flew east, and set down in a field where a single car was waiting with Inga, Gunnar, and Officer Jonsdottir beside it. I was frustrated and disappointed because, once again, my tourism plans were thwarted by this investigation.
Rational me knew that I should be blaming Swagley and his nefarious designs, but right now, three people were keeping me from a rather nice afternoon hiking at a volcanic crater. “Can’t we just have one afternoon of peace?” I said as soon as I was far enough away from the helicopter for my words to reach them.
“We understand your frustration, but—” Inga said.
I didn’t let her finish. “No, you don’t. This is part of your work. This is not part of my work, and anyway, this part of my trip was supposed to be relaxing. Hunting down a mob boss is not relaxing!” I was almost shouting, and when Adaire pulled me close to him, I realized I was near tears.
Officer Jonsdottir stepped forward and put her hand on my arm. “I understand, and we are asking so much of you. Yes. You are doing superbly well, Poe. You really are.” There was a softness in her voice that calmed me, and I wondered if she might have children who benefited from her kindness and understanding, too.
“Thank you,” I said after I took a deep breath. “You heard my stipulation about returning the books, and you will do that?”
“Yes,” she said, “As soon as we are able, we will, and we will let the owners know that their books will be returned as soon as Swagley is in custody.”
Gunnar cleared his throat behind her, and she looked quickly at him and then back to me. “You have my personal word,” she said.
I believed her, and the knot in my chest loosened just a bit. “Okay, so why are we here?” I tried to keep my tone neutral, but even I could hear the edge in my voice.
Officer Jonsdottir frowned. “You aren’t going to like this, and I’m sorry we have to ask it. But we need your help with securing evidence about Elena’s killer.”
“What kind of evidence?” Aaran said as he stepped forward. “You can’t really be expecting Poe to extract a confession from Swagley.”
“No, not from Swagley,” Inga said as she moved closer. “From Weber. She killed Elena.”
The bluntness of those words left me a little breathless. “She did?”
“Yes, we found a dark hair on the knife, and a partial fingerprint on the handle matches one of Erika’s known aliases,” Gunnar said. “But before you ask, no, that’s not enough. She could claim that the hair and fingerprint were left from her stay there.”
I felt a little lightheaded and started to sway. Adaire gripped me tighter. “This is too much,” he said.
I put my hand over his, where it rested on my arm. “What do you need me to do?” I didn’t know why I said that, really, except that it seemed like this awful situation would never go away if I didn’t get the authorities everything they wanted.
“Are you sure, Poe?” Officer Jonsdottir said.
I nodded, even though I wasn’t that sure. “What do you need me to do?” I asked again.
“When you give Weber the books tomorrow, ask her if she knows what happened to your friend,” Inga said. “Push her, but make it seem like you just need closure.”
Aaran sighed. “You don’t have anything she can use as leverage?”
Inga shook her head. “Nothing that won’t tip them off to the fact that she’s working with the police. You have to get her to trust you, Ms. Baxter. Find some way to help her feel like your ally.”
“So let me get this straight,” I said as I leaned even more heavily into Adaire’s shoulder. “You want me to be buddy-buddy with a crime boss’s hit woman? Am I understanding that correctly?”
Officer Jonsdottir looked away, and I wondered if she had objected to this plan before they came. I hoped so because it was truly ridiculous.
“Is there no other way to get more evidence?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer. They wouldn’t be asking me, of all people, to do this if I wasn’t their only option.
“I’m afraid not,” Inga said, softening just a little. “We will be close by, and this time, you will be wearing a wire. It’s completely safe.”
I sighed. “Okay, don’t lie to me. I’m not an idiot. You cannot make me completely safe in confronting a murderer.” I stood out of Adaire’s grasp. “I’ll do it, but on two conditions that I want in writing. First, you guarantee the return of the books I have and will acquire on Swagley’s behalf and that you let those sellers keep the funds from Swagley?” I looked from Inga to Gunnar to Officer Jonsdottir.
When they all nodded, I said, “Second, we are then done with any and all work for whoever it is you are all working for, the president, the Icelandic police, whoever.”
This time, all three of them nodded immediately. “I’ll have the paperwork drawn up and will get it to you this evening,” Inga said.
“And now,” I said, “I want you to leave us alone so that we can take our tour.” A sudden thought occurred to me. “We are taking a ground tour of that volcano also, right?” I looked at my friends.
“Yes, you are,” Officer Jonsdottir said. “I have secured you the best tour guide around.” She looked down at her watch. “He should be here any minute.”
As if on cue, a black Range Rover pulled up, and a very solidly built man with a blond beard stepped out. “You ready?” he said with a smile.
I didn’t hesitate and walked right over. “Poe,” I said as I shook the man’s hand.
“Ivan,” he said. “You look excited.”
“You have no idea,” I said as I climbed into the back seat. “You have no idea.”