Dane felt as if he had been plunged into an icy bath. He sat down clumsily on the deck. His legs were suddenly too weak to support him. “But, Nexus searches current periodicals. For Covilha's name to show up in Nexus means…” He paused, trying to get a handle on his thoughts. “Where did his name turn up?”
“In a small item buried in the New York Post. Someone robbed his grave.”
CHAPTER 10
Dane gritted his teeth as he weaved the rental car through the snarl of traffic coming out of LaGuardia. He and Kaylin had made the difficult decision the previous day to leave Bones and the crew behind to finish the search, while the two of them pursued Jimmy's lead.
“It says that the police apprehended the man who dug up the grave just as he was opening the coffin,” Kaylin read from the article Jimmy had forwarded to them. “He was a local drug addict and trouble maker. He said that a guy he had never met before had paid him a hundred bucks, and promised him a thousand more if he would bring him whatever he found in the coffin.” She turned and looked directly at Dane. “Obviously, he didn't have a chance to take anything out of the coffin. That's good news, Maddock.” Since their uncomfortable exchange on board the Queen's Ransom, she had taken to calling him only by his last name.
“I know,” he muttered. “I just…”
“You're just a cynic,” she completed the sentence for him. “How did you get that way, anyhow?”
Dane was not about to tell her the truth. He shrugged and went on with his previous train of thought. “I just worry that this is a sign that whoever has been after you is ahead of us. They knew about the captain before we did.”
“Look at it this way. The grave was robbed last week. That means that, as of that time, the sword had not yet been located. Given that they were already working on the captain angle, we can safely eliminate the museum collections, or anything from his estate that might have been on record anywhere. That eliminates a lot of dead-end investigating on our part.”
“And leaves us where? What new lead do we have to follow up on? If you're correct, the bad guys have already checked them all out.”
“Have faith, my friend.” She patted him on the shoulder, a gesture of condescension more than companionship. “My dad used to tell me there’s always a stone unturned if you’ll only look in the right place.”
The problem they faced, Dane thought, though he kept it to himself, was finding the right place.
The basement of the Stoney Falls Public Library was damp and musty, a terrible place to keep books, particularly old ones. The walls were ancient brick, discolored by years of leaks and a light dusting of mold. The shelves looked as if they had been donated by a local warehouse or automotive repair shop. The dull gray metal was pitted by rust and most of the shelves sagged in the middle. Dane scanned the spines of the aged volumes, withdrawing them one by one, flipping them open to the inside cover to look for Francisco Covilha's name.
Jimmy had learned that one of the captain's descendants, a great, great granddaughter, had died without heirs, and had left her estate to her church. The estate included a number of very old books, which the church had in turn donated to the local library.
Given that the woman was the granddaughter of the Covilha's granddaughter, his surname was in no way associated with her in any public records. This, Dane and Kaylin hoped, was a new angle of investigation.
The librarian, Mrs. Meyers, was of little help, expressing first surprise, then suspicion at their interest in the aged volumes. She was reluctant to let the two of them see the books, citing the need to “protect them from damage.” Kaylin concocted a story about searching for her ancestors. It was a plot replete with lost loves and parents she had never known. Dane thought it sounded like a pile of crap, but it won over the aging woman who looked to him like she spent her free time with her nose buried in a gothic romance. She took them down into the dark basement and guided them to the area in which the books “should” be kept.
“Found them,” Kaylin called. She held open an old book. Written on the inside cover was the name “Francisco Covilha.”
Dane knelt down next to her. A number of very old books were grouped together on the bottom shelf. He pulled out a thick tome that was obviously written in a foreign language. He was not familiar with Portuguese. He opened it at random, and held it out for Kaylin to inspect.
“Portuguese,” she said, and returned to paging through her book.
Dane leafed through his own volume, crinkling his nose at the musty smell. Page after page passed across his vision with nothing catching his attention. “What do you hope to find?”
“I don't know,” she said. “Truthfully, I had hoped to discover his personal journal. Short of that, maybe we could find some personal correspondence that belonged to him. If the sword was passed down to his descendants, maybe we could find some hints from one of them. I know I'm clutching at straws here, but there has to be a clue somewhere. The sword is too important to have just disappeared.”
“Do you think he knew it was important?” Dane asked. “I mean, what if, to him, it was just a sword?
“I can't believe that. Rienzi considered it his greatest discovery. Given how much he liked to boast, I wouldn't be surprised if he bragged to someone on the ship, if not several someones. There would be few secrets from the captain on such a small ship.”
Dane could tell by the tone of her voice and the expression on her face that she was picking up steam now.
“Also, Rienzi lost nearly all of his personal papers in the wreck. Allegedly, `some' of them were recovered. I'll bet a lot, if not all of them, were found. Just not by Rienzi.”
“So you think the captain knew something about the sword's significance,” Dane said.
“I believe he hid it away somewhere. I think the clues are there if we can just find them.”
Dane waited for a moment. “Kay, how much of this is about your dad?”
Kaylin's eyes widened. “Who are you to ask me that?
“It's just a question.” Dane was already wondering why he had gone down this road.
“Have you ever let me in? Have you told me what makes you tick? Shared your pain?” Kaylin stood up, hands on hips. She looked down at him like a vulture circling over dead meat.
He looked her in the eye, staring for several heartbeats. Perhaps he should tell her. “You're right, I…”
“I'm not finished.” Tears welled in her eyes. “Yes, it's about my dad, but the why of it is none of your business. Furthermore, that does not mean I don't believe in what we're doing. I know we can find the sword!”
“Fine, I’m sorry.” He did not truly feel like baring his soul, and she seemed to be in no mood to make nice. He returned to the book he had been looking at, letting an uneasy silence fall over them. Something caught his attention, and he chuckled. Kaylin flashed him a resentful look, so he explained quickly. “Somebody was a doodler.”
On one page, on the bottom inside corner, was a rough sketch of a large tree, perhaps an oak. He held up the book for her to inspect. She nodded and returned to her work. Dane shrugged and flipped through the remaining pages. He saw nothing else of interest, so he set the book aside, and selected another. This one was in English, but the date, if he remembered his Roman numerals correctly, marked it as old enough to possibly have been part of Francisco Covilha’s collection. Again, nothing but a small drawing on a random page in the book’s center. This one was drawn on the same spot on the page, the bottom left corner next to the spine. Instead of a tree, this one was a rough illustration of what appeared to be a wrought-iron fence. He inspected it for a moment, and then scanned the remainder of the pages before placing this book atop the other.