The Cracked Spine (6 page)

Benny pulled open one of the two doors and turned his attention back toward the road and parking spaces.

“Have you seen Jenny yet?” Edwin asked as he handed Benny his car keys.

“Noo, I havenae,” Benny said. “I thought she'd be with ye.”

“Would you please let her know I'm inside the moment you see her?” Edwin asked.

“Aye.”

Edwin turned toward me. “Benny parks the cars elsewhere. He's a bit of a magician when it comes tae keeping us a secret.”

Benny sniffed.

“I see,” I said with a smile in Benny's direction. He didn't acknowledge it.

I followed Edwin inside, and then stopped in my tracks, needing another moment to soak in my surroundings.

“This is beautiful,” I said as I looked up a wide stairway with a wooden railing and wood-paneled walls, not slat panel like in some of the older houses back home, but real wood panels, topped with carved arches.

“Aye, a lovely place,” Edwin said. He looked back through the doors briefly. “Benny takes his security seriously. You'll see kilts here and there throughout Scotland but mostly for special occasions. To Benny, this is a special occasion.”

I wondered if Benny took his security as seriously as Edwin did for his warehouse, but I just nodded.

“Come along, we're just up here.”

I hurried after him, working hard to keep up with his long legs, and onto another floor with the same wood-paneled walls but with giant chandeliers above.

“What's the Fleshmarket Batch?” I said.

“Oh, aye, that's what we call ourselves, the Fleshmarket Batch. One of our founders had family that decades ago lived on Fleshmarket Close—a close is an … alley.”

“Hamlet mentioned the closes to me. What about Batch?”

“Ah, I believe your word would be something like ‘club.'”

“Fleshmarket, huh? Sounds gruesome.”

“Aye. It was the location of the meat market that led to the slaughterhouse. Not pleasant images to ponder, but a reality from an older time.”

I nodded as we reached the third floor. “Where is everyone?”

“They're either already inside or on their way. Come along.”

Edwin now sauntered down the long hallway as if he didn't want to appear to be in a hurry even though I was sure he was. I followed and tried to keep my awe under control. Halfway down the hallway we turned toward a door on our right. Before he opened it, though, he looked in all directions, twice. Finally, he turned the old brass knob, and pushed through. I followed directly behind and he quickly and quietly closed the door behind us.

The room was expansive, decorated with the same polished wood paneling I'd already seen, but in here the floor was off-white marble with swirls of gold throughout, reminding me of an even more expensive version of the bookshop's floor. Tall windows offered a view of green grounds in one direction and more buildings and wings in the other. One half of the room was filled with puffy green upholstered chairs and a podium at the end of a middle aisle. The other side held a snack buffet with what looked like empty sterling silver serving dishes. That side was also populated by people. The space wasn't crowded, but there was a small group of three, and the low rumble of their conversation came to an immediate halt once they turned our direction and saw us … well, probably just me.

“Hello, friends!” Edwin said. He was exuberant but not overly cheery. “This is Delaney. She's from Kansas, in America. Please welcome her in the warmest of ways.” My previous home was becoming a part of my name.

“I don't see Jenny yet,” he said quietly to me as we walked toward the group. “But it looks as if everyone else is here. This isn't everyone in the group, mind, but it's the ones who were interested in the item up for bid today.”

The introductions went okay, a little strained, but nothing that made me want to run out of the room and catch the next flight back home. No one had expected me to be there, but no kerfuffle ensued, or at least I didn't think so according to what I thought “kerfuffle” meant. Edwin left me to fend for myself but I didn't mind, and even a quick one-on-one with each of the three people would help me know them better.

If she'd been from England, Genevieve Begbie would have been straight out of a PBS television show about aristocracy and their servants. She was clearly Scottish though, and she was young in comparison to everyone else in the room. She was probably somewhere in her early fifties and dressed in clothes that made me think I shouldn't stand anywhere near her if I held food or drink. She wore her brown hair boyishly short with a small swoop to the right. Her firmly set mouth didn't smile when she shook my hand, but her eyes did a little bit, so I held out hope that she and I might get along okay, eventually.

“I thought dear Jenny would be coming with Edwin. You're a true surprise,” she said, her smiling eyes holding steady with mine.

“I think she's coming on her own.”

“I see. I do hope so. It's been so encouraging tae see her turning things around, though I think Edwin's given her a task that's too much tae try to handle,” Genevieve said. The smile left her eyes so suddenly that I felt my eyebrows raise.

“Oh?” I said.

“She's been such a challenge tae that family. More than that family, I suppose. Gracious, I'm speaking out of turn,” she said with no noticeable regret and with an accent so light I thought I might understand her even if she spoke quickly.

“How do you know the family?” I asked.

“Edwin's family and mine have been friends for decades. Our parents, grandparents were close, even though Edwin's parents were significantly older than mine. They're long dead now. And, Jenny and I were flatmates for a couple of years at university.”

“It didn't go well?” It seemed like the only reasonable question to ask, considering her tone.

She laughed. “It went fine.”

Evidently not, but Genevieve excused herself before I could ask more questions. I felt like I'd misjudged the earlier introductions. I'd thought maybe no one had expected me, but perhaps she'd been somehow prepared for my arrival, or maybe just prepared to say unflattering things to
someone
in regards to Jenny. I didn't necessarily feel like I'd been played, but perhaps used as a way to spread bad tidings. I wasn't going to spread anything, but in the back of my mind I started a list of things I wanted to uncover. I'd suddenly become much more interested in Edwin's family. Exploring his ancestors went on the list, right next to searching for the best spots to find ghosts.

I thought back to Edwin's unsophisticated gulp. Were he and Genevieve speaking about the same responsibility? What sort of monumental task had he given Jenny, and why did Genevieve think it might have been too much to handle? And, why had she brought it up to me so soon after our initial greeting? I looked toward the door, hoping Jenny would come through, but no one did at that moment.

“Hello, lass, you're a bright spot on our otherwise auld and cranky bunch. Welcome, it will be nice tae have some young blood,” said another man as he introduced himself.

Hamilton Gordon also wore a kilt with all the trimmings today, but his color scheme was blue and yellow. He was adorable in the getup, in an almost-eighty-years-old, wrinkled and bald sort of way.

“It's great to be here. I think Jenny's on her way,” I said reflexively. I cringed inwardly. I shouldn't have predicted that everyone would be looking for Jenny instead of me.

“Och, don't care who's here and who isn't. I've met the MacAlister lass a time or two and she's friendly enough. The more, the merrier, I say.” He scanned the room. “Gracious, is there no whisky on the premises? Who has a gathering with Scottish people and doesn't think tae serve whisky? Disgraceful.”

“Uh, I don't know,” I said as I looked toward the buffet table. There were no whisky bottles in sight.

“I'll have tae find some on me own. Excuse me.”

I sighed and turned my attention toward the man I still hadn't met. No time like the present, I supposed. I approached him as he turned away from Edwin. Whatever they'd been discussing, it seemed to have ended with a huff of disapproval from the man dressed in all gold. He wasn't handsome, but it seemed he'd worked hard to get that way. His build told me that he must have been close to Edwin's age, but the tight features on his face made me think he'd had a few plastic surgeries. Up close, I could also see the spaces in his head where hair plugs had been inserted. I had an urge to ask about the gold jacket and pants, inquire as to whether or not they had real gold threads in them, but I didn't.

“Hi,” I said.

“Hello,” he said with a forced smile.

“Delaney Nichols,” I said.

“Birk Blackburn, at your service,” he said with a small nod. “Welcome tae Edinburgh, Delaney. I'm one of the few outside the bookshop who knew you were coming tae join The Cracked Spine. I'm glad you made it safe and sound.”

“You and Edwin are good friends then?”

“Aye,” he said less than enthusiastically. “He told me about you when we completed a transaction a few weeks ago. Edwin mentioned that he wanted tae wait for you and your expertise, but he went ahead and purchased the item anyway. I'm sure he's mentioned it tae you.” Birk's eyebrows rose in question, though his forehead didn't wrinkle.

“I, uh, he hasn't mentioned it yet.”

“Aye?” He looked toward Edwin, who had moved across the room and was talking to Hamilton Milligan, and sent him a furrowed frown before he turned to me again. As with Genevieve, I got the sense that he was anxious to share something.

“It's a book of supreme greatness,” he said quietly.

“Oh? What's the book?” I said. I knew I could have eventually figured out any book's value if that's what Birk meant as the reason for Edwin waiting for my arrival, but I wasn't an expert appraiser.

“Ask Edwin. He'll tell you. In fact, I suspect you'll be retrieving it today. He left it with his sister, and something tells me that's not working out as well as he'd hoped.”

“Why isn't it working out? You won't tell me what the book is?”

“You'll have tae ask Edwin why it isn't working out. He won't give me the details. But the book”—he looked around furtively—“William Shakespeare.”

“Okay.” I caught myself before I rolled my eyes. The drama with which he'd said the bard's name could have landed him a starring role in one of his tragedies.

“It's one of his. One of his first ever. In fact, that's part of the title.”

“I don't understand,” I said.

“First Folio,” Birk whispered.

The earth shifted. Birk couldn't possibly be speaking the truth, or at least the facts. Edwin had not purchased a copy of Shakespeare's First Folio from him. It wasn't possible. There were only a couple hundred copies of the early 1600s manuscript still in existence. They were all accounted for and kept mostly in museums. I'd dreamed of visiting the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., to put my eyes on at least one of their twentysomething copies.

Except. Hadn't I recently heard that someone found a copy in their attic? Had that been a true story? I couldn't quite remember.

First Folio was more than a book, it was an artifact.

I didn't notice that Birk had walked away because I'd fallen into some sort of vacuum of disbelief, and my brain was working hard to understand the possible ramifications of such a transaction, the possibility that the item actually existed.

The door to the room began to slowly swing open. I pulled myself together and looked toward it. Everyone else in the room did too. I hoped to see Jenny come through. I wanted to meet the sister of my new boss, the person he'd allegedly trusted to watch over something so outrageously valuable.

But it wasn't Jenny. The man who came through the doorway was probably close to Jenny's age, though, somewhere in his fifties.

His most distinguishing feature wasn't his handsome face, his red hair that almost matched mine, his dapper tuxedo, or the cane he wielded. It was his black eye that made him stand out from the crowd. Once inside, he closed the door behind him, nodded sheepishly at the rest of us, and made his way to one of the green puffy chairs. He sat down, angling his body so that all we could see was his back.

“That's Monroe Ross.” Edwin had stepped up to my right. “I'd hoped maybe Jenny would have come with him.”

“They're friends?” I said.

“Not exactly,” he said. “They used to be together, a couple, but that was a long time ago. I'd hoped … I'd hoped maybe they could be friends again. I'm working on it. She's one of the few people he's comfortable around.”

“What about the black eye?”

Edwin shrugged. “I haven't seen Monroe with a black eye for some time. Perhaps he's taken up his old ways. He used tae spend a fair amount of time in the pubs. But now he's not comfortable around a crowd. He has a difficult time, that's why he took a seat so quickly. He doesn't know you, Delaney. Perhaps you could befriend him.”

Edwin walked away too quickly for me to ask him anything more, either about Monroe or the Folio. I could tell he was disappointed his sister hadn't shown up yet, but I didn't understand the exact reasons why. Did he think her absence was because of her addiction or the argument she'd had with him? Or something else?

His command had been clear, though. I was to befriend Monroe. Genevieve had wanted to dump some gossip my direction. And even though I sensed that he knew Edwin hadn't yet told me about the Folio, it had been Birk's priority to share the information. Was this the Scottish way, or was I being used as a conduit for moving information from one place to the next? If so, what direction was it all supposed to go? It didn't much matter. Whatever my job would turn into, I wasn't going to suddenly become a gossip. And I doubted I'd ever be convinced to do much of anything behind my boss's back. But I might be able to get to know Monroe easily enough.