Pickups and Pirates (Southern Relics Cozy Mysteries Book 3)

by Bella Falls

  “Let’s keep it where we can see it,” suggested Mason. “If we put it over there with those other items, it’ll blend right in and won’t be conspicuous. Then we’ll know right where it is the whole time.”

  With careful fingers, I wrapped the stone back up in the black fabric and placed it in the small wooden box. Unwilling to place it anywhere that it could get lost or taken, I went against the lessons learned from past experiences and shoved it in my pocket.

  Checking to make sure we were ready, Rissa blew out a hard breath. “We’re fine, right? He’s just a British professor who wants to share his research. What’s the worst that could happen?”

  I cringed, knowing that Fate never left that question unanswered.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Rissa’s voice echoed down the hallway as she escorted the visiting professor in through the museum offices. Although I couldn’t understand what they were talking about, I recognized the same pleasant accent from the phone conversation from yesterday.

  Panic seized my gut as they approached. “We didn’t come up with a plausible explanation as to why we’re here,” I hissed at my friends.

  “It’s fine,” Mason assured me, holding up his hand to stop me from freaking out. “One thing I’ve learned from years on the job is that it’s better to let others do the talking. Let him make assumptions and then adjust to fit the narrative he already believes. Or if Rissa comes up with something, roll with it.”

  “What if that doesn’t work or something goes wrong?” Dani asked, her eyes darting between the door and the warden.

  The detective dismissed our concern with a single shrug of his shoulder. “If things get really bad, then we knock him out with a spell and deal with the consequences later. The benefits of all of us being witches.”

  “There’s my bad boy,” Charli purred, caressing his arm and shimmying closer to him. “I love it when you’re willing to break the rules.”

  “Stretch them,” he corrected and held his finger up to his lips. “Shh. Be cool.”

  Rissa stood in the doorway and gestured our way. “And this is our modest little lab where we examine artifacts and work on putting together our exhibitions. Please, won’t you come in?”

  A man in his late forties or early fifties bowed his head to our friend and entered with a rolling suitcase trailing behind him. He stopped short and stared at the rest of us, his amicable smile fading upon discovering us. “Oh, I say. I was not expecting for there to be others with you when we spoke on the phone.”

  The stranger stood taller than Rissa but a little shorter than Mason. Gray hairs peppered his dark mess of hair that flopped into his face and over the wire-rimmed glasses he wore, giving him a level of nerdy attractiveness that didn’t make him hard to look at. However, I couldn’t keep my eyes off of the obvious trauma on his face. A purple bruise rested just under his right eye while bright red scratch marks stretched across his left cheek.

  Rissa uttered a nervous giggle. “Uh, these are the volunteers who have been working with me on the research and collection of items for a permanent exhibition on Ann Bonnet. Since they have been so involved, I wanted them to meet with you as well.”

  An expression I could not read passed over his face until he coughed and recovered. “My apologies, I did not imply that it was wrong for you to be here. Oh dear, I seem to have, as you Americans say, stepped my foot in it?” He placed a hand over his chest. “Allow me to introduce myself. I am Dr. Wilfred Simons, professor of maritime history from the sixteenth to early-nineteenth century at Queen’s College in London.”

  His formality struck me as a little high-falutin’ for our area of the globe, but I played along. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir. This is my cousin Danielle and our friends Mason and Charli. After Rissa explained your expertise on the subject of women pirates, especially the infamous Ann who crashed in our waters, we can’t wait to hear anything you can contribute.”

  The visiting professor greeted each of us in turn. “Well, I must say, you have a very lively volunteer program here. I am lucky to get even one person interested enough in my own department let alone a handful of willing participants who are not students forced to help me to uphold their fellowships.”

  “I’ve read your book several times when I started putting together my proposal for the exhibition,” Rissa gushed, still a little enamored of the visitor. “Although I barely recognized you from the book jacket since you shaved off your beard. It makes you look…”

  “Completely unrecognizable?” Dr. Simons chuckled. “I suppose you might call it vanity. I grew out my beard because nobody respected my baby face when I first entered academia. However, I decided that looking younger than my years was to my advantage at this stage in my life.”

  Mason pointed to the spot under his own eye that matched the bruise on the professor’s. “You look like you’ve been in a fight recently.”

  Dr. Simons stammered a bit and pushed his glasses up his nose. “Oh dear, I am afraid I can be a bit clumsy. The bruise is from a run in with a door when I was reading some correspondence. I tend to be a bit clumsy.”

  The detective’s lips thinned as he considered the explanation. “Mm-hmm, but those marks on your cheek look new. Perhaps we can find you a first aid kit to help?”

  With a wave of his hand, Dr. Simons turned down the help. “I am most anxious to present the purpose as to my pilgrimage to your fair shores. Well, your battered shores, as I am sure there may have been damage due to the severity of the recent weather.”

  “It’s not unusual for hurricanes to hit this area, but the suddenness of this past one surprised the whole community,” I said, a protective instinct of our home overtaking me.

  The professor held up a finger. “And yet, is it not true that with the shifting of the waters, a ship wreckage was revealed?”

  “Oh, did you watch Nigel Lansing’s video?” Dani asked in a friendly tone.

  The professor stiffened at the mention of the adventurer. He actually stuck his nose into the air with a sniff. “I was not aware of any videos. I read it in this morning’s complimentary newspaper at the hotel.” When our silent surprise at his tone permeated the small space, he recovered fast. “Now that I give it some thought, I do recall that name from the reporting.”

  My hand clutched my stomach, a physical response to my churning instincts wreaking havoc in me. To be a picker and do my job well, I’d spent years learning from my father and uncle how to read people. The mixed messages the professor gave sent off alarm bells, and it took great effort to keep my mask of benign interest from slipping.

  Rissa offered her guest a drink, and when he declined, she got down to business. “You said you brought something with you in your suitcase. If you’d like, you can set it up on the table.”

  Dr. Simons studied all of us again with a bit of a scowl. “This is very irregular to share my work with so many. However, now that interest in Ann Bonnet will most likely increase exponentially, time is of the essence.” He rolled the case over to the table and unzipped it, flipping the top open.

  With great care, he removed an object wrapped in a couple of frayed towels and set it in the middle. Bending down, he retrieved a weathered leather briefcase with metal buckles. He opened it and pulled out two files, placing them parallel to each other next to the item.

  “Before I show you what I am sure has piqued your interest,” he patted whatever the towels cocooned, “I thought you would appreciate the two papers that came into my possession at the same time from an estate sale. These, of course, are facsimiles of the originals.” Dr. Simons withdrew a paper with a colored copy of a piece of yellowed vellum that looked like the letter we’d found in the hidden study this morning. From the second folder, he pulled out and unfolded what looked like a smaller version of our map.

  “That map,” started Rissa, her hand touching her throat as she attempted to compose herself. “We have many like it from different eras stored here in the museum that have been donated or c
ollected over time. It seems like an odd thing for you to come by, Dr. Simons.”

  After the flirtatious gaze he shot at my friend, I expected him to ask her to call him by his first name, like Fred. Or Freddy. Or Willie. A sudden chortle of amusement bubbled up at the thought of the prim and proper professor being called “Willie.” Dani elbowed me in my side more than once until I realized the visiting professor was waiting for me to quiet down.

  “As I was saying,” he repeated in a louder, disapproving tone, “my discovery came after finding evidence of a specific family of the peerage and its alleged connection to Ann Bonnet. Or Ann Bonneville as she was known prior to her career on the seas.

  “The Moreton line had greatly depleted over the multiple generations, so it was deucedly hard to track any of them down to ask for permission to read through any familial correspondence or written history. It was by sheer coincidence that the last descendant from one of the branches of the family had passed away, and her caregiver found a stash of old things hidden in a random storage space.

  “The young man had read my book and recognized the name of Ann Bonnet when he looked through some of it. He brought all of the material to me in the hopes I might discern a value point for it all.” Without giving us a chance to ask any questions, he unwrapped the towels protecting the item to reveal a wooden box with some simple ornamental carvings on the sides and a strange round metal receptacle located in the middle of the top.

  After receiving permission from Dr. Simons to inspect the item, Rissa opened a drawer and pulled out some gloves. “I’m still unsure of how a letter or two led you to me, but I’m happy to take a look at anything you have.”

  “Well, your correspondence with me about Ann Bonnet intrigued me. You asked some questions that I myself have that my editor and publisher had me remove from the book.” Dr. Simons pushed his glasses up. “Once I read to you the section of the journal I have copied, then you might have a better grasp on the enormity of everything.”

  Wanting a better look, I leaned over the table to inspect the map and the copied page. “May I see the entry?” I asked, stretching my hand out towards the document.

  The visiting professor whipped it away from me. “Without knowing your proficiency in reading eighteenth century handwriting, it would be better for me to read it.”

  My cheeks reddened with rage, and without meaning to, I summoned a little power into my hands just to spellcast a teeny-weeny little hex on his rude behind. Mason caught my attention and shook his head once in caution. Waving my fingers, I flicked away the small amount of magical energy and pursed my lips to keep from sassing that man all the way back to Great Britain.

  Dr. Simons cleared his throat. “Now, I have confirmed that the journal this is taken from is written in the hands of Elizabeth Berkeley Moreton, wife of a Captain Roger Moreton. Her entry pertains directly to us, Miss Ward. Listen.

  “I have nowhere else to express my sorrows as friends and family members have abandoned Roger and I in his final days. My words here may be a harbinger of the end of our line and I write them with poison in my heart.

  When I met Roger as a young lady, I was enamored by his strength of character, determination in duty, and his unwavering loyalty. However, all of who he was has been lost for some time now since he returned from his travels for the last time, still speaking of the treasure he has wasted his life pursuing.

  Upon his arrival home from his last journey, he returned to me a new man, bringing with him the promises of riches found upon execution of yet another search for that which ‘Bonny’ Ann owed him. If I never hear the name Ann again until my dying breath, it shall be too soon, for it is forever upon my husband’s lips.

  Riches he has promised, yet none has he succeeded in finding. He has squandered our living until there is little left, all for a worthless object of which he cannot open for lack of a key. The wooden box has taunted him enough, so when Roger fell ill, I saw fit to put it away to keep it out of sight and preserve what little of his mind that remained.

  During one of his fits, he revealed the one piece to the puzzle that has consumed him body and soul written on a slip of paper. For his own good, I threw it into the fire only to find his fingers buried in the flames to retrieve it. From the burns and his own illness of spirit, he will not recover.

  And yet, he repeats the words recorded now as only ashes, and they have been carved in my memory against my will. I record them here in the hopes that the words will leak out of my soul and onto the page forever. Whatsoever they speak of, they have rotted Roger and our family from the inside, and I pray my husband’s death will bring an end to the curse it has wrought upon us.”

  Dr. Simons paused at the end of the entry, allowing us to soak in the story from the past. He asked for a glass of water, and Dani left to fetch him one.

  I drew in a deep breath. “Poor woman. She sounds haunted.”

  “In a way, I believe she was.” He thanked Dani upon her return with the glass of water. “Elizabeth was tormented by her husband’s relentless pursuit of what he believed to be Ann Bonney’s treasure that she disposed of prior to her ship sinking off your local coastline. And yet, she was not the most tortured soul in that failing household.” The professor set down the facsimile of the journal, shifting his focus to the map. As he walked closer to me, the faint scent of his cologne filled my nostrils. It took a moment for me to recover from the added assault on my senses.

  Instead of exploring important points on the chart, he flipped it over. “I paid an exorbitant amount for the best printed reproduction to maintain its integrity. If you look on the back here, you will see the scribblings of a man driven mad by obsession.”

  Ink stains and scribblings covered every free space on it. If ever there was a literal manifestation of someone losing his mind, we were standing as witness to it all of these centuries later.

  “How can any of that be legible?” Rissa asked, standing in close proximity to the professor.

  Dr. Simons tilted his head, a smug grin at the corner of his lips. “I used the resources of the college in the application of a UV spectrogram.” He tapped the surface of the table. “If this is what I think it is, you might be able to see the differences in the ages of ink, allowing different passages to be highlighted. Were this the original, of course. As it is not, you will have to take my word for my recitation. If I am correct, they may have led to his procurement of the box you see before you.”

  Although I dealt regularly in antiques, I still marveled when something so old managed to survive time. Placing my elbows on the table, I cradled my head in my hands and stared at the box while the guest repeated the relevant words.

  “From under sea to under land

  The promised prize is close at hand

  From corner stone of life and loss

  Go three and half rods to a cross

  One foot above seven feet below

  What the living wants the dead will Stowe”

  Wishing I had written down what he’d said to study it, I went to the desk for pen and paper. “Would you please repeat the verses again?”

  He raised one of his eyebrows with keen interest but did as I asked. When he finished, I showed him the paper, which he corrected with my pen. “There are three significant differences. Separate the words corner and stone. It was written as a cross, not across. And the last word, stow, is capitalized with an e on the end.”

  “Why do the differences matter?” Charli asked.

  Rissa peered at the sheet. “Because it changes the meaning. A cornerstone could mean foundation, but this refers to a stone that could be in a corner.”

  “It’s talking about a grave,” Mason stated, surprising all of us. “That line about one foot and seven feet. It means six feet under. And there’s an intentional play on words that the dead will stow, as if to keep. But if I were a gambling man, the capitalized word with the extra e was a name of the person buried.”

  Dr. Simons stood with his mouth agape. “I must co
mmend you, Miss Ward, on having such astute volunteers working for you. It took me much longer than a mere minute to solve the riddle. Usually experience in a task breeds proficiency.”

  “Lucky guess,” Mason stated, leaning against Charli and whispering something in her ear that made her smile.

  “So, somehow this Roger Moreton found the clue and dug up a grave to retrieve the box? It’s a little gruesome,” Dani commented, scrunching her nose.

  “But that is how a lot of the historical artifacts have been recovered for centuries,” Rissa explained. “All of those Egyptian treasures on display in the British Museum? Taken out of tombs. And if I’m remembering correctly, there was an old graveyard that was dug up and moved prior to the current courthouse being built.” She raised her eyebrow at me until her words made sense.

  “Oh!” I exclaimed.

  Dr. Simons took off his glasses and wiped them with a handkerchief from his pocket. “I feel as if I am missing something very important.”

  “No, not really,” I covered up, thinking as fast as the hamster wheel in my head could turn. “We’ve been comparing maps of Bellfort from different eras, and I made the connection from an old one to a…less old one,” I finished with inelegance.

  The professor grasped the wooden box without wearing any gloves, dragging it to him, his fingers stroking its surface. “The lines that Elizabeth burned were similar in nature but not in meaning. I have memorized those as well.

  “First, you have to find the key

  To use where’er the close may be

  Turn North, East, West, South

  In which direction is the best?”

  I frowned when he read out the last line. We’d heard those words before, the directions were listed in reverse order. Professor Simons had more than established a clear connection between Roger Moreton and Ann Bonnet. But how had the captain come by that map with more clues? And why would the directions be changed from the ones we found using the powers of the aquamarine stone?