Secret of the Ankhs: A Maggie Edwards Adventure (Maggie Edwards Adventures Book 2)

by Nellie H. Steele

  Groans rose from a crowd and the director held his hands up. “I know, I know. We’re working as quickly as we can. And again, in the meantime, we’ve got plenty of refreshments and exhibits to keep you entertained.” A few chuckles emerged from the crowd, and the director offered a weak laugh at his own joke. “Even with the limited lighting!”

  Maggie narrowed her eyes as he disappeared again from the room. “Twenty bucks says they find something missing,” she said.

  “I’ll take that bet,” Leo answered.

  “I’m with Maggie,” Henry said.

  “Shocker,” Leo retorted. “I hope you’re happy losing twenty dollars!”

  “You can’t possibly think the lights just happened to go out,” Maggie responded.

  “Yes, Mags, I do. This is a museum. They have priceless artifacts here all the time. Even in this small museum, they have security. It’s not the local dollar store where someone’s going to pocket a lipstick.” Leo glanced around as he polished off the drink in his hand. “I mean, look,” he motioned toward a display case near the center of the room. “The jewels of Cleopatra are still here. If anyone was going to steal something, don’t you think they’d steal that! It’s got to be worth millions! It can easily be slipped into something to be carried out and you can cut it up and sell it piece by piece, making it completely unidentifiable. If the motive was theft, that’s where the money is.”

  “Certainly know a lot about pulling off a jewelry heist, mate,” Henry countered. “Down to how to divvy up the pieces to sell them.”

  Leo rolled his eyes. “Oh, come on,” he groaned. “Everyone knows that! Haven’t you seen Ocean’s 8?”

  “Was that the one with the girls?” Piper asked.

  “Yeah, the girl one. They steal the jewelry and cut it up and make new jewelry and wear it out of the event to get away. Anyway, clearly that didn’t happen here,” Leo answered.

  “The jewelry isn’t the only valuable thing here,” Ollie added.

  “No, I realize that,” Leo answered. “I’m just pointing out that everything else is harder to steal and sell off without being caught.”

  “The black market is not THAT hard to sell on, mate,” Henry responded.

  “Let’s quit arguing about it. We should know soon enough if anything is missing,” Maggie said, ending the argument.

  “How about a drink? Ladies, can I bring you anything?” Leo inquired.

  “Sure, I’ll have a beer,” Piper responded.

  “Nothing for me, thanks,” Maggie answered.

  Leo crossed the room, heading to the bar to retrieve Piper’s requested beverage.

  Henry closed his eyes for a moment. “I really hate that guy,” he lamented. “Why did you bring him?” he questioned Piper.

  “Never mind that,” Maggie hushed him. “Look!” she breathed, tossing her head toward the main entrance. “The police are here.”

  A smirk crossed Henry’s face. “Looks like you may be twenty dollars richer, princess.”

  Another forty-five minutes passed before the director addressed the crowd again. He ran a shaky hand through his hair before beginning. “Hi, folks, ah, thanks again for bearing with us. This is not the evening any of us expected. At this time, we’re going to begin to disperse the party. Uh, we’re asking everyone to form an orderly line. Each of you will be asked to speak with one of the detectives before you leave. And, I am very sorry, but we’ll be doing a sweep with our wands and checking your purses.” Murmurs shot through the crowd.

  “Is something missing?” someone shouted, interrupting the director’s speech.

  “Ah,” Stan hesitated. He glanced toward the detective to his right and swallowed hard. Stan raked his hand through his hair again. “We are, uh, still completing our inventory, but to be safe, we’d like to take a look. I am more than sorry for the inconvenience. We’ll be sending out free museum passes to each of you for the trouble.”

  The detective nodded as the director side-eyed him again after his less-than-eloquent explanation. “Ah, now if everyone could please form an orderly line. We’ll be as quick as we can. Just form a line. That’s right. Thank you.” The director continued shouting instructions to the crowd as the line began to form.

  “Well, I guess that’s our cue,” Maggie said. Before they could step toward the rapidly forming line, two men stepped toward them, blocking their way.

  “Dr. Keene?” the taller of the two queried.

  “Yes, that’s me,” Ollie answered, raising his hand.

  “Would you mind coming with us? And if you, Miss Edwards, and you, Mr. Taylor, wouldn’t mind joining us as well, thanks.”

  “Ooooooooh,” Piper murmured. “Somebody’s in trouble!”

  Maggie shot Piper a glance as Piper giggled. “Lead the way,” Maggie answered.

  “Don’t call me to bail you out, boss lady!” Piper called as they departed.

  The two men, museum guards, led the trio through the museum to a door marked PRIVATE: EMPLOYEES ONLY. They pushed through the door and wound through the hallways to a large office. Furnished in dark woods with bookshelves on two walls, the office belonged to the museum’s director. Two men in less-than-expensive suits stood in the center of the room.

  Maggie gazed at the two men, awaiting an explanation. Before they spoke, the door opened, and the museum director strode in along with another security guard. “Oh, Bryan, you found them, good, yes,” the middle-aged director said, stumbling through his words. He ran a shaky hand through his medium-brown hair again. “Thank you, you, Tim and Gary may go.” The two men who escorted them departed along with the third guard who pulled the door shut behind them.

  “What’s going on, Stan?” Ollie questioned.

  “Oh, it’s terrible, Ollie, just terrible.” The man sank into the chair behind his desk, staring at the floor as though in disbelief. “Well, not too terrible at least. Awful, but not horrible. I may yet save my job.” The man rambled.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Gibson,” Maggie interrupted. “Can you tell us what ‘it’ is that’s awful but not horrible?”

  “Something was stolen from the museum tonight,” one of the detectives answered in Stan’s place.

  “Yes, yes, quite right,” Stan agreed.

  “Something from the Cleopatra collection?” Maggie inquired.

  Stan nodded. “Yes, though thankfully, a smaller, less valuable item compared to some of the others. Still, every piece is invaluable in its own way…”

  “It was the ankh, wasn’t it?” Ollie asked, interrupting Stan’s musings.

  Stan’s brows furrowed, and he glanced at Ollie. “Yes, but how did…” he began to question before his voice dropped off.

  “Same thing I’d like to know,” the tall detective stated.

  “Just a hunch,” Ollie stated with a shrug of his shoulders.

  “That’s some hunch, professor,” the older detective countered. “Out of all the priceless artifacts in that room, some of them worth hundreds of thousands, even millions, you guessed a small, nondescript stone cross was the missing item?”

  “Not a cross, an ankh,” Ollie corrected. “And not stone, it’s faience.”

  The detective offered a less-than-impressed stare Ollie’s way. “Listen, doc,” the second detective chimed in, his accent sounding distinctly like someone from the Bronx, “maybe you can explain to us dummies here why you guessed that. Like my partner said, it’s not the most valuable item. Not even the flashiest! If you’re going to go through the trouble to rob a museum, cut the power, cut the gennies, you’d think it would be over something a little more… valuable.”

  “So, the power was cut to facilitate the theft?” Maggie questioned.

  The Bronx detective glanced at Maggie. A smile crossed his face. “Well, hello Miss… ah, I don’t believe we were introduced.”

  “Maggie Edwards,” Maggie said, extending her hand. “Ollie’s niece.”

  “Nice to meet you, Miss Edwards. Detective Giovanni Russo. You can just call me G
io.” He winked as he squeezed her hand.

  Maggie offered a demure smile. “Maggie, please.”

  “Maggie,” Henry said, wrapping his arm around her shoulders, “is also one of our team. In addition to being Ollie’s niece. And my girlfriend.”

  “Oh, ah, thank you, Maggie’s boyfriend,” Gio retorted.

  “Henry Taylor’s the name,” Henry said, extending his hand for a handshake.

  “Anyway,” Maggie continued after shooting a confused glance Henry’s way, “you said the power was cut. So, this suggests the theft was planned.”

  “Yes, the power was cut,” the older detective, who introduced himself as Detective Sharpe, answered. “Obviously the theft was planned.” He sighed in annoyance at the question.

  “What I meant,” Maggie corrected, “was this wasn’t a crime of convenience. No one grabbed this…”

  “Ankh,” Ollie filled in.

  “Ankh, right. No one grabbed the ankh in the heat of the moment. Cutting the power AND the generators took some doing.”

  “Which brings me back to my original question,” Gio said. “Why go through all this trouble for a piece of carved… uh, what did you say it was again, doc?”

  “Faience,” Ollie repeated. “One of the oldest known forms of glazed ceramic in the world. It’s a non-clay-based ceramic. It wasn’t carved, but rather, formed. It normally carries a blue-green luster. Though this has lost some of that glazing, making it appear stone-like. Likely the years of…”

  “Thanks for the history lesson, professor,” Detective Sharpe snapped, interrupting Ollie. “But we’ve got more important things to consider. Such as why someone took this rather worthless artifact and why you immediately guessed it was the one missing.”

  “Well…” Ollie began, rubbing his chin. “Its value depends on who you talk to.”

  “So, it’s worth some money?” Gio inquired. “How much do you estimate?”

  “Oh, no, no, I doubt it would fetch much in general. Only the most informed would know its value.”

  “You’re talking in circles, doc,” Gio said.

  “What he is referring to,” Stan chimed in, “is an old wives’ tale about the object.” The director waved his hand in the air dismissively. “Ollie, you can’t possibly think…” His voice trailed off as though he could not finish the statement because it was so fantastic.

  “Old wives’ tale?” Maggie questioned. “Now I’m the one who’d like some explanations.”

  “Yes,” Ollie answered. “Well, no, not a wives’ tale.”

  “More of a legend,” Henry added.

  “Right,” Ollie confirmed. “A legend.”

  “And this legend suggests the ankh holds some value? Is it because it belonged to Cleopatra, or is there some other reason?” Maggie inquired.

  “Another reason,” Ollie responded. “The ankh in and of itself is worthless. Just a hunk of ceramic, pieces like that were a dime a dozen in that era. No, it’s not the ankh, it’s what the ankh points to.”

  “Points to?” Maggie queried. She shook her head, not understanding.

  Ollie nodded, a tight-lipped grin on his face. “It gives the location of the Library of Alexandria.”

  “What?!” Maggie exclaimed. “Like the famous one?”

  “The very same.”

  Stan snorted in response. He rolled his eyes, waving his hands in the air again. “A bunch of hooey!”

  “And this library… it’s important?” Gio questioned.

  “Infinitely,” Ollie answered. “The materials held in that library would advance knowledge of the ancient world by leaps and bounds.”

  Maggie’s brow furrowed. “I thought the Library of Alexandria was destroyed. Burnt down in one of those wars they were always having back then.”

  “It was,” Stan said with a sigh.

  Ollie wagged his finger in the air. “Most scholars believe it was, yet the remains have never been identified. A library the size of the one that stood in Alexandria should be identifiable.”

  Ollie’s statement was met with another eye roll from the museum’s director. “While not finding the remains is not beyond the realm of possible events, the leading theory is the library, at least in the form we imagine it existed in, did not, in fact, exist at all.”

  “Too much is written about it for it not to exist,” Ollie countered.

  “I didn’t say it didn’t exist, I said it didn’t exist as we imagine it. As a large library that dominated the landscape of Alexandria. Perhaps the library was much smaller and contained far less.”

  “Not likely. The library was legend, even in ancient times. It is implausible that it was referenced so much throughout history if it were, in fact, a small library.”

  “Uh, gentlemen?” Gio interrupted. “Could we perhaps debate the finer details another time?”

  “My partner’s right. The matter at hand is the missing object and retrieving it. The reason we pulled your team in, Dr. Keene, is because our FBI contact, who should be arriving any moment, told us you may have some insight about the missing object.”

  “I do,” Ollie said. “And I have shared it. The reason the object was stolen, the reason I knew immediately, was because of its connection to the Library of Alexandria.”

  A disgusted sigh rose from Stan. “All right,” Gio said, “let’s assume this theory of yours is correct. Then, someone stole it so they could find the Library of Alexandria and what, get rich from that?”

  “The contents of that library are invaluable.”

  “And worth money?”

  “Yes, probably worth millions on the black market,” Ollie admitted.

  “Uncle Ollie,” Maggie interjected, “if this ankh gives the location, why didn’t you examine it and find the library already? You oversaw the dig site. This must have crossed your desk.”

  “There were thousands of items,” Ollie nodded. “I didn’t examine each one of them myself before they were catalogued and sent out for cleaning and exhibits. When I saw the description on the inventory, I made certain to view it more closely this evening. It’s consistent with what I expected. But it does not contain a complete map, only a partial one.”

  “Okay, I’m going to need you to back up a step, doc, and explain this again,” Gio said. “Call it Intro to the Library of Alexandria for dummies, okay?”

  “Yeah, I’d be interested in hearing this, too,” Maggie agreed.

  Ollie launched into his lecture. “The Library of Alexandria was one of the largest libraries of the ancient world. So much so that Alexandria was regarded as the capital of learning, much of that due to the library. Most people believe the library was destroyed. But this is not exactly true.”

  “If I remember your story correctly,” Henry chimed in, “it actually declined over time.”

  “Correct. Scholars believe it declined due to waning support by the rulers. Lack of money and support, all that. And many believe Julius Caesar himself accidentally burned part of it during one of his wars.”

  “Julius Caesar DID burn part of it during one of his wars,” Stan countered.

  “Or Caesar moved the contents in secret and pretended it had burned.”

  “Again, we can debate who did what later,” Detective Sharpe chimed in. “The FBI seems to put some stock in Dr. Keene’s theory, or they wouldn’t have pointed us in his direction. So, please, doctor, continue.”

  Ollie nodded at him and Stan shook his head, tossing his hand in the air. “Where was I?” Ollie questioned.

  “Most people believe the library was destroyed, but that’s not the whole truth,” Maggie reminded him.

  “Ah, yes,” Ollie answered, pacing the floor, his arms clasped behind his back. “Most scholars believe the library was destroyed after being in significant decline for many years. But that’s not what others believe, myself included.”

  “And what do you believe?” Detective Sharpe questioned.

  “That the library’s contents were moved, hidden somewhere else for safeke
eping,” Henry answered.

  “Yes,” Ollie agreed. “Despite the library’s membership continuing in the 200s A.D., I believe most of its contents were moved. The new location, a secret location, was not discussed openly.”

  “Who moved everything?”

  “Julius Caesar,” Ollie answered. “His ruse was the fire, though I believe he moved items in actuality.”

  Maggie shook her head. “How does this relate to a worthless ceramic ankh in Cleopatra’s tomb?”

  “After Caesar moved the library, he coded its location on three ankhs. One he kept, one he gave to his good friend Marc Antony, and the third…”

  “He gave to Cleopatra,” Maggie answered.

  Ollie ceased his pacing and nodded, touching his finger to his nose and pointing the other to Maggie.

  “So, you believe the stolen ankh is a piece of the map pointing to the lost Library of Alexandria?” Maggie asked.

  Ollie nodded while Stan shook his head. “He’s wrong,” the director said.

  Ollie shrugged. “I may be, but the odds I am correct have gone up since the robbery this evening.”

  “He wasn’t wrong about the golden scarab of Cleopatra,” Maggie replied. “I believe you, Uncle Ollie.”

  “As do I,” Henry added.

  “Doc’s explanation seems legit,” Gio said. “And unless anyone else has any other idea why this specific item was stolen, it’ll be our working hypothesis. Now, who would want access to this coded map?”

  Ollie shrugged again and shook his head. “The list is long and varied. It’s a major archeological find. Beyond that, anything found there not only lends itself to the world’s knowledge of ancient people but is worth a mint to collectors.”

  “Like on the black market?” Gio questioned.

  “Right. Antiquities are sold constantly on the black market, some of them going for millions. Owning a piece of history like this in one’s private collection gives some a thrill and great bragging rights. Among certain circles of the super-rich, it’s a popular pastime.”