"Sorry, Ma, I was on the cell a lot." He took a breath. "Actually, I was looking for dwellings. I think I found a place in Brooklyn, with Beck, you know, from school?"

Mary Peg blinked, nodded, and said, "Well, it's your life, dear. But the thing I wanted to talk to you about, Bulstrode's lawyer called here."

"Bulstrode is dead," he replied stupidly.

"Yes, but dead people have lawyers too. It's the estate." She gave him a closer look. "Albert, is there something wrong with you?"

Crosetti thought briefly of trying to conceal the events just transacted a block away but realized that Agnes Conti distributed information with a velocity that telecom engineers were still struggling to match, and would shortly be phoning to supply the details, real and imagined. He said, "Sit down, Ma."

They sat in the kitchen, Crosetti had his gla.s.s of wine and told his story. Mary Peg heard him out and thought she took it rather well. Actually, she thought, it put her in a somewhat better position than she would have been, given what she now had to relate to her son.

"Ma! What did you do that for?" was Crosetti's wail. "G.o.d! I hate when you pull stuff behind my back."

"Like stealing your father's guns and turning my home into an armed camp?"

"That's not the same thing. It was an emergency," said Crosetti without enthusiasm. He really wanted to lie down.

"Well, I too thought that some action was required, and since you were unavailable and too busy running away from home, or whatever, to answer messages..."

The sound of a car pulling up in front of the house stopped her short. "Oh, I bet that's Donna," said Mary Peg and went to the door. Crosetti poured another gla.s.s of wine. As Crosetti drained this, Radeslaw Klim came into the room, freshly shaved in a black uniform jacket and tie, and holding a s.h.i.+ny-peaked black cap.

"Want some wine, Klim?"

"Thank you, but no. I must drive shortly."

"It's dark already. They don't have funerals at night."

"No, it is not a real funeral. It is for vampires."

"Excuse me?"

"Yes, is quite a la mode now, you know, rich young people pretend to be vampires and ride in hea.r.s.es, and have a party in crypt of a former church. Ah, here is your mother. And this must be the daughter. How do you do?"

Donna Crosetti, or The Donna, as she was known in the family, was a skinny red-haired clone of her mother and an ornament of the Legal Aid Society of New York, a friend of the downtrodden, or a bleeding heart who sprung hardened criminals to run wild in the streets, depending on whether you were talking to her mother or her sister, Patsy. She was the youngest daughter, just a year older than Crosetti himself, and had a more than full measure of the middle child's sense of cosmic injury, the focus of which had been, from the earliest dawn of consciousness, the slightly younger brother, the Irish twin, the object of hatred and resentment, yet also the creature to be defended from all threats, to the last drop of blood. Crosetti felt exactly the same way and was just as inarticulate about it: a perfect stalemate of love.

Klim introduced himself, shook hands with the rather startled Donna Crosetti, kissed Mary Peg formally on both cheeks, and took his leave.

"Who was that that?"

"That's the new live-in boyfriend," said Crosetti.

"What?" exclaimed The Donna, who had not been consulted.

"Not," said Mary Peg.

"Is too," said Crosetti. "He drives a hea.r.s.e."

"At night?"

"Yeah, he says it's for vampires. How are you, Don?"

"He's not not my live-in boyfriend," said Mary Peg. "How could you say such a thing, Albert!" my live-in boyfriend," said Mary Peg. "How could you say such a thing, Albert!"

"He is too too," Crosetti insisted, feeling the years slip away in a manner that was unpleasantly quasi-psychotic and comforting at the same time. In a minute Donna would be screaming and chasing him around the kitchen table with a cooking implement in her little fist and their mother would be yelling and trying to stop them and dis.h.i.+ng out random smacks and threatening apocalypse when their father got home.

Donna Crosetti glared at her mother and brother. "No, really..."

"Really," said Mary Peg. "He's a friend of f.a.n.n.y's who's helping us decipher a seventeenth-century letter Allie found. He was working late on it so I offered him Patsy's room for the night."

"Which was three nights ago," said Crosetti. He wrapped his arms around himself and made kissing noises.

"Oh, grow up!" said his sister. Crosetti stuck his tongue out at her, she rolled her eyes at him and sat down at the kitchen table. Removing a leather portfolio from her capacious bag, she flipped it open with a businesslike snap and said, "If this guy's coming at eight, we don't have much time. Let's have it, from the beginning." Crosetti looked at his mother. "I don't understand why we have to do this," he grumped.

"Because you were cheated, and we're here to see if you have a case against the estate, to make them pay you what the original was really worth, or get it back."

"I don't want want it back," said Crosetti, getting sulky as the wine fumes rose from his empty stomach to his head. "I want none of this ever to have happened. it back," said Crosetti, getting sulky as the wine fumes rose from his empty stomach to his head. "I want none of this ever to have happened. That's That's what I want." what I want."

"Well, my child," said Mary Peg, "it's a little too late for that. This has to be disentangled by a lawyer, and Donna is the lawyer in our family. And I'd think you'd appreciate her volunteering to help, especially since you just shot someone right outside our house-"

"What!" said the family lawyer. "You shot shot someone? Did you call the-" someone? Did you call the-"

"No, and I'm not going to. A couple of guys tried to kidnap me-"

"What! Who?"

"Donna, calm down," he said, "you're sounding like an Abbott and Costello act. You want the story or not?"

Donna took a breath or two and seemed to snap her professional persona into place. It took nearly the whole hour to spin out the tale, what with her questions and the backtracking and prevarications by the little brother, so typical and so maddening, and the elaborate explanations of the ciphers and Klim's role in the household, and the peculiar case of Carolyn Rolly. By the time Donna was satisfied, the little kitchen was uncomfortably warm and the level in the gallon jug of red wine had descended two inches or more.

Donna riffled through her pages of notes and checked her watch. "Okay, let's review a little before this guy gets here. First of all, you have no claim whatever on the Bulstrode estate for any purported swindle, because you had no right to sell that ma.n.u.script. Nor had your pal, Rolly. Both of you conspired to steal property rightly belonging to your employer. So the main thing I'm going to have to do is convince this Mishkin to forget the d.a.m.n thing and go home. You really should've talked to me earlier."

"n.o.body stole anything, Donna," said her brother. "I explained this to you. Sidney told us to break the books and we broke the books. He got full value for the maps and plates and the rest was fully insured. It was just like a junked car. The junk man pays ten bucks for it and if he finds a CD under the front seat, he doesn't have to give it back."

"Thank you, counselor. I see you went to a different law school than I did. Finders, keepers is only on the playground. If your junk man found a diamond ring in the wrecked car, do you think he could give it to his girlfriend?"

"Why not?" asked Crosetti.

"Because he had no reasonable expectation that the car would contain a diamond ring. If the legal owner happened to see the ring on the girlfriend he could sue for replevin and he'd win. When Glaser gave you those books he had no idea that they contained a ma.n.u.script worth serious money. When you found it your duty was to inform him of the increased value of his property, not convert it to your own use."

"So if I find a painting in a yard sale and I know it's a Rembrandt and the seller doesn't, I have to tell her? I can't just give her ten bucks and sell it for ten million?"

"A completely different situation. You'd be profiting from your superior knowledge, which is legit, and you would own own the painting before you sold it. That, by the way, is what Bulstrode did to you. It's sneaky, but perfectly legal. On the other hand, you never owned the books from which the ma.n.u.script emerged. Glaser did and does. In fact, I would suggest you contact him right now and tell him what's going on." the painting before you sold it. That, by the way, is what Bulstrode did to you. It's sneaky, but perfectly legal. On the other hand, you never owned the books from which the ma.n.u.script emerged. Glaser did and does. In fact, I would suggest you contact him right now and tell him what's going on."

"Oh, get out of here!"

"Idiot child, focus on this! You stole stole an object worth between fifty and a hundred thousand dollars. In a few minutes, a guy is going to show up who thinks that value is part of an estate he holds in trust. What do you think he's going to do, as an officer of the court, when we have to tell him that this valuable object actually belongs to someone else, and did when you sold it to his client?" an object worth between fifty and a hundred thousand dollars. In a few minutes, a guy is going to show up who thinks that value is part of an estate he holds in trust. What do you think he's going to do, as an officer of the court, when we have to tell him that this valuable object actually belongs to someone else, and did when you sold it to his client?"

"Listen to her, Albert," said Mary Peg in a stern voice.

Crosetti rose from the table and stalked out of the room, seething. At some rationalizing level of his mind he had convinced himself that the whole ma.n.u.script transaction was something of a prank, on the level of swiping a stop sign from a pole, for which he had been duly punished by Andrew Bulstrode's scam. Morally, he had argued to himself, the thing was a wash. But now he was sitting with two of the three women in the world he most wished to impress (Rolly being AWOL), and they were agreed that he was a colossal jerk and a felon, and here all the family weight bore down: the disappointment, however veiled by kindness, that he was not the hero his father had been, that he was not an achiever like his sisters, that he especially especially was not a graduate of Princeton was not a graduate of Princeton and and Columbia Law School like Donna. He was woozy with wine besides and thought that he might as well go upstairs with his gun and shoot himself, that would save everyone a lot of trouble. Columbia Law School like Donna. He was woozy with wine besides and thought that he might as well go upstairs with his gun and shoot himself, that would save everyone a lot of trouble.

But what he did instead, since he was in fact a decent young man from a loving family and not the tortured neurotic artist he sometimes imagined himself to be (as, briefly, now) was to pull out his cell phone and call Sidney Glaser in Los Angeles. He had Glaser's cell phone number inscribed in his own device, of course, and Glaser answered on the third ring. An old-fas.h.i.+oned fellow, Sidney, but he made an exception for cell phones.

"Albert! Is there anything wrong?"

"No, the shop's fine, Mr. G. Something's come up and I'm sorry to trouble you, but I need an answer right away."

"Yes?"

"Well, um, it's sort of a long story. Can you talk?"

"Oh, yes. I was about to go down to dinner but I can talk for a little while. What is it?"

"Okay, this is in reference to the Churchill. The one that got ruined in the fire and you asked Carolyn to break it?"

"Oh, yes? What of it?"

"I was just wondering about the, ah, remainder. I mean the stripped books...."

A pause here. "Have you had a call from GNY?"

"No, it's not really an insurance issue...."

"Because, ah, what they paid out wasn't nearly what we could have got at auction and so, ah...look, Albert, if they call, if they ever ever call, please refer them to me, understood? Don't discuss the breaking of those books, or what Carolyn did, or anything with them. I mean the prints and maps, the decorator backs, these are really quite trivial matters and you know how these insurance people are...." call, please refer them to me, understood? Don't discuss the breaking of those books, or what Carolyn did, or anything with them. I mean the prints and maps, the decorator backs, these are really quite trivial matters and you know how these insurance people are...."

"I'm sorry...decorator backs?"

"Yes, Carolyn said she had a customer for the backs and could she burnish them up and deodorize and so forth and sell them and I conveyed them over to her. There should be a paper bill in the files. But the main thing is-"

"Excuse me, Mr. G. When was this?"

"Oh, that day, the day after the fire. She came upstairs and asked me if she could play with the carca.s.ses, the leather and so on. Did you know she was an amateur bookbinder?"

Mary Peg called out, "Albert? Come back here and talk!" Crosetti stuck his thumb over the microphone slits and yelled, "In a minute, Ma. I'm on the phone with Mr. Glaser."

Resuming his conversation, he said, "Uh-huh, yes, sir, I did know that. And so you actually sold her the books?"

"Oh, yes, just the carca.s.ses, net of the prints and so on. I think she paid thirty dollars a volume. I really don't like to bother with that aspect of the trade and Carolyn made a little business of it for some years, sprucing up fine bindings off worthless books and selling them to decorators, who would then sell them, I imagine to illiterates for concealing their liquor cabinets. Now, what was it you wanted to ask me?"

Crosetti made something up, a question about how he should handle the fire loss in their inventory accounting system, got a brief answer, and closed the conversation. He was both relieved and stunned by what he had just learned: relieved because this cleared up the legal owners.h.i.+p of the ma.n.u.script, stunned because Carolyn had allowed him to think there was something shady about the deal when there wasn't. So why had she allowed him to take the ma.n.u.script for his own? Why had she pretended to be semi-blackmailed into letting him have it? Why had she used this supposed crime as an emotional lever to get him to sell it to Bulstrode? None of it made sense. And how was he supposed to get all that past his sister?

He went back into the kitchen and related the gist of the conversation he had just had, and, as expected, Donna was full of the objections that he just pa.s.sed through his own mind. He cut her off, however, feeling rather more aggressive, now that he had right on his side. "Donna, for crying out loud, none of that matters. For all practical purposes I own the Bracegirdle ma.n.u.script. Carolyn isn't here, and Glaser is not going to make a fuss because I got the impression he's scamming the insurance company on the ruined volumes. He probably put in for the whole value and forgot to mention to them what he'd realized on the maps and prints, five grand or so. So that part's fixed."

"Oh, I don't know," said Donna. "The insurance company might have a case that they own the thing. They paid for it."

"Then let them sue," snapped Crosetti. "Meanwhile, do we have any chance of getting the ma.n.u.script back from the estate?"

"You could sue," replied Donna with equal heat. could sue," replied Donna with equal heat.

"Children," said Mary Peg in a familiar tone, "calm down. If no one stole anything, we have a completely different situation, thank G.o.d. Why don't we wait and see what this Mr. Mishkin has to say. What I'm a lot more worried about is this attempted kidnapping business. I'm going to call Patty. I think the police should be involved."

With that, she went to the kitchen phone, but before she could dial, the doorbell rang. Mary Peg went to the door and admitted a very large man in a black leather coat. He had a close-cropped head and a bleak, hard look on his face, and for a panicked instant, Crosetti thought he might be one of the men who had just attacked him. But as he came forward to introduce himself, Crosetti saw that, despite the hard features, the man was not a thug, that there was a sad look in his dark eyes, reminding Crosetti of his own father, also a man with a hard face and a sad look.

Mary Peg declared that they would all be more comfortable in the living room (she meant: away from the disgraceful jelly gla.s.ses on the table and the reek of red wine), and so they all trooped off to the worn upholstery, the knickknacks, and the Portrait, and she said she would make some coffee, and could she take Mr. Mishkin's coat?

When they were seated, Donna lost no time showing that she was in charge. She told the big man who she was and that she was representing the family temporarily and stated what she believed were the primary facts of the case: that her brother had gone to Professor Bulstrode in good faith for an a.s.sessment of a seventeenth-century ma.n.u.script he owned; that Bulstrode had abused his professional responsibility to provide an honest a.s.sessment, had, in fact, lied about the content of the ma.n.u.script, which was a valuable addition to Shakespeare scholars.h.i.+p, and had purchased the doc.u.ment from Albert Crosetti for a fraction of its value, a transaction that any court would find unconscionable. And what did Mishkin intend to do about it?

Mishkin said, "Well, Ms. Crosetti, there's not much I can can do about it. You see, I'm here under false pretenses, in a way. My personal involvement in this affair was prompted by the fact that Professor Bulstrode came to me shortly before his tragic death and deposited the ma.n.u.script he had bought from Mr. Crosetti here with our firm. He was seeking some intellectual property advice, which I provided. The ma.n.u.script was part of his estate at death, and when a woman appeared claiming to be his heiress, we accommodated her in our trust department. I personally am not handling that aspect." do about it. You see, I'm here under false pretenses, in a way. My personal involvement in this affair was prompted by the fact that Professor Bulstrode came to me shortly before his tragic death and deposited the ma.n.u.script he had bought from Mr. Crosetti here with our firm. He was seeking some intellectual property advice, which I provided. The ma.n.u.script was part of his estate at death, and when a woman appeared claiming to be his heiress, we accommodated her in our trust department. I personally am not handling that aspect."

"So why are are you here?" asked Donna, and then, as she registered the import of his phrasing, demanded, "And what do you mean by ' you here?" asked Donna, and then, as she registered the import of his phrasing, demanded, "And what do you mean by 'claiming to be his heiress'?" to be his heiress'?"

"Well, as to that: it seems we've been defrauded. This woman, the supposed niece to the decedent, Miranda Kellogg, made off with the ma.n.u.script. Her whereabouts are at present unknown."

At this, astonishment. "You must be joking!" said Donna.

"I wish I were, Ms. Crosetti. And I admit it was entirely my fault. This person secured my confidence with an entirely plausible story and I gave her the doc.u.ment."

Mishkin turned his sad eyes on Crosetti. "You asked why I came to see you. Tell me, have you or has anyone a.s.sociated with you been threatened in any way?"

Crosetti exchanged a brief glance with his sister, then answered: "Yeah. As a matter of fact a couple of guys tried to s.n.a.t.c.h me a little while ago."

"These were two men, one very large and one somewhat smaller, traveling in a black SUV?"

"Yeah, that's right. How did you know?"

"They attacked me too, last week, and tried to steal the thing. I was able to fend them off at the time, but shortly after that, they, or someone else, invaded my home, knocked out my a.s.sistant, and made off with the ma.n.u.script and the woman who was posing as Ms. Kellogg. I had imagined that she was kidnapped, but it now seems that she was in league with the a.s.sailants. I can only suppose that the first attack was to establish a bond between me and the woman, to allay my suspicions. That, or we're dealing with two separate antagonists. Speaking of which, Mr. Crosetti, I a.s.sume you know the person listed in Bulstrode's appointment book as Carolyn R."

"Yes! Yes, I do. Carolyn Rolly. She's the person who found the ma.n.u.script in a set of books. Do you know where she is?"

"No, I don't, but Ms. Kellogg called me after she vanished and told me there was a person named Carolyn involved. Whether she's a victim or working with the thugs I couldn't say. But clearly, she understood that you did not part with the entire ma.n.u.script, and that there were still a number of pages, apparently in ciphered form, that you retained. Whoever's behind this knows you have them and wants them."

"But they're useless," Crosetti protested. "They're indecipherable. h.e.l.l, whoever it is can have them right now. You want them? You can have the G.o.dd.a.m.n things...."

"I don't like the idea of surrendering your property as a result of threats," said Donna.

"No? Then why don't you you take it?" take it?"

"Take what?" said Mary Peg, entering with a tray full of coffee cups and a plate of biscotti.

"Albert wants to give his ciphered ma.n.u.scripts to the thugs," said Donna.

"Nonsense," said Mary Peg as she handed out the coffee mugs. "We don't give in to violence." She sat down on the sofa next to her son. "Now, we all seem to be involved in this in various ways, so why don't we all share our stories from the beginning, just like they do in the mysteries, and then agree on a course of action."

"Mother, that's insane!" cried Donna. "We should call the police now and turn this whole mess over to them."

"Darling, the police have other things to worry about besides secret letters and attempted kidnap. I'll let Patsy know what's going on, but I'm sure she'll agree. The cops can't possibly put a twenty-four-hour guard on everyone in this family. We have to figure this out ourselves, which we're perfectly capable of doing. Besides, my Irish is up. I don't like it when b.u.ms try to muscle my people. When that happens I muscle back."

At this, both of Mary Peg's children stared at her, and for the first time in many years recalled certain mortifying events of their childhood. All the Crosetti children had gone to school at Holy Family down the street, and were part of the last generation of American Catholic children to be educated at least in part by nuns. Unlike the parents of all their friends, Mary Peg had taken no guff at all from the sisters and had often appeared in the chalky hallways to rail against some injustice or inattention or incompetence she had detected in their relations with her children, and continued despite all their pleas to stop. Yet at some level, they still believed that anyone who could take on a fire-breathing eleven-foot-tall Sister of Charity could handle any number of mere gangsters.