Chapter 13
The recording clicked.
“There is a ledger in the room beneath the west wing. Not the archive. The room past the old wine cellar. The entrance is behind a loose stone marked with a crescent. The ledger contains the names of everyone who received money and everyone who gave instructions.”
Alexander set the lamp on the table.
“Why didn’t she tell us this in person?”
“Maybe she couldn’t,” I said.
“Maybe she didn’t trust us.”
“She gave us the key.”
“She gave us a recording.”
“She also left the envelope.”
His attention moved to the red-sealed packet on the archive desk.
I returned the receiver to its cradle.
“What did she mean when she said she helped deliver the evidence?”
Alexander looked at me.
“Did she bring the documents to you?”
“No.”
“Then how did she help?”
“I don’t know.”
The telephone rang again.
We both turned.
This time the sound was not coming from the table.
It came from somewhere deeper in the passage.
Alexander picked up the lamp and walked toward the descending branch.
“Wait.”
He stopped.
“We need to think.”
“There’s another phone.”
“And someone wants us to follow it.”
“Yes.”
“Then we follow carefully.”
His expression softened almost imperceptibly. “You’re beginning to sound like my security chief.”
“I’ve spent ten years learning not to enter rooms without considering who wants me inside.”
“That wasn’t an accusation.”
“It was experience.”
He accepted the answer.
Together, we descended.
The passage ended at a stone wall. A faint golden light showed beneath a door set into the wall. The ringing had stopped, but the sound had led us to the old wine cellar beneath the west wing.
Alexander pushed the door open.
Rows of empty racks stretched across the room. The estate had not stored wine there in years. Dust covered the floor except for a narrow line of disturbed footprints leading toward the far wall.
A crescent-shaped mark had been carved into one of the stones.
I walked toward it.
“This is the place.”
Alexander examined the wall. “Stand back.”
He pressed the stone beside the crescent.
Nothing happened.
He tried another.
Still nothing.
I ran my fingertips along the edge of the marked stone and felt a slight gap beneath it.
“It moves.”
Alexander wedged his fingers into the opening and pulled.
The stone shifted outward with a low scrape, revealing a shallow compartment.
Inside lay a black ledger wrapped in oilcloth.