The Curious Case of the Cursed Dice (Curiosity Shop Cozy Mysteries Book 2)

by Constance Barker

  “Not that,” he said. “I know about the searching. I was referring to all this unfeminine perspiring," he said. "You should control yourself better than that."

  "Of course I'm sweating. It's about nine thousand degrees out here, without a cloud in sight. The forecast is for unrelenting heat. If you had a body you'd be sweating too."

  He turned away. "Go ahead and rub my lack of a corporal existence in my face."

  "If you don't have a corporal face I can't rub anything in it."

  "True." He turned back and smiled. "I appreciate you reminding me of some of the advantages of my present state… whatever it actually might be."

  "How about turning your ethereal brain to the problem of helping me find this woman?" I said. "Picture her. She’s tall, thin, and a redhead."

  "Sounds a bit like Rowena," he said dreamily.

  We made it to the next casino. Electric doors swooshed open and cool air rushed out as I ducked into the smallish casino and sighed as the cool air washed over me. I headed for the bar to find people I could ask about the woman and my phone rang. Naturally, it was Clarence.

  "How are you doing? Did you get your artifact yet?" he asked unceremoniously.

  "I'm hot on the trail of them," I lied. Well, the hot part was true enough. "I've found out who has the dice and I'm tracking her down now. It shouldn't be long until I find her."

  "You are lying to him," Edgar said.

  I muted my phone. "I am not. We are on her trail. Now please keep out of this."

  "People," he sniffed. As he shrugged, I turned the phone on again.

  "How about you, Clarence? Any progress with the lock?"

  He chuckled. "Absolutely. I'm close. I just came from a meeting with Ulrich Steele. He's the collector who owns it. He showed me the lock and gave me a private tour of his collection. I sent you a picture."

  I checked my incoming messages.

  "Yeah, there it is all right. I mean, I suppose that’s it. How do you know what an ancient Egyptian lock should look like? Although, I'll give you that this sure looks like one. When you were close to it, did you sense the curse? Did it call to you?"

  "As you can see, he has it in a case. I didn’t get to touch it, but from where I stood, no. He said it was cursed though."

  “Did you ask him about the curse?”

  “No. I didn’t want to seem too interested in that part.”

  “You think a regular person wouldn’t want to know what sort of curse it was?”

  “Maybe I should’ve asked.”

  "I wouldn't have thought that glass would be a decent shield from a curse," I said, glancing at Edgar. He gave me an uninterested shrug. "Or maybe its batteries are dead."

  "Batteries?"

  "I mean that figuratively. As in, maybe it ran out of oomph. What do you think the shelf life is on a curse? Would it last 4000 years?"

  "I don’t know. And anyway, that's how old the lock is. It could have been cursed five years ago—the day before Mason put it in the ledger."

  That hadn’t occurred to me, but he was right. "I suppose so. Are you going to have any trouble getting your hands on it?"

  "Ulrich seems like a reasonable man and I think we can come to an understanding.”

  “You are going to ask him to hand over an ancient artifact? I can’t see why he’d give it to you.”

  “No, I won’t ask. I was teasing you. But I do have a plan. I've cased the place and I don't imagine it will be that hard to take it."

  His news irritated me and I didn’t like that. I was focusing too much on competing with Clarence and hearing that he seemed so much closer to his goal than I was stung. Even if he wasn’t as certain of getting it as he sounded, at least he'd laid eyes on it. With the picture, I knew that much. That put him in the lead. I'd never seen the dice unless I'd walked right past them without knowing. It was scary that I could've done that too. There were more than a few pairs of dice around this city and I had no idea if these looked odd in any way at all.

  "So you'll get the lock today, do you think?"

  "Soon." I liked that he didn't sound quite so positive about the timetable. The longer he took, the better chance I’d find the dice first. "Maybe later today. I'd like to get back to Destiny's Point as soon as we can. It is unbelievably hot here."

  "Oh, is it? I hadn't noticed."

  I ignored the look of disbelief on Edgar's face. "Liar," he hissed.

  “Well, take your time and make certain your plan covers all the eventualities,” I said. “Be thorough. Careful planning takes time.”

  “What did you do with the Cecilia I know?” he asked, laughing.

  “She was left in the air-conditioned room at the motel. Anyway, good hunting.”

  “I do know what you’re up to.”

  “It was worth a try.”

  And so we hung up. "He's closing in on the lock," I told Edgar.

  "I know. I could hear him talking in your head."

  "I wish you would stay out of my head."

  "Me too, now that you mention it, but I can't."

  "You can't? What can’t you?"

  He shrugged. "Well, maybe I can, but I don't know how to do it. This has been going on since you opened the box. You opened it and there I was… in your head."

  "And you never bothered to mention this before now?"

  "I honestly thought you would’ve noticed―that you’d be aware of a ghost inside your head. I have a substantial presence." I glared at him. "Honest, I did. Keep in mind that I'm new to haunting people, so don't assume this is all something I understand. All I know is that it's been going on since you opened the box and let me out. I thought it was kind of interesting, myself."

  "So only now you let me know I don't have to speak out loud for you to hear me?"

  "Even if I’d realized you didn’t know, well, I like the sound of your voice. It's very musical, in a romantic and charming way."

  "Getting back to the matter at hand, we need to deal with the fact that Clarence is closer to his goal than we are to ours."

  "We? Our goal?"

  "You and I."

  "There's a surprise. I actually count now?"

  "Of course you count. We've been working together haven’t we?"

  "Not so I noticed. From my perspective, I’d say that you've mostly ignored me. You haven't relied on me much at all. I feel more like I'm being dragged along. And it's only natural that Clarence would be proceeding faster."

  "It is? Natural?"

  "He's using logic."

  "And I'm using mashed potatoes?"

  "It isn’t your fault, Cecilia. It’s biology.”

  “You can explain that right now.”

  “Given that females are not prone to rely on reason and logic, they are unskilled in their proper application to problem-solving. That’s why you so often turn to emotion and instinct."

  "What?"

  "The facts are well established. But I have to say that you've done amazingly well for a woman."

  One problem with ghosts is that you can skip right past smacking them up the side of the head. It won’t do a thing. But I did have options and I took out his pen and looked at it. With the frustration and the heat, I didn't need to be bombarded with his Victorian sexist prejudices. Of course, I couldn't throw the pen away. After all, it was cursed and we were working hard to collect cursed objects so that would be a giant step backward. Besides, I'd tried to walk away from it and it didn't work. But, if I couldn't leave him in the dust, I could seal him back in the box the pen came in. Fortunately, I just happened to have it with me. He squeaked in dismay as I took out the box. “Don’t,” he gasped.

  “Watch me.” I put the pen in the cradle in the box.

  "I thought you wanted and needed my help," he said, sounding a little panicked.

  "I did, but my poor female reasoning is causing me to act emotionally, not logically. You should understand that. Oh, before you go, I have a quick question.”

  “Sure. Anything.”

&nbs
p; “Do you sense the object, or any cursed object at all, in this casino?"

  He sniffed. "No. Perhaps we should move along to the next one."

  That was all I needed to hear. I closed the lid and he was gone.

  I stared at a fountain that some reasonable and logical person, probably a man, had decided would make sense in the foyer of the casino. It was ornate and spouted water from an elephant's nose into a large basin. The symbolism, if there was any, was lost on me, but it gave me an idea. Water had sealed off the spectacles and kept them safe, at least from some things and for a time. I contemplated tossing the box in the fountain. Maybe then I could walk away from it.

  But that would be unfair. Someone, some unfortunate soul would find it, open it, and be cursed with Edgar's witty observations. If they weren’t clever, it might be for life. When they realized their fate, they might kill themselves and that would be on me.

  Also, I’d feel bad about it later. Normally, much of the time, I liked his company.

  The trail seemed to have gone cold and I felt like I was at a dead end. We'd covered a lot of casinos, talked to a lot of people who’d been around that night. Of course, I had no idea if the people I'd talked to were telling me the truth. Privacy was a big thing and even if they'd seen the woman, if she'd just gambled, won a small amount, they'd never tell a stranger, no matter how good her story. I was beginning to get that. A good customer was anonymous.

  I walked over to where a few people played roulette. There were four tables, mixed in with blackjack, craps, and other games. Overhead large television monitors advertised the restaurants, some shows, and more games… sports book, keno.

  The one thing I wanted to see was nowhere in sight—the tall, thin redhead, or anyone who looked anything like her.

  Desperate I took out the box and opened it. "Do you sense it now?"

  "I do not. And it's stuffy in here."

  "Too bad. You need to learn to keep a civil, less critical tongue in your head."

  "And perhaps you should be more ladylike and cover up…"

  I shut the lid again and savored the relatively peaceful ambiance of the casino with only the digital slot machines making their fake mechanical noises and people wandering about aimlessly, like zombies in search of a grand win. Not a ghostly whisper anywhere.

  It occurred to me that I was doing exactly the same thing as the gamblers in my aimless wandering. The difference was that instead of winning money, I wanted to find a tall, thin, redhead who was slowly winning at roulette.

  Chapter 12

  Clarence hung up the phone feeling unsettled. Cecilia often had screwy priorities and she could be a wild woman when it came to taking action, but she was clever and resourceful. She'd already identified the other artifact and managed to find leads to the person who had it. Once she made the connection, she’d be close to getting the dice.

  They were locked in a tight race and he sensed that his rival was ahead of him. It was hard to tell for certain though, as he had no idea how close she was to getting her hands on what she was after.

  He knew that it ached to know that his artifact, the ancient Egyptian lock, was so tantalizingly close by, yet out of easy reach.

  Clarence only saw two options for acquiring it, and the first one didn’t seem likely at all. As Cecilia had pointed out, Steele wouldn’t exactly give it to him… just because. As proud of it as Ulrich Steele was, he wasn't likely to sell it either; even if he would consider selling it, antiquities were pricey trinkets. Clarence knew he didn't have anything close to the kind of money Steele would expect for it. That meant there was little point in even trying.

  That left him with no choice but the less desirable option – burglary. Clearly, he'd have to steal it. Under the circumstances, given that he would be taking a cursed object out of circulation, the ethics of stealing didn't bother him in the least. The practical aspects of executing such a crime, however, baffled him. If there was a way to get around all of Steele’s security he hadn’t seen it yet. Even getting into the apartment and then through the security door seemed impossible.

  Confronted with all this, the only way Clarence knew how to approach the problem was to sit down and work out a plan, even though that played into Cecilia’s hands. But it took sorting out. When you aren't a professional thief, even a limited security presence seems daunting. Unfortunately, Clarence knew that he was easily daunted.

  It was so much easier to be a bit more fearless when Cecilia was taking the point. She could always come up with some idea too, even if it was a crazy one. In fact, the crazy ideas seemed to be the ones that worked best—not that they necessarily produced the right results, but they stirred things up, and Cecilia was usually able to turn the chaos into a victory for their side.

  He envied that quality, but at the same time, it rubbed him the wrong way that she trusted her instincts more than his thoughtful ideas. She often disregarded him and his concerns. That stung. What made it worse was that there was no getting around the fact that she got results by taking risks. She was good at this.

  Like now. Like the way she was going after the dice, running full tilt while he was standing in the lobby of Steele's building wondering what in the world he was going to do.

  Finally, he sat down on a lovely cream-colored couch in the lobby and called Enid.

  "How is it going?" she asked.

  "Not so good."

  "How can I help? Do you need ideas about where it might be?"

  "That's not the problem. I've found it. I've seen it. But I have to get it.”

  “That’s usually the hard part. Most people who have cursed objects don’t want to let go of them. I think that’s part of your average curse, to be honest.”

  “So… did you and Mason ever have to break into a place and steal an artifact? A secure place?"

  "Break in?"

  "This collector keeps the lock in a secure area on the top floor of a high-rise building.”

  “My, that does sound tricky.”

  “You need to take a private elevator to get to his apartment. Then you have to pass through a security door with a passkey so you can get up some stairs to where the collection is kept." He decided not to mention the live, armed guards.

  "And then back out, retracing your steps with the artifact," Enid pointed out. "Unless you manage those steps, all the first part is a rather pointless exercise."

  "Yes. In and out. The whole thing."

  "I can’t recall dealing with anything like that at all, Clarence. No, I'm sure we never did anything like that," she said. "Of course, the bulk of our acquisitions were objects that people assumed had no value. We tried to find them before they used them and learned about the abilities they gained… while it lasted. Sometimes, we got them from the families after tragedy befell the user. You'd be surprised how many we picked up at yard sales and second-hand stores over the years. It’s almost shocking how many people seem to have cursed objects just lying around their homes."

  "This collector who has the lock mentioned that he thinks it is cursed too, but I don’t know if that’s just talk, or because it fits with the mystique of artifacts, or if he’s actually used it and found out it has powers. Whatever he might know he does value it and thinks it’s worth protecting."

  “There was a time or two… yes, Mason and I did have to do a little snatch and grab a few times, and once or twice Mason did sneak into a house while I waited in the car with the engine running… but that wasn’t nearly what you're talking about. That place sounds like a fortress.”

  “It feels a bit like one. The man is definitely security conscious.”

  "Well. I don't know what to say that would help. And I have to wonder… seeing that Mason knew about the lock and had entered it in the ledger, it just might be that he knew we just didn't have the skills we'd need to get it. There were always plenty of other artifacts to track down. A lot of them just required time and patience to acquire. We often went for the easy ones. That way we could feel like we were acc
omplishing things and getting the job done."

  Clarence’s heart sank. Enid had nothing to tell him. "I see."

  "I could hear your disappointment with me. It came through very clearly, Clarence. I’m sorry I can’t solve your problem for you. Bear in mind that Mason and I didn’t have anyone to call.”

  “That’s true and I’m sorry for expecting you to have all the answers.”

  “Now tell me, given this situation, what does Cecilia think you should try?"

  Clarence paused. "We are pursuing different objectives for the moment."

  "Are you telling me that you went after the lock and let her go after the dice alone?"

  "I didn't let her. I couldn't stop her, actually."

  "And when she insisted on going after the dice, you remained pigheaded about going after the lock."

  Clarence sighed. "Yes, I did."

  "Doing that put her in danger, Clarence. And you going off alone puts you in danger too. That is unnecessary danger. There's no need for that."

  "We need to get the artifacts."

  “Not at any cost, dear. Your lives are more important, and if something happens to you, you’ll be leaving all those uncounted artifacts out there anyway.”

  “We thought this would be more efficient.”

  "You two argued and went your own ways, I’ll bet. I've said it before… you two must stick together and combine your abilities. Working as a team is the only way you can counter all the challenges you'll face."

  "And you and Mason always worked together?"

  "Not always. We should've though."

  "Why? What's wrong with splitting up?"

  "You are dealing with something that is elusive as well as dangerous, Clarence. One person can't be expected to anticipate everything that can happen or even see trouble coming."

  "Something happened with you and Mason. Something went wrong. What was it?"