by Nic Saint
It had actually been Dolores Peltz, the police station dispatcher, who thought she recognized the gem when Dan had published a picture on the Gazette website. This particular diamond had been set in an engagement ring, offered by Sheikh Bab El Ehr, ruler of Khemed, to his betrothed on the occasion of their marriage. The gem had gone missing thirty-something years ago, never to be found.
“Did the Pink Lady belong to a real pink lady?” asked Dooley.
“I doubt it, Dooley. Besides, chances that this diamond is the actual Pink Lady are very slim.”
“So it could be a pink lady, but not the Pink Lady?”
“Exactly,” she said with a smile as she parked her car in front of Gems World, the jeweler on whose shoulders now rested the responsibility of finding out where this diamond came from.
3
Thormond Linoski, owner and proprietor of Gems World (‘A World of Gems at Your Fingertips’), was a smallish man, with a ring of frizzy hair crowning a large dome, which was attached to a reedy frame. He looked as if he’d been carrying the weight of the world on his narrow shoulders for far too many years, and the slightly bewildered look in his eyes confirmed this view. When we walked in, he plastered a thin-lipped but pleasant smile on his careworn face, and greeted us with the kind of professional warmth and friendliness your small shopkeeper learns to master over a long and checkered career.
“Hello there,” he said the moment he recognized our human, and there was a slight diminution of warmth as he eyed her expectantly. Instinctively the man knew that Odelia hadn’t come to the shop to sample his wares, or spend lavishly on a gem, and his next words confirmed this. “You’re here for that diamond, I presume? Has your uncle found the owner yet?” A flicker of hope shone in his pale blue eyes , but when Odelia shook her head, the flicker was replaced by a look of annoyance. “I was really hoping to get quick service from our local police department, Miss Poole.”
“Mrs. Poole,” I corrected the man from my position on the floor. Not that he seemed to notice. He directed a disinterested glance in my direction, then up at Odelia again.
“I don’t feel entirely safe keeping that precious stone in my shop, you know. It’s been one person after another who wants to take a look at it. The sooner you find the owner the better.”
“Maybe you should close up the shop for now?” Odelia suggested, her voice laced with concern. That’s my human for you: always concerned with the wellbeing of her fellow man, even when that fellow man doesn’t show her the courtesy to remember that she’s recently plighted her troth to another fellow man, and is now Mrs. Poole and no longer Miss Poole. Though of course one could argue that she’s actually Mrs. Kingsley, but then Odelia had grown attached to the name her parents christened her with—she has, after all, been carrying that name for the past twenty-four years. One would get attached to something in less time, wouldn’t you agree?
“Close my shop? I can’t close my shop. I have a living to make, you know.” He sighed as he drew a hand across his brow. “Though if that stone really is the famous Pink Lady, maybe I should close my doors for now. And upgrade my security system. I’m really not equipped to deal with the kind of attention a stone of that notoriety will no doubt garner.”
“Do you think it’s the actual Pink Lady?”
Mr. Linoski wavered. “It certainly looks like the genuine article. It has all the hallmarks—it even has very faint markings where you can see it was set.”
“Set in a ring, you mean?”
The jeweler nodded. “Do you want to take a look?”
Odelia’s face lit up with excitement. “Oh, can I?”
“Only because it’s you,” said Thormond, who looked old enough to have dandled Odelia on his knee when she was little. He disappeared through a small door, only to return promptly, carrying a small red velvet box in his hands. He was holding it reverently, as one would hold the hand of the Queen, when granted the rare privilege of an audience with that formidable lady. “Here she is,” he said in hushed tones, betraying his reverence. He placed the box on the glass counter and opened it. Odelia bent over the item, and from her quick intake of breath I imagined this Pink Lady was a real sight to behold.
Odelia gestured to me and Dooley and asked, “Can I…”
The jeweler’s face took on a stern expression, not unlike the wandmaker in the Harry Potter stories if a pimple-faced wizard had wandered into his store and declared that he didn’t like the wand he bought and could he exchange it for one with more bells and whistles.
“I don’t know…” said the jeweler hesitantly as Odelia first picked up Dooley, then me, and ever so carefully placed us on top of the glass counter.
It was a very nice glass counter, as glass counters go, and filled with the kind of stuff that makes people’s heads spin: rings and bracelets and earrings and the like. It all glittered invitingly, and I could see why Mr. Linoski would be reluctant to allow two cats to prance around there: the counter’s main purpose was to display the jeweler’s wares, not as a runway for two cats to strut their stuff, especially since one of those cats was on the heavy side.
But then I caught sight of the Pink Lady—if indeed it was that fabled gem—and I stopped worrying about Thormond Linoski. The diamond was indeed a sight to behold. It was small and shiny and sparkly and, most assuredly, very pink!
“It’s gorgeous, Max,” said Dooley next to me. “But it’s very small, isn’t it?”
“It is very small,” I said. “Although for a diamond I think it’s plenty big.”
“How much do you think it’s worth?”
Odelia smiled and voiced that same question to the jeweler now. Thormond pursed his thin lips and glanced up at the ceiling, as if hoping to draw inspiration from the bright lights that shone down on the counter, and made his gem collection sparkle like a Christmas tree. “Well,” he said after long and careful deliberation, “a diamond of this superb clarity, 24.78 carat in weight, pink coloring, cut to perfection by an expert cutter, would normally fetch seven figures at least.”
“Seven figures?” asked Dooley, who’d been listening with rapt attention.
“Millions,” said Odelia.
The jeweler nodded. “But if it is the Pink Lady, you have to add the history, and if my research is correct that would make this diamond, well, priceless.”
“Priceless?” asked Odelia, as she glanced down at the gem, her eyes sparkling almost as fervently as the diamond itself.
“Priceless,” said Thormond Linoski.
“I don’t understand, Max,” said Dooley. “How can a diamond have no price?”
“He means it’s so expensive it’s impossible to put a price on it,” I explained.
“So… is it worth a lot, or nothing at all?” asked my friend, still confused.
“It’s worth a lot,” I said. “A whole lot.”
“If you had to put a price on it,” said Odelia. “How much…”
The jeweler shrugged helplessly. “Depends on the buyer. Stones like this are put up for auction, not sold in jewelry stores. We’re talking many, many millions. Though, of course,” he was quick to add, “the point of pricing is moot, since the stone will return to its rightful owner, and won’t enter the market at any point.”
“If it is the Pink Lady…”
The jeweler smiled now—a rare sight, and it caused his leathery face to stretch at the seams. “There’s every chance that it is. But how it ended up on that beach? Now that is a complete mystery.”
“And to think it might have stayed on that beach, and probably would have been swept away by the waves.”
A look of constipation came over the scrawny gem specialist. “I’d rather prefer not to think about that. Imagine a precious and priceless gem like this, perfect in every respect, to be lost forever.” He closed his eyes and shook his head. “It doesn’t bear thinking. It simply doesn’t.”
“How do you think it ended up on the beach?”
“I can only imagine that whoever was in posse
ssion of the stone over the past thirty-odd years must have lost it somehow.”
“The thief, you think?”
“Most assuredly. Are you familiar with the history of the Pink Lady?”
“Only what I’ve read on Wikipedia.”
An expression of distaste flashed across the man’s face, as if to convey the notion that your serious gem dealer doesn’t consider Wikipedia a valuable source of information. “Well, the stone of course belonged to Sheikh Bab El Ehr, ruler of Khemed.”
“Who gave it as a gift to his wife, didn’t he?”
“Yes, he did,” said Mr. Linoski with an indulgent smile. Even Wikipedia gets it right sometimes, that smile seemed to say. “The original stone was found in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1967. At the time it was the largest stone ever retrieved in that particular mine. It was cut by an expert cutter in Antwerp, Belgium, heart of the international diamond industry, where the most renowned cutters are located, and then transferred to Khemed to become part of that country’s collection of royal jewels. In 1985 it was set in an engagement ring and offered to the Sheikh’s ninety-ninth wife, the lovely Laura Burns, who was only nineteen at the time of her wedding. She was, according to local lore, supposed to be the Sheikh’s final wife, as he’d decided to stop short of reaching a full hundred, and he was rumored to be so enamored with the young lady that he wanted to gift her the most precious and expensive diamond in the world, the only thing that could possibly compete with his bride’s radiant beauty. She wore the ring at their lavish wedding, and it’s at that point that the story gets a little sketchy. The Sheikh’s wife died at the one-year anniversary of her wedding, and the Pink Lady seems to have vanished without a trace after that.”
“Poor Sheikh,” said Odelia with feeling. “Losing his beloved wife like that must have been a terrible blow.”
“At least he had his ninety-eight other wives to console him,” Dooley pointed out.
“Did they ever find out what happened to the ring?” asked Odelia.
“No, like I said, things are a little sketchy, and no one seems to know what happened to the diamond after the Sheikh’s wife died. But if you look closely at the stone, you can see very faint markings, where the stone was set in a ring.” He offered Odelia his loupe to support his discovery.
She looked through the magnifying glass and said, “I see it. It’s very faint, but those markings are definitely there.”
“Which is why I’m almost certain that this is the fabled Pink Lady,” said the jeweler with a smile of satisfaction. “Which of course will have to be confirmed.”
“Who’s going to have to confirm it?” asked Odelia as she put down the loupe.
“The insurance company contracted to insure the original ring would be my best bet,” said Mr. Linoski. “Which is why your uncle needs to get in touch with the owners of this diamond as soon as possible—Sheikh Bab El Ehr’s heirs. I believe that would be his son, who took over when his father died. Sheikh Bab El Ghat.” He gave Odelia a look of concern. “I really don’t feel safe keeping the stone here any longer than strictly necessary, you know.”
“Maybe you should talk to my uncle,” Odelia suggested as she put me and Dooley down on the floor again. “He might be able to arrange for an officer to keep an eye on your store.”
The jeweler’s face took on a look of annoyance. “I asked him that exact thing. And do you know what he said? That he couldn’t spare anyone at the moment, and that it was up to me to make sure the stone was appropriately secured.” He shook his grizzly head. “I ask you—is that what I pay taxes for?”
“Let me talk to my uncle. I’m sure I can convince him to post a couple of officers outside your shop.”
A look of hope lit up the man’s aged features. “Oh, I’d be most grateful. Most, most grateful.”
“No problem.” She offered the man a radiant smile. “We wouldn’t want Hampton Cove to become known as the town where the famous Pink Lady went missing a second time, now would we?”
4
While Odelia went in search of her uncle to argue with the man about providing some much-needed security for the jeweler, Dooley and I decided to head on over to the hair salon and see what all the fuss was about with this flat earth business. After all, I was pretty sure that Dooley had exaggerated and that everything was just fine and dandy with Hampton Cove’s go-to hair wizard.
But the moment we stepped into the shop, I immediately noticed that something was indeed off: there were no customers, which is exceptional, since Fido’s business is usually buzzing with activity from morning till sometimes late at night, especially on the days that count like the holidays, when everyone wants to look just so.
Buster was seated on the windowsill, glancing up at his master with a forlorn look in his eyes, while said master was glancing through the window of his shop, a forlorn look in his eyes. He was dressed in his usual outfit: a white apron providing ample pockets where he tucked away the tools of his trade, such as there are combs and scissors and the like, only now his scissors weren’t snipping away merrily as they usually did, and his many combs were as idle as his blow-dryer, clearly wondering why this sudden lull in a life that had always been busy as the proverbial bee.
When we entered, Fido looked up, an expectant gleam on his noble visage, but when he saw that it was just us, his face assumed its sad look again, and he resumed his idle gazing out of the window.
“Buster,” I said, “what’s going on?”
“Oh, hey, Max, Dooley,” said the Maine Coon. “Well, as you can see there’s something seriously wrong in the world of hair.”
“Has this got something to do with the whole…”
“Flat Earth Society thing? Yeah, I think so. Fido has been going around trying to recruit new members, and this is what happened: people are staying away and going someplace else.”
“But where are they going? Fido is the best hairdresser there is.”
“My best bet would be the mall,” said Buster. “One of those places where they whack off your hair for a couple of bucks. Clearly anything is better than to have to listen to Fido’s ramblings.”
“But… does he really believe all that stuff?” I asked, glancing up at the hirsute maestro, now temporarily out of work.
“Oh, yeah. In fact he’s just accepted a position as the head of LIFES, the Long Island Flat Earth Society. His mission, should he choose to accept it, and of course he has, the doofus, is to build a vibrant community of flat earthlings and make Hampton Cove their Long Island headquarters.”
“We have to do something, Max,” said Dooley. “If this keeps up Fido will go out of business, and Buster will be homeless.”
“I don’t think it’ll come to that,” I assured my friend. And Buster, too, of course, for the latter looked more than a little worried now that his human had gone off the deep end.
“We have to convince Fido that the earth is round,” said Buster. “But how?”
“Well, just like Max suggested,” said Dooley. “We need to take him on a trip around the world, and then when he discovers that he didn’t fall off, but that he simply returned here, he’ll know that this flat earth stuff is stuff and nonsense.”
“We can’t simply take the man on a trip around the world, Dooley,” I said, once again engaging in a discussion I frankly never thought I’d have to get into—twice! “Like I already explained to you, it’s going to take months, and we don’t have the time.” Or the money. I don’t think traveling the world comes cheap nowadays, what with inflation and everything. Christopher Columbus had Ferdinand and Isabella to sponsor his expeditions, but who was going to hand us coffers full of Spanish gold? “Look, all we need to do is to ask Odelia or Marge or even Gran to reason with the man. I mean, how hard can it be to talk some sense into him?”
A man had wandered into the shop, rubbing his head, and clearly in the market for a haircut. “Wow, this is a first,” he said as he glanced around at the empty chairs. “Can I…” He gestured to the c
hair Fido reserves for the customers ready to be divested of their surplus of hair.
“Please,” said Fido, perking up now that he was once again requested to ply his trade. With a flourish he tied a barber cloth in front of his customer, tucked a protective strip along the man’s neckline and, smiling a pleasant smile, said, “Have you ever wondered, Gerald, about the possibility that we’ve all been fed a bunch of lies since time immemorial?”
“Oh, sure,” said Gerald, shifting a little in his chair and making himself comfortable. “All you need to do is turn on the television and watch a couple of those political debates.”
“I’m actually referring to the fact that the earth is flat, Gerald, not round the way we’ve always been told.”
Gerald frowned. This clearly wasn’t the direction he thought the conversation would go. “Flat?” he asked. “What are you talking about?”
“The planet is flat, Gerald,” said Fido, not wasting time coming to the point. “Flat as a pancake.”
“Huh. Is that a fact?”
“It is! Only you didn’t know that, did you?”
“I sure didn’t,” said Gerald, directing a bewildered look at the hair master who was patting his client’s head in that preparatory ritual favored by hairdressers the world over.
“I’ll give you a flyer,” said Fido confidentially, as he picked up a flyer from a stack he had lying next to the sink and the hair products he liked to apply. He handed the piece of paper to Gerald. “Everything you need to know is right there,” he whispered conspiratorially.
“Um…” said Gerald as he helplessly glanced at the flyer, then stole a quick look at the door.
“Read it and weep,” said Fido. “And then join us tonight at the meeting.”
“The meeting?”
“I’m organizing the first-ever meeting of the Long Island branch of the Flat Earth Society. I’m the president,” he added proudly as he took out his pair of scissors and snipped the air a couple of times for good measure. “Now how do you want your hair done, Gerald? The usual?”