The Billionaire's Curse

by Richard Newsome

  “I think I know you,” the man said.

  Gerald looked up, surprised, and shook his head. “Um, I don’t think so.”

  “You’re Gerald Wilkins. I was at your great-aunt’s funeral. Mason Green, chairman of the Museum Trust.”

  He shook Gerald’s hand in a firm grip. Gerald thought maybe he did recognize the man from the church hall.

  “I’m sorry about this unpleasantness,” Green said, nodding toward McElderry’s office. “Touchy business, this diamond thing. Mr. Gupta and his daughter have been on a plane all night to get here from Delhi and he’s not in the best of humor.”

  “So I see,” Gerald said.

  “Once all this is sorted, I’d like to have a chat with you. I knew Geraldine very well and I think it most appropriate that we become acquainted.” He reached into his suit pocket and took out a business card. “Give me a call and let’s have lunch, shall we?”

  Gerald looked at the card in his hand. It said simply: Sir Mason Green GCMG, with a London telephone number.

  “Um, sure,” Gerald said. “Thanks very much.”

  “Not at all, Gerald. The pleasure is all mine. Now, I best get inside and make sure those two remain gentlemen.”

  He swung the door closed behind him.

  “Watch out for the turtle!” Sam called out as the door pulled to.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “Well, you’re mixing with the muckety-mucks, aren’t you?”

  Gerald, Sam, and Ruby made their way down the broad marble staircase to the museum ground floor, leaving Professor McElderry and Mr. Gupta to argue in peace.

  “You know who just invited you to lunch?” Ruby said.

  “Nope,” Gerald replied. “Some bloke from the Museum Trust?”

  Ruby laughed. “That’s Sir Mason Green, dopey. He’s one of the richest men in Britain. He’s in the papers all the time, doing charity stuff. He’s worth squillions.”

  “Yeah,” Sam said. “He’s almost as rich as you.”

  Gerald blushed and tried to change the subject. “So, were you looking through the professor’s stuff?” he asked Sam.

  “Course I was,” Sam said. “Couldn’t help it, could I? Half of his office landed in my lap.”

  “While you and Mackleberry were outside we managed to find one thing of interest,” Ruby said. “Look.”

  She pulled a crumpled piece of paper from her pocket and handed it to Gerald. He flattened it out to reveal a rough pencil sketch of a rectangular box, decorated on the sides with a pattern of suns and moons. In a barely legible scrawl under the drawing was written: Sketch of Noor Jehan casket copied from papyrus believed originally from Library of Alexandria (c200 AD).

  Gerald studied the drawing, trying to divine some meaning from the pencil lines on the paper.

  “It was on top of his desk,” Ruby said. “Seems it might be top of mind for the professor, as well as for your skinny mate.”

  Gerald ran a hand across his forehead. “Why would the professor say he didn’t know anything about a diamond casket when this was sitting on his desk?”

  “Dunno,” Sam said. “But I don’t fancy going back and asking him.”

  They reached the Great Court and stepped into the vast space under the glass roof.

  “Now what?” Ruby asked.

  “Beats me,” Gerald said. “We’re no closer to finding out anything about Geraldine or the diamond. Professor McElderry was no use at all.”

  “Look,” Sam piped up. “They’re taking down the police tape.”

  Across the Great Court they saw Constable Lethbridge rolling up the tape outside the Reading Room.

  “Wanna take a look inside?” Ruby asked. She didn’t have to wait for a response. In no time, they were across the floor and through the open doorway. Just inside, Gerald pulled up short and the others bustled into the back of him.

  “Far out,” Gerald exhaled.

  The sheer expanse of the Reading Room took their breath away. It opened up in an enormous circle around them, three stories lined with volume upon volume of books of all sizes—hundreds of thousands of them. Two sets of narrow balconies ringed the insides like ribs, providing access to the upper levels. Above them, light streamed through a bank of arched windows that lined the base of a huge pale blue and gold dome.

  Fifty yards away, on the opposite side of the hall, was the Dumpster that Gerald had seen earlier.

  “Come on,” Gerald said. “Let’s have a look.”

  They crossed the room and found that the Dumpster was filled with broken bits of plaster, including a long section that looked like an elephant’s trunk.

  “I guess this was where the thief was hiding, then,” Gerald said.

  “…and I still can’t find my elephant.”

  Sam raised his eyebrows and looked at Gerald.

  “Did you say something about an elephant?” he asked.

  Gerald shook his head. “No. I thought you did.”

  “…a fifteenth-century statue of Ganesha gone without a trace. Must have weighed a ton and a half.”

  The disembodied voice seemed to come out of the air around them. Sam wriggled a finger in his ear. “There it is again,” he said. “Something about a statue—”

  “Shhh!” Ruby hissed. “Look!”

  She pointed across the room. There, standing in a group, was Professor McElderry, Mr. Gupta, his daughter, Constable Lethbridge, and another policeman, who looked like he might be Lethbridge’s boss. He was a fair bit older than the constable, and the gray of his short-cropped hair matched his moustache.

  “It’s the professor,” she whispered to Gerald and Sam. “It’s him we can hear.”

  “How can we?” Sam said. “He’s miles away.”

  “The sound must be bouncing off the domed ceiling and coming down here,” Gerald said. “You know, like a satellite dish. How cool is that?”

  “Shushhh!” Ruby hissed again. “If we can hear them, they can probably hear us. Listen.”

  The three huddled their heads in tight and listened hard.

  “…you think the thief was hiding inside the replica statue for at least a day before the robbery, Inspector Parrott?”

  “That’s Mr. Gupta’s voice,” Sam said. Ruby’s sharp elbow into his rib cage produced a muffled grunt and persuaded Sam to keep his thoughts to himself.

  “Yes, that’s right, Mr. Gupta,” the inspector said. “We’re dealing with a professional gang. To smuggle a fake statue into the Reading Room and remove the original was a feat in itself. To have overpowered one of our finest men here in Constable Lethbridge, well, that must have taken immense strength and planning.”

  Gerald popped his head up. Even from across the other side of the room he could tell that Mr. Gupta was less than convinced by the inspector’s description of Constable Lethbridge.

  “Is it not true that this policeman was found with his trousers around his ankles and a bunch of flowers up his—”

  “Mr. Gupta!” Inspector Parrott interrupted, “I can assure you the Metropolitan Police Service is doing all it can to retrieve your diamond. We have a number of very promising leads and we’ll keep Sir Mason posted on any breakthrough.”

  “That’s all very well,” Gupta said. “But the fact is this man was the last person to be with my diamond. So far the only evidence we have about a supposed thief is the constable’s word for it. How do we know he didn’t break the statue and take the diamond himself?”

  “We have every faith in Constable Lethbridge and his story,” Inspector Parrott said. “Not to put too fine a point on it, the state in which we found the constable required the involvement of at least one other person. It’s just not possible to do that type of injury to yourself. We tried to replicate it in the forensics lab and the results were”—the inspector let out an involuntary shudder—“not pretty. Don’t worry. We’ll find your diamond. No reputable collector will go near it.”

  Gupta scoffed.

  “It’s not the reputable collectors I’m worried abou
t,” he said.

  The professor grumbled a thank-you to the inspector and led Mr. Gupta and his daughter out of the Reading Room. Constable Lethbridge sighed with relief.

  “That wasn’t too bad,” he said.

  “Lethbridge!” the inspector barked. The friendly tone he had used with Mr. Gupta had evaporated. “Thanks to you, the Metropolitan Police Service is a global laughingstock. Someone manages to smuggle themselves into this room hidden inside a statue—a statue of an elephant no less—then proceeds to use your arse for target practice before disappearing with the most valuable diamond in the world, and you think it’s ‘not too bad’!”

  “Well, I thought—”

  “You’re not paid to think, Lethbridge. Your diamond thief escaped, leaving the room locked from the inside. So there must be another way out. I suggest you round up any of your colleagues who’ll still talk to you and find it.”

  “But we’ve already looked—”

  “Well, look again!”

  Inspector Parrott stormed out of the Reading Room, leaving Constable Lethbridge speechless.

  Ruby motioned for the others to follow her to a nearby desk.

  Before he moved, Sam said in a deep voice, “And hurry up about it, Lethbridge.” Across the room, the constable spun around as if he’d heard a ghost. He shook his head, then hurried off.

  “Very funny,” Ruby muttered as her brother and Gerald laughed. “But if we’re going to solve this mystery, we need to find how the diamond got out of this room.”

  Gerald turned a full circle, scanning the walls of books. It seemed impossible. How could anyone get out of a room and leave it locked from the inside? Then, high up on the second balcony, to Gerald’s astonishment, one of the bookcases swung open. A woman stepped out from behind it and walked around the balcony, replacing books on shelves. Gerald noticed that every so often one of the bookcases had a doorknob on one end.

  “Look,” he said to the others. “Some of the bookcases open like doors. Maybe that’s how the thief got out.”

  Sam and Ruby followed Gerald’s gaze. A number of bookcases on both balconies popped open and police officers stepped out, searching for clues.

  “Not much chance of getting up there to have a look with that lot stomping around,” Ruby said. “Let’s have a look down here.”

  Like the higher levels, the ground floor was ringed by bookcases. But they couldn’t find any sign of doorknobs. They moved around the room until they came to a small alcove under a section of the lower balcony. Inside the alcove, they were hidden from the rest of the library. There was a closet on one side that was full of jackets on hangers, and a glass-paneled door on the other. Gerald tried the handle.

  “Locked,” he muttered. Next to the door was a set of pigeonholes, some of which had mail and other bits of paper stuffed into them. Like the rest of the alcove—the ceiling, walls, and floor—they were made of dark polished wood.

  “Well, there’s nothing much in here,” Sam said. “Want to look somewhere else, Gerald? Gerald?”

  Gerald’s eyes had glazed over. A dull ache throbbed across his brow. The pattern of pigeonholes seemed to lift off the wall and wash in front of his eyes. The grid of squares weaved and shimmered like a flag in the breeze. All the squares were dark, deep holes, openings to endless tunnels. Except for one. One square shone with a harsh blue light.

  “Gerald!”

  The sensation of Ruby tugging hard on his elbow yanked Gerald out of his apparent stupor.

  “Are you okay?”

  Gerald rubbed his eyes.

  “I’m fine,” he said. “I sort of blanked out, I guess.” Gerald was used to wandering off in his thoughts during school lessons—especially during history classes—but he’d never wandered off on his own time before.

  “That’s weird,” he mumbled. “I thought one of these boxes—” He stuck his hand deep into one of the pigeonholes and let out a surprised grunt.

  “What is it?” Sam asked.

  “It feels like a metal handle. You know, like on a cabinet.”

  “Give it a twist. See what happens.”

  Gerald turned the handle clockwise a quarter turn. There was a dull click. He pulled his hand out of the pigeonhole and looked at the others. “Maybe this bit of the wall opens up like those bookcases,” he said.

  He pushed on the far edge of the shelf but it wouldn’t budge.

  “That was a bit useless,” Gerald said.

  Then the wooden floor beneath their feet dropped dead away.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Gerald, Sam, and Ruby landed in a knot of arms and legs and bounced onto a thick mat with a chest-flattening “oof.” A rectangle of light from the Reading Room alcove above disappeared as the trapdoor swung back into place. They were left in absolute darkness.

  “You all right?” Gerald grunted, shoving what he guessed was Sam’s knee off his face. He elbowed himself into a sitting position and blinked hard. No good. Couldn’t see a thing.

  Muffled grumbles on either side of him suggested Sam and Ruby were okay.

  “I guess this is how the thief got out of the Reading Room, then,” Ruby’s voice came out of the darkness. “Where are we?”

  “Dunno,” Sam said. Gerald could hear him patting about with his hands. “I can’t see a thing.”

  Sam’s attempts at discovery continued for a while, then he called out, “Hold on! I think I’ve got something.”

  The blackness was broken by a spark and the smell of burning sulfur. A small flame appeared, illuminating Sam’s face.

  “Found some matches,” he said. “And a half pack of Dunhills—looks like our thief is a smoker.” The match burned out and they were thrown back into darkness.

  Another match ignited. Gerald could make out the vague shape of Sam’s head in the distance.

  “Well, hel-loo,” Sam murmured, “what do we have here? Ow!” The match extinguished, and the darkness engulfed them again.

  “What is it?” Ruby asked.

  Her face was suddenly lit up. She shielded her eyes. “Hey!”

  “Ta-dah!” Sam cried. He emerged out of the murk with a flashlight strapped to his head. “Found this on the ground.”

  “What is it?” Gerald asked.

  “It’s a headlamp,” Sam said.

  He moved his head and the flashlight beam shone around the room, like a slow-turning lighthouse. They had landed on a large padded mat, the type used in school gyms. They were in an open space that disappeared in all directions into the darkness. To one side, near the mat, a bank of scaffolding stretched up toward the trapdoor.

  “Here,” Sam said to Gerald. “Steady this and I’ll climb up for a look.”

  Gerald and Ruby grabbed hold of the lower sections of scaffold as Sam clambered his way toward the top.

  “What do you see?” Gerald called up. The light from the flashlight bounced around the dusty ceiling.

  Sam’s voice came back to them, “There’s some rope and pulleys and an electric winch. But I can’t see how to open the trapdoor. I don’t think we’re getting out this way.”

  He climbed back down and jumped the last section to rejoin Gerald and Ruby. In the light from the flashlight they could see the floor was littered with food wrappers, drink containers, and cigarette packets, as well as a few candle stubs. A pile of discarded teabags lay by a small camp stove.

  “Here, give me the matches,” Gerald said to Sam, and he lit a candle, standing it upright in a plastic cup. “I’d say they were down here for a while. Look at all this rubbish.”

  “I’ll take a look over there,” Sam said, and headed off into the darkness.

  Ruby took the matchbook from Gerald and flipped it over. A single letter on each side—a large R in a deep russet red—was the only marking.

  “You don’t think the thin man might be lurking down here?” Ruby asked, keeping close behind Gerald as he poked about.

  “I doubt it,” Gerald said. “There’s not much at all down—”

  A sh
riek cut through the shadows. The light from Sam’s head flashlight suddenly disappeared, leaving Gerald’s candle emitting a pathetic glow.

  “Sam!” Ruby called out. “Are you all right?” She grabbed the candle and moved in the direction of Sam’s cry.

  She stumbled a few steps, then a light flickered on and she found herself just inches from an enormous white face. Her mouth opened in a piercing scream.

  Gerald caught up and grabbed Ruby by the arm. “What’s the matter? What is it?”

  Ruby opened her eyes to find Sam looking sheepish, his headlamp shining on the face of a large statue.

  “I think I found the professor’s elephant,” he said.

  The elephant rested on a wooden cargo pallet, its proud features looking out of place in the dank surrounds.

  “You idiot!” Ruby said.

  Gerald snorted. “You two like screaming, don’t you?”

  Ruby snatched the flashlight from Sam’s head. “I’ll be in charge of lighting from now on,” she said. She shone the lamp onto the statue and bent down to pick up a small brass plaque. “‘Ganesha—one of the most revered of Hindu gods,’” Ruby read. “‘Few major tasks are undertaken in India without first making an offering to Ganesha.’”

  “Hey, look at this,” Gerald said. A forklift was parked behind the statue.

  “That must be how they did the switch,” Ruby said. “Winch, ropes, forklift: They came prepared.”

  “What makes you think it was more than one person, genius?” Sam said, still smarting after being called an idiot.

  “You heard the professor,” Ruby said. “This statue weighs over a ton. It would take at least two people to maneuver it, even with a forklift. And how about getting the fake elephant up into the museum? How do you think a guy hiding inside a statue is going to operate a forklift or a winch, genius?”

  Sam bristled. “Cretin!”

  “Imbecile!”

  “Hey, I’m two minutes older than you, moron!”

  Gerald intervened. “Hold on, you two. Let’s concentrate on how we get out of here first. Then you can argue about how many people it takes to corral a marble elephant.”