“I remember, Matthew,” I promised him. “Bye, Chris.”
“See you soon.” Chris gave me a hug and released me quickly. He looked down at my protruding stomach reproachfully. “One of your kids just elbowed me.”
“Or kneed you.” I laughed, smoothing a hand over the bump. “They’re both pretty active these days.”
Matthew’s gaze rested on me: proud, tender, a shade worried. It felt like falling into a pile of freshly fallen snow—crisp and soft at the same time. If we had been at home, he would have pulled me into his arms so that he, too, could feel the kicks, or knelt before me to watch the bulges of feet and hands and elbows.
I smiled at him shyly. Miriam cleared her throat.
“Take care, Gallowglass,” Matthew murmured. It was no casual farewell, but an order.
His nephew nodded. “As if your wife were my own.”
* * *
We returned to the Beinecke at a statelier pace, chatting about the Voynich and Ashmole 782. Lucy was even more caught up in the mystery now. Gallowglass insisted we pick up something to eat, so we stopped at the pizza place on Wall Street. I waved to a fellow historian who was sitting in one of the scarred booths with stacks of index cards and an enormous soft drink, but she was so absorbed in her work she barely acknowledged me.
Leaving Gallowglass at his post outside the Beinecke, we went to the staff room with our late lunch. Everybody else had already eaten, so we had the place to ourselves. In between bites Lucy gave me an overview of her findings.
“Wilfrid Voynich bought Yale’s mysterious manuscript from the Jesuits in 1912,” she said, munching on a cucumber from her healthy salad. “They were quietly liquidating their collections at the Villa Mondragone outside Rome.”
“Mondragone?” I shook my head, thinking of Corra.
“Yep. It got its name from the heraldic device of Pope Gregory XIII—the guy who reformed the calendar. But you probably know more about that than I do.”
I nodded. Crossing Europe in the late sixteenth century had required familiarity with Gregory’s reforms if I had wanted to know what day it was.
“More than three hundred volumes from the Jesuit College in Rome were moved to the Villa Mondragone sometime in the late nineteenth century. I’m still a bit fuzzy on the details, but there was some sort of confiscation of church property during Italian unification.” Lucy stabbed an anemic cherry tomato with her fork. “The books sent to Villa Mondragone were reportedly the most treasured volumes in the Jesuit library.”
“Hmm. I wonder if I could get a list.” I’d owe my friend from Stanford even more, but it might lead to one of the missing pages.
“It’s worth a shot. Voynich wasn’t the only interested collector, of course. The Villa Mondragone sale was one of the greatest private book auctions of the twentieth century. Voynich almost lost the manuscript to two other buyers.”
“Do you know who they were?” I asked.
“Not yet, but I’m working on it. One was from Prague. That’s all I’ve been able to discover.”
“Prague?” I felt faint.
“You don’t look well,” Lucy said. “You should go home and rest. I’ll keep working on it and see you tomorrow,” she added, closing up her empty Styrofoam container.
“Auntie. You’re early,” Gallowglass said when I exited the building.
“Ran into a research snag.” I sighed. “The whole day has been a few bits of progress sandwiched between two thick slices of frustration. Hopefully, Matthew and Chris will make further discoveries in the lab, because we’re running out of time. Or perhaps I should say I’m running out of time.”
“It will all work out in the end,” Gallowglass said with a sage nod. “It always does.”
We cut across the green and through the gap between the courthouse and City Hall. On Court Street we crossed the railroad tracks and headed toward my house.
“When did you buy your condo on Wooster Square, Gallowglass?” I asked, finally getting around to one of many questions about the de Clermonts and their relationship to New Haven.
“After you came here as a teacher,” Gallowglass said. “I wanted to be sure you were all right in your new job, and Marcus was always telling stories about a robbery at his house or that his car had been vandalized.”
“I take it Marcus wasn’t living in his house at the time,” I said, raising an eyebrow.
“Lord no. He hasn’t been in New Haven for decades.”
“Well, we’re perfectly safe here.” I looked down the pedestrians-only length of Court Street, a tree-lined, residential enclave in the heart of the city. As usual, it was deserted, except for a black cat and some potted plants.
“Perhaps,” Gallowglass said dubiously.
We had just reached the stairs leading to the front door when a dark car pulled up to the intersection of Court and Olive Streets where we had been only moments before. The car idled while a lanky young man with sandy blond hair unfolded from the passenger seat. He was all legs and arms, with surprisingly broad shoulders for someone so slender. I thought he must be an undergraduate, because he wore one of the standard Yale student uniforms: dark jeans and a black T-shirt. Sunglasses shielded his eyes, and he bent over and spoke to the driver.
“Good God.” Gallowglass looked as though he’d seen a ghost. “It can’t be.”
I studied the undergraduate without recognition. “Do you know him?”
The young man’s eyes met mine. Mirrored lenses could not block the effects of a vampire’s cold stare. He took the glasses off and gave me a lopsided smile.
“You’re a hard woman to find, Mistress Roydon.”
That voice. When I’d last heard it, it was higher, without the low rumble at the back of his throat.
Those eyes. Golden brown shot through with gold and leafy green. They still looked older than his years.
His smile. The left corner had always lifted higher than the right.
“Jack?” I choked on the name as my heart constricted.
A hundred pounds of white dog pawed out of the backseat of the car, hopping over the gearshift and through the open door, long hair flying and pink tongue lolling out of his mouth. Jack grabbed him by the collar.
“Stay, Lobero.” Jack ruffled the hair atop the dog’s shaggy head, revealing glimpses of black button eyes. The dog gazed at him adoringly, thumped his tail, and sat panting to await further instruction.
“Hello, Gallowglass.” Jack walked slowly toward us.
“Jackie.” Gallowglass’s voice was thick with emotion. “I thought you were dead.”