“This article is from twenty years ago, though.”
Ella didn’t reply, and instead waited for Byford to offer something other than a setback. He offered nothing, so she took it upon herself.
“Didn’t Jimmy’s wife say something about pawn shops? That Jimmy dealt with them?”
“She did.”
“Let’s go and have a word with the one she mentioned. They might be able to tell us something.”
“Alright, let me just finish up,” Byford said.
She read the rest of the article while she waited for her partner, finding nothing of value. Alan Yates used to find foreign coins in his shipments, so gave them away to children to play with. She remembered Pogs from back when she was a kid, and Alan was right, the kids would have loved them. Pretty creative judgment on Alan’s part, she thought.
To finish, she checked the two image files. The first was the picture of the smiling boy with the coin, the second was an image she hadn’t yet seen, and one made her skin break out in goosebumps.
“Oh my God,” she said. She thought the cocktail of exhaustion and stress was forcing her eyes to play tricks on her. “Nigel, look at this.”
“What now?” he asked as he got to his seat. He grabbed his jacket before he sauntered over. When he got to the screen, he too froze in shock. “Holy f....”
The picture showed Alan Yates as a younger man, smiling ear to ear while holding two coins over his eyes.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Ella parked their vehicle around 200 feet away from their destination. One of the advantages of being in law enforcement was the parking flexibility but finding spaces in a busy city like Newark was still an arduous task. Ella found an empty curb outside a hardware store where she wouldn’t obstruct traffic.
Aces & Eights was an old brick-and-mortar shop on Dragon Run Road in downtown Delaware. It had a pinstripe canopy cascading down from the roof, immaculately clean and surprisingly appealing, Ella thought. The shop window announced WE BUY GOLD in giant letters that were impossible to ignore. Ella suddenly realized that she’d never actually been in a pawn shop in her life.
Tolling wind chimes announced their entrance through the wooden door. The interior smelled of fresh pine and lemon, and it seemed there wasn’t an inch of space that didn’t boast some ancient relic. The path through the shop was determined by a small strip that could barely stand two people. It ran through the store linearly, like some kind of manual amusement ride. To Ella’s left she saw two elongated masks staring back at her, looking like they belonged to some faraway African tribe. All the bizarre stuff seemed to be at the front, while the rear was decked with bikes, guitars, electronics and jewelry.
They moved to the counter and found it deserted. Ella shouted for assistance.
“Hello. Anyone here?”
“Be right out,” a voice replied. Seconds later, a gentleman appeared from a back room, sweating. “Sorry, some heavy stuff back there. Are you guys okay?”
The gentleman was as stocky as they came. Gray hair decorated his face, from his windswept hair to his gigantic beard that reached his chest. If Ella had to guess, he was about fifty years old. He wore a gray vest that revealed his tree trunk-like arms. Not muscular as such but looked like they could hold a few pounds.
“We don’t mean to bother you, sir, but I’m Agent Dark and this is Agent Byford with the FBI. We’re looking for the owner of this store.”
“That’ll be me. I’m Ace. FBI, you say? Well, I didn’t do it, I promise,” he laughed.
“We’re sure you didn’t. We’re actually investigating a homicide case and we believe you may have known the victim.”
“Old Jimmy,” Ace chimed in before Ella could finish. “Yeah, I heard. I had a feeling the cops would come knocking actually. I don’t know all the details but it’s shocking. Appalling.”
“You expected us, sir?” Byford asked.
“Yeah. And less of the sir. Call me Ace. I named this shop because my eight kids help me run it.”
Ella put the dots together. “Wow, eight children? Do you sell TVs in here? Because I think you need one for your bedroom.”
“Zing!” Jimmy laughed. “They’ve all grown up and left me now. I’d have another eight if my wife was still around. But anyway, me and Jimmy were as close as any married couple, so ask me anything. I got all day.”
Ella appreciated Ace’s cooperation. A lot of people would be afraid of being so helpful in case it cast them in a suspicious light. Given Ace’s size, she doubted he could sneak into three homes unobserved.
“Thank you. Jimmy’s wife said you and he sometimes had spats. Can you tell us about that?”
“Spats?” Ace laughed. “She’s talking out of her backside. This is a man’s business, and banter comes with the territory. Me and Jimmy might have disagreed on a few things but nine times out of ten, we were like brothers. I had a lot of respect for the old man.”
Ella decided to rummage around their relationship before getting to the real question. “What did you disagree on?”
“Prices mostly. His store is a cat’s hair away from mine. Ain’t no one gonna buy a vase from him when I’ve got the same thing for half the price. He was always telling me to put my prices up, but I told him there was no point. If I did that, neither of us would get the sale.”
“Sounds like classic competitor pricing,” Byford said.
Ace pulled his beard and twisted it around. Ella had to wonder how that thing didn’t itch his face off. “Totally. But he had his antiques lovers; I have my bargain hounds. We both got our own niche, but we overlapped when it came to stuff like ornaments, jewelry, coins. Everyday stuff.”
Ella and Byford caught each other’s stare when Ace mentioned the magic word.
“You touched on something we’re very interested in there, Ace. Do you know if Jimmy had any involvement with coins at all? Specifically rare coins?”
Ace rested his hands on the countertop. “Coins you say? Well, you won’t find an antique dealer that doesn’t sell coins, but yeah, Jimmy sold a few.”
Ella felt the walls of this getting smaller. Whenever she got a connection like this, it sent her numb for a few seconds, then the dopamine high kicked in. It was the rush she lived for.
“He did? Do you know what type of coins? Or whether he had any regular buyers?”
“Umm, well I’m not sure about Jimmy’s particular transactions or anything. I know he sometimes sold coins by the bundle. Can I ask why coins are so special here?”
“It’s confidential,” Byford jumped in, abrupt as ever.
Ella thought that maybe they should give a little back. Ace and Jimmy were clearly close, and it didn’t seem fair to not clue him in on some aspects of his friend’s murder.
“We can’t say too much, but two coins were found on Jimmy’s body. We believe they may have some significance to the crime, like perhaps a wronged client looking for vengeance. We still don’t know all the answers yet.”
Ace retreated a little in light of the new information. He was probably picturing the scene in his head. People had a tendency to keep a vicarious distance from the realities of murder, but when presented with specific details, it made it all the more real.