Proof of Murder (Beyond the Page Bookstore Mystery #4) - Lauren Elliott Page 0,18
to un-see—if she ever could.
Right now, she needed to focus on something else. The room, look at the room. What do you see? The fireplace, a beautifully carved marble mantel with matching pillars framing each side. Something like this could only have been created by a skilled stonemason. She wondered if it had been a local artisan or if the piece had been shipped over from Europe, a common practice of the more affluent in the early nineteenth century. She examined the deep-set inglenook firebox with wrought-iron log burner. If it were just a touch deeper, it would have made the perfect colonial cooking hearth.
She took a step back to admire the craftsmanship of the built-in bookcases on either side of the fireplace and heard a crunch under her foot. She glanced downward. It appeared she was tracking ash bits across the hearth as another wood charcoal piece crumbled under her step. She assumed they had been sparked embers from the fire that Charlotte must have ignited last night judging by the fresh, half-burned logs in the grate. Burned pits dotted the floor in front of the fireplace, and ash was now spread across the wooden floorboard onto the area carpet the desk sat on. It was a shame that Charlotte had been so careless as to burn a fire without the protection of a fire screen. The entire house could have caught on fire or at least the books on the floor.
Books on the floor. In the excitement of discovering the body, she’d completely missed seeing them earlier and reached to pick up the one closest to her foot. Then she stopped—don’t contaminate the crime scene. The words of Marc Chandler, the chief of police, echoed in her mind. This was hardly a crime scene, but if she touched anything else, he would no doubt reprimand her. She was already going to have to explain her prints on the chair back. She pulled her hand away and left the books where they lay.
Then a thought struck her. If she hadn’t turned the chair, the book would have been directly at Charlotte’s feet, as would the other one poking out from under the desk. Addie squinted to try to see if there was actually a dark spot on the cover of the second book, or if it was just a trick of the lighting. Her gaze traveled upward, and she spotted something else she’d missed in the heat of the moment. A tipped-over teacup. The contents had obviously dripped down the side of the desk onto the book below it. Charlotte must have been working on these books when . . . when, what? She clutched at her chest, knocked the cup over, allowing the books on her lap, on the desk, in her hands, to slide to the floor?
It was going to be impossible to inspect the cover for damage without leaving a trail of fingerprints behind, and then she glanced back at the ash that had already been tracked onto the area rug. Too late, the scene was already contaminated. Fingers crossed, Marc wasn’t back from his vacation and Sergeant Jerry Fowley would go easy on her. She snatched up the book and turned it over in her hand. The calfskin cover suffered from the teacup mishap, and when she opened the book to inspect it closer, she gasped. It was Washington Irving’s The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., his collection of thirty-four essays and short stories published in 1819. Irving’s most famous stories included in it were “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Rip Van Winkle.”
She didn’t remember seeing this one yesterday but remembered marking up her version of an auctioneer’s tip card. It was a plain index card on which was noted the book’s publisher, publication date, auction house inventory number, and current market value. Kalea had tucked the card, as instructed by Addie, inside the cover and title page. This particular book was in good condition, not prime, but good. The last few pages didn’t open completely, and the paper was lightly browned along some of the edges. Addie had the same edition in her own collection, and she knew hers was worth about nine thousand dollars. This one, given its wear, would still have gotten Blake about seven thousand at the auction. As it was now, with the tea-stained cover and discoloration, he’d be lucky to get eight hundred to a thousand.
Addie knew this book had been on the table with the others