Jamie Brodie 02 - Hoarded to Death

good."
    "Okay." Kendall went to a back room and returned with two cold bottles of water. He sat back down. "So. How good a look did you get at this torn bit?"
    "I got a very good look. It was in a plastic bag, so I couldn't feel it. But it looked old. Of course I know things can be aged to look old, but if that was the case, it was very well done. And it was definitely from an illuminated manuscript, even if it was a recently done facsimile."
    Kendall mused. "I haven't heard anything about a missing page of a well-known manuscript. And that kind of news gets around in my business. Of course, from what you say, if it was missing, it's been missing for twenty or thirty years up in the old lady's attic."
    "Right."
    I gave Kendall the copy of the page that Belardo had given me. "This was made on a police department copier, through a plastic bag, but it's the best I could do. What do you think?"
    Kendall studied the page. "The script is definitely Latin." He turned it over, then pulled out a magnifying glass and examined it more closely. "How well does the copy reproduce the colors?"
    "They're a shade lighter on the copy, but the tint is pretty close."
    "Huh." He kept studying it for a while. Pete got up and started browsing around the shop. I sipped my water and waited. After about five minutes, Kendall laid down the magnifying glass and straightened up. He handed the copy back to me.
    "If I remember my Latin correctly, those words are from the gospel of John. The bit where Jesus is being buried in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea."
    I was impressed. "I didn't know you were such a biblical scholar."
    Kendall rolled his eyes. " I don't know how you managed to escape Oxford without a religious education. Anyway, the text isn't important, except that it's part of what's missing from the Book of Kells."
    That got Pete's attention. "What??"
    "The Book of Kells ends at John, chapter 17. This bit is from John, chapter 19. It's consistent with the section of pages that's missing from the Book of Kells."
    "Consistent with. But not necessarily the actual page."
    "Oh, no." But Kendall was intrigued. "This is very interesting, though. It's not a copy of the existing book, or of any of its facsimiles, like the one you've got at the university. Because this page doesn't exist in the original Book of Kells, or any of its copies. It could be that some art student took a fancy to create the rest of the book on his or her own. This could be a page from that kind of thing." He looked back at the copied page. "But the artwork and manuscript are very, very close in style to those in the original book." He handed the page back to me.
    I looked at it again, lying there in my hands. "But if the cops took this to a dealer, wouldn't he have recognized the same thing?"
    "Not necessarily. I don't know that any of the dealers in town are experts on illuminated manuscripts. And I very much doubt that any of them read Latin. None of the others have the benefit of an Oxford education, you know."
    Pete snorted and I laughed. "Right. Well, what would you suggest that we do next?"
    Kendall raised his eyebrows. "Right little detective, are you now?"
    I laughed again. "No. But if this does turn out to be something extremely valuable, the police need to know that. So when they find the murderer, they won't just chuck the other section of the page. So, yeah, I'd like to find out what it is for sure, both for law enforcement purposes and to satisfy my own curiosity."
    "I'd stay focused on the academic side of things. Anyone with a profit motive and a less than pristine conscience wouldn't necessarily be honest with you about this."
    I grinned at him. "That's why I came here. Because your conscience is so pristine."
    Kendall laughed a lot at that. "Rig ht, mate." He sobered up a bit and pushed the copied paper back at me. "Keep me informed about what you find. If it does turn out to be something valuable, I'd love to be the one to get the commission on it."
    "Absolutely."
    “Have you been back to Oxford since you left?”
    “No, but I’m planning to go next summer. There’s a paper I want to write, and I need to do some research in the Bodleian. And see a few friends.”
    Kendall nodded. “I was back last year. Hasn’t changed a bit.”
    “Are you kidding? It’s barely changed in three hundred years.”
    He laughed. “True. Good to see you, mate.”
    “You too.” We shook hands. "I'll be in touch."
    We pushed out of the shop and walked to the car. I