Jamie Brodie 02 - Hoarded to Death

I looked at the caller ID; it said “Unknown Number.” Of course. I grabbed a pen and paper to take notes, and answered. “Hello?”
    A female voice. That was a surprise. The voice sounded disguised, but it was definitely female. “Dr. Brodie.”
    “Yes?”
    “I understand that the university is interested in old manuscripts.”
    “That’s right.”
    “So your donor is still interested?”
    “Yes, if an attractive item was to come available.”
    “How much is your donor willing to spend?”
    “Well, that depends on the item, its condition, its authentication…”
    “Oh, authentication won’t be a problem.”
    “May I ask what it is that you have?”
    “I don’t have it.” The voice’s disguise seemed to be slipping a bit; the pitch was rising. The speaker was starting to sound like a teenager. “But I know where it is.”
    “Don’t be offended by my asking this, but is it yours to sell?”
    She laughed. “That’s not a problem.”
    Like hell . “That’s good to hear. May I ask what the item is?”
    “It’s a page from a ninth century manuscript.”
    I tried to sound offended. “Just one page?”
    “I don’t want to talk about this any more on the phone. Do you think your donor would be interested, or not?”
    “Well, yes, I think it’s possible. But we’re going to have to examine the item here at the university before the donor will consider making an offer.”
    “ Right. How soon can we set that up?”
    “Um – it’s Friday afternoon, our manuscript specialist is gone for the day. I’ll have to talk to him and get back with you. Can I get your name and number?”
    “I’d rather not do that. I’ll call you back. When will you know?”
    “Monday afternoon. After 3:00, 3:30. I won’t get a chance to meet with him before then.”
    “Okay, fine. I’ll call you at 3:30 on Monday.” She hung up.
    Whoa . I set down the phone and scrawled the rest of my notes. Then I picked up my office phone and called Detective Eckhoff.
    “Eckhoff.”
    “Hey, it’s Jamie Brodie. I just got a call on the phone you gave me.”
    “No shit .” He sounded excited. Come to think of it, I was kind of excited myself. “Did you get a name?”
    “No. She wouldn’t give her name or number.”
“A woman? ”
    “Yep. She was trying to disguise her voice, but not doing a very good job. Definitely a woman. She sounded young.”
    “What else did she say?”
    I read him the conversation as constructed from the notes I took. He was impressed. “You got a lot there.”
    “Well, not really. I don’t have an ID or location or anything.”
    “No, but it sounds like this might be the person with the torn page. Or at least that person’s agent.”
    “Yeah. So do you want to be here when she calls back?”
    “Sure do. You said 3:30 Monday?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Okay, I’ll come to your office. See you then.”
    Finally . Maybe we were going to get a break in this case.

    UCLA’s rugby team was having a great year. I was teaching Pete the details of the game, and we went to matches when we could. On Saturday afternoon, UCLA was playing UCSB. It was a chilly day, but clear, so we bundled up and went to campus. We were settling into our bleacher seats when I spotted Kendall McEwen a few seats down. He saw me at the same time and waved, then came over to join us. “Hey, mate! Mind if I sit?”
    “No, no, sit down. How’s it going?”
    Kendall and I talked for a while about my upcoming trip to Oxford. The match began, and my attention was divided between the field and Kendall, who kept up a constant stream of chatter. He kept touching my arm, nudging me, being almost…flirtatious, but I didn’t think much about it. The talk from other Oxonians was that Kendall was an equal opportunity flirt, but was completely straight when push came to shove. I could believe that. Kendall had always seemed like the kind of guy who wanted to be admired by everyone in the room, male or female.
    UCLA had scored two quick trys but was having a run of sloppy play. I was trying to pay more attention to the game when Kendall asked, “So, any word on your scrap of illuminated manuscript?”
    I was about to answer him when UCSB scored a penalty goal. Pete leaned into me and pointed at the field. “Okay, what just happened there?”
    I explained, which took a while – Pete kept asking questions, which I wanted to answer because I wanted him to learn and enjoy the game. It distracted me from Kendall, and I completely