The Book of Air and Shadows

a hell of a lot about antique ciphers.”
    “That’s why you stole the grille from that church.”
    “You know about that?” This with some alarm.
    “I know everything. Why didn’t you just steal the Bible?”
    “Bulstrode
did
steal it. And then he got me to swipe the grille. Man, by that time he was so paranoid he thought there were gangs of scholars on the same search and he wanted to slow them down, if they happened to have just the ciphertext. He assumed that you’d give the ciphered pages to someone, your pal at the library for instance, and a general hunt would be on. That’s why he came back to New York. He wanted to get to you and get the cipher pages from you. He had the grille and-”
    “Shvanov grabbed him up and tortured him. Why was that?”
    “He thought Bulstrode was double-crossing him. Someone, I never found out who, called Shvanov and told him that Bulstrode was dealing with another group hunting for the play manuscript. Shvanov went crazy and-”
    “Another group? You mean us? Mishkin?”
    She considered this for a moment, chewing her lip. “No, I don’t think it’s you they meant. Someone else, some other gangsters. A guy named Harel, also Russian. They’re all Russian Jews, all related in some way, rivals or former partners. They mainly talk in Russian, so I don’t get much information…”
    “And what about this Miranda Kellogg that Mishkin is always going on about? What’s her story?”
    “I only met her once,” she said. “I have no idea who she really was, some kind of actress or model Shvanov hired to get the Bracegirdle original away from Mishkin. They sent the real heiress away on a freebie vacation and presented the actress as Kellogg.”
    “What happened to her?”
    “I think she held up Shvanov for more money after she had the thing and he got rid of her.”
    “Killed her?”
    “Oh, yeah. She’s dead. Gone.” She shivered. “Dead as Bulstrode. Shvanov doesn’t like people screwing him.”
    “
Was
Bulstrode double-crossing Shvanov?”
    “Oh, yeah. Not with any other gangsters, though, as far as I know. But he never had any intention of handing over the play if we found it. Are you kidding? March told me he was planning to give it to the nation, with of course the proviso that he have sole access to it and the right to do a first edition. They’d lock him and it up in the Tower and Shvanov could just go suck a frog. I mean the man was a Shakespeare scholar down to the bones. He used to talk about it, with fucking stars in his eyes, the poor jerk!”
    “Well, no perforated Bible has turned up as far as I’m aware, so we have to assume that Shvanov has it. What happened to the actual grille?”
    “Shvanov has that too, obviously, because Bulstrode took it with him when he left England. And when they put the boots to him Bulstrode must have told him about Mishkin having the original letter and he already knew you must have kept the originals of the ciphered letters. Didn’t anyone try to get them from you?”
    “Oh, yeah, they tried,” said Crosetti, and briefly related the events lately transpired in Queens. He added, “So the basic situation is, we have only the ciphers, he has only the grille: the classic Mexican standoff. Or am I missing something
again
, Carolyn?”
    This last was in response to a peculiar expression that swiftly crossed her face. She said, “Do you have have the ciphers here? I mean right here in this room.”
    “Well, the originals are safe in a vault at the New York Public Library.
    But I have a digitized version on my laptop here. Encrypted, of course. I have a Breeches Bible too. Mishkin bought two of them. And I have a digitized text of the 1560 edition I put in there back in the city before we-”
    “I have the grille,” she said.
    “You do? Where?”
    In answer, she stood and pulled the robe aside and propped her foot up on the arm of the chair, exposing her inner thigh. “Here,” she said, pointing to a constellation of tiny blue dots on the smooth white skin. He knelt and peered, his face just inches away. The scent of rose soap and Carolyn made his knees tremble. At first the dots looked random, but then he saw the pattern: a stylized weeping willow tree, symbol of mourning. He cleared his throat, but his voice still croaked. “Carolyn, is that a jailhouse tattoo?”
    “Yeah. I made it in my room at Ollie’s after I swiped the grille. I used a pin and ballpoint ink. There are eighty-nine holes.”
    “Jesus