TEN

“I’m going to step out and let you finish your business with Jill,” I said. “Why don’t you call me when she’s gone, Paul?”

I was reeling from seeing Barr’s face on a library document just moments after Gibson told me she didn’t know the girl.

“What’s the matter? You see a ghost?” Battaglia asked.

“Yes, I did. The one I’ve been trying to channel since you told me to find her.”

I was angry about being a pawn in the middle of their deal. Jill Gibson had lied to me, and the district attorney let her do it.

Jill leaned over and tapped her finger on the table. “You’ve tipped your hand, Paul. It’s the photograph.”

Battaglia wasn’t rattled. He had a reason for playing this the way he had chosen, and irking me was of no consequence to him.

“Sit down, Alexandra. Pouting doesn’t become you.” He waved at me with the lighter that he held to the tip of the cigar. “Jill’s in the middle of some professional difficulties and I’d just agreed to open an investigation when the Barr girl got herself tied up the other night.”

“Got herself what? Not exactly the way I’d describe that attack, Paul. What do you know that I don’t? I understand how sensitive the issues are at an institution like the library.”

“We’ve spent so many decades dealing with the renovation and modernization of the building itself, Alex, that we’ve dropped the ball on most of the other problems,” Jill said. “They’ve festered and grown.”

“Tell her why you were brought in,” Battaglia said, puffing on the cigar that was plugged into the middle of his mouth.

“I spent the first twenty years of my career at the NYPL, so I know the collections-and the characters-quite well. In the century since we opened, there was never any relationship between the research library-this central building-and the branches. I’m heading the long-overdue consolidation of the two divisions. There are now ninety-three branches, so that’s a big enough undertaking of its own. But at the same time I’ve walked into a firestorm.”

“Why?” I took my seat across from Jill Gibson.

“There are personal issues involving some of our trustees that have spilled into the boardroom. Battles over family fortunes have us in and out of court. A century ago, Samuel Tilden’s nieces and nephews fought tooth and nail to break his testamentary trust so that the library would never be created, from the first day of probate. Brooke Astor’s estate wasn’t the first to be dragged through a court of law-by her own son, no less-and it won’t be the last.”

“That can’t be unusual for museums or any other institutional beneficiaries, can it?”

“Certainly not. But we aren’t a museum, Alex. That’s one of the things that makes our situation unique.”

“What do you mean?”

“Very often, when trustees or benefactors of the library die, we inherit not only their manuscripts and books. We get other works of art, too. But we’re a library and a research institute. We can’t care for great art, nor can we curate it. Most of the time, we can’t even hang it on our walls. And yet, if we violate the wishes of the dearly departed, we’re likely to lose everything else bequeathed to us.”

“So there’s been trouble in-house because you’ve been selling art that the library owns?”

Jill looked to Battaglia before she answered.

“That’s part of it. I think it’s what Paul refers to as our lack of transparency. One of the committees made the decision to deaccession a major painting a few years ago that had been left to us by one of our most famous donors, and after the full board learned about the transaction, some of the trustees really thought it was grounds for murder.”

“Tell me more about it.”

“Forget it, Alex,” Battaglia said, drawing back his lips around the cigar. “I’ve got someone on that.”

“From the U.S. Attorney’s Office?” I asked. The feds had jurisdiction over matters involving culturally significant works of art, but it was unusual for Battaglia to want to share a major investigation with them.

“Nobody mentioned the feds, did they?”

“Who did you assign to it, Paul? I’ll work with him,” I said. “We’ll make it a joint investigation. Whatever has been going on might have something to do with Barr’s assault, or the murder of Karla Vastasi.”

“Someone’s been stealing from the library, Alex,” Jill said. “That’s the reason I called Paul for help. Whoever it is-or they are-has got to be stopped. We’ve got treasures under our roof worth millions of dollars, some of them not even cataloged, and we’re starting to bleed from the losses.”

Now I felt guilty for holding back the information about the jeweled book that had been found under Vastasi’s body.

“What do you know about the Bay Psalm Book?” I asked.

Battaglia’s eyes narrowed as he listened to Jill’s answer. “It’s a very rare piece of Americana. Interestingly enough, the Puritans considered Hebrew to be the ‘mother’ of spiritual languages and used it in many of their services. The book is a makeshift translation of David’s Psalms from the original Hebrew into English, printed in Massachusetts when the first presses were set up. It’s one of the most important items that came to the library with the Lenox collection.”

Now Battaglia shifted his gaze to me. “I guess your memory’s improving, Alex. Is that the book the cops found last night?”

“Can’t be the same. The one they vouchered came from the Hunt collection, not from Lenox. Minerva was quite emphatic about its history.”

Jill Gibson’s elbows were on the table and she rested her head in her hands. “The police have it? Is it covered with precious stones?” she asked without looking up.

“Yes.”

“That will be another blow to Leland Porter,” Jill said, referring to the library’s president. “I don’t think anyone’s aware that the Hunt piece had gone missing.”

“Stolen or deaccessioned?” Battaglia asked. “We’ve got to know that before we go looking for bad guys. You’ll check on that, Jill. Does it literally have jewels on the binding?”

“Yes, it does. Jasper Hunt took a perfectly interesting piece of history-not important literature-and turned it into a garish little objet d’art, a personal vanity. It’s been locked away in a library vault for as long as I can remember,” Jill said. “The only one we display-the one that scholars work with-is the Lenox version of the Bay Psalm Book. Thank you, Alex, for letting me know about this.”

I couldn’t tell whether my revelation would come back to bite me or not.

“Do you know where Tina Barr is?” I asked Gibson.

“No, I don’t.”

“But you know her, don’t you?”

Jill grimaced as she looked to Battaglia again. “I’m sorry I lied to you before. I, uh-I wasn’t sure Paul wanted me to tell you the story. Yes, she used to work in our library. She trained there as a conservator.”

“What exactly do conservators do?” I asked.

“It’s a field that requires great skill. They’re responsible for the preservation of all our rare documents and books. They’ve got to be knowledgeable about the history of the materials, and have enough scientific education to understand the structural stability and characteristics of whatever they’re working on. Tina’s young, but she’s one of the best.”

“When did she stop working at the library?”

“She was full-time with us until a year ago. Then she started working with Jasper Hunt,” Jill said. “But that isn’t unusual. All the private collections of that quality have conservators, and because we have our own lab, many of them-like Tina-do their work right in our facility.”

“So it wasn’t a problem that she went to work for Hunt?”

“Of course not. We viewed it as an advantage for Tina to catalog everything in his home. We expect to get the rest of his collection some day. It’s been promised to us.”

“Unless one of his children convinces him to change his will,” Battaglia said.