Chapter 2 - The Letter From a Dead Man
Elena could not make herself touch the envelope.
Dante did it for her.
He took it from the elderly man, inspected the seal, then looked at Elena.
“Do you recognize the handwriting?”
“Yes.”
The answer barely escaped her.
“Who are you?” Dante asked the stranger.
“Samuel Crane.”
Elena knew the name.
Her father had mentioned a Samuel once.
Not fondly.
“You knew him?”
Samuel looked at her.
“I was his attorney.”
Elena almost laughed.
“My father couldn’t afford an attorney.”
“He could once.”
The words hurt more than they should have.
Because there had been a before.
Before the debts.
Before the tiny apartment.
Before Arthur stopped performing.
Before Elena learned not to answer the telephone because debt collectors knew when children sounded afraid.
Dante handed her the envelope.
Elena broke the seal.
Inside was one page.
Ellie,
If Samuel gives you this, then I failed to fix what I allowed fear to destroy.
Do not trust the contract with my signature.
There are two versions.
Find the original.
The theater was never sold.
And the music belongs to you.
Elena stopped.
Dante read over her shoulder.
“The theater was never sold?”
Samuel closed his eyes.
“Arthur discovered the truth too late.”
“What truth?” Elena demanded.
Samuel glanced toward the guests.
“Not here.”
Dante turned to his security chief.
“Clear the ballroom.”
A ripple of objections rose.
Dante did not raise his voice.
“Now.”
Within minutes, billionaires who had expected entertainment were being politely but firmly escorted toward the east wing.
Elena remained beside the piano.
Mrs. Greaves hovered near the door.
Dante looked at her.
“You too.”
Mrs. Greaves stiffened.
“I manage this house.”
“Tonight I do.”
She left.
But before disappearing, she looked directly at Elena.
It was not anger anymore.
It was fear.
Elena noticed.
The ballroom doors closed.
Only Elena, Dante, Samuel and two security men remained.
Dante opened the black case.
Inside lay bundles of documents tied with black ribbon.
A silver pocket watch.
A photograph.
And a leather-bound musical manuscript.
Elena reached for the photograph first.
Two young men stood outside the Vale Theater.
One was Arthur.
The other was unmistakably Dante’s father, Salvatore.
They were smiling.
Friends.
On the back Arthur had written:
We built something beautiful before they taught us to be afraid.
Elena looked at Dante.
“You knew?”
“No.”
“You expect me to believe your father never mentioned mine?”
“My father mentioned very little about his past.”
Samuel sat heavily.
“They were partners.”
Elena turned.
“In the theater?”
“Arthur owned sixty percent. Salvatore financed the restoration and held forty.”
“But the Vale Theater belonged to Calder Properties when it closed.”
Samuel nodded.
“That is where the stolen contract comes in.”
He explained.
Twenty-two years earlier, developer Victor Calder had wanted the block where the theater stood. Arthur refused to sell.
Then Salvatore Moretti became entangled in a criminal investigation.
Calder saw leverage.
A replacement contract appeared transferring Arthur’s ownership to a shell company.
Arthur’s signature was genuine.
The pages above it were not.
“They switched the signature page,” Samuel said.
Elena stared.
“You knew?”
“Not then.”
“When did you know?”
“Three years later.”
“And you said nothing?”
Samuel looked ashamed.
“I was threatened.”
Elena stepped back.
“My father lost everything because you were afraid?”
“Yes.”
The honesty stopped her.
Samuel did not defend himself.
“He tried to fight,” Samuel continued. “But by then Salvatore had disappeared from the theater partnership, Calder controlled the building, and Arthur was publicly accused of financial misconduct. Venues stopped hiring him.”
Elena remembered her father reading rejection letters at the kitchen table.
She had thought he was unlucky.
He had been buried alive.
“What does the music have to do with it?” Dante asked.
Samuel pointed to the manuscript.
“Arthur and Salvatore hid evidence inside things Calder would never understand.”
Dante opened the manuscript.
Numbers were written beside certain measures.
Dates.
Initials.
Bank references.
Elena’s heart raced.
“A ledger?”
“Partly.”
Dante turned pages.
Then stopped.
One had been torn out.
“Where is page forty-seven?”
Samuel’s face changed.
“I don’t know.”
Dante looked toward the ballroom doors.
“Elena. Who had access to this house before tonight?”
She almost answered nobody.
Then remembered Mrs. Greaves.
Her fear.
Her insistence that Elena leave the piano.
“I think your housekeeper knows something.”
Dante’s security chief immediately touched his earpiece.
“Find Greaves.”
A pause.
Then his expression hardened.
“She’s gone.”
Dante stood.
“Gone where?”
“Her car left through the service gate six minutes ago.”
Elena felt cold.
Samuel rose too.
“If she knew about the archive—”
A violent crash sounded from the corridor.
One security man opened the door.
A maid stood outside.
White-faced.
“Sir.”
“What happened?”
“The archive room.”
Dante moved first.
They followed him through the manor.
At the end of the west corridor, smoke curled beneath a door.
Security rushed forward.
The lock had been broken.
Inside, papers burned in a metal waste bin.
Dante kicked it over and smothered the flames with a rug.
Elena coughed through the smoke.
Then she saw something on the floor.
A photograph.
Half burned.
She picked it up.
Arthur stood beside a young woman.
The woman’s face had survived the flames.
Elena knew her.
Mrs. Greaves.
But on the back, Arthur had written another name.
Margaret Calder.
Elena stared at it.
Calder.
Samuel whispered behind her.
“Oh God.”
Dante turned.
“What?”
Samuel looked toward the open archive door.
“Margaret Greaves isn’t a housekeeper.”
Elena’s phone vibrated.
Unknown number.
A photograph appeared.
It showed the boarded entrance of the abandoned Vale Theater.
Underneath were six words.
COME ALONE IF YOU WANT PAGE 47.
May you like
Then another message appeared.
AND DON’T TELL DANTE MORETTI.
