บท 42: Chapter 42

“I trust you’re recognized now?” Bryan offered me a brandy.

“Thank you.” I accepted the snifter. “Yes, I am.” The problem hadn’t been the security guards but more the assistants and the assistants to assistants who felt the need to throw their weight around.

“Would you mind joining me in the study? I have something I’d like you to see.”

“Of course.” I followed him down the hallway and into the room which was bright with moonlight. Shelves were filled with all manner of books, fiction and nonfiction, and in a corner was a cloisonné globe on a stand. The drapes for the floor-to-ceiling windows hadn’t been drawn yet.

Bryan flipped on the light switch, tugged the drapes closed, then gestured toward his desk.

Spread out on the flat surface was a map and some papers.

“I asked a friend who lives down in Columbia if she’d look into what might have happened to Mark ten years ago. Have you heard of the town of Barichara?”

“I can’t say that I have.”