“I’d seen a lot of strange things in Babel’s Tower,” Mr. Haig said, shaking his head and staring out at the radio orchestra beyond the engineering room window. “But these recruits . . . It looked like they were going to drown them. Cold-blooded murder. And there was a strange white light coming from Mrs. Cushing, and it was like a rope, pulling me in. I felt like the whole boat was collapsing on itself. Like . . . like we were sitting on a whirlpool that would take us all down. And then Mrs. Cushing saw me, and I felt like I was looking into the devil’s own eyes.”

“What happened next?” Astrid asked, her own eyes wide with alarm. Bo felt something warm on his arm and realized that she was searching for his hand. He wrapped his fingers around hers and was surprised by the strength of her grip. She wanted comfort; he squeezed back, happy to provide it. Happy she wasn’t mad at him, however momentarily.

Mr. Haig shook his head before he answered her question, looking blank and haunted. “I panicked. The cabin’s doors were open to the deck. I ran outside and jumped overboard. Hurt myself on some rocks, but managed to swim to shore,” he said, nodding toward the stiff leg. “Almost didn’t make it. Thought I was surely dead, but I reckoned it was better to die in the water than on that cursed boat.”

The dim room was quiet for a moment, but for the crackle of electricity coming through the amplification equipment and the soft strains of the orchestra beyond the window. Bo finally asked the question at the forefront of his thoughts.

“Did you see what happened to the Plumed Serpent?” he said, studying Mr. Haig’s troubled eyes. “Do you know where it went for the last year?”

Mr. Haig stared at him for a moment and said, “I don’t know where it went, but I can tell you what I saw when I got to shore. Lightning struck it—a great big white streak from the night sky. And when it did, the damned yacht disappeared into thin air.”

NINETEEN

Shaken up and anxious, Bo matched Astrid’s quick steps back through the executive offices. They didn’t speak until they were heading down the stairs, out of earshot of the people working on the sixth floor. And even then, she was only focused on what they’d just learned from Mr. Haig.

“That had to have been Mrs. Cushing in my vision,” she said, her heels click-clicking as she trotted down the stairs. “She was the woman in the red robe. She was elderly then, but that ritual must have restored her youth. That’s the only thing that makes sense. But how come she wasn’t on the yacht with the rest of the survivors when it crashed?”

“I don’t know, but the police chief said she helped with their investigation last year after the boat went missing. So she had to have gotten off it somehow.” Astrid glanced back at him, eyes fixed on where the gold coin jingled in his coat pocket. He’d taken out the coin and showed it to Mr. Haig before they left the radio station. Astrid had been surprised but didn’t say anything until now. “So it’s a pirate coin, not a disk? Where’s the rest of the idol? Did you destroy it?”

“I sent it along to Mrs. Cushing’s house,” he said, and then briefly told her about prying off the coin and his reasons for doing so. Though Mr. Haig hadn’t been able to identify the symbol on the gold coin, he’d vaguely remembered seeing the turquoise during the ceremony on the yacht. And even if he couldn’t help them with the exact nature of the ritual, he’d at least been able to point them toward Babel’s Tower. It could be dangerous for Bo and Astrid to show their faces there, especially after the threatening letter Bo sent along with the idol. But as long as they didn’t run into Max or Mrs. Cushing, no one should recognize them, and Bo believed that the benefit gained would outweigh the risk. Maybe he’d try tomorrow, if they were open; tonight he had bootlegging runs to manage.

Astrid came to a quick stop on the fifth-floor landing and spun around to look at him as shoppers filed out of the cafe. “How did you find me? It was Jonte, wasn’t it? I knew he was up to no good. ‘I have to telephone Greta,’” she mimicked in Jonte’s low Swedish accent. “That dirty liar.”

She swung around and started to head down the next flight of stairs but stopped again. “You shouldn’t even be out! Dr. Moon told you to stay in bed today and rest. You’re probably tearing those damn stitches right back open, but you don’t even care, do you?” She waved dramatically at his side, squinting at his coat as if she were checking for blood. “And why do you smell like gum?”

“Velma came by the pier,” he said. “It’s one of her remedies. Speeds healing.”

And at the moment, it was itching terribly, so he supposed what Velma had told him about the wound knitting itself together was true. At least the pain was lessening.

Pale blue eyes blinked at him, big and round. “Are you feeling better?” she asked in a softer voice.

He nodded once. “Been worse. Good job with Mr. Haig. That was smart, tracking him down.”

Astrid shrugged off his compliment and descended the stairs at a brisk clip, fur-trimmed coat flying behind her like a cape. She passed the fourth floor and kept going.

He jogged to catch up. “In a hurry to get somewhere?”

“Maybe I am,” she said, lifting her chin.

“I see. Where would that be?”

Her mouth twisted up. She clutched the handbag dangling from her wrist and, instead of continuing her descent, made a sharp turn onto the third floor. Women’s dresses. She strode past a holly-decorated column to browse holiday gowns displayed on headless wirework mannequins.