After Mrs. Berkovich brought steaming bowls of soup, fresh bread, and half-sour pickles pulled from fat wooden barrels near the counter, Lowe retrieved the amulet base. The strange, disconcerting vibration it emitted grew louder as he unwrapped it. “Take a look.”

Adam whistled in appreciation. “This is it, eh?”

“What do you think? Can you do it?” Lowe glanced at Stella playing with the windup cat. She didn’t seem to “hear” the amulet, which was probably a good thing. Adam didn’t comment about it, either.

“May I?” Adam asked, pulling out a pair of jewelers’ eyeglasses with extended magnifying lenses.

“Be my guest. I can’t stand to touch the thing. Gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

Adam turned it in his hand, leaning closer for inspection. “Same strange red tarnish to the gold as the crocodile statue, but completely different method of casting.”

“A thousand years older, different place. Pay close attention to the hole at the top.” Lowe pulled out a black pocket notebook from his suit and roughly sketched the finished shape of the amulet with the four crossbars stacked on the top—or how he theorized it would look, based on known descriptions and other djed pillars depicted in stoneware and jewelry from that time period.

“A curator at the de Young Museum looked at it—daughter of the antiquities department head.”

“The one who offered to buy it?”

“The very one. I just came from seeing her.” Lowe tapped his fingertips on the table and felt Adam’s eyes boring into him. “Came from seeing her father, I mean. Her and her father.”

Adam made a guttural noise that was both judgmental and amused. “Pretty?”

“The father?”

“Screw you.”

“Hadley, then.”

“Oh, Hadley,” Adam drawled. “Ech. One day home and you’re already on first-name basis? Damn you and your crazy Viking height and that lying smile of yours. What does she look like?”

“She’s interesting.” Well, she was. And he didn’t really know how to describe her. Part of him wanted to tell Adam about the “cock” slip and the astounding shape of her ass, but some irrational part of his brain selfishly wanted to keep it all for himself.

“Fine, don’t tell me. Is her father still buying this from you?”

“Even better. The man claims he found the crossbars that fit into the top. His dead wife hid them around the city years ago. He wants me to track them down and sell him this so he’ll have the whole thing.”

Adam looked at him above his magnifying spectacles. “How much?”

Lowe told him.

“No.”

“Oh, yes,” Lowe confirmed. “And God willing, if I find them, I want you to copy each piece exactly.”

“It’ll take me a couple of weeks to forge this one.”

“That’s fine. The crossbars will be smaller. Less detail.” Lowe slipped his friend an envelope with a rather hefty wad of bills he’d pilfered from Winter’s petty cash that morning; he’d have to replace it when Bacall’s check cleared. “Money to purchase the gold. And keep that thing in the warded vault, Adam. Just in case anyone comes sniffing around.”

“Why would anyone have reason to?”

“Well, for one, Monk is furious about the paperwork for the statue.”

Adam raised his eyes to the ceiling. “Your uncle and his schemes. Are we in trouble?”

“Maybe, I don’t know. I made sure I wasn’t followed here, but watch yourself.”

“Hold on a minute. Am I making the amulet copy for Monk? To repay him for the statue? Why would he trust you again if you’ve cheated him once and got caught?”

“He wouldn’t. You’re making the forgery for Dr. Bacall. I’ll give Monk the real thing.”

“Damn. Sure you’re confident enough to pass off a forgery to an expert?”

Lowe leaned back in his chair and smiled. “Dr. Bacall is blind.”

“Ah.” Adam smiled. “That helps, I suppose.”

“If those crossbars really do exist and you can forge the entire amulet, we’ll be rich. Still, worse case scenario is no crossbars, Monk gets the real base for no charge, and we get fifty grand from Bacall for the forged base.”

“Fifty grand. Even that’s a fortune.”

“Your cut’s half.”

“Lowe—”

“Half,” he insisted, nodding to Stella. “For her, if not yourself. All I did was dig the thing up. Besides, Miriam would whip your ass from the Beyond if you didn’t take it.”

Adam sighed and removed his eyeglasses. “It’s so much more than the statue. Maybe you should just clear your debt with Monk, sell Bacall the forged base, and be done with it.”

“But if I can find the pieces, it’s fifty a piece, Adam. Fifty.”

“If you find the pieces. If.”

“I found part of a mythical object buried in a flooded room halfway across the globe. Searching the city for a few more will be as easy as duck soup.”

SIX

LOWE WAS AN EXCELLENT schmoozer, as Adam would say. But several days later, when he climbed the white marble steps of the Beaux Arts–style Flood mansion and passed his things to the doorman—invitation, hat, white gloves, and overcoat—an old loathing resurfaced. Tailcoats and evening gowns thronged the Grand Hall and the adjoining rooms spilling into it. Old money. Prestige. San Francisco high society.