The 39 Clues [Cahills vs. Vespers] 05 - Trust No One (8 page)

Dr. James smiled. “I’m afraid we can’t show it to you,” she said. “As I’m sure you know, the manuscript is very fragile. We have to keep it under restricted access to preserve it.”

The four teens exchanged glances of disappointment.

Dr. James went on, “I’m sorry about that, but I can take you downstairs to the reading room, and you can have a look at the catalog. We have lots of Voynich resources that might interest you.”

“That would be great,” Amy said politely.

Jake guessed what she was thinking: that any chance to see more of the building could be useful. They followed Dr. James around a corner, where she asked them to leave their bags and backpacks in the lockers that lined the wall. Then they went down some stairs and past another guard into the reading area.

They stopped at the desk and signed in. Dr. James then led them to the computers and sat down in front of one. A few clicks later, she had pulled up a page listing the Voynich-related material held by the Beinecke.

Jake ran his eyes down the list, then gasped. “The Marci Letter is kept here, too? Cool!” He turned to the others. “It’s from the seventeenth century,” he said, “supposedly the earliest surviving written evidence of the manuscript’s history.”

Dr. James looked surprised first, then impressed. “You do know your Voynich,” she said.

“Mostly because of my mom,” Jake said. Struck by sudden inspiration, he said, “Maybe you knew her — Astrid Rosenbloom?”

Now Dr. James looked
really
surprised. “Astrid? She’s your mom?”

“Yes, did you ever meet her?” Atticus asked eagerly.

Somewhat belatedly, Jake said, “I’m Jake Rosenbloom, and this is my brother, Atticus.”

“I should have guessed — you look like her.” Dr. James smiled at Atticus. Then she grew solemn and her voice dropped a little. “I was so sorry to hear about her passing.”

An uncomfortable silence.

Jake wondered how long it took before you could talk about someone who had died with comfortable silences.

“And yes, I did meet her. We e-mailed each other a lot, and she came here once to view the manuscript.”

“She did? When?” Jake asked, a little indignant that Astrid hadn’t invited him to go along.

“Summer,” Dr. James said. “Not this past one, of course — the summer before. In June, maybe?”

That would have been just before she got sick,
Jake thought.
Probably while I was away.
He had spent that summer working as a junior counselor at an eco-camp.

“She came here with . . .” Dr. James paused and gave Jake a quick look he couldn’t interpret. “Do you know Dr. Siffright?” she asked.

Jake shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Oh. Well.” For the first time, Dr. James seemed to fumble for the right words. “They viewed the manuscript together. Dr. Siffright is — um, very intense about the Voynich.”

“You mean she’s one of the angels-and-aliens crowd?” Jake asked in surprise. He knew that Astrid had always found those theories ludicrous.

“Oh, no, nothing like that!” Dr. James said hastily. “Dr. Siffright is a reputable scholar! But most academics have several subjects that interest them. Dr. Siffright is — how should I put it — very single-minded.”

“I get it,” Jake said. Since both his parents were academics, he knew the kind of people Dr. James was talking about. A little batty, but often entertaining when they weren’t boring you to death.

“Anyway, I’m glad I got to meet Astrid,” Dr. James said. “I enjoyed our exchanges — we had some great discussions.”

She looked from Jake to Atticus and back again. Then she clicked through to the home screen on the computer and stood up.

“I’m going to make an exception to the rules,” she said, “in memory of Astrid. Let’s go to my office.”

Dr. James led them through a corridor behind the reading room. At the back of the group, Dan gave Atticus a subtle thumbs-up. So far, the plan — if you could call it that — was working.

In her office, Dr. James made a quick call and a young man named Michael came into her office. She introduced him to the group, then sent him to fetch the Voynich Manuscript.

A few minutes later, Michael wheeled a cart into the office. Dr. James took the manuscript out of its storage box and placed it on a foam wedge to support it.

Jake gasped. “It’s so small!” he said. “I thought it would be way bigger!”

The Voynich Manuscript was about the size of an average paperback book, thick, but not large. It looked like a book, too, its pages bound between flimsy leather covers.

“That’s a common reaction,” Dr. James said. “I think it’s because people who view the manuscript are used to studying the digital images. Those were enlarged to show the detail.”

Jake reached out with his hand, then stopped and looked anxiously at Dr. James.

“Go ahead,” she said. She stepped back and let the rest of them crowd around.

“I can’t believe it,” Jake murmured, clearly awestruck. “I’m actually
touching
the Voynich!”

He opened the cover gingerly.

“Look at the writing,” Amy said. “It’s so tiny!”

The pages contained line after line of text in perfect, delicate calligraphy. “That must have taken
forever
to do,” Atticus said.

Botanical drawings, astronomical charts, more tiny writing. As Jake paged slowly through the manuscript, occasionally sharing comments with Amy and Atticus, Dan started to feel edgy.
Am I the only one who remembers why we’re here?

“The numbers,” he said to Jake. “See the page numbers?”

Each right-hand page had a number in the corner. Ordinary numbers, not in code.

“Those were added long after the manuscript itself was written,” Dr. James said, “some think in the seventeenth century. And they’re not page numbers, they’re folio numbers.”

“Duh!” Atticus said and smacked himself on the side of the head in disgust. “I knew that! With old manuscripts, you almost always talk about folios rather than pages. I can’t believe I forgot.”

“What’s a folio?” Dan asked.

“A leaf,” Atticus said. He moved closer and held a sheet of the Voynich to demonstrate; it had the number twenty on one side. “One folio equals two pages, see? The first is the recto — that means ‘right’ in Latin, the right-hand page —”

“Recto?” Dan snickered. “Any relation to the word
rectum
?”

“Actually, yes.” It was Dr. James who answered. “The Latin root for both words means ‘right,’ but it can also mean ‘straight.’ The rectum is straight, as distinct from the other parts of the intestine.”

“Oh,” Dan said, blushing.

“Cool!” Atticus said. “Anyway, the other side is the verso, the left-hand page, see?”

Dan put his mind back on task. “Seventy-four,” he hissed. “Look up seventy-four.”

Jake flipped gingerly through the manuscript. Dan counted under his breath: “Seventy-two, seventy-three, seventy —”

“Hey, look — a plumbing picture!” Atticus said gleefully.

Pools and basins and canals, all filled with naked women. But this time, Dan wasn’t interested.

“Turn back one,” he said to Jake.

Seventy-three.

“Now forward.” To the plumbing picture again.

Amy frowned and leaned closer. “Seventy-five?” she said, and her eyes met Dan’s.

About time she caught on!

There was no doubt about it.

Folio 74 was missing.

Dan’s thoughts were crashing into one another like a multicar pileup on the highway.

Where is it? Who stole it? It couldn’t have been the Vespers — they sent
us
to steal it for them! How can we steal it if it isn’t here? And if we don’t — can’t — what will happen to the hostages?

He saw the stricken expression on Amy’s face and knew that she was having the same thoughts.

Dan forced himself to concentrate.
One thing at a time.

“Do you see that?” He put on a fake-excited voice. “Page seventy-four — it’s missing!” Dan turned to Dr. James. “Did you know that already? Or did we, like, discover it?”

Beside him, he could feel Amy’s muscles tense.

“We did know about it, but thank you anyway,” Dr. James said. “There are several folios missing — the online records give a complete list.”

“Do you know when the missing folios disappeared?” Amy asked.

Dr. James shook her head. “No, but they were already missing when Wilfrid Voynich bought the manuscript.”

“In 1912,” Jake reminded them.

It seemed that Atticus had finally noticed the Cahills’ distress and was puzzling things out, too. “Dr. James, did you just say that the list of missing folios is online?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Oh,” Atticus said. “That’s nice. That way, ANYONE CAN TELL WHICH ONES ARE MISSING.”

In Dan’s opinion, Atticus would be well advised to stay away from acting as a career. But his message came through clearly: The Vespers had to know already that Folio 74 was no longer part of the manuscript.

Then why do they still want us to steal it?

Unanswerable, at least for the moment.

The hastily scraped-together plan called for Dan to create a distraction, aided by Amy and Jake. It was Atticus’s job to pilfer the manuscript and get it out of the building somehow, the thinking being that as the youngest, he would look the most innocent.

Dan moved away from the manuscript and toward Dr. James. Then he clapped one hand to his eye.

“Ow!” he said. “My contact, I lost my contact!”

He dropped to his knees right next to Dr. James. Just as he hoped, she bent over and began helping him search for the imaginary contact lens.

Then Amy grabbed his elbow.

“It’s okay, Dan,” she said with a forced smile. “You — um, you DON’T REALLY NEED IT, do you?”

“What?” Dan almost yelped.
What’s with her?! She can’t have forgotten the plan already!

“He doesn’t need his contact lens?” Dr. James looked up in surprise.

“Of course I need it!” Dan pulled his arm away from Amy and glared at her. “Thanks for your help, Dr. James. ISN’T SHE NICE TO BE HELPING?”

Amy glared right back at him. “What I meant was, you have all those extra pairs in your suitcase, so THERE’S NO NEED FOR DR. JAMES TO LOOK FOR IT.”

Meanwhile, Atticus was edging closer to the manuscript and had one hand on it. Amy reached over and brushed his hand away.

“Atticus, whatever you’re thinking about doing, you can’t do it now. We need to get going because — because IT’S TIME FOR YOUR NAP.”

“My
nap
?” Atticus looked utterly bewildered.

Just then Jake started to say something. “Oh, I get it — er, I mean, you’re right, Amy. YOU NEED TO TAKE A NAP, ATTICUS.”

Dan still had one hand over his eye. “Will someone please help me find my contact?”

Amy grabbed Atticus with one hand and yanked Dan up with the other. “We should go now,” she said, her voice so bright it was almost shrill. “That way we can get Dan another contact and Atticus can have his nap! Thank you, Dr. James, we really appreciate your bending the rules for us.”

“You’re welcome,” Dr. James said, still pleasant but clearly bewildered.

“Yes, thanks, this was great,” Jake said. “Really, thank you so much.” He put his hand on Dan’s shoulder. It might have looked like a friendly gesture, but Jake had a pincer grip and pushed Dan toward the door.

Meanwhile, Amy dragged Atticus out of the room.

Without the manuscript.