Free Irish Gilt by Ralph McInerny

ill-lit bar. Eggs actually shrank in his chair. Then they were gone.
    â€œSo you’re here doing research?” Boris said with a chuckle.
    â€œShe’s a waitress in the restaurant in Grace.”
    â€œNow, don’t apologize.”
    Eggs ordered a Manhattan, pushing away his undrunk beer. He felt the need for strong drink. Boris continued to tease him for a time and then lost interest.
    â€œDo you know why I’m here?” Boris asked.
    â€œTell me.”
    â€œNot to jolly waitresses.” He grew serious. “I am here to persuade the university to open a John Zahm Center.”
    After Boris rapidly outlined his plan, Eggs had to admit it was a great idea. “And you’re going to finance it?”
    Boris sat back, seemed about to say something, then hesitated. Then, “Not entirely.”
    â€œJust donating the travel diary would amount to so much. Your tax man would be delighted.”
    â€œOf course, the diary belongs at Notre Dame.”
    â€œGreg Walsh got the idea you intended to sell it to the university.”
    â€œStrange fellow. Now, what’s this about you being a writer?”
    â€œDo you believe everything a waitress tells you?”
    â€œEggs, the girl is nuts about you.”
    â€œThen why was she fawning over you?”
    â€œTo make you jealous. What’s this about her husband?”
    â€œWhat she said. He threatened me.”
    â€œWhat a romantic figure you’ve become.”
    â€œWhen are you going to let me see Zahm’s travel diary?”
    â€œI’m afraid you might organize an expedition and go in search of El Dorado.”
    â€œWhat’s that got to do with the diary?”
    â€œGuess.”
    â€œWhere are you staying?”
    â€œRight here.”
    â€œWell, I’m in the Jamison Inn. I’d better get going.”
    â€œNot interested in dinner?”
    â€œNot tonight.”
    They rose and shook hands, and as Eggs left the bar Boris called after him. “Watch out for husbands.”

16
    Late that afternoon, Boris Henry stepped out of the workroom at the archives and beckoned Greg Walsh to come in. When the archivist entered, Boris shut the door and went to the table, where he pushed a box toward Greg. “Tell me what you make of that.”
    â€œThe letters of Father Zahm?”
    â€œTake a good look.”
    Greg sat and began to leaf through the identifying tabs in the box while Boris stood in an expectant attitude. Greg looked up. “What am I looking for?”
    â€œLet me put it this way. If you were looking for letters from 1914 and 1915, you wouldn’t find them.”
    Greg again went through the contents of the box, more carefully now. When he was finished, he turned to a computer and brought up the archives Web site. Boris could see that he was checking the contents of the box as recorded there. After several minutes, he turned and once more went through the actual box. Then he sat back.
    â€œThey’re not here.”
    â€œSo I found. And Kittock was the last one to deal with the contents of that box, right?”
    â€œYou think he took them?”
    â€œWell, they’re not there. Of course, there may be an innocent explanation.”
    It was clear that Greg Walsh could not think of one. There was now a deep frown on the archivist’s face. The materials in the archives represented a sacred trust, and he was unlikely to regard missing materials as a routine matter.
    â€œCould he have walked away with them?” Boris asked.
    Greg was checking the drawers of the worktable. When they yielded nothing, he made a careful search of the workroom. Finally, he slumped once more in a chair and put his face in his hands and groaned. “Why would he take them?”
    Boris was about to say that Kittock was intent on sabotaging his own effort, but he had not told Walsh, as he had Roger Knight, of his wild hunch. However wild, it had come to seem almost established fact.