He nodded, reaching to unbutton his cuffs and roll his sleeves back. “Is Max watching the Emporium?”
“Yeah. I have to bring him back food or he may quit.”
The waitress returned with coffee for Calvin and Quinn before taking our orders.
Quinn grabbed a handful of sugar packets and poured them into her mug as we were left alone again. “So how’s your little shop?”
“It’s fine,” I said politely.
Calvin leaned back, placing his arm across the top of the seat to rest behind me. It was like the teenage boy sitting on a couch beside his crush, so he acts like he’s stretching to put an arm around them. Except that Calvin was way more cool about it.
Quinn nodded as she finished drowning her coffee in sugar. “Calvin told me this morning someone busted a window?”
“That’s right. I—oh.” I hesitated. I had declined to tell Officer Brigg and Officer Lowry about the second note, but to not tell Calvin seemed stupid. Keeping something like that from him would undoubtedly cause a domestic dispute if he found out through work.
And besides, I was retired from sleuthing.
No matter how curious I was about these notes.
I reached into my sweater and pulled out the second slip of paper. “I got another note today.”
“You what?” Calvin asked, setting his mug down and turning his attention to me.
“Note?” Quinn piped up.
I handed it to Calvin. “It was wrapped around a brick on the counter.” When he glanced up from the message, I explained everything, from the brick outside to the police to Luther’s second visit.
Hearing myself say it all out loud, I sounded insane.
Someone breaking into my store?
Harassing me with bricks and nonthreatening messages?
No wonder Quinn was giving me a peculiar expression as I finished.
“Well,” she began. “That’s fucking weird.”
I leaned sideways to stare at the one word on the letter that Calvin still held.
Curious?
Yes. And now, so were others.
The bricks were intentionally chosen. They had to be. They were so unexpected, so odd, that it got people talking. And when you want folks invested in their own curiosity, you have to nourish it.
“Barnum,” I stated, sort of surprised at the thought.
Calvin looked at me while folding the letter. “Hmm?”
“P.T. Barnum,” I said again. “That’s what this whole thing reminds me of.”
“The circus guy?” Quinn asked.
I nodded, took the letter from Calvin, and stuffed it in my pocket. “But before he went into the circus business, he used to own a museum here in New York. He hired some guy to walk around the block with bricks, putting one on each corner before going into the museum, walking through it, and slipping out the back to go through the process again. The brick thing was so strange that people started getting curious and following him. They’d pay to enter the museum but would then be sidetracked by the displays.”
Quinn snorted. “Correction.That’sfucking weird.”
I shrugged. “Barnum was a brilliant businessman. He knew in order for people to give a crap about his curiosities, he needed them to be… curious.” I looked at Calvin, and he was staring hard at me with an unreadable, very cop-like, expression.
