The Blue Divide

Chapter 19

Lainey pedaled up the hill to Mr. Leventis's house. Too bad she had to work today. She wanted to go home so she could see how Eko was doing. He was still asleep when she left for school, and even though Dr. Sully had assured her he'd be fine, she still worried about him.

His communication was improving as were his daily interactions with her and her grandfather, but there were little things, like walking outside barefoot, and drinking a whole bottle of cough syrup, that made her wonder if some parts of his mental growth were still stunted from his accident. It was like he was seeing the world for the first time, and she wanted to be the one to show him everything. Her heart sped up when she recalled how excited he'd been when he saw her grandfather playing the violin, or how enormous his eyes were when he walked into the living room to hear the Cole Porter record that night.

She reached the house and Mr. Ardent buzzed her in.

"I'm glad you're here, Lainey." He said it in a way that sounded so sincere she couldn't help believing he really was pleased to see her.

"Mr. Leventis has gone out of town for business, which makes this the perfect opportunity for you to clean his office."

Why did her heart just give a nervous flutter? Was it the thought of going somewhere that had been off limits? It was probably just a typical messy office, nothing out of the ordinary.

"It's about time, if you ask me," continued Mr. Ardent, leading the way. "I've been telling him to let you clean it since I hired you, but he's very particular about his things; didn't feel comfortable having someone poking around his private space, so don't focus on rearranging anything so much as cleaning up the dust."

"Will Mr. Leventis be angry if he finds out I've been in there?" asked Lainey.

"Nah. It certainly can't hurt to sneak a vacuum in there, and as long as you don't move anything around, I doubt he'll even notice."

He opened the office door and Lainey got her first glimpse of the inside. As she suspected, it looked like a typical office, the kind you'd imagine a rich executive to inhabit. It was spacious, with a large window that looked out over the ocean, and a fancy black leather couch. The desk was big enough for a dinner party and was covered with messy stacks of paper. The small wastebasket was overflowing with crumpled up papers and dust covered the file cabinet in the corner.

"Just give it a quick turn," said Mr. Ardent. "Then you can do the guest bedrooms." He left her alone to get started.

Lainey paused a moment to take in the scene. The décor was pretty bland except for two distinct glass cases hanging on the wall to the side of the desk. In one was a bronze trident. It looked ancient and tarnished, perhaps a legitimate Greek artifact. The other held a stone tablet written in letters similar to the Latin alphabet, but with some noticeable differences. She tried to read it, but found it impossible. Not only were some of the letters different, there didn't seem to be any spaces between the words, which she could only assume were ancient Greek.

The glass case had a small metal inscription on the top. οθάνατοςτουΠοσειδώνα.

On the floor below the case was a stack of thin blue booklets with the same words printed across the cover. οθάνατοςτουΠοσειδώνα. Beneath the words was the imprinted symbol of a silver trident.

She picked up one of the booklets and flipped through it, expecting to find it written in

Greek. Instead, she was pleased that the contents were in English. The title page read: The Demise of Poseidon. A Translation. The bottom of the page gave credit to Allen Leventis for his translation work. She was interested in knowing what the tablet said, but just then, Mr. Ardent poked his head in the office. She quickly dropped the booklet.