I handed him the bag so he could look for himself. “Nothing worth much here,” I said. “Nothing valuable anyway.”

“It’s the things that don’t have any value that are worth the most,” Frank said like he was a sage sitting on the top of some fucking mountain. “Something I read in a fortune cookie,” he joked, but it was something he’d said before, something he believed.

“You worried about it?”

“Not yet,” Frank said, “but I’m working on it.”

We started back to the hotel and Frank began brooding. We wouldn’t be able to get back fast enough. We almost didn’t get back at all.

—

“Stuff that has value can be replaced,” he had said. “A house, car, money. Almost anything you can buy, you can buy again. But sentimental stuff, family stuff, ex-girlfriend stuff, your kid’s first drawing, whatever means something that no one would care about but you, that’s the stuff that’s worth the most. Think about it. If you could only take one thing in the world with you, what would it be?”

Frank was not sentimental about those types of things, material objects. Over the years I had become less sentimental, I suppose, but I think I know what Frank would want to save. If he could take one thing, maybe it would be a book. Plato’s Republic, maybe. But that’s not right. He could replace a book; no, he would take something that wasn’t his. He’d take my jacket. He’d given it to me anyway. A vintage black leather jacket I wore almost year round. That’s the thing he would take. So he could give it back to me, probably.

He already knew my answer. It was a money clip I kept in my pocket. My father had given it to me. His father had given it to him. It had initials engraved on it. It was scratched and bent and wasn’t worth any more than the stainless steel that went into making it, but it was maybe the most important thing I owned. My father gave it to me the day I cashed my first paycheck, and I’ve never gone a day since without it being in my pocket.

“What would you do if someone took that from you?” Frank said.

“Whatever it took to get it back. But this isn’t that. You think?”

—

Frank opened the shoulder bag and looked at the small silver goat statue and put it on the seat between us. “Well, it’s worth enough for someone wanting it stolen. And that means someone knows more about it than we do.” Frank never liked to be in that position. “This isn’t good,” he said. “This is trouble.”