Never in her life had she seen Sheridan look so near explosion. “Now see here—”

“Enough.” Casek leaned forward, all menacing muscle. “Who really cares about a trinket box? What do you know of Johnnie Rosedew?”

Sheridan at least had the grace to look abashed. “Only the name—from a report. Not from Scofield, but . . . ah, I must go further back. You see, I’d been paying another chap to look into a lead in the Caribbean, as that’s where Rupert and Mucknell went for a while. Before Scofield, I mean. That my search there was before, not that they were in the Caribbean before. Though, of course, that was also before.”

“Sher!”

Bram’s bark earned a throat-clearing from Sheridan and a splinter of a smile. “He’d found nothing though, and Scofield—or rather you, Miss Tremayne. The first piece you found.” His face lit, eyes all but blazing as they always did when he thought a discovery just beneath the dirt on which he stood. “I had a chance to see it when you sent it to them for authentication. It was Mucknell’s mark, I’d know it anywhere. And it mentioned the John. So the timing is right.”

Libby’s brows knit. “Which item was this?”

Beth shot her a look but still said nothing.

Sheridan never had any such inhibitions. “A map—an actual treasure map! Or, well, maybe. On the treasure part. No one knows what Mucknell did with it, you know. The loot, I mean. But it could be here still, in the Scillies. He lived here for years, apparently. With his wife. Well, not right here in this very spot, of course, but somewhere nearby.”

“The point, Sher.” Bram, naturally.

While the rest of them exchanged a glance. This house hadn’t been his. But Tas-gwyn Gibson’s had been, if his word on the matter could be trusted.

“Ah. Right. Well, you see . . .” He faced Beth again. “You probably know this already. But no one’s entirely certain what happened to the John. Might have sunk, or he might have got it back to the islands and then scuttled it. Never sailed again though. Of course.”

Beth sighed and looked to her brother. “I did a bit of digging. It seems the ship he took right before his final battle was called the Canary, and there was something of value on board that the rightful owners spent considerable time searching for to no avail. But if the John was scuttled, then it means whatever treasure he carried was brought ashore. And even if not, if it’s at the bottom of the sea, there was a lot of loot he’d taken with it beforehand.”

“But no one knows what he did with it,” Sheridan concluded.

Mabena snorted. “Spent it, most likely.”