About a week passes while Gavin stays pretty still and heals. Alexandra passes the time working on another set of ether goggles on a new principle. Unfortunately the new principle turns out to be not as effective as the last principle.
Gavin gets a call from Ryan, telling him he's been upgraded to C clearance (as has Alexandra) and that the Inquisition wants Gavin and Alexandra and Alexandra's ether goggles to go to the auction of some of the collection of Winston H. Krudd. Apparently he collected a whole lot of weird things. The Inquisition is particularly interested in two items: the six, seven, and eight of swords from the Conclave tarot deck, and a second-generation copy of "Sorority Sexpose" - otherwise known as the Naked Goddess tape. Our heroes are given a budget in the millions, but told to call back if they are likely to spend more than half a million. The auction is at a Holiday inn in the middle of nowhere in Idaho.
They (where "they" is Gavin, Alexandra, and Thielo: Angelina and Esteban are down with the flu) set out the next day, driving most of the day across Oregon and Idaho in order to get to the Auction site. Once there, they receive their auction agreements - they have to sign a contract pledging not to interfere with the auction through any means or to attempt to change the outcome of the auction, including negotiation or urging others to do something. While the contract is a bit strange, it doesn't pledge them to much more than being good auction participants, so they are willing to sign. The Auctioneer, Sam Chessex, is rumored to be an avatar of the Merchant, so these contracts are expected to be quite binding.
The team goes to dinner at the local Denny's and after failing to properly calibrate either pair of ether goggles, they notice an older man, well dressed, looking at them. He comes over and introduces himself as Albert Menismechen, greeting Alexandra as if he knows of her. She remembers vaguely having corresponded with him.
He sits with them for a bit and after being a cagey for a while he admits to being interested in the pipe and the phone (see the list below). The phone, he believes, is of the right age and provenance to have been a white house red phone. Perhaps during the missile crisis. Alexandra realizes this means a major charge item if true. Alexandra and Albert agree to meet the next day between the showing of items and the auction and maybe work out a deal about the bidding. The only other bit of useful information garnered from their talk is that the old black man in the corner with the guitar case, who the team had taken for a local, is also an auction participant. Albert leaves with a "Good to see you... again..." for Alexandra.
The next day the team turns in their contracts to Sam at nine before going to breakfast. Sam lets them know that it will be permitted to pause the auction to quickly round up more money, but doubts that that will be necessary for them. He also tells them that if they need to get in touch with another bidder after the auction, for instance to try to buy the item off them, they may do so through him.
They go to breakfast and scope out the bidders. Albert and the old man are there (Albert has a small flame in his head, the old man is normal to the goggles). A woman who Alexandra realizes must be Daphne Lee is there, with a huge flesh-colored flame visible to the ether goggles. Not someone to mess with. A young man in a suit is there as an agent for a phone bidder. There is a man dressed like Elvis, rhinestone jumpsuit and all. And there is also a middle aged woman, tall and thin, whose aura reveals a grey flame. At the auction later, a second phone bidder using one of Sam's assistants will also appear, but obviously he/she/it is not at breakfast.
Breakfast is followed by the viewing (again, see the list below for full descriptions of the objects). Using the goggles, the team learns that the wax cylinder has a small dark aura, the sealed box has a shifty black aura inside it, the rose, dust, and the moon box have auras but nothing too exciting, and the videotape has no aura at all.
Alexandra interrogates the phone, and finds that it is pretty grumpy but refers to having "showed them who's boss" and having "made them back down". "They ruined the color red" it also says. The team decides this may indeed be a significant red phone. Interrogating the clockwork men reveals them to be simple toys. Talking to the wax cylinder produces strangely compelling gibberish. Alexandra starts talking in gibberish, a little, and the team pulls her away.
Various forms of scholar skills are also employed looking at the objects, but nothing really exciting is learned. The sword is probably Greek. The goblet is probably medieval. The egg is damn big.
At lunch, the team meets with Albert and after he proposes that he bid on the phone and they on the pipe, they persuade him that really they have deeper pockets than he does and it should be the other way around. He reluctantly goes along with that.
After lunch, the auction occurs. It's pretty exciting, but the humble chronicler will refrain from a blow-by-blow and summarize the items, their eventual price, and who they were sold to:
The items:
After the auction everyone picks up their winnings. The team is told to wait for an escort to drive back to Seattle. While they wait, Albert comes to talk to them and congratulate them on their purchases (as well as thanking them for not being difficult and letting him have the pipe). He and Alexandra exchange cards.
The only other visitor they have is the old black man. He comes in, wearing the rose in his lapel, and asks them if they know what they've got in the box. They admit they don't. He looks Gavin up and down, declares him to be a stand up sort of fellow, and tells them that the box has a shadow-creature in it. "Like a doberman, but only comes out in the dark. Mean. Bite anyone." They thank him for the information and ask what he did with the cylinder. "I stomped it flat. Thems were bad words." He leaves.
Cage and a bunch of other thugs show up and escort the team back to Seattle. Surprisingly, nothing happens on the way there. Once there, they go to the safehouse and are met be Orchid and Ryan. Orchid will watch the tape, and the others are welcome to if they want. Everyone does watch, and emerges knowing a little more about the Invisible Clergy (and some things about Sororities they may not have known before). The team also infodumps about the auction and the other bidders before being sent back to the Hospice with the telephone for Alexandra to play with.