Vanished by Jordan Gray

collections of action figures, movie posters, books. What he saw, though, was Willie on board the Black Sea Pearl, a gold coin in his pocket. A gold coin with Latin letters spelling out Transalpina, and Cyrillic letters, as well. Surely that mix of writing styles indicated an origin in Eastern Europe.
    He sat down at his keyboard, and within moments established that Transalpina was an alternative name for Wallachia. Which was where? He was soon following links that led him all over the world—and then, surprisingly, back to Blackpool itself.
    â€œStill at it?” asked Molly from behind him.
    Michael swam up from the depths of his research. The digital clock on his desk couldn’t be right—had he been sitting there for an hour? Rubbing his eyes, he turned around to see Molly in her favorite pink bathrobe, the one that made her auburn hair glow. Her feet were encased in the slippers he’d given her. They were shaped like furry white rabbits, long ears perked forward, open red mouths exposing felt fangs.
    With a smile at her slippers, and another at her lovely face, he said, “The gold coins are from Wallachia, today part of Romania. Wallachian coins were originally made of silver, until the supply of silver dried up. Then they started using coins brought in from other countries. Willie’s big silver coin, the one with the lion—that’s a Dutch thaler.”
    â€œThaler? I bet that’s where dollar comes from.”
    â€œCould well be, yes. There’s no way of telling whether Willie’s thaler came here by way of Wallachia.”
    â€œBut the other coins are Wallachian, even though they’re gold, not silver?”
    â€œApparently so,” Michael replied. “One ruler during the sixteenth century minted gold coins that were copies of the older silver ones, but there are very few of those.”
    â€œIf they’re rare, then they’re extra valuable. And yet a shady character like Willie has three. That’s quite a nest egg for him.”
    â€œThey’re only valuable if he can find someone to buy them.”
    Molly nodded. “That’s why he wanted to see Trevor Hopewell.”
    â€œThere’s more to it than that. I found an article from the Blackpool Journal about two boys exploring the passageways beneath the town back in the 1840s. One of them was named Abercrombie.”
    â€œTunnel ratting must run in the family—you explore the Blackpool tunnels with the modern-day Abercrombie, right?”
    â€œYes, and I’m wondering what else has been handed down in the family,” said Michael. “The boys found several Wallachian coins, but the story doesn’t say what happened to them.”
    â€œOoooh!” Molly’s eyes lit up.
    â€œThat’s not all. Do you remember the copy of the Blackpool Journal that Dylan threw on the floor in Willie’s kitchen?”
    â€œWith a headline about the Magic Lantern Theatre, yes.”
    â€œI found it on the Journal ’s Web site. The article about the coins was in the same issue. A good thing I set up that Web site for Fred, isn’t it, even though all I wanted was to test a new Web platform.”
    â€œNo good deed goes unpunished,” said Molly with a grin. Her voice turned cautious. “Maybe Willie having a copy of that paper is just coincidence. Maybe the paper was lining a kitchen cabinet or—no. One cabinet was lined with a 70s-style yellow-and-green flowered paper. The other ones weren’t lined at all.”
    Only Molly would have noticed that. “There were no other newspapers in the flat. I expect Willie saved this one for a reason.”
    â€œYou’ll have to ask Rohan and the others if they’ve ever seen Willie scrounging around the tunnels. And where he might have found the coins. One reason people keep exploring and mapping those tunnels is because of the rumors of treasure. Pirate treasure, smuggler’s goods, and there