The pawnshop on Grant Avenue is a dusty museum of desperation. You flip through the velvet trays behind the counter, the old jeweler's magnifying glass making your right eye feel three times too big. The initials on the jewelry pieces—'L.C.', 'R.B.', 'T.M.'—lead you down a rabbit hole of old society pages and country club membership rolls.

Your knuckles rap against the glass case as you point to a matching set of cufflinks. The pawnbroker—a wiry man with nicotine-stained fingers—adjusts his spectacles. 'Ah, the Lowell Collection. Came in last winter from an estate sale up in Pacific Heights.' His voice drops to a whisper. 'Funny thing—half this high-end stuff's been turning up since those society boys started disappearing.'

Back at your office, you spread the documents across your desk like a tarot reading. Each monogram matches a member of the now-defunct Excelsior Club—a secretive gentlemen's society disbanded after a scandal involving smuggled antiquities. The last president? Theodore Montague III, whose 'T.M.' signet ring was found in victim number two's glove compartment.

The rain starts again, tapping against your window like impatient fingers. You're staring at a photo of the Excelsior Club's 1947 gala when you see him—a young Richard Chase standing at the edge of the frame, his smile not quite reaching his eyes. The timestamp shows three weeks before the society dissolved... and exactly one year before Chase married Evelyn.