A cold gray sky darkened outside, while Oliver sat cozily behind his dark wooden desk acutely aware of the soft hum from his radiator. Smoke drifted lazily through the air off the tip of a cigarette, his ash tray already cluttered with the remains of many others. Without removing his calculating gray eyes from the case file in front of him he poured himself a drink. Amaretto, straight. The sweet syrupy liquor never failed to give his mind the edge it needed. Reading carefully over each minute detail of the file he swore, frustration burning its way through his reserves of reason. It wasn’t adding up. There had to be some key peace of information missing from his notes. It had already been months and he’d had no luck at cracking it. He stood, the old spoon chair scraping against the floorboards. Donning his worn straw hat, careful to place the black ribbon to his left, and grabbing his tattered green coat he set out to get some air. Walking the frozen streets of the city, people hurried to get in before the sleeting winter rain set in, but Oliver paid them no mind. It didn’t make sense, even in his line of work, priceless museum pieces didn’t simply vanish from display in the middle of the afternoon. That’s where all the evidence pointed however, and conventional policing had failed to yield results. That’s why they turned to him, Oliver Gray, knowing full well he’d stick his nose into all sorts of bad business in order to get results. An idea took hold of Oliver, his eyes narrowing with a surge of determination. There was one more stone to turn over. Pulling his collar up to block the wind, he set out on a far walk across town. His step quickening with renewed vigor now that he had a goal in mind the winter chill rolling off his shoulders.

After a long trek through the filth rampant on the streets this side of town he walked in to a seedy little sorry excuse for a bar, walking straight to the bartender, not even bothering to put out his cigarette. He asked gruffly “where’s the djin?”

The small Indian man behind the ramshackle bar, eyes wide, shakily replied “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Oliver grabbed him by the collar, pulling him halfway over the wooden barrier, threatened “Ganesh, where’s the goddamned genie? I’m not asking again.”

Ganesh hurriedly responded “he’s in the basement. I wouldn’t go down there, he has guests.”

Oliver pushed past him as he made his way to the stairs behind the counter, shouting as he descended “where’s the painting you damned dirty afrit? I know you’re down here, and you’re going to give it to me or else I’ll see you bound within a salt shaker for the next millennium. So help me Barbatos!”

When he arrived in the musty cellar space it was empty, save for a burning oil lamp, and an old painting.