Synopsis: Agent Burke and his team stumble into a murder while investigating a stock trader. The FBI soon realizes that the murder is in fact a robbery gone bad. Meanwhile, Neal Caffrey contacts an old flame whom he believes could help him find the music box.Episode Summary: Neal Caffrey is at Rockefeller Center holding a flower origami in his hand. He watches as a beautiful young woman watches a man. Neal bumps into the man, and soon after the young woman bumps into the man as well, but filches his wallet. The beautiful young woman looks at the wallet, and finds nothing but a flower origami inside it. She looks around, and finds Neal Caffrey waiting for her. Neal sought for Alex Hunter to ask for her help to find the music box. Alex confesses to giving up looking for the elusive music box, but Neal refuses to believe her for he found a piece of the box in the young woman’s bag. Alex continues to deny having interest in the music box, and claims to only carry a piece of it as a keepsake. Nonetheless, Neal gives her his number. Continue reading...
Agent Peter Burke arrives in the surveillance van to check up on their suspect. Agent Jones and Cruz are on the stake, and find nothing unusual except for Mr. Gray bringing home a young woman. Soon after, they hear a gunshot. The three agents barge inside the mansion, and find the corpse of Mr. Gray lying on the floor. Agent Burke hears sobbing from behind the couch, and finds the scared, young mistress behind it. She informs them that the male assailant ran out the door, and Agent Jones verifies it with a footprint. The mistress becomes a witness to a murder. According to her, the killer was hiding in the room, and immediately shot Mr. Gray when they arrived.
Neal Caffrey arrives at the crime scene, and tries to get himself out of the case as soon as he sees the dead body, but changes his mind after Agent Burke informed him who the victim was. Aldys Christopher Gray is one of the few stock traders who profited before the market crash. Moreover, he is a man also known for his art collection. Agent Burke called in Caffrey, because he knows something is off, but cannot quite put his finger on it. He briefs Caffrey on what had happened based on their witness’ story. Caffrey looks through the purse of their witness, now part of evidence, and inspects her driver’s license. Caffrey puts it in a solution, and just as he suspected, the ID though of high quality is a fake. Agent Burke then notices that the footprint Agent Jones saw by the door where Pierce Spelman said the assailant escaped belonged to Aldys Gray. The young woman used the dead man’s shoe to make an impression therefore making her the shooter. Agent Jones gets word from the hospital that Pierce Spelman sneaked out when the nurses left her in the room to undress.
Agent Peter Burke arrives in the office late. Moreover, he is carrying with him luggage making Neal think that Elizabeth kicked Peter out of their house. Ostensibly, husband and wife are having HD surround system installed in their house. Agent Burke plans to spend a few days in a hotel, while Elizabeth and Satchmo stay at her sister’s house upstate until the wiring system is fixed. Strapped in cash, Agent Burke decides to stay at the same motel he put Neal Caffrey when he was released despite Caffrey’s offer for him to stay at June’s.
Later that night, while Neal is working on the cryptic list of words Spelman left behind, he receives a knock on his door. It is Alex Hunter demanding an explanation as to why Neal is working for the FBI. Neal explains that it is a deal he was forced to take, and assures her that he is not trying to set her up with the FBI. Neal is only curious about the music box, and would like to know all the information Alex has on it, since she was the one who got close to it. According to the fence from whom she got a piece of the box, there is a sudden interest in it, but refuses to tell her who. Alex senses that Neal’s interest goes beyond the music box. Meanwhile, Peter arrives at the motel of his choice, and quickly realizes that it is far from what was advertised. He decides to take up Caffrey’s offer, and shows up at his door while Alex is still there. Neal warns Alex of divulging the real reason of her visit, and so the two make it look like they were about to have intercourse. Peter is mortified, but refuses to play along when Neal asks him not to tell the woman that he is an FBI agent. Neal sees no hope of getting Alex’ help with her learning that he is now friends with the FBI.
Peter has clearly invaded Neal’s turf with him barging in, and now having breakfast with June. Moreover, Peter and June have been messing with the cipher he was trying to decrypt. Agent Burke is not happy finding the list that should be in evidence with Neal, but the young man was on to something. Agent Burke noticed that Neal misspelled the name of the victim, and with that the Caffrey realizes that the cipher is a shift code hidden in an anagram. Soon they discover that the list they have is in fact a hit list. With the list decrypted, the FBI contacted the men on it, and all swear not to know Spelman. Agent Burke hypothesizes that the young woman was looking for a specific item that she thought one of those men possessed. Aldys Gray got shot after being drugged, because he regained consciousness and found her snooping through his belongings. The FBI believes that Spelman will be going after the trust-fund baby Daniel Picah next.
The spoiled, filthy rich nerd who uses a Boaz Vaadia bust as a hat rack annoys Neal Caffrey for collecting artifacts for the sake of having them. The reason for their visit is to identify what it is that the murderous young woman is after. With four floors of priceless artifacts that lack cohesion, it is impossible to know what Spelman is looking to steal.
Neal Caffrey secretly researches about the music box afraid to make his intensions known to Peter, but the agent finds the book he’s been hiding, and quickly discovers that Neal is looking into the music box. Meanwhile, Caffrey catches a break in the case. He realizes that the FBI interrupted Pierce’s search when Agent Burke, Jones and Cruz barged in after hearing the gunshot. This means that whatever it is the young woman was after must still be in Aldys Gray’s house. However, this also means that they need to bring along Dan Picah with them to help them identify what it is he and Gray both have in their collections. Luckily, it took no time for Dan to pinpoint the item Spelman was looking for. Pierce Spelman was after Aldys Gray’s imperial jade elephant, one of the emperor’s five elephants.
The elephants were a gift from Emperor Zhu Di to each of the ambassadors who attended the inauguration of the Forbidden City. The elephants, however, were stolen and turned up in the United States where they were sold individually. Daichi Yoshida of the Japanese Embassy arrives at the FBI headquarters in New York to file a claim on the figurines declaring that they were stolen from them and illegally imported to the United States. With the relationship of two governments at stake, Agent Burke is under pressure to recover all the missing pieces afraid of stirring up an international incident.
Agent Jones runs the prints from the scrabble piece that Peter saw Alex touched the night he barged in on the two. He identifies her as Alexandra Hunter, and pulls up her file to reveal that she is a high-end fence that specializes on Eastern European antiquities. She was arrested in France, but the charges were mysteriously dropped on account of her having powerful friends.
Agent Cruz tracks down Pierce Spelman through Daniel Picah’s online dating profile where the desperate, young woman gave him her phone number. Unfortunately, the FBI only has circumstantial evidence on Spelman that prevents them from making an arrest. Agent Burke’s idea is to put Dan as bait, but with Neal Caffrey posing as him. Thanks to the Fedora that Dan quickly assimilated in his profile picture, Spelman was at least fooled for a second. Immediately recognizing him as not the Daniel Picah on the online dating profile, she walks away, but Neal manages to make her stay claiming that he is the person who tipped the FBI causing them to move in on Aldys Gray’s house before she could steal the imperial jade elephant. Moreover, Neal shows her a picture of the two imperial jade elephants he has in his possession. Neal’s proposal is for the two of them to team up in order to sell the whole set at two hundred million; otherwise the pieces sold separately would only get them two million. Pierce Spelman takes the bait. All is well until Alex Hunter arrives specifically to cause trouble. Her spite comes from learning that the FBI ran her fingerprints, which could cause her ruin. Hearing this, Spelman makes her way to the door. Neal follows and grabs her. Knowing her strength, she feigns being attacked, and immediately the buffed workers by the street come to her rescue. Luckily, Agent Burke arrives before any one of them threw a punch, but nevertheless Spelman is long gone.
After a falling out with Agent Burke, Neal Caffrey decides to walk home where Pierce Spelman greets him with a pointed gun demanding the two imperial jade elephants. Neal claims to have given the elephants to a friend for safekeeping. The two make their way to Neal’s friend, but not without Spelman instructing him to cut his tracking anklet. Worried after hearing the door slam, June comes up to check on Neal where the young woman greets her and reassures the old woman that everything is all right. Meanwhile, Neal cuts the anklet, and secretly sends a Morse code with it.
Agent Cruz informs Agent Burke that Neal’s anklet has been cut. They bring in June for questioning, and she identifies Pierce Spelman as the woman whom Neal was with the last time she saw him. Agent Burke maintains his faith in Caffrey despite FBI Director Hughes’ belief that Caffrey is in cahoots with Spelman. The agents review his tracking information watching his every move before he cut his anklet. Agent Burke notices the flickering of his tracking signal right after he cut his anklet. He recognizes it as Morse code for “power”. Agent Burke gets the message.
Neal Caffrey enters Agent Burke’s house with Pierce Spelman where the woman rummages through the drawers in search for the jade. The power is still out, but Neal turns on the radio, and puts the volume in full blast. Meanwhile, the SWAT team is outside rethinking their strategy given the risks of going in the house without power. Agent Burke suggests that they turn on the power and storm in the house putting his faith on Neal whom he thinks would already have set something up for his rescue. Neal continues with his plan, and presses the TV button, but the power is still out. Spelman starts to feel antsy, and suspects being played. She aims the gun at Caffrey, but is startled by the loud music from the radio and TV. With power turned on, the FBI storms inside Agent Burke’s house, and comes to Caffrey’s rescue.
Agent Burke returns the complete set of imperial jade elephants to the Japanese Embassy, and puts in a good word to Hughes for Caffrey. Caffrey, however, is in disbelief for the deal Spelman got in exchange of the jade. Pierce Spelman will only get four years of prison time despite the theft and not to mention the murder of Aldys Gray. At any case, Caffrey is more than pleased to have closed the case, and thanks to the grateful Japanese ambassador, he was able to obtain free of charge a hotel room at a Japanese luxury hotel for Agent Burke.
Neal Caffrey tries to woo Alex Hunter again, but all he got was a teaser. Alex claims to know where the music box is, but refuses to tell Neal for as long as he works for the FBI.
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