He had been a notable bookseller, with membership in the Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America. This is not an easy group for flakes and fly-by-nights to get into. They nose around in your credit, they check your bank references and take a long look at your stock before admitting you to the club. People who bounce checks and cheat little old ladies get a quick brush-off from ABAA.
Kenney was a past president. His field was fine-press books.
But he had not run an ad in the magazine since 1986. I found out why in that year’s December issue, in a news column headlined “Kenney to Close S.F. Bookstore.” No, he laughed, he was not going broke. He had been offered a job that was simply too lucrative and challenging to pass up. He was going to create a world-class library on the career of Darryl Grayson. He would be looking for anything that pertained to the man’s life or work—ephemera, photographs, correspondence, business records, and, of course, the books, in any quantity. Multiple copies were eagerly sought. The work of Richard Grayson was also of interest, Kenney said, but it was clear from the tone that he was considered an association figure. As far as posterity was concerned, there was only one Grayson.
I didn’t want to park in the Hilton garage: my rust bucket was a little too prominent for a class hotel like that. I put on my raincoat and carried my bag, leaving the car parked on the street.
I rode up the elevator to the lobby on the ninth floor. Paid cash for two nights and told them I might be longer. I asked for a quiet room on a high floor, where I could see the city.
The clerk had rooms on fifteen, seventeen, and twenty.
Seventeen would be fine, I said. I was given a key to 1715.
I rode the elevator up and walked along the hall. The door to my old room was open. I walked past and looked in.
Two men were there, going through the wastebas-ket. The big one with the pale olive skin stood up and turned as I came by. I turned as he did, letting him see the back of my tired gray head.
I opened the door and went into my new room. Couldn’t help gloating just a little as my door clicked shut.
Score one for old dad in the game of guts football.
Up yours, supercop.
32
I sat on the bed and called Leith Kenney in Los Angeles. This time I had no trouble getting through to him.
He had had a dozen hours to think about it and decide how he wanted to handle it. He gave me the direct frontal approach, which I liked. We were two bookmen talking the same language, even if only one of us knew it.
If the material was genuine, he wanted it. If there were questions of ownership or provenance, he would still pay top money for possession and would hash out the legality when the thing went to court. This to him was a foregone conclusion. We were talking about a substantial sum of money, and people tend to bicker when money arises. At the same time, Kenney had no doubt where The Raven would end up, where it should end up. He was prepared to top any offer, many times over. He was prepared to fly to Seattle at a moment’s notice or fly me to Los Angeles in Scofield’s private jet. He was prepared for just about anything.
“Let’s put it this way,” he said. “If you’ve got something you even think might be the genuine article, we want to see it and we’ll pay you for that privilege no matter how it turns out. We’ve been looking for this item for a very long time.”
“That’s pretty good, for a book the bibliographer swears was never made.”
“We know it was made. Mr. Scofield has seen it. He’s held it in his hands. Maybe Allan Huggins wouldn’t be quite so smug if he had done that.”
Before I could ask, he said, “It was a long time ago, and that’s all I want to say about it until I know more about you. You’ve got to appreciate my position, sir. I don’t even know your name. Mr. Scofield may be the only man alive who has actually touched this book, and we don’t want to be put in the position of giving away what we know about it.”
That was fair enough. I didn’t like it, but I had to live with it.
“Remember one thing,” Kenney said. “If you do turn it up, people like Huggins will be all over you. Don’t make any deals on it without giving us a chance to top their bids. We will top them, you’ll be shocked at how much. And you’ll be doing yourself or your client a terrible disservice if you sell it anywhere else.”
At last we were down to bedrock. The big question.
“How much money are we really talking about here, Mr. Kenney?”
“Whatever you’d like.”
33
I didn’t move for a while: just sat on the bed listening to my inner voice. It drew my mind back across the hall to the room where Eleanor and I had spent our last few hours together.
Homework’s finished, said the muse. One more phone call, maybe two, and you can hit the street.
In the room across the hall, Eleanor had mailed a letter. Against my better judgment, I had watched her write it and then I had let her send it off.
What was it, who got it, where had it gone?
Questions with no answers, but sometimes the muse will give you a hint. Her nearest and dearest was one obvious call, a risky one I’d rather not make on this telephone. Still the letter had to be chased—if it deadended, at least it would lead up an alley that had to be checked anyway.
And then there was Trish, a source of growing discontent. I seemed to have lost her in the heat of the moment. She faded to black while I scrambled around covering my tracks, and now, suddenly, my need to hear her voice was urgent.
The muse played it back to me.
Call me, she said. Don’t disappear, I have some things to tell you.
Having said that, she herself had dropped off the earth.
So the nightwork was there. Chase the letter, track down Aandahl.
I called her home, wherever that was, but the telephone still played to an empty house. I tried her desk at the paper, without much hope. At the end of three rings there was a half-ring, indicating a shift to another line.
A recording came on, a woman’s voice.
“Hi, this’s Judy Maples, I’ll be running interference for Trish Aandahl for a few days. If it’s vital, you can reach me through the main switchboard, four six four, two one one one.”
I called it. The operator wouldn’t give me a number for Maples, but did offer to patch me through to her at home. The phone rang in some other place.
“Hello.”
“Judy, please.”
“This is she.”
“I’m a friend of Irish.”
“Aha. What friend would you be?”
“One who’s a little worried about her.”
“She’s fine. Something came up suddenly and she had to go out of town.”
“When will she be back?”
“Not sure, couple of days maybe.” There was a kind of groping pause. “Trish left a package for a friend, if you happen to be the one.”
“What’s in it?”
“Can’t tell, it’s sealed up in a little Jiffy bag. Do you think it’s for you?”
“Is there a name on it?”
“Initials.”
I took a long breath. “How about C.J.?”
“You got it. Trish didn’t know if you’d get this far or not. For the record, I have no idea what this is about. I’m just the messenger gal. She told me to say that. It’s true. I left your package with the guard at the paper. If you want to go pick it up, I’ll call him and tell him to release it to you.”
I said okay, though nothing about it felt okay.
I walked out past my old room. The cops were gone and the place was closed tight. I rode the elevator down, drew my raincoat tight, pulled my hat down to my eyebrows. The day was going fast as I went out into the timeless, endless rain. Everything in the world was gray, black, or dark green.