Lawrence Block - Enough Rope

“And you didn’t want them stealing the books.”

“You’re very direct,” he said. “I suppose that’s a useful quality in your line of work. But no, I didn’t want to tempt anyone, especially when alcoholic indulgence might make temptation particularly difficult to resist.”

“So you hung up plastic sheets.”

“And came downstairs this morning to remove the plastic, and pick up some dirty glasses and clear some of the debris. I puttered around. I took down the plastic from this one section, as you can see. I did a bit of tidying. And then I saw it.”

“Saw what?”

He pointed to a set of glassed-in shelves, on top of which stood a three-foot row of leather-bound volumes. “There,” he said. “What do you see?”

“Leatherbound books, but—”

“Boxes,” he corrected. “Wrapped in leather and stamped in gold, and each one holding a manuscript. They’re fashioned to look like finely-bound books, but they’re original manuscripts.”

“Very nice,” I said. “I suppose they must be very rare.”

“They’re unique.”

“That too.”

He made a face. “One of a kind. The author’s original manuscript, with corrections in his own hand. Most are typed, but the Elmore Leonard is handwritten. The Westlake, of course, is typed on that famous Smith-Corona manual portable of his. The Paul Kavanagh is the author’s first novel. He only wrote three, you know.”

I didn’t, but Haig would.

“They’re very nice,” I said politely. “And I don’t suppose they’re for sale.”

“Of course not. They’re in the library. They’re part of the collection.”

“Right,” I said, and paused for him to continue. When he didn’t I said, “Uh, I was thinking. Maybe you could tell me...”

“Why I summoned you here.” He sighed. “Look at the boxed manuscript between the Westlake and the Kavanagh.”

“Between them?”

“Yes.”

“The Kavanagh is Such Men Are Dangerous, ” I said, “and the Westlake is Drowned Hopes. But there’s nothing at all between them but a three-inch gap.”

“Exactly,” he said.

“As Dark as It Gets,” I said. “By Cornell Woolrich.”

Haig frowned. “I don’t know the book,” he said. “Not under that title, not with Woolrich’s name on it, nor William Irish or George Hopley. Those were his pen names.”

“I know,” I said. “You don’t know the book because it was never published. The manuscript was found among Woolrich’s effects after his death.”

“There was a posthumous book, Chip.”

“Into the Night,” I said. “Another writer completed it, writing replacement scenes for some that had gone missing in the original. It wound up being publishable.”

“It wound up being published,” Haig said. “That’s not necessarily the same thing. But this manuscript, As Dark— ”

“ As It Gets. It wasn’t publishable, according to our client. Woolrich evidently worked on it over the years, and what survived him incorporated unresolved portions of several drafts. There are characters who die early on and then reappear with no explanation. There’s supposed to be some great writing and plenty of Woolrich’s trademark paranoid suspense, but it doesn’t add up to a book, or even something that could be edited into a book. But to a collector—”

“Collectors,” Haig said heavily.

“Yes, sir. I asked what the manuscript was worth. He said, ‘Well, I paid five thousand dollars for it.’ That’s verbatim, but don’t ask me if the thing’s worth more or less than that, because I don’t know if he was bragging that he was a big spender or a slick trader.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Haig said. “The money’s the least of it. He added it to his collection and he wants it back.”

“And the person who stole it,” I said, “is either a friend or a customer or both.”

“And so he called us and not the police. The manuscript was there when the party started?”

“Yes.”

“And gone this morning?”

“Yes.”

“And there were how many in attendance?”

“Forty or fifty,” I said, “including the caterer and her staff.”

“If the party was catered,” he mused, “why was the room a mess when you saw it? Wouldn’t the catering staff have cleaned up at the party’s end?”

“I asked him that question myself. The party lasted longer than the caterer had signed on for. She hung around herself for a while after her employees packed it in, but she stopped working and became a guest. Our client was hoping she would stay.”

“But you just said she did.”

“After everybody else went home. He lives upstairs from the bookshop, and he was hoping for a chance to show her his living quarters.”

Haig shrugged. He’s not quite the misogynist his idol is, but he hasn’t been at it as long. Give him time. He said, “Chip, it’s hopeless. Fifty suspects?”

“Six.”

“How so?”

“By two o’clock,” I said, “just about everybody had called it a night. The ones remaining got a reward.”

“And what was that?”

“Some fifty-year-old Armagnac, served in Waterford pony glasses. We counted the glasses, and there were seven of them. Six guests and the host.”

“And the manuscript?”

“Was still there at the time, and still sheathed in plastic. See, he’d covered all the boxed manuscripts, same as the books on the shelves. But the cut-glass ship’s decanter was serving as a sort of bookend to the manuscript section, and he took off the plastic to get at it. And while he was at it he took out one of the manuscripts and showed it off to his guests.”

“Not the Woolrich, I don’t suppose.”

“No, it was a Peter Straub novel, elegantly handwritten in a leatherbound journal. Straub collects Chandler, and our client had traded a couple of Chandler firsts for the manuscript, and he was proud of himself.”

“I shouldn’t wonder.”

“But the Woolrich was present and accounted for when he took off the plastic wrap, and it may have been there when he put the Straub back. He didn’t notice.”

“And this morning it was gone.”

“Yes.”

“Six suspects,” he said. “Name them.”

I took out my notebook. “Jon and Jayne Corn-Wallace,” I said. “He’s a retired stockbroker, she’s an actress in a daytime drama. That’s a soap opera.”

“Piffle.”

“Yes, sir. They’ve been friends of our client for years, and customers for about as long. They were mystery fans, and he got them started on first editions.”

“Including Woolrich?”

“He’s a favorite of Jayne’s. I gather Jon can take him or leave him.”

“I wonder which he did last night. Do the Corn-Wallaces collect manuscripts?”

“Just books. First editions, though they’re starting to get interested in fancy bindings and limited editions. The one with a special interest in manuscripts is Zoltan Mihalyi.”

“The violinist?”

Trust Haig to know that. I’d never heard of him myself. “A big mystery fan,” I said. “I guess reading passes the time on those long concert tours.”

“I don’t suppose a man can spend all his free hours with other men’s wives,” Haig said. “And who’s to say that all the stories are true? He collects manuscripts, does he?”

“He was begging for a chance to buy the Straub, but our friend wouldn’t sell.”

“Which would make him a likely suspect. Who else?”

“Philip Perigord.”

“The writer?”

“Right, and I didn’t even know he was still alive. He hasn’t written anything in years.”

“Almost twenty years. More Than Murder was published in 1980.”