Tracy Kelleher - A Rare Find

“As I recall, it was uninspired, nominally French food—and I mean nominal.” Nick thought back to the one time the mother of one of his freshmen advisees had taken them to the finest culinary institution in town. You knew it had pretences because it was housed in a mock, half timber Tudor building across the street from the university campus. Only minutes before meeting her Nick had learned it was a jacket-and-tie joint only, of which he’d had neither. He’d frantically scrounged something up from a guy who roomed down the hall. The waist on the jacket had been six inches too big and the sleeves three inches too short, but at least the tie hadn’t had a naked lady painted on it.

“People are always curious about Ivy League colleges and picture-perfect towns. Now we’ll be able to give the insider’s view,” Georgie continued, still selling the idea. He was a producer, after all. “Get the lowdown on whether students still go to the same places to grab something to eat when they’re up all night studying. Or maybe they’ve developed more sophisticated palates over the years to go along with their future hedge-fund-manager lifestyles?”

Something was definitely wrong because Nick was becoming seriously interested in Georgie’s idea. “I don’t know if you realize it, but Grantham holds its alumni Reunions right before Commencement. So it’s essentially a weeklong college-nostalgia party, where the soon-to-be graduates get to lock arms with their fellow Granthamites, thus building their sense of family and forging contacts for future employment.”

Nick was acutely aware that he was talking as if he was doing voice-over commentary—in addition to regaining feeling in his outer extremities. No wonder Larry’s bundled up like a polar bear, he suddenly realized. He shivered. A mistake, given his recent encounter with the lethal masseur.

“That’s better than perfect,” Georgie responded with enthusiasm. “A blend of past, present and future all rolled into one big happy, highly photogenic package.” He paused. “I presume these alums are your usual crazies—all rah-rah and wearing garish school colors?”

“Oh, wait till you see their school colors,” Nick said knowingly. The totally tasteless Reunions getups that the returning alums donned for the traditional parade and class functions were legendary. Then he eyed his producer. “So tell me. You think this august Ivy League institution is really going to allow my unique commentary on the wild and wacky world of small town, Ivy League customs?”

Clyde, the sound guy, snickered.

“Hey, just because you grew up in London and went to Cambridge, doesn’t mean you can look down on Grantham,” Nick shot back. “I’ve seen the apartment you share with three other guys in Queens. No one in your shoes can even think about looking down their nose.” Speaking of shoes, he was becoming increasingly aware of just how cold he was. He also figured that once he got back to their excuse of a hotel his maimed body would be incapable of removing his own frozen shoes.

“Clyde’s just being Clyde, and as to the permissions? Don’t worry,” Georgie interjected. “I’ll have them in hand before you can say ‘bourbon on the rocks.’” He seemed so gleeful that he began to skip down the frozen road.

In Nick’s critical view, the producer seemed more like some demented munchkin stumbling along some nightmare version of the Yellow Brick Road. Georgie was not exactly svelte, and he barely topped five feet three.

“I love it. I love it,” Georgie said to no one in particular as he continued to lead the little group down the road. Then he stopped and turned to face them. “Just think. You’ll be able to answer the question that burns in the hearts of all college students.” He put his hand to his chest, and if Nick didn’t know better, looked truly earnest.

“What? ‘Will I get laid tonight?’” Nick responded sardonically. Then he shuffled around to stare at Larry since he couldn’t turn his neck. “Don’t you have a bottle of schnapps back at the hotel?”

Georgie cupped his chin in his Gore-Tex-gloved hand. “I was thinking more along the lines of, ‘Is it true that these are the happiest days of my life?’”

Thinking about that question suddenly made Nick feel very depressed, even worse than his usual morose state. “No, the black humor isn’t covering up a mirthful soul,” he once told a cub reporter for some newspaper in Peoria or Saskatchewan—or was it Lubbock? Whatever. “It’s merely the surface of a very angry guy,” he’d concluded before the reporter had quickly shut his notebook and hightailed it out of the hotel room.

“There’s less than a third left in the bottle,” Larry, the cameraman, whined, the tip of his nose having already gone from red to a worrisome ice-white.

“If you’re looking for sympathy, you’re looking at the wrong guy,” Nick retorted. “In fact, if you’re not careful, there’ll be no Christmas bonus in your stocking this year.”

“Hey, I’ve got a bottle of duty-free tequila and a hot-water bottle,” the soundman Clyde bragged in his very plummy accent.

“You British—always ready to sacrifice yourselves for queen and country, or your boss, in this case. But, hey, I’ll take whatever I can get.”

Georgie exhaled through his mouth as he waited for the others to follow. His breath formed clouds in the frigid air and partially obscured his bearded face. “Just think. It’ll be like old home week.”

“Or something like that,” Nick replied sullenly. He looked down absentmindedly, thinking of someone he could maybe call from his Grantham University days. Was it worth contacting an old college friend after more than fifteen years? he wondered. Then the ground came into focus. And for the first time after what seemed like hours of misery, Nick felt a smile cross his face.

Georgie, he noticed, was standing square in the steaming pile left by the horse.

CHAPTER TWO

May

Grantham, New Jersey

PENELOPE BIGELOW©HELD©the rare second-century manuscript of Galen’s medicinal writings between her white-cotton-gloved hands before placing it in the glass case for display. The Vatican Library had a Latin translation from the Arabic version of the ancient medicinal treatise dating from the eleventh century, but this manuscript in the original ancient Greek had been lost to the West after the fall of Rome, finally resurfacing centuries later. Only someone with a thorough knowledge of ancient and medieval history including Byzantine history, a background in multiple ancient languages, and the trained eye of a paleographer would appreciate the difference between the two versions.

Penelope had all that and more—a Ph.D in Classics and she had studied at the Vatican on a fellowship in Rome ten years ago. While there, she’d also gone through the Apostolic Library’s rigorous two-year course in paleography, the study of ancient handwriting.

Holding the so-called Grantham Galen manuscript in her hands, Penelope could practically feel the power of the ancient scholar and philosopher through the gloves. Galen had been a prolific author, and in his day he was known to have hired more than twenty scribes to take down his potent words. But as she stared at the confident blocklike script, she was almost positive that this manuscript was in Galen’s own handwriting. It was too swiftly written, as if it had been produced in a mad dash of insight.

She read the Greek as swiftly as if it were her mother tongue, though in her case, more her father’s tongue. Stanfield Bigelow was a professor of Classics at Grantham University, and he had made it a personal crusade to homeschool his precocious older child. And it had been he, in fact, who had recovered this lost manuscript and donated it to his alma mater.