Allison Bartlett - The Man Who Loved Books Too Much - The True Story of a Thief, a Detective, and a World of Literary Obsession

A year of freedom following arrest and the payment of bail. It was a formula for revenge. Even after having been caught, and perhaps because of it, Gilkey was confident he could now do whatever he wanted. The worst was behind him. He was sure that after the year was up, a judge wouldn’t sentence him to more than a few months in prison, and that was nothing, just a blip in his plans. For now, building the collection was what mattered.

Less than a week after Sanders’s e-mail message, on April 1, Cynthia Davis Buffington of Philadelphia Rare Books and Manuscripts wrote to Sanders:

Phone order today for $6500. American Express name: Isser Gottlieb. Conversation felt right, authorization came through. Caller said he wasn’t sure the Oakland shipping address was current card address. Said he’d just moved from Savannah and gave me address there also. Googled ship address: Hilton. Phone area code: san fran . . . I called American Express. They said fraud.

Sanders had Buffington send a dummy package overnight to the address given by the caller. It was delivered to the Hilton Hotel the next morning, but no one showed up to pick it up. Gilkey hadn’t made a reservation under a phony name, either. Munson and his officers had waited outside the hotel from ten A.M. to four P.M.

We’ll just have to wait for the next one, he wrote Sanders.

A couple of weeks later, Sanders got word that Gilkey (who was not using an alias) was in Los Angeles, trying to sell a set of Winnie-the-Pooh books by A. A. Milne worth $9,500 for a price far below their value, first to William Dailey Rare Books, then to Heritage Book Shop. The books were: When We Were Very Young , 1925; Winnie-the-Pooh , 1926; Now We Are Six , 1927; and The House at Pooh Corner, 1928. Recognizing Gilkey’s name from Sanders’s e-mails, both stores contacted him. Dailey e-mailed that when Gilkey left his shop, he’d climbed into a Nissan with the license plate SHERBET. Sanders alerted the trade.

Dailey forwarded the address Gilkey had given them on Gateview Court to Sanders. Anyone in San Francisco, please comment on address , e-mailed Sanders, even though he assumed it was bogus.

Several people replied, and Sanders learned from Munson that the address was on Treasure Island, a man-made swath of land that sits in the middle of the bay between San Francisco and Oakland. A WPA project from the 1930s, the island was built with mud dredged from the Sacramento Delta, and its name was inspired by the gold that may have been buried in the soil. San Francisco’s first airport was on Treasure Island, as were a military base and the site of the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition, but many of its buildings are now empty. Nowadays, much of the island seems like a ghost town surrounded by water and the silhouettes of San Francisco, Marin County, and the East Bay. Few people live there.

That a book thief might be living—and possibly hiding his stash—on Treasure Island seemed storybook perfect, not only because it is the name of a famous, oft-collected book (exceptional first editions can go for over $30,000) but also because it’s so evocative of the treasure hunt that book collecting often is.

Sanders thought it unlikely that Gilkey would have given anyone his correct address, but dutifully called Munson with it anyway.

“I hate to waste your time,” he said. “I doubt this is any good.”

Arnold Herr, a bookseller in L.A., was in fact reading Sanders’s latest alert concerning Gilkey’s attempts to sell the A. A. Milne books, when he looked up to see a man who resembled the photo of Gilkey. It was as if the bookseller had conjured the thief just by thinking about him. But there he was, approaching the counter. Herr steeled himself. 3

“Nice shop you have here,” said Gilkey. “I’ve got these four Winnie-the-Pooh books. Very nice condition. Any chance you’re interested in buying them?”

Herr looked at the books, stalling for time. “Uh, I think I have a customer who may be interested,” he said. “Why don’t you call me in an hour or so, after I’ve had a chance to talk to her.”

“Well,” said Gilkey, “I’m checking out of my hotel at one or two o’clock, so I really need to take care of this soon.”

No sooner had Gilkey spoken those words than they were reported to Sanders.

At Sanders’s suggestion, Herr then called Dailey, who said there was no way to prove that the books were stolen. Herr then reached Gilkey at the Hyatt in West Hollywood, and Gilkey assured him he was still eager to sell. Herr told him that the potential customer was out of town for the weekend, but that he could reach her Monday. Gilkey gave Herr his cell phone number.

Twelve minutes later, Sanders received an e-mail from George Houle of Houle Books in L.A., saying that Gilkey had just left his shop with the Milne he had tried to sell. Gilkey had told Houle he was waiting for a taxi, but Houle watched him get into a dark car with no plates. Houle couldn’t see the driver. The car had been parked a block away, even though there was plenty of parking in front of the store.

Sanders informed the ABAA of Gilkey’s recent activities, noting that he was described as wearing a blue Caesars Palace jacket and tan trousers. He then suggested that Southern California dealers set up a phone tree to alert those who didn’t have access to the ABAA e-mail list.

Late that night, at nearly eleven, Malcolm Bell from Book-fellows Fine and Rare Books, a non-ABAA bookseller who had received an alert by phone, wrote to Sanders:

Unfortunately, I got info too late. Gilkey was here 4:00 Saturday, offering four Pooh’s for $2000. I had no interest. His manner was pleasant and he was chatty. He appeared to me to be collector. He looked at our stock. Asked my wife to open science fiction case. He selected two: Shirley Jackson’s Raising Demons, first edition $100, and Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian first edition $200.

He paid with check, presenting a passport and license number for ID . We will deposit check on Monday with little hope of it going through. He had a small rolling case and made mention of traveling by plane.

The next morning, Bell e-mailed Sanders: We’ve applied for ABAA membership.

A FEW DAYS LATER, on April 21, Detective Ken Munson struck gold. Search warrant in hand, he decided to investigate the Treasure Island address Gilkey had provided. Munson rang the bell, but no one answered. He used a key he had obtained from the apartment’s management office, and as soon as he opened the door, he knew he was in the right place. The address was indeed Gilkey’s, and every surface was covered in books. Moving through the dreary, government-subsidized three-bedroom apartment, Munson and his three accompanying officers found books in the kitchen, on the bookshelf, in the bedroom, on counters, on dining room chairs. Some of the oldest items were an illuminated leaf from a Book of Hours, circa 1480, encased in a plastic sleeve; a land deed from 1831; and a signature of Andrew Jackson. Along with the books were coin collections, stamps, documents, baseball cards, posters, and autographed photographs. There were also books, advertisements, and articles throughout the apartment related to these items and their value. The officers found what appeared to be shopping lists of book titles and authors. They also found receipts for hotels, and cards and papers with the names of auction houses and bookstores, several of which Munson recognized as having been victims of fraud within the past three years. Receipts for various hotels and travel documents were also among the goods. It appeared that both John Gilkey and his father, Walter Gilkey, were living in the apartment, and in John’s bedroom they found a manila envelope with Saks Fifth Avenue credit receipts and pieces of paper with credit card holders, credit card numbers, and expiration dates handwritten on them. 4