The Forger's Daughter

by Bradford Morrow

  “You going to start the car, or do you prefer to spend the afternoon in the garage?”

  I shrugged and backed into the lane, drove to the rural intersection not far from Maisie’s friends’ place, then headed along a series of roads that would eventually lead us to Rhinecliff, a hamlet set, as its name implies, on a rampart overlooking the wide Hudson. We parked at the bottom of a fairly steep hill, and while Nicole crossed the overpass that bridged the railroad tracks out toward the boat launch, where she planned on sketching the ragtag holiday regatta, I entered another historic clapboard hotel to meet another figure from my past.

  “Don’t tell me I haven’t aged a day, because I won’t believe another thing you say,” were Atticus’s words of greeting. When he took my outstretched left hand in both of his, the wide smile on his face would discredit any onlooker who might suggest we were here for anything other than the most collegial purposes. “Come, I’ve got us a table outside.”

  As promised, he was seated by himself on a stone veranda overlooking the tracks and grand river beyond. We sat at a wobbly table on which waited a bottle of white wine in a cooler, and two glasses. Overhead, a canopy blocking the filtered afternoon sun flapped pleasantly in the breezes off the water.

  “Here’s to fresh beginnings,” he said, raising his glass in a toast.

  “Or at least clean endings,” was my response as I touched mine to his.

  Atticus had always been a little larger than life, I recalled, and now, years on, he had become distinguished. He wore a beige panama hat even in the semishade, and his glasses were tinted and thick and gave him an aristocratic air. His cleft chin and strong cheekbones further lent him an aura of casual nobility. The cream-colored trousers and blue blazer he’d worn in Rhinebeck were again on display. Nothing about the man insinuated anything other than success, the outward contentment of a life fulfilled.

  Ignoring my toast, he said, “I’d love to do some catching up, but I know we are both on a schedule.”

  “You, I think, more than I am,” I said.

  “How’s that?” he asked, with a light cough.

  Taking another sip of the wine, whose buttery taste I was sure Nicole would be able to identify down to the vineyard and year, I recounted what Slader had told me about Mrs. Fletcher—not mentioning her name—­returning from a trip overseas, and Tamerlane—not mentioning its title—needing to be replaced, along with a new-old letter, in its solander box.

  “No, that’s nothing for you to be concerned about. Indeed, it’s something I’d rather you make an effort to forget, if that’s all right.”

  “Fine by me,” I said.

  “I will tell you this, though. Your recent craftsmanship was every bit as sophisticated as what you used to do in the days when we were more in commerce. I might add that your transition from calligraphic to letterpress makes you something of a virtuoso.”

  Rather than thank him for a compliment I’d as soon not be paid, I nodded, peering out at a catamaran running with other sailboats on the river.

  “And while we’re speaking of this and that, I’m sorry to see your hand. Of course, I knew about the accident—”

  He saw me recoil at that characterization.

  “Assault, I should say—but watching you, I’m pleased to see that you’ve made a full recovery.”

  “Tell that to my phantom fingers. I think they’d disagree,” I said, without hostility. “But, yes, many days go by without my even noticing. For instance, it wasn’t on my mind until you brought it up.”

  “My apologies,” Atticus said, his tone of voice sincere. “And I am sorry about it all. I know you probably think I was somehow behind it, but no way was I involved. It was pure barbarism on Slader’s part, and he himself paid a steep price for his loss of sanity.”

  Though I didn’t respond to this, it did occur to me that sanity had never been one of Henry Slader’s traits.

  “You understood that my substantial payment was meant to reimburse you for books I’d sold from your father’s library and your own, as well as help with medical debts, as a gesture of friendship, and for your family.” As he told me this, he removed his glasses and I could see, for the first time, that both of Atticus’s eyes appeared frosted, had a filmy dimness to them, were far more aged than in years past when they fairly danced with vigor. “I never expected you to thank me then, and I don’t want you to thank me now.”

  “You and I are even, Atticus, at least in that regard,” I assured him. “I can’t really see why you elected to send Henry Slader to deliver the Tamerlane to me, though. Maybe it’s not finally worth getting into the hows and whys, but he’s the polar opposite of you.”

  “Mostly true, except he’s deeply versed in the craft you know so much about, and is my sole connection to that world. A world which, by the way, after Tamerlane is brought out into the light, is one I plan on quitting forever.”

  I crossed my arms lightly, breathed in the soft tang of river air. “You know, you could quit it forever right now. Just give Abigail Fletcher her book back and destroy mine.”

  Atticus glanced around, a little ruffled by my comment, checking to see if anyone had wandered onto the veranda and was listening. “Don’t think it wasn’t something that occurred to me as I was driving down here. But I’m afraid the die is cast. By this time your beautiful production is in its new home near Boston. And the original is out in the world waiting to be discovered.”

  He didn’t look well, now that I’d been sitting with him for a time. Given that he had been so out-front about my disability, I considered asking him if he was all right. Instead, I said, “Could you tell me what you mean by ‘out in the world waiting to be discovered’?”

  With that, he smiled again, put his glasses back on, and the dim nimbus of illness that I thought I’d seen dissipated. “May I ask you a question?”

  “Shoot,” I said, taking another sip.

  “I believe Meghan will act with discretion going forward, but how much can the girls be counted on to keep your work with the Poe book a secret?”

  “That’s a question you might have asked yourself before you sent Slader on his errand here.”

  Atticus leaned back in his chair, gazed out at the gray-blue sky. “Henry Slader’s admittedly a problem that will need to be solved. But please do answer, and rest assured there’s no threat implied in what I’m asking.”

  “To be honest, I feel confident that my daughters won’t break their promises to keep this a secret. I don’t think my younger fully appreciates what this Tamerlane business is all about, and anyway she tends to keep her own counsel. And regarding Nicole, she helped me with the whole thing, so she’s as bound to silence as I am myself.” I withdrew the bottle from its cooler and poured more wine for each of us.

  “You like the Meursault, I see. Domaine Antoine Jobard,” he said. “I brought another bottle down with me if you’d like to take it home.”

  “Nicole seems to be an oenophile in the making.”

  “It’s all hers then. She’d probably prefer a Montrachet, but this is a particularly fine vintage of white Burgundy,” he said. “I’ll give it to you for her before you go.”

  “No need, but thanks.”

  Atticus smiled, shook his head. “I insist, if only on her behalf.”

  “On her behalf, thank you. But you should know that I don’t feel as confident about Meg’s willingness to go along with all this as you seem to be,” I told him, and drummed my left-hand fingers before spreading my hand, palm down, on the table. “You know how much she hated my involvement with forgery all those years ago, and she’s been a stalwart supporter of my reformation. It’s been a long road to come back from those troubled times, and seductive as it’s been now and then to want to backslide, until this past week, I haven’t forged anything.”

  “Aside from forging ahead?”

  I didn’t laugh. He mea
nt to leaven our conversation, I knew, but I wanted him to comprehend how difficult this project was for me, how much it involved waking old demons.

  “So you really and truly gave it up?”

  “You don’t believe me.”

  “I just find it hard to comprehend how someone as gifted as you could walk away.”

  Looking Atticus hard in the eye, I said, “Meghan may be a problem.”

  Unexpectedly, abruptly, he offered me an ardent close-lipped smile that was the very definition of self-possession. “I’m glad you’ve been forthright with me about this, Will, and I hope you’ll trust me when I tell you that she will not present a problem. I’m feeling good about things now and am so happy we’ve been having this chat. Maybe it’s mawkish to say so, but that old chestnut about true friendships not dying, despite many years of absence, never seemed truer to me.”

  “Don’t forget that even chestnuts can go bad,” I said, wishing I hadn’t.

  He rapped his knuckle twice on the table, rose from his chair, and whispered, “Stay right here while I run upstairs and get that Meursault for Nicole.”

  While he was away, I rose and walked to the railing at the edge of the veranda and, shading my eyes against the sun lowering itself in the west, looked for Nicole down by the water’s edge. A southbound train, perhaps the Lake Shore Limited out of Chicago, given its sequence of sleeper cars, temporarily blocked my view as it shot through the station, air horn blaring. After a minute, I located her sitting on a riverside bench with her book, and a surge of love for my daughter swept up through my chest—love, and an urgent, almost aching imperative that I protect her at all costs. She was gifted beyond her years, always had been, but stood at the precipice of adulthood in a much more precarious situation than I think she understood. I couldn’t retrofit the architecture of my life, so to speak, couldn’t replace some of the rotten building materials I’d used to construct who I was. But I could make sure that my every decision going forward was in the interest of keeping her, Maisie, and their mother as free from strife as I possibly could. With Nicky’s invaluable help, unwitting or not, this Poe conspiracy, this high-stakes confidence game, had to be seen through to its inevitable end. It was the only way for everyone involved—or, rather, most everyone—to slip away unscathed. I had only two paths. Either to turn myself in or to trust Atticus. And I wasn’t about to turn myself in.

  “Lovely view, isn’t it?” he said, standing behind me with a canvas bag dangling from his fingers. “Here’s your daughter’s Meursault. It’s even better than the bottle we’re sharing. Comtes Lafon Meursault-Genevrières. Tell her it doesn’t want to be overchilled.”

  “I’ll tell her, and thanks, really,” I said. “Meantime, if you don’t mind, I do have one more question for you.”

  “We have another glass apiece left,” he said, waving his hand back toward the table. “Let’s not let good wine go to waste. I too wanted to ask a question, but you first.”

  “When you said earlier that Meghan would not pre­sent a problem, was that intended to sound menacing? If so, it’s more Slader’s style than what I’d expect from you.”

  “Another reason his usefulness here may have reached its end,” Atticus said, almost as if making a note to himself. “But no, not menacing. Encouraging, rather.”

  “I don’t see how.”

  “You can’t see how just yet,” he responded. “I don’t mean to be cryptic, but you’ll understand in retrospect how this all needed to unfold.”

  Seeing he had no intention of revealing what was set in motion, I told him, “You know we’re leaving for the city sometime tomorrow. Any further unfolding, by which I assume you don’t mean unraveling, will need to take place down there.”

  “So I figured,” he said, carefully pouring the rest of the wine. “Now a question for you, Will. How well situated are you at your auction house? I mean to say, I know you’re not the head of the house or the auctioneer, but as their specialist in literature—”

  “Autographs.”

  “You do both, from what I understand. Either way, how deep does their trust run for you? How would you characterize your level of sway at the house?”

  Trust—that vexatious word again. “So far as I know, my status there is solid. Over the years I’ve proven myself, made few mistakes, and of course everyone there loves Meg.”

  “Who doesn’t? She’s consigned them some pretty stellar lots over the years from what I’ve heard,” he said, offering no reason why he’d have such information. “What I’m getting at is, I know you conversed with Henry about the probability of your handling the Tamerlane when it manages to surface. That still good by you?”

  Another train came in, this one northbound, judging from the direction of the horn sounding around the bend below Rhinecliff station, and, after an exchange of passengers, set off toward Albany. The clamor temporarily brought our dialogue to a halt, during which I studied Atticus as he watched an oil tanker ply the shimmering Hudson, leaving behind a burnt-gold wake the sailboats were forced to negotiate. Again I was struck by an intuition that he wasn’t well. The persistent cough. The wan paleness of his skin that I didn’t recall from years past. The cane—I now saw it wasn’t for show—and milky eyes. Maybe it was a matter of simply having aged, since his personality and movements were as vigorous as ever.

  Once the train had pulled out, I told him, “I’m still willing. You haven’t filled me in about how you’re going to go about consigning it, since your Abigail Fletcher might well catch wind and reasonably wonder how two copies of Tamerlane could possibly be handled by a single dealer—”

  “Oh, there’s an historical precedent. If I’m not mistaken, the late great New York barrister and collector Frederic Robert Halsey owned two copies at one point,” he said. “But the pamphlet won’t be coming directly from me, so don’t concern yourself about that.” In the soft pinkening light he glanced at his watch, a vintage Patek Philippe not unlike one Meg had inherited from her brother.

  Interpreting the gesture, I said, “I need to be getting back home myself.”

  We stood, and Atticus extended his hands, which I took in both of mine. “It’s been good to see you again after so long,” he said. “For what it may be worth, I think your earlier path on the straight and narrow seemed to be serving you well. I’m sorry to be a part of temporarily dislodging you from it.”

  “Let’s hope we both survive the detour.”

  “My best to Meg and Nicole,” he finished, before turning away. “And please promise to give Maisie a special hug and kiss for me. She has no clue who I am, but I was furious to hear how the Tamerlane was transferred. Henry may have made a fatal mistake there.”

  Hearing this, I wanted to ask Atticus more questions. Such as, how deep did his relationship with Slader continue to go after all these years? And speaking of fatal mistakes, what misstep had Ginger-head made to meet the end he had met? How did Atticus plan on secretly recompensing me for my illicit efforts and, indeed, my daughter’s? And why the special hug and kiss for Maisie? But before I could summon any words, he was gone.

  Leaving the country for the city at summer’s end was usually a bittersweet exercise. In years past, my husband and I always found it hard to give up the pastoral simplicity of life at the farmhouse, even as we felt refreshed and ready to return to the swing of all things urban. In years past, trading our neighborhood hoot owl and songbirds for the sirens and shouts of city life was made easier with the knowledge that we would be back upstate as apple-picking season rolled around, and afterward when the leaves changed color and came fluttering down. But this year, our haven had been tainted. Rather than return on autumn weekends, I thought, maybe Will and I should consider the once unthinkable idea of selling the house and resettling elsewhere.

  Neither Moran nor any other detectives had come by to question me further. I found myself listening more closely to news segments between mu
sic broadcasts on my ever-present radio, and also picking up the local paper from the market, but didn’t hear or read anything more about the murder. Had it been solved, the killer taken into custody, and the authorities moved on to fresher crimes without my having known? Of course it was possible. Had I hallucinated the pale-blue car and discarded body left like a sack of litter on the deserted road? Not as likely, but it was beginning to feel that way, and I knew that I had the capacity to blur painful memories. How else could I have weathered Adam’s unsolved murder all these years? It wasn’t impossible that I’d begun doing the same with this apparent murder of a man I never met.

  Maisie’s friends were with her upstairs, purportedly helping her pack but no doubt using her coming departure as an excuse to hang out. To my knowledge, Maisie hadn’t confided anything to them about what had been going on here. And telling from the peals of laughter that now and then erupted from her bedroom, such troubles were far from their minds. It was as much music to my ears as the Aaron Copland symphony playing in the background—his third, I think the honey-voiced radio host had said.

  Though conflicted about so many matters, I looked forward to cataloging the latest collection of books we’d procured. For a bookseller, or at least for this bookseller, shelving new stock, emailing or phoning clients to quote them items on their desiderata lists, finding new homes for orphaned volumes was a rich satisfaction. While I had devoted hours to re-sorting the new books into categories, separating nineteenth-century lit from twentieth-century fantastika, and pulling volumes I considered the most valuable for careful boxing, there was no way I’d have time to finish going through them all before we left. With that in mind, I began packing them in tissue and bubble wrap for the drive down.