The Burglar in the Rye

by Lawrence Block

  I asked him what he collected. He leaned over the counter and lowered his voice to a confidential whisper.

  “Fairborn,” he said.

  What a coincidence.

  “I’m a completist,” he said, with an air that combined pride and resignation, as if he were at once claiming royal blood and admitting to hemophilia. “I want everything.”

  “Well, I don’t have much,” I said. “A few books shelved alphabetically in the fiction section. I’ve got Nobody’s Baby, but it’s a fifth printing.”

  “I have a first.”

  “I thought you probably did.”

  “And a tenth,” he said. “For the revised jacket. And I have fourteen paperbacks.”

  “So you can give copies to friends?”

  He gaped at the very idea. I don’t know which seemed outlandish to him—the idea of having friends, or the thought of giving books to them. Both, probably.

  “Fourteen paperbacks,” I said. “Oh. One for each printing?”

  “Hardly. There have been over sixty printings. What sort of fool would want to collect them all? What I want is a copy of each cover. There have been fourteen different covers among the sixty-plus printings.”

  “So you have them all.”

  “I have the first printing in which each appeared. Except in one instance. There was a new cover introduced on the twenty-first printing, but my copy is the twenty-second. I’ve not yet been able to get my hands on a twenty-first. It’s not rare, it’s certainly not valuable, but try to find one.”

  “Well,” I said, “I wish I could help you out, but I only get paperbacks when I buy a whole library, and I wholesale them off right away.”

  “I have my want list with specialists,” he said. “That’s not what I came here for.”

  “Oh.”

  “I just wanted you to understand the scope of my collection.”

  “You’re a true completist.”

  He nodded. “I have the foreign editions. Almost all of them. I have Nobody’s Baby in Macedonian. Not Serbo-Croat, Serbo-Croat’s common as dirt, but Macedonian. It’s not supposed to exist, none of the bibliographies list it, and I don’t believe the edition was ever authorized. It must have been pirated. But somebody translated the text, and somebody set type and printed it, and I have a copy. It may be the only copy this side of Skopje, but it exists and I’ve got it.”

  “That’s impressive.”

  “When I collect someone, Rhodenbarr, I go all out.”

  “I can see that.”

  “I don’t just collect the books. I collect the man.”

  I pictured him with a great butterfly net, running over hill and dale in pursuit of a terrified Gulliver Fairborn.

  “I have a copy of his high school yearbook,” he said. “There were eighty students in the graduating class, so how many yearbooks could they have printed? And how many do you suppose have survived? It wasn’t easy to find a classmate who still had his yearbook handy, and it was harder still to persuade him to sell it.”

  “But you managed.”

  “I did, and I can assure you I wouldn’t part with it, not for twenty times what it cost me. He was the only senior who didn’t have his picture included. There’s a blank space opposite his list of accomplishments and activities. He was a hall monitor his junior year, did you know that? He was in the Latin Honor Society, he played trombone in the school band. Did you know that?”

  “I know the capital of South Dakota.”

  “That’s neither here nor there.”

  “It’s not here,” I said, “but I’m pretty sure it’s there.”

  He gave me a look. “He was camera-shy even then,” he said, “the only senior class member unpictured. He signed this particular copy. Where the photo would have been, he wrote, ‘When you are old / And sitting still / Remember the fellow / Who wrote uphill.’ The handwriting slants.”

  “Upward,” I guessed.

  “And he signed his name in full. Gulliver Fairborn.”

  “A signed photo,” I said. “Without the photo.”

  “His photograph does appear in the book, however. Not in the senior listings, but in the group photos. He’s in the band photo, but he’s holding the trombone right in front of his face. On purpose, I’m sure.”

  “What a kidder.”

  “But he was also in the Latin Honor Society, as I may have mentioned, and they didn’t let him hide behind a copy of Caesar’s Commentaries. He’s in the last row, second from the left. He’s half hidden behind another student, and his face is shadowed, so you can’t really get much sense of what he looked like. But it’s nevertheless a genuine photograph of Gulliver Fairborn.”

  “And you have it.”

  “I have the yearbook. I’d like to get the original. The photographer’s long dead, and his files were dispersed years ago. The original’s lost, probably forever. But I do have an original photograph of Fairborn’s boyhood home. The house itself was torn down over twenty years ago. I missed my chance.”

  “To see it for yourself?”

  “To buy it. The state took the property for an expressway extension, but I could have bought the house and moved it to another lot. Imagine housing the world’s foremost Gulliver Fairborn collection in the house he grew up in!” He sighed for what might have been. “Over twenty years ago. Even if I’d known about it, I’d have been hard put to afford it. Still, I’d have found a way.”

  “You’re dedicated.”

  “One has to be. And now I have the means, as well as the dedication. I want those letters.”

  “If I had them,” I said, “what would you pay?”

  “Name your price.”

  “If I had a price,” I said, “it would be high.”

  “Name it, Rhodenbarr.”

  “The thing is, you’re not the only person who wants those letters.”

  “But I’m the one who wants them the most. Get all the offers you want. Just give me the opportunity to top them. Or set a price yourself and give me the chance to meet it.” He leaned forward, his collector madness burning in his dark eyes. “But whatever you do, don’t sell those letters without giving me a crack at them.”

  “The letters,” I said carefully, “are not physically in my possession at the moment.”

  “Quite understandable.”

  “But that’s not to say they won’t be.”

  “And when they are…”

  “I’ll want to contact you. But you’re in…” I looked at his card. “…Bellingham, Washington. That’s near Seattle?”

  “It is but I’m not. I’m in New York.”

  “I can see that.”

  “I flew in the day before yesterday. I thought I might speak to this Landau and see if she’d entertain a preemptive offer as an alternative to public auction. Why wait for her money? Why pay a commission?”

  “What did she say?”

  “I never spoke to her. I went first to Sotheby’s, where I learned they had a signed agreement with the woman. They’d given her an advance and she’d agreed to turn over the entire Fairborn file within the month, so it could be cataloged for sale in January. I urged them to offer it as one lot. I’m sure the University of Texas would prefer it that way, and whatever other institutional bidders turn up.”

  “And did they agree?”

  “They hadn’t decided, and won’t until they see the material. My hunch is they’ll parcel it out. That means bidding lot by lot. I’ll do that if I have to, but I’d much rather write one enormous check and be done with it.”

  Checks, I pointed out, could be a problem. Not for Sotheby’s, he said, but in the event of a private sale, entirely off the record, it would be a simple matter to handle the transaction in cash. He told me he was staying at the Mayflower, on Central Park West, and that he’d be there for the next week or so. There were some other dealers he had to see, booksellers and others, and he might get to a few museums and see a show or two. Gulliver Fairborn, while his great passion, was not his only interest.


  We shook hands. I expected a sweaty palm, but his hands were dry, his grip firm. He wasn’t creepy after all. He was just a collector.

  I picked up the phone and tried Alice Cottrell and Mowgli, neither of whom answered. I decided they must be having a late lunch together, and talking about me. I put down the phone and reached for O’Hanlon, but before I’d hacked my way through the first overgrown paragraph someone got my attention by clearing his throat. It was my friend with the long face and the silver beard.

  “I couldn’t help overhearing,” he said.

  “Neither could I.”

  “Was that gentleman serious?”

  “He’s a collector,” I said. “They’re like that.”

  “Not all of them, surely.”

  “He’s like the rest of them,” I said, “only more so.”

  “This writer,” he said. “Gulliver Fairborn. It sounds as though he wants to…to possess the man. To stuff him and mount him on the wall.”

  I nodded. “Properly preserved,” I said, “and perfectly displayed. It’s a passion or a mania, or maybe both, but whatever it is he’s got it. And you can see how it starts. He read a book and he liked it. Well, I read it myself.”

  “So did I.”

  “And I suppose I could say it changed my life.”

  “Some books have changed my life,” he said, grooming his beard with his fingertips. “But then it was time to move on and lead my new life, not fill up the old one with memorabilia. I certainly didn’t come away from any of them with the urge to have a jar full of the author’s fingernail clippings.”

  We drifted into a nice bookish conversation, of the sort I’d envisioned when I decided to buy the store. I told him my name, which he’d already overheard, and he gave me a card proclaiming him to be Henry Walden, from Peru, Indiana.

  “But I don’t live there anymore,” he said. “I had a little factory, a family business with about twenty employees. We made modeling clay, and then a big toy company came along wanting to gobble us up.” He sighed. “I liked being in the clay business,” he said, “but they made us an offer my brother and sister couldn’t refuse.”

  He was outvoted, so he gave in gracefully and took the money, but he didn’t want to go on living in the midst of two siblings he’d ceased to like and twenty out-of-work claymakers who’d ceased to like him. He’d always liked New York, and now he was staying at a hotel while he looked for an apartment and figured out what to do with the rest of his life.

  “I’ve even thought—promise me you won’t laugh—of opening a bookstore.”

  “I’d be the last person to laugh,” I said, “and I think it’s a great idea. Just remember the surefire way to wind up with a small fortune in the antiquarian book business.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Start with a large fortune,” I told him. “Meanwhile, do you want some hands-on experience? You can help me carry in the bargain table.”

  “You’re closing?”

  “I’m afraid I’ve got an appointment half a mile uptown, and I’ve enjoyed our chat so much I’m running late. So if you’d like to give me a hand—”

  “I could shop-sit for you,” he offered. “God knows I’ve got nothing else to do. You wouldn’t want me to close up, but if you’ll be back at the end of the day…”

  I took ten seconds to decide to leave him in charge. I could tell he was honest, but people have thought that of me, so how could I be sure? In less time than it would have taken to close up, I told him what to do and how to do it. “Anything else,” I said, “people with books to sell, people who want to argue about the price, tell ’em to wait for me. And if there’s anything I haven’t covered, ask Raffles.”

  “Meow,” said Raffles.

  CHAPTER

  Eleven

  “Kessler’s Maryland Rye Whiskey,” Martin Gilmartin pronounced, holding his glass to the light. “Sounds like something a bellhop would bring you.” He took a sip, considered it. “Sweet, but not cloying. Still, I don’t think it will win me away from scotch.”

  “No.”

  “But it has a distinctive taste. Got some body to it. And some authority, I’d say.” He took another sip. “Very American drink, isn’t it? Though I don’t know of anyone who drinks it, American or otherwise. Still, people must. The bottle wasn’t covered with dust.”

  I’d asked if the club had rye, not a blend but a straight rye whiskey, and the waiter had brought the bottle of Kessler’s to the table. I’d studied it like an oenophile peering at a wine bottle, trying to make out if it was chateau-bottled. I said it looked all right to me, and he took it away and brought back a couple of drinks, and we were doing our part and drinking them.

  “I could imagine John Wayne ordering this,” he said. “In a film, that is to say. Shoving his way through the bat-wing doors of a saloon. The room goes dead silent. He bellies up to the bar. ‘Rye whiskey,’ he says, putting that take-it-or-leave-it tone of his in each syllable.” He took another sip. “It grows on you,” he said.

  We were in the downstairs lounge at his club on Gramercy Park. We were both wearing blue blazers and striped ties, but Marty managed to look a good deal more elegant than I. He always does. He’s tall and slender and silver-haired, with the kind of looks and bearing that belong in a Man of Distinction ad—or in a club like The Pretenders, where the portraits on the walls were mostly of great actors of the past, Drew and Barrymore and Booth. They all looked at once dashing and distinguished, and so did my host.

  Marty’s a businessman and an investor and not an actor at all, except insofar as he plays his part in the drama of life. But there are non-actors among The Pretenders—a pulse and a checkbook seem to be the principal qualifications for membership. Marty’s listed on the club’s rolls as a patron of the theater, which generally means no more than that the member so designated goes to a play once in a while. But Marty’s connection is deeper than that. He’s an occasional angel for off-Broadway productions, and he’s made a habit over the years of one-on-one interactions with individual members of the acting profession.

  Individual female members, that is to say.

  “It said in today’s Daily News that she’s an actress,” I said, and hefted my glass of rye. “I suppose I should have guessed as much.”

  “Isis, you mean.”

  “Isis Gauthier. She’s a beauty, Marty. I’ll say that for her.”

  “It’s not what you think,” he said, and then looked aghast at his own words. “I can’t believe I said that. ‘It’s not what you think.’ Of course it is, it’s very much what you think, so let me amend my statement. It’s not just what you think.”

  “All right.”

  He raised his glass, found it empty, and motioned for the waiter. When both our glasses had been refilled, he took a sip and heaved a sigh. He said, “I don’t suppose you’ve ever met my friend John Considine.”

  “I don’t believe I have.”

  “And why would you? John’s a bond trader. Sails, plays a lot of golf.”

  “Is he a member here?”

  “No, though I’ve offered to put him up. In a manner of speaking, he’s a patron of the theater.”

  “In a manner of speaking.”

  “Quite. John’s a happily married man, a father and grandfather, but sailing a boat and hitting a golf ball can only go so far. Over the years, John has had a series of friendships with some charming and talented young women.”

  “Actresses.”

  “For the most part. A little over a year ago, John and his wife attended a Psoriasis Foundation benefit here in the city. It was well past midnight by the time they returned to their home in Sands Point, and in their absence they’d had visitors.”

  “Burglars.”

  “Yes. They’d come and gone by the time the Considines returned.”

  “That’s just as well,” I said, “for the good of all concerned. Some burglars are capable of violence when provoked, and so are some of the people they visit.”

/>   “John was on the wrestling team at Colgate,” he said. “Of course, that was a while ago. Since then he’s had his share of good dinners, not to mention an angioplasty. So it was as well that he and his uninvited guests never met, especially since their visit struck him as less a violation than an opportunity.”

  I made the leap. “Insurance.”

  “You’re very quick, but then so was John. He saw at a glance that he’d been…burgled? Or burglarized?”

  “Either,” I said. “Or eye-ther. Whichever.”

  He considered the matter. “Burgled,” he said decisively. “A robber robs, a mugger mugs, and, I suppose, a forger forges on. So a burglar burgles, and these burglars left a mess—chair cushions tossed around, furniture overturned. Bernie, you look appalled.”

  “Believe me, I am.”

  “So was Cynthia.”

  “Mrs. Considine.”

  He nodded. “John took her outside and made her wait in the car while he assessed the damage and alerted the authorities.”

  “Dangerous. Suppose they were still in the house?”

  “Either he was blind to the risk or he was prepared to run it. He dashed upstairs to the master bedroom, where the evidence of a crime was unmistakable. Night tables upended, drawers dumped out on the floor.”

  “Barbarians.”

  “John did not linger. He phoned 911, then hurried downstairs to his wife. ‘They left the safe wide open,’ he told her. ‘They cleaned it out. They got everything.’”

  “But they hadn’t?”

  “It was a wall safe,” he said, “concealed behind a print hanging in the bedroom. The print was worth a few dollars itself, but the burglars didn’t recognize it, or didn’t care. If they’d known to take it they’d have found the safe, and who knows? They might have been able to open it.”

  “If they didn’t know enough to find it,” I said, “they wouldn’t have been able to open it. Unless your friend taped the combination to the back of the picture frame, like a fellow I paid a call on some years back.”