The Ancient Nine

by Ian K. Smith, M. D.

  Note: HH74/16. Vellum binding, with remnants of ties. MS. notes on back fly-leaves. Provenance: Harmsworth copy

  Location: Harvard University Libraries, Cambridge, Massachusetts

  Shelfmark: [Unverified]

  Note: lacks Mm8 [Catalog match]

  Source: English Short Title Catalogue.

  Record ID: ESTCS1536

  When I had finished, I asked, “What does this list mean?”

  “Have you ever heard of the English Short Title Catalogue?” he said.

  “Never,” I said.

  “It’s the world’s largest and most important electronic database containing bibliographic records for books, pamphlets, broadsides, and songs published in Great Britain or her dependencies in any language. It is therefore the best source for materials published in the English language from 1473 to 1800. If any library in the world holds a particular title, it would be listed here. As you can see, there are only eight libraries in the world, including Harvard, that have a first edition of The Christian Warfare. But despite the existence of these other books, our edition is uniquely of interest.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Because of those two missing pages.”

  “Are these two pages not found in the other seven copies?”

  Davenport took the papers out of my hand, placed them back in the folder, and closed it.

  “The answers are out there for you, Mr. Collins. But you must be willing to work a lot harder to find them.”

  31

  DALTON AND I agreed to skip the dining hall and have lunch at a favorite restaurant in the Square, a small greasy spoon called Leo’s Place, which for my money had the best short-order cook in town. Tucked away between the STA travel offices and a CVS pharmacy, Leo’s was passed over by most students, who were unaware that they were walking by one of the best meals Cambridge offered. I was already seated at the long yellow Formica countertop when Dalton walked in.

  “Smells great in here,” Dalton said. “All these years I’ve lived in Boston, and I never knew this place existed.”

  “A lot of people don’t,” I said, walking up to place our order. “That’s what’s so nice about it. The regulars are die-hards and the owners treat us like family.”

  Rafi and Rich Bezjian were two hardworking Armenian brothers who took over the shop from Leo back in 1982, and through grit, great customer service, and simple, delicious food had won the hearts and stomachs of a clientele that included everyone from locals to senior administrative university deans to a sprinkling of celebrities. We ordered a couple of cheesesteaks and fries and took a seat in the window. The sun pouring through the glass felt good.

  “Well, it’s safe to say that you’re no longer in the Delphic punch,” Dalton said. “I’m sure Jacobs took care of that right away.”

  “We both knew I was a long shot from the beginning,” I said. “It sucks, but life goes on.”

  “And so does our search for the Ancient Nine’s chamber,” Dalton said. “Just because they won’t let you in, doesn’t mean we’re not getting in.”

  “It’s gonna be almost impossible now,” I said.

  “There are other ways of getting in,” Dalton said.

  “They sure in hell aren’t legal.”

  “No, but they could be effective.”

  “Care to share your genius plan?”

  “Not yet.” Dalton smiled. “I’m still working on the details. Speaking of which, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about Moss Sampson.”

  “What about him?”

  “I’ve been trying to figure out what his role might’ve been in all this.”

  “He probably killed Abbott,” I said. “Dunhill saw him in the window that night.”

  “Yeah, I know, but it just seems too convenient,” Dalton said. “The one guy with the violent past killing Abbott’s son.”

  “If he didn’t, then who did?” I said.

  “Why not one of the members?”

  “Because the regular members presumably didn’t know anything about the Ancient Nine or their secret chamber. If one of them had caught Abbott, they would’ve assumed Abbott had broken in just to pull a prank. That wouldn’t be a reason to kill him.”

  Dalton thought for a moment. “I still think it wouldn’t hurt to get a better idea of what happened to Sampson,” he said. “He’s a valuable link, and he just suddenly disappears. What did he know? Where did he go? How did he die?”

  “Let’s say we did find that stuff out. How could that help?”

  “I’m not exactly sure, but it might give us better insight into what happened that night.”

  “My bet is on The Christian Warfare, if Brathwaite hasn’t done something with it,” I said. “Once we get a look at the book, I think it’ll help direct our search.”

  “If we can understand what the hell the damn thing is saying,” Dalton said. “The English is so old, it’s like reading hieroglyphics.”

  “I went to see Davenport this morning in his office,” I said. “I wanted him to look at the passage that was engraved on Abbott’s urn and tell me what he thought.”

  “You didn’t tell him where you saw it!” Dalton said, slightly rising from his stool.

  “Of course not. I’m not stupid enough to admit that we illegally exhumed and carted away someone’s ashes.”

  “Then what did you tell him?”

  “I lied and said I was flipping through a book in a friend’s room and saw the passage engraved on a silver bowl. Don’t worry, he bought it.”

  “So, what did he say about the passage?”

  “Not much, actually. He showed me two pages from the book and asked me what I thought. Both passages were on those pages.”

  “Pages from The Christian Warfare?”

  “Yes, but not from the 1634 fourth edition that was in John Harvard’s collection. Davenport had copies of the two pages from the rarer 1604 first edition.”

  “I thought those two pages were missing.”

  “They are. But his pages came from one of the remaining books that’s not in Houghton. He said the 1604 edition is available on microfilm and his pages were made from one of the remaining books in England. But what I don’t get is why he insisted that I need to see the original book if he already had copies of the missing pages.”

  “Doesn’t make sense to me either. Nothing is making sense anymore. What’s so important about those passages that the Ancient Nine would adopt some of the words as their creed and Abbott’s family would engrave the other on his urn?”

  “That’s why I wanted to talk to you. Davenport suggested that the literal translation of the words is not what really matters. There’s something unique about the first edition book here at Harvard that makes these two pages more special than in the other books around the world.”

  “So, Harvard doesn’t have the only copy of the first edition?”

  “No, there are seven others. There’s a total of eight first editions left. Three copies in England, one of which was used to make the microfilm, two in Ireland, one in Scotland, one in D.C., and the one here in Houghton. But Davenport made it very clear that even with the other copies available, researchers and scholars around the world have been focused on the one here at Harvard with the two missing pages.”

  “Doesn’t make sense to me,” Dalton asked.

  “There must be something about the actual missing pages.”

  “Did he say what it was?”

  “He wouldn’t tell me.”

  “Why not?”

  “He said I needed to work harder to find some of my own answers and satisfy my intellectual curiosity.”

  “Jesus Christ! Why won’t the old geezer just come clean?”

  Rafi brought over our cheesecakes and drinks, and we went right to work.

  “On another note, I kissed her last night after the concert.”

  “No way!”

  “Yup. Right on Comm Ave near Kenmore.”

  “I thought
she didn’t want to date a Harvard man.”

  “She doesn’t. In her mind, it was just a kiss.”

  “Women and their mind games. If you score, it’ll be one of the all-time greatest scoops.”

  As we dusted off the rest of our cheesesteaks, I updated him on the articles Stromberger found about the book heists. He told me his plans to go back down to Wild Winds to keep digging.

  * * *

  “I’M LOOKING FOR ARTICLES about rare book thefts at Widener,” I asked Lucy Tyler, the brunette member of Lamont Library’s dynamic reference duo.

  “How can I help you?” she asked in a slightly raspy voice.

  “I’m looking for articles about rare book thefts at Widener,” I said.

  She wrinkled her forehead and cocked her head to the side as if she didn’t hear me. “Did you say book thefts at Widener?”

  “Yes. I have copies of Crimson articles from 1932 and 1969 that cover book thefts. I wanted to see if there were any others.”

  “Is this for a paper you’re writing?” she asked.

  “Just some research I’m doing on international biblioklepts,” I said.

  “Do you have those articles from the Crimson with you?”

  I handed her the articles.

  “I’d heard about the Gutenberg case, but I hadn’t heard about this New York thievery syndicate,” she said. “I’m not surprised. A large and open library system like Harvard’s is very vulnerable to thefts.”

  “Is it possible to find out if anyone ever stole the book The Christian Warfare?” I asked.

  “The one in our special collections in Houghton?”

  “Exactly.”

  “It might be best to ask one of the research assistants over there,” she said. “They can probably tell you more about it than I can.” She looked down at a schedule and said, “Oh, they’re not open on the weekends. Let me just do a quick search in our databases and see if anything comes up.”

  After a few minutes of typing, she said, “I don’t see anything specifically regarding the book that you mentioned. I tried several key word combinations, and nothing has come back. I wish I could be more helpful.”

  32

  ON A HUNCH, I decided to try the Boston Public Library. I took the Green Line to the Copley Plaza branch. I wasn’t expecting the mass of people that awaited me. It took almost an hour to find a reference librarian who could help me. He was a short man with foppish sandy brown hair, reading glasses hanging around his neck, and a plaid shirt tucked neatly into his beige chinos. His eyes widened when I told him the subject of my search. He found the summary of an article from the Boston Post that talked about book thefts at Harvard. It was written on October 17, 1931. Joel Williams, a Harvard graduate and resident of the nearby town of Dedham, stole almost two thousand books from Widener and was caught when he had the audacity to attempt to sell two of them to a bookstore in Harvard Square, only yards away from Widener. Williams eventually admitted his crimes under intense questioning and was sentenced to two years of hard labor. There was no mention of the specific titles he had stolen or their presumed worth.

  “We have that paper on film,” he said. “That was a major paper.” He wrote down the call number. “Let’s go take a look.”

  We took the elevator to the third floor and walked to the section of the library that housed long rows of metal filing cabinets and an entire room of viewing machines. Most of them were occupied.

  “This is the cabinet,” he said, pulling out the top drawer. There were only two boxes inside. He picked them up. They weren’t the dates I needed. “Strange,” he said. “This drawer should be completely full.” He pulled out the second and third drawers. They were full. The librarian walked me back to his desk and scanned through several screens before shaking his head.

  “I have really bad news,” he said. “That film is lost. We renovated the library several years ago and stored many of the old films. When the boxes were returned from storage, two were missing. Unfortunately, the film you’re looking for was in one of those boxes.”

  I couldn’t believe my bad luck. Thousands of rolls of old film, and the one I needed was one of the few that got lost. I would have to go directly to the paper.

  “Do you know where the paper’s offices are?” I asked. “They must have their own paper on film.”

  “They would if they still existed,” he said. “The Boston Post folded in October of 1956.”

  * * *

  HARVARD’S MORE THAN one hundred libraries were spread across several campuses in buildings that most of us didn’t even recognize. Pusey Library was one of them and it housed the University Archives with a reading room situated at the end of a long, carpeted hallway, next to one of the world’s most admired map collections. Other than the staff, there was no one around for miles, but the archivists still spoke in hushed tones. This was a subterranean gold mine for serious research and my next best hope after striking out at the Boston Public Library. A bookish-looking woman with salt-and-pepper hair and a pencil stuck behind her right ear offered a smile as I approached the front desk. The name PEGGY was etched into her nameplate. Once she entered my ID into the computer and assigned me a number, I asked her about biblioklepts from the thirties involving Widener.

  “That’s an interesting request,” she said, nodding her head. “I’ve been here for fifteen years, and this is the first time someone has asked about that.”

  I explained to her the contents of the article describing the attempted burglary of Widener’s Gutenberg Bible. She did a search for other burglaries. There wasn’t any mention of The Christian Warfare, but she found the summary of the Boston Post article on Joel Williams.

  “Can we get the entire article?” I asked.

  “Possibly,” she said. “We have so much material in our repository, most of our collection is kept off-campus, and it might take a few days to get it here. But it’s possible we have it downstairs.” She typed more into the computer, then scowled. “Unfortunately, this is off-site. It’ll take two or three days to get it here.”

  I took a moment to think.

  “Do you know when microfilm came into existence?” I asked.

  “Not offhand, but I’m sure it’s not too hard to find out. I’m certain the technology has been around since the mid-1800s.”

  “But when do you think the technology was widely available for commercial purposes like recording books and newspapers?”

  “Much later, I would presume,” she said. “Maybe turn of the century, probably even later than that. In the beginning, it was being used only in select centers throughout the world, then as the process improved, others began to use it.”

  My reasoning was pretty straightforward. The succession book was dated 1936. So some time before 1936, they had either seen Harvard’s 1604 first printing of The Christian Warfare, had gotten ahold of the other few copies that were in Europe, or they had seen the microfilm. In any case, it all came down to timing.

  “I have the title of a book, and I know that it’s also available on microfilm,” I said. “Is there any way you can check and see who made the microfilm and when?”

  “This is really something one of the reference librarians at Widener or Lamont should be helping you with,” she said. “I’m an archivist.” She looked around, then said, “But it’s not busy today, so I’ll give it a shot.”

  I gave her the title and author of The Christian Warfare.

  She worked the keyboard expertly over the next several minutes, then said, “That recording was done by University Microfilms International. They’re out in Michigan. But it doesn’t give the production date.”

  “Are they the only ones who made a microfilm copy of that book?” I asked.

  “I’m pretty sure,” she said. “You’re talking about a book from the early 1600s. There are very few remaining copies of a book that old that can be photographed.”

  Then I thought of another way to get to the date. “When did that company start making microfilms?”


  She flipped through a couple of more screens. “It says here the company was founded in 1938 by Eugene Power, who was racing against the clock to protect and preserve Britain’s scholarly treasures during the war.” She stopped reading aloud and instead started mouthing the words to herself. She bunched her face up into a frown. “That’s ironic,” she said.

  “What?”

  “The first microfilm they made was of Early English Books, the ongoing microfilm edition of the Short Title Catalogue I and Short Title Catalogue II. So, that means The Christian Warfare was probably one of the first books they actually photographed. What a coincidence.”

  “But they did it in 1938, right?”

  “At the earliest. That’s when the company opened.”

  And that gave me my first elimination. The Ancient Nine couldn’t have gotten the passage from a microfilm copy, because the succession book was dated two years earlier, 1936. So that meant the Ancient Nine had either seen the Harvard 1604 copy of The Christian Warfare before the two pages had been stolen or they had seen one of the other seven copies of the intact books.

  Another thought occurred to me. Maybe there was a record of when the 1604 book had been acquired and its condition. If two pages were missing before Harvard acquired it, that important detail would have merited recording. I walked up to the front desk and waited for Peggy to get off the phone.

  “Does the library keep records of all the books they acquire?” I asked.

  “Sure, but the type of record kept depends on the value of the book and the era,” she said.

  “What are those records called?”

  “Accession records.”

  “Can they be seen?”

  “Sure, they’re open to the public.”

  “How do I get the accession records for a rare book that was donated around the turn of the century?”

  “All the rare books and manuscripts are stored in Houghton,” she said.

  “I know, but Houghton wasn’t built when the book was donated.”

  “Hmm, that’s a tricky one. In that case, we would likely store the records. It really depends. Back then, all the records were handwritten. With the construction of all the new libraries and the transferring of books, things got somewhat disorganized. Houghton keeps some of the records, Widener has some, but we keep a vast majority of the older donations.”