The Sayers Swindle (A Book Collector Mystery)

by Abbott, Victoria

  My head was throbbing. I couldn’t wait to get away from Candy’s intense presence and back to my soothing little attic.

  After I said good night for the third time, Candy reached out and tentatively touched my arm. “Hey, I don’t suppose you want to go to a movie this weekend? Or something?”

  I smiled weakly.

  • • •

  AS SOON AS Officer Candy drove off, I locked the back door and headed up the dark, narrow stairs to my flowered bower.

  A note under my door indicated that Vera wanted to talk at me.

  I headed back down the narrow stairs to the first floor and then along the endless corridor in the east wing to get to the front foyer and the stairs to the second floor and Vera’s suite. It’s not a place I visited often, although it was good exercise getting there. I knocked on the door and waited until Vera rolled over and opened it.

  “No,” Vera said.

  I blinked. “No what?”

  “No unidentified injured males have showed up or been taken to Grandville General Hospital, last night or today. They’ve had heart attacks, strokes, gastrointestinal drama, premature babies, injured toddlers and teenagers as well as females hurt in collisions, all attended by relatives. No one of your descriptions, attended or unattended.”

  “That’s good,” I said.

  “I certainly hope so, Miss Bingham, because I went out on a limb for your request, taking advantage of my position on the board and leaning on the chief of staff. I hope it was worth it.”

  I nodded. “I appreciate it.”

  “What now, Miss Bingham?”

  I shook my head. “I have no idea.”

  “What about the body found in Burton?”

  “No. That’s one good thing. Officer Mortakis showed me a picture of the victim. It wasn’t anyone I knew.”

  To my astonishment, Vera said, “I hope your friend and your relative are fine and there is some explanation for this that doesn’t involve violence to them.”

  As she spoke, a Siamese whipped through her bedroom door and disappeared into her suite. I really hoped it was Good Cat.

  “Thank y—”

  But by then she had shut the door in my face. Still, I had to think that our relationship had just made a great leap forward.

  I headed back to my room, feeling equal parts gratitude and surprise.

  • • •

  IT IS USUALLY wonderful to unwind in my attic space with the sloped ceilings and faded cabbage rose wallpaper, but usually I’m not worried about missing friends or relatives who may be lying unidentified in some lonely morgue. Uncle Mick and Uncle Lucky were not used to chasing after their little brother and were probably just relieved that he was out of their hair. They didn’t seem to be bent out of shape by his absence. I didn’t know if Tyler even had any relatives. For the first time in the five months since I’d first met him, I considered that I knew nothing about him at all. Not even whether his parents were alive. Perhaps he had a ton of relatives and had just never mentioned them. I couldn’t imagine that. Maybe it was a guy thing. Could it be he’d ended up at the hospital and someone had come to take him home? But if that had happened, it hadn’t been in our local hospital.

  I was tired but too restless to sleep. I thought about the books I had pilfered from the Adams house. If these books could talk, what would they tell me? I wanted to know why one of them was actually flung at a wall hard enough to damage the spine. I couldn’t imagine Randolph doing that under any circumstances. He loved these books enough to pay Karen well for eleven Sayers novels. Maybe he didn’t care as much as Vera. She was infatuated with every book in her collection, but he cared and paid plenty. So why had those eight been left behind? Where were the rest of the books?

  Of course, it had to have been Mason who had tossed the books. But again, why?

  Was there anything to be learned from them? I lay on my flowered quilt, closed my eyes and thought about Whose Body? the first of the Wimsey novels. Coincidentally, the book dealt with someone who was not who he appeared to be. That was relevant to me: Mason wasn’t who he appeared to be. None of the Adamses were who they appeared to be. Tyler Dekker was certainly not behaving like a cop. And Uncle Kev wasn’t behaving at all. As for the victim, who knew for sure, but I bet he hadn’t been what he appeared to be either.

  I shook my head and tried to concentrate on the matter at hand and the books that were linked to this whole situation. At least that copy was pristine. I breathed a sigh of relief, even though Whose Body? was my least favorite of all the Sayers books, maybe because it’s such a short book compared to the others. But then it was Sayers’s first. Although you could always count on Lord Peter to be equal parts debonair, urbane, knowledgeable and silly, I felt that he improved with each book. It didn’t take Sayers long to expand to more substantial novels and, of course, to bring in Harriet Vane to spice up the action, because an intelligent young woman can bring a lot to a book.

  Harriet Vane—a successful author of detective stories, like her creator. I enjoyed thinking about Harriet and wondering whether I might have liked the kind of life she’d lived. It made a nice change from thinking about the missing and dead people I knew. Fictional dead folks I can handle.

  Could I become a detective novelist? I knew plenty about crime and also knew not to be fooled by what you see on the surface. I was well aware that pleasant, ebullient and attractive men could have more interest in your sterling silver than in your heart, no names mentioned. I loved reading and researching, and I loved writing, but Lord Peter would find that a bit less than original. I was better off with the career I was having so much trouble hanging onto.

  I wondered idly whether Vera also might have daydreams about the people in the books she collected. I shook my head. Who would Vera Van Alst aspire to be? I’d read a lot about Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. Christie had a family and exotic travel. Dorothy L. Sayers had a lively, creative and productive life. She worked tirelessly; she was intellectual and she loved good food and partying with her friends. So not Vera, then. On the other hand, Sayers was passionate about her beliefs and she liked a good argument. As does you know who. Being housebound for so long and now set in her ways, Vera was more like Nero Wolfe, without the “charm.”

  I wondered if she’d always been like that or if a softer Vera had once roamed these grounds.

  I shook my head to clear the competing thoughts. Time to get back to productive thinking. At the Adams house, I hadn’t located Sayers’s second book, Clouds of Witness. I had really enjoyed Clouds of Witness because it dealt with the crazy situations that one’s nearest and dearest can drop on your doorstep. Or as my uncles would say, “Ya can pick your friends, but ya can’t pick your relatives.” This was usually in reference to Uncle Kev, no big surprise.

  Clouds of Witness was definitely one of the stolen fine firsts. I knew that. Or did I? Was I wrong? So many strange things had happened, I could hardly trust my brain at this point. Eleven Dorothy L. Sayers first editions, that’s what I needed to get back. All the Sayers novels had been pinched. None of her collaborative efforts had been taken, nor had the short story collections. I loved those short stories. Perhaps they would have been swiped next if the perpetrator hadn’t been stopped. But they weren’t missing now. I was sure of it. Or was I? I had brought back eight volumes. Were there only eight missing books? I knew the hamster in the wheel would never get a break if I didn’t find out for sure.

  Karen would be fast asleep, helped along by medications. Naturally, I was reluctant to ask Vera, since that kind of inquiry could easily blow up in my face. And I felt attached to that face. Mind you, it had a pretty dumb look on it right now. I should have been absolutely certain how many books were missing. It was too late to call Lance and check, so I closed my eyes and tried to recall the books. The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club hadn’t been there either. But Unnatural Death had been. I’d checked Unnatural Death gingerly and found it to be in excellent condition. At least it hadn’t been
damaged by the rough treatment in the Adams house. It would certainly pass the Vera test.

  I clearly remembered picking up Strong Poison, where we readers first met the splendid Harriet Vane in the prisoner’s dock, accused of murdering her lover. That’s when Lord Peter first fell and fell hard. Lucky lady, except for the murder charge. Then I’d inspected Five Red Herrings, a classic puzzle mystery. Sayers said that every sentence in this book was important to the solution. So many of those sentences involved the minute details of railway schedules that it had failed to get my motor running. Five Red Herrings was Vera’s favorite Sayers book, but then she adored puzzles.

  I had moved on to Murder Must Advertise, in which Peter really shone, in my opinion, as he assumed another identity and went undercover in an advertising agency. I found that undercover thing exciting when it was happening on the page, but not so much when it was happening to me.

  I hated to be out of my depth. Sayers lived and breathed advertising for years, and that’s why Murder Must Advertise seemed so authentic.

  Next I’d inspected Gaudy Night, where I really got to know Harriet Vane and started picturing myself living that scholarly way of life in the nineteen thirties. What would it have been like to be born in an earlier century and to have enjoyed the academic life in a women’s college at Oxford in that era? I thought I’d look good in the billowing academic gown. But I mustn’t digress. At any rate, I knew perfectly well, if Harriet Vane had been born in my circumstances she would be in graduate school right at that very moment, come hell or high water. Something to ponder. But for now back to my task of remembering: Busman’s Honeymoon was right up there on my A-list too. And it had been one of the books I’d recovered.

  But I was troubled by the missing books: Clouds of Witness, Have His Carcase and The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club. I’d failed to find them.

  Late or not, I called Lance. He was surprisingly agreeable, conisdering the hour. He was also willing to take a look at the books. He confirmed all eight of the titles were there and also verified that the other three were not.

  “So I’m not crazy,” I said.

  “Not sure I’d go that far,” he chuckled. “It is the middle of the night. I’m going back to sleep.”

  After Lance disconnected, I closed my eyes and thought back to the room at 87 Lincoln Way. Had I located every Sayers book on that section of the shelf and on the floor? Had Randolph chosen a few of his favorites to take on the Adams family trip to wherever? Or did I manage to miss those three in the chaos of the Adams house? I’d been in a minor panic because, at any moment, Officer Candy could have thumped down the stairs from the attic and caught me. Perhaps I just hadn’t realized what they were in the midst of the debris. Or maybe the three books had landed under a piece of furniture. A dozen possible scenarios flashed through my mind.

  What if there was a miracle and it turned out that they’d never been stolen at all?

  I got out of bed and headed downstairs to check the library. Hammy the hamster and I wouldn’t be able to sleep if I didn’t.

  • • •

  OF COURSE, EVERYTHING in Van Alst House feels like it’s two miles away. The library is on the first floor, down not one but two endless corridors. I keyed in the security code, closed the door behind me and switched on the light. Even when I’m in a hurry, I always have to pause to admire the rosewood and the perfect shelves filled with perfect books. I always inhale the scent of old leather and paper. This library is one of my favorite places on earth, especially when Vera isn’t in it. I quickly climbed the wrought iron circular staircase to the mezzanine. Sure enough, despite my desperate desire to see them, the Sayers first edition novels were not there. The short story collections stood all in a row. I ran a hand over Lord Peter Views the Body. Some people turn up their noses at a few of these early stories, but to me it was a thing of beauty. Vera must have thought so too, because I knew she’d paid a thousand dollars for it, without so much as a blink. There was also a copy of Striding Folly, a collection of the last three Wimsey stories. I liked the long introduction by Janet Hitchman, with its blend of biographical details for Dorothy Sayers and Wimsey. Not complete, but interesting. I’d even bought a copy with a slightly psychedelic cover for myself, the New English Library 1980 mass-market reprint. I loved every one of those over-the-top covers and snapped up several in that reprint series. They were still on display on the coffee table, so I could admire their funkiness. Ten dollars a pop, well spent at the book fair.

  I was getting to enjoy the hunt as much as Vera did, although at a much lower price range. I didn’t care so much about pristine first editions or books that had never been read. I loved to plunge into the era the books conveyed.

  I turned back to the shelves and the large gap that had been left when the Sayers books had been stolen. Of course, the books would most likely have all been in the same room at the Adams house, and now, somehow, I’d ended up with three of them missing. Why was that? And more to the point, I wondered how much hair pulling I could take before I would need to invest in another wig.

  • • •

  AS I REVERSED my trip down the two endless hallways and back up the steep stairs to my quarters, I thought hard. The missing books were either in the Adams house or they weren’t. And if they weren’t, then the absconding Adamses had taken them for some reason. As the Adamses had vanished—and in fact were not even the Adams family to begin with—if the books had gone with them, I had a really big problem, in a week of massive problems.

  So, I had no choice really but to head back to 87 Lincoln Way. Officer Candy was keen to have a girls’ night, but I could hardly ask her to join me in a bit of lighthearted midnight breaking, entering and book pilfering. Even though the Hemingway was worth more than the whole haul of Sayers, a court might not see it that way. Definitely no Officer Candy for this gig. The same thing went for my friend, Smiley, wherever he was. That thought stopped me cold. Where was he? All I could do was hope he was all right.

  Who could help me? I would have liked someone to keep watch and give me a heads-up if the cops showed up. Lance came to mind. Of course, as he had career plans in the library world, he’d want to avoid certain types of controversy, such as being tossed into the slammer. Tiff was completely off the grid. And I really preferred not to tell Vera that I may have left some of her precious babies alone in a house that probably had lousy climate control to begin with and worse now that it was unoccupied.

  The signora’s talents lay elsewhere.

  Karen was too fragile.

  Well, the possibilities were shrinking, but I didn’t have much choice. I decided not to involve my uncles. They never wanted to encounter the police unless a major payoff made the risk worthwhile. And they needed their beauty sleep. Plus Uncle Kev was still missing.

  At least I had my fictional role models.

  I wondered who was the better advisor for this: Harriet reflecting alone on the situation and perhaps having a word with . . . well, herself. Or Lord Peter, man of action, expert lock picker who never avoided an unauthorized entry. For sure, he’d dress nattily and head into the thick of things. If he needed a helper, Bunter was the perfect person. I didn’t have a valet, a butler or any kind of person Friday.

  I was on my own.

  I dressed in a black cashmere turtleneck (very Audrey Hepburn), black skinny jeans (a bargain at Goodwill) and a black pashmina wrapped rather fetchingly as a scarf. I popped a black beret, one of my mother’s few remaining hats, into my jeans pocket. I took my lock picks (a sweet-sixteen gift from my uncles) and slipped them into the special slot on the side of my black messenger bag. It would take a pro to find them there. The messenger bag had been a gift from Uncle Lucky for my college graduation. Up until tonight, the special slot was a bonus that I’d figured I’d never need. Over my outfit and the bag, I added a very loud, plaid cape, a vintage prize from the early seventies. I’d be hard to miss in the cape, but I’d be ditching it soon enough. Between the cashmere sweater and th
e pashmina I’d still be a nice combo of warm and invisible. I had my old black Converse on my feet and I’d used a black marker to get rid of the white rubber around the soles.

  Fifteen minutes later, I pulled up in front of Michael Kelly’s Fine Antiques and parked the Saab under a streetlight where it couldn’t be missed. Wearing the plaid cape, I couldn’t be missed either. I chuckled to myself as I’d gotten the clever idea from Five Red Herrings, but sadly, I had no one to share my cleverness with.

  I still had my key, but I tiptoed so as not to wake the uncles. Scavenging in Uncle Mick’s shelf of useful gadgets at the back of the antique shop, I came up with what I’d remembered seeing: night vision goggles joined the tools in the messenger bag. I ditched the cape and, black as the night, headed out the back entrance and two doors down where the uncles always have a collection of “extra” cars stashed. I took a set of keys from the hook and headed out in a burgundy Honda Civic that was nearly as old as I was.

  • • •

  IN LESS THAN fifteen minutes, I had parked around the corner from 87 Lincoln Way and was creeping through a series of backyards, hugging the fences as I went. Of course, I avoided the crime-scene area. Obsessed: maybe. Nuts: no.

  Soon I was at the back door of the Adams house. Like the front door earlier, the back door was not locked. I hadn’t needed those lock picks after all. So it seemed likely that no one had returned to set the security alarm. It had been off when Officer Candy and I “visited,” and I figured it still was. I pushed the door all the way open, and waited before easing in. I held my breath for two minutes and then slowly exhaled. Almost all security would have engaged by then if it was on. The security system being off was a good indication that the Adamses didn’t plan to return and didn’t care what happened. Or was it a clue that they’d been taken by surprise by someone they knew and trusted and from whom they fled or were taken? In which case, it was possible they might return if that danger was past.