The Collectors cc-2

by David Baldacci

  “Well, that might work,” Caleb grudgingly conceded. “But what if they ask you some question you don’t know the answer to?”

  “There’s no one easier to impersonate than a scholar, Caleb,” Stone assured him. Caleb looked very offended at this remark, but Stone disregarded his friend’s annoyance and added, “I’ll be at the library at eleven o’clock.” He wrote something on a piece of paper and handed it to Caleb. “This is who I’ll be.”

  Caleb glanced down at the paper and then looked up in surprise.

  With that, the meeting of the Camel Club was adjourned, although Stone took Milton aside and started talking to him quietly.

  A few hours later at the library Caleb was handing a book to Norman Janklow, an elderly man and reading room regular.

  “Here it is, Norman.” He handed him a copy of Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms. Janklow was a Hemingway fanatic. The novel he was holding was a first edition, inscribed by Hemingway.

  “I would die to own this book, Caleb,” Janklow said.

  “I know, Norman, me too.” A signed Hemingway first edition would fetch at least $35,000, Caleb knew, certainly beyond his financial means and probably Janklow’s too. “But at least you can hold it.”

  “I’m getting started on my biography of Ernest.”

  “That’s great.” Actually, Janklow had been “getting started” on his Hemingway biography for the last two years. Still, the notion seemed to make him happy, and Caleb was more than willing to play along.

  Janklow carefully fingered the volume. “They’ve repaired the cover,” he said irritably.

  “That’s right. Many of our first-edition American masterpieces were housed in less-than-ideal conditions before the Rare Books Division really got up to speed. We’ve been going through the backlog for years now. That copy was long overdue for restoration, an administrative error, I guess. That happens when you have nearly a million volumes under one roof.”

  “I wish they’d keep them in their original condition.”

  “Well, our chief goal is preservation. That’s why we have this book for you to enjoy, because it’s been preserved.”

  “I met Hemingway once.”

  “I remember you telling me.” Over a hundred times.

  “He was a piece of work. We got drunk together at a café in Cuba.”

  “Right. I remember the story very well. I’ll let you get to your research.”

  Janklow slipped on his reading glasses, took out his pieces of paper and a pencil and lost himself in the adventurous world of Ernest Hemingway’s prodigious imagination and spare prose.

  Promptly at eleven o’clock Oliver Stone arrived at the Rare Books reading room dressed in a rumpled three-piece tweed suit and holding a cane. His white hair was neatly combed, and he sported a very trim beard along with large black glasses that made his eyes buglike. That coupled with his walking with a stoop made him appear twenty years older than he was. Caleb rose from his desk at the back of the room, hardly recognizing his friend.

  As one of the attendants at the front desk approached Stone, Caleb hurried forward. “I’ll take care of him, Dorothy. I . . . I know the gentleman.”

  Stone made an elaborate show of producing a white business card. “As promised, Herr Shaw, I am here to see the books.” His accent was thick and Germanic, and very well done.

  As Dorothy, the woman behind the front desk, looked at him curiously, Caleb said, “This is Dr. Aust. We met years ago at a book conference in . . . Frankfurt, was it?”

  “No, Mainz,” Stone corrected. “I remember very clearly, because it was the season of Spargel, the white asparagus, and I always go to the Mainz conference and eat the white asparagus.” He beamed at Dorothy, who smiled and went back to what she was doing.

  Another man came into the reading room and stopped. “Caleb, I wanted to talk to you for a minute.”

  Caleb turned a shade paler. “Oh, hello, Kevin. Kevin, this is, uh, Dr. Aust from Germany. Dr. Aust, Kevin Philips. He’s the acting director of the Rare Books Division. After Jonathan’s—”

  “Ah, yes, the very untimely death of Herr DeHaven,” Stone said. “Very sad. Very sad.”

  “You knew Jonathan?” Philips said.

  “Only by reputation. I think it clear that his paper on James Logan’s metrical translation of Cato’s Moral Distichs was the final word on the subject, don’t you?”

  Philips looked chagrined. “I must confess I haven’t read it.”

  “An analysis of Logan’s first translation from the classics to be produced in North America, it is well worth exploring,” Stone advised kindly.

  Philips said, “I’ll be sure to add it to my list. Ironically, sometimes librarians don’t have a lot of time to read.”

  “Then I will not burden you with copies of my books,” Stone said with a smile. “They’re in German anyway,” he added with a chuckle.

  “I invited Dr. Aust to take a tour of the vaults while he’s in town,” Caleb explained. “Sort of a spur-of-the-moment thing.”

  “Absolutely,” Philips said. “We’d be honored.” He lowered his voice. “Caleb, you heard the report about Jonathan?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “So that means he just had a heart attack, then?”

  Caleb glanced at Stone, who, out of Philips’ line of sight, gave a slight nod.

  “Yes, I think that’s exactly what it means.”

  Philips shook his head. “God, he was younger than me. It gives one pause, doesn’t it?” He looked over at Stone. “Dr. Aust, would you like me to give you the fifty-cent tour?”

  Stone smiled and leaned heavily on his cane. “No, Herr Philips, I would much prefer you to take that time and begin your friend’s paper on Moral Distichs.”

  Philips chuckled. “It’s good to see that distinguished scholars can retain a healthy sense of humor.”

  “I try, sir, I try,” Stone said with a slow bow.

  After Philips had left them, Caleb and Stone headed into the vault.

  “How did you find out about Jonathan’s scholarly work?” Caleb asked once they were alone.

  “I asked Milton to dig around. He located it on the Internet and brought me a copy. I scanned it in case someone like Philips showed up, to prove my scholarly pedigree.” Caleb looked disgruntled. “What’s the matter?” Stone asked.

  “Well, it’s a little deflating to one’s ego to see how easily a scholar can be impersonated.”

  “I’m sure your validation of my pedigree made all the difference to your boss.”

  Caleb brightened. “Well, I’m sure it contributed somewhat to the success,” he said modestly.

  “All right, take me through your exact movements that day.”

  Caleb did so, ending on the top floor. He pointed at a spot. “That’s where his body was.” Caleb shivered. “God, it really was terrible.”

  Stone looked around and then stopped and pointed at something on the wall.

  “What’s that?”

  Caleb looked to where he was pointing. “Oh, that’s a nozzle for the fire suppressant system.”

  “You use water in here with all these books?”

  “Oh, no. It’s a halon 1301 system.”

  “Halon 1301?” Stone asked.

  “It’s a gas, although it’s really a liquid, but when it shoots out of the nozzle, it turns to gas. It smothers the fire without damaging the books.”

  Stone looked excited. “Smothers! My God!” His friend looked at him curiously. “Caleb, don’t you see?”

  What Stone was referring to suddenly dawned on Caleb. “Smothering? Oh, no, Oliver, no. It couldn’t have been the cause of Jonathan’s death.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because a person would have several minutes to escape the area before he’d start feeling the effects. That’s why they use halon in occupied places. And before the gas is discharged, a warning horn comes on. We’re changing systems actually but not because it’s dangerous.”

  “Why, then?�
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  “Halon significantly depletes the ozone layer. In fact, while it can still be used in this country and recycled for new applications, the manufacture of halon 1301 is banned in the U.S. and has been since the mid-nineties. Although the federal government is still the biggest user of it.”

  “You seem to know a lot about halon.”

  “Well, all employees were given an in-depth review of the system when it was first installed. And I did some extra reading on the subject.”

  “Why?”

  He blurted out, “Because I come into this vault a lot, and I didn’t want to die a horrible death! You know I lack any shred of personal courage.”

  Stone examined the nozzle. “Where’s the gas stored?”

  “Somewhere in the basement level of the building, and the gas is piped up here.”

  “You say it’s stored as liquid and then comes out as a gas?”

  “Yes. The speed with which it’s blown out of the nozzle turns it into a gas.”

  “It must be very cold.”

  “If you’re standing in front of the nozzle, you could get frostbite, in fact.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Well, if you stay in the room long enough, I suppose you could be asphyxiated. The rough rule of thumb is if there’s not enough oxygen for a fire, there’s not enough oxygen to sustain life.”

  “Could the gas cause a heart attack?”

  “I don’t know. But it doesn’t matter. The system never came on. That horn can be heard throughout the building. The only way Jonathan wouldn’t have heard it is if he was already dead.”

  “What if the horn was disconnected?”

  “Who would have done that?” Caleb said skeptically.

  “I don’t know.”

  While he was talking, Stone was staring at a large register built onto one of the columns supporting a bookshelf. “Is that a vent for the HVAC system?” he asked. Caleb nodded. “Something must have fallen on it,” Stone said, pointing to where two of the vent grilles had been bent.

  “It happens with people bringing book carts in and out.”

  Stone said, “I’ll have Milton research the halon system and see if anything else turns up. And Reuben has some friends at D.C. Homicide and the FBI from his days in military intelligence. I’ve asked Reuben to call them to see if he can find out something about the investigation.”

  “We have the meeting with Vincent Pearl tonight at Jonathan’s house. In light of these developments, don’t you think it best to call it off?”

  Stone shook his head. “No. Those men can find us wherever we are, Caleb. If we’re in danger, I’d rather try to find out the truth for myself than sit back and wait for the blow to fall.”

  As they were leaving the vault, Caleb muttered, “Why couldn’t I have just joined a nice, boring book club?”

  CHAPTER 22

  THAT EVENING THEY ALL RODE to DeHaven’s house in Caleb’s Nova. In the meantime Milton had found out a lot about fire suppressant systems. He reported that “halon 1301 is odorless and colorless, and extinguishes fires by tweaking the combustion process, which includes the depletion of oxygen levels. It evaporates quickly, leaving no residue. Once the system is activated, it’ll discharge in approximately ten seconds.”

  “Can it be lethal?” Stone asked.

  “If you hang around long enough and depending on the concentration levels of the flooding agent, you can suffer asphyxiation. It can also cause a heart attack.”

  Stone looked triumphantly at Caleb.

  “But the autopsy result said he suffered cardiopulmonary arrest,” Milton reminded him. “If he’d suffered a heart attack, the cause of death would’ve been listed as a myocardial infarction. A heart attack or a stroke leaves very clear physiological signs. The medical examiner wouldn’t have missed that.”

  Stone nodded. “All right. But asphyxiation can happen, you said.”

  “I don’t really think so,” Milton said. “Not after I spoke with Caleb earlier.”

  “I looked more into the library’s halon system,” Caleb explained. “It’s rated as an NOAEL system. That stands for No Observed Adverse Effect Level, a standard protocol used in fire suppression. It relates to the cardio-sensitization levels present in a particular place in relation to the amount of flooding agent required to extinguish a fire. Bottom line, with a NOAEL level, you’d have plenty of time to escape the space before being affected. And even if the horn were disconnected for some reason, if the gas had come out of that nozzle, Jonathan would’ve heard it. There was no way halon could have incapacitated him so fast that he couldn’t have escaped.”

  “Well, it looks like my theory on how Jonathan DeHaven died was incorrect,” Stone admitted. He looked up ahead. They had just pulled onto Good Fellow Street.

  “Is that Vincent Pearl?” he asked.

  Caleb nodded and said irritably, “He’s early, probably very eager to prove yours truly wrong about the Psalm Book.”

  Reuben smirked. “I see he left the robes at home.”

  “Keep your eyes open,” Stone warned as they got out of the car. “We are undoubtedly being watched.”

  True to Stone’s words, the same pair of binoculars from the window across the street were trained on the group as they met Pearl and headed into the house. The person also had a camera and snapped a few shots of them.

  Once inside, Stone suggested that the rare book dealer accompany Caleb to the vault alone. “It’s not that large of a space, and you two are the experts in the area,” he explained. “We’ll just wait upstairs for you.”

  Caleb looked unhappily at Stone, doubtless for casting him solo to Pearl. For his part Pearl gazed at Stone suspiciously for a moment and then shrugged. “I doubt it will take me long to show that it is not a first-edition Psalm Book.”

  “Take your time,” Stone called to them as the two men stepped onto the elevator.

  “Don’t let the book bugs bite,” Reuben added.

  As the door closed, Stone said, “Okay, quick, let’s search the place.”

  “Why don’t we wait for Pearl to leave?” Milton asked. “Then we can take our time and Caleb can help us look.”

  “I’m not worried about Pearl. I don’t want Caleb to know, since he would undoubtedly object.”

  They split up, and for the next thirty minutes they covered as much as they could.

  Stone said in a disappointed tone, “Nothing. Not a diary, no letters.”

  “I did find this on a shelf in his bedroom closet,” Reuben said, producing a photograph of a man and a woman in a small frame. “And that’s DeHaven next to her. I recognize him from his picture in the paper.”

  Stone gazed at the photo and then turned it over. “No name or date. But judging from DeHaven’s appearance, it was taken many years ago.”

  Milton said, “Caleb told us that the lawyer mentioned DeHaven was married once. I wonder if that was the bride?”

  “Lucky guy if it is,” Reuben commented. “And they look happy, which means it was early on in the marriage. That all changes with time, trust me.”

  Stone slipped the photo into his pocket. “We’ll just hold on to it for now.” He stopped and looked upward. “This home has a steeply pitched roof.”

  “So?” Reuben said.

  “So homes with a pitched roof of this vintage usually have an attic.”

  Milton said, “I didn’t see anything like that upstairs.”

  “You wouldn’t if the access were hidden,” Stone replied.

  Reuben checked his watch. “What’s taking the book geeks so long? You think they’re fighting?”

  “I don’t really see those two chucking first editions at each other,” Milton said.

  “Whatever it is they’re doing, let’s just hope they keep it up for a little while longer,” Stone said. “Milton, you stay down here and keep watch. If you hear the elevator, call up to us.”

  It took a few minutes, but Stone found the attic access behind a rack of clothes in DeHaven’s closet. I
t was locked, but Stone had brought a pick and tension tool with him, and the lock quickly succumbed to his prodding.

  “They must have added this closet later,” Reuben said.

  Stone nodded. “Walk-in closets weren’t very popular in the nineteenth century.”

  They headed up the stairs. Along the way, Stone found and hit a light switch; this illuminated their path only weakly. They arrived at the top of the stairs and looked around the large space. It appeared unchanged since the day the home had been built. There were a few boxes and old suitcases, but a quick examination revealed them to be either empty or full of old junk.

  Reuben spotted it first, positioned in front of a half-moon window of leaded glass. “Why a telescope here?” he asked.

  “Well, you wouldn’t have one in the basement, would you?”

  Reuben looked through it. “Holy shit!”

  “What?” Stone exclaimed.

  “It’s pointed at the house next door.”

  “Whose house is it?”

  “How do I—” Reuben stopped and adjusted the eyepiece. “Damn!”

  “What is it? Let me see.”

  “Now, wait a minute, Oliver,” Reuben said. “Let me just execute a nice long recon.”

  Stone waited a few moments and then pushed his friend out of the way. Wiping the eyepiece clear, he gazed through a window of the house next to DeHaven’s. The drapes were drawn, but this window also had a half-sphere of glass above, which the drapes didn’t cover. It was only from this high vantage point that one could see into the room. And now Stone saw what had fully captured Reuben’s attention. The room was a bedroom. And Cornelius Behan was sitting naked on a large four-poster while a tall and lovely brunet did a slow striptease for him. The dress had already hit the polished floor, as had a black slip. She was now undoing her bra. When this fell, she was left with nothing on save four-inch heels and a G-string.

  “Come on, Oliver, it’s my turn,” Reuben called out, his big hand on Stone’s shoulder. Stone didn’t budge. “Hey, that’s not fair, I saw the damn telescope first,” Reuben protested.

  As Stone continued to watch, the panties slid down the young woman’s long legs. She stepped out of them and tossed them to Behan, who promptly put them over a certain part of his anatomy. She laughed, grasped one of the bedposts and proceeded to engage in a professional-looking pole dance. When she took off her shoes and slinked barefoot and naked toward the eagerly awaiting Behan, Stone gave up the telescope to his friend. “I’ve seen a picture of Mrs. Behan in the newspaper. That is not the woman.”