The Burglar in the Library

by Lawrence Block

  “What happened, Lettice?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Somehow I knew I’d made a mistake. I knew it days before the ceremony, Bernie. I suppose it was intuition, little hints I picked up. I knew I shouldn’t marry him.”

  “But you did.”

  “I almost got married a few years ago,” she said, “to a perfectly nice young man, and I got cold feet and backed out at the last minute. So I thought I was just doing the same thing all over again, and I told myself I had to go through with it this time. I was afraid to go to Aruba, Bernie. I think I knew something would happen to me there.”

  “And that’s why you talked him into coming to Cuttleford House instead.”

  “That’s right. And then driving up I thought, well, I can leave first thing in the morning. I can grab the car keys when he’s not looking and get out of there. And when we walked across the bridge…”

  “Yes?”

  “I thought, well, if we’re snowed in for the weekend, and if I can’t get away, then maybe I’ll get over this case of the jitters and settle down and be a wife. But I wasn’t sure if it would snow enough to keep me there. And I thought, well, if something happened to the bridge—”

  “You’d be forced to stay.”

  “That’s right. And I thought I would just cut the ropes, just like that, but they were thick and tough, and the cold didn’t make it any easier. I had to give up because Dakin was coming back up the path to see what had happened to me, and if he saw me sawing away at the ropes—”

  “He might have wondered.”

  “God only knows what he would have thought. I was going to go outside later and finish the job. In fact, I did come downstairs after I, uh—”

  “Consummated your marriage.”

  “Yes. I was going to finish what I’d started, but I was also all flustered because you had turned up at Cuttleford House after all, you and uh—”

  “Carolyn,” Carolyn said.

  “Yes. And I looked around until I found you, Bernie, and then I uh—”

  “Finished what you’d started.”

  “So to speak, yes. And then I thought of going outside again, but I was so warm and cozy, and pretty sleepy, too, and the snow was still coming down out there. And I found myself wondering why I’d wanted to disable the bridge in the first place. I didn’t have to seal off my escape route to make it through the weekend. Married life wasn’t going to be so bad.”

  “Married life,” I said.

  “Well, I don’t suppose I was likely to be the traditional wife, Bernie, baking cookies and mending socks.”

  “No,” I said, “I suppose not.”

  “I never thought anybody would get killed. To tell you the truth, I thought it would take a chain saw to get through those ropes. I didn’t realize I’d weakened them enough so that the bridge would give way if anybody set foot on it.”

  “And then Orris fell to his death.”

  “Yes. And I knew it was my fault.”

  “But you didn’t say anything.”

  “No, of course not,” she said. “What about you, Bernie?”

  “What about me?”

  “Are you going to say anything?”

  “I just did.”

  “To anybody else, I mean. You didn’t say anything to the police. I guess you hadn’t figured it out by then.”

  “Sure I had. I knew Wolpert would have slashed right through those ropes, and so would anybody else who’d gone out there for that express purpose. There were plenty of tools that would have done the job. The kitchen was full of long sharp knives, and if you didn’t want to go that far there were loads of exotic edged weapons on the walls, like the kris I wound up using to ruin my parka. So I figured the sabotage was a spur-of-the-moment thing, and that’s when it came to me. Little Lettice, sawing away with a teeny-weeny penknife. Well, it turned out to be mightier than the sword, didn’t it?”

  “What are you going to do, Bernie?”

  “Me? Sell books until six o’clock or so, then go home.”

  “You know what I mean. What are you going to do about me? Are you going to tell anybody?”

  I shook my head.

  “You’re not?”

  “I told you. That’s enough.”

  “Why?”

  “Why tell you?”

  “Yes, why? When you called, Bernie, I thought I’d wind up coming over to your place, and you’d put on your Mel Tormé record and we’d enjoy ourselves in front of your phony Mondrian. But that’s not going to happen.”

  “Somehow I guessed as much.”

  “It’s never going to happen, Bernie. You ruined it forever. Why? That’s what I want to know.”

  “Well,” I said.

  “Never mind,” she said. “Don’t tell me. I don’t really want to know. You won’t be seeing me again, Bernie. Goodbye.”

  CHAPTER

  Twenty-nine

  “She may not want to know,” Carolyn said, “but I do. What was that all about, Bern? Why’d you call her and make her come down here? And why schedule things so you got to play the scene in front of me? Not that I’m complaining, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world, but…”

  “But why did I do it that way.”

  “Right.”

  I thought about it and took a bite of my sandwich. It had gone untouched since Lettice walked in, and an interlude like that can give you an appetite. I chewed and swallowed and drank some cream soda, and I said, “Raymond Chandler.”

  “Huh?”

  “It was a Raymond Chandler case,” I said. “Once I realized that, I went out and took action, instead of trying to put the pieces together like some English gentleman assembling a jigsaw puzzle in his drawing room. That’s why I did what I did that night while you were sleeping.”

  “When did Philip Marlowe fake his own death and stab a dummy with a wavy knife, Bern? I must have missed that book.”

  “Well, you know what I mean. And I certainly had Marlowe and Chandler in mind when I wrapped it all up in the library. The way I confronted Dakin Littlefield? Pure Philip Marlowe.”

  “If you say so, Bern.”

  I drank the last of the cream soda. “Maybe you can’t see it,” I said. “But the business just now with Lettice, that was Marlowe.”

  “It was?”

  “Uh-huh. I couldn’t let her think she got away with it.”

  “You didn’t want to play the sap for her,” she said. “But that’s not Philip Marlowe, is it? It’s more like Sam Spade.”

  “He wouldn’t play the sap for Bridget O’Shaughnessy,” I said, “but this wasn’t a matter of playing the sap. This was getting at the truth, no matter what it did to human relationships.”

  “And the truth was that she cut the ropes.”

  I nodded. “And there was no point bringing it up at the time, because it would just have confused the issue. I suppose she was guilty of something, whether it was malicious mischief or negligent homicide, because if she hadn’t whittled away at the ropes Orris wouldn’t have been killed. But how could you prove any of that anyway?”

  “So you waited and brought it up now.”

  “Right.”

  “Why, Bern? Because you wanted an excuse to see her again?”

  I shook my head. “Because I didn’t want to see her again. She tried to cut down a bridge. Well, I wanted to burn mine. You heard what she said, how she expected to wind up at my place listening to Mel Tormé. I wanted to make sure that didn’t happen.”

  “Because you weren’t interested.”

  “Because I was,” I said. “And I always would be, and there could never be any future in a relationship with someone like Lettice, or much of a present, either. So I wanted to fix things so that I’d never see her again. Now I can’t call her and she’ll never call me, and that’s the way it should be.”

  She pursed her lips and let out a soundless whistle. “I think you did the right thing,” she said. “And I have to tell you, Bern, I’m impressed.”

&nbs
p; “Thanks,” I said, “but don’t give me too much credit. I just asked myself what Philip Marlowe would have done, and then I went ahead and did it.”

  “Raymond Chandler.”

  It was an hour later, and I’d actually sold something in the interim, a nice set of Daniel Defoe. The customer was a lanky fellow who owned a batch of launderettes. He’d almost bought the set two weeks before, but I’d felt obliged to point out that it was missing a volume. Conscience may not make cowards of us all, but it can spoil a lot of sales.

  He came back and carried the books to the counter. “I thought about it,” he said, “and it struck me that a complete set would cost a good deal more.”

  “No question.”

  “And if I ever locate the missing volume, I can probably pick it up for a couple of bucks, and then I’d be way ahead of the game.”

  “You would indeed.”

  “So I’ll have something to look for, and I’ll enjoy that. And if I never complete the set, well, who cares? They’ll look fine on the shelf the way they are, and as far as reading them is concerned, hey, who am I kidding? I had to read Moll Flanders in college, and I read the Cliff’s Notes instead. Aside from the Classic Comic of Robinson Crusoe, that’s as far as I ever got with Defoe.” He patted the stack of books. “I intend to have a go at these,” he said, “but I’ll wait until I’ve read all seven volumes before I start pissing and moaning because the eighth volume is missing.”

  So I bagged the books and took his money, feeling for all the world like virtue rewarded, and a little later the door opened again, and a familiar voice said, “Raymond Chandler.” And I looked up and it was Carolyn.

  “The book,” she said. “The reason we went to Cuttleford House in the first place.”

  “The Big Sleep.”

  “Right. We saw it on the shelf, and it was still there after Jonathan Rathburn was murdered, and then a little later it was missing. What happened to it?”

  “I took it.”

  “You took it?”

  “For safekeeping,” I said. “And so I’d have something to read.”

  “Something to read?”

  “In Rathburn’s room. I knew I was going to hole up there, and I didn’t know what I’d find on the bookshelves, so I stowed The Big Sleep in the top drawer of his dresser. It’s a good thing I brought it, too. The only books in there were Victorian romance novels by women with hyphens in their names.”

  “And you actually read the book?”

  “What’s so remarkable about that? Chandler’s still a good read.”

  “I guess it wasn’t the Hammett copy, huh?”

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “Well, you wouldn’t actually read it if it was, would you? A book worth so much money?”

  I opened a drawer, withdrew a book, opened the cover. “Nowadays,” I said, “most authors use the title page for a simple signature, or the half-title page for a full inscription. But Chandler didn’t do this sort of thing often enough to care about the proper form. Here’s what he wrote on the flyleaf: ‘To Dashiell Hammett, who put homicide in the mean streets where it belongs. I trust you’ll give this little volume a place on the shelf next to your own. With appreciation and friendship, Raymond Chandler.’”

  “Wow! Talk about literary history. Can I see, Bern? That’s what it says, all right. But what’s this?”

  “Can you make it out?”

  “It’s a real scrawl, isn’t it? Did Chandler write this, too? It doesn’t look like his handwriting.”

  “It’s not.”

  “‘What a pretentious bore. Let him take his book and shove it up his prissy hero’s ass. Come to think of it, they’d probably both enjoy it.’ It’s not signed, Bern.”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Don’t tell me, Bern. Is it…”

  “It’s Hammett’s handwriting,” I said. “More of a scrawl than usual, but that’s how he wrote when he was drunk, and he must have been pretty far gone to write something like that. He certainly didn’t like the book enough to take it home with him, and I guess somebody stuck it on a shelf.”

  “Raymond Chandler’s first book,” she said, “in nice condition, with an intact dust jacket. Inscribed by the author to Dashiell Hammett, and counter-inscribed by Hammett. And what an inscription!”

  “It’s something, all right.”

  “I guess it must be the ultimate association copy in American literature.”

  “Well, if you found a copy of Tamerlane inscribed by Poe to the young Abraham Lincoln, it’d probably put this volume in the shade. Barring that, I guess it’s way up there.”

  “What’s it worth, Bern?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “A fortune, but how big a fortune? I couldn’t even guess. You’d need to hold an auction to answer the question. It would depend on who showed up and just how badly they wanted it.”

  “Wow.”

  “But it doesn’t matter,” I said. “I can’t sell it.”

  She stared at me.

  “Lots of things didn’t come to light up at Cuttleford House,” I said. “We never did find out what became of the real Mr. Pettisham, or what Rathburn and Wolpert were hoping to get from him. And I kept Lettice’s secret, and there were probably other people keeping other secrets. But one thing that did come out was my two occupations. Millicent Savage had already told everybody that I was a burglar—”

  “Because you’d made the mistake of telling her.”

  “Well, yes. But now Ray told them, too, and they had to believe it. Besides, that explained how I’d been able to get into various rooms and unearth various facts. But it also came out that I was a bookseller.”

  “So?”

  “So after the dust had settled and before you and I could head for home, Nigel Eglantine took me aside. Ever since they bought the place he’d known they ought to do something about the books. He’d hesitated approaching a dealer because he didn’t know who would prove trustworthy. But he could tell I was an honest chap—”

  “Hadn’t he just learned you were a burglar?”

  “I guess he figured I must be an honest burglar. Anyway, he wanted to know what I’d charge to go through the entire library, pull the books that were worth selling and the junk that ought to be disposed of, and arrange the remainder into some semblance of order. I told him I’d spotted a fair number of collectible books on his shelves, and that I’d broker them for a split of the net receipts. And while I was at it I’d clear out the obsolete travel guides and world almanacs, the Reader’s Digest condensed books, the theme cookbooks from the Junior League of Chillicothe, Ohio. All the junk you can’t unload at a yard sale. When I was done he’d have a nice piece of change, an orderly library, and a lot less clutter.”

  “And you’d have a few days in the country and a fair return on your time.”

  “It’ll take more than a few days,” I said. “I’ll have to close the store for at least a week, and probably two. But I’ll do it in August, when it’ll be so hot here in town I’ll be able to talk myself into going to the country. And yes, I’ll be well paid for my time. He’s got a lot of books there, and some of them’ll bring decent money.”

  She frowned, thinking it through. “But what about The Big Sleep? He never knew it was there, and it’s not there anymore. Can’t you just consign it at Christie’s or Sotheby’s without saying where it came from?”

  I shook my head. “With something like this,” I said, “provenance is everything. What really authenticates the handwriting is the passage from Lester Harding Ross’s memoir that indicates the meeting of the two men took place, and that there was a book signed and presented. If I want to get top dollar for the book, I have to be able to say where it came from. Even if I don’t say a word, anyone who walks the cat back is going to wind up at Cuttleford House, and once the book is connected to Cuttleford House I’m on the spot.”

  Raffles put his forepaws out in front of him and stretched, humping his back to show what he thought of the prosp
ect of being walked back to Cuttleford House.

  “So when you go there in August you take it along in your suitcase,” Carolyn said, “and you discover it there. You’d have to split the money with Nigel and Cissie, but your share still would be a decent sum, wouldn’t it?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “And you’d make a name for yourself. You’d be the man who discovered the Hammett copy of The Big Sleep.”

  “Yeah.”

  “What’s the matter, Bern?”

  “I’d be the man who let the world know that one great American writer scribbled an inscription full of fawning praise for another great American writer, who didn’t care enough about the book to take it home with him. Instead he scrawled a nasty little addendum to the inscription and left the book behind. Oh, I’d make a name for myself, all right. I’d be the man who smeared muck on two of his favorite writers.”

  “They’re the ones who smeared the muck, Bern.”

  “Well, I don’t have to be the one who points it out to the world.” I sighed. “I could make a few dollars,” I said. “I could sell the book privately and hope that word of the sale never found its way back to Cuttleford House. I could smuggle it back in the way I smuggled it out, make a big show of discovering it, and cut myself in for a percentage of what it would bring. But you know what I’m going to do?”

  “If you tell me you’re going to burn it,” she said, “I swear I’m going to scream louder than Earlene Cobbett.”

  “Burn it? Are you out of your mind?”

  “No, but—”

  “I’m going to keep it,” I said. “For God’s sake, Carolyn, this is the book Chandler took along to give to George Harmon Coxe. He wound up giving it to Hammett instead, complete with flowery inscription, and Hammett…well, we know what he did with it.”

  “Right.”

  “I don’t really think Edgar Allan Poe ever inscribed a copy of Tamerlane and Other Poems for a young Illinois lawyer, and even if he did I’m never going to have a chance to hold it in my hand, let alone own it. But I can own this book, Carolyn. No one will ever know it’s mine, but I’ll know.”