The Bookman's Tale (8 page)

Two hours later, having bathed and put on a fresh set of clothes, Peter listened again to the answering machine message. The voice was certainly not that of the inhospitable man at Evenlode House. This voice sounded inviting, the sort of voice Peter hated to ignore. He thought he might ask the proprietress of the village shop where Mr. Alderson lived, but he had nodded mutely to this woman nearly every day for the past five months as he bought his bread and milk and newspaper and he could not imagine anything more awkward than suddenly breaking that well-established silence. The only two people in the neighborhood with whom Peter could claim to be on speaking terms were the gardener, who puttered around in Peter’s tiny backyard once a week in exchange for a twenty-pound note, and the postman. He could not recall either man’s name. Then it occurred to him that perhaps Martin Wells might be able to help. Martin was listed in the local phone directory, and Peter was pleased to hear the exasperated sigh with which the painter accepted an invitation for tea. “To repay you for your hospitality and your advice about the Watercolour Society,” Peter said.

“Best go on and get it over with,” said Martin. “I’ll be round in half an hour.”

—

“J
ohn Alderson,” said Martin, reaching for his third biscuit. “You’ll not be wanting Evenlode House to speak with him. Mr. Alderson lives in Evenlode Manor, farther up the road. Surprised you made it off the premises of Evenlode House if you used his name.”

“I almost didn’t,” said Peter.

“Aldersons and Gardners have hated each other for centuries,” said Martin. “Not sure when it started, but they haven’t spoken a civil word to each other since before Victoria.”

“And they’re neighbors?” asked Peter.

“Live on opposite sides of the river,” said Martin. “Nothing to stop them killing each other but a few feet of water. You’ll be safe with Alderson, though. Evenlode Manor’s nice enough, I’ve heard.”

“So how did it happen that Evenlode Manor is a fine house with a library and Evenlode House is a pile of rubble?”

“Depends who you ask. Gardner would say it was the Aldersons drove them to poverty, though he’d not say why. Alderson would say his family went to work in the past century while the Gardners drank, grumbled, and shot pheasants. Not that the Aldersons are living like kings. I hear they’ve had to sell off all sorts of things to keep that house in good nick. You can tour it on Tuesdays in the summer.”

Martin seemed in a hurry to leave once the chocolate digestives had been exhausted, but his facade had mellowed somewhat during the half hour of his visit. He did not say thank you as he stepped back out into the winter sun, but he did say something much more generous to his host. “First American I ever met who could make a proper pot of tea.”

P
art of Peter’s job in Special Collections was playing host to visiting scholars. It was one of his favorite tasks for two reasons: it often gave him the chance to examine books and manuscripts he might not otherwise have come across as he pulled them for researchers, and it showed him that there was some purpose to Special Collections other than mere preservation. Though he was frustrated by how seldom members of the Ridgefield community used the materials in Special Collections, the regular visits by scholars from as far away as Europe and Japan comforted Peter with the thought that the collection was a living, breathing thing—taking in new information as acquisitions were made, and sending out knowledge in the form of new scholarship.

It was during his preparation for one such visit that Peter handled the first edition of
Greene’s Groatsworth of Wit
, a 1592 deathbed confessional by the minor author Robert Greene, which included the first printed reference to William Shakespeare as a member of the London theatrical community. Dr. Yoshi Kashimoto of the University of Tokyo had requested this pamphlet along with a number of other Elizabethan items.

Peter lifted the delicate pamphlet out of its folding case and began to read Greene’s text. His understanding of the Elizabethan idiom was still far from fluent, but he had no trouble finding the reference, near the end of the text, to Shakespeare as an “upstart crow.”

“Everything ready for Dr. Kashimoto?” said Francis, who stepped into the room as Peter was returning the Greene pamphlet to its case.

“Absolutely,” said Peter. “I saw he was interested in minor Elizabethan dramatists, so I also pulled a few items we have that aren’t in the standard bibliographies.”

“I’m sure he’ll appreciate that,” said Francis. “You’re taking Connelly’s Shakespeare survey this semester, so you might want to attend Kashimoto’s public lecture. I think you’ll find him thought provoking.”

“Funny,” said Peter, “Connelly didn’t mention anything about a Shakespeare lecture on campus.”

“ I’m not surprised. Kashimoto is an Oxfordian.”

“So he’s from England?” said Peter.

“No,” said Francis. “An Oxfordian is someone who believes that Edward de Vere, the Earl of Oxford, wrote the works commonly attributed to William Shakespeare of Stratford.”

“I beg your pardon?” said Peter.

“There’s a significant and legitimate question about the authorship of Shakespeare’s plays,” Francis explained.

“They never taught us that in high school English,” said Peter.

“Well,” said Francis, “the Oxfordians have had trouble making inroads in the academic establishment.”

“How can they say that Shakespeare wasn’t Shakespeare?” said Peter, bewildered by such nonsense.

“Two reasons, essentially,” said Francis. “To begin with, the Stratford businessman known as William Shakspere, who never spelled his name with an
e
after the
k
, has a reasonably well-documented life, and yet there exists no evidence from his lifetime that he was even a writer, much less the great William Shakespeare—whose name always had an
e
after the
k
.”

“But it was a long time ago,” said Peter. “People didn’t know then that they should save letters or manuscripts.”

“True,” said Francis. “That is just what the Stratfordians argue. They’re the ones who believe the plays were written by William Shakespeare of Stratford.”

“Well, they were, weren’t they?” said Peter.

“The other problem,” said Francis, “is that there is no evidence that Shakespeare ever received any education, though he probably attended the Stratford Grammar School. He certainly never attended Oxford, Cambridge, or any other university in Europe.”

“So,” said Peter, puzzled that he seemed to be, for the first time since they had met, in an argument with Francis. “He was a genius, he didn’t need to be taught how to write.”

“Again, well argued,” said Francis. “But it’s not the quality of his writing but the content that presents a problem. The writer of Shakespeare’s plays had a significant knowledge of law and art, of music, medicine, military tactics, philosophy, and a dozen other specialized fields, and especially of life in the Italian court. He used sources in several languages, including Latin and Greek. One can be born with genius, but where did Mr. Shakspere of Stratford acquire all this information?”

“So you really think Shakespeare didn’t write his own plays?” said Peter, not sure how to refute this argument.

“Alas, no. I myself remain a Stratfordian. But I do admit there is room for doubt. I might even say it would be unreasonable not to doubt.”

“Do you think we’ll ever know?” asked Peter.

“Perhaps,” said Francis, “when some enterprising book hound discovers solid evidence in favor of Mr. Shakespeare, or Edward de Vere, or Christopher Marlowe, or Francis Bacon. They’ve all been suggested as possible authors.”

Peter felt the usually solid floor of the Devereaux Room shifting beneath him. He stared down at the stack of books and pamphlets awaiting the arrival of Dr. Kashimoto. He had expected to have his preconceived notions about the world challenged when he came to college, but to have his mentor introduce a doubt like this, on such a basic tenet of Western culture, was like being told that truth wasn’t true or reality wasn’t real. But then he felt Francis lay a hand on his shoulder and he heard a calming voice turn a bizarre nightmare into a glorious fantasy.

“Wouldn’t it be something, Peter, to discover a page of manuscript written by the Stratford Shakespeare? Or a letter to Anne Hathaway where he complains about what trouble the third act of
Hamlet
is giving him?”

“The Holy Grail,” said Peter reverently. He was surprised to hear the words coming from his mouth. The comparison had been instinctual.

“Exactly,” said Francis. “The Holy Grail.”

P
eter took the car this time. If he had to make a second getaway, he had no interest in doing it on foot again. A few hundred yards past the unwelcoming entrance to Evenlode House the road humped over a small stone bridge. Below, the River Evenlode flowed—a dozen feet wide and muddy and swollen from the recent rains. Another quarter mile down the road on the right he came to a pair of stone pillars surmounted by ornamental urns. An engraved stone on a pillar read
E
VENLODE
M
ANOR
. The iron gate was open, and a neat gravel drive led through a row of trees to the crest of a small hill. Peter turned his car into the drive and shortly crunched to a stop in front of Evenlode Manor. It was no Blenheim Palace, but it was a far cry from its decrepit neighbor. Looking up at the three-story Georgian facade, with stairs sweeping up to the huge wooden doors, Peter felt as if he had entered a Jane Austen novel. The grass was immaculately trimmed and a croquet lawn to the left of the house was backed by ornamental shrubs that led into further gardens. Peter felt confident that this time he had come to the right place.

The door was answered by a housekeeper who led him into a drawing room and told him in a deep Irish brogue that he should make himself comfortable while she informed Mr. Alderson of his arrival. The furnishings were a little French for Amanda’s tastes, Peter thought, but the view she would have loved. Tall windows looked out across the wide green Evenlode valley. He wondered why, during the summer they had spent in Chipping Norton, Amanda had never come here on a Tuesday, and then he thought perhaps she had, some day when he was deep in a book and she had announced only, “I’ll be out for a while.”

“Mr. Byerly,” said a crisp, friendly voice behind him. Peter turned to see an exceptionally tall man with a neatly combed wave of white hair.

“I’m John Alderson,” said the man, extending a hand.

“A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Alderson,” said Peter, taking Alderson’s firm handshake.

“Please, call me John. We don’t stand on formalities here at Evenlode Manor, despite what Miss O’Hara might have told you.”

“She was most kind,” said Peter.

“I won’t waste your time, Mr. Byerly. The fact is I’d like to sell some books. I happened to mention that fact to the vicar on Sunday and he said there was an American chap in Kingham who was in the book business. I presume that’s you.”

“It is,” said Peter, pulling a card out of his pocket and presenting it to John. It was the only one he could find that morning, a bit crumpled and with one corner torn off, but it would do the job.

“Well,” said John, “I have a modest library filled with old books that I have no use for, and I have three bedrooms in which I’ve piled all my books on gardening and art and the law—books I actually read. The present arrangement seems a rather inefficient use of both funds and space. So I thought perhaps you could take a look through the library and see if there are some things there worth selling. Clear out a case or two, perhaps.”

“I’d be delighted,” said Peter, who suddenly felt a familiar, but nearly forgotten, excitement pulsing through his veins—that anticipation of a treasure hunt. Rarely had he bought books in an environment that seemed as conducive to treasure finding as Evenlode Manor.

John showed Peter into the library where eight bookcases of deep cherry lined two walls of the room, while two others flanked the fireplace. On a large table in the center of the room lay a stack of oversized volumes. The cases by the fireplace ran from floor to ceiling; the others extended to the ceiling from solid built-in cabinets.

Most of the bindings looked nineteenth-century, though some were clearly older. Peter knew immediately that he would have no trouble moving a case or two of these books fairly quickly. Even if they turned out to be mediocre in content, he could sell them to another dealer for the bindings. It seemed likely he would find a few rarities. Only one shelf was not filled. From the lack of dust, Peter guessed that some books had been removed recently. Then he remembered the strict face of Miss O’Hara, and decided she must dust the library at least twice a week.

“Well,” said John, “if you’re perfectly happy having a look around, I’ll get back to my work. Perhaps we could meet for tea in a couple of hours.”

Peter knew it would take a lot longer than two hours to examine the library in enough detail to recommend a course of action, but he could at least do some browsing and get an idea of what he was up against. He felt the rusty wheels of his bookseller’s mind slowly begin to turn, and thoughts of the mysterious watercolor faded away.

His first find came almost immediately. Because they were already laying out on the table, he started with the oversized books. At the bottom of the pile Peter saw two matching volumes. The deep brown calf binding was clearly at least a hundred years older than the other volumes, and on the spine, stamped in gold, were the words
A Dictionary of the English Language
. Any other bookman might have been disappointed that the set, though in excellent condition, was not a first edition; Peter was thrilled to read on the title page of Samuel Johnson’s magnum opus, “Fourth Edition.” The fourth edition, Francis Leland had explained years ago, included Johnson’s final corrections and additions. “I’d love to have one for the Devereaux collection,” Francis had said.

Peter decided in that moment that he would not sell the volumes to Ridgefield; he would buy them from Alderson at a fair price and donate them to the Devereaux Room in memory of Amanda—his Amanda. Though he had thousands of books to look at, he could not resist lingering over the Johnson for a few minutes. In the “Advertisement” he read words of comfort to a twentieth-century widower who fears his own weaknesses: “Perfection is unattainable, but nearer and nearer approaches may be made; and finding my dictionary about to be reprinted, I have endeavoured, by a revisal, to make it less reprehensible.” A noble undertaking, thought Peter. He wondered if he would have made quicker progress if Dr. Strayer had simply told him,
Peter, I believe that by revisal you could make yourself less reprehensible
.

With cases full of books beckoning him, Peter set the Johnson aside and turned to his work. After an hour he had found a few fine eighteenth-century titles and sorted through several shelves of worthless volumes of nineteenth-century sermons. He had just sat down on the floor to begin work on the lower shelves when he heard a knock on the open door. He looked up to see a mousy woman, shoulders hunched, strands of hair flying in all directions, standing in the doorway. She wore a plain gray dress that had all the tailoring of a potato sack and her feet were encased in a pair of muddy Wellington boots. He thought at first she must be one of the gardeners, but then she brushed the strands of hair away from her face and he saw the same high forehead and sharp chin as his host. She was too old to be his daughter; Peter could only assume this was John Alderson’s sister.

“Been walking,” she said, almost inaudibly, as if these two mumbled words would explain not only the mud on her boots but everything about her, from her choice of wardrobe to her defensive stance, arms clasped across her insubstantial breasts.

“Is the sun still out?” asked Peter, who knew that in England, whenever a social situation left one at a loss for words, one could always bring up the weather. He used this rejoinder to pull himself up from the floor, but neither her stance nor her tone of voice invited him to move any closer.

She stared at him for a long moment, then looked around the room, her eyes resting on the one shelf that had been empty before Peter set to work. Then, when Peter had nearly forgotten his query, she growled, “No.”

“Pity,” said Peter, forcing a smile. In a conversation with a stranger, he was used to being the one who was socially inept. He found it unnerving that he should be better at making small talk than someone else.

After another long pause, and still without moving, she said, “Brother show you the box?” Her eyes did not stray from her own feet as she muttered this enigmatic question.

“No,” said Peter, unable to elaborate as he had no idea what she was talking about.

The woman gave a small grunt of disgust, then shuffled across the room to the desk by the window. Not the gait, Peter thought, of someone who takes walks in the countryside. She opened a drawer, removed a small brass key, and shuffled back across the room where she inserted the key into the door of a cabinet. With a click she unlocked the door and then stooped and withdrew a hinged wooden box, its edges covered in brass straps faded to a dull grayish brown. A label pasted to the top of the box had nearly peeled away and the woman quickly ripped it off and crumpled it in her hand—but not before Peter could read the nineteenth-century script:
NEVER TO BE SOLD
.

She set the box in the middle of the library table and opened the lid. “Save you the trouble of looking through all that muck,” she said, nodding toward the shelves where Peter stood. “Give you a week to make an offer, then I’ll get brother to call someone else.” And with this cryptic threat she turned and left the room.

Peter opened the dusty lid of the box and soon felt that even being shot at this morning had been worthwhile if it brought him to this. The box was a gold mine. Despite his limited experience with documents, Peter suspected its contents might be worth more than all the bound items in the library combined. Just a quick perusal of the papers in the box revealed a commission signed by Charles I, a letter from Walter Raleigh, and a deed signed by Francis Bacon. There were church documents signed by archbishops of Canterbury and a stanza of manuscript poetry signed by Robert Greene. Of course they would all need careful study and authentication, but there was enough here to keep Peter busy for months.

He took the documents from the box one by one, carefully stacking them on the library table, and just as he was about to return them, he saw there was something else in the bottom of the box. At first, Peter thought it was a book, but then he realized it was a custom-made folding case, much more elaborate than any he had seen on the shelves of the Devereaux collection. The work appeared nineteenth century—mid-Victorian, Peter guessed. It took him several minutes to open, and he was careful to memorize each step of unfolding so that he would be able to reassemble the case. Inside was a slim quarto volume in a simple leather binding.

Peter gingerly lifted the front cover. When he read the title page, he stopped breathing. He knew he had found something that made the rest of the contents of the box pale in comparison. If the text was complete, it could be the sort of treasure he had always dreamed of finding. When he began to turn the pages, and his eyes suddenly comprehended the scribbled markings that filled the margins, the breath spurted from his lungs as suddenly as if he had been punched in the gut. Without his realizing it, that expelled breath voiced two words.

“Holy Grail.”