Part 9 (1/2)
”Is something wrong?” I asked innocently.
”I'll say there is.” He gave me a slightly garbled account of what had happened earlier and wanted to know if I knew there were some gangsters after me.
”Wait a minute.” I tried to sound skeptical. It wasn't hard. ”How do you know these guys were G-men?”
”He had an identification card, it said he was with the FBI.”
”Those can be printed up by the hundreds in any joke shop. What did they look like? Was it a little guy and a chubby kid with bad skin?”
”That's them.”
”Dad, I hate to say it, but you've been had.”
”What d'ya mean?”
”I did a story on those fish last year. They're a couple of con men. Because of me, the cops went after them, a lot of their victims turned up in court, and these guys got sent up. Did they try talking you into buying anything?”
”No, they wanted to know where you were, and then someone broke the window- ”.
”That was the third man in their team. They'll be coming back and trying to sell you some kind of phony U.S. government insurance...” I gave Dad an imaginative account of their criminal career, stating that Braxton was a dangerous crazy and that he and Webber indulged in some bizarre s.e.xual practices. Then I held my breath to see if he believed it, because I'd always been a lousy liar.
Dad said a few well-chosen obscenities, but they were directed at his recent guests, not me.
”Watch out for them,” I suggested enthusiastically. ”The little one's a real weasel when he's cornered. If they bother you again, just call the cops. Don't let them back in the house.”
”I won't, I just wish you'd called earlier. Why are you calling now?”
”I've been moving, I wanted to give you my new number.”
”They said you'd moved. Where are you?”
”I found a nice boardinghouse. If there's an emergency they'll get a message to me.” I gave him Escott's phone number and told him to keep it to himself.
”What about the address?”
”I'll be getting a box at the post office, the landlord likes to steam things open.”
”That's illegal.”
”Yeah, but the rent's cheap and the food's good. How's Mom?”
He put her on the line and we exchanged rea.s.surances and other bits of information. She thought I had a job at an ad agency and asked how it was going. I let her keep thinking it. Except for the Swafford case, my modest living expenses and the money I sent home to help them out had come from an inadvertent theft from a mobster and some engineered luck at a blackjack table. Neither of them would have won her approval.
I promised to call again in a day or two for further news and hung up, grinning ear to ear.
A few years ago I walked into a small bookstore in Manhattan. The window on the street was just large enough to display the painted legend: BRAXTON'S BOOKS, NEW & USED, and the inside sill held a few sun-faded samples of literature. In the last few weeks I'd seen a hundred hole-in-the-wall places like this; I liked them.
A bell over the door jingled as I entered. Dust motes hanging in the sunlight were stirred by the draft and I sneezed. By the time I straightened and wiped my nose he had appeared out of one of the alcoves formed by bookshelves.
”Good afternoon, sir, may I help you?”
He was shorter than me, with dark wrinkled skin like a dried apple. There was a suggestion of black shoe polish in his hair, but the world was full of people who didn't want to look their age.
”Got anything on folklore or the occult?”
”Yes, sir, in this first section.” He indicated the area and watched with a pleasant smile as I went to look it over.
It was a fairly complete selection. There were copies of Summer's works on witchcraft and vampires, even Baring-Gould's book on werewolves, but nothing I hadn't already seen and read before. I checked the fiction section, drew a blank, and finished off with the occult shelves. They were also very complete, but only with the usual junk. I said thank you to the general air and started for the door.
”Perhaps,” he said, stopping me, ”if you're looking for something special I could be of help. I have other books in the back.”
It was my day off, I was in no hurry. ”Well, sure, if you don't mind.”
”What are you looking for?”
Speaking the t.i.tle always made me feel vaguely foolish. ”A copy of Varney, the Vampire by Prest.”
He knew what I was talking about, not surprising considering the contents of his well-stocked shelves. His brown eyes got brighter with interest. ”Or the Feast of Blood,” he said, completing the t.i.tle. ”Yes, that is a rare one. I have a copy, but it's part of my own collection and not for sale.”
”Oh,” I said, for want of something better.
”May I ask why you are interested in it?”
The real reason I couldn't talk about, so I had a fake one practiced and ready.
”I'm working on a book, a survey of folklore, fact and fiction.”
”That is a very wide field.”
”Not when you're tracking down certain books.”
He looked sympathetic. ”I'd like to help, but it could only be in a limited way.”
Strings of some kind? He'd find out real soon I wasn't rich.
”You'd have to read it here in the shop, that is if you want to. I value it too much to loan it out.”
”I can understand that,” I said gratefully. ”Are you sure it wouldn't be too much trouble?”
”Not at all, but it would have to be during working hours.””That would be fine, thank you.”
He offered his hand. ”I'm James Braxton.”
”Jack Fleming.”
”Come in the back, I'll show you where you may read.”
”You have it right here?”
”Oh, yes. Yes.” He threaded past ceiling-high shelves, leading me deep into the narrow shop. He switched on the light over a desk and chair and swept some account books to one side. The light revealed shelves crammed with a faded patchwork of book spines of every shape and age. It looked like a duplicate of the folklore section out front, but more so. Some of the volumes were very old, with odd t.i.tles, others were recent and by skeptical writers. One shelf held only copies of Occult Review. He was more than casually interested in the subject himself, and I wondered if he sincerely believed in it. If so, I'd have to watch my lip.