Bland Beginning (19 page)

“Well, come on, man. Tell us who it was,” said Uncle Jack. “Don’t sit there making a damned fiddle-faddle of it.”

“I propose to read you the document which Cobb deposited with his lawyer on July 19th, 1922, nearly two years ago. But before I begin to read, let me ask if any of you know the name of Leon Amberside.”

Vicky, Uncle Jack and Anthony shook their heads. Ruth said, “Just know it, but I don’t know who he was.” Basing-stoke said doubtfully, “Wasn’t he a Victorian bookseller? But surely he died some years ago?” Blackburn said nothing.

“Mr Basingstoke is right, as he is so often right. Leon Amberside was a Victorian bookseller, and he died some years ago. Mr Blackburn, can you add anything to that?” He paused, and added, again with elaborate mock modesty, “As I told you, I am fishing in waters much too deep for poor policemen. You see how much I need your assistance.”

Michael Blackburn looked puzzled. “Yes; I know quite a little about Leon Amberside. I don’t see, though, that it can possibly be relevant to your investigation.”

“Tell us what you know, Mr Blackburn.”

“I knew Amberside personally – or at least I met him once or twice – when I was a young man. He was a rather shady, but in his way remarkable figure,” said Blackburn thoughtfully. He seemed to be summoning up ghosts out of the past. “I don’t know what his antecedents were, but in the eighteen-eighties he made a splash as a bookseller – and also, incidentally, in a small way as a publisher. He had two or three bookshops in Central London – one in Piccadilly, I remember, and another in Chelsea – where he sold fine art books and first editions. He was one of the few booksellers of that time who specialised in first editions.”

“And his publishing?”

“He published the works of young writers, little-known poets and novelists. He produced them very nicely, and had quite a success for some time. He dealt in erotica, too – modern and classical. He was prosecuted for the importation of indecent literature into this country, and it was discovered that he did a considerable trade in that way. He was fined a very large sum, had to sell the bookshops, and his literary career ended. I don’t know much of his life after that, but I know he drank a great deal, and was very poor. He had an invalid wife, I remember. I should think he died about twenty years ago.” Blackburn stopped, and looked at Inspector Wrax. “Cobb was very friendly with Amberside.”

“Precisely. What a pleasure it is to have a literary man by one’s side, able to evoke the past with such dramatic skill. Well, ladies and gentlemen, I do not propose to keep you in suspense any longer. According to the document that Cobb left with his lawyer the name of the forger is – Leon Amberside.”

They looked at him incredulously, and then all spoke together.

“Stuff and nonsense,” said Uncle Jack.

“It makes my head ache,” said Anthony.

“Then who’s stealing all these copies of
Passion and Repentance
?” asked Ruth.

“Does Cobb say that the things Jebb was investigating
are
forgeries?” Basingstoke wanted to know.

Then Vicky said with a rush: “I know, Inspector, I know. Amberside isn’t dead at all. He’s a presence moving amongst us.” She looked round wide-eyed. “
Amberside is in this room
.”

The Inspector coughed. “Let us not place too much strain upon our imaginations. Leon Amberside, my dear Miss Rawlings, is certainly dead. But let me read you what Cobb wrote.” They were silent as he picked up a sheaf of papers from his desk. He said dryly, “You literary people will appreciate this, I think. It’s quite a little essay in its way. Remember the date of this document – July 19th, 1922.” He began to read:

“Certain occurrences during the past six months make me think it is advisable for me to put on record now, as protection for myself, the full details of my acquaintance with Leon Amberside, and of the way in which I have fulfilled his deathbed request to me.

“There will be few in this generation who remember this erratic and gifted man. I met him first when I was a little known and lonely youth in London; and he, at that time a known and reputable literary figure, was kind to me. He invited me to several ‘At Homes’, often asked me to dine with him (guessing shrewdly enough that I had few good dinners at that time) and frequently gave me small bibliographical commissions to execute for which I was paid extravagantly well. Amberside was indeed an attractive personality, generous and charming, and possessed by that real love for books which is found in very few people in any age; but he was indiscreet in his conduct with women (his wife, unfortunately, was a sufferer from infantile paralysis, and a permanent invalid), was an irregular but heavy drinker, and was fascinated by erotic literature, like so many other literary men of his age. Had he been satisfied, like them, to acquire a library of erotica, he might have come to no harm; but his tastes were expensive and always outran his income, and the secret sale of such literature offered rich rewards. He was prosecuted, heavily fined, and many of his books impounded; and this prosecution, combined with his many debts, ruined him financially and morally. He drank more heavily, and it was even said that he used drugs.

“During the last years of his life our relationship gradually changed. Some fortunate bibliographical discoveries freed me from immediate pecuniary worries, and enabled me to give up my occupation of bookseller. As my own position improved, Amberside sunk lower and lower, maintaining himself by means into which his friends did not care to enquire too closely. We never lost touch altogether, and I did what I could to help him; but that was not very much, for he showed little gratitude to those who offered him the assistance which he seemed to regard as his right. His drink and his drugs and his women combined with this touchiness to estrange his friends from him.

“I shall not easily forget the night on which I received a note from him, saying simply,
For God’s sake
,
come.
An address in Holborn was scrawled above these words. I went there at once and found Amberside lying in bed in a filthy basement room, coughing blood, while his latest mistress sprawled in a chair blind drunk. It was typical of the other side of the man that he had rented a country cottage for his wife, saw to it that she had a nurse to look after her, and that she wanted for nothing; also that he paid for the education of his son. He saw his wife once a month, and on those visits he did not drink; but when he returned to London he went back to the life of debauchery that had gained a hold on him.

“I saw at once that he was very ill, and I wanted to call a doctor. That, however, was not why he had sent for me. Between bursts of coughing blood he lay in that dirty bed with his eyes bright and his cheeks hollow, and told me what he wanted me to do.

“He was dying penniless; but he had, he told me, one asset. Various little-known or unknown first editions of minor works by Victorian authors had come into his hands from time to time, and these first editions could provide a small income for his wife, and also allow his son to finish his education at a good school. He had several copies of most of these books, and it would be foolish to flood the market; they must be disposed of judicially, in ones and twos. I was in a position, he said, to handle these books for him, as a bibliographical authority. Would I do it and send the money, anonymously, to his wife, saying simply that it was money left in trust for her own use and their son’s education, by her husband?

“I felt that I could not refuse to undertake such a commission. Perhaps I should have thought about it more closely: but what man of heart would have done so, sitting in that little room with a dying man by his side, and a drunken trollop muttering in one corner? My prime desire was to call a doctor to see if he could be saved, and Amberside would not let me do so until I had given him my promise. Then he sank back in the bed and said, ‘Now I can die in peace.’

“I called the doctor, but he could do nothing. The bleeding was from an internal haemorrhage, and it gradually lessened. I thought he might recover, but the doctor shook his head. Amberside asked for a priest – he was a Roman Catholic – and seemed satisfied when one came and gave him absolution. I remained with him through the night. He fell asleep, breathing at first in great gasps, but then more easily, and I began to think, in spite of what the doctor had said, that he might recover. Just after half-past five I saw that his eyes were open, and he was looking at me curiously. He tried to speak, but a great fountain of blood spouted from his mouth, and after one convulsive heave he was dead. He was only forty-five years old. He died on the morning of January 10th, 1904.

“The first editions he had referred to were stored in a room Amberside had reserved for his use at a firm of printers. I collected the books, and examined them at leisure. A complete list of them is appended at the end of this statement. I saw that they would indeed, as Amberside had suggested, be extremely valuable collectors’ items if they were sold over a period of time, and I wrote anonymously to Mrs Amberside to tell her that she could expect a minimum of two hundred pounds a year from a trust that her husband had left for her.

“I wondered where Amberside had obtained these books, but no thought entered my mind that they could be anything other than what they pretended to be – genuine first editions. Amberside was a man with such a wide circle of acquaintances, and a man so well-known in the book trade, that he would very naturally have been approached by anybody in possession of such a collection. Moreover, several of these books were already known – Amberside had placed them on the market in ones and twos during the preceding five years. I pondered over the best way to dispose of them. I was anxious to have no personal connection with the sale of the books, because of my former status as a bookseller, which, in my position as a bibliographical authority, was not a thing which I wished to be remembered. On the other hand, if I employed any well-known bookseller to dispose of them for me it was certain that before long rumours would go round the trade that I had a stock of various first editions. I should have found such a rumour highly distasteful, and it would have lowered the price of the books.

“I compromised for a few months by giving a few books to various booksellers. Then I was put into touch with a certain Mr Jacobs, a bookseller who traded under the name of Lewis, issued occasionally a small but select list and, I was assured, was absolutely to be relied on in confidential matters. From that time on I employed Jacobs, and found the arrangement a satisfactory one. Every three months I sent a substantial sum of money to Mrs Amberside, and once or twice I visited her as a friend of her late husband. She wanted for nothing, and within the limits of her affliction she was contented. She was particularly pleased that her son, who was named Leon, like his father, was able to carry on his education.

“This procedure continued for several years. A complete record of the books sold and of the sums of money paid to Mrs Amberside will be found appended to this statement. Like many chronic invalids, she lived for a long time, even though the last years of her life were marked by the tragic death of her son. He gallantly volunteered for service during the war, and was posted ‘Missing, believed killed’ in 1916. Mrs Amberside died two years later; and in a sense her death was a relief to me, not only because it relieved me of the burden of a heavy trust, but because for the last two or three years of her life it had been necessary for me to make up myself some of the money I sent her. The reason for this was that the number of what I may call ‘Amberside first editions’ already on the market had caused a considerable drop in prices. When Mrs Amberside died, I was some hundreds of pounds out of pocket because of the money I had sent her. It seemed to me then (and I must confess that it seems to me still) that I had a moral right to recoup myself for this money from the remaining Amberside first editions. It is not for me, however, to debate this point of ethics, except to observe that I surely had a better title to the remaining books than anyone else. Young Leon Amberside was presumably dead, and the nearest relative was a very distant cousin. I am not concerned, however, to defend, but only to explain my conduct. I continued, after Mrs Amberside’s death, to dispose of these first editions through Jacobs.

“In January of the present year, 1922, I was approached by a man named Jebb, who made certain allegations about the genuineness of several of these first editions, and asked if I could give him any information about them. He had been in touch with Jacobs, and asked him the source of his copies, and Jacobs, quite rightly, had refused to supply it. With singular pertinacity Jebb had also traced back some of the copies I had sold through other booksellers soon after Amberside’s death, and he hinted, in a manner that I found altogether impertinent, that he thought I should make some explanation. Our correspondence was distinctly acrimonious, and it ended by my telling him that I did not recognise his authority to ask such questions – he is, I discovered, merely a literary journalist – and was not prepared to assist a man who was moved by pure sensationalism.

“None the less, I was perturbed. In the course of our correspondence, Jebb gave me his reasons for believing that several of the Amberside first editions were forgeries. They were technical reasons connected with printing and paper, which I need not mention here in detail, but they seemed on examination to be exceedingly cogent. I was unable, also, to trace a single case in which an association copy of one of these books existed – that is, a copy given away, or inscribed, by the author. I was moved to a thorough examination of the Amberside first editions, guided by what Jebb had said. As a result of this investigation, I am now convinced that all, or almost all, of the Amberside first editions are forgeries.

“Was I criminally careless in my failure to discover this before? I cannot think so. How could I imagine that such a man as Amberside would proceed to create a first edition by the simple expedient of having a book or pamphlet printed with an incorrect date, and with no publisher’s name, or a false name, attached to it? The steps by which the man Jebb had been led to his conclusions are, indeed, more like those of a police detective or a laboratory chemist than of an accredited bibliographer. These vulgar investigations of type and paper are hardly a bibliographical task – although in the ‘scientific’ world of the future towards which we seem to be moving the merits and demerits of literature may well be established by subjecting it to the scrutiny of an analytical chemist.