The Book Stops Here (29 page)

His eyes twinkled. “Would you like the five-cent tour?”

“I’m willing to pay more.”

“Aren’t you delightful?” He chuckled and slipped his arm through mine. “I like you.”

I liked him, too. He was an old-fashioned gentleman, as Ian had said, with a twinkle in his eye and a lively sense of humor. The tour was mind-blowing. Mae West memorabilia filled every room. He was a true collector and had to have spent millions of dollars
on his favorite hobby. Except for the fact that the rooms were pristine and orderly, I would’ve been tempted to call him a hoarder. Instead, he was merely obsessive. He owned thousands of items from Mae West’s life, including furniture. And he appeared to know the minutest details of every piece.

He opened the door to a bedroom off the main hall that was used as a sitting room. “Everything in this room is from the set of
She Done Him Wrong
, right down to the wallpaper and wainscoting.”

“It’s amazing,” I whispered. Although spotlessly clean, the room smelled a little musty, probably because everything in it was decades old. A red velvet chair. An old-fashioned lampshade with crystal fringe. A gold rococo mirror. A spinet piano that displayed sheet music from 1933. A vase filled with colorful feathers on the ledge of the piano. A brocade fainting couch filled one corner, covered in a mass of colorful pillows. In another was a curved love seat in a shiny gold satin fabric. Some of the pieces were of good quality; others looked a bit shabby.

The room was a wild mishmash of colors, textures, and styles. But it was all great fun. I didn’t know what to look at first.

When Edward closed the door, I noticed a small brass plaque screwed into the wood. It read, S
HE
D
ONE
H
IM
W
RONG, 1933.
He showed me a few more rooms furnished in items collected from Mae’s other films, including a Western-style saloon from
My Little Chickadee
. But none of the others were as riotously garish as the
She Done Him Wrong
room. I wondered if he spent much time in these rooms and what determined which room he would choose. Did it depend on his mood? The day of the week? The phase of the moon?

Edward led me back to the living room and offered me a chair while he sat at the end of the sofa nearest me. “Now, Ian tells me that you’ve come across something that might be of interest to me.”

I opened my satchel and pulled out my copy of
The Secret Garden
and handed it to him.

“Ah,” he whispered. “Excellent.”

Prinny, the Siamese cat, strolled into the room and stopped at my feet. Could he sense my little kitten’s scent on my shoes? After a few seconds of sniffing, he returned to his master’s side and Edward rewarded him with long strokes along his back. The cat purred with happiness.

At that moment, Mrs. Sweet bustled in with a tray of tea and cookies. She set the tray on the table and poured the tea into fine china cups. She was about to walk away when she noticed the book her employer was holding and blinked a few times. “Oh, my. That is a lovely one.”

Edward looked up and smiled. “Isn’t it, Mrs. Sweet? It’s a duplicate of the one I have in the library.”

“You have the very same book?” I asked. I wasn’t exactly surprised. The man had everything that Mae West had ever touched. But had his copy of
The Secret Garden
been signed by her, as well?

“Yes, the very same,” he said, smiling as he stroked the spine gently. “This limited edition is exquisite, isn’t it?”

“I love it,” I admitted.

“Enjoy,” Mrs. Sweet said, and toddled off.

Reaching for my teacup, I said, “There’s a signature on the inside front cover. Would you be able to verify that it’s Mae West’s?”

“Certainly.” He laughed lightly. “That is what you’re here for, after all.” He opened the book carefully and raised his eyebrows. “Oh, my. Yes. It’s definitely Mae’s signature. From the early years of her career. It changed as she grew in fame. Became grander, more flamboyant.” His smile softened. “This was the signature of her youth.”

He set down the book, got up, and walked slowly over to a small escritoire in the corner. He returned with a magnifying glass and sat and stared at the writing for another long moment. Then he gazed at me. “Tell me how you came to possess this book.”

“I’m working as a book expert on
This Old Attic
while they’re taping in San Francisco. Do you know the show?”

“Absolutely. I never miss it.” He chuckled. “In fact, this will confirm that it’s a small world, because the producers called to ask if I would come and be interviewed on their ‘Collector’s Corner’ segment next week.”

“That’s wonderful. I’ll see you there.”

“I’m delighted. But go on with your story.”

I told him how Vera had found the book by chance and brought it to the show. I mentioned that she had died a few days later, but left out the gorier details of her death. I didn’t want to shock him.

“My goodness, that is tragic.” His head tilted as something else occurred to him. “But what will happen to the book?”

“If the owner has no living relatives, it might be put up for auction. The Covington would probably be interested in bidding. I suppose any money made from the sale could go to charity.”

“Oh yes.” He nodded briskly. “The Covington would be a wonderful place to display it. But, dear me, I’m stunned that the young lady found it at a garage sale.”

“Yes, it was one of those crazy things,” I said lamely. I wasn’t about to mention the bad luck that had followed me, not to mention Vera, ever since.

“I used to enjoy poking around garage sales,” Edward admitted. “These days, I prefer to use the services of the established auction houses.” He added with a wink, “And usually by telephone from the comfort of my humble abode.”

He spent a few more minutes studying the book, turning the pages slowly, touching only the outer edges so any oils in his skin didn’t mar the leather surface. He was clearly experienced in handling rare books.

When he handed the book back to me, I said, “Thank you for treating it so respectfully. I can tell you’re a true book lover.”

“Yes, I am, and I appreciate your saying so.” He took a cookie and bit into it. “I’m very careful with my own books and would be highly agitated if someone were to mistreat one of them.”

“I would, too,” I said firmly. “I’m sorry to say it, but many people don’t treat these rare books with the reverence they deserve.”

He scooted forward on the couch. “I don’t share my library with most people, Brooklyn dear, but I know you would appreciate it. Do you have time for me to show you some of my special treasures?”

“I would love to see your library,” I said eagerly, elated by the offer.

On the way down the long hallway, he entertained me with the story of how Mae West met Frances Hodgson Burnett. It was the same basic story I’d read in her biography, but Edward peppered it with interesting details and humorous asides.

Both women had been living and working in New York in 1912. Mae came to see Frances’s
Little Lord Fauntleroy
on Broadway and Frances was thrilled. She’d seen Mae onstage in a little-known revue the previous year, and then again more recently in the opening performance of
A Winsome Widow
.

“Frances told Mae that she was destined for stardom.”

“She was right about that,” I said. “But how did you discover all these stories? I’ve been looking everywhere for information like this.”

At the end of the wide hall was a closed door. Edward pulled a key from his pocket and unlocked the room before glancing at me. “Mae told me the stories herself.” He walked into the room, leaving me aghast.

“You met her?” I followed him into the room. “Really?”

“Yes. She had long been an idol of mine and I made it my goal to meet her one day. And to become friends. And perhaps more.”

“Wow.”

He smiled at my expression. “It’s good to have goals, don’t you think?”

I laughed. “Definitely. But . . . I’m not sure how to say this, but weren’t you quite a few years younger than she was?”

“Oh, my, yes,” he said, chuckling. “But I still loved her as a man loves a woman.”

I blinked at his words, but they faded from my mind as I turned and gazed around the big, elegantly wood-paneled room. “This is a beautiful space.”

“Thank you. Have a look around.”

The ceiling was at least twelve feet high, with solid wood beams running its length. The walls were paneled in a rich mahogany. Two arched windows faced south and west, allowing for stunning views in both directions. Bookshelves and glass display cabinets lined the walls. In the center of the room were six pedestals holding one book each, displayed under glass domes.

“The surface of the windows is coated so the sunlight won’t damage the books.” He strolled past glass-fronted cabinets filled with rare collections of beautifully bound works. “I couldn’t bear to block the view.”

“I don’t blame you,” I said, following him slowly, taking it all in. It was as though a treasure chest had been opened and I was trying to keep my greedy fingers from grabbing the jewels.

In one oblong, glass-fronted case were six finely bound books by Jane Austen. Each had a miniature portrait of the author or the subject matter encased in glass and inset into the leather binding.

“I can’t believe what I’m seeing,” I murmured. “Are they all by Cosway?”

“Yes.” Edward stared at the display with his hands clasped together. “I do love his miniatures. The detail is exceptional. I have other artists’ works on the shelves, but Cosway’s are so special to me.”

Richard Cosway was a Regency-era artist famous for his miniature portraits. Book lovers knew his name because so many of the portraits had been set into the covers of the finest leather-bound books of his time. They had come to be known as Cosway bindings and were beyond rare.

On a nearby shelf was a collection of six delicate, colorful, gem-encrusted eggs, each set on a matching three-legged stand. One was studded with diamonds. Another was fashioned to look like a flower basket. Yet another was opened to reveal the tiniest royal coach. I was pretty sure it was made from solid gold.

“Are these Fabergé?” I asked in a whisper.

“Yes. Aren’t they fun? I couldn’t resist.”

It must have been nice to buy priceless artwork just for fun.

Several paintings on the walls were familiar to me and I wondered if they were original. There was a large Titian that I thought I’d seen at the Palace of the Legion of Honor. Or was it in Los Angeles at the Getty Museum? How had it ever ended up in Edward Strathmore’s library?

I stopped to admire a lavishly jeweled binding of Chaucer’s
Canterbury Tales
. “This is fabulous.”

His eyes lit up. “It is, isn’t it?”

I frowned at him. “Don’t tell me Mae West was a rare-book collector.”

He tossed his head back and laughed out loud. “Oh no, no. These are my own little obsessions. But Mae did enjoy spending time with Frances and collected her books.”

“Did they have much in common?”

“You wouldn’t think so, would you? But both had strong feminist sensibilities, even before the term was coined. They were outstanding in their chosen fields. They both enjoyed the company of younger men.”

I smiled as he chuckled and went on. “They were both successful writers on Broadway as well as in other genres. Both were destined to suffer through at least one unhappy marriage.”

“Do you think Frances gave her this book?” I asked, holding up my copy of
The Secret Garden
.

“Probably. Frances gave Mae several autographed copies of her books. I have three of her most famous works on display here.” He
stopped at a glass display case mounted on a pedestal at eye level. It held three books:
The Secret Garden
,
Little Lord Fauntleroy
, and
A Little Princess
. They were all standing and held open to the title page. A viewer could circle the cubicle and see the front-cover illustrations and gilding designs as well as the signature of the author on all three books.

“And these all belonged to Mae?”

“Yes.”

The Secret Garden
in the case looked like the exact same limited-edition version that Vera had bought at the garage sale. The other two books on display were similar in style, but not quite as elaborate.

I turned and looked at him. “I just realized I never asked. Would you be interested in acquiring the copy I have?”

He chuckled again. “As you can see, I’m fascinated by anything connected with Mae. But I already have two copies of the same book, both signed.” He pointed to the three books within the glass case. “These were in her home when she died, and they mean so much more to me, knowing they were with her throughout her life.”

“I understand,” I murmured.

He sniffled once and collected himself. “It simply wouldn’t be right to bring in another book and disturb the balance I’ve achieved in this room.” He wiped away a tear and shook his head. “Forgive me for unloading my personal feelings on you.”

“I don’t mind at all. I appreciate your honesty.”

“Good,” he said, with a stiff exhalation of breath. “Good. Then I would rather see your book go to the Covington Library or another worthy organization that would display it for all the world to see.”

“That’s very generous.”

“Mr. Edward.”

We looked over and saw Mrs. Sweet standing in the doorway, beaming at us. “You have a phone call, sir.”

“Oh, I think I know what this is about.” He patted my arm. “Would you excuse me for just a moment, my dear?”

“Of course.”

Edward strode out and Mrs. Sweet toddled along after him. I probably should’ve taken the opportunity to say my good-byes, but I wanted to wander and explore more of the library. I might not ever have the chance again.

I took a quick look out at the view before reaching the display case I’d noticed before. It contained the complete works of Shakespeare, in folio.

In between the Shakespeare cabinet and the next one was a burgundy velvet curtain hanging on the wall. Without thinking too much, I pushed it aside to take a peek at what was hiding behind it.