“Much better idea, but still a bad execution,” was Slader’s bland response.
“Bad execution, why’s that?”
“Because it was discovered is why. The best forgeries are never discovered. You and I know for a fact that we each have work out there in the world that will never be run to ground. That’s my definition of good execution.”
Once a forger, I thought. I couldn’t argue with the gnarly logic of his statement.
“But forget Columbus, forget Faulkner. The Poe isn’t even on a very long-term loan. Just long enough until an exact copy can be made to take its place and go back in the book dungeon that is the Fletcher library. Which is why time’s tight.”
“For you, maybe. Not for me.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” he said, brusquely no-nonsense. “You are aware that while our charming criminal justice system puts statutes of limitations on many, even most, crimes, murder ain’t one of them. Some of the stories I heard under lock and key were fascinating. Men who’d been sent up for three to five years for some lesser misdeed would never see the light of day again if the cops knew other, choicer things they’d done back when. Gateway crimes. Things like you yourself have done.”
Already knowing where Slader was headed with his desperado anecdote, I said, while trying to hide both my disdain and fear, “That’s all fascinating, but what does it have to do with Poe?”
“Well, as I’m sure you know, he is credited with writing the first detective story and knew his fair share about murder, and not just in the rue Morgue.”
Again, nothing for me to do but wait. Ginger-head had returned to his baleful staring in our direction. He had the look of a loner, one who spent many hours in a basement mixing chemicals or practicing magic tricks. If he was indeed trying to eavesdrop on what we were discussing, the bar was too noisy. Though I couldn’t help but be curious why he was so interested, I forced myself to ignore him in order to concentrate on Slader.
“I have irrefutable evidence of your guilt in the case of your brother-in-law’s—”
“You’re deluded.”
Slader revealed that chipped tooth once more. If I were a violent man, I might have wanted to knock it, along with some of the rest of his teeth, down his throat.
“We both know certain, shall I say, unwholesome aspects about each other’s lives, but there are details we obviously aren’t aware of. You, for instance, have no idea that I’m a pretty decent outdoor photographer. Or used to be, years ago.”
I shook my head and offered him a disparaging smile.
Ignoring me, he continued. “When I used to visit Adam Diehl back in the halcyon days, I got some beautiful shots of the lighthouse out on Montauk Point, a lot of shorebirds, dramatic skies and waves.”
“This is all terribly charming, Slader, but speaking of points, what’s yours?”
“One winter morning, sometime predawn, I was out walking along the beach with the early-bird joggers. The sky was a weird green-gray. I took some stills of the rollers, some of gulls against the clouds.”
“Very Ansel Adams of you.”
“I also happened to get quite a sharp photograph of you leaving Diehl’s bungalow. And another of you getting into your car, a silver Volvo that looked like it was ready for the junkyard. I had a bad feeling when I saw you speed off. So I made like a zephyr myself and disappeared.”
“Wish you’d stayed disappeared,” I muttered, then added, offhand, “One could ask what you were doing there at that hour.”
“One could decline to answer,” he said.
I gave this a moment’s reflection, then pressed forward. “If you’ve got this so-called evidence, why didn’t you turn it and me in a long time ago?”
“Because I invest for the long term,” he said without the slightest hesitation, quietly, his brow wrinkling as he tented his fingertips under his chin. “You see, you lost me my friend and business partner, and in so doing you deprived me of substantial future income. What gain is there in it for me if you’re languishing in the joint, taking advantage of the prison library and communing with the chaplain?”
The image made me laugh. “Sounds relaxing,” I said. “You must have enjoyed your time on the inside.”
“Won’t say I didn’t. One learns a lot behind bars. For example, when you run afoul of agreed-upon terms, you pay a price. We had an agreement, you and I. You compensated me for my losses and we both moved on. Then you blew that deal by stealing from me again.”
I cringed inwardly, knowing he wasn’t wrong. Years ago, I had purchased from Atticus a breathtakingly skillful forgery of some Arthur Conan Doyle documents—letters and a manuscript fragment—that I later learned had been fabricated by Slader. Driven by absurd rivalry, I forged a superior duplicate of his inventive original, and then, more brazen yet, I turned around and sold my forged forgery back to Atticus, thus rendering Slader’s “original” valueless. High-wire madness and, convincing as the documents were, not a single word had ever been so much as a figment of Doyle’s fertile imagination.
“I gave you one more chance to make things good in your beloved Ireland—”
“You knew it was impossible for me to start printing fakes on my boss’s press—”
“—and you blew it again. That time you paid the price in three and a half fingers. And as it turned out, fate made the better investment for me. I got some good years of practice in seclusion while you’ve had plenty of time to hone your skills as a printer. So now you’re going to deliver your next installment.”
“I owe you nothing, Slader.”
At that he flared up. “You stole my life, my livelihood. This is all on you, my friend.”
“Such righteous anger is unbecoming in a blackmailer.”
“If this deal goes as it should, it can easily be the end of the matter,” he said, calm again, smoothing the palm of his right hand over the crown of his head. “Once and for all.”
“You can’t be trusted, no matter what assurances you make. And you know it.”
“Was that finally a confession I just heard? How refreshing,” he said.
“It was a statement of fact.”
“To be sure. So my proposal is simple, modest, straightforward, and poses no risk to you or your family.”
“You sound like a cheap insurance salesman,” I tried, knowing I was boxed into at least hearing him out. Memory, being at times a mercurial monster, came at me just then from an unwelcome angle, as I recalled how this man’s threats in Kenmare had proved to be anything but empty. “I’m listening.”