3

The Broken Colophon

 

Tho.V. Castellmare, G.L.O.T.U.

 

I spent only a few more days in Vatican City before departing. Truth be told, I was too shaken by my meeting with Castellemare to get any significant research done; and, if the theory of his library held true, then indeed all my research was at bottom insignificant. My travels were sorely uneventful after that, yet I resisted the urge to break the spell of the mundane in calling upon Castellemare. It would only be a matter of time before he contacted me with a list of chores anyhow.

I was back in Toronto, cutting my journeys short. I had acquired some exquisite texts at an estate auction in Barcelona, but my heart wasn’t into it. The potential buyers must have noticed my preoccupied and nebulous malaise, for they employed their instinct in haggling down my list price, effectively narrowing my profit margin to a pittance. Fortunately, I did not own a store, but kept all my connections and catalogue online. Many of the books I had in virtual stock were ones that were not yet in my possession, or otherwise kept in a climate-controlled storage locker in my home town of Woodstock. Part of my business was to act as a sales conduit between owner and collector, taking my modest commission. I mostly operated out of my small, bachelor apartment near York University, an apartment modestly and tactfully furnished with various pieces of imitation Empire furniture I had picked up on the cheap. My walls were sparsely peppered with miniature reproductions of medieval manuscripts - mostly blown up details of woodcuts from various astrological incunabula and the like, including one reproduction of Hildegaard von Bingen’s portrait where she is being infused with the word of God while her ecclesiastical assistant looks on in shock and awe upon a madness von Bingen is taking as a pure ecstasy transporting her out of space and time. I usually worked late, scouring the online auction sites for texts the sellers were listing at ridiculously low prices, obviously ignorant beasts who had no inclination of their own collection’s value. I, of course, had the entire Lincolnshire Librorum in my Rolodex memory, and could spot a good deal from an attempted gouge. It was about two in the morning when I received an email alert from a [email protected]. In my line of work, my customers were global and had all sorts of bizarre email addresses, so I dismissed very little as being merely spam. The subject line read: “Texted!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And so there it was: my first day on the job. Although all the metrics were provided, the question remained as to how I would remove these books without incident. When I was in college, I used to steal books from the library by removing the magnetic strip inserted in the spine - easier to do with some books than others; the books rebound by the library were too hard to remove unless one was so intent on the book as to slit the entire spine in search of this little strip. But how much had changed in library security since I was a student? How could I remove these books without getting caught? Just then, as if he was adjacent to my thoughts, a follow-up email:

 

 

 

 

 

…

I set myself to task right away, checking the library catalogue online for the holdings of St. Michael’s College. Indeed, there it was, listed in its scant metric order, yet gleaming as a dangerous potential gaffe by the drunk at dinner. It looked as though Castellemare's information was a bit stale since the book had now been officially entered into the catalogue. I wondered how the librarians decided to include it in the collection; if what Castellemare said was true, it just magically appeared, and was not a text the Acquisitions Officer would have purchased. Perhaps they thought it was some sort of oversight and decided to shelve it rather than inquire further. The library would not be open for another six or seven hours yet. I decided to forego sleep and move forward with the plan. I booked a ticket to Essen at a usurious price.

Hunting down books has always given my life a sense of purpose. The quarry may not appear elusive, and it has no legs upon which to scurry away, but the hunt can prove difficult nonetheless. Books have a pernicious habit of blending in and effectively disappearing altogether in their surroundings. Their means of camouflage is to nuzzle in, cover to cover, with others of their kind, and only time, luck, and a keen eye can jiggle them loose… like some obstinate, hard-to-reach tooth under the labour of an ill-equipped dentist. Although books are my life, I never have more than a hundred or two in my personal collection. Books are the means, the resources by and through which I facilitate sales and research. I love books, but not enough to keep them. As one learns from those engaged in the sale of illicit substances, it is never a good idea to cut profit by using what one sells. I try not to let my love of books get the better of me, even though I am the sort predisposed to collection fetishism. And so my tendency is to create an impassable, indifferent gulf between myself and the books I am hunting, to not become too attached. Perhaps I justify this to myself with some twisted secret belief that I will one day be reunited with every book that has ever come into my possession… perhaps the only way I could make my mercenary trade in books bearable.

I know that books carry innate mysteries and histories. Who owned them is as important as their contents, origin of publication, materials utilized to fabricate them, and edition; otherwise, books are little more than blocks of cut paper stuffed with the words of someone as fallible as any other. Without their histories, books have no content in being articles of conversational intrigue. One could indicate the exceptions in every case such as this, perhaps pointing to some vintage text that purports - or has purported on its behalf - to hold some secret, a code, a key, a portal to personal enlightenment, a means to achieve mystical intuition. Certainly, I do not deny this. However, the personal embroidery we cannot see appended to the book’s journey is, for me, a sense of its reality, its narrative vitalism in this world as a participant object. Books are a form of cultural currency in so many ways. This is why I spend so many hours studying various high end catalogues of rare books - the pedigree of prior ownership is as valuable to the book merchant in locating its true origins and in adding to its value as a soil index layer on an archaeological dig is for dating relics. There is a particular cachet among those of us who trade in books, for there are some names among the book collections that carry an indisputable weight of respect and validity. For instance, Hon. Johann V. Sturges who lived in Fairfield from 1734 to 1791 had an enviable collection of texts, each one he meticulously sought out and authenticated… Now, if I come across his name in a list of previous owners, I presumably know the text to be genuine and in good condition. Sturges was a borderline maniac when it came to the care of the book, and his methods of care and restoration antedate many of our more technical means today - and are arguably still more effective. I look around at the books produced today by the large print mills, a cheap mass production line of indifference and widespread market deluge of disposable bilge… These books of today are not built to last. Their paper will crumble and the glue that binds them will disintegrate in less than two centuries, and that is with proper care. But when editions and print runs exceed the millions, and just about anyone publishes nowadays instead of only the moneyed nobility of classical learning, the value of the book, per unit, has plummeted. All attempts to manufacture scarcity to drive value only succeeds in contrivance, and eventually the publisher relents once the sales marker is so high by pushing the pedal on production once more.

Today’s books are produced inelegantly. I compare a folio edition from the 1700s to a mass trade paperback - the new and embarrassing invention of the mid-19^th century with the noble intention of democratizing objects for the demands of a growing literate population - and note the stark juxtaposition of quality. Quantity wins the day. Who was it that demonstrated to me the durability of books? Perhaps it was in college, where I obtained my first real taste for the sublime beauty of rare texts. Professor Zenas Payne, a scruffy and bulbous-nosed man with a stout physique and a crumbling, scratchy voice… He came to class on the first day, without introducing himself, holding two books. The one was a luridly mass produced Clive Cussler, and the other was a book of significantly older appearance although I could not discern then what book it was. All I knew then was that this second book was extremely old, like I had seen in period films about the Renaissance. In fact, it was incunabula… a 1416 treatise of some kind on princely affairs and the writing of laws for feudal governance - a kind of motley town charter. Professor Payne took one look at us with the glazed glance of a man fresh from a gin bender, and violently winged the Cussler across the lecture hall with enough precision to land on the table beside the lectern. The Cussler burst apart, its many tongue-pages loosing themselves from the cheap Perfect Bind. He then looked at us to note the effect. I had the impression that this had been rehearsed many times, that this was the way he had always introduced this course in his twenty plus years of teaching it. He found his sensationalist opening the determination of a rhythm. He then pitched the incunabula with the same force (which would inspire a sense of horror in any bibliophile) where the Cussler now sat in its own exploded paper entrails. The manuscript held together just fine. Not a page was disturbed from its hardy binding. “See?” he said. “At one point, books were made to last.”

It was from him that I learned that, not only do older books age well, but books always age much better than us as though we occupy a different temporal velocity - more intense and less calm than that of our cherished incunables. As well they should. Great families and their legacies may come and go, but the patient accumulatory documentation of our language, history, and culture needs to contained in far more durable and resilient stuff than that of which human organisms are composed. And, perhaps, I also learned the cheap thrill of hurling pulpy books to watch them explode.

Despite my eagerness to start on my task, and in staying up, I propped myself up in bed scanning a catalogue and dozed off…

 

My mornings generally start the same, a routine one may as well predict as coming from a book somewhere. I tend to roll over and let my hand blindly fumble about for my eyeglasses first, and then a cigarette (now that I had quit quitting once again), a lighter, and bring them all into an all-too-often rehearsed ritual. On this morning, there was a difference, but I could not say a welcome one. Just as I was about to light my cigarette, and as my eyes were adjusting from the non-focus of sleep and dreams to that of harsh daylight slashing through the crack in the velvet drapes that were too obstinate to stay absolutely drawn, I was given a scare. Mornings were not built for fright, and it is only the sign of the cruelest god that does not grant its subjects the mercy of easing into the day like a warm bath. As I had the cigarette in my lips, a sudden flick followed by a flame appeared. I recoiled and a voice followed.

“You ought to pick up around here. I nearly twisted my neck, and everybody knows mornings aren't a good time to kick it.”

My eyes adjusted automatically out of shock. I saw a man with thinning black hair smoothed back with gel and a goatee. He was in an English rain slicker looking more like a rat than a man. It was Angelo, carrying some kind of shoulder bag, the shoulder strap of which he had let hang loose on my bed. He was sitting on the edge with a kind of vacant grin on his face, as if even he didn’t know why he was there or what to expect next.

“What the hell?” I croaked in these first words of waking.

“I thought you and I would get an early start on the day, maybe I’d show you the ropes…You know, trainee stuff.”

Angelo stood up and walked around, surveying the contents of the home he had just unlawfully entered, perhaps it not having occurred to him that there were alternate ways of calling on someone. I seriously suspected that, in his trade, it would have seemed unnecessary. He picked half-interestedly at my shelf of books, a meagre collection. He then peeked in the direction of the kitchen, asking me if we could rustle up some coffee and eggs.

“What… What gives you the right to just… enter and - “

“Hey, whoa, mister master of his domain… I’m just doing my job, and if you want to earn your pay with the boss, you better ease up a little on your bourgeois sense of propriety. We’re partners, you and I, and maybe it would suit you better to act accordingly. What kind of host are you, anyway? And would it kill you to pick up around here so I don’t twist my neck?”

Going on about his neck yet again. Would this be his stock phrase? Audaciously, he yanked the drapes open with such force that I thought he would rip them from their bar. “Gotta let some light in here, start the day. Rise and shine, and all that.”

“I… do not work well… under these rude conditions!” I said, gaining vocal momentum to roar, but only sounding whiny, grizzling ineffectually. “Castellemare told me nothing about having or needing a partner. I did not elect for this.”

I was standing now, shaking both with mounting anger and with the residual shock of rude awakening. The credibility of my anger and intimidation was being thwarted by my painful realization that I was in nothing else than my boxers with a cutesy balloon pattern. It was a bad day to let my laundry lapse.

“There’s a lot Castellemare did not tell you, but it isn’t his fault: he’s a busy man, you understand, and he can’t be bothered micromanaging his crew by going over all the small details. Hell, you should - and probably will - meet Setzer one day. Hope not. Forget I mentioned it. Nice shorts – where's your teddy bear?”

“So, this is just a little detail? Maybe he thought it unimportant to make this omission, but when I awake to a stranger sitting on the edge of my bed, I have a right to be jumpy and believe that this was a detail he ought to have communicated to me!”

Angelo had seemed to give up hinting at coffee, and was now motioning to go and make it himself.

“Suit yourself, grumpy, but you’d be hard pressed to have such a swank job with such sweet pay. Say, where do you keep the sugar in this joint? And, by the by, I am no stranger, bub. If anyone is the stranger in this operation, it’s you. I am not one to question my boss’ judge of character, but I have my reservations about you. You professorial types are all alike. Who said this?: 'crotchety stinkers to the very last, ornery natures unduly imbued with an unsubstantiated sense of entitlement and superiority.' Mornings don’t suit you very well, it seems. I'll make a note of that and try to remember to ring your butler a week in advance.”

“You have reservations about me?” I asked incredulously.

“Yeah, of course. I don’t trust you, and you have a massive pickle up your ass. Now get it in gear because these books aren’t just going to pop into your post. And, for godsakes, get some trousers on – I feel as though I've just barged into Bobby the Child Adventurer's bedroom.”

I was livid. He had left his shoulder bag on the bed. It felt greasy, just how I pictured everything Angelo owned to be - his objects a perfect match for his wretched character. I slapped the bag against his chest and stretched out a finger, expecting him to follow the direction it was pointing at: out.

He smirked and said, “You’re making a big mistake, mate. I’m not trying to be cute with you, and I can assure you that despite my gruff appearance and manner that I am no ignoramus as you may have assumed. I act only out of necessity. You may think you have it all figured out, that you don’t need my assistance… and so be it. But I can tell you that arrogance will only bring you so far, and after that, well, you may need your wits about you. What I mean to say, my good Gimaldi, is that you know squat about what you are getting into, and if it were up to me I would have chosen a much better equipped candidate. As it stands, you will make enemies fast, and I can assure you that you will either become a liability or a corpse.”

Angelo seemed to step out of what could now be called a comedic façade, and was standing before me with a sudden surge of personal gravity.

“What are you saying, Angelo?”

“In our occupation, we need to craft and cultivate a series of masks to suit all occasions, a face for all seasons. Our art is that of subtlety, stealth, and anonymity. If you come flaunting your self-important intellect in all its silly ego rigidity, you are asking to be noticed. Note well the success of the ninja: they were silent workers, and could blend seamlessly into any situation, among any kind of people, speaking any kind of dialect. Take me, for instance. I know eleven languages. I can speak ‘street’ with as much ease as any native-born speaker of the dialect, just as I can perfectly mimic the dialect of an Oxfordian economics professor or a Grecian dockworker. This is the first lesson that one must learn: talk may be cheap, but it gets you into and out of everything. You want unlimited access? You want minimal detection? You need to relearn the art of speaking. I can guarantee you that if you and I wanted to get a limited access manuscript at the Bibliotheque Verillons, I would succeed and you would fail because I would know how to chat up the lowly clerk or the highbrow librarian officer. You, on the other hand, would protest in the only way you know how, completely disregarding the sensitivity of the situation by stamping your foot in petulant outrage with demands, thinking yourself entitled as if your academic affiliation was some kind of noble birthright. You see, rhetoric is part of our trade, and so greases the wheels of acquisition. I could already tell the first moment you set foot in Castellemare’s flat, casting your eyes on me, that you assumed I was some ignorant flunky footman who procured his position by mere luck alone - or that I was the gruff hired help, some kind of leg-breaker or scheming weasel. Of course, if Castellemare asked me to break your legs, I'd be fully capable of doing so. Cast any aspersions you like, but you are always being tested. You are proof that I can fool all the people all of the time. It is not only the library that is infinite potentiality. I suppose now that I am speaking in the phrasings of a more refined individual you feel that you can warm up to me… that we share some kind of common set of values and interests. Be wary of this, too, for you will only be enamoured with a mere affectation, a facet of my person, and ultimately your own narcissism. If you wish to extend your friendliness to me, you must accept that I am always much more than I seem in any given moment. Don't get any silly ideas that we're going to be pals palavering over Plato, mind you. I see right through your type... So full of himself, but at bottom just another pretentious sot who thinks the world owes him a living. So, how about that coffee?”

“The coffee maker is broken,” I said, ashamed and defeated, yet not really knowing why. I felt scolded.

“No matter, then; I saw a café on the way here. Let’s catch that quick guzzle of joe before heading for St. Mike’s college. I ought to tell you the sordid tale of Mike, the saintly Mikhail…”

And so he did. I had to admit that the thoroughness of his explanation, filled as it was with intriguing anecdotes and lateral associations to other meaningful historical events, perhaps even outshone my own knowledge. His words had an eclipsing effect, and when he decided to speak in this way, I was pulled in by my own desire to hear more.

Before leaving, he arranged for my “disguise”… He had me wear my old suede sport jacket with the leather patches, tussled my hair, and produced a pair of awkward-looking and very thick spectacles. He mildly complained that my nose was not aquiline enough to balance the effect of the spectacles, but that it would have to do. I trusted his judgement, for what other choice did I have? He had demonstrably proven that he was much more skilled at a task I was yet to even do once. We left my apartment and situated ourselves in the pastiche bustle of the early morning café crowd, each resignedly dreading the rest of their day of employment spent in waste and little benefit. It was there that Angelo schooled me on the particular “ruse” we needed to utilize in order to procure text number one. We were a comical pair: me in this stereotypical harried professorial Harvard get-up and him steeped in a kind of maccassar hoodlum leather gear making him less suitable for a library than a patron at a dingy late afternoon pub.

“You,” he began, “are a visiting scholar from - let me see now…” - He rifled through his shoulder bag for a particular envelope, plucked it, and opened its contents - “Ah, here we are! State University of New York.”

The letter bore the unmistakable SUNY letterhead.

“I am to use this?” I asked.

“Yep. It’s pretty standard. I drew it up last night. It says, in the proper froufrou style that you have been given express permission by the Department of Philosophy to remove this text from the library for the duration of your stay. The letter states that permission was granted by the Chair of the Department. I also have permission letters by the SUNY department, and a backup letter from the library head in case they don’t buy it. Just let me double-check to see if all the names are correct.”

Angelo removed a small PDA from his shoulder bag and called up his list. A little USB key was inserted into its side, functioning as an archive.

“Okay,” he said, once satisfied. “All the names are current and kosher. You’re good to go on this pass.”

“What do you have there?”

“Oh, you mean my database? You might call it a combination address book and who’s who archive, updated daily - or when I can secure the net connections. I have the names of virtually every departmental head in every university in the world, as well as the addresses, names of head librarians, and so forth of every library in the land. It always comes in useful.”

“And the letterhead?”

“That’s my sneaky trick. It took me a long while to procure the letterhead for every university and their respective departments. The way was this: I falsely applied as a candidate to each of their programs and received a mass of rejections all on their letterhead. I scanned each and now keep them in a separate database. When an acting Chair quits the position, I find out who has taken the place, and alter the file. The trickier letterheads are the embossed kind, but I have connections with those who have the right tools in their workshops to make counterfeits. I then order a block of a hundred blanks, which usually covers my needs. Signatures are too easy to forge, so I don’t sweat on that score either. There’s an art to using these blanks. Sometimes it is simple, like a subway ticket, pitched into the trash once the use has been exhausted, and sometimes it gets tricky when they keep it on file. If the book the ‘visiting scholar’ wants to borrow goes missing, phone calls and emails are made to the people named in the letter. You can imagine what happens after that: ‘I never authorized someone by the name of so-and-so to remove the text in question’, to which the librarian replies that a signed letter is present stating just that fact, etc. A scandal ensues, a minor one, and so the department head marches down to the library to salvage reputation, sees the letter, declares it a forgery, and you know what happens next?”

“No.”

“Well, piece it together… It comes to light that forged letters purporting to be on the authority of the Chair of the Department are circulating, which means some industrious individual has access to the official letterhead. To avoid further complications and miscommunications, the letterhead is changed and a closer guard is kept on it, since they are more willing to suspect internal individuals who have access to it than someone on the outside. That means my letterhead becomes useless. Sometimes I only get to use the blank once before I have to find another strategy if I want to remove another text from the same library. It can be potentially embarrassing if I don’t get word of the change and I try to use the same old letterhead. That’s where talk comes in handy, to - as I said earlier - get out of sticky situations. If a mass email goes out to all the librarians to be on the lookout for forged official letters, then one can be sunk. What I don’t want you to think is that this is the only means available for plucking books - it is one strategy among thousands. Today I am employing this one. It isn't always necessary since one can pinch books in regular circulation quite easily; it's the stuff behind the counter that requires special permissions and the right documentation, or stuff in rare manuscript libraries that need the forms.”

“Have you ever used the letterhead of this institution before?”

“Yes, which makes this potentially risky. I’ve actually used it before since this library is one of those where the boss’ books seem to pop up most frequently. A weird kind of rift thing he would be better disposed to explaining. So the general rule is supreme caution, no matter what. I’m the backup in this. That is, ask to see the book first before showing the letters. Have it in your hands, and then top up the performance with the official business. Introduce yourself as a visiting scholar right from the start, ask to see the book, and then provide the evidence of your claim to it. This works five times out of ten, depending on the librarian, and the other times you have to have the letter first for their inspection. Should there be any problem, I am dressed appropriately to function as plan C. If I suspect that things are going to make a turn for the worse, then I will cause a spectacle, maybe some public drunkenness, a violent tipping over of shelves, something startling… at which point you can fade away into the crowd or bolt - it’s your choice. Either way, we will have to dodge security. I only hope that I don’t have to resort to this unpalatable option.”

“So what is plan B, since you have C covered.”

“Ah! This is where you can start practising the gift of gab. What would you do if the librarian knows the letterhead to be stale, and therefore a forgery?”

“I, um… hm. I guess I would stall.”

“Your hesitation, even now, speaks volumes on your immediate guilt, gives away the game before it even starts. Here’s what you do: you have to act, perform, and believe yourself to be the genuine article and not some rogue goliard. Your first reaction must be shock, then consternation, and then confusion – the best one-two-three psycho-punch. This is convincing because it makes you appear as though you are as much a victim of fraud as the librarian and everyone else involved. You’re just some innocent and meek scholar who had applied to get this permission, but only through distance correspondence. You assumed everything was copasetic. You never once imagined that someone would sink so low as to implicate you in some twisted joke, making you an unwitting accessory to attempted theft. Yes, this must be some kind of cruel joke played on you by some nasty colleague who is trying to jeopardize your bid for tenure. Start speaking more to yourself at this point, puzzling out who could have done this to you. Apologize profusely, but meanwhile maintaining that your apology is on behalf of some cretin who is trying to sabotage your illustrious and impeccable reputation. Express your disbelief that someone would resort to such infantile tactics – this is key since it casts the whole framework of the suspicion and accusation as patently absurd, thereby softening up the librarian to the idea of predictable reason. Ask the librarian for contact information since you are now explicitly committed to getting to the bottom of this, of locating the culprit and putting an end to this sorry act of fraud. Don’t ham it up too much, make it believable, which is to say truly believe that you have been unduly placed in the wrong by cruel and vindictive forces. Get it? This old trick is the ultimate suspicion buster, the old shared victimization gag. Sure, I’m actually on your side. Ha!”

“Doubtless, I have plenty of questions before I start--”

“I’ll field one now. Shoot,” he said, winking and making an obnoxious cliché gun with his thumb and index finger.

“Why not just find a sneaky way of bypassing the security system? Most books have that little magnetic strip inserted in the spine. With a small blade, and a delicate incision, it can be removed. After that, repairing it would be easy if one isn’t sloppy in mangling the text.”

“Hey, Gimaldi… That’s pretty shrewd of you,” he eagerly applauded, followed by his deflating evaluation, “but not foolproof.”

“When I was younger and foolish, I used to steal books from my public library.”

“Well, looks like you’re at the foot of the circle. However, listen, we’re not lifting Nancy Drew or your run-of-the-mill academic slop freely available on the shelves for any grubby undergrad to rifle through to make a term paper… The books we are trying to retrieve are behind the desk. In some cases, and at some libraries, you need special letters of permission to even see them. But, you knew that already… Weren’t you at the Vatican Library? They don’t just open it up for any schmuck… You need authorization and a personal invite.”

“Yes, of course. How foolish of me to make the parallel - “

“Well, hold on a second, Gimaldi… Don’t be too down on yourself. The boss’ books can occur anywhere: under librarian lock and key, in someone’s personal collection, on the shelves at the public library, in one of those big mega-chain bookstore-slash-kitschy coffee shops…anywhere books are. Some jobs will be easier to pull off than others.”

“Have you ever failed to retrieve a book, even with all your planning?”

“Once,” he said, his face suddenly darkening with clouds of memory. “The poor guy who had it in his possession went mad. I really blew it, but the circumstances... I suspect something was working to counter my efforts, some kind of nudge or attempt to plant the text, well... I... never mind… I’d rather not get into that morose tale, especially when we ought to be keeping sharp and the morale high. No sense swapping stories on past failures when we need to go about the business of successful reacquisition.”

And I left it at that, for now. Angelo would tell me one day…The story of Leo and the Red Lion book. He gave me a conspiratorial wink before gently tugging me in the direction of the library.