The Secret Mark Part 3

CHAPTER IV WHAT THE GARGOYLE MIGHT TELL

Frank Morrow was the type of man any girl might be glad to claim as a friend. He had pa.s.sed his sixty-fifth birthday and for thirty-five years he had been a dealer in old books, yet he was neither stooped nor near-sighted. A man of broad shoulders and robust frame, he delighted as much in a low morning score at golf as he did in the discovery of a rare old book. His hair was white but his cheeks retained much of their ruddy glow. His quiet smile gave to all who visited his shop a feeling of genuine welcome which they did not soon forget.

His shop, like himself, reflected the new era which has dawned in the old book business. Men have come to realize that age lends worth to books that possessed real worth in the beginning and they are coming to house them well. On one of the upper floors of a modern business block Frank Morrow's shop was flooded with suns.h.i.+ne and fresh air. A potted plant bloomed on his desk. The books, arranged neatly without a painful effort at order, presented the appearance of some rich gentleman's library. A darker corner, a room by itself, to the right and back, suggested privacy and seclusion and here Frank Morrow's finds were kept. Many of them were richly bound and autographed.

The wise and the rich of the world pa.s.sed through Frank Morrow's shop, for in his brain there rested knowledge which no other living man could impart. Did a bishop wish to purchase an out-of-print book for his ecclesiastical library, he came to Frank Morrow to ask where it might be found. Did the prince of the steel market wish a folio edition of Audubon's "Birds of America"? He came to Frank and somewhere, in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Frank found it for him. Authors came to him and artists as well, not so much for what he could find for them as for what he might impart in the way of genial friends.h.i.+p and the lore of books.

It was to this man and this shop that Lucile made her way next morning.

She was not prepared to confide in him to the extent of telling him the whole story of her mystery, for she did not know him well. He was her father's friend, that was all. She did wish to tell him that she was in trouble and to ask his opinion of the probable value of the set of Shakespeare which had been removed from the university library.

"Well, now," he smiled as he adjusted his gla.s.ses after she had asked her question, "I'll be glad to help you if I can, but I'm not sure that I can. There are Shakespeares and other Shakespeares. I don't know the university set--didn't buy it for them. Probably a donation from some rich man. It might be a folio edition. In that case--well"--he paused and smiled again--"I trust you haven't burned this Shakespeare by mistake nor had it stolen from your room or anything like that?"

"No! Oh, no! Not--nothing like that!" exclaimed Lucile.

"Well, as I was about to say, I found a very nice folio edition for a rich friend of mine not so very long ago. The sale of it I think was the record for this city. It cost him eighteen thousand dollars."

Lucile gasped, then sat staring at him in astonishment.

"Eighteen thousand dollars!" she managed to murmur at last.

"Of course you understand that was a folio edition, very rare. There are other old editions that are cheaper, much cheaper."

"I--I hope so," murmured Lucile.

"Would you like to see some old books and get a notion of their value?"

he asked.

"Indeed I would."

"Step in here." He led the way into the mysterious dark room. There he switched on a light to reveal walls packed with books.

"Here's a little thing," he smiled, taking down a volume which would fit comfortably into a man's coat pocket; "Walton's Compleat Angler. It's a first edition. Bound in temporary binding, vellum. What would you say it was worth?"

"I--I couldn't guess. Please don't make me," Lucile pleaded.

"Sixteen hundred dollars."

Again Lucile stared at him in astonishment. "That little book!"

"You see," he said, motioning her a seat, "rare books, like many other rare things, derive their value from their scarcity. The first edition of this book was very small. Being small and comparatively cheap, the larger number of the books were worn out, destroyed or lost. So the remaining books have come to possess great value. The story--"

He came to an abrupt pause, arrested by a look of astonishment on the girl's face, as she gazed at the book he held.

"Why, what--" he began.

"That," Lucile pointed to a raised monogram in the upper inside cover of the book.

"A private mark," explained Morrow. "Many rich men and men of n.o.ble birth in the past had private marks which they put in their books. The custom seems to be as old as books themselves. Men do it still. Let's see, what is that one?"

"An embossed 'L' around two sides of the picture of a gargoyle," said Lucile in as steady a tone as she could command.

"Ah! yes, a very unusual one. In all my experience I have seen but five books with that mark in them. All have pa.s.sed through my hands during the past two years. And yet this mark is a very old one. See how yellow the paper is. Probably some foreign library. Many rare books came across the sea during the war. I believe--"

He paused to reflect, then said with a tone of certainty, "Yes, I know that mark was in the folio edition of Shakespeare which I sold last year."

His words caught Lucile's breath. For the moment she could neither move nor speak. The thought that the set of Shakespeare taken from the library might be the very set sold to the rich man, and worth eighteen thousand dollars, struck her dumb.

Fortunately the dealer did not notice her distress but pointing to the bookmark went on: "If that gargoyle could talk now, if it could tell its story and the story of the book it marks, what a yarn it might spin.

"For instance," his eyes half closed as the theme gripped him, "this mark is unmistakably continental--French or German. French, I'd say, from the form of the 'L' and the type of gargoyle. Many men of wealth and of n.o.ble birth on the continent have had large collections of books printed in English. This little book with the gargoyle on the inside of its cover is a hundred years old. It's a young book as ancient books go, yet what things have happened in its day. It has seen wars and bloodshed. The library in which it has reposed may have been the plotting place of kings, knights and dukes or of rebels and regicides.

"It may have witnessed domestic tragedies. What great man may have contemplated the destruction of his wife? What n.o.ble lady may have whispered in its presence of some secret love? What youths and maids may have slipped away into its quiet corner to utter murmurs of eternal devotion?

"It may have been stolen, been carried away as booty in war, been p.a.w.ned with its mates to secure a n.o.bleman's ransom.

"Oh, I tell you," he smiled as he read the interest in her face, "there is romance in old books, thrilling romance. Whole libraries have been stolen and secretly disposed of. Chests of books have been captured by pirates.

"Here is a book, a copy of Marco Polo's travels, a first edition copy which, tradition tells us, was once owned by the renowned pirate, Captain Kidd. I am told he was fond of reading. However that may be, there certainly were men of learning among his crew. There never was a successful gang of thieves that did not have at least one college man in it."

He chuckled at his own witticism and Lucile smiled with him.

"Well," he said rising, "if there is anything I can do for you at any time, drop in and ask me. I am always at the service of fair young ladies. One never grows too old for that; besides, your father was my very good friend."

Lucile thanked him, took a last look at the pocket volume worth sixteen hundred dollars, made a mental note of the form of its gargoyle, then handed it to him and left the room. She little dreamed how soon and under what strange circ.u.mstances she would see that book again.

She left the shop of Frank Morrow in a strange state of mind. She felt that she should turn the facts in her possession over to the officials of the library and allow them to deal with the child and the old man. Yet there was something mysterious about it all. That collector of books, doubtless worth a fortune, in surroundings which betokened poverty, the strange book mark, the look on the old man's face as he fingered the volume of Shakespeare, how explain all these? If the university authorities or the police handled the case, would they take time to solve these mysteries, to handle the case in such a way as would not hasten the death of this feeble old man nor blight the future of this strange child?

She feared not.

"Life, the life of a child, is of greater importance than is an ancient volume," she told herself at last. "And with the help of Florence and perhaps of Frank Morrow I will solve the mystery myself. Yes, even if it costs me my position and my hope for an education!" She paused to stamp the pavement, then hurried away toward the university.

CHAPTER V THE PAPIER-MACHE LUNCH BOX

"But, Lucile!" exclaimed Florence after she had heard the latest development in the mystery. "If the books are worth all that money, how dare you take the risk of leaving things as they are for a single hour?"

"We don't know that they are that identical edition."

"But you say the gargoyle was there."

"Yes, but that doesn't prove anything. There might have been a whole family of gargoyle libraries for all we know. Besides, what if it is?

What are two books compared to the marring of a human life? What right has a university, or anyone else for that matter, to have books worth thousands of dollars? Books are just tools or playthings. That's all they are. Men use them to shape their intellects just as a carpenter uses a plane, or they use them for amus.e.m.e.nt. What would be the sense of having a wood plane worth eighteen thousand dollars when a five dollar one would do just as good work?"