Vol. 95: Usually I’m quite the gasbag when it comes to my fiction, but I think this is my shortest. Please peruse.
A Shakespearean Tragedy
“...I’ve been to his home in Stratford eleven times! The first time with a school group. I knew Old Bill would be a lifelong friend as soon as we begun Hamlet in class, I were hooked in a moment. But Stratford is glorious! Have you been? We read Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet and Othello and Macbeth in school, so I had some knowledge of his work, but there’s nothing like seeing how someone actually lived, eh?”
Patrick Bellows wasn’t entirely sure he was supposed to respond. At first, he’d assumed he was having a conversation with this large red-faced man in the Shakespearean section of Shakespeare & Co. It had seemed natural enough to find another bardolator in this exact space in this exact shop. Bellows had expected it, maybe even hoped to meet someone who admired Shakespeare almost as much as he did, but he had not expected to find this bloated Cockney horror.
“I told my wife this morning to make her own plans because I was spending the day at Shakespeare and Co. I like sayin’ it as “co” like the signage, rather than “company”. I’ve been wanting to get here for years, ever since I read about it in the papers as a lad, I was a reader from a young age, and now, here I am and I intend to look through it all. A feast for the eyes and the soul, eh? Wait til I tell my mates about it,” the chubby man said with a shake of his head, as if being in a bookshop was another one of his mad schemes.
Bellows fussed with his cashmere scarf and silently sent a message of gratitude to the heavens that he didn’t have this incessant chatterbox in his neighborhood. He seemed like someone who would ring your bell at all hours and be in the middle of a conversation when you opened the door. The man halted his speech for half a second, but it was only to switch topics.
“Anyway, is there a particular tome you’re looking for... er, sorry, I didn’t catch your name.” He seemed to loom over the smaller man.
Bellows began rubbing his hands together as if that could wipe away the amount of dust acquired from brushing against the shelves. This shop was so musty, untidy, the shelves lopsided and looking like they would crash down any moment. It made him a bit anxious. He answered without meeting the other’s expectant smile, because really, he’d hoped the delay would cause this nitwit to go away, but no joy there.
“Mr. Bellows. I look for anything I don’t already have.”
“Bellows! Yes, well, I am Nigel Plum, and very nice to meet you, sir. You must have quite a collection of books on our Old Bill.”
Bellows clenched his teeth at another reference to “Old Bill”, as this ragged wart insisted on calling the greatest writer of Western civilization. It made the Bard sound like he roamed the streets coshing hoodlums and dragging them to goal. Bellows was not a proponent of the caste system, but a person should realize where they were born and make themselves happy there, otherwise you ended up with a jibbering plague sore mistaking themselves for scholars. Before answering, Bellows turned his head each way as if looking for something to beat this Plum with.
“I do have an extensive collection,” Bellows replied with a finality that would have ended the conversation for most people, but Plum was made of denser stuff.
“Reeeaaally?” Plum once again turned to look Bellows in the face, as he’d been doing with each sentence either man spoke. It grated on Bellows’ nerves just as much as the conversation.
“And if you don’t mind, sir, may I ask how many volumes you own?”
Bellows pursed his lips. This was a predicament. He did not wish to continue the conversation with this man, in fact, he hadn’t started the conversation in the first place and had tried his best, within the confines of good manners, to end it once he realized what he was dealing with. On the other hand, he was rightly proud of his Shakespearean collection, which was so fastidiously curated that he’d had the honor of loaning some of the rarer volumes out to museums and libraries in certain circumstances. They wrote to him often, pleading to have his books for a few weeks. His mailbox was positively bursting with requests from famous institutions. His name had appeared on cards next to the editions, so even this oaf standing next to him might have seen his books on display. Bellows took a moment to consider whether to just answer vaguely. “A few...” thrown off breezily as he engrossed himself in the titles before him might suffice, and he could pat himself on the back for rising above his ego.
“I own four hundred and ninety-two volumes of Shakespeare’s work. I have translations in eighty-four languages. I have one Second Folio and several rare illustrated editions. In addition, I have three hundred and three books about the man himself, and the Globe. Mostly rarities.” There.
Plum looked quite thrilled. When he collected himself enough to speak, he once again said, “Reeeaaally?”
“Yes,” Bellows snapped. “I believe I’ll come back another time. Enjoy,” he said with a flourish towards the peeling shelves that Plum insisted on blocking. The man wouldn’t be able to buy the rare books that Bellows was interested in anyway. He could drop in tomorrow and have the Bard’s works all to himself and have his purchases shipped home to Stratford-upon-Avon. It was late afternoon now and he needed to freshen up at the hotel before heading to the theatre for a French language production of Richard III. It was the main reason he’d suffered the gut-clenching Hovercraft to come to Paris.
Bellows walked out of the bookshop and turned right onto the Rue de la Bucherie. He walked past shops he had no interest in, clothing boutiques, salons and tatty souvenir stalls. The stench wafting from the fromagerie caused him to hurry past while holding his breath. His destination was much more pleasant.
He entered the patisserie and asked for his favorite, a tarte au citron. It was boxed up for him in pale blue and tied with white string, and as he doubled back and made his way through a shortcut down an alleyway, he anticipated biting into the zesty cream.
He was suddenly in such tremendous pain, crashing down to his knees, his face hitting the dirty bricks of the alley. He had a second of wondering, “Is that blood? Is that my blood? Oh, the tart…” before losing consciousness. He was bashed on the top of the head again for good measure.
Plum tossed the bloodied brick back into the plastic carrier bag he’d brought with him. The amount of blood that came spurting out of head wounds never failed to surprise him, and he’d given Bellows such a good bashing that he wasn’t sure if the man was dead or merely unconscious for a few hours, but did it matter? He quickly rummaged through Bellows’ coat pockets, taking the wallet, hotel room key and a return Hovercraft ticket to Dover. He could turn that in quickly. England was no place for Plum as long as Thatcher was there, the prison terms were too long.
He also pulled a ring off Bellows’ middle left finger. It was a chunky gold band with a ‘WS’ engraved in a garnet stone. He’d noticed it as Bellows ran his fingers along the book titles. He would wait a few weeks before he began wearing it about.
Pulling off the leather gloves and cheap rain jacket he wore over his leisure suit, he balled them up and tossed them, along with the bagged bloody brick, into the skip in the alleyway. He picked up the blood spattered patisserie box, and with a jolly “cheers!”, left Mr. Bellows to whatever shape he was in.
He hurried through alleyways, coming out upon the Rue Saint-Julien, where he ducked into a callbox beside a tobacco shop. The Cockney accent was gone as he spoke to Angus in his native Geordie, reading off the address on Bellows’ driving license. The boys could be there in an hour, tops, and if what that stuffed shirt had said about his collection was true, they’d have a good split in a day or two. He ate the tart after he’d rung off, still saying “yes, yes” between bites to keep from being hurried by those milling outside.
God, but he’d hung around that boring shop for two days waiting for a mark to show themselves. They were always drawn to old bookshops and museums, the bookworms, the little weeds who thought their education made them smarter. In his experience, the academic types had more money than sense, which worked for him. But the ring would stay with Simmons, Plum’s actual name. He didn’t give a toss about “Old Bill” as far as his writing went, but he enjoyed meeting the people who did.
Welcome to more new ALH subscribers! More meddling kids to help get to the bottom of this haunted castle.
How things work around here: a new ALH post goes up every Tuesday. Free subscribers get in the door every other Tuesday, while paid subscribers (Gloriest Goriest rule ok!) get in every single posting. We drink pumpkin beer and practice our knife throwing. The buy-in is just $5 a month, which also gets you a name drop, and that reminds me- Hey, Larry! Thanks so much for renewing your subscription!
Next week: how much of The Conjuring was based on real events? We’re also checking out Stephen King’s side hustle from years gone by, and browsing the upcoming horror and true crime releases.