Quotidian Keller Read online

  Besides those six stamps, though, there were thirty or forty other lots, ranging in estimated value from ten to two hundred dollars. They would fill spaces in his collection, and he might or might not bid on them, depending on how they looked on close inspection and how the bidding proceeded. So he had all of those lots to look at as well, and notes to make in his catalog, and he gave himself up completely to the task at hand.

  He was not the only prospective bidder in the room. There were eight chairs positioned at the bank of tables, and his was never the only one occupied. Others came and went, with Keller never more than marginally aware of their coming and going. The conversation in the room was subdued, and largely limited to men (and at least one woman) calling the lots they wanted to examine. But occasionally some small talk crept into the conversation, most of it dealing with sports or the weather, or an inquiry about a mutual acquaintance. One man talked about airport security and what a nuisance it was, and Keller expressed his agreement without looking up or having any idea whose opinion he was seconding. Or caring, because his concentration remained centered upon the stamp he was holding to the light, to determine if the paper had thinned where a previous collector’s hinge had been removed. It hadn’t, and he made a note in his catalog.

  “Thurn and Taxis,” someone said. There’d been words preceding those, but Keller hadn’t noted them. His mind registered the phrase, Thurn and Taxis, and Dot’s wordplay popped into his head, and out of his mouth.

  “The only certainties,” he said.

  He spoke almost without realizing he’d done so, but the words echoed in the room, and an attention-getting silence followed them.

  “Say again?”

  “Oh,” Keller said. “Well, you know what they say. Nothing’s inevitable in this life besides Thurn & Taxis.”

  “Well, I’m damned,” a man said. He had a shock of iron-gray hair, and wore a well-tailored suit. A wafer-thin watch contrasted with a surprisingly gaudy ring. “All the years I’ve been collecting the damned stamps, and there’s a connection I never made. Do I know you? You’re not a German States guy, are you?”

  Keller shook his head. “Worldwide before 1940,” he said. “Well, through ’45, actually. British Empire through ’52.”

  “To include all of George the Fifth.”

  “Right.”

  “Never had the urge to specialize?”

  “Not really. Although there are some areas I’m more interested in than others.”

  “Like?”

  “Well, French Colonies.”

  “Pretty interesting,” the fellow acknowledged. “And you don’t go crazy with watermarks and perf varieties. Of course you’ve got to watch out for counterfeit overprints.”

  “I know.”

  “Tons of counterfeits in the German States issues. And then there are all the stamps that are worth more used than mint, so you’ve got fake cancellations to worry about. It’s almost as bad as early Italy, where something like ninety-five percent of the used stamps have fake cancels.”

  “I’d rather have mint anyway,” Keller said.

  “If you can find them, what with all the counterfeiters buying up the mint stamps and hitting ’em with fake cancellations. But, see, I want mint and used. And cancellation varieties. And multiples, mint and used, and covers. That’s what happens when you specialize. You want everything, and there’s just no end to it.”

  Keller just nodded. He should never have piped up in the first place, he thought, and now if he just let the conversation die maybe he could get out of this.

  No such luck.

  “Say, can I buy you a drink? Seems like the least I can do, since you were kind enough to point out the inevitability of Thurn & Taxis.”

  And that wasn’t all that was inevitable, Keller thought, and raised his eyes to meet those of the man in the newspaper photograph.

  At least the hotel bar was dimly lit, and the table he shared with Bingham was off to the side. Even so, it was a terrible idea for the two of them to be sitting together. Anything that connected them would give the authorities a reason to talk to Keller after Bingham’s death, and the last thing Keller wanted was to draw the attention of the police. His edge professionally lay in his professionalism. When his job was done, there was nothing to tie him to the deceased.

  If that was the last thing Keller wanted, getting to know the man he had come to kill was a close runner-up. When he got to know somebody, the person became a human being instead of an impersonal target, and that made for complications. There was a time when Keller had worried that he might be a sociopath, and now it struck him that there were certain advantages to sociopathy. A true sociopath could befriend a potential victim without being conflicted. He could enjoy the man’s company and then enjoy killing him; he wouldn’t have to perform mental gymnastics in order to depersonalize the man.

  What Keller hoped, raising his glass in acknowledgement of Bingham’s toast—“To philately, the king of hobbies and the hobby of kings!”—was that the man would turn out to be loutish and obnoxious. A passion for postage stamps, he knew, was no guarantee of a noble character or a congenial personality, and with any luck at all Sheridan Bingham would turn out to be a greedy and purse-proud type, gobbling up German States issues like a glutton gorging himself at a buffet.

  “You ever exhibit at these clambakes, Jackie?”

  Call me Sherry, Bingham had urged, which more or less compelled Keller to invite Bingham to call him by name. His name was John, but nobody ever called him that. Virtually everyone called him Keller, but Call me Keller seemed an inadequate response to Call me Sherry.

  His name was John, he’d told Bingham, and started to say what everybody called him, and veered in midsentence, claiming that everybody called him Jack. As far as Keller could recall, no one had ever called him Jack. Nor did Sheridan Bingham, who immediately converted Jack to Jackie.

  He shook his head. “Never even considered it,” he said. “When you’re a general collector, you don’t wind up with anything exhibit-worthy. Except . . .”

  “Except what?”

  “Well, my collection of Martinique is complete, and I’ve been adding minor varieties when I run across them.”

  “Sounds as though you’re specializing in spite of yourself.”

  “Well . . .”

  “And aren’t there a couple of high-ticket items from Martinique? One or two genuine rarities? My friend, you could exhibit if you wanted to.”

  “I suppose I could. I never thought of it.”

  “And now that you think of it?”

  “I don’t think it’s my style,” he said. “Not that I don’t like to look at what other collectors exhibit.”

  “You been to the exhibit room yet?”

  “No, I went straight to the auction room.”

  “Well, when you get there, you’ll see a couple of frames of my stuff.” Keller said he looked forward to it, and Bingham made a dismissing gesture. “Nothing to make a special trip for,” he said. “Decent material, and well displayed, if I say so myself. And why shouldn’t I? It’s not as though I had anything to do with it.”

  “How’s that?”

  “There’s a fellow who prepares my exhibits for me. Does the layout and lettering, decides what should or shouldn’t go on display. You ever raise show dogs, Jackie?”

  Dogs? How did dogs get into this?

  “Never,” he said.

  “Well, neither have I, but a cousin of mine wins prizes more often than not at the Westminster Kennel Club show. Got a wall full of blue ribbons. He’s got a guy who tells him what dogs to buy, and a woman who grooms the animals and gets them in peak condition for each show, and a handler who parades around the ring with the dog and makes sure the judges are properly impressed. My cousin’s involvement is pretty much limited to writing a bunch of checks every month, which is something he does reasonably well. And in return he gets the ribbons and the trophies, and he’s so proud of them you’d think he was the one who taught t
he dog to raise his leg when he needs to pee.”

  “I thought it was instinctive.”

  “You’d think so, wouldn’t you? Anyway, I do pretty much the same thing as my cousin, with stamps instead of dogs. I write the checks and I take home the ribbons. I don’t know why the hell I bother.”

  “It’s a contribution to the hobby.”

  “You think so? I think it’s a contribution to my own ego and that’s about all. My glass is empty, Jackie, and my throat’s still dry. You’ve hardly touched yours.”

  “You go ahead,” Keller said. “One’s my limit, this early in the day.”

  Bingham caught the waiter’s eye, motioned for another round. “Easier this way,” he told Keller. “Just leave it on the table if you don’t want to drink it. You know what I’m beginning to do? I’m beginning to relax.”

  “Well, that’s what the drinks are for.”

  “That’s what stamps are for,” Bingham said. “They take you out of where you are and put you in a nice peaceful place. Lately it hasn’t been working.”

  “You’re losing interest in your collection?”

  “No, but it’s harder to get away from what’s on my mind.” He fell silent while the waiter brought the drinks, then picked up his glass and stared into it. “I didn’t begin to relax,” he said, “until I got on the plane this morning. I had a shorter flight than you, flew nonstop on Northwest from Detroit, and I started to unwind when we pulled away from the gate.” He took a sip from the new drink. “And this helps the process along. If your limit’s one, well, my limit’s going to be two, because I don’t want to get sloshed. I just want to reach that state where I know everything’s going to be okay.” He managed a twisted smile. “Because,” he said, “it’s not.”

  Don’t tell me about it, Keller thought. Stick to stamps, will you? Tell me all about the pressing problem of fake cancellations.

  And, mercifully, the man did just that.

  Keller ordered dinner from room service.

  Which was ridiculous, in a city with such a wealth of restaurants. All he had to do was walk a block in any direction and he’d stumble on a restaurant with food that was better, cheaper, and more interesting than he could expect to get from the hotel kitchen. But for some reason he didn’t want to leave his room, and after the waiter wheeled in the cart and lifted the metal lids off the various dishes, he realized what the reason was. He was afraid of running into Sheridan Bingham again.

  Silly.

  Still, after he’d eaten, he stayed in the room and watched television until it was time to go to bed.

  “Well, good morning yourself,” Dot said. “Although it’s afternoon here. What time does the auction start?”

  “It started almost an hour ago,” he said. “But there’s nothing in today’s session that I’m interested in. It’s all U.S.”

  “As in America the Beautiful? What’s the matter with the United States, Keller?”

  “I collect worldwide.”

  “Oh? And what’s America, stuck on some other planet?”

  “No, but—”

  “I thought you were a patriot, Keller. Dishing out quiche to the rescue workers at the Trade Center. And now you don’t even think enough of your country to collect its stamps?”

  “I could explain,” he said, “but I don’t think that’s what either of us wants.”

  “Well, you’re not going to get an argument from me on that score. Did you, uh, establish that our friend made the trip?”

  “Oh, he’s here, all right.”

  “That sounds ominous somehow.”

  “We had drinks yesterday afternoon,” he said, and told her briefly what had happened.

  “Not great,” she said.

  “I know.”

  “Are you going to be able to do what you’re supposed to do?”

  “I think so. In one respect it’s easier this way.”

  “Because he won’t be suspicious of his new best friend.”

  “Something like that.”

  “But in another respect,” she said, “it’s got to be harder.”

  “Remember when you called me a sociopath?”

  “How could I forget? I also remember how upset you got.”

  “There are times,” he said, “when being a sociopath would make things a lot easier.”

  “What you need to do,” she said, “is meditate.”

  “Meditate?”

  “Get into a place of quiet stillness and peace,” she said, “and try to get in touch with your inner sociopath.”

  He thought about that while he checked out the exhibits. They were more interesting than usual, and, while the overall quality was high, he didn’t think that explained it. He had a different perspective on exhibits as a result of the conversation he’d had with Bingham.

  The exhibits were anonymous, presumably to avoid prejudicing the judges, but Keller was sure those worthies were well aware of the identities of most of the exhibitors. He himself could put names on several of the displays, having seen the material before, and of course he had no trouble spotting Bingham’s entry, which he’d already had described to him by the man himself. Three frames showed material from the three German colonies of islands in the Pacific—the Marshalls, the Marianas, and the Carolines. There were mint and used specimens of all the stamps, including minor varieties, and there were envelopes—covers, collectors called them—and blocks of four and six, and, well, a wealth of material, all artistically arranged and professionally written up. You could see the work of the pro who’d prepared the exhibit, but you could also see the hand of the collector, Sheridan Bingham, who’d tracked down the material in the first place and paid what he’d needed to for it.

  Would he want to do anything like this himself? He thought about it and decided he wouldn’t. His hobby was private, and he wanted to keep it that way.

  But what he might do, he thought, was expand his interest in Martinique to include covers and multiples. They’d look good, even if no one else ever saw them.

  And no one ever would. He was no artist, and layout and lettering were way beyond him. Like Bingham, he’d have to hire someone.

  No thanks. He’d had a dog once, and he’d hired a young woman to walk the animal in his absence, and before he knew it he had a live-in girlfriend. And the next thing he knew, she disappeared, walking herself and his dog clear out of his life.

  You didn’t have to take a stamp collection for a walk. You had to feed it—it ate money, and its appetite was bottomless—but it could go as long as it had to between meals. And if you had to go somewhere, you just locked the door on it and the albums sat on their shelves without complaining.

  He took another tour around the exhibit room, admiring what he saw, weighing the relative merits of the different displays. Very nice, he decided, but it was like the way he’d come to feel about dogs. He liked to look at them, but he wouldn’t want to own one.

  “Thought I might find you here.”

  A hand fastened on the edge of the table where Keller was seated, and the overhead light of the bourse room glinted off the blue stone of the high school class ring.

  Keller was in the dealers’ bourse room, where he’d sifted through several shoeboxes full of covers without finding anything he had any reason to buy. It was interesting, though, because he’d never bothered with covers, and looking at them gave him some sense of his own response to them.

  “I was looking at covers,” he told Bingham.

  “From Martinique?”

  “From all over. I didn’t see anything from Martinique. I’m trying to decide how I feel about covers.”

  “It’s a Pandora’s box,” Bingham said. “No two covers are identical, so you never know when to stop buying them. Or what’s a good price. So you wind up buying everything, even though you’re not sure you want it, and when you pass something up you wind up thinking about it for years, wishing you hadn’t missed your chance.”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t get started.”
/>   Bingham looked at him, then shook his head. “My guess,” he said, “is you’re not going to be able to resist. But go ahead and hold out as long as you can. Meanwhile, what do you say we get some lunch?”

  It was a long, leisurely lunch, in a restaurant that was all red leather and hand-rubbed wood and well-polished brass. The clientele was mostly male, and they were all wearing suits and ties, with the occasional blue blazer for Casual Friday. Lawyers and stockbrokers, Keller guessed, starting with martinis and finishing up with brandy, and pausing en route to take on a load of prime beef and fresh seafood.

  “My party,” Bingham had announced when they ordered their drinks, and waved away Keller’s insistence that they split the check. “You can grab the dinner check tonight, if you want. But this is gonna be on me. You’ve never been here before, Jackie? Well, outside of a place I know in Dallas, they serve the best steak I ever had.”

  Keller hadn’t been sure he wanted a steak that early in the day, but the first bite he took convinced him. Conversation during the meal was light—the food demanded their full attention—and when they did talk it was about stamps.

  The coffee was what you’d expect—dark, rich, and perfectly brewed—and when Bingham ordered an elderly Armagnac to keep it company, Keller went along with him. He was no big fan of brandy, it usually gave him heartburn, but he went along anyway.

  What the hell, he thought. What the hell.

  And he found himself wondering if a mistake might have been made. Suppose someone back in Detroit had clipped the wrong photo. Suppose it wasn’t Sheridan Bingham but some other resident of the Motor City who had incurred Alan Horvath’s displeasure. Because, really, how could anyone want this perfectly pleasant gentleman killed?