The Ross Forgery

by William H Hallahan

  The maître d’ quickly read Ross’s suit, shoes, and haircut. “Mr. O’Kane? Yes. Mr. Emmett O’Kane, it is. Follow me, please.”

  Ross was led to a table in front of one of the great windows, awash in blinding spring sunlight. Outside the window, an enormous American flag swung slowly from an angled flagpole.

  Ross looked at the gold-colored hair, the tanned, handsome face, the glen plaid suit, and the unwavering blue eyes of Emmett O’Kane.

  O’Kane folded a Wall Street Journal and laid it aside. He nodded at Ross. “Good morning.”

  Ross nodded.

  Without rising, O’Kane held out a hand. “I’m Emmett O’Kane. You’re Ross?”

  Ross nodded and gave the extended hand a short shake. “Please sit down, Mr. Ross.”

  Ross sat down across from O’Kane.

  A waiter placed a silver bowl before Emmett O’Kane. In it was a bed of crushed ice with a large glass of orange juice. From the delicate spout of a silver coffeepot, he filled O’Kane’s cup.

  “Beautiful day,” said O’Kane. “I understand it’s turned colder.”

  Ross nodded. “It has.” The cold air was moving the large flag behind O’Kane’s head.

  O’Kane drank some coffee and studied Ross’s face.

  “I’m told you’re an expert in the graphic arts.”

  “Type,” said Ross. “My business is type and typefaces.”

  O’Kane nodded and studied his face again. “How’s business?”

  “Peachy. How’s yours?”

  O’Kane watched again. “Peachy.”

  Ross nodded slowly. Slowly, too, he lit a cigarette, then leaned both elbows on the table. He waited indifferently.

  The waiter returned. “What would you like for breakfast?” asked O’Kane. “He knows what I want.”

  “Just coffee,” said Ross. “Coffee’s fine.”

  The waiter left.

  O’Kane finished his orange juice. “I understand you were over in Jersey last night. Near Newark Airport.”

  Ross nodded.

  “Godforsaken hole. Something right out of Dante’s Inferno.”

  Ross nodded. “Shows you what a group of dedicated, high-minded businessmen can do to a beautiful salt marsh.”

  O’Kane watched Ross narrowly, then smiled, showing a perfect set of teeth. “Yes. I know. I grew up in Newark. In a large Irish family with no money.”

  Ross nodded without comment.

  “There was a pack of dogs roaming those marshes then, and stands of marijuana grew in all the various garbage dumps they were using for landfill. You know where the marijuana came from? Garbage. From the bottoms of canary-bird cages. Birdseed was mixed in those days with seeds from the marijuana plant. The canaries got high on the stuff and sang their brains out. Any dirty little Irish kid from Newark who wanted to could go down and roll himself a joint of marijuana anytime. Shows you what a group of dedicated businessmen can do for a garbage dump.”

  Ross nodded silently again, almost smirking.

  The waiter pushed a cart across the sun-filled carpet on soundless wheels. He lifted a silver cover from a bowl, then lifted the bowl from a steaming pan of hot water. Deftly, he mopped the water drops from the bottom of the bowl and placed it before Emmett O’Kane. He removed the orange juice server and placed a small pot of cream on the table, a silver-topped glass jar of raisins, a nutmeg shaker, and a small pitcher of golden honey. In the bowl was a steaming serving of coarse, steel-cut Irish oatmeal.

  “You sure you won’t have something to eat, Mr. Ross?” asked O’Kane. “I can heartily recommend the oatmeal. Imported from Drogheda, Ireland. I eat it every morning.”

  Ross shook his head. “Just coffee.”

  O’Kane picked up the raisin jar and began to spoon raisins onto the oatmeal. “A dedicated businessman has the aesthetic sense of a jackal at a corpse, Mr. Ross. If you’re telling me that you don’t like the American businessman’s primitive ethical sense, I have to agree with you. In fact, that’s precisely why I asked you to breakfast with me.”

  Ross nodded and snuffed out his cigarette.

  “Did Mr. Service tell you anything last night?”

  “Service?”

  “Huh. Service was his usual prudent self. Didn’t even give you his name. Redhaired man, with a Sandhurst accent.”

  Ross nodded. “OK. He told me nothing.”

  “Well. Mr. Service is my vice-president in charge of corporate security. He’s a former section head of British Military Intelligence, and he’s very good. He also tells me you’re very good.”

  “Did he mean very hungry?”

  O’Kane smiled a charming smile. “If you’re hungry, Mr. Ross, so much the better. I understand that you accumulated a sizable gambling debt last night. But Mr. Service uses very specific English, and he said ‘very good’!”

  3

  O’Kane studied the balding head before him, the perpetually downturned mouth and insolent, sullen eyes. Something defeated, he read in that face, something baffled and bitter. He noted also the long, strong, slender hands. Service had chosen wisely.

  “I understand you specialize in antique typefaces and small art-press printing.”

  “Something like that.”

  “You also design typefaces. Mr. Service gave me a list of books and advertising campaigns your typefaces appear in. I believe you also do motion picture titles.”

  “Yes.”

  O’Kane sensed a growing boredom and restlessness in Ross. “Mr. Ross. How would you like to make fifty thousand dollars?”

  Ross’s mouth began to open. He shut it. He moved his arms and moved his legs. O’Kane decided he looked like a man trying to conceal the fact that he had just been shot. “Do I have your attention?”

  “Say it again.”

  “Fifty thousand dollars. How would you like to make fifty thousand dollars?”

  “I think I’d better leave.” Ross stood up.

  “Why, you haven’t heard the proposition yet.” O’Kane looked up with disgust.

  “I’ll give you twenty to one odds the proposition is illegal or dangerous or both. I’m too nervous to steal, too old to run, and the only thing I do well enough to get paid for is type design—and there’s not a face on God’s green earth worth fifty grand. Besides that, any bona fide businessman tells me what he needs and asks me to name my price. You didn’t ask me how I’d like to design a new typeface, or how I’d like to be involved in a challenging graphic arts assignment. You offered me money, so you think I’m for sale. Take your fifty grand and stick it up your ass.”

  “Whoa. Whoa. Mr. Ross.”

  “No hard feelings, O’Kane, but you ought to get yourself another spy. You got a completely wrong reading on me.”

  “No, I didn’t. I made the error, not Service. I’m asking you to sit down.”

  “I don’t think we have any more to say.”

  “Look. I mentioned the money as an indication of the size of the opportunity, not as a price tag on you. I want something designed. I have no idea of its worth—probably considerably less than fifty thousand dollars, but I’m willing to put that kind of money down to get the very best talent to do the very best job. I want you to know that you’re considered the best, and I’m willing to pay well to get you. Now, you’re not a stupid man, and you’re not in business for fun. Money is why we all get up in the morning, and I’ve got a first-rate proposition to make to you. Why don’t you sit down and listen to it?”

  O’Kane watched Ross sit down.

  “Ross. You goddamned creative people are all alike. You all take a holier-than-thou stance whenever anyone mentions money, but every time I get a bill from one of you, it’s so high it looks like somebody’s telephone number.”

  Ross’s eyes grew angry, and he pushed his chair away from the table again. “Look, O’Kane. We can go on swapping insults all day. If you have a proposition, put it on the table.”

  O’Kane smiled and poured cream on his oatmeal. He nodded happily, reachin
g for the honey. “You’re all right, Ross.” He chuckled. He was looking at a man who would do practically anything for fifty thousand dollars.

  4

  O’Kane watched the waiter clear away the oatmeal impedimenta and refill the coffee cups. Then he looked at Ross.

  “No,” said Ross. “I never heard of Thomas J. Wise.”

  “Neither did I until a few weeks ago. I guess you never heard of the Ashley Library, either?”

  “No,” said Ross dryly.

  “Well, Tommy Wise was an Englishman. A bibliophile. He created one of the greatest private libraries ever assembled. Back around the turn of the century. In fact, his contributions to book collecting and bibliography are staggering. He is considered the father of modern bibliographic science by many people. Are you a book collector?”

  Ross shook his head. “No.”

  “OK. Book collecting requires three things.” O’Kane counted off three fingers. “Good taste. Superb business acumen. And money. Tommy Wise had all three. He was punctilious, exacting, painstaking, and very, very accurate. Through diligence and patience, he issued massive bibliographies that were reference books all over the world. He corrected a number of bibliographic errors and even exposed some infamous literary shams and forgeries.”

  O’Kane watched Ross’s eyes wander uninterestedly to the window. “Now, this Wise had one major failing. Can you guess what it was, Ross?”

  “No.” Ross’s eyes returned to O’Kane’s face.

  “Shortly before he died, he was unmasked as the greatest literary forger in the history of the English language.”

  O’Kane had Ross’s complete attention now. “That’s right. Forger. Tommy Wise started out in life as a clerk. To build his library, he needed money, and he got it through creating forgeries. He made first editions of Victorian masterpieces. In pamphlet form. All short pieces. Poems, essays, short stories. He created over fifty of them in a forty-year period. They made him a fortune. Unfortunately, for him, two very bright literary detectives, Pollard and Carter, uncovered the whole mess and ruined his reputation. So, when he died, Wise left a besmirched reputation, a small fortune to his wife, and a truly great library to the British Museum. And a whole new collector’s category to the world—Thomas Wise forgeries. OK so far?”

  Ross nodded. “Seems to me I’ve heard this story.”

  “Of course. Typography was one of the tools they used to nail Wise.”

  “A hybrid font.”

  “Right! Right!” O’Kane leaned back, his golden hair haloed by sunlight. “There’s a great deal more to this tale, but I’ve told you the essential details.”

  “And you want a Wise forgery.”

  O’Kane smiled again. “You’re an impatient man, Mr. Ross. And a hip-shooter. So, before I explain what I’m after, I’d better prepare a little justification first. I don’t want a Wise forgery. Not per se, at least. What I’m after—well, I know a rapacious animal. A human animal. I want to make him slobber. I want to create something that he wants. Something he wants so badly he’ll kill for it. And something that he can’t have.”

  Ross looked at the sudden hardness in O’Kane’s eyes, and the foxlike smile.

  O’Kane drew a deep breath. “Look. I’m not accustomed to explaining myself, Ross. Not to anyone. I’m taking some pains with you, because I want things between you and me to be as clear as that pane of glass. I want no misunderstandings. You can take it on faith from me that the man I want to torment is one of the dirtiest groin kickers I have ever met. An unprincipled Neanderthal from Texas who tears up people like rag dolls. He is also the world’s leading collector of Thomas Wise forgeries. Now. I want you to create one—a Wise forgery that has never existed. One of a kind. That I own. It has to be good enough to fool experts. I want it with a certified pedigree. And I want it known that I have it. And I want this animal from Texas to know that his set of Wise forgeries is incomplete and will stay incomplete until the day he dies. I want him to know that there’s one thing on earth he cannot have—and that I own it.”

  Ross frowned. “You want a fake of a forgery. Something seventy to ninety years old. A collector’s item good enough to fool all the literary experts and their scientific equipment. And you want it for fifty grand.”

  “Yes.”

  Ross sat back thoughtfully. “I’ll give you a word of advice, O’Kane. I shoot craps with some characters who’ll charge you a mere grand to put your groin kicker in the intensive care unit for a month. You’ll save forty-nine thousand dollars.”

  “You’re telling me no?”

  Ross stood up. “I’m telling you no.” Ross turned to walk away.

  “Mr. Ross. My final offer.”

  “Don’t tell me.”

  “One hundred thousand.”

  Ross hesitated.

  “Sleep on it, Mr. Ross. Sleep on it.”

  Ross nodded.

  “Oh, Mr. Ross.”

  Ross stopped and turned to O’Kane again.

  “Never give two to one odds on making an eight.”

  “Up your orange juice.”

  5

  Ross walked.

  In the sailing air that flapped his coattails, he walked south toward the Battery. And everywhere, his eyes were assailed by typefaces. On buildings, on church boards, newsstands, buses, trucks, street signs.

  There was a Bodoni. Dom. Broadway. Baskerville. Futura Medium. Bank Script. Goudy Text. Venus Bold Extended. Caslon. Century Condensed. All taunting him with their beauty and functionalism. Challenging him.

  Futura Medium. No serifs. No shoulders. No flourish. Humble and spare. Lean as a peeled stick. Baskerville, with a rakish hat and a flourish of drums. The style of a British toff. Goudy, all cursives and curves, thick-and thin-line script—intricate and biblical, like a Latin chant.

  The big hit. The one big hit that would free him, that would let him spend his days uninterrupted, designing typefaces—new ones no one had dreamed of yet.

  The maître d’ of the Nassau Club, with the insolent eyes, the frank eyes, the eyes that put all men on a scale from one to ten depending on the clothes they wore. Damn his eyes. He still felt a fist-clenching fury at the man’s brutally cool eyes. Should have clouted him. Clouted that O’Kane, too. The contempt of the powerful—O’Kane, commanding anything with money. Using money as he would use the forgery. For torment. For power over others.

  A shop in Basel, Switzerland. Brass nameplate on the door: EDGAR ROSS, ASTD, TYPOGRAPHER. Inside the atelier, sunshafts from a skylight fall on the master’s taboret and drawing board. And there—designs. Ross designs. O’s as plump as partridges. Heron-legged K’s. Q’s, all hats off and scraping: Welcome, welcome.

  And all around in the city of Basel, Switzerland, the sense of artisans and graphic-arts experts working, creating, turning out superb books in flawless, completely appropriate typefaces, on handsome textured laid papers, with handmade bindings, tooled spines. Ah.

  Yes. Under the floorboards, safely, all safely, a bundle, a wad, a lifetime supply of bucks, dollars, gelt, loot, pelf, dough, juice. Money.

  One big hit would do it. A fast bank job on the right day in Manhattan. One hundred thousand dollars. One oh oh comma oh oh oh.

  Just once. Without principles. Without a shred of integrity or fair dealing with anyone. Oh Bee Jay. One Big Job and freedom.

  Imagine someone like Jesperson, the old fraud, conning a genuine Edgar Ross type fake of a Wise forgery. “Ah, yes, Mr. O’Kane. This is undoubtedly the real thing. No typographer alive today could fake this. This is unquestionably the hybrid font that Wise used in all his forgeries. You may rest assured.” (Stage directions: Jesperson pulls off his steel-rimmed glasses and gazes deeply, gazes sincerely, gazes convincingly—italicize convincingly—into Mr. Oh apostrophe Kane’s eyes.) Ding, goes the cash register. One hundred thousand Ross dollars.

  The Battery. Cold wind getting to him. Edgar Ross paid his fare and walked onto the Staten Island Ferry. The American Legion.

  A r
ide across New York Harbor would clear his brain.

  The chance he’d been waiting for all his life, for one oh oh comma oh oh oh dollars.

  There was one man who’d know how to make it. Townsend. Ross knew he could never make it without Townsend. And that meant waiting until after three o’clock.

  Forty years old. And five thousand in the hole. Cold. Oh, so cold.

  6

  Miss Amalie Dodgson, spinster, lay dying.

  She’d realized it when she’d awakened at 6 A.M. The first strange flutterings of her heart, like outrider waves from a distant storm, had told her. All through the day, her perceptions had grown sharper. She’d had that stunning clarity of feeling that children know, hearing everything, seeing objects with sharp edges, smelling the musty air of the house, and feeling at one with the wind that seethed through the old clapboards of the Victorian mansion. The old pin oak outside her bedroom window waved his down-sloping bare branches like antennae tracking the arrival of death. The wind played herald. Vivid light of sun periodically flooded her bedroom.

  She lay perfectly still. It was mid-afternoon, the hot cup of tea losing its steam and finally growing cold on the table beside her bed. She lay, feeling the gradual change in her body. She hadn’t felt such a sense of intense beauty and exaltation since childhood. Her eyes found her hands and wondered at them. Incredible miracles. She manipulated one of them and wept for joy at its great beauty. Strangely, dusk came. Shadows acquired a graininess in the corners of her room and slowly moved across the Axminster carpeting. Her feet grew cold. Dusk was so early.

  She turned her eyes away from the western horizon beyond the pin oak. And she saw an elderly gentleman sitting in her reading chair. Neat, with carefully sponged suit of good cut and quality, wool, with neatly brushed hair. There was a hint of want in the frayed cuffs of his clean shirt. He’d come for her. He looked at her with gentle sadness, and she knew he wouldn’t hurt her.

  He stood at last and came over to the bed.

  Directly over her head, in the attic, touched by the midday light, rested the old wooden chest that she’d cared for all these years. On the transom, just below the locks, was lettered REVEREND OSWALD LEX DODGSON, D.D.