Dutch Blue Error (18 page)

Graustein led me to a tiny bar wedged between a place that displayed photos of big-busted women in advanced states of nudity, and a movie theater whose marquee boasted:
ALL X-RATED
!!!

I followed Morris Graustein through the door into a narrow, dark barroom. At the far end, a small color television was tuned to an afternoon soap opera, and a thin man in a short-sleeved white shirt leaned against the wall behind the bar, staring at it. When Graustein hopped up onto a stool, the bartender glanced over and lifted his eyebrows. Graustein nodded and smiled. The thin man poured a tall glass of coffee-colored beer from a tap and set it on a cardboard coaster in front of the stamp dealer.

“Thank you, Jimmy,” he said. “And you, my friend? Will you have the same?”

“Sure,” I said.

Jimmy brought two glasses of the dark brew and whisked away Graustein’s first, already empty. “Ah,” he said. “The first for the thirst, and the rest for the taste.” He lifted it toward me, then raised it to his lips. I imitated him. The beer was strong and creamy and faintly bitter.

“Now, sir,” said Graustein, wiping a frothy mustache from his lip with the sleeve of his shirt, “you wanted to know about fraudulent stamps.”

I shrugged. “It sounds interesting. And you mentioned the Nazis…”

He waved his hand. “Oh, sir, that is only a tale. I do not think that happened.”

“In any case.”

“Yes. Well, then.” Graustein sipped his beer. “There are two kinds of fraudulent stamps, sir. First there are the forgeries. Counterfeits. Like paper money, eh? And as with counterfeit money, knowledgeable people cannot be fooled by forged stamps.”

“They can’t?”

“Oh, my, no. There are too many ways to detect forgeries. The size, the details of the design, the color and type of ink, the type of paper, the quality and color of the gum, the manufacturing process—all of these are variables, sir, that the expert can examine. Just as with paper money.”

“I see,” I said. “Forgeries really aren’t a problem, then.”

“Not with very rare stamps, sir. They are examined too carefully. Sometimes with middle-range stamps we find forgeries. But your concern is the Dutch Blue Error, and no forgery would escape the detection of an expert. It would be an absurd waste of effort to forge such a stamp. Absurd.”

Graustein shook his head in dismay at the thought.

Jimmy, who had returned to his television program, glanced over and said, “Again, gentlemen?”

“Why, yes, Jimmy. Please,” said Graustein.

“You mentioned a second kind of fraud,” I said.

“Ah, thank you, Jimmy,” he said to the bartender, who replaced our empty glasses with full ones. The philatelist sipped from his glass. “Mmm. Ambrosia. Nectar of the gods. Divine. Wonderful.” He pronounced it “vunderful.”

“Fakes,” said Graustein.

“Huh?”

“The second kind of fraud, sir. Fakes. These are genuine stamps that are altered to increase their value. A much nastier matter.”

I raised my eyebrows over the rim of my glass. Graustein’s eyes twinkled in reply.

“The third great pillar of philatelic value, sir,” he said. “Condition.” Then he frowned. “Of no interest with regard to your Blue Error stamp. The British Guyana black and magenta, of course, which we generally acknowledge to be the single most valuable stamp in the world—it is in perfectly horrible condition. Corners cut off, nasty blob of a postmark. With stamps of this great rarity, these unique stamps, condition is less of a factor than supply and demand. Most especially, of course, demand.” I nodded. Ollie Weston had told me much the same thing.

“On the other hand,” he continued, after a long draught from his glass, “there are hundreds of genuinely rare and valuable stamps for which condition is all-important. A very fine mint stamp—well centered, clear, bright color, unhinged, with original gum, perforations nicely torn—that stamp might be worth, let us say, three thousand dollars. That would be a collector’s prize. And the same stamp, off center, or color faded by the sun, perhaps creased or with a tiny half-millimeter tear in the corner, or with pulled perforations—actually, sir, with any one of those seemingly minor defects—your same stamp might bring you forty or fifty dollars. If you could find someone to buy it. No bargain, sir.”

“Yes. I see.”

“So, you create a fake from that stamp. You alter it. You repair a crease or a tear or a thin spot, let us say. Or perhaps you erase or fade a heavy cancellation—what we call a ‘killer blob.’ With care, this can be done with chemicals. Or you can brighten faded color, eliminate a stain, regum the back. There are unscrupulous men who will doctor stamps in such ways to increase their value, do you see? Alas, it is most difficult to detect. Few have the skill and the equipment with which to detect such clever doctoring of stamps.”

“Have you ever heard of Albert Dopplinger?” I asked him.

“Ah, poor Albeit. I knew Albert, yes.”

“Was he considered…?”

“Oh, my, yes. The best. Better by far than me, sir. And he had all the equipment. The microscopes, the quartz lights, the chemicals. Nobody was better than Albert.” Graustein shook his head. “He is dead, you know.”

“Yes. He was murdered.”

Graustein turned again to stare at me. His eyes were solemn. “Is this why…?”

“No,” I said. “I told you. I’m an attorney.”

“Because I know of no one who would want to murder Albert Dopplinger, sir.”

“I’m sure of it,” I said. “I have no interest in the murder case. I’m interested in the Dutch Blue Error.”

“On the other hand,” Graustein continued, as if I had not spoken, “men have been murdered for stamps. Oh, yes.”

I raised my eyebrows.

He steepled his fingers in front of his face. “The two-cent Hawaiian Missionary of 1851. There are only fifteen of them in existence. According to the story, they were used by missionaries on their mail back to the mainland. Cheap, unattractive stamps. But valuable to collectors. They are worth perhaps one hundred thousand dollars today, the two-cents. Not as valuable as your Blue Error, sir, but valuable stamps. Worth killing for, some might say. Hm. Shall we have more beer, sir?”

I nodded and gestured to Jimmy, who slid two brimming glasses to us.

“One day, sometime in the eighteen-nineties,” continued Graustein, after a long draught on his beer, “I forget the exact year, a gentleman named Gaston Leroux was found murdered in his Paris flat. The police had no clues—no known enemies, no motive, no evidence of theft. There was money still there, gold coins, a diamond watch. But Leroux was a philatelist, and one of the investigators happened to know a bit about stamps. He examined the dead man’s collection and determined that there was one stamp missing. Yes, sir. The two-cent Missionary of 1851. So the detective thought that he might have a motive for murder, and his suspicions soon centered on a gentleman named Hector Giroux, a friend of Leroux and himself a collector. The detective befriended the unsuspecting Giroux. They had, after all, a common passion in philately. And one evening Giroux invited the inspector to his flat. The detective turned the conversation to the Missionary stamps, and Giroux was duped into proudly showing off his collection to the detective. It contained one of the two-cents—the precise one, the detective was convinced, that had belonged to the late M. Leroux. The next day Giroux was arrested and interrogated. He was unable to explain satisfactorily how he had acquired the two-cent Missionary. No papers, you see. No authentication, no bill of sale. So he was charged with the murder of Gaston Leroux. And eventually he confessed. His explanation, which, one imagines, he may have considered a justification, was that he needed the two-cent to complete his collection of Hawaiian Missionaries.” Graustein smiled elfishly at me. “Only a true philatelist could sympathize with Hector Giroux, eh?”

I returned his smile. “I suppose you’re right,” I said. “But, as I said, I am only interested in the Dutch Blue Error.”

“And you want to know about fakes and forgeries. And you knew Albert.” Graustein nodded his head up and down. several times. Then he turned to grin at me. “Well, maybe you will find the man who murdered Albert anyway, eh? Wouldn’t that be something? All right, sir. Let me tell you about the other kind of fake, and then we shall drink some more fine German beer, eh?”

I smiled. “That sounds fine.”

“Stamps can be doctored. Altered, sir, in small ways that can enhance their value. Perforations can be changed, for example. That creates an entirely different stamp. Or they can be cut off to create imperforates. Or added to previously un-perforated stamps. Overprints can be added. Stamps can be regummed. All of these things make a different stamp from the original, sir. The average man cannot detect such doctoring. That is why a collector should make his purchases only from a reputable dealer.”

“Could a person create a forgery—or a fake—of the Dutch Blue Error?”

Graustein cocked his head in amusement at me. “To attempt such a thing, sir, would be a monumental waste of time. Monumental.”

I nodded. That had been Ollie Weston’s opinion, I recalled. In fact, aside from some myths about the Blue Error that Ollie had neglected to tell me, Morris Graustein had convinced me that Ollie hadn’t lied about the stamp.

“Mr. Graustein…”

“Morris. Call me Morris, my friend.”

“Morris,” I said, “you’ve been a big help to me. I do appreciate it.”

“Oh, it has been my pleasure, sir.” He raised his glass to me and dipped his head. “My pleasure,” he repeated.

I noticed that his glass was nearly empty. “I suppose we really ought to have one more,” I said.

“Yes, sir. I think we ought. One more glass of this magnificent German beer is what we ought to have.”

W
HEN I WAS IN
college I could tuck away a couple of six-packs in an evening, no sweat. If I respected the demands of my bladder, I could drink beer all day and all night.

No more. My bladder continues to cry for attention, but in addition my eyes grow heavy, my stomach churns and gurgles, my intestines begin to snarl and kink, and a dull meat cleaver commences a slow descent through the center of my forehead.

When Morris Graustein and I finally bumbled out of the little baron Washington Street, night had fallen and the Combat Zone had sprung to life. Red and green neon flashes jabbed painfully at my eyes. The insistent beat of amplified music—what my son Joey had once told me was called “heavy metal”—reverberated in my liquid brain. Graustein shook my hand vigorously, thanked me for the fine beer, and disappeared among the crowds on the street.

I had no interest in the business establishments, nor did the ladies moving in and out of them arouse my curiosity, I wanted only to go home and vomit.

The subway ride did nothing to ease my misery. I stumbled into my apartment, put the heat on under the water, and climbed into the shower, leaving a trail of clothing behind me. I adjusted the flow for faster and hotter than I could normally stand it. Steam filled the room. I breathed the humid air deeply. I thought that if I quit smoking cigarettes I might be able to drink better. I thought that if I quit drinking I could smoke better. I thought that if I quit doing both I could live longer.

I thought none of that would be any fun.

I dialed Deborah’s home number. It rang three times before I heard a click and then her recorded voice. “This is Deborah Martinelli,” said the voice.
I’m all business
, her tone made clear.
I’m an important executive lady, not to be mistaken for a fluff-headed girl. I don’t play. So don’t mess around.
“I can’t come to the phone right now. When you hear the tone, please leave your name and message. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.” There was a pause, and then she continued, a different edge to her voice. “And if that’s you again, Philip, the answer is still no, it will always be no, and you needn’t leave a message. Just stop calling me, will you?”

Then I heard the beep. I cleared my throat. Talking to an answering machine inhibits me. It’s like being interviewed for television, which has happened to me a couple of times. I can’t think of anything intelligent to say. I mumble. My syntax goes all to hell. I grin foolishly.

Once outside a courtroom where I had just finished winning a hefty award in damages from the city of Lawrence for a client who had been run over by a school bus, a reporter touched my arm and asked if I would mind answering a few questions. Behind him stood a fat, bearded man with a camera perched on his shoulder like a parrot on a pirate. The camera was trained on me. A crowd of people quickly ringed the reporter, the cameraman, and me.

“Ready, Sal?” said the reporter. The cameraman thrust up his thumb. The reporter then turned to me. “All set, Mr. Coyne?”

I smiled stiffly and nodded.

The reporter glanced at the cameraman, hesitated, then said, “I’m here at the Lawrence courthouse with Brady Coyne, the attorney for Jacqueline Callahan, who has just been awarded three-quarters of a million dollars damages for injuries sustained in an accident with a city school bus last December. Mr. Coyne,” he said, turning suddenly to me and smiling his dazzling television smile, “do you expect the city to appeal this decision?”

“Well, jeez, I dunno. I mean, hey, I suppose I would. Wouldn’t you?” That was my speech—this from the same attorney who had the previous afternoon delivered without notes a fifty-minute summation, a model of grammatical exactitude and verbal dexterity. “Jeez, I dunno.”

When I heard myself speak, I looked at the reporter and said, “Hey, I hope this is on tape. Let me try it again, huh?”

“This is the live ‘Action Cam,’ Mr. Coyne,” purred the reporter. He turned to the camera. “Well, that’s the word from the victorious attorney here live at the Lawrence courthouse, Frank and Jenny. Now back to you.”

I felt equally daunted by Deborah’s answering machine. I considered hanging up. Then I figured this was as close as it appeared I was going to get to speaking to her.

“I tried to reach you several times today,” I said to her machine. “I hate talking to machines, by the way. Though your Darlene isn’t a hell of a lot friendlier. And maybe she doesn’t deliver messages. Anyway, to say hi, really. And to suggest you find someplace else to crash for a few days, just in case our friend should decide to pay you another visit. Maybe that’s what you’ve done already. Maybe that’s why you’re not home. Oh, hell. The real reason I called originally was to see if you’d like to have dinner with me tonight. Too late for that, I guess. God, I sound inane. Look. I’ve been doing some thinking about the stamp, and there’s a question I forgot to ask you. So call me, will you?”