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Authors: Michael Kurland

Tags: #parallel world, #alternate universe, #time travel, #science fiction, #aaron burr

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BOOK: The Whenabouts of Burr
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“Should be able to check that,” Ves said. “Let's see…” He went over to his wall of books and browsed amid the history section, pulling out and leafing through a variety of books before settling on three to use. He went back and forth among them, making rapid notes. “Yup,” he said finally. “No doubt.”

“What?”

“During the Constitutional Convention, which took place in Philadelphia in May and June of 1787, Aaron Burr was a practicing attorney in New York City: Manhattan, to be precise. He had several cases that came to trial at that time. Philadelphia and New York are about ninety miles apart. That's about two-three days by coach, I think. It would mean an absence of at least a week. Burr just wasn't absent from New York for a week. Hamilton was the delegate from New York. Hamilton and Burr were, ah, not the best of friends, even then.”

“Well,” Nate said stubbornly, “I still say that if our experts have found the replacement Constitution isn't a forgery, then it isn't a forgery.”

“I'm familiar with the game of ‘our experts are better than your experts,' ” Ves said. “As a practicing private detective, I've played it in court many times. But isn't this more a case of ‘our experts' versus the laws of logic?”

Nate shook his head. “There are more things under Heaven and Earth, I'm afraid, Amerigo Vespucci, than are allowed for under your laws of logic.”

Ves shrugged. “We'll see. I think we'll start with your idea.”

“That's fine,” Nate agreed. “What idea?”

“The idea that, whatever was done, it was done by a collector. Let's ask around and find out if anyone has expressed an interest in collecting the Constitution.”

“You know, when you say it that way,” Nate said, “it sounds like a nutty thing to do.”

“We'll try it anyway,” Ves said. “You know, rare book dealers, autograph places, museums, galleries, auction houses, like that. Someone was interested enough in the Constitution to steal it; maybe he expressed that interest to someone who'll remember.”

“Sure,” Nate agreed. “We'll go around asking dealers whether anyone's made them an offer for the Constitution recently. You know—the one in Washington under glass.” Ves shrugged. “Worth a try.”

CHAPTER THREE

At the seventh place they tried, they struck gold: Brown, Lupoff & Gilden, est. 1868: Rare Books, Manuscripts, Autographs, Coins, Stamps, and Personal Items of the Great, Important, Famous, Notorious, or Noteworthy, Bought & Sold; Appraisals Free; No Estate Too Small.

Mr. Gilden himself helped them. A small man, thin and nervous-looking, with a dark moustache borrowed from a miniature walrus. He was, he assured them from behind the small dealer's table, the fourth of that name in the firm. “My father, his father, and his uncle. The firm was originally called merely ‘Brown's', you know. Of course, it was a coffee shop then. Lupoff and Gilden used to meet there every second Sunday and hold an informal rare book and document auction. Gradually, the auctions became more important than the coffee. It's in memory of this tradition that we always keep a pot of coffee brewing for our customers.”

“What a nice tradition,” Nate said. “I'd like some coffee.”

“It's fifty cents a cup,” Mr. Gilden told them.

Ves pulled a dollar from his pocket. “My treat,” he said. “Could we get some information from you, Mr. Gilden?”

“That's what I'm here for,” Gilden said. “One second!” He went off to a corner behind the long counter, and returned with three cups of coffee. “Now, what can I do for you? Cream or sugar?”

“Cream.”

“Black.”

“Good, here.”

“Mr. Gilden, what we'd like to know is: has anyone approached you—your firm—with any unusual requests recently?”

“That's my business, unusual requests,” Mr. Gilden told them. “A man wants a note from Dolly Madison to the White House butcher, and is willing to pay five hundred dollars: this isn't an unusual request? Another man, he couldn't care less about Dolly Madison, but a playbill autographed by Harry Lauder will drag a check of four figures out of his wallet. Usual? Collectors—big money collectors—go for the unique, the unusual. They're all specialists.”

“It's a certain kind of specialist we're looking for, Mr. Gilden,” Nate said. “Has anyone offered to buy anything from you that you, ah, shouldn't be expected to have?”

“Like a government document, for example?” Ves added.


I
know what you mean,” Mr. Gilden said, his eyes wide. “Spies! Someone must be trying to pass secret information out of the country disguised as an autographed letter—or concealed in the binding of a first edition; I'll bet that's it!”

“Not exactly, Mr. Gilden,” Swift said.

“That's good thinking, though,” Ves encouraged. “But we're looking for someone who might be making really odd requests. Either buying or selling. Something you just wouldn't expect them to have.”

“I see what you mean,” Mr. Gilden said, shaking his head rhythmically up and down. “Yes. Wait here a minute, I have something to show you.” He trotted off toward the vault at the back of the showroom.

“Aha!” Ves said. “What do you suppose?”

“It couldn't be—” Nate said. Then he shook his head a bit sadly. “No, I suppose not. That would be a bit much.”

“I'm sure we're not going to find the, ah, document itself, Nate,” Ves told him softly. “Some clue, some trace, some starting point; that's the best we can hope for, and it should be enough for us.”

“All kinds of nuts in this business,” Mr. Gilden said, coming back to the little table with a small, flat box, looking like a cigar box built to hold one layer of cigars. “Mind you, these aren't for sale.” He opened the box and removed several gold coins, which he spread out on the felt top of the table for display. On the face of each coin was an arrogant, strong-nosed, self-willed head, in profile, surrounded by the legend AARON BURR IMP. MEXICO. On the reverse was the device of an eagle on a cactus clutching a snake; on top the words UN EAGLE D'OR. Underneath was the motto:
Don't Tread on Me
, and the date: 1827.

“The things people do,” Mr. Gilden said, holding one of the coins between thumb and forefinger and examining it closely. “The workmanship someone put into this, it's incredible. Aaron Burr was never emperor of Mexico, you know.”

“I know, it was Hamilton,” Nate couldn't help saying.

“Maximilian,” Mr. Gilden said, not seeming to notice. “I looked it up. The things people will do for a joke, or a hoax. Incredible. These are mint-quality coins. Really first rate.”

“Where did you get them?” Swift asked.

“I bought them. For their weight in gold, you understand. But they're so fine, I'm not going to melt them down. Twenty of them.

“The Federal Bureau of Weights and Measures is going to borrow three,” Swift told him, pulling his identification card holder from his jacket pocket. “You'll get a receipt of course, and we'll have them back to you undamaged in about a week.”

“I've heard that before,” Mr. Gilden said, snatching up the coins. “That's one of the oldest tricks in the books.”

It took a half hour to straighten that one out, to convince Brown, Lupoff & most particularly Gilden to entrust three of the coins to a representative of the Federal Government. Nate and Ves returned in high humor to Nate's office in the ancient building that housed the Observational Branch of the Bureau of Weights and Measures.

“Phone call,” Swift's secretary declared firmly as they entered the office. She was holding the handpiece at arm's length and facing away from her. “It's
him
. I've been afraid to put him on hold.”

“Him whom?” Swift asked, reaching for the phone.

“You know,
him
! The President.”

“Well, Mary, lucky thing I came in just as he called.”

“He's been on the phone about ten minutes,” Mary said. “I hold him you were out. He said he'd wait.”

“Ten minutes?” Swift said, staring at the receiver in his hand with a snake-handler's respect. He brought it slowly up to his ear. “Hello?”

“Mr. Swift?” Not the President.

“That's right.”

“One second.” Which stretched to five minutes.

“Hello?” The President.

“Hello?”

“Nate? Where the hell you been, boy?”

“I've been out investigating, Mr. President. That's what you pay me for: to investigate.”

“Damn right. And I got confidence in you, Nate. Confidence which had better not be misplaced. The country is counting on you, Nate. A fact which the country had better not ever find out. What have you got for me? You got IT yet?”

“No, Mr. President. But we have a lead. A start.”

“I knew it. I knew I could rely on you. Let's hear it.” Swift told him about the coins. There was a silence, while the President digested the information. Then: “You're kidding!”

“How's that Mr. President?”

“You're kidding. That's progress?”

“It's a connection. We had nothing before; now we have three gold coins.”

There was a short pause, then the President abruptly hung up.

“Nice office,” Ves said. “I've never been in your office before, you know that? Nice secretary.” He smiled down at Mary, who was young, pretty and easily flattered by distinguished-looking older men who smiled without leering. She smiled back.

Nate put down the phone. “The President,” he told Ves, “just hung up on me.”

“You told him about the coins?” Ves asked.

“Yes.”

“He is not amused?”

“Obviously he expected more. He's disappointed at the lack of progress.”

“Your president,” Ves said, with heavy accent on the ‘your', “is a man who expects miracles. And clearly he has a right to: he got elected, didn't he?”

“He's afraid of what will happen if the people find out,” Nate said.

“They already know,” Ves told him. “It's hard to keep the results of presidential elections secret for long.”

“Laugh,” Swift said. “Go ahead. But he's right, you know. If the people find out the Constitution has mysteriously disappeared, there'll be panic in the streets. Look at it this way: aside from the symbolic importance of the document, if the Constitution, kept in a vault-tight building under constant guard, in a helium-filled bullet-proof case that's set to dive under concrete at the first sign of trouble, can silently vanish away, then what is safe, and where should it be kept?”

“Well, then, let us proceed to find the damn thing,” Ves said. “If Tom Browne was willing to attempt ‘What song the Sirens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he hid himself among women', then surely we can try where the paper strayed, or what hand signed its replacement.”

“I'm glad it will prove so easy,” Swift said. “I had rather feared it would be difficult. What do we do?”

“Let me sit down and muse over a piece of paper for a few moments,” Ves said, “and I'll tell you.” He took off his jacket, a blue blazer with large gold buttons. He was about to hang it over the chair when he noticed the small coat rack in the corner and appropriated a hanger instead. “Like the jacket?” he asked Mary, who'd been watching the process. “I used to wear suits,” he told her when she nodded, “but now that I'm retired—semi-retired —I wear what I like. My son wears the suits.” He carried his vest-pocket notebook back to the chair and began doodling in it.

The office door opened, and a heavily bearded, skinny young man wearing a laboratory smock barged in. “Hello, Mary love, hello Mr. Swift. Here are your coins; we're all done with them.” He slid the thin cigar box onto the desk.

“What's the word, Ralph?” Nate asked.

“Gold,” Ralph replied solemnly, “solid gold. Well—an alloy, of course. They are each two hundred seventy grains troy weight, the U.S. standard for that denomination, with an accuracy of better than two parts in a thousand. They were stamped from a screw press, most probably; the compression patterns are different from those caused by a lever press. They show a very slight amount of wear, different for each coin, which is consistent with being in circulation for between six months and two years.” Ralph paused here and looked up expectantly, waiting for some appropriate comment.

“Hum,” Swift said, nodding his head, “hum. Go on.”

“The coins are nine-one-six-point-six-four fine, which means they contain slightly over eight percent alloy. This fits in closely with the traditional eleven-twelfths gold standard for coinage, first adopted in England in 1526 and still in use. Except there haven't been any gold coins minted recently. The alloy is 95% copper, 4% tin, and 1% zinc. This is known as coinage bronze, which was adopted by most of the world's mints shortly after 1789, and used until nickel-bronze was introduced in 1861.”

“Excuse me, young man,” Ves said, “but are you saying that these coins were minted before 1861?”

“No, sir,” Ralph said, sounding slightly shocked. “That would be most unscientific. I am merely saying that the alloy we found in the coins has not been in use since 1861. Also, the screw press has not been in use in government mints since the invention of the lever press in 1839 by Uhlhorn. Of course, some small private mint somewhere could still be using screw presses and alloying with coinage bronze.”

“Do you know of any?” Swift asked.

“No, sir. And we keep comprehensive records.”

“Thank you, Ralph. And thank the rest of the gang down in the lab for me. I appreciate your putting the rest of your work aside and getting this out for me.”

“Our pleasure, sir,” Ralph said. “Whenever we can do anything for you, sir, all of us below the stairs are only too anxious to please.” He left the room, closing the door gently behind him.

“It's that damn union,” Nate said, shaking his head. “Ever since those government scientists were unionized, you've practically had to kiss their collective Erlenmeyer flasks to get them to do anything.”

“Here,” Ves said, ripping a page out of his notebook, “the fruits of my intensive labors. Mary, if you can make out my handwriting, type this up. Then we'll Xerox it and send copies out right away.”

“Copies of what?” Nate asked. “To where?”

“To all the papers,” Ves explained. “Major papers all over the country. Just a simple advertisement for the book page. We always used to advertise for missing jewelry. It often worked. No explanations required; that sort of thing. The simpler the better.”

Ves's ad read:

Unusual information or documents wanted pertaining to Aaron Burr. Highest prices paid. Confidential. Box 1945, Washington D.C. 20013. (202) 301-3856

Nate shrugged, an uncharacteristic gesture. “I always thought you private detectives had all sorts of mysterious secrets. Now I found out you advertise. Another boyhood illusion shattered.”

“Sherlock Holmes advertised,” Mary said.

BOOK: The Whenabouts of Burr
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