Book of Stolen Tales by D. J. McIntosh Read Free Book Online Page B

whether I could buy a translation but met with no success. At a printing shop I faxed my theft report to New Scotland Yard and did a quick check of my email. A well-intended message came in from a business friend in New York saying word had already leaked out about my involvement with Sherrods and a stolen book.
    I swore under my breath. It had been only a couple of hours since I talked to Amy. Bad news travels faster than the speed of light.
    My last experience dealing with a stolen relic from Iraq proved to me that once a rumor grabs hold, it’s hard to control it even when you’re close to the source. From this far away it would be impossible. My only hope lay in recovering the volume that had touched my hands so briefly and finding the other four.
    I entered Lincoln’s Inn through a gatehouse, a handsome red-brick structure accented with white limestone and two turrets joined by a crenulated wall bearing the Lovell coat of arms.
    The Newhouse chambers occupied a prestigious spot on the third floor of a posh bank of buildings at New Square. Framed by a double archway, a wide, formidable iron door buttressed with rivets and topped with sharp pikes formed the entrance. A handsome coach house–style lamp with a flickering gas flame hung overhead. Did all this fortification protect the lawyers from the screaming mobs or the disgruntled clients from their lawyers?
    One of Newhouse’s clerks came out to greet me in the reception room. “I regret to tell you Mr. Newhouse has been delayed,” he said. “He’ll be back by 2 P.M.” He gestured toward the giant grandfather clock stationed beside an umbrella rack as if I wasn’t aware of the time.
    â€œThat’s fine. I’m happy to wait.”
    â€œGlad you’re able to accommodate us, sir. Would you take a seat? Might I ask our Jennie to bring you some tea?” Our Jennie, a sharply attractive, narrow-faced young woman seated at the reception desk, looked up without smiling. She appeared to think pouring tea was about as enticing a proposition as doing overtime on Christmas Eve.
    â€œI’m fine. Thanks anyway,” I said.
    The fellow gave me a brief nod, excused himself, and disappeared down the hall. The only seat on offer was a rose damask settee so uncomfortable it felt as though it had been stuffed with cement. Jennie typed away on her desktop in silence. The grandfather clock chimed the half hour and ticked away the minutes. I wondered whether the police had already told Newhouse about the theft.
    On my phone, I launched a browser and searched for the author under his real name. For his work to become a sensation in his lifetime was remarkable enough, but Basile had accomplished the near impossible—his words were still read and lauded centuries after his death. He was both a poet and court administrator, and also, most notably, one of the earliest Europeans to collect and transcribe oral folk tales.
    Shunted from one patron to another, Basile was often treated miserably by his wealthy sponsors. He opined that “no life could be more unstable or fuller of anxiety,” and “you serve now, you serve later, you serve today, you serve tomorrow and then … suddenly it’s night for you. You’re told to turn yourself around and get out!”
    I could relate to that. The more I read, the more I found myself intrigued by the man. He was the life of the party wherever he went. His poems and bawdy, comic stories were much sought after. One of his early translators described the anthology as being among the “oldest, richest, and most artistic of all books of popular tales.” Basile wrote literary versions of folk tales in the opulent, overblown Baroque tradition. But some of his fables were scurrilous and brutal, reminiscent of Swift’s dark, sharp-pronged satire.
    â€œMr. Madison?”
    I’d become so engrossed in Basile’s life I hadn’t realized Arthur Newhouse stood