“Actually,” he went on, “the thing would have been forgotten altogether but for me. About 1950 I felt a stirring of interest. I don’t have a clear memory why. The nation of Israel had just been established and the Middle East was much in the news. Perhaps that was the reason. In any case, I got to thinking of the old family story and I dredged the thing out of its drawer.”
Reed took out his iron gem absently and held it in the palm of his hand. “It did look meteoritic to me but, of course, in my great-grandfather’s time meteorites weren’t as well known to the general public as they are now. So, as I said earlier, I took it to the Museum of Natural History. They said it was meteoritic and would I care to donate it. I said it was a family heirloom and I couldn’t do that, but — and this was the key point for me — I asked them if there were any signs that it had been chipped off a larger meteorite.
“The curator looked at it carefully, first by eye, then with a magnifying glass, and finally said he could see no sign of it. He said it must have been found in exactly the condition I had it. He said meteoritic iron is particularly hard and tough because it has nickel in it. It’s more like alloy-steel than iron and it couldn’t be chipped off, he said, without clear signs.
“Well, that settled it, didn’t it? I went back and got the letter and read it through. I even studied the original package. There was some blurred Chinese scrawl on it and my grandmother’s name and address in a faded angular English. There was nothing to be made of it. I couldn’t make out the postmark but there was no reason to suppose it wasn’t from Hong Kong. Anyway, I decided the whole thing was an amiable fraud. Great-grandfather Latimer had picked up the meteorite somewhere, had probably been spending time in the Arab world, and just couldn’t resist spinning a yarn.”
Halsted said, “And then a month later he was dead under mysterious circumstances.”
“Just dead,” said Reed. “No reason to think the death was mysterious. In the eighteen-fifties life was relatively brief. Any of a number of infectious diseases could kill. Anyway, that’s the end of the story. No glamor. No mystery.”
Gonzalo objected vociferously at once. “That’s not the end of the story. What’s the bit about the offer of five hundred dollars?”
“Oh, that!” said Reed. “That happened in 1962 or 1963. It was at a dinner party and there were some hot arguments on the Middle East and I was taking up a pro-Arab stance as a kind of devil’s advocate — it was before the Six-Day War, of course — and that put me in mind of the meteorite. It was still in the drawer and I brought it out.
“I remember we were all sitting around the table and I passed the package and they all looked at it. Some tried to read the letter, but that wasn’t so easy because the handwriting is rather old-fashioned and crabbed. Some asked me what the Chinese writing was on the package and of course I didn’t know. Just to be dramatic, I told them about the mysterious turbaned strangers in my father’s time and stressed great-grand dad’s mysterious death, and didn’t mention my reasons for being certain it was all a hoax. It was just entertainment.
“Only one person seemed to take it seriously. He was a stranger, a friend of a friend. We had invited a friend, you see, and when he said he had an engagement, we said, well, bring your friend along. That sort of thing, you know. I don’t remember his name any more. All I do remember about him personally is that he had thinning red hair and didn’t contribute much to the conversation.
“When everybody was getting ready to go, he came to me hesitantly and asked if he could see the chip once more. There was no reason not to show it to him again. He took the meteorite out of the package — it was the only thing that seemed to interest him — and walked to the light with it. He studied it for a long time. I remember growing a little impatient, and then he said, ‘See here, I collect odd objects. I wonder if you’d let me have this thing. I’d pay you, of course. What would you say it was worth?’
“I laughed and said I didn’t think I’d sell it and he stammered out an offer of five dollars. I found that rather offensive. I mean, if I were going to sell a family heirloom it surely wouldn’t be for five dollars. I gave him a decidedly brusque negative and held out my hand for the object. I took such a dislike to him that I remember thinking he might steal it.
“He handed it back reluctantly enough and I remember looking at the object again to see what might make it attractive to him, but it still seemed what it was, an ugly lump of iron. You see, even though I knew its point of interest lay in its possible history and not in its appearance, I was simply unable to attach value to anything but beauty.
“When I looked up he was reading the letter again. I held out my hand and he gave me that, too. He said, ‘Ten dollars?’ and I just said, ‘No.’ ”
Reed took a sip of the coffee that Henry had just served him. He said, “Everyone else had left. This man’s friend was waiting for him — the man who was my friend originally, Jansen. He and his wife were killed in an auto accident the next year, driving the very car at whose door he stood then, waiting for the man he had brought to my house. What a frightening thing the future is if you stop to think of it. Luckily, we rarely do.
“Anyway, the man who wanted the object stopped at the door and said to me hurriedly, ‘Listen, I’d really like that little piece of metal. It’s no good to you and I’ll give you five hundred dollars for it. How’s that? Five hundred dollars. Don’t be hoggish about this.’
“I can make allowances for his apparent anxiety, but he was damned offensive. He did say ‘hoggish’ — I remember the exact word. After that I wouldn’t have let him have it for a million. Very coldly I told him it wasn’t for sale at any price, and I put the meteorite which was still in my hand into my pocket with ostentatious finality.
“His face darkened and he growled that I would regret that and there would be those who wouldn’t be so kind as to offer money. Then off he went — and the meteorite has stayed in my pocket ever since. It is my ugly luck piece that I have refused five hundred dollars for.” He chuckled in a muted way and said, “And that’s the whole story.”
Drake said, “And you never found out why he offered you five hundred dollars for it?”
“Unless he believed it was a chip of the black stone, I can’t see any reason why he should,” said Reed.
“He never renewed his offer?”
“Never. It was over ten years ago and I have never heard from him at all. And now that Jansen and his wife are dead, I don’t even know where he is or how he could be located even if I decided I wanted to sell.”
Gonzalo said, “What did he mean by his threat about others who wouldn’t be so kind as to offer money?”
“I don’t know,” said Reed. “I suppose he meant mysterious turbaned strangers of the kind I had talked about. I think he was just trying to frighten me into selling.”
Avalon said, “Since a mystery has developed despite everything, I suppose we ought to consider the possibilities here. The obvious motive for his offer is, as you say, that he believed the object to be a genuine piece of the black stone, of the Kaaba.”
“If so,” said Reed, “he was the only one there who did. I don’t think anyone else took the story seriously for a moment. Besides, even if it were a chip of the black stone, and the guy were a collector, what good would it be to him without proof? He could take any piece of scrap iron and label it ‘chip of the Kaaba,’ and it would do him no less good than my piece of iron.”
Avalon said, “Do you suppose he might have been an Arab who knew that a chip the size of your object had been stolen from the iron stone a century before and wanted it out of piety?”