“In truth there are only a handful of big houses left, mostly foreign-owned. And they are fragments of bigger conglomerates. I work this street. I know. I haven’t done a decent deal in six months. This industry’s worse than General Motors because it’s broken and it won’t get bailed out.”
“But won’t it all come back soon? This can’t last too long.”
“It will never come back, not the way it was. What’s coming is what you see everywhere else — a digital tsunami overwhelming the old ways. Newspapers? Dying. Magazines? Falling like flies. Big label music and CD’s? Gone. Broadcast radio? So last century. TV. All sliced into bits. Now, clunky old hard-copy paper books that are hauled around from warehouses to dying bricks and mortar emporiums? And then back again. No way. The whole industry is compressing to a few survivors. People are getting laid off, budgets cut, and that’s not a great time for unproven writers. Hell, even I got rejected this year. Totally. My first book.”
“What?”
“Yeah, and I went to Iowa for Cris-sakes!”
His tone opened a little window into his psyche. He suddenly reminded her of a boyish, sputtering Luke Skywalker. “I … I’m not a half-bad pilot myself!”
She started to let it slide, but something told her to push him back while he was in this vulnerable zone. “So, with these Tolkien documents, I guess if all else fails, I could go on Oprah?”
He leaned back, the momentary look was priceless.
“Just kidding, Mr. Chricter. OK, so what about the legal stuff. I’m only trying …”
He recovered smoothly. “Hold on. Just suppose some of these documents are real. Then you’re a threat. Worse, you’re a sinner against the god of money. Forget kindly old Professor Tolkien. He’s wonderful but irrelevant. This is about something unowned, uncontrolled. That’s a threat. That’s where I come in. Without me, you know who you’ll see next?”
“Well …”
“Intellectual property lawyers. They are terrible. They are the bloodless low priests — our friend Everett excepted — who have the sacred access.”
“Access to what?”
“ To the blessing that all stories that want to get told must procure. Copyright. It’s a genie, a jealous little god that can bedevil people like you for a century or more.”
“But I’m not writing a story. I just bet this is the real thing. The Ara that these talk about,” she patted the valise for emphasis, “is a heroine in somebody’s world. A world no one, not even Tolkien, has ever really seen before. She seems to have made a huge difference. It looks to me like this may be all that’s left of her. This … orphaned story.” Cadence bit her tongue. She went on. “It belongs to everyone …”
“Bullshit. Nothing is real and nothing belongs to everyone. This is either nothing or, just possibly, a question of … very precious property.”
She sat back, thoroughly dejected.
“Let me give you a little story, Cadence. You know movies, of course.”
“Yes … I think I do.”
“You like monsters?”
“Not particularly, especially if they’re fiery.”
“Well, you know the movie Alien? You know, ‘acid for blood’?”
She nodded, unsure where he was going.
“Well, you know where Ridley Scott stole that idea from?”
She looked puzzled. “No.”
“You should. Every good story steals something from the past. Anyway,” he shook his head and clucked in disappointment. “Look it up. And one other thing.”
“What?”
“Take some friendly advice: don’t bet your life on a movie trivia contest.”
She felt the growing heat of being lectured to, and couldn’t stop it from slipping out: “Thanks, Dad. I’ll remember that.” She didn’t skip a beat. “So where am I? I do what, just take the peach crate and put it back in the attic? No one ever reads it?”
“It all depends on one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Provenance. Proofs. Is this stuff real, or just somebody’s scribblings.”
She waited, sure he would continue.
“Then, of course, if you’re right, if it’s real, some people will want it and some people will try to stop it.”
“So, I’m stalled.”
He paused. “No. But there is another way.”
“Somehow I knew you would say that.”
He leaned conspiratorially forward, his squinting eye focused on her. She leaned too, her left eye narrowing in rapport, her silk blouse grazing the breakfast halibut on her plate.
His voice fell to a stage whisper. “Look, there is a bigger story. Perhaps a tale of which these fragments are but a part. Use their evil genie against them. The sparse contents of this peach crate are not the real story here. You’re the story.”
“Only one problem,” she whispered.
A moment of unexpected silence, he wasn’t following.
“I don’t have a story to tell,” she said.
“Bullshit, and I don’t mean that about what you have to say. Tell what really happened. Start with the start. Where’d this stuff really come from?”
“I …”
“And if you don’t know, find out.”
Yeah, she thought, as in find my grandfather after a year of a cold trail. I might as well find out who killed JFK and where Jimmy Hoffa is? I’m no good at this.
Cadence looked at him, certain he was following her dismal interior dialogue almost word for word. She steeled herself for a dismissive wave of the hand.
Instead, he softened and said, “Everett told me you were pretty lost about what to do. After you got to L.A. with the disappearance and all.” His demanding eye narrowed. “So, what are you doing now?”
“Keeping house at his property. Ignoring his creditors, and …,” she brightened, “teaching school. Fifth grade.”
“Saints’ praise to you.”
She rushed on. “Yeah, L.A. public schools. Raynor Elementary. I like it. I hope I get hired back. But for right now, I’m here. I’m ready to do something.”
His lean fingers once more tapped the edge of the business card on the table. “Look, Cadence, “I can tell that you really want to find your grandfather or, excuse me if I’m too indelicate, what happened to him. So if he’s the one you gotta find and the one who knows about these writings and Tolkien, then you need to go look for him. What’s an angle you haven’t tried? Tell me something new.”
They were both quiet. Then she said, “Well, you wouldn’t believe all the stories about him.”
“Oh? Try me.”
“Well, here’s the root of it. He was a scissor sharpener.”
“A what?”
“You know,” she held up two fingers and brought them together several times, “for cutting. Meshed single-edge blades? Really hard to sharpen? I’m sure you’d just throw them away, but that’s not how they used to do it.”
He nodded.
“Sharpening them used to be a wayfarer’s trade. Scissor sharpeners travelled all over. Like gypsies.” She was warmed up, talking faster now. “You see, my folks said he had a valise, probably this one, that he carried all his stuff in, a folding grinding wheel, whetstones, a few items for sale. He hopped trains and hitchhiked and walked through all the big towns and half the small towns in America. He kept a journal every day. He’s sort of a family myth.”
“I’d be wary of myths. What’s the real truth?”
“I don’t know … at least not yet. I never met him.”
“OK, take a break and eat your fish. I’ve got a call to make. Then I want to know all about your grandfather.”