Read Online The Wanderer in Unknown Realms by John Connolly - Free Book Online

in a shop window on Charing Cross Road.”
    â€œMr. Maulding is missing,” I said. “He has not been seen for a week—” I thought of the calendar on Fawnsley’s desk, and added, “or more. I’ve been employed by his lawyer to inquire into his condition.”
    Eliza Dunwidge did not seem at all taken aback by this announcement. Perhaps people disappeared around her on a regular basis. There might even be a section in the shop containing works alluding to such practices: People, Disembodiment of. Still, she found it in herself to say the appropriate words under the circumstances, even if she gave no sign that she meant them.
    â€œI’m sorry to hear that,” she said. “I hope no harm has come to him.”
    â€œAs you say, he was a good customer. Wouldn’t want to go losing too many of those, would you?”
    Her head tilted slightly. She was examining me in a new light, although it wasn’t clear if she liked what she saw.
    â€œNo, Mr. Soter, I would not.”
    I , not we . Interesting. It was easy to see who was the principal partner in this particular firm. They would have been better off naming their business Daughter & Dunwidge.
    I moved away from her and paused in front of the locked cabinets.
    â€œAre these valuable?”
    She joined me. She did not use perfume, and her body gave off a musky odor that was not unpleasant.
    â€œEvery book is potentially valuable. It depends upon theperson who wants it, as much as the book itself. Value is linked to age, rarity, condition, and, of course, affection for the book in question—or simply the desire to acquire it. Eventually, of course, some books acquire an agreed value. The books in that cabinet are among them.”
    â€œDo you sell many books with an agreed value that might be higher than most?”
    â€œSome.”
    â€œWhat is the most expensive book that you have in stock?”
    â€œOff the top of my head, there are some sixteenth-century occult volumes that we would price in the high hundreds, but the demand for them is low.”
    â€œAnd the thousands? Do you have books that cost more than a thousand pounds?”
    She shook her head.
    â€œOh no, not here. To sell a book worth that much, one would need to have a buyer to hand. We would not be in a position to make a speculative purchase of a book worth so much simply in the hope that we might be able to sell it on at a later date. It would bankrupt us.”
    â€œBut there are such books?”
    â€œYes, of course.”
    â€œOccult books?”
    She paused before answering.
    â€œA few. Not many.”
    â€œWas Lionel Maulding looking for such a book?”
    She was staring at me intently now. Her face didn’t give much away, but I knew she was considering how much I might know, and how much she could give away, if anything, before she was obliged to start lying or clam up entirely. I understood, too, that she was a strong woman but also a vain one. I had felt her dislike of me from the moment we set eyes on each other. To be caught in a lie would humiliate her and wound her pride. To remain silent would be littlebetter, for it would be a tacit admission that I was on the right track, and any further inquiries on my part would catch her on the back foot. Either result would also mean that I had won the first stage of whatever game was being played here.
    So she went for the truth, or some of it.
    â€œYes, he was seeking a very rare book,” she said.
    â€œWhat was it?”
    â€œIt’s a work so unusual that it doesn’t have a fixed title, or rather, it’s known by a number of names, none of which quite captures the essence of it, which is apt under the circumstances. Mr. Maulding wasn’t sure at first that it even existed, but the nature of his researches meant that he had begun consulting books that were more and more obscure, and each obscurity led to further obscurities, like the branches of a