The Book of Air and Shadows

battle of Edgehill, the first major battle of the English Civil War, which took place on October 23, 1642. He is writing from Banbury, it seems, a town close to the battlefield.”
    “What about Shakespeare?” Crosetti asked.
    Bulstrode regarded him quizzically and blinked behind his thick spectacles. “Excuse me? Did you think there was some reference to Shakespeare in this?”
    “Well, yeah! That’s the whole point. This guy says he spied on Shakespeare. That he had an autograph copy of one of his plays, in fact, that he was the one who got Shakespeare to write one of his plays for the king. It’s right there on the signature page.”
    “Really. Dear me, Mr. Crosetti, I assure you there’s nothing of that sort. Secretary hand can be quite confusing to ah…an amateur, and people can see all sorts of meanings that don’t exist, rather like finding pictures in clouds.”
    “No, look, it’s right here,” said Crosetti and came out of his chair and around the desk. Picking up the manuscript and indicating the relevant lines, he said, “This is the part I mean. It says, ‘They tell all the tale nearly of our spying upon the secret papist Shaxpur. Or so we thought him although now I am less certain. In that manner and bent of life he was a nothing. But certain it is he wrought that play of Scotch M. I commanded of my Lord D. his plot and of him in the king’s name. I find passing strange that all though I am dead and him also yet the play lives still, writ in his own hand and lying where only I know and there may it rest forever.’”
    Bulstrode adjusted his eyeglasses and issued a dry chuckle. He picked up the magnifier he had been using and placed it over a line of text. “Very imaginative, I must say, Mr. Crosetti, but you’re quite mistaken. What this says is, ‘I shall tell to you of the sale of gems secretly proper Salust.’ The man must have been some sort of factor in Salisbury for this Lord D. Then it goes on, ‘Of these thefts I lack shriving. In that manner and bent of life I was a nothing.’ And further along he writes ‘the pearls live still willed by his own hand,’ and he says he alone knows where they are. I’m not entirely sure of what ‘willed by his own hand’ means, but in any case the man was clearly dying and probably in intense distress. He seems to flit from subject to subject. In fact, much of this may be pure fantasy, going through his life in a kind of terminal delirium. But the document is interesting enough as it is without bringing in Shakespeare.”
    “What does the rest of it say?”
    “Oh, it contains a quite vivid description of the battle itself, and these are always of interest to military historians. And apparently he served in the early stages of the Thirty Years’ War, ditto. He was at White Mountain, Lützen, and Breitenfeld, although he gives no detail about these. Pity. A professional artillerist, it seems, and trained as a cannon-founder. He also claims to have made a voyage to the New World and been shipwrecked off Bermuda. A very interesting seventeenth-century life, even a remarkable life, and potentially of great value to certain narrow fields of study, although I suspect there’s also a touch of Munchausen in his narrative. But nothing about Shakespeare, I’m afraid.” A pause here. Leaden silence for a good thirty seconds; then, “I would be happy to purchase it from you, if you like.”
    Crosetti looked at Carolyn, who returned a neutral stare. He swallowed and asked, “For how much?”
    “Oh, for a Jacobean manuscript of this quality I should think perhaps, ah, thirty-five would be the going rate.”
    “Dollars?”
    An indulgent smile. “Hundred, of course. Thirty-five hundred. I could write you a check now if you like.”
    Crosetti felt his belly twist, and the sweat started to bead up on his forehead. This was wrong. He didn’t know how he knew, but he did. His father had always talked about instinct, although he always called it his gut, how you always went with your gut when you were out on the street in harm’s way. Crosetti’s gut made him say, “Uh, thanks, but I think I’d like a second opinion. I mean on the translation. Um, no offense, Dr. Bulstrode, but I’d like to eliminate the possibility that…” He gestured haphazardly, not willing to put it into words. He had remained standing after handling the manuscript, so it was an easy matter to snatch the papers from Bulstrode’s desk and slip them into the brown