“I came to America. They had been sold, scattered abroad. The thief eluded me, but the books I could trace. By the gargoyle in the corner and by the descriptions of dealers in rare books, I located many of them.
“Those who had them had paid handsomely for them. They would not believe an old man’s story. They would not give them up.
“I brought suit in the courts. It was no use. No one would believe me.
“Young lady,” the old man’s voice all but died away as his feeble fingers clutched at the covers, “young lady, every man has some wish which he hopes to fulfill. He may desire to become rich, to secure power, to write a book, to paint a great picture. There is always something. As for me, I wished but one thing, a very little thing: to die with the books, those precious volumes I had inherited. The foolish wish of a childish old man, perhaps, but that was my wish. The war has taken my family. They cannot gather by my bedside; I have only my books. And, thanks to this child,” he attempted to place his hand on the child’s bowed head, “thanks to her, there are but few missing at this, the last moment.”
For a little there was silence in the room, then the whisper began again, this time more faint:
“Perhaps it was wrong, the way I taught the child to get the books. But they were really my own. I had not sold one of them. They were all my own. She knows where they came from. When I am gone, if that is the way of America, they may all be returned.”
Lucile hesitated for a moment, then bent over the dying man.
“The books,” she whispered. “Were two of them very small ones?”
The expression on the dying man’s face grew eager as he answered, “Yes, yes, very small and very rare. One was a book about fishing and the other—ah, that one!—that was the rarest of all. It had been written in by the great Napoleon and had been presented by him to one of his marshals, my uncle.”
Lucile’s hand came out from behind her back. In it were two books.