Puzzles of the Black Widowers - By Isaac Asimov Page 0,34

possibly of different nationalities.

"The general editor, Henry Smith Williams, filled in gaps with essays of his own. He was a humane person of liberal views and almost every time I read what I thought was a particularly telling passage, it proved to be one of his. You must understand that it was edited to read as connectedly as possible. There was just an occasional unobtrusive superscript which guided you to the end of the volume, where you found out that you were reading Gibbon or Prescott or Bury or Macaulay or Thucydides or whoever.

"The library had the set in double volumes and I picked them out one and by one and quickly found I could not bear to stop reading them for anything as dull as my daily work. I took them to the lab with me and read them during lunch or through a partially open desk while I had something boiling slowly under a reflex condenser. My memories of that entire period are vague except for those volumes.

"I had always been interested in history, but it was those volumes that converted that interest into an obsession. The volumes were all terribly old-fashioned, of course, for prior to the twentieth century, history was almost exclusively a matter of battles and court intrigue. Still, that was what I loved and my own histories are just as old-fashioned. I dwell very little on social and economic issues."

Rubin said, "The social and economic issues would make your histories more valuable."

"And more dull, perhaps," said Dunhill. "I don't omit such things altogether but I always remember I am writing for the general public, not for scholars. In any case, by the late 1950s, nearly ten years after I had held those library books in my hands for the last time, I abandoned chemistry and began to spend my full time on histories and historical novels."

Dunhill paused and seemed to brood awhile.

Drake chuckled as he stubbed out a cigarette. He said, "Unless you're telling the story with a total absence of art, which I cannot believe of a novelist, that Historians' History is going to turn up again."

Dunhill nodded vigorously. "You are quite correct. A few years ago, I made a new acquaintance, and my wife and I visited his house and had dinner there with several other couples. After dinner, I wandered over to his bookshelves and studied them - a bad habit that exasperates my wife but of which even she cannot cure me.

"And there, filling an entire shelf, was the Historians' History. I hadn't thought of it in years, had all but forgotten it. The instant I saw it, however, everything flooded back. The memory of reading those volumes at a terrible time in modern history, memories gilded and made more wonderful by the passage of years, were achingly sweet and intense.

"I was no longer the impecunious lad of decades ago. I am quite well off now and can afford to cater to my whims. I approached my host at once, therefore, and offered to buy his set. I couldn't believe that it had any attraction to anyone but myself and I was ready to pay far more than it was worth. Unfortunately, my host, for some reason he never explained, would not sell. He was quite emphatic about it.

"I tell you, gentlemen, if there were a million dollars on this table, and I knew I could take it without danger of detection, I would not touch it, out of a simple sense of honesty. But I actually thought of stealing those volumes that my friend would not sell me. It was only the thought of being caught if I tried breaking and entering that held me back. My sense of ethics simply shattered under the strain and I ended the new friendship rather than expose myself to the bitterness of seeing those volumes in someone else's possession.

"I began visiting such secondhand bookstores as I could reach, and calling those I could not reach, asking them if they had or could get a set of the volumes. I even advertised in the New York Times Book Review, in general magazines, and in periodicals of interest to history buffs. The longer I waited the more I was willing to pay if I had to. - And this brings me down to the present."

Halsted said, "I hope you're not going to tell us you drew a complete blank and that that's the end of the story."

Dunhill frowned at him, his eyebrows hunching low.