Sometimes I think I have too many books.

Before the move from Pennsylvania to Virginia last summer, I gave away a lot of books to friends. And that felt good. I also donated several boxes of books to Denny Dobry, who handles book sales that benefit The Baker Street Irregulars Trust.

Cover of Starrett’s 1928 novel, *Seaports in the Moon*.

(If you’re looking for some great bargains, get in touch with Denny and let him know your Sherlockian want list. He’s got a basement full of books just waiting to be sold!) That felt very good, because I knew the books would go to a good home and the proceeds would benefit the Trust.

What remains is what I consider to be a practical but intentionally limited, Sherlock Holmes/Vincent Starrett library. It’s designed for both pleasure reading and research, which is all I can ask.

I was going through the final boxes from our move not long ago and found some things that had been put in a box of spring clothing. Those last few days before the move were crazy and stuff just got jumbled together.

Most of these items came from an auction from the estate of an Amsterdam Sherlockian named Cornelis Helling. Helling collected the writings of Conan Doyle and Jules Verne, and he also put together a sizeable library of Starrett’s work. The two men wrote to each other for decades.

I was especially eager to get his correspondence with Starrett and a few other unusual items, like some of the rare Edwin B. Hill publications.

Looking back, it is embarrassing to admit that I largely ignored the few books in the lot, especially those that I already owned. After all: What could I learned from one more copy of Starrett’s fantasy novel Seaports in the Moon?

I put it aside for another day.

Maybe I would sell it or give it away, I thought.

Big mistake.

It turns out Helling had a unique copy of Starrett’s only non-mystery novel. To understand why I’m so excited about it, you need a little background about the book and its plot. (Hang in with me here. We’ll circle back.)

Seaports was a book Starrett slaved away at when he was anxious to make a lasting name for himself as a creative writer. Taking a page from others who had written fantasy tales like John Kendrick Bangs, Starrett reached back to the books he admired as a boy and decided to write new adventures for some of his heroes. He also blended in real life historic characters, so Christopher Columbus and Ponce de Leon show up, but so do Don Quixote and Long John Silver. In my opinion, the best chapter tells of a sick and feverish Edgar Allan Poe having a drunken night arguing over dinner with his imaginary dinner companion: William Legrand, the protagonist from “The Gold Bug.”

The connecting thread to all these tales was that a bottle of water from the Fountain of Youth was traveling through time. Starrett’s little tales show how the bottle generally brought bad luck to anyone who owned it. (Like Poe, who never got to drink from it.)

Helling’s copy was inscribed by Starrett to Ames Williams, an attorney who was, like Starrett, a Stephen Crane collector. Williams took a little 1923 bibliography Starrett produced of Crane’s work and greatly expanded it in the 1940s. Williams was gracious enough to give Starrett co-writing credit and when the book was published in 1948 it was by "Ames Williams and Vincent Starrett." That would be reason enough for Starrett (who signed EVERYTHING) to inscribe the book “For Ames W. Williams—Hoping he will approve my sequels—with affectionate good will. Vincent Starrett. 24-2-’43.”

So far, pretty standard Starrett stuff.

Then I flipped through the book and noted that the last page had a substantial bit of writing in Starrett’s hand.

The last page of *Seaports in the Moon*, with Starrett’s alternative ending. So far as I know, this is the only copy to carry this notation. If you have seen something similar, please let me know.

The novel’s ending is set in a bookshop (of course) and the wise old book dealer knows about the vial, which has a few precious drops of the magical fluid left.

A supercilious millionaire with the absurd name of Franklin Guppy comes in and offers enormous sums for the last drops of the elixir. But the dealer dumps the last drops into a his fish tank. The millionaire immediately grabs the tank and races from the shop, drinking the green fishy fluid. As the dealer smiles at the millionaire, Starrett adds a hand-written note to the printed text, providing an alternative ending:

"For he was not afraid that any permanent benefit would accrue to Franklin Guppy by reason of his gift. Mingled with the green fluid in the fish tank, he felt sure, the scattered drops from the immortal fount would quickly lose their identity and their strength. And, anyway, he reflected, Franklin Guppy, like himself, was only a figure in a tale.”

I like that ending better than the one which was published. Apparently, after some reflection, Starrett did too.

I hope you enjoy it as well.

Since we’re talking about Ames W. Williams, this is a good place to mention his role in Starrett’s life. As I said earlier, Williams was a Stephen Crane collector. In the 1940s, Starrett and he teamed up to revise, expand and update the Crane bibliography Starrett wrote in 1923. Their combined effort was published in 1948 by Burt Franklin of New York. Here’s some images from a copy I picked up a while back. Youi’ll notice it was inscribed by Williams to Charles Honce, who was Starrett’s bibliographer.

Click on the images below to see more.

One more before we go: Starrett and Williams also worked together to publish “Legends,” a Crane poem from 1896. The booklet was printed by Starrett’s friend Edwin Bliss Hill at his little hand press in Ysleta, Texas. Forty-five copies were printed and they are rather hard to find today.

Click on the images below to see more.