On what I recall as a chilly day,

Bill told me about his two-decades-long career dealing books, which started at the legendary Strand Book Store in Manhattan, and took me on a tour of High Valley Books' shelves. They were filled with hard-to-find volumes and vintage magazines about interior decoration, architecture, photography, art, fashion, the lives of society figures and of creators of all stripes—all topics I was interested in. He pulled out a dozen volumes, introducing me, among other things, to monographs about overlooked Italian architects, catalogues for early 20th-century European designers whose ideas were being mined by American decorators today, and illustrations by British artists whose work graced great classics of literature as well as landscape designing manuals. I was impressed. His taste was exquisite, his knowledge deep, and his ability to cross-reference and connect both books and figures in his collection awe-inspiring.