"Do I have $10," he asks the 40 to 50 book dealers and assorted bibliophiles seated in front of his lectern, tables piled high with books behind him as four runners take turns offering lots and delivering them to the successful bidder. "It’s cheaper than firewood," he observes of the looming mass of periodicals, but the dealers aren’t convinced. Still no takers.

Except for lack of interest in the periodicals, the work in this first phase of the auction has gone well and, even though the sums being bid are hardly gaudy, the bidding is spirited. Laudamus gains confidence with the swift pace of the auction. His style is straight forward with fewer of the irreverent asides that characterized the approach of the late Richard Oinonen, who died at age 56 last January and from whose estate Laudamus subsequently purchased the auction gallery.

Now renamed the New England Book Auctions, the auctions take place pretty much every other Tuesday night at the same location Oinonen used for almost 20 years - the hotel on King Street - and the business end - cataloging, sorting and storage of books - is conducted in the same large white barn attached to the Oinonen home in Sunderland, just off Route 47, that Laudamus’ predecessor used.

What has changed is that Leif Laudamus has now emerged from behind the curtain where he had done the challenging and important research work required to catalogue, describe and give a value to the better and more valuable books that come to auction, mostly in alternating two-week intervals along with the sale of the more common uncatalogued volumes.

It is a different role for Laudamus, who by most accounts is a brilliant bookman in terms of his scholarship and knowledge of the antiquarian book trade.

"He’s a genius," Barbara Smith, co-owner of the Whately Antiquarian Book Center, said of Laudamus, who she has known for about 15 years. "He’s got an incredible depth of knowledge about books."

That Laudamus, now 50 and wearing his hair in a pony tail, should wind up as Oinonen’s successor is hardly surprising.

"It was kind of natural that I take over," Laudamus said in an interview in the second story of the barn where the cataloguing is done, long shelves of books lining the surrounding walls.

It was back in 1979-1980, he recalls, that he and Oinonen joined forces to start the auction. They had gotten to know one another some years earlier when Oinonen ran the book department for William Hubbard’s Pioneer Auction Gallery in Amherst.

Laudamus, who grew up in Worcester, got the book collecting bug at a young age. He was only 16 years old when he and his mother would travel to Amherst for book auctions.

"I had a scholarly bent," he said, and was drawn to books about physics, astronomy, and literature. He studied science and music at Clark University, then did graduate work at the University of Pennsylvania, all the while continuing to collect books.

In 1974 he was working on his master’s degree in musicology and needed money so he decided to sell some of the books from a collection that numbered perhaps 3,000 volumes, many of them reflecting his interest in early American history. The collection was not particularly valuable, he said, but he recalls that he realized some $5,000 or $6,000 from the sale, which was a big help to the struggling graduate student.

He continued dealing in books, attending auctions in Philadelphia. "There were a lot of interesting book people in Philly," he says.

When he finished his degree, he went to work as a book cataloguer at the famous Swann Galleries in New York, doing bibliographic research, writing descriptions for auction catalogues and estimating the value of books to be auctioned.

But after a year, it was time to leave New York City; a book dealer - Howard Baron - from Rye, N.Y. put him in touch with Oinonen who was on the verge of leaving the Pioneer Auction. So they joined forces and held their first auction in 1980, probably at the Motel 6, says Kathy Keroack, Oinonen’s widow, who was involved in the auction from the beginning and is now business manager for New England Book Auctions.

Laudamus and Oinonen were partners for three or four years, until Laudamus struck out on his own as a bookseller, while he continued to do cataloging for Oinonen as the need arose.

In the valley Laudamus lived first in Amherst and then Leyden, but four years ago moved to Portland, Maine, from which he commutes, spending large chunks of time here occupying a rented house next to the Sunderland auction headquarters.

His wife operates a bed and breakfast in Portland, a city which he has come to admire for its diversity.

Like the Oinonen Auction before it, the New England Book Auctions is the only full-time regular book auction in the entire six-state region and one of perhaps only some 20 such full-time book auctions in the country. Its gross annual sales have often topped more than $1 million.

"Our reputation and our track record speaks for itself," says Keroack. "We pride ourselves on our bibliographic skills and our knowlege of the research tools of the book trade."

It is the location of the auction within the New York and Boston orbit that fuels its success, rather than the presence of the Five College area’s educational institutions; academics value books for their content, rather than for their worth as objects.

According to Laudamus, if he could make the choice, he would only auction catalogued books - meaning volumes that have an established auction record and have a value of at least $100 . But it is not always possible to obtain only high-end books. As Keroack explained it "to get the good stuff you have to take a lot of lesser stuff."

Books come to auction from private parties, institutions, such as libraries, colleges and universities and from book dealers. A lot of unsolicited books are offered, but frequently the condition of the books is very poor and they have no value. As Keroack says diplomatically: "There are times we just say we don’t think they will do well at auction."

Right now, Laudamus and Keroack say they have between 1,000 and 1,500 cartons of uncatalogued books in storage awaiting sales, with a typical auction resulting in the sale of 150 cartons. "We could have uncatalogued sales for years and years," says Keroack.

"I would rather not do that if we have enough catalogued books," says Laudamus.

Upcoming auctions are scheduled through 2002, based on a schedule that provides for anywhere from a month to four months to prepare a catalogue for a sale that would involve between 250 to 300 lots. A lot can consist of a single book or at most a small handful. If the books are "really fine" then the sale might consist of slightly fewer books, perhaps only 200 lots.

Laudamus continues to do most the cataloging, which he describes as "a chore and a pleasure." A lot of books are "boring" and like all cataloguers, he says, he appreciates seeing books that he hasn’t encountered before.

He says it is difficult to find good book cataloguers, who are fast and accurate and knowledgeable about the business and know values. "They have to be bibliographically astute," he explains. "The rare book trade has its own language - booksellerese."

According to Barbara Smith, Laudamus is "very generous" about sharing his knowledge with other book dealers. "He’s one of those people who I trust," she says about his professional advice and counsel.

In addition to Laudamus’s "exquisite taste" in books and ephemera, said Smith, "his real passion is his music. He’s working toward that being a major part of his life."

What books sell best, according to Laudamus "are anything that has strong visual appeal," books with valuable plates, books "the more scholarly, refined and specialized" the better.

"You only need two people in the room for a book to bring a high price," he says, noting that over the years some illuminated manuscripts that have come to the local auction have sold for between $10,000 and $50,000.

When it comes to these kinds of collectible volumes, "they don’t make them any more, these books are a commodity," says Keroack.

Laudamus and Keroack don’t see that the growing role of the Internet in various sectors of commerce has had much affect on their book auctions. "It’s affected book dealers, more than auctions," says Keroack.

Laudamus admits being a auctioneer is a very different role from his background as book dealer and bibliographer. "It’s a little nerve-wracking getting up in front of an audience, but I’m getting better with practice. It helps to know the audience and to know the books you’re selling."‘

Laudamus continues to indulge his own passion for acquiring books for himself. At the moment he’s collecting juvenile science books, some going back to the 16th century.

An earlier collection of his books dealing with the history of Atomic Energy which grew to some 3,500 titles now resides at Oregon State University and his catalogue of that collection was published in book form with an introduction written by the late Linus Pauling.

But life for Laudamus is more than books. His professional work as a bibliographer and bibliophile gives him pleasure, he says, "but sometimes I’d rather be playing guitar or fishing. I see so many books, I don’t feel the visceral urge to jump into every book store I see."

And so on Wednesday nights, Laudamus, bookman and auctioneer, can be found with his trio playing at Theodore’s blues club on Worthington Street in Springfield, giving a very different kind of performance.