1 Killer Librarian (15 page)

One was Dickens’s
The Pickwick Papers,
which I had read for the first time in sixth grade. I remembered clearly sitting in the school library and feeling as if I was living in a different time and a different place. That book was probably the real reason that I
was attracted to all things English. After that, I had come to dearly love Dickens’s work and was close to having a complete set of older editions.

There, on a waist-high shelf tucked in next to
A Tale of Two Cities,
was a small leather-bound book titled
The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club.
I had found it.

I carefully extracted the volume from the shelf, opened it, and saw with delight that it was also illustrated. While the
Papers
had been originally published in the 1830s as pamphlets, the book I was holding had been published a hundred years later. Still, it might be worth something. Plus, more important, I liked it.

When I turned to read the price written on the inside cover in pencil, I saw that it was nearly out of my range: $350. I gulped but pulled out my credit card to buy it. A gift to myself.

“Where’d you find this?” the store clerk asked. He looked like he was about twelve years old and as if he had combed his thick black hair with a corkscrew.

“Right with all the rest of Dickens.”

“Must have come in recently. Nice book, this. Did you know that when the
Pickwick Papers
were originally published they were serialized, coming out once a month for twenty months?”

“Yes, I do happen to know that and that the last serial was a double issue, which broke records for its sales.”

The boy’s face fell as he wrapped up the book and I wished I could take my know-it-all comment back, but it was hard sometimes to squelch the librarian. “You seem to know his work quite well. What’s your favorite Dickens?” I asked.

“Oh, it has to be
David Copperfield.
My own life story right there. Like David I’ve come to London to find my fortune.” He smiled from beneath his dark bangs and I wished him well.

As my feet were threatening to turn into bloody stumps, I sat down outside the bookseller and pulled out a map to figure out where I was. I had walked for hours, but had actually not gone too far. Fortunately I was close to a tube stop.

Since it was rush hour the car was crowded, but in my new mood, I enjoyed it, the crush of people from all over the world, men wearing turbans, young girls with pierced eyebrows, an old woman carrying her older toy poodle, who was wearing a pair of sunglasses (the dog, not the woman), the dignified British businessmen in their dark suits.

One of the things about everyone looking different is that it starts to not matter anymore. People become just people, not representative of any country
or race. No one gave me more than my fair share of glances. They probably thought,
American tourist wearing comfortable, ugly shoes.

When I came out of the tube station, the woman in front of me pulled out her cell phone and checked it. An automatic response caused me to copy her. There weren’t many people who knew my number, but there was one message. Maybe Rosie had called with news on her romance.

When I checked the message, I heard a slightly familiar British male voice say, “They moved camp, but I managed to track them down. Don’t worry about the plumber. I’ve got the situation well in hand.”

TWENTY-THREE

Why Hay-on-Wye?

I
stood on the top step of Caldwell’s house, puzzled and worried. The voice had been Guy’s, of that I was sure. Also, he was the only man in England who might have my cell phone number.

When I tried to get Guy’s number all that showed up on my phone was a bunch of zeroes, probably because it was an international phone number. How had he gotten my number without comprehending my message? Had I been unclear? What did he mean, he was taking care of the situation?

Guy sounded like he was still messing around
about Dave. Now the situation was even worse. I didn’t know where Dave was, but Guy did. I was rocking back and forth on the front steps, when the door flew open and Caldwell looked out at me. “Hello,” he said.

“Hi,” I said back.

“Good day?” he asked.

“Not bad,” I said, not wanting to say anything more.

“Coming in?”

“Sure.”

He stepped back and peered at the book I was carrying. I had unwrapped it to look at it on the tube. “What do you have there?”

“A book,” I said.

“Looks oldish,” he said.

I handed it to him. He took it reverently. “Dickens.
Pickwick Papers
. Oh, yes, this is splendid.” He gently turned to the copyright page. “Obviously not a first edition, but still worth some money I think. Where did you find it?”

“Not too far from here.” I told him the name of the shop. “I wasn’t really looking for anything—just browsing.”

“How much did you pay for it?”

Rather embarrassed at how much I had paid, I hesitated, then told him.

He flared his nostrils and patted the book. “You’re a good browser. I’d say that this little beauty is worth nearly ten times that much.”

“Seriously. Or are you funning me?”

“Why would I do that? Hang on to it. I think Dickens is due a revival and it will only go up in value.” He handed me back the book with reluctance. “Do you often buy old books?”

I thought of the hoards of books lining all the rooms of my house and reminded myself not to slip into librarian mode. “Only if I like the book. So, sometimes. I have a few odds and ends. You seem to collect books too.”

“Well, I’m going to Hay-on-Wye later on this week. Have you heard of this town?” he asked.

Hay-on-Wye. A small town located on the border of England and Wales with at least thirty antiquarian bookstores. Mecca to book collectors. I was dying to go there. When I had planned the trip with Dave I hadn’t dared suggest we go to Hay-on-Wye. I knew Dave would have died of boredom.

I squeaked out, “Yes. More bookstores than any other small town in England.”

“It’s about two hundred miles from London.”

One hundred and seventy-nine miles, if I remembered correctly. “How long will that take you?”

“Oh, I’ll leave early. I like to get there as the
shops open and then spend the day.” He lifted his eyes up. “I would be gone for the whole day. I feel the need for some new books. Howard’s death has been such a disturbance. I need to do something to cheer myself up. Don’t you think?”

He was asking me to approve his reason for going on this long-awaited trip. “Absolutely. Cheering up is always good.”

“You wouldn’t care to go along, would you?”

I noticed that he put the question in the negative, but I jumped on it. “Yes, I would love that.”

“You wouldn’t mind being gone so long from London in the middle of your trip and all?” Again, a question.

“There is nothing I would rather do.”

“Fine then. Let’s say in two days we’ll go.”

When Caldwell smiled, I was relieved. I could tell he did want me to go.

Francine walked in from the sitting room. “Where are we going?” she asked.

“Karen and I are going to Hay-on-Wye,” he told her.

“I will go also,” she said as she slipped her hand onto his arm.

“But the whole town is filled with books, in English,” Caldwell said, pointing out, “You don’t read, and especially not in English.”

“I’m sure there will be other things to do.”

He cleared his throat. “I thought you were going back to Paris?”

She slitted her eyes like a cat. “It can wait until the weekend. I wouldn’t want to miss this voyage.”

*   *   *

I curled up on my bed with my new old book, on which Mr. Pickwick looked very pompous with his walking stick and waistcoat bulging at the buttons. I must admit I was handling it more carefully now that I had learned how much the volume was worth. This discovery made me wonder about some of the other older books I had picked up in my years of amateur collecting. I had never checked out how much any of them would be worth, I just paid what I could afford for what I liked. That way I was never disappointed.

Then I thought of the millions of books I would be perusing in a couple days. Going to Hay-on-Wye with Caldwell would be a dream come true, even with Madame F-F coming along. For the chance to wander through miles of books, I would not let that French fatal femme get in my way.

Just as I was thinking about what to do about Dave, the phone rang. I scrambled off the bed. I could hear my cell but not find it. It must have been in my purse but I couldn’t find that either. Maybe it
would be Guy and I could find out what he thought he was doing. I had to find that phone.

On the fourth ring I thought to look under the bed and dug it out of my purse. I slammed the phone to my ear and said, “Hello?”

“Inopportune moment?” Rosie asked. “Were you in the tub?”

“Long day. Couldn’t find my phone.”

“Say no more. Guess what, guess what?”

I could picture Rosie jiggling up and down as she talked. I would not ruin her pleasure of telling me by guessing that something momentous had happened in her ongoing quest of the sci-fi guy.

“What?” I asked.

“We’re going to see a movie together. Richard and I.”

“Great!” I said. “You’re going on a date?”

“Well, I’m not sure if it’s a date. You see, I did what you told me to do. I asked him who his favorite author was. Gene Wolfe, whom I barely have read. But we got talking more and somehow I mentioned Jules Verne and he said that this funky movie theater by the university was playing
Journey to the Center of the Earth,
and we both started laughing and thought wouldn’t that be weird to go see it and then we kind of decided to go see it and
we thought we might as well go together since we were both going to go see it and I guess it might be a date.”

“Act as if it is.”

“Oh,” Rosie said. “How do I do that?”

“Dress up. Wear lipstick. Smile at him. Be sure and go out for drinks afterward. Flirt.”

“Yeah. Flirt. I might have to take out a book on that. I don’t really know how to do that.”

I knew what she meant. I had had to bone up on flirting when I was her age. I still wasn’t very good at it. “Tilt your head when he talks. Touch his arm. Flip your hair back over your shoulder.”

“My hair’s about two inches long.”

“Doesn’t work then.”

“How’s it going with you? How’s the Frenchwoman? She still alive?”

“Yes, she is, and butting into everything. But the main thing I’m worried about is Dave.”

“What?” she said. “How can you stand to think about him after what he did to you?”

So I explained about how I had blathered away to a strange man in a pub who had some kind of connections in the criminal world about how Dave had done me wrong and then I had seen this same man talking to Honey. Then how I had tried to
warn Dave but he had left his hotel and I couldn’t find him.

“I don’t know what to do,” I finished.

Rosie said, “You have to find him. If he dies, it will ruin your trip. Think. Where would an American plumber go in London?”

TWENTY-FOUR

Holiday, Anyone?

I
n the middle of the night, I woke and couldn’t get back to sleep. Nightmares of missed planes, sleeping men falling over dead, and geese running at me with slashing beaks had plagued me. I don’t know what Freud would have made of these images, but I understood what they were telling me: I was afraid I had set something in motion that I was unable to stop.

As Rosie put it, much would be ruined if something bad happened to Dave. Plus, I had a few other things I had been rehearsing saying to Dave on how he had treated me.

Unable to settle down, I crawled out of bed and sat down in front of Caldwell’s bookshelf. My eyes wandered down the rows of books, looking for anomalies. I liked books to be organized, not just by author, but also alphabetically, by name of book. Arranging books always calmed me down. Taking control of something and putting it in the proper order made me feel like I had some actual power in the world. I started moving books around and hoped Caldwell wouldn’t notice that I had messed with his library. Or if he noticed, that he would be pleased.