1 Killer Librarian Read Online Free PDF

nudged Caldwell and said, “That’s right. The Yanks call it Seven-Up.”
    “Worse yet,” I said. “Plain beer sounds good to me. I’ll have whatever you’re having.”
    “Pints all around?” Tweed asked.
    Again Caldwell tried to protect me. “How about a half-pint for you?”
    “No, if everyone’s having a pint, I will too.”
    The Indian food had been spicy and salty, and I found that I was terrifically thirsty. My pint came, looking more like a pitcher of dark beer to me, and I drank half of it very quickly.
    “You like that then?” Twad asked.
    “Like what when?” I said back.
    “The ale?”
    “Brilliant,” I said, because I had been practicing saying brilliant all month long. I could say it with a pretty good accent, I thought, with a soft, slight roll to the r .
    I wasn’t the only one who had gulped the pint down in a quick hurry. Twad and Tweed weren’t far behind. When we came to the bottoms of our glasses, Twad declared it was his round and went back up to the bar.
    While he was gone, I took the time to glancearound the room, which was as I had always imagined an English pub being, except smaller and dingier. The ceiling was low and the room was dark, as if people had been smoking in it for a few centuries, which they probably had. The dark alcoves and odd nooks gave one the sense that intriguing conversations were taking place.
    “How old is this pub?” I asked Caldwell.
    “Fairly recent really, I’d say. Maybe early eighteen hundreds.”
    I nodded as if I drank in two-hundred-year-old pubs all the time. When Twad handed me my next pint, I proposed a toast. “To the old country and the new country, coming together.”
    We clanked our pints together and drank to amity across the waves.
    “What brings you to London?” Twad asked me.
    Caldwell raised his eyes slightly as he waited for me to answer.
    “Doing some research,” I said.
    “You must go to the Victoria and Albert,” Tweed effused.
    “I was planning on it. I hear they have an excellent collection of swords.” Which was true—I had heard that from a friend who did ironwork in his spare time when he wasn’t cataloguing children’s books at the Kerlan Collection.
    “You’re interested in swords?” Twad gave me a look and stretched his eyebrows up to the top of his head.
    “As much as I’m interested in any weapons of destruction.”
    They all looked at me to see if I was serious. Caldwell gave out a hoot of a laugh and the two older gentlemen twittered along with him.
    Twad said, “You Americans and your weapons of mass destruction. Liable to get us all killed.”
    We all laughed again.
    I had never been much of a beer drinker, preferring a light chardonnay with dinner, but there was something about standing up in a pub with three English blokes that made the libation taste as good as any I had ever had. I had nearly finished my second pint without any trouble.
    As Caldwell went off for the third round for all of us, Twad and Tweed started discussing a cricket game and I looked around the room.
    A blond-haired man was standing next to me, nursing a glass of red wine by himself. While his face was somber, his eyes lit up when I turned his way. He nodded and said, “Cheers,” lifting his wineglass.
    I lifted my almost-empty pint glass. “Thanks. Iguess I should say cheers too. Or, as we say, here’s mud in your eye.”
    “Why, you’re an American,” he said, and laughed. “I love your accent. I went to New York once. Great city.”
    “Yes, it is. But London is wonderful,” I gushed, which was unlike me, but at the moment it felt wonderful.
    “Can be sometimes,” he murmured. “I’m Guy, by the way.”
    “I’m Karen. I just got here today—to London, I mean.”
    “On your own?” he asked.
    With that question, what Dave had done to me came crashing down. “I wasn’t supposed to be. A friend was going to come too, but then something came up. Actually, he called the day we were going to leave. And he told