The Silver Bough Read Online Free PDF Page B

some sheets of paper.
    “You look worried.”
    She looked up, shaking her head. “I just found this. It’s a photocopy from the British Library—a reader’s request. I think it must have come in last week with some other things, only it slipped down behind the shelf, and I’m not sure if Connie sent out a notice about it—I know
I
didn’t.”
    “Who’s the reader?”
    “Mrs. Westray.”
    Kathleen bent down to the card index of membership details kept on a shelf below the counter and pulled out the drawer marked T-Z. For her first few weeks in this job the reliance on such a traditional system of file cards and ledger books and book tickets had seemed impossibly primitive, as if she’d been thrown back in time to an age of hand-drawn water and quill pens, but by now it was second nature.
    “The thing is,” Miranda went on, “I can send her a card, of course, but she wouldn’t get it until Monday, when we’re closed, and if she’s in any kind of hurry for it—she’s already had to wait, and it’s only a few sheets of paper. It wouldn’t cost more than a second-class stamp to mail it to her.”
    Kathleen had found her card:
Westray, Eleanor Rowan (Mrs.)

    Orchard House
    Fairview Hill
    Appleton

    tel: 777 802
    “Remind me who she is?”
    “American lady, early thirties, attractive, rather tall, doesn’t say much, favors classics and the more literary modern fiction.”
    “Oh, I know who you mean. I’ll give her a call.”
    Miranda put the photocopy down on the desk in front of her, and Kathleen ran her eye over the top sheet as she waited for the phone to be answered. It was an extract from a book and an author completely unknown to her:
Pleasures of the Table
by Percival M. Lingerton.
    “Hello, is that Mrs. Westray? It’s Kathleen Mullaroy from the library here. I think you requested something from the British Library…a photocopied extract…”
    “Oh, yes.”
    “Well, it’s arrived. Now, I could mail it to you, or—”
    “I was planning on coming in tomorrow.”
    “Oh, that’s fine! You can pick it up then. Just ask at the counter. You know our opening hours?”
    That settled, she wrote “Mrs. E. Westray” on a Post-it note and stuck that to the top sheet before putting it on the shelf allotted to readers’ requests. Then she picked up her heavy ring of keys, and told Miranda, “I’m just going to check the museum and lock it up now; somehow, I don’t think we’ll get a last-minute surge of visitors today.”
    “That does seem a bit unlikely.”
    The entrance to the museum was located at the far end of the room, just past the children’s section. The big wooden door had been carved with a riot of Celtic-style intertwined forms, animals, birds, and foliage revolving around a central tree of life. Beyond it, the roof-lit museum was a dim and shadowy chamber, despite the banks of spotlights, echoing to the relentless drum of the rain. Ignoring the high-hanging oil paintings and the glass cases with their displays of stuffed birds, old coins, tools, and pottery, she peered up at the vaulted ceiling, painted a Wedgwood blue between the white struts and skylights, and held her breath to listen for the sound of an intrusive drip. A swift but careful circuit of the long gallery satisfied her that it was all still watertight, so she switched off the lights and locked up.
    “I’ll be in my office if you need me,” she said as she passed the counter.
    “I’ll ring if the crowds get too much for me to handle alone.”
    As she stepped out into the foyer again, hearing the loud echo of the steady drip of water into the bucket, she became aware of how cold it was, and shivered unhappily at the thought of the long winter drawing in. The library was a great place to work in the summer, always cool on the hottest days, but she did wonder how much use the antiquated storage heaters would be in combating an extended cold spell, especially with winter gales blowing off the sea and howling in the