by Rick Wayne
“You know it?” I removed Kell’s book from her purse and read the name from the stamp. “The Barrows?”
“Oh, I know it. We all knows it. What you want with that old goblin anyway?”
“What? No. My friend, the one you met, she’s in some kind of trouble. I thought . . .” I looked at the old book in my hand. “I don’t know what I thought, actually. But it’s closed.” I motioned to the accordion gate and started up the steps again. “So, it’s fine. Thanks, man. Enjoy the glasses!”
“Yeah, that’s a damned good ward, it is,” he said, admiring the rust-worn gate like it was a work of art. “Gets lotsa folks. Ain’t nobody do them good no more. They don’t take the time.”
“Gets?” I looked again at the gate. On a whim, I walked back down and shook it. It rattled noisily. “Gets how? It’s locked.”
“Exactly,” he said with a nod, as if I’d just answered my own question. “If some fool hears about a place he ain’t supposed to hear ’bout and comes lookin and finds it closed, he ain’t gonna keep lookin, right?”
I had the sneaking suspicion I was the fool in question. I looked again. “But it is closed.”
“Only two ways inta that place, girlie. One is fulla twists and turns and if you don’t take ’em right, you liable to end up far gone. Takes skill, it does.”
“And the other?”
He seemed to study me a moment, but with his eyes behind my sunglasses, it was impossible to tell.
“With a skeleton key,” he said as he produced one from his pants.
The long arm of the key was shaped like a pair of jointed bones. Its teeth were shaped like narrow human teeth. Holding it aloft, my new friend turned to face the steel door in the wall directly across from the gate.
In the city, you pass doors like that all the time—heavy, unmarked jobs with no handles. They’re back entrances or emergency exits or maybe leftovers from prior construction or whatever. On top of that, there are countless manholes, maintenance hatches, arches of scaffolding, and doorways to nowhere left in old facades. I’d walked past enough of the above without noticing that I could not in all honesty say for sure whether this particular door had been there before or not. But whether it had or hadn’t, seeing it then made the little hairs on my arms stand up.
My unusual friend walked over and inserted the key, which I didn’t think would fit the lock, but it did, and he turned it and pulled the door open. Inside was another staircase. I stood at the threshold and peered down.
“Girlie,” he said with a tone of warning, like now he was Mr. Cool for wearing my glasses. “Go on in, do your business, and get out. Don’t let that old grouch trick you. Don’t go in the back. Stay up front where the books is at. And whatever you do, don’t linger ’round. Bookstore’s the kind of place you can get lost forever, if you’re not careful.”
I wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but it’s certainly true I always seemed to lose track of time in one.
I peered in again. “Down there? Are you sure?”
He nodded. “Take the stairs on the right, not the left, and remember what I toldya and you’ll be fine.”
“Don’t linger,” I said as I stepped in.
He nodded sagely. He seemed taller then, or maybe it seemed that the door had shrunk, and me with it, but by the time I turned to object, it shut. Standing there in silence, everything in normal proportion, I told myself to act like an adult and that it was silly to get scared over the ravings of a crazy street person. His deformities, I was sure, were not evidence of anything nefarious but simply some kind of birth defect that probably also meant his mind wasn’t quite right, and by the transitive property, mine wasn’t either if I let it get to me.
Holding that thought like a flashlight, I stepped down the second staircase, which was identical to the first. At the bottom, it split to the right and the left, as predicted. These steps, however, were older, so old that they sagged in the middle from long use. I paused for a moment, wondering then if it was better to take his advice and go right or if it was a trick and I should do the opposite. But since I couldn’t marshal a good argument either way, I turned to the right and continued down.
At the bottom, under an arched doorway, was a metal plaque in a window-shaped nook that said:
THE BARROWS
Est. 1676 (A.D.)
The letters A.D. were in parentheses and off-center, as if someone saw the original version and got worried people might get confused as to which 1676 they meant. Below that was a dedication:
REINTERRED 1848
at this location with
Generous Donations from
THE ROEBLING FAMILY
& H. Morton Ramsay & Sons
& Eleanor Peas
A second, smaller plaque was affixed to the wall just underneath the first:
REDEDICATED 1931
with special dispensation from
The Archdiocese of New York
On the other side of the door was a foot-and-a-half drop to an uneven cobblestone floor. To my right and left were walled archways that suggested there was once a promenade, now absent. It was dark down there, and other than the stiff echo of my own movements, it was also deathly quiet. I would’ve turned back immediately if not for the light that shone from beyond a 1930s-style wood-framed glass door. I couldn’t see much of the interior, though, because the glass was neatly filled with gold-painted letters, rimmed in black:
THE BARROWS
Since 1676
Anson Gruel,
Proprietor
No soliciting
All sales final
The door creaked loudly, as if by design, and right away I got that unmistakable sweet smell of must and old books. The interior looked like a Victorian library. The space was much longer than it was wide and bookshelves covered the walls on two sides. The stamped-tin ceiling was considerably higher than in a normal shop—high enough to give the space a very faint echo—and the shelving went all the way up, although not all of it was full. A pair of narrow wheeled metal staircases were attached to glide tracks in the middle of the wall so that people could slide them back and forth and peruse the higher rows without fear of falling off. To my right was an old leather chair, pulled out from the corner just enough to let someone browse snugly behind it. The cushion was stacked with books. To my left was an old brass telescope. A curved brace marked degrees horizontal while a perpendicular one marked degrees vertical in precise ticks. The worn slats of the hardwood floor were the color of rich chocolate. Light came from a simple chandelier in the middle of the ceiling. The loops and arms were brass. I was sure it had burned gas at one point but had since been fitted with electricity. Black wires wound around the arms on their way to the lightbulbs at the end, which poked from fluted glass fittings.
The top shelves of the wall to my left held the oldest books and were locked behind glass-paneled cabinets whose polished brass fixtures were scuffed at the margins and around the keyholes. At the back was a high wood counter and an oak door, maybe to a stock room. There was a pendulum clock, ticking softly, and a long display shelf full of oddities and antiques. Hanging over them in the last bit of open space under the ceiling was a line of various ornate frames—some small, some quite large. All of them had tasteful little museum lights to illuminate their contents, but all of them were empty. I could see straight through to the brick.
In the very middle of the floor was a kind of circular podium made of polished walnut that displayed books in 360 degrees—some open, some closed. The book facing the door was large and hardbound and open to colorful illuminated pages. But it wasn’t old. The pages were white and the corners crisp. The copyright at the front said 2009. I looked at the cover. The Red Book (Liber Novus) by Carl Jung. Signed in high cursive by the author.
“Are you sure you have the right place?”
The door to the stock room had been opened and an old man with an Amish beard stood scowling at me. He wore denim coveralls on top of a simple short-sleeved, collar
ed shirt and had wire spectacles resting on top of his head, like he’d been tinkering with a clock or something and stopped to see who was at the door.
He took one look at me and asked, “Is it Tuesday again? Already?” He turned about as if looking for a wall calendar.
“Excuse me?”
“Ah, wonderful. You are excused.” He said it with relief and raised his hand to the door, as if he expected me to turn around and leave at that exact moment.
I took Kell’s book from her purse and held it up.
“I’m sorry, but I think my friend and her stupid ex might’ve stolen this.”
His face was so old, his wrinkles magnified every expression, which in this case seemed to be confusion. And disgust.
“Yes. They did.” He had a faint European accent. Not quite German. Dutch maybe, or some Nordic language.
“I’d like to return it.”
“This isn’t a library,” he said with a snap in his voice. He pointed to a small sign above the punch-key register at the back:
THIS IS NOT A LIBRARY
It hung above another small sign that said:
CASH ONLY
Both signs were next to a much larger one that said in very clear letters:
BEWARE OF TROLLS
There was some legal-looking smaller print under it that I couldn’t read, as if that sign was required by city ordinance.
“You take the books,” he said, “you buy them.”
“But I didn’t take—” I sighed at his indignant eyebrow-raise. Those suckers were like brooms. “Fine. How much?”
He walked to the counter and tossed his glasses on it. He pressed the heavy, levered keys of the antique register until a bell chimed.
“That will be two hundred and five dollars and nineteen cents.”
“For a misprinted book?”
Leave it to Kell to steal the most expensive damned book in the store.
It wasn’t really. But that’s what it felt like.
“It is not misprinted.”
“Whatever.” I didn’t want to argue. I set the book on the counter and dug in my purse.
“Your friends were clever,” he said, “hiding that one of them was mizzen.”
I handed him two hundred and ten. “What’s a mizzen?”
“I don’t have change,” he said.
“What?” I started to object. Then I took a breath. “Fine. Whatever.”
I called it a theft tax. The register dinged loudly and the drawer slid open. He put the money inside. He totally had change.
He eyed me eyeing the drawer, like I was a thief as well, and shut it hard.
“This is a respectable establishment. We don’t sell to the Dispossessed. Thank you for your business.” He raised an arm toward the door. “Good day.”
“I don’t suppose you could help me find something?”
“Probably not.”
“Dude. Can you at least pretend to be helpful?”
“It wouldn’t be very convincing.”
I held up The Compendium of Greater Travesties. “This is, like, an encyclopedia or something.”
“It’s not ‘like’ an encyclopedia,” he said. “It is an encyclopedia. Of heresies. Not proper reading for a young lady.”
“Yeah. Fine. Whatever. That’s what I said. Do you have any books on—” I stopped myself from saying ‘like’ again. “—stone tables? Or—shit, what did he call it? Covens or empty cupboards or something like that?”
“This is a bookstore,” he chided. “Not a furniture shop.”
I waited. I hate people like that.
He pointed to the books, as if the answer were obvious.
I looked around the rectangular room. I turned my palms up.
“Ah. Of course.” He scowled, deeply, and shuffled toward the back door. “With the exception of the volumes under glass, which will be beyond you, the books are shelved alphabetically by author. Where an author isn’t known, by the Erskine Codex reference number. If you are not going to make a purchase, I will kindly ask you to show yourself out through whatever doorway you came in. Good day.”
He shut the door hard to emphasize the point.
Jerk.
I turned slowly in a circle. It was books all around. I had no idea what I was looking for and so started opening volumes at random. Most were giant walls of text that went on for hundreds of pages. Half of them weren’t even in English, although I did find one in Chinese. It was so old, I couldn’t make it out. It wasn’t long before I started appreciating the ones I couldn’t read. That at least gave me a reason to rule them out quickly. After a while, I heard the door to the back open again and the old man stopped with an audible exclamation. I’m pretty sure he thought I had left half an hour ago. I was squatting in front of the bottom shelf holding a very heavy book I had hoped was some kind of encyclopedia. It wasn’t. I’m not sure what it was, actually, but it described itself as a bestiary.
He cleared his throat. “This is a bookstore. NOT a library.”
“You said that. Can’t I just—”
I was turning my head to argue my case when my eye caught the title, in between all the others. I reshelved the big book in my hand and pulled out the thin hardbound volume one shelf up.
The Long-Vacant Cupboard.
“Hmpf. Should have done that the first time,” he said.
“Done what?”
He squinted at me for some sign of recognition.
“You really don’t know anything? You’re not even a Wiccan or one of those girls who cut themselves to feed the vamps?”
I shook my head.
“How did you find—” He stopped himself. He harumphed again. “A book, young lady, is the most magical thing there is. It is the only spell”—he lifted a faded leather-bound from the shelf—“that’s patent.” He slapped the cover as if to show it was real. “A spell you can touch.”
He shook it.
“A spell?”
“Yes. A spell. You know what that is, don’t you?”
I rolled my eyes.
“Words,” he said, “that make magic.”
“I know what a spell is.”
“They’re about the only magic left. That regular folks can touch, anyway.” He looked at the shelves. “But even they’re going away. No one reads anymore.” He started mumbling to himself as he reshelved the tome in his hand.
“If a book is magic, then how is magic different than anything else?”
“Who said it was?” he asked, as if I’d just told him people were spreading nasty rumors about him.
He started to speak again but I interrupted him. “They stole the books when you were giving her boobs the speech, didn’t they? Did you even look in her eyes?”
He walked over and snatched The Long-Vacant Cupboard from my hands.
“The books are for sale.”
He turned to put it back on the shelf.
“Fine. How much is it?”
He checked. “You’re in luck. All I have left is the third edition with the rambling introduction by Sprague. Eighty-nine ninety-nine. Plus tax.” He shelved it.
“Jeez, dude. I need to eat.”
“So do I,” he objected. “We buy books as well.”
I looked at the one by my feet. The one I’d just bought. I handed it to him.
He took it and examined it thoroughly, like he’d never seen it before. He flipped through the pages. All of the text was printed correctly—or at least I didn’t see any that wasn’t.
“Wait a minute . . .”
“I’ll give you forty dollars for it,” he said, moving it behind his back.
“WHAT? I just gave you two hundred!”
“Depreciation,” he said. “I don’t know what damage you’ve done.”
What. An. Asshole.
As if to prove his point, he took out the tarot card and handed it to me with a stiff arm.
“A hundred,” I replied.
“No.”
I held out my hand. “Then give i
t back.”
He looked at it. “Fifty.”
“Eighty or I walk.”
He scowled. Then he turned for the back.
“Criminal,” he muttered.
“Dude, I’m not the only one.”
I took money out of my purse, added it to what he handed me, and grabbed The Long-Vacant Cupboard from the shelf.
“I’d like to buy this book,” I said all innocently.
He shuffled to the counter and retrieved a calculator with fat buttons. He tapped. “With tax—”
“Tax?”
“With tax,” he repeated, louder, “that will be ninety-seven dollars and twenty cents, please.”
I counted out a hundred dollars in fives and twenties and handed it to him. We walked to the register where he recounted them in front of me.
“I don’t have change,” he said.
I rolled my eyes. “Fine. Whatever. Just give me the damned book.”
He scowled again. “Language.” He handed it to me.
“Manners,” I retorted with bug eyes. “Can I sit? Or are you gonna charge me for that, too?”
“It would seem so.”
“So it’s alright if I move the—” I stopped.
The chair had been cleared. The books had all been stacked on the floor.
I looked around. I didn’t see or hear anyone.
“Thank you, Charles,” the old man called sarcastically. “Always did have a thing for young girls,” he muttered. He turned for his workshop, then snapped back to me. “We close promptly at 5:00.”
“Five? Who the hell closes that early?”
He looked at his watch. “That’s one hour and forty-seven minutes.”
I flashed the clock on my phone. I waggled it and pursed my lips like “Oooooooo, a magic lighted timepiece!” That was when I noticed I didn’t have a signal. Nothing.
He just squinted in disgust and retreated to his work room.
So, the book pretty much said the same thing the old man did—that there was a time when magic was part of the world, same as anything else, which is why every pre-modern culture everywhere believed in it, but that there are only bits and pieces left, that everything else has been obscured by this group called The Masters, also sometimes called the High Arcane, who were like a council I guess, made of the most powerful practitioners of every age. They’re the ones who said no one could talk about magic and stuff directly. Like, it was forbidden, and if you did it anyway and got caught, they locked you up someplace really bad. Some really talented people were allowed to write about it, but they had to use “keys and ciphers” to keep everything esoteric.