Bookweirder

by Paul Glennon

  Brother Godwyn had been a young man when he’d arrived in the Holy Land, but he was now old and grey and bent by years. When Hugh Montclair had brought the boy to him, Godwyn had rolled his ancient eyes and arranged the hiding place. Charged with the boy’s education, the archivist had bowed slowly and taken on the burden, but it soon became no burden at all. Jerome was bright and attentive, cheerful without being boisterous. He learned quickly and eagerly and soon became Godwyn’s assistant, copying texts that the old man’s failing eyes could no longer read and asking the questions that prodded the old man’s sluggish mind to solutions.

  The young foundling became the Holy Land’s youngest scholar. Godwyn finished off the boy’s foundation in Latin and added Greek and Aramaic. When Jerome had mastered these, they turned to English.

  Brother Godwyn had almost forgotten the language of his own homeland. It was decades since he’d spoken it regularly. Only in his dreams, when the desert wasteland of the day was replaced by the green hills of his youth, did he speak and hear English. It was a pleasure to be able to speak it out loud again with the strange boy with the prodigious facility for languages.

  As Jerome grew older and the archivist’s eyes grew weaker, Brother Godwyn enlisted him in his great struggle to maintain the archive at St. Savino. For years the kings of England and France had tried to get their hands on the St. Savino scrolls. England and France agreed that the scrolls were not safe in this far-off desert outpost. The kings disagreed only on whether the scrolls would be safer in London or Paris. Brother Godwyn’s campaign of letter writing had kept the courts of England and France at bay and at each other’s throats for years. The boy now acted as his scribe.

  Jerome and Godwyn worked together during the warm desert days at the top of the tower that housed the library. It was just a few small rooms, tightly packed with shelves, but it contained documents of incalculable value. Every cubbyhole was stuffed with scrolls. Brother Godwyn and Jerome had hardly begun their quest to catalogue them. There were scrolls there that no hand had unravelled for hundreds of years.

  “That’s where your map is,” Norman declared.

  “Sure as Stoats,” Malcolm agreed. “When are we going?”

  Norman shook his head reluctantly. “We can’t both go. My ingresso works only for me.” He knew his friend wanted to be part of the action, and to tell the truth, he would have liked to have the little warrior at his side.

  “Then let’s get back to Kelmsworth. We’ll make Todd send us both.”

  Norman had thought about this already, but he had realized the limitations of the lawyer’s ingresso. “He can’t either. He was bluffing. He needs more than just the book. He needs something from it. He needs a piece of paper, something, or else he can’t get in. He didn’t think we’d figure it out, but that’s why he needs our help.”

  “But you can’t get in either. You can’t eat a page of this book. You know what your mum said. It could be the only copy.”

  Malcolm was right. He couldn’t eat any part of A Secret in the Library. “I don’t know what would happen if I ate the last copy. Probably its whole world would disappear. But I don’t have to. I can just copy part of it and eat it.”

  The stoat started to say something, but instead he sighed and snarled, showing his little fang in frustration. “I don’t like being put out of the action like this. At least if I were back in Kelmsworth, I could be helping George.”

  “I wish you were coming too. I don’t like the looks of this Black John guy.”

  The stoat just stared back silently, his whiskers rippling with a frown. But there was one thing about Malcolm you could always count on—he never stayed down for long.

  “Right, there’s no use moping about it.” He bared his teeth determinedly. “You fetch a pen and paper. I’ll find that page about the library.”

  The section about the library was almost perfect, a full page, four paragraphs, describing its location at the centre of a maze of chambers, how it could be reached only by a flimsy wooden stairway, its rows of shelves and cubbyholes for the scrolls.

  Norman sat down at the desk and slid out a blank piece of foolscap. Malcolm held the book open for him with his small paws while Norman copied it out in the tiniest letters he could manage. He was going to have to eat it, and he wanted to keep it late-night-snack size. The result was just barely readable.

  Malcolm huffed and tutted as he looked it over. “You should have let me do it. I could have written it much smaller and tidier. This looks like it was done by a palsied giant.”

  “We didn’t have all month,” Norman shot back.

  Malcolm held up his paws and grimaced. They were not made for holding a pen. “All right, then,” he conceded. “Bon appétit.”

  “Promise me you’ll put the book back when I’m gone,” Norman pleaded between chewing, swallowing and ripping another strip of foolscap.

  “Sure,” replied the stoat. He wasn’t convincing. “When I’ve read some more.”

  “No, right away. You have to put it back,” Norman insisted. “If my mom wakes up and finds it gone …” That was certainly part of the reason, but something else bothered him about Malcolm reading on without him. Maybe it was just that he didn’t want his friend to know more of the story. Part of him felt weird about Malcolm reading a book when he was in it. “You need to get it back as soon as possible. I’ve no idea what time my parents get up in the morning.”

  “Okay, sure,” Malcolm assured him.

  Norman wasn’t assured. “Promise?” He looked him in the eye.

  Malcolm’s glossy black eye stared back for a long time before blinking. “Just be quick and bring back that map.”

  They lashed one of Norman’s belts around the book to make it easier for the stoat to carry. It was still an enormous load for the little animal, but Malcolm just winked and hoisted it over his shoulder. Like all stoats, he was enormously strong for his size. He left by the bedroom window and promised to be back within the hour. Norman lay in bed waiting, imagining he could hear his friend scrambling up the drainpipes and across the roof, but sleep finally came, and he never felt the stoat return and curl up in the crook of his arm beside him.

  More Secrets in the Library

  It was more than dark. It was the dark of a windowless room. He could tell without opening his eyes. The dark seemed to seep in through Norman’s closed eyelids. The air was thick and hot and heavy on his skin. He had to fight the panic that made him want to flail his arms around to find a light switch. There would be no light switch here.

  There was a scent in the air that Norman recognized, that peculiar scent of old books. It reminded Norman of the library at his father’s university, a sort of dusty, homey smell that made you tired but not sleepy, just the right mood for reading books. But Norman was not waking up at the university library. He knew with absolute certainty that he was waking up in Brother Godwyn’s library in the desert fortress of St. Savino.

  His eyes opened, but there was nothing to see. The dark was absolute.

  “Jeeze,” he admonished himself with a whisper, “you could have brought a flashlight.”

  Slowly he rose to his knees. The rough-hewn planks beneath him creaked as he shifted his weight. Cautiously he reached out into the dark, his fingertips grasping for something to grab onto and pull himself up. They touched nothing. He waved his hands, but they just wafted in the air. It made him dizzy, kneeling there in the dark with nothing to brace himself with. He could be on a high balcony or at the top of the stairs. The bookweird didn’t really think about safety when it set you down somewhere.

  “Okay, Norman,” he whispered, “just relax. Close your eyes.” He screwed them closed, as tight as he could. It was a trick you used when sneaking downstairs to inspect your presents on Christmas Eve. Closed your eyes tight so you got used to absolutely no light. When you opened them, your eyes would be ready to take advantage of the smallest amount of illumination.

  His eyelids opened slowly again to absolute dark
ness. He could hear his breathing now, ragged and scared, panting as if he’d just run a race, but only his mind was racing. Where was he? Had he woken up in a sealed chamber? Was this the dungeon instead of the library? He cursed himself for his lack of preparation. The bookweird could get you into a locked room, but you needed a book to get yourself out again, or at least a page. Norman had counted on writing himself home. How could he do that now without any paper and no light to read or write by?

  “Stop it. Stop thinking like this. Just relax,” he hissed.

  “Who are you talking to?” a voice asked. It wasn’t an especially deep voice or a threatening tone, but Norman jumped anyway. He wasn’t alone here in the dark. He stayed as still as he could, not answering. If Norman couldn’t see the owner of the other voice, the other voice couldn’t see him. He thought of Bilbo Baggins falling into Gollum’s cave in The Hobbit and his heart raced a little more.

  “Who are you talking to?” the voice repeated. It was a curious voice, not an angry one. It sounded thoroughly unsurprised that Norman had arrived here in the middle of its darkness, but still Norman did not answer.

  “Shall I open the skylight so you can see? Your eyes will never adjust to this dark. I can only do it because I live here. Brother Godwyn says I have the eyes of felis lybica.” The voice stopped for a moment and repeated the strange word “felis” to itself, as if trying to remember something.

  “Felis—cat. Desert cat. He says I have the eyes of a desert cat.”

  It was not a man’s voice. It was a boy’s voice, a boy who normally spoke another language—Jerome. Norman had not wanted to meet anyone here in the desert fortress. He’d just wanted to get in, get his map and get out. But if he had to meet someone, Jerome was at least the safest option. Still, he sat there speechless.

  “You speak English,” the boy whispered. “Are you from England? Like Meg?”

  “What?” Norman asked, unable to stop himself.

  “Do you know Meg?” Jerome asked excitedly. “Did she send you?”

  There was the sound of movement as Jerome shifted from whatever location in the darkness he inhabited. First there was just a crack of light somewhere above him, then suddenly it was blinding. A trap door had opened somewhere in the ceiling. It was like being in the hull of a sinking ship when the hatch finally burst. Norman squinted and yelped. He couldn’t help it.

  “Sorry,” Jerome apologized hastily. He must have reached up and closed the hatch a little because the light eased back. Still, Norman dared not look up into it. He had never seen a sun so bright. His eyes adjusted slowly to the brightness, but finally, through the dust that floated on the shaft of light, he was able to see his surroundings.

  He was indeed in the library. On three sides of the room tall, rickety shelves rose up. They were lined with small, cylindrical cubbyholes. Each hole held a scroll, some of them attached to wooden handles, others just rolled up like an architect’s blueprints. A small wooden table was pushed against the fourth wall. A tiny three-legged stool was pulled back from the table. It looked incapable of supporting anything, but it did support something. It supported a boy.

  He looked to be about fourteen. Norman had expected him to be younger for some reason, but he had to be Jerome. He wore a short white tunic cinched with a length of rope. Norman had seen something like this back in England, the first time he’d visited, which was back in the ninth century. Unlike the Anglo-Saxon boys he had met there, Jerome wore no hose or jerkin. His feet were bare, and it was too hot to wear much more. Norman was already starting to sweat in his jeans and sweatshirt. It was difficult going from a rainy English summer to the desert.

  “You are English, aren’t you?” Jerome asked in a soft, curious voice. He looked like a little monk with his simple robe and his hair trimmed so short.

  “Yes, I am. Well …” Norman started to qualify his statement, but he realized that he’d have to explain about the New World and Columbus and all that. “Yes, I’m English,” he repeated.

  Jerome’s bright blue eyes lit up, and he pulled his stool towards Norman. “Did Meg send you?”

  “Uh-huh,” Norman replied. He rose to his feet, his head scraping against the low wooden beams of the ceiling.

  Jerome’s forehead wrinkled in confusion. “Pardon?” he said.

  “Yes,” Norman repeated, more correctly. “Meg sent me. She sent me to find something.”

  Jerome rose from his stool and approached Norman with his arm outstretched. It was a strange moment for Norman. This was a fictional boy who knew his mother. She had probably known Jerome longer than she had known him. He halted and shook away the strange feeling of unease that this gave him. He couldn’t find a word for it. It took a moment to gather his wits and shake the offered hand.

  “You must be Jerome,” Norman said.

  Jerome held Norman’s hand resolutely and stared at him for a long moment.

  “You’re not Christopher, are you?” he asked, stepping back and eyeing him warily.

  Norman didn’t understand the question. “What?”

  “Are you Kit? Meg’s brother?” Jerome narrowed his eyes and assessed Norman.

  “Unc—uh …” Norman stuttered. “No, no, I’m Norman.”

  Jerome continued to stare.

  “Why would you think I was Christopher?” Norman asked.

  “You look like her,” Jerome replied. “Like Meg. You could be her brother. She said he might come.”

  Norman could tell by the wariness in the other boy’s face that his mother had not said anything kind about Uncle Kit, but then she rarely did. Why would she expect Uncle Kit to come here? Why would he? Could he even? Could everybody do this?

  “People say we look alike, but we’re not related,” he began hesitantly. “We’re friends from school. We read the same books.”

  Jerome looked skeptical. Norman wondered for a moment how to convince him. Really, there was nothing he could do to prove who he was. A bead of sweat darted past his eyelashes into the corner of his eye, making it sting and blink. The heat was getting to him. He pulled his sweatshirt over his head and looked around for somewhere to put it down. No, that wouldn’t do. He had already lost too many clothes in books.

  Norman had a sudden inspiration. Losing his clothes had reminded him of something. “I don’t suppose this will convince you?” he asked. He held out the label for Jerome to see.

  Jerome leaned over and read Norman’s name from the label.

  “My mom wrote it in there so I wouldn’t lose it. It doesn’t seem to help, though. I lose everything.”

  “Your mother can write too?” Jerome asked, curious again, his suspicion apparently easily assuaged.

  Norman tied his sweatshirt around his waist by the arms and nodded. Why was that surprising? he wondered.

  “Meg is the first girl I’ve heard of who could read. I mean, I haven’t actually met anybody, since I never leave this part of the fortress, but I know that none of the serving girls or wives or even the nuns here at St. Savino can read. Brother Godwyn tells me that noblewomen are often taught to read. Is Meg a noblewoman?” Jerome answered his own question. “You must be nobility, too, if you have enough clothes to lose them. Of course, you both must be. She never will say. I always thought she must be. Her hair is always so well combed and her hands are perfectly clean and soft.” Jerome’s tone changed completely when he talked about Meg. His voice softened and trailed off. He sounded a little bit like Dora when she talked about the pony she rode.

  Now it was Norman’s turn to regard the other boy suspiciously. Did Jerome have a crush on his mother? That was crazy. Jerome was just a boy. Meg Jespers-Vilnius was a grown woman now. Maybe he hadn’t seen her since she was a girl his age. Maybe she’d given up coming here after she grew up. Would Jerome have noticed this, or was it always the same time to him? Norman had not yet worked out the relationship between normal time and book time.

  “Has Meg sent a message?” Jerome asked. He’d moved closer and joined Norman in the squ
are of sun under the skylight.

  Norman thought for a moment about how to approach this. He thought better of trying to trick Jerome. It seemed best to be as honest as possible.

  “I’ve come for the map. My … Meg left it here for safekeeping. She sent me to get it.”

  Jerome regarded him studiously for a few more seconds. He appeared to be trying to make a decision.

  “The map?” Jerome pretended half-heartedly that he knew nothing about it.

  “Yes, the map of the realm of Undergrowth. It shows the Northern Kingdoms and the Obsidian Desert.” Norman didn’t know if Jerome had read the map, but if he had, he wanted the other boy to know that he’d read it, too.

  “Yes …” Jerome answered. It was half a question, half a statement.

  “At the centre is the Castle of Lochwarren. That’s my friend King Malcolm’s castle.” Norman hoped this would impress the apprentice monk. He failed to mention that his friend was a member of the weasel family.

  Whether this impressed Jerome or not, it finally burst the dam that had been holding back his curiosity.

  “This is in the land of Scotia, yes?” he asked eagerly. “Or is it Hibernia, or Kernow? I could never place it on my maps.”

  “There are lots of names for these places,” Norman replied warily.

  “Of course,” Jerome agreed. “Map-making is an imperfect art.

  I should like to make a comprehensive atlas one day. Have you really come all the way from Lochwarren?”

  “Yes,” Norman replied, making this up as he went along. “I left from the port of Cuaderno, one of the Five Cities. Let me show you.”

  Jerome’s cautiousness had completely disappeared now. He tugged at Norman’s elbow, and Norman followed him to a wall of scrolls. He paused for just a moment, scanning the rows of tiny cubbyholes, and then drew out a wrapped cylinder. Norman recognized his map right away.