The case of the missing books

by Ian Sansom

  'How's your lady friend?'

  'What?'

  'Your lady friend?'

  'She's not my lady friend.'

  'She looked pretty friendly to me.' George stood up straight, brushed her red hair out of her eyes and fixed Israel with a stare.

  'Well, it was…Business. Anyway, I've got a—'

  'That's what you call it on the mainland, is it? Business?'

  'No, it is not. Listen, I've got a bone to pick with you.'

  'Aye, right, well.' George looked away. 'Sure, it's your business anyway, whatever it is. Now while you're here, you can make yourself useful.'

  'No, hang on.'

  'We need to strain these wires.'

  'What? Why? No. I need to talk to you about—'

  'Fine, you can talk and work, can you? Or that beyond you?'

  'No. Of course it's not beyond me.'

  'Good. Because we're stock-proofing the field.'

  'What?'

  'Stock-proofing. Stop the pigs getting away. We had a turshie out last week.'

  'Right. What?'

  'Never mind.'

  'Wasn't it stock-proofed before?'

  'It was. But we're having to sell off parts.'

  'Of the field?'

  'Aye.'

  'Why?'

  'Why d'you think we're selling the field?'

  'I don't know. For money?'

  'Aye, well done: it's certainly not for the sake of my health, is it?'

  'No.'

  'Same reason we took you in,' she said, looking at him disdainfully. 'We're not doing it out of goodwill.'

  'No. Clearly.'

  She handed Israel a wooden post. 'Here. Hold this. Have you sorted out anywhere else to stay yet?'

  'No, I've not had the chance.'

  'Unfortunately,' said George.

  'Yes. Well. My feelings exactly. Anyway, George, I—'

  'You just let me know when you do.'

  'Believe me, you'll be the first to know. But—'

  'Good. Hold it. There. There.' She placed her hands firmly on his, steadying them.

  'What are you—'

  'Just hold it straight. I need to mallet it in. I need it straight.'

  'OK.'

  'Straight! Holy Jinkers! What are you, stupit? Straight!'

  She pounded the mallet onto the post, Israel gripping tight all the while, his whole body shuddering.

  The post stayed upright.

  'Right. Is that it?'

  'I need to box 'em.'

  'Box them?'

  'Box anchor.'

  'Right. Well, first, let me—'

  'I've already got the rocks in. I need the Number 8 wire from the box there. There.' She pointed to the box with a long fine finger. 'Can you get it?'

  'The what?'

  'The Number 8 wire!'

  All wire looked the same to Israel.

  'Is this it?'

  'No! The Number 8!'

  'This?'

  'Aye, that's it.'

  'George?'

  George started tying and straining the wire.

  'George?' repeated Israel, raising his voice.

  'What? What?'

  'Listen, I think I'm in trouble, because—'

  'Oh, this is the bone you want to pick with me, is it?'

  'Yes, it is, actually. If you would just let me explain.'

  'Fine. Go on then.'

  'Well. It's…You or Brownie haven't mentioned the missing books to anyone, have you?'

  'What?'

  'The missing books from the library.' Israel looked around to make sure no one could hear him. They couldn't: he was in the middle of a vast silent field. 'You haven't mentioned it to anyone? It's just, we really didn't want rumours getting around.'

  'And who's "we" then?'

  'The Department of Entertainment, Leisure and Community Services.'

  'Oh, right, you're speaking on their behalf now, are you?'

  'Well. Yes. I am supposed to be the librarian.'

  'Supposed to be. Aye.'

  'Right. Anyway, it's just, you know, it wouldn't look good if people knew the library books were missing.'

  'We said we wouldn't mention it to anyone.'

  'Yes, that's right.'

  'So we haven't mentioned it.'

  'Not just accidentally maybe, or—'

  'We said we wouldn't mention it.'

  'But—'

  'Is that it? Here, hold this.' She gave Israel the end of a piece of wire. 'Hold it tight!'

  He held it tighter. 'So you haven't spoken to anyone at the paper or anything?'

  'The Impartial Recorder?'

  'Yes. You've not spoken to them—'

  'If we said we wouldn't, we haven't. Do you understand that? Unlike some people I could mention, we do have standards in this family, Armstrong.'

  'What? What's that supposed to mean?'

  'Nothing.'

  'I have standards!'

  'Aye, right enough: snuggling up like with your lady journalist friend in your love nest, sipping on whiskey at half past four in the afternoon while other people are out working, earning an honest day's wages: that's your standards, is it?'

  'What? My love nest! That…place!'

  'Coop.'

  'Exactly! And I told you, she's not my lady friend. I've only just met her.'

  'Aye, well, that makes it all right then.'

  'What? No! And anyway, what about you snuggling up with your man friend in the back of the taxi the other night?'

  'That's different.'

  'Is it? Why?'

  'Because. It is.' George stared at him again, hands on hips, eyes blazing. 'Because it's my business.'

  'I see. Fine. Right.'

  'And I'd be grateful if you kept your nose out of it.'

  'I will. And maybe you can do the same.'

  Israel turned away as if about to go.

  'Hey, Armstrong! Don't you just walk away from me. I've a bone to pick with you, before you go flouncing off.'

  'I am not flouncing off.'

  'Well, you can call it what you like. I had my aunt on the phone this afternoon.'

  'Right?'

  'Minnie. At the café? Have you been talking to her?'

  'Well, I—'

  'Well, don't. Her and that other woman are…'

  'What?'

  'We don't really have anything to do with them.'

  'Why?'

  'Because. They're almost as much trouble as you. And I don't want to hear from her or from you about how I should lead my life.'

  'Fine.'

  'And, just to make it clear, in case it's not, in your twisted little English mind, wild horses would not drag me out on a…date with you.' She spat out the word 'date' as if it were a stone or a pip.

  'What? You don't think it was me that suggested that, do you?'

  'Well, wasn't it?'

  'Of course it was not!'

  'Aye.'

  'What do you mean, "Aye"?'

  'Ach, sure you've your hands full anyway, with your lady friend.'

  'She is not my lady friend!' shouted Israel.

  George proceeded to tie wire round the fence posts. 'Hold this,' she instructed Israel, and they worked together in silence for some time.

  'She told me about your parents,' said Israel, eventually breaking the silence.

  'Who did?'

  'Veronica. The reporter.'

  'What about them?'

  'You know. The…'

  'What?'

  'The way they…How they died.'

  George was silent again. Israel could see her bite her bottom lip.

  'I just wanted to say how—'

  'Listen, Armstrong,' she said, with barely contained rage. 'I am tolerating you around here, and that's all–tolerating just. D'you understand?'

  Israel remained silent.

  'And I have had just about enough of listening to your nonsense today–do you hear me?–and I would like to be left in peace and quiet, if that's all right? Some of us do
have work to do, if you don't mind.'

  'Right. It's just…I just wanted to say…'

  'Listen! Listen!' She looked at him with something close to hate. 'I don't need you saying anything. All right? Do you understand? Everything's already been said long ago. Do. You. Understand?'

  'Yes. OK. All right. All right. Don't—'

  'I don't need your interfering. I don't need your pity. I don't need you, or anyone else for that matter. What I do need is to get this field stock-proofed.'

  'Fine!'

  'Good! The sooner you learn to leave things you don't understand around here well alone, the better for everyone.'

  'I'm sure.'

  'You can go.' She turned her back on him.

  'What?'

  'I said, you can go.'

  'I thought I was helping you to stock-proof the field.'

  'I'll do it myself.'

  'But—'

  'Go. What are ye, stupit? Can you not see when you're not welcome?'

  He could, actually. It was a feeling with which he was becoming increasingly familiar.

  11

  Israel was not exactly feeling welcome anywhere–not at the farm, not in Tumdrum, not in fact on the whole of the island of Ireland generally, which had not turned out to be the place he had imagined it might be, and if his father had been alive, he'd have called him and told him so. As it was, he'd called his mother a few times, but he didn't like to tell her exactly how he was getting on, in case she said, 'I told you so.' He kept on calling Gloria, but she was always too busy to talk:

  'Hello?' he'd say.

  '—.'

  'It's me.'

  '—.'

  'Israel.'

  '—.'

  'Yeah, sure. I'll call you later.'

  '—.'

  'Yeah. Fine.'

  '—.'

  'No, that's fine. Yeah. OK. Bye. Bye.'

  He missed her. She didn't seem to be missing him.

  He was feeling pretty alone, then, in this godforsaken wasteland, and he most certainly did not expect to find himself feeling welcome in church of all places, but it was strange, he didn't have a problem being here now, in Tumdrum First Presbyterian; there was a Second, also, apparently, according to Mr Devine, and a Third and a Fourth, and if they were all like this then Israel felt he could maybe reconsider his position on the Christian Church, if not indeed on Christianity as a whole. Presbyterians might as well have been theosophists as far as Israel was aware, and they may have practised child sacrifice and believed in every kind of impossible thing, but he liked their style.

  The big double church doors had been wide open when he arrived in town and wedged the mobile library in the nearest on-street parking space, just nudging the kerb, and there may have been a slight bump with the car behind, but nothing major, no lasting damage, and nobody seemed to notice so nobody needed to know.

  And then he checked in his wing mirrors and leapt out of the van and ran inside the church, really sprinted–which was quite a feat, given the state of his old brown brogues and those pinchy combat trousers of Brownie's, and the amount of potatoes he'd been having to eat recently to make up for the lack of any alternative vegetables of any kind or any non-meat protein. He ran as fast as he could, under the circumstances; the last thing he needed was people stopping him and trying to borrow library books; anyone might have thought he was a librarian.

  There'd been no sign of the map of Tumdrum in the post from Amazon.co.uk, or indeed of any post arriving for him at the Devines' whatsoever and he'd decided that before setting out on any more wild-goose chases to Ballygullable–Ballygullable, God–or anywhere else, he'd try the Reverend Roberts at First Presbyterian, who Minnie believed might have a map and who might be able to help him out.

  Inside, Tumdrum First Presybterian was a root-bare kind of a church which looked as though the Reformation had just happened, about half an hour ago, and people had just been in with their lime and whitewash and stripped and scraped out all the craven images and left the place looking sparkling clean and not unlike a fresh-painted gallery waiting to be hung with one or two tastefully abstract paintings; a nice Rothko, maybe, or something done with a roller and a tin of matt emulsion, nothing too challenging or religious. It was a bit like the soft-seating area in a corporate reception: in fact, the church reminded Israel of the reform synagogue he'd sometimes attended with his mother as a child, which was more like a doctor's waiting room than a place of worship; all it would have taken would have been a few dog-eared copies of the National Geographic and the place could have been in business as a kind of giant, open-plan orthodontist's.

  'Yes?' said an elderly, black-suited man, with a face like a gargoyle and a little floral pinny around his waist, who popped up suddenly from behind the large, oak lectern as Israel wandered down the aisle.

  'Bloody hell!' said Israel.

  'Mind your tongue now,' said the man.

  'Sorry. I…Erm. You gave me a hell of a fright there.'

  'Aye,' said the man, who was holding a large multicoloured duster-on-a-stick, which he was now absentmindedly flicking around the lectern. 'But this is a house of God.'

  'Yes. Sorry.'

  'And what would you be wanting exactly?'

  'Erm. Well. You're not the Reverend Roberts by any chance, are you?'

  'That I am not.'

  'Right. Sorry. I was hoping to see the, er, minister.'

  'The Reverend Roberts?'

  'Yes. If that's him.'

  'Aye, it is, surely.'

  'OK. Well, I wonder if I might be able to see him?'

  'Aye. Mebbe.'

  'Is he around?'

  'Well, he's in, but he's out.'

  Oh, God, another comedian. These people gave him a headache.

  'OK,' said Israel pleasantly.

  'Would you be having an appointment at all?' asked the man.

  'No. No, I don't, I'm afraid. Do I need an appointment?'

  'Generally those that don't, do, and those that do, don't.'

  'Erm. Well, I can always come back later if now is not convenient.'

  'Mebbe.'

  'Right. OK. So, where does that—'

  'Would it be a matter of personal and spiritual urgency?'

  'Er. No, not really. It's more sort of business, actually.'

  'Are you selling something?'

  'No. No, I'm not.'

  'Are you sure?'

  'Yes. I'm the new mobile librarian.'

  'You don't have the look of a librarian.'

  Israel was currently sporting a Green Day T-shirt ('AMERICAN IDIOT'), the combat trousers, and his brown brogues and corduroy jacket, most of the rest of his own clothes having now gone mouldy hanging to dry–after he'd washed off all the chicken shit–in the Devines' stinking damp scullery back at the farm. Also he had had to apply another layer of masking tape on the bridge of his glasses to hold them together, so he looked like a down-on-his-luck Second World War fighter pilot, someone who'd perhaps lost both their legs coming down over France and who was now reduced to begging for a living.

  'No. Sorry. It's just, I needed a very quick word with the, er, reverend.'

  'Aye. Right,' said the old gargoyle man. 'Well, take a pew. We'll see what we can do.'

  The man then disappeared somewhere behind the organ.

  Israel sat down in the front pew and stared up at the creamy-white walls and the big grey organ pipes, like some grim industrial machinery: maybe the place could have done with some decoration after all.

  The dark-suited man reappeared.

  'Reverend Roberts is on the phone at the moment. If you come into the robing room, he'll be with you shortly.'

  The man led Israel to the robing room in silence, through a door and down a little corridor and ushered Israel in, and said goodbye.

  'I've just tidied in here,' he said, as his parting shot. 'So don't touch anything.'

  'Right. OK. No, I won't,' promised Israel. 'Definitely not.'

  There was nothing much to t
ouch: the windowless room was as cold and bare as the church, like a cell, in fact, except for a table set in the middle of the room piled high with hymn books, and long low bookshelves all around, and portraits of unsmiling ministers in black and white up on the walls, and a long black gown which hung on the back of the door, which presently opened, and in walked the Reverend Roberts.

  Who was a black man.

  For a moment it was all Israel could see, and he was amazed, flabbergasted: it was like someone had fixed an aerial on the telly, and the world had suddenly gone into colour. He realised he hadn't seen a single person who was not a pure pasty white since he'd arrived, and he felt like going up to this man, this fine example of colour and contrast, and shaking him warmly by the hand just to say thanks. But then he thought better of it: when he was at university and he told people his name, they'd sometimes say to him, 'Some of my best friends are Jewish,' which as a welcome and introduction he'd always felt was rather less than warm, and very possibly a threat, in fact–the implication usually being, 'And therefore this justifies me being a raging anti-Semite.' So he just smiled.

  'Hello,' said the reverend, who towered above Israel, and who had a booming voice born of years of sermonising and stating the sublime and the startlingly obvious, a voice of great echoey depths.

  'Hello,' said Israel, 'you must be the Reverend Roberts?'

  'Ah, it's the dog-collar that always gives me away, isn't it?' said the Reverend Roberts, booming.

  'Right,' said Israel.

  'But please, call me England.'

  'Sorry?' said Israel, hesitating. He could feel a headache coming on. 'Say again? You lost me there. Call you England?'

  'Yes.'

  'Erm…'

  'That's my name.'

  'England?'

  'Yes. I'm from South Africa, as you may be able to tell.'

  And here England boomed a laugh, a 'Ho! Ho! Ho!' as deep and as echoing and as resonant as Paul Robeson doing Santa somewhere in a grotto deep underground, and it was the sweetest, the richest and the most welcomingly ironic sound that Israel had heard since arriving in Ireland.

  'My mother,' he continued, 'was a great admirer of your Queen. And indeed of the whole of your United Kingdom! I have a brother called Scotland, and another called Wales.'

  'You're joking me?'

  'No! Most certainly not. She always wanted us to travel: she thought the names would give us a good start.'

  'You didn't have a brother called Northern Ireland?'

  'Yes. I did, of course, although my mother called him Ireland. Her grasp of post-partition politics was not strong. Ho, ho, ho! But I'm afraid he died shortly after he was born.'