by Ellen Klages
“She used to be such a sweet child.” Blythe sighed. “What are we going to do?”
“Now, now. She’s just at that age,” Edith said calmly. “She’s not really a child anymore. She needs some privacy, and some responsibility. I have an idea.”
And so it was that Dinsy got her own room—with a door that shut—in a corner of the second floor. It had been a tiny cubbyhole of an office, but it had a set of slender curved stairs, wrought iron worked with lilies and twigs, which led up to the turret between the red-tiled eaves.
The round tower was just wide enough for Dinsy’s bed, with windows all around. There had once been a view of the town, but now trees and ivy allowed only jigsaw-puzzle-shaped puddles of light to dapple the wooden floor. At night the puddles were luminous blue splotches of moonlight that hinted of magic beyond her reach.
On the desk in the room below, centered in a pool of yellow lamp-light, Edith had left a note: “Come visit me. There’s mending to be done,” and a worn brass key on a wooden paddle, stenciled with the single word: STACKS.
The Stacks were in the basement, behind a locked gate at the foot of the metal spiral staircase that descended from the 600s. They had always reminded Dinsy of the steps down to the dungeon in The King’s Stilts. Darkness below hinted at danger, but adventure. Terra Incognita.
Dinsy didn’t use her key the first day, or the second. Mending? Boring. But the afternoon of the third day, she ventured down the spiral stairs. She had been as far as the gate before, many times, because it was forbidden, to peer through the metal mesh at the dimly lighted shelves and imagine what treasures might be hidden there.
She had thought that the Stacks would be damp and cold, strewn with odd bits of discarded library flotsam. Instead they were cool and dry, and smelled very different from upstairs. Dustier, with hints of mold and the tang of vintage leather, an undertone of vinegar stored in an old shoe.
Unlike the main floor, with its polished wood and airy high ceilings, the Stacks were a low, cramped warren of gunmetal gray shelves that ran floor to ceiling in narrow aisles. Seven levels twisted behind the west wall of the library like a secret labyrinth that stretched from below the ground to up under the eaves of the roof. Floor and steps were translucent glass brick, and the six-foot ceilings strung with pipes and ducts were lit by single caged bulbs, two to an aisle.
It was a windowless fortress of books. Upstairs the shelves were mosaics of all colors and sizes, but the Stacks were filled with geometric monochrome blocks of subdued colors: eight dozen forest-green bound volumes of Ladies’ Home Journal filled five rows of shelves, followed by an equally large block of identical dark red LIFEs.
Dinsy felt like she was in another world. She was not lost, but for the first time in her life, she was not easily found, and that suited her. She could sit, invisible, and listen to the sounds of library life going on around her. From Level Three she could hear Ruth humming in the Reference Room on the other side of the wall. Four feet away, and it felt like miles. She wandered and browsed for a month before she presented herself at Edith’s office.
A frosted glass pane in the dark wood door said MENDING ROOM in chipping gold letters. The door was open a few inches, and Dinsy could see a long workbench strewn with sewn folios and bits of leather bindings, spools of thread and bottles of thick beige glue.
“I gather you’re finding your way around,” Edith said, without turning in her chair. “I haven’t had to send out a search party.”
“Pretty much,” Dinsy replied. “I’ve been reading old magazines.” She flopped into a chair to the left of the door.
“One of my favorite things,” Edith agreed. “It’s like time travel.” Edith was a tall, solid woman with long graying hair that she wove into elaborate buns and twisted braids, secured with number-two pencils and a single tortoiseshell comb. She wore blue jeans and vests in brightly muted colors—pale teal and lavender and dusky rose—with a strand of lapis lazuli beads cut in rough ovals.
Edith repaired damaged books, a job that was less demanding now that nothing left the building. But some of the bound volumes of journals and abstracts and magazines went back as far as 1870, and their leather bindings were crumbling into dust. The first year, Dinsy’s job was to go through the aisles, level by level, and find the volumes that needed the most help. Edith gave her a clipboard and told her to check in now and then.
Dinsy learned how to take old books apart and put them back together again. Her first mending project was the tattered 1877 volume of American Naturalist, with its articles on “Educated Fleas” and “Barnacles” and “The Cricket as Thermometer.” She sewed pages into signatures, trimmed leather, and marbleized paper. Edith let her make whatever she wanted out of the scraps, and that year Dinsy gave everyone miniature replicas of their favorite volumes for Christmas.
She liked the craft, liked doing something with her hands. It took patience and concentration, and that was oddly soothing. After supper, she and Edith often sat and talked for hours, late into the night, mugs of cocoa on their workbenches, the rest of the library dark and silent above them.
“What’s it like outside?” Dinsy asked one night while she was waiting for some glue to dry.
Edith was silent for a long time, long enough that Dinsy wondered if she’d spoken too softly, and was about to repeat the question, when Edith replied.
“Chaos.”
That was not anything Dinsy had expected. “What do you mean?”
“It’s noisy. It’s crowded. Everything’s always changing, and not in any way you can predict.”
“That sounds kind of exciting,” Dinsy said.
“Hmm.” Edith thought for a moment. “Yes, I suppose it could be.”
Dinsy mulled that over and fiddled with a scrap of leather, twisting it in her fingers before she spoke again. “Do you ever miss it?”
Edith turned on her stool and looked at Dinsy. “Not often,” she said slowly. “Not as often as I’d thought. But then I’m awfully fond of order. Fonder than most, I suppose. This is a better fit.”
Dinsy nodded and took a sip of her cocoa.
A few months later, she asked the Library for a third and final boon.
The evening that everything changed, Dinsy sat in the armchair in her room, reading Trollope’s Can You Forgive Her? (for the third time), imagining what it would be like to talk to Glencora, when a tentative knock sounded at the door.
“Dinsy? Dinsy?” said a tiny familiar voice. “It’s Olive, dear.”
Dinsy slid her READ! bookmark into chapter 14 and closed the book. “It’s open,” she called.
Olive padded in wearing a red flannel robe, her feet in worn carpet slippers. Dinsy expected her to proffer a book, but instead Olive said, “I’d like you to come with me, dear.” Her blue eyes shone with excitement.
“What for?” They had all done a nice reading of As You Like It a few days before, but Dinsy didn’t remember any plans for that night. Maybe Olive just wanted company. Dinsy had been meaning to spend an evening in the Children’s Room, but hadn’t made it down there in months.
But Olive surprised her. “It’s Library business,” she said, waggling her finger and smiling.
Now, that was intriguing. For years, whenever the Librarians wanted an evening to themselves, they’d disappear down into the Stacks after supper, and would never tell her why. “It’s Library business,” was all they ever said. When she was younger, Dinsy had tried to follow them, but it’s hard to sneak in a quiet place. She was always caught and given that awful cherry tea. The next thing she knew it was morning.
“Library business?” Dinsy said slowly. “And I’m invited?”
“Yes, dear. You’re practically all grown up now. It’s high time you joined us.”
“Great.” Dinsy shrugged, as if it were no big deal, trying to hide her excitement. And maybe it wasn’t a big deal. Maybe it was a meeting of the rules committee, or plans for moving the 340s to the other side of the window again. But what if i
t was something special…? That was both exciting and a little scary.
She wiggled her feet into her own slippers and stood up. Olive barely came to her knees. Dinsy touched the old woman’s white hair affectionately, remembering when she used to snuggle into that soft lap. Such a long time ago.
A library at night is a still but resonant place. The only lights were the sconces along the walls, and Dinsy could hear the faint echo of each footfall on the stairs down to the foyer. They walked through the shadows of the shelves in the Main Room, back to the 600s, and down the metal stairs to the Stacks, footsteps ringing hollowly.
The lower level was dark except for a single caged bulb above the rows of National Geographics, their yellow bindings pale against the gloom. Olive turned to the left.
“Where are we going?” Dinsy asked. It was so odd to be down there with Olive.
“You’ll see,” Olive said. Dinsy could practically feel her smiling in the dark. “You’ll see.”
She led Dinsy down an aisle of boring municipal reports and stopped at the far end, in front of the door to the janitorial closet set into the stone wall. She pulled a long, old-fashioned brass key from the pocket of her robe and handed it to Dinsy.
“You open it, dear. The keyhole’s a bit high for me.”
Dinsy stared at the key, at the door, back at the key. She’d been fantasizing about “Library Business” since she was little, imagining all sorts of scenarios, none of them involving cleaning supplies. A monthly poker game. A secret tunnel into town, where they all went dancing, like the twelve princesses. Or a book group, reading forbidden texts. And now they were inviting her in? What a letdown if it was just maintenance.
She put the key in the lock. “Funny,” she said as she turned it. “I’ve always wondered what went on when you—” Her voice caught in her throat. The door opened, not onto the closet of mops and pails and bottles of Pine-Sol she expected, but onto a small room, paneled in wood the color of ancient honey. An Oriental rug in rich, deep reds lay on the parquet floor, and the room shone with the light of dozens of candles. There were no shelves, no books, just a small fireplace at one end where a log crackled in the hearth.
“Surprise,” said Olive softly. She gently tugged Dinsy inside.
All the others were waiting, dressed in flowing robes of different colors. Each of them stood in front of a Craftsman rocker, dark wood covered in soft brown leather.
Edith stepped forward and took Dinsy’s hand. She gave it a gentle squeeze and said, under her breath, “Don’t worry.” Then she winked and led Dinsy to an empty rocker. “Stand here,” she said, and returned to her own seat.
Stunned, Dinsy stood, her mouth open, her feelings a kaleidoscope.
“Welcome, dear one,” said Dorothy. “We’d like you to join us.” Her face was serious, but her eyes were bright, as if she was about to tell a really awful riddle and couldn’t wait for the reaction.
Dinsy started. That was almost word for word what Olive had said, and it made her nervous. She wasn’t sure what was coming, and was even less sure that she was ready.
“Introductions first.” Dorothy closed her eyes and intoned, “I am Lexica. I serve the Library.” She bowed her head once and sat down.
Dinsy stared, her eyes wide and her mind reeling as each of the librarians repeated what was obviously a familiar rite.
“I am Juvenilia,” said Olive with a twinkle. “I serve the Library.”
“Incunabula,” said Edith.
“Sapientia,” said Harriet.
“Ephemera,” said Marian.
“Marginalia,” said Ruth.
“Melvilia,” said Blythe, smiling at Dinsy. “And I, too, serve the Library.”
And then they were all seated, and all looking up at Dinsy.
“How old are you now, my sweet?” asked Harriet.
Dinsy frowned. It wasn’t as easy a question as it sounded. “Seventeen,” she said after a few seconds. “Or close enough.”
“No longer a child.” Harriet nodded. There was a touch of sadness in her voice. “That is why we are here tonight. To ask you to join us.”
There was something so solemn in Harriet’s voice that it made Dinsy’s stomach knot up. “I don’t understand,” she said slowly. “What do you mean? I’ve been here my whole life. Practically.”
Dorothy shook her head. “You have been in the Library, but not of the Library. Think of it as an apprenticeship. We have nothing more to teach you. So we’re asking if you’ll take a Library name and truly become one of us. There have always been seven to serve the Library.”
Dinsy looked around the room. “Won’t I be the eighth?” she asked. She was curious, but she was also stalling for time.
“No, dear,” said Olive. “You’ll be taking my place. I’m retiring. I can barely reach the second shelves these days, and soon I’ll be no bigger than the dictionary. I’m going to put my feet up and sit by the fire and take it easy. I’ve earned it,” she said with a decisive nod.
“Here, here,” said Blythe. “And well done, too.”
There was a murmur of assent around the room.
Dinsy took a deep breath, and then another. She looked around the room at the eager faces of the seven librarians, the only mothers she had ever known. She loved them all, and was about to disappoint them, because she had a secret of her own. She closed her eyes so she wouldn’t see their faces, not at first.
“I can’t take your place, Olive,” she said quietly, and heard the tremor in her own voice as she fought back tears.
All around her the librarians clucked in surprise. Ruth recovered first. “Well, of course not. No one’s asking you to replace Olive, we’re merely—”
“I can’t join you,” Dinsy repeated. Her voice was just as quiet, but it was stronger. “Not now.”
“But why not, sweetie?” That was Blythe, who sounded as if she were about to cry herself.
“Fireworks,” said Dinsy after a moment. She opened her eyes. “Six-sixty-two-point-one.” She smiled at Blythe. “I know everything about them. But I’ve never seen any.” She looked from face to face again.
“I’ve never petted a dog or ridden a bicycle or watched the sun rise over the ocean,” she said, her voice gaining courage. “I want to feel the wind and eat an ice-cream cone at a carnival. I want to smell jasmine on a spring night and hear an orchestra. I want—” She faltered, and then continued, “I want the chance to dance with a boy.”
She turned to Dorothy. “You said you have nothing left to teach me. Maybe that’s true. I’ve learned from each of you that there’s nothing in the world I can’t discover and explore for myself in these books. Except the world,” she added in a whisper. She felt her eyes fill with tears. “You chose the Library. I can’t do that without knowing what else there might be.”
“You’re leaving?” Ruth asked in a choked voice.
Dinsy bit her lip and nodded. “I’m, well, I’ve—” She’d been practicing these words for days, but they were so much harder than she’d thought. She looked down at her hands.
And then Marian rescued her.
“Dinsy’s going to college,” she said. “Just like I did. And you, and you, and you.” She pointed a finger at each of the women in the room. “We were girls before we were librarians, remember? It’s her turn now.”
“But how—?” asked Edith.
“Where did—?” stammered Harriet.
“I wished on the Library,” said Dinsy. “And it left an application in the Unabridged. Marian helped me fill it out.”
“I am in charge of circulation,” said Marian. “What comes in, what goes out. We found her acceptance letter in the book return last week.”
“But you had no transcripts,” said Dorothy practically. “Where did you tell them you’d gone to school?”
Dinsy smiled. “That was Marian’s idea. We told them I was home-schooled, raised by feral librarians.”
And so it was that on a bright September morning, for the first time in ages, th
e heavy oak door of the Carnegie Library swung open. Everyone stood in the doorway, blinking in the sunlight.
“Promise you’ll write,” said Blythe, tucking a packet of sweets into the basket on Dinsy’s arm.
The others nodded. “Yes, do.”
“I’ll try,” she said. “But you never know how long anything will take around here.” She tried to make a joke of it, but she was holding back tears and her heart was hammering a mile a minute.
“You will come back, won’t you? I can’t put off my retirement forever.” Olive was perched on top of the Circulation Desk.
“To visit, yes.” Dinsy leaned over and kissed her cheek. “I promise. But to serve? I don’t know. I have no idea what I’m going to find out there.” She looked out into the forest that surrounded the library. “I don’t even know if I’ll be able to get back in, through all that.”
“Take this. It’s your library card. It will always get you in,” said Marian. She handed Dinsy a small stiff pasteboard card with a metal plate in one corner, embossed with her name: Dinsy carnegie.
There were hugs all around, and tears and good-byes. But in the end, the seven librarians stood back and watched her go.
Dinsy stepped out into the world as she had come—with a wicker basket and a book of fairy tales, full of hopes and dreams.
Afterword
I DIDN'T BEGIN TO WRITE, or take my writing seriously, until I was almost forty. I began to scribble bedtime stories in the middle of the night, the year my mother was dying. They calmed the frightened child I woke up as.
After Mom died, my sister Mary and I went through a box of her letters, and found one she’d written to my grandmother the Christmas I was two-and-a-half: Ellen wants a football helmet. Of course, we’re not going to get her one, but….
I read that and wanted to go back in time and give the kid a football helmet, just to see the delight on her face. Delight should be a daily occurrence—Cookie! Swingset! Green Socks! It became an even scarcer commodity the older and more responsible I got.
I’m still delighted now and then (frequently by things on eBay), but to tap into that (literally) unadulterated sense of delight and wonder, I write myself stories about being a kid.