Library

Chapter 14

It was another two days before the wind and rain finally spent themselves, and Ralph deemed the roads passable. As soon as could possibly be managed, Ivy convinced him to drive her into the village. Arms loaded with books and her ledger, Ivy sat in the back seat, lost in thought as the car puttered along.

The unnerving coincidences between the books and events of the last few days weighed on her. Her head felt jumbled, and when she woke in the mornings, it was impossible to parse the night's dreams from the events of the previous day. Her nightmares of London hospitals and bloody battlefields morphed into dark corridors, hooded figures and ominously tolling bells. The sooner she could get out into the fresh air and out of the stifling walls of the abbey, the better.

She caught Ralph watching her in the mirror. "Bringing any interesting books today?"

The question caught her off guard. "Mostly novels."

"Good," came his curt response.

"I didn't realize you read novels, or anything for that matter."

"I don't."

"What do you like?"

"What do I like?"

"You said you don't like books, so what do you enjoy?"

She couldn't see his face, but she sensed his surprise at being asked.

"Never mind," she said when it became clear he wasn't going to answer. "Forget I—"

"I like to drive," he said, his words quiet but decisive. "I like driving fast and far and not having a single thought in my mind while I do it. I like that it's silent and loud all at once, and that I can forget about everything except the road in front of me."

He so rarely let his guard down, showed her anything besides his prickly exterior. She weighed her next words carefully, aware that whatever she said could serve to either nudge open the door between them, even just a bit, or close it more firmly. "I feel the same about bicycling," she told him finally. "There's a freedom to it."

He made a soft noise of agreement, his eyes still trained on the road. "Freedom," he said. "That's it."

This time, when they lapsed into silence, it felt a little warmer between them.

"Ralph," she said suddenly, "do I strike you as a forgetful person? Or prone to flightiness?"

The pause was so long that she almost thought he hadn't heard her, but then his answer came out low and soft. "No, you don't."

He didn't press why she had asked, but Ivy found herself explaining anyway. "It's just that apparently I've had the same conversation several times with Agnes, and I never remember it. And my head, sometimes it just feels so...so fuzzy, especially when I work in the library."

Another heavy pause. "You must have remembered the conversation the last time though," he said. "Otherwise you wouldn't be telling me about it."

"I don't know why I remember it now. Maybe because I wrote it down right after it happened so I wouldn't forget." After that night, she'd gotten into the habit of recording everything that happened to her every day, no matter how mundane or trivial. As long as she remembered to write in the journal and read it, then nothing should fall through the cracks.

Ralph didn't say anything else, and she let her head fall back against the seat, watching the fields and farms pass. She wasn't certain what she was looking for from him. Reassurance? He was hardly the person to give her that, given his clear dislike for her. If anyone had reason to play tricks on her, it would have been more likely to be Ralph than Agnes. Even Mrs. Hewitt took her position too seriously to engage in deceit and subterfuge. But serious, mercurial Ralph hardly seemed the type to spare time for playing tricks either.

In town, the ground was saturated from all the recent rain, but there was a crispness in the air that promised better weather ahead, and the sun was making a valiant effort at burning through the clouds. She laid out her blanket with a tarpaulin she had found in the stables under it to protect the books from the wetness.

The traffic was slower today, with fewer people out and about looking for books. Her first patron was an older man with thick gray hair and ruddy cheeks in a green jacket, a pipe hanging from the side of his mouth. "I've come to return a book," he said.

Ivy took out her ledger and ran her finger down the columns, trying to place him. She was usually good with names, but for some reason she couldn't for the life of her remember his.

"Henry Bryson," he told her, when it became obvious she couldn't remember.

"Of course. How are you?"

"Well enough. Turned out useful to have that book," the older man told her with a good-natured grin as he handed it back to her. Angry red welts peppered one side of his face, and his left eye was caught in a permanent squint. "Never thought I'd be learning firsthand about bee swarms."

Ivy winced. "I was sorry to hear about what happened. Do you keep bees?"

"That's the thing though, innit? I don't keep 'em, but was thinking of starting a hive. Sell some honey for a little extra pocket change. But after what happened, don't think I'll be bothering with the nasty little buggers."

She wanted to ask him where he had been that an angry swarm of bees had found him, but there was a commotion at the periphery of her vision, and a ripple of movement as her patrons were jostled and pushed aside from the queue.

Where there had only been a handful of people, it now seemed that a crowd had appeared out of nowhere, and everyone was talking on top of each other, shouts of excitement cutting through the rabble.

Mr. Bryson's pipe fell from his mouth, ash spilling on the books. "Lord almighty, it's Harry Oliver and he looks like the devil himself."

Ivy vaguely recognized the name as one of her patrons, but the man who was staggering through the crowd hardly looked human. His neck was grotesquely swollen, pustules the size and color of overripe plums protruding from his collar. A woman shrieked as he grabbed at her coat in a desperate attempt to right himself.

Unable to tear her gaze away from the unfolding horror, Ivy stood rooted as he sank to the ground, his hands at his throat as if he were choking for air.

The hospital where her mother had died had been full of the foulest illnesses and injuries imaginable, but at least those were expected at a hospital, and there was a sort of dark comfort that such things were dealt with in the correct place. This was the middle of a village, with birds singing in the trees, and people going about their daily shopping. Whatever was happening, did not belong here.

"For Christ's sake, someone call a doctor!" The commanding voice cut through the chaos, and soon Ralph's tall frame was pushing through the crowd. "Bunch a' ninnies, standin' about," he muttered as he dropped to his knees beside the convulsing man. "Hand me that blanket, will you?"

Snapped out of her stupor, Ivy snatched the blanket out from under the books and thrust it at Ralph. The man's breaths were coming fast and shallow, and his lips had taken on the putrid shade of bruised meat.

The man's chest rose and fell as Ralph cushioned his head on the blanket, and for a moment, she caught a glimpse of what Ralph must have been like in the field, decisive and imposing, making lightning-fast life-or-death decisions.

It might have been hours or minutes before an ambulance came careening through the village, sending the gawkers and bystanders scattering. Ivy watched in stunned silence as Ralph conferred with the medics and the man was lifted onto a stretcher and then whisked away.

Birdsong gradually returned and the rest of the crowd dispersed, whatever horror they had witnessed relegated to an unpleasantness best left in the past. Hearing a soft sound from beside her, she glanced down to see Ralph's hand at her elbow. His sleeves were still pushed up, a smear of blood smudging his cheek. He looked tired. "My lady," he said. "I'll take you home."

Nodding, she allowed him to lead her to the car. "What—what was that? Will he be all right?"

Ralph was grim-faced as they made their way back across the green, his silence only compounding her fears.

"Wait a moment." Something had caught her eye, and Ivy bent down to find a tented book in the grass. Someone must have dropped it in the commotion. Picking it up, her heart went cold in her chest as she slowly turned it to the title page.

"What is it?" Ralph asked.

She wetted her lips before answering, wishing very much that she hadn't stopped to look. That morning, when she had chosen books for the lending program, she had thought it would make an interesting, if not slightly gruesome addition. Now she saw it through new eyes, and wished she had left it on the shelf.

"It—it's called The Black Plague."

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