On Monday, after a weekend spent almost entirely in my pjs, I approached the bookstore with a different appreciation for it.
Two weeks ago, I dreaded it.
A week ago, I went in imagining that they were fortunate to have me.
Now there was respect…and a far greater understanding.
It was one thing to tell me that they were responsible for keeping dangerous fictional creatures from hurting anyone.
It was quite another to have been involved in it, especially when I saw the cost on E.J.’s face as he looked up from the counter. Dracula must have hit like a hammer with nails embedded in it. His eye was a delightful blend of blue and purple and he’d covered the gashes with a bandage, probably for my benefit more than anyone else’s as I grimaced at his face.
“We still haven’t managed to scare you off.” He remarked.
I opened my mouth to say something smart and altogether arrogant…then stopped.
“You came close.” I admitted soberly.
E.J. eyed me for a moment then nodded. “Maybe Weiss was right to take you on. You seem to have come to an…understanding of what it is we do.”
“And the danger you put yourselves in to do it.” I held up my hands. “Let it be known, I’m no martyr. I don’t want to die for this job.”
“I don’t want anyone to die for this job.” E.J. insisted.
There was a catch in his tone that made me pause.
“E.J.,” I asked slowly, not sure if I wanted to know the answer, “has anyone died for this job?”
E.J.’s blue/grey eyes dimmed a little and my heart did a lurch backwards.
“There have been casualties.” He said softly then looked up. He saw my stricken expression and was quick to add, “but not anyone I’ve been responsible for.”
“What about the girl who worked here before. Jai told me about her.”
“Weiss had to get rid of her.”
The merciless dullness of Weiss’ eyes as she’d told me not to look, her gangly form standing over the tormented victim of Dracula with a wooden stake in her hand, sent me cold to my core.
“What do you mean, got rid of her?”
“She was hopelessly incompetent. Poor penmanship, sloppy reference cards and, breaking the most sacred of taboos, she went into Weiss’ office.”
“She didn’t!” I exclaimed.
“Out the door she went, using language reserved for sailors and bad 80s movies.”
I chuckled. “I thought you didn’t watch movies.”
“Hey, I love a good movie.”
“Nothing made in the 80s was good.”
The light hearted banter was a welcomed relief after the seriousness of the topic before.
“Where is Weiss?” I asked.
“She had to go deal with the Dracula problem once and for all.”
“I thought it, he, had been taken care of.” I said nervously.
“Oh he’s gone. That’s the problem.” E.J. waved his hand. “Sam, you can’t know everything all at once. And Weiss left you a stack of notes to write up.”
I dutifully went to my place and began the long, systematic task of reference card writing.
E.J. stayed in the bookstore, looking tired.
“Why don’t you go have a sleep?”
“You’re not to be left alone in here.”
“Weiss doesn’t trust me yet.”
“Weiss doesn’t trust anyone.”
I glanced at him. “She trusts you, though, right?”
“Out of necessity I think,” he admitted, “and it’s been just the two of us for so long, I was really surprised she hired you at all.”
“She needed the help.” I chuckled, able to see the funny side of the comment.
“Don’t mistake her coldness for a lack of compassion.”
The sentence made me pause and I stared at the reference card for a while then looked at E.J. I think we were both recalling the same memory. Even though I hadn’t seen her do it, my imagination filled in the blanks after I looked away and Weiss ended the woman’s suffering.
“Wasn’t there any other way to help her?” I asked quietly.
“No. And that’s the worst part.” E.J. sighed. “I know it’s changed the way you see Weiss but really, am I any different for having dispatched Dracula?”
“He wasn’t a real, living person.” I insisted.
“You do this job for long enough, you’ll start to question your adolescent all knowing assumptions.” E.J. leaned forward. “Sam, had I let Dracula go, he would have built a harem of deformed vampires of young women who are defenceless to his attacks. Trying to get to dangerous characters before they hurt someone is our primary goal. We were too late in this instance. In order to have risen as a vampire, according to Bram Stoker and the rules placed upon his creation of Dracula, she had to die after drinking his blood. What happened to her after she rose from the grave, the violence and thirst for blood even as her body fell apart…that was torture to what remained of her mind. Weiss knew that and ended her torment.”
I shook my head. “I don’t think I could ever do something like that, even out of ‘compassion’.”
“You’re not meant to. That’s what I do and, only when she has to, Weiss does.”
I wished desperately for a way to change the topic. I couldn’t think of one that wasn’t totally obvious so I asked a side question that had been bugging me.
“Now I know my information on Dracula is a little screwy after all the movies about vampires,” I confessed, “but I still saw no mention of him being flammable.”
E.J. laughed outright then groaned as the motion jarred his ankle. “Sorry Sam, I’m not laughing at you. I’m laughing at the things I take for granted that I assumed you would know or realise.”
“Okay…”
“The fictional characters that break through into our world seem very real. The well written characters are downright impossible to detect from the rest of the world unless they have obvious physical differences. But no matter what they look like or their physical abilities, they do have one major flaw.”
I stared at him. “And you’re going to tell me what that flaw is?”
E.J. leaned forward. “Sam, what are characters made out of?”
I paused. “Imagination?”
He laughed again then put his hand to his head. “No Sam, even more basic than that.” I frowned and shrugged. “A writer imagines a character, their nature, their appearance and name…it swirls around up here,” he tapped his head, “until the writer picks up a…”
“Pen or pencil,” I said softly, “and then is written down on…paper.” E.J. nodded at me. “You mean, they’re made of paper?”
“The connection is the flammability of paper.”
I closed my eyes. “That’s why there were none of those creatures left that chased us in the sewer and why Dracula went up in the blink of an eye.”
“It’s also why I had a hard time getting a beat on him.” E.J. explained. “The dirtbag turned to fog…really hard to set fog on fire.”
I blinked and shook my head. “This job just gets weirder and weirder.”
“Yep, it really does.”
Weiss didn’t get back to the store until after midday. She walked in, pushing her glasses up her nose, pulling a book out of her handbag.
“How is E.J.?” She asked.
I put my finger to my lips and pointed behind the counter. She looked over at him, asleep on the floor.
“He wouldn’t leave me on my own,” I assured her, “so I got him a pillow. Those painkillers are great sedatives.”
“Indeed.” She walked by me and went to the switchboard. She must have gotten the book earlier as the code was already entered. It was easy enough to see the name on the cover before the clockwork creepy hand grabbed it.
“Dracula. Haven’t you had enough of that guy?”
“I had to put him back where he belongs.” She said, watching the book fly up into rafters, sliding into place. “Any deliveries?” Weiss was not afraid of a stare and I caught myself looking at her, trying to see the woman who had dispatched a real person because of what a fictional character had irrevocably done to them. She stood with her grey hair tied back in a messy bun with her eyes distorted by the thick lenses of her glasses. She couldn’t look any less like a killer in her sloppy batwing top over leggings and boots. She looked like a librarian and the scariest thing that would come out of her mouth would be, ‘shush’, if you disturbed the silence her books rested in.
E.J. was right. The Weiss I’d seen the other night was a far cry from this one. And, upon looking back at the moment with greater understanding, I guess I could see that the hardness on her face was not mercilessness, but rather, the determination to do what was necessary.
“I put them on the filing cabinet closest to your office.” I said and she nodded, walked away, scooped up several books and disappeared behind a firmly shut door.
It had to be said that E.J. was warming up to me. I treated him like an old man, he treated me like a kid and we had some laughs in between.
Those given to aspirations of psychology might be quick to point out that he filled a ‘dad’ role in my life that had been lacking for far too long. But it wasn’t as if we were working on the car together, having the talks about what I was going to be when I was older…we talked about books and the deadly creatures that were just waiting for the chance to jump out of the pages at us.
I mean, who else were we going to talk about that sort of stuff with?
Weiss seemed almost completely humourless and though we spent more time together, I didn’t get the impression that she liked me. I was tolerated because I didn’t mess up the clockwork filing system and I was careful with the reference cards to the point of being paranoid. Apart from that, she kept her distance.
Maybe she was scared if, she actually came to like me, that she might be forced to put me out of my fictional misery should a Dracula character do something irreversible to me.
It was one of many, baseless, theories I’d made up in my head about her. So far, none of them had rung true.
“Books and their notes.” She announced unnecessarily as she put them beside my current pile. I groaned and looked at them and then at the pile I still had to do. “You are falling behind.”
“Tell me about it.” She blinked at me and opened her mouth. I held up my hand. “On second thoughts, don’t. I’ll get there, I promise.” I breathed out and allowed myself a momentary pause to check my phone that was buzzing. A few of my friends were going out Thursday night and wanted to know if I could come. “Not ruddy likely.” I muttered but text back that I would see how work went then put my phone away. I felt rather than saw Weiss’ glare and looked up. “A thirty second break. It doesn’t hurt, you know.”
“Perhaps not. But perhaps you spend more time on it than you realise.”
That was unfortunately true.
“You know,” I said, twisting to face her, “this system,” I waved my hand to the filing cabinets, the shelves crammed with books and the switchboard, “would work much more efficiently if it was on a computer. I mean, these filing systems are hopelessly outdated.”
Weiss stared at me blankly. E.J. was sitting behind me at the counter with his foot up. He’d taken to sitting in the shop with me occasionally and the company was nice.
I heard E.J. chuckle. “I wouldn’t go there, Sam.”
“I’m serious.” I insisted. “This whole operation would move in the blink of an eye if it was digitised.”
Weiss leaned down. Instinctively I wanted to flinch away from her googly gaze but held my ground.
“Prove it.” She said.
“How?”
“We will both search for the name of a character or creature, you on your phone and me with my outdated filing system.”
I smiled. Now this was a competition I knew I could win.
“Alright.”
Weiss turned to E.J. “Ask us to find an obscure detail in a book.”
“Obscure detail, huh?” E.J. thought about it.
“And don’t just blurt it out.” I muttered. “Give us a countdown.”
“Life rarely gives you a countdown.” E.J. retorted. His face wasn’t the bloodied, bruised mess it had been. The bandage was gone and his forehead just had a large piece of gauze over the strips. He was still on crutches as he’d slipped and made it bad again after insisting he could inspect the blockades in the warehouse district.
Klutz.
“Okay,” he cleared his throat, “I want you to tell me the name of the man who preceded the expedition and whose footsteps they followed in, ‘Journey to the Centre of the Earth’.”
Out came my phone, my fingers flying and racing over the smooth surface as I worded the question the best way I could.
The first entry was the most recent movie’s interpretation which I dismissed straight away. Movie references were not to be relied upon. I was starting to remember than lesson. I could hear Weiss working her way through the cabinets but she wasn’t rushing, so sure she was of her antiquated filing system. I flicked through the responses and tapped on a website that had a detailed description of it. My eyes raced along the information, searching for what I needed to find…
“Arne Saknussemm,” Weiss announced, dropping the book on the cabinet in front of me. “a Spanish explorer who preceded the expedition in the tale that Jules Verne told by three hundred years.”
I looked up at her in astonishment and then looked at E.J. “That’s the one.” E.J. nodded. “My favourite book. So much for technology.”
“The internet is a bit slow in here,” I insisted, sure I could do better, “and anyway, how was I supposed to pronounce that?”
“Alright, I’ll give you a beginner level question.” E.J. said and I bristled at the condescension. “Weiss, you ready?”
“Always.”
I couldn’t understand how she was able to get away with superiority and my confidence just came across as arrogance but before I could ponder it, E.J. said,
“The name of the man who went overboard in Treasure Island.”
This time I tried voice command search on my phone. After a false start, in which it insisted I had asked about hoverboards and tried to tell me about the ‘Back to the Future’ movies, I abandoned voice search and hunted for the name, leaping at the first instance I found that looked legit.
“Samuel Branson!” I declared loudly out of desperation, sure Weiss was dead on my heels.
E.J. made a noise. “Wrong!”
“What?!”
“Mr Arrow, who was known for being a drunkard, fell overboard on the Hispaniola,” Weiss announced and I cringed, “and as the Captain had ordered all alcohol locked away, it is presumed that one of the pirates, masquerading as respectable crew, slipped him liquor. Whether or not he tumbled overboard because he was drunk or he was pushed, no one knows for certain but his death made way for more of Long John Silver’s associates to rise in authority on the ship.” I bristled as she laid the book in front of me. “Page seventy two.”
I glared at the book as if it were the source of all my problems.
“Pretty sure you just found the name of a guy who went overboard on his boat, The Treasure Island.” E.J. sipped his coffee.
Yeah, I’d figured that out about five seconds after E.J. had told me I was wrong.
“Shall we get back to my antiquated way of doing things?”
I tried to be gracious in defeat. “Fine, so you know your system and it works,” I offered as though it were a consolation prize…even though it was clear even to me that I’d been trumped, “but with the right system and software, you could have all this,” I waved my hand at the filing cabinets, “on a custom built program that you could put on a USB drive or even store it online and access it anywhere.”
“I have no reason to go anywhere.” Weiss replied tersely.
I threw up my hands in frustration, put my head down and kept writing. I’d be here until midnight at this rate.
“Kid’s got a point, Weiss.” Well, that was unexpected. Weiss and I both looked at E.J. who was sipping his black coffee. “It might pay to have the system digitised.” where was this guy from? Tron? “After all, if anything were to happen to all this,” he said, looking around, “you would, quite literally, have to start from scratch.”
I don’t know how he managed to hold Weiss’ gaze. I felt myself shrinking away, shrivelling up like a worm caught on the pavement on a hot day. E.J. gazed steadily at Weiss with a small smile on his face, as if he found her ire amusing.
I was not amused.
Neither, I think, was she.
She turned on her heel and stalked into her office. I’m not saying she slammed her door in a fit of childish tantrum…but the force of the door closing did make the clockwork retrieval scaffolding above our heads, rattle and twang.
I glanced at E.J. and pulled a face.
“I’d keep my head down for a few days if I was you.” He said, getting up, attempting to carry his coffee and use the crutches at the same time.
I paused. “Why did you back me up?” I asked as he got to the door. “I’m mean, it’s not like you’re Mr Technology.”
“I’d hate for all the work that has been accumulated in this place to be lost.”
“You get it,” I said then jerked my head towards her office, “why doesn’t she?”
“She’s worked hard to make this place what it is,” E.J. looked around, “this is her world, her sanctuary and her reason.”
“Reason for what?”
He tapped his nose infuriatingly and hobbled out.
My conversations with Weiss over the next couple of days consisted of a maximum of two word answers to questions and absolutely no openings for any discussions. It was hard when I knew I could go so much faster on a computer than I could with a pen and reference card.
Heck, I even knew where to start. There were heaps of programs that were already written for cross referencing and details. Using one of them as a base, with the knowledge of how to add more categories, one program could take the place of all the filing cabinets. If she wanted to, Weiss could get rid of them altogether and put ten foot high shelves down the middle of the room that could house hundreds more books.
But it was just like talking to my mother.
The old ways are the best ways. We survived before technology and we’ll survive after the robot-apocalypse uprising has wiped out all the internet and computers.
Geez…why are people so afraid of the future?
And it’s not like we’re talking about barcodes branded on our bodies or GPS chips inserted in our heads.
I managed to catch up on the reference cards and had only to wait until Weiss dumped the day before’s deliveries next to me to have something to do. She was being uncharacteristically antisocial…wait, no, that’s the way she was all the time.
The highlights in my day were the book deliveries and Jai Giri. The parcel deliverer didn’t stay for long but Jai was always up for a chat. Today, however, he came in with a large box.
“Hey Sam, give me a hand?”
“Yeah, sure…I guess?” I helped him unloaded a few more boxes and then, to my surprise, he heaved an office chair out of his van. “What’s all this?”
“I thought you knew.” Jai said, surprised. “Weiss told me you needed a computer with all the trimmings and a chair that,” he slid it behind the counter and jacked it up high, “would work at this height. The counter is high so you’ve got a foot stand for your feet.”
“Wait,” I looked at the boxes, “this is all computer gear…for me?”
“Yeah. You really didn’t know?”
I shook my head numbly.
Jai took my muted state to mean that I didn’t have a clue how to set a computer up. He went about doing so, explaining it all to me in bite sized little explanations. By the time I’d shaken off the stupor, he was plugging it all in and kicking polystyrene out of the way with his feet and I didn’t have the heart to tell him I’d custom built several computers including my own in my room.
Still, it gave him something to do.
He turned it on and let it load.
“Give it a few minutes and then just say yes to pretty much anything it asks.” Well, I wouldn’t because I didn’t like some of the auto features inferring with my programming but I smiled and nodded. “You be alright?”
“I’m sure I’ll figure it out from here. Thanks Jai.”
“Oh,” he picked up a box, “Weiss also said you’d need a tablet to be able to interact with the system.”
I took the box, numb again and looked at the screen that was glowing and doing its, coming to life, download a million files, thing.
“If you need any help, let me know!” Jai waved and left.
I just stared at the computer. I didn’t know what to think.
“Is it adequate?”
I turned and saw Weiss standing a few feet away as though she might burst into flames if she got too close to the infernal machine and its evil devices. Her face was stony and her eyes were diamond cold.
“Adequate?” I repeated softly, still not really sure it all meant.
“For the creation of a program that will allow all this,” she gestured to the cabinets, “to become eternal.”
Did she mean it? Really? Really and truly?
“Yeah, I think so.”
She nodded. “I gave the concept to Jai and he put together a list of items required but if you need anything else, let him know…within reason.”
She turned and started to walk away.
“I’ll build you a great program.” I blurted, sensing a sad sort of defeat in her. I didn’t realise that, upon conceding to my point, I would injure her so badly. I wanted to reassure her that it was money and trust well spent, that her sacrificed pride would pay for something amazing. “I promise. All this,” I gestured to the cabinets, “will go in here and be just as viable. You won’t even need the cabinets.”
“The filing system stays.” She said quietly and I realised I had, inadvertently again, insulted her hard work.
“Yeah, yeah of course! The filing system is primary. My program will always be second place, like a backup. I promise.”
Oh the joys of working on a computer with its own little modem to speed up the internet connection tenfold. I practically leapt into work, researching all manner of programs, whittling down what we needed and what was available to try to get the best one. Then it was just a matter of tweaking it as I went.
Of course there was the inevitable and arduous task of entering all the information into the program which I was not looking forward to. But I didn’t complain. Not once.
My head went down and I was kept busy from the moment I arrived to the time I left.
I looked up on Thursday afternoon and cracked my neck. I’d been leaning in towards the screen.
Abruptly I was aware of someone standing by my shoulder and I yelped loudly.
“You scare easily.” Weiss said, standing behind me.
“You try not jumping out of your skin when someone sneaks up behind you.” I exclaimed then pointed to the screen. “It’s starting to take shape now. What do you think?”
Weiss raised an eyebrow and stared at it.
“It does not resemble the filing cabinets at all.” She remarked.
“It was never going to,” I admitted, “but, let’s take my monumental internet failure of the other day and look for that guy who fell over the side of the boat.”
“Ship.”
“That thing,” I nodded, “now, you can search by book title, character, name of notable objects, creature classification etc or you can do a general search. It’s a program that resembles an online used book seller so that people can find what they are looking for.”
“I am very familiar with such programs.” Weiss assured me.
“Yeah, only in this instance, no one is buying anything of course. But that kind of website, the program behind it, allows for any kind of books to come up that might be related to your search. So, if I put, ‘Treasure Island’, into the random search bar and click go,” there weren’t that many entries as putting in all the information would take months but ‘Treasure Island’ had been the first as it had highlighted both my failure and the need for digital copy of the system, “see, all the search results pop up. And you can filter them by book, title, author, character etc,” I clicked on the character button and a list came up, “and each character has its own tab so that you can find details about them, which helps when you need to know if they die or not.”
I looked at Weiss. While I knew she wasn’t the most animated of characters, I had hoped for an encouraging smile or head nod.
She blinked.
I suppose that was something.
“How long will it take to implement the reference cards to the system?”
“Weeks upon weeks.” I admitted. “Once I’ve got this running how I want it to, I’ll start alphabetically with book titles. Then, when I get to the characters, creatures, evil and benign, I’ll cross reference them back to the books they came from. The main thing we need to be careful of is if new books come in that I miss because I’m further along in the alphabet.”
“So you would be better off imputing the notes I take straight into the system?”
She seemed to be understanding the concept which was encouraging.
“The book titles at the very least and then, when I get to the sub categories, I’ll come across all the information anyway.”
Weiss nodded.
“This is a system I believe we can utilise.”
I’m actually glad E.J. stormed in at that moment because I wasn’t sure what else to say, so dumbfounded was I at receiving, what I was going to take as, a compliment from the grey haired librarian.
We both looked at E.J. who was attempting to stomp his feet in anger, despite the fact that he was still leaning on his crutches.
“What is it?” Weiss asked. E.J.’s jaw was tight. He handed her his phone. She looked at it then raised those eyebrows that were so sharp, they could cut glass. “An all agent alert? A target eluded capture?”
“Unbelievable!” E.J. exclaimed. “A dozen agents and the guy just slips right past them and then they get to summon help from all over, demanding that every agent drops what they’re doing to fix their mistake…and here I am, one man patrolling an area that should be covered by half a dozen agents and I’d be terminated if I let one go!”
“Seriously?” I asked. “They’d fire you if something or someone escaped your area…unless we’re using terminated in different ways?”
“Fired.” E.J. clarified.
“What’s their problem?”
“Complacency based upon the erroneous assumption that numbers fill the gap where experience and talent ought to be.” Weiss said quietly. “Did they at least identify the character?”
“They know he is human and from a period era book series, like ‘A Christmas Carol’. Quite frankly I think all they’ve seen is a top hat and have guessed as much from there.”
“That is not much to go on.” Weiss said softly. “Did they say where?”
“Towards the Southbank of the river. They’ve got the area somewhat fenced by agents in so unless he opts to swim…”
“Southbank of the river?” I snorted. “Are you kidding me? That place is full of restaurants, a casino, live music and heaps of piers for ferries to dock at. Not only will they not find him, he’d only have to hitch a ride on a ferry and skip across the river at its next docking.” Weiss and E.J. looked at me. “It’s the kind of place you like to go, even if you have no money to spend there.” I explained. “It makes you feel like you’ve got a million dollars.”
“Then you and I should make tracks.” E.J. announced.
“You are not going anywhere.” Weiss said firmly and E.J. groaned. “Your ankle is badly hurt and if you are not careful, you will break it which will take much longer to heal.”
“It’s an all agent alert, Weiss.” E.J. argued. “It’s another one of those, don’t show up and you’re out, ultimatums.”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“And had you informed anyone of your injury, you might have been spared the call out.”
“Ryder and Patch would love that.” By the way he spoke, I guessed these people were not ones E.J. wanted to expose any kind of vulnerability to. It was strange. Apart from the tiny group of people he worked with, I didn’t think E.J. knew anybody at all.
“You only need to send someone from your area. Sam is perfectly capable of being a presence to quell their requirements for someone to represent you.”
“Yeah, I’m perfectly capable.” I put a little more emphasis on perfectly.
“A body is all that is required.”
Okay, that was unnecessary.
“We know nothing about the character. He could be anyone or anything. It could be a vampire again.” Suddenly my heart was hiding behind my ribcage, quivering in a corner. I must have paled because when E.J. blue/grey eyes lit upon me, he immediately looked guilty. “Not that there’s any reason to think so.” He added lamely.
I hesitated. The last time I’d gone willingly into a situation like this I’d nearly wound up one of Dracula’s converts…or at the very least I would have been wearing turtlenecks for a couple of weeks.
I turned to Weiss. “What if you went with me?”
Weiss’ eyes opened in surprise but it was E.J. who half exclaimed, “Weiss?”
“Yeah? Why, what’s the problem?” I looked at E.J. and then back to Weiss. “Think of it as supervised field work.”
Weiss’ mouth was firm. I sensed I had somehow blundered onto a taboo subject and was desperately thinking of a way to make a strategic retreat.
“That would be acceptable.” She conceded and it took all my concentration not to let my jaw fall open.
“Great…” It suddenly occurred to me that I had just volunteered to spend at least two hours with a woman who was yet to admit if she even liked me a little. At best I was just tolerated out of necessity.
“We should leave at once.”
“Um…should we take your car?” I asked E.J.
“Won’t do you any good. Weiss doesn’t have a licence and I don’t think we should risk your driving a car twice in less than a week with an adult in the front seat but who technically can’t be called a responsible driver.”
“Taxis will get stuck in the rush hour traffic. Train it is.”
It only took two minutes of Weiss being on a train for me to wonder if I hadn’t made a terrible mistake. She clearly wasn’t at ease, holding onto a strap and standing up, trying to keep an imaginary bubble around herself as passengers came and went. When a spare double seat opened up I lunged for it and jerked my head for her to sit with me. She did so, her hands primly in her lap but sitting stiffly upright as if she lacked the ability to relax.
“Not a fan of trains?” I asked.
“Inanimate objects do not trouble me,” she flinched as a mother with her three scrabbling children pushed past us, “it is the people I have trouble being around.”
I began to wonder if that was the reason for her working in a bookstore all alone apart from E.J. Perhaps Weiss had a fear of crowds or people she didn’t know. I wasn’t sure if people-phobia was a thing but given the way Weiss was doing her utmost to keep clear, I thought she could be the primary case study.
“Hey Weiss,” I began, not really sure where I was going with it but becoming equally as agitated about every person that went anywhere near her as she was because I wasn’t sure how she would ultimately react, “I have a question about the bookstore.”
She glanced at me briefly. I had shown interest in her beloved bookstore. That was bound to get her attention. Now to come up with a question for it.
“What is it?” She asked.
“Um,” I thought furiously, “there have to be millions of books in the world, right?”
“Yes, I thought that was obvious.”
Ease off the condescension, Weiss, I’m just trying to help.
“But not all of them are fantasy. Yet all we seemed to get in our deliveries are fantasy books. Is that on purpose? Is there another place where romances go? And another for cold war, spy verses spy books go?”
She swallowed and I could see she was concentrating hard on answering my question, pulling her attention away from her people-phobia.
“Throughout the years, the trend has been that characters from fantasy stories are the ones most likely to break through. Fantasy allows the reader to escape the life they are living into a world where normal rules do not apply.”
“Aren’t all fiction books fantasy in some way?”
“To an extent.” Weiss admitted. “Which is why ‘Beyond The Page’ has a collection of non fantasy genre books that do have fictional characters in them which have broken through occasionally.”
“Such as?”
“‘Pride and Prejudice’ by Jane Austen.” She eyed me sharply. “Even if you have not read the author, surely you would have seen the movies and tv series?”
“Oh yeah, I know about them.” Vaguely, oh so vaguely. “Are they popular?”
Weiss gave a little huff which could have been a laugh or a sad sigh, it was hard to tell.
“Some, in fact most, books, fade into obscurity, blending into the background of all the stories that have gone before it. They might be popular, may even be best sellers but many will quietly drift out of knowledge, remembered by those who read and loved them. But there are some books,” Weiss leaned a little closer as though whispering the secret of the universe, “some authors, that have withstood the test of time and transcend the writing fashions. Their books never date, even though they may be hundreds of years old, and their tales go on after those who have written the words and imagined the characters have fallen into dust.”
My skin prickled at the thought, of books so timeless that they were never forgotten.
Weiss nodded, seeing she had caused me to understand.
“A copy of these books, the canon, as decided by the Agency, is accessible at any time by the agents. Every nexus point has them and, in some cases, they are first editions and are extremely valuable.” She tilted her head. “Do you recall the first week you worked for me, E.J. brought a woman into the store and I escorted her out the back?”
“Yeah, I wondered where she had gone.” My eyes widened. “Wait, was she a work of fiction?”
“A work of art, some might argue, for that was Elizabeth Bennet, Jane Austen’s most famous and most complex character ever written.”
“But,” I shook my head, “she’s not fantasy…I mean, she’s not dragons and dwarf fantasy. If the trend is towards the fantasy genre, how would someone like her fall through into our world?”
Weiss smiled and it was odd to see her so soft.
“She is half of one of the greatest love stories ever told where crisis, prejudice, hopelessness and deception all fought for the final word, yet the story ended with love. People all look for love in their lives and many women look forward to a Mr Darcy in their future. Does it not surprise you that, in a world where the books on bookshelves change constantly, yet, on a single table, you will always find a collection of books that never go out of style? ‘Pride and Prejudice’ is one of those books. It is a story of love and of redemption.”
I thought about this for a while, rocking backwards and forwards as the train stopped and started, the world shifting about me like it was on its way to tell one story while I was still riveted in this one.
“What are your thoughts?”
“I think the job would be easier if the incursions were more like Miss Bennet than Dracula.”
“Much easier,” Weiss agreed, “however, when you look at the trend, the obsessions that people have with the darkness…”
“Wait, obsession with darkness?”
Weiss, who had been looking out of the window at the big buildings that whipped past us, climbing higher and higher against the sky as we ventured closer to our destination, glanced at me.
“Surely you are not ignorant of this world’s interest in the darkness?” I wasn’t really sure what she meant.
“You mean, we like the night life?”
I felt like she wanted to give me one of her withering looks when the speaker system chimed and said we were pulling into the station we needed. I stood up and, with Weiss, joined the queue heading for the exit. I felt bad for her. There were so many people about. The Southbank was extremely popular with locals and tourists and on a fine night like this was turning into, the promenade was going to be packed.
There was nothing I could do about it but take my place in the crushing crowds, heading for the stairs. I waited at the top for Weiss who was one of the last to come up. It was then that I realised there was no need to be one of the first. I could have waited with her. It’s not like it had saved me very much time at all. Thirty seconds at most.
She followed my lead as we walked through the station and onto the start of the promenade which went along Southbank. The sun was glancing its hot rays off the river and the glare was formidable.
“Should we start walking or…”
“Let us wait until our sight is not hampered by the harshness of the sun.”
I wasn’t going to argue. We found a bench beneath a tree and waited, people walking down the promenade from the station and others coming towards us, heading for the station.
“So what did you mean about the obsession with the darkness?”
It was a strange conversation to be having when surrounded by people on a busy, well lit promenade.
“Bram Stoker wrote ‘Dracula’ over one hundred years ago. He conceived of a creature that had spurned God and death and descended into darkness, imbued with power and a hunger for blood yet never satiated. He destroyed lives, kidnapped children and adults, forced himself into dominance of a wife over the love she had for her husband and would have continue to build his empire until the world turned to dust. He was the epitome of evil, a devil here on earth. Now,” she looked around, “vampires are worshipped and seen as some kind of culture, superior to humans and desirable. There are those that would happily give up almost anything to have the kind of power.”
“Yeah, but that’s because not all vampires are bad.”
“See, even you have found the darkness acceptable.” Weiss eyed me and I felt my certainty waver. “Now, books are written that glorify the darkness, the evil written in such a way that you feel sorry for it, that it is simply misunderstood. Not the people, the evils contained therein.”
I thought about this as the sun sank lower and the glare became a little more bearable.
“But people aren’t that much different a hundred years ago to what we are today. I mean, civilisation has changed but people, fundamentally, we haven’t changed all that much. You can’t tell me that a hundred years ago, there weren’t ‘I love vampires’ clubs and darkness was held up as something to be admired.”
“You are correct,” Weiss said calmly and I nearly fell off the bench, “people have not changed as much as they would like to think so. But the worship that hid beneath the cracks is now common place and held in high esteem and not just in one place, but globally as movies and literature soars worldwide at the touch of a button.” She shook her head. “For all your permissions, you have yet to understand freedom.”
I did not like where this line of questioning was going, challenging my preconceived ideas.
“The light has dimmed to acceptable levels. We should go.”
I dutifully followed Weiss along the promenade. It stretched for a long way and was filled with green hills overlooking the river, cafes, restaurants and all the outdoor entertainment you could ask for. The river was littered with ferries loaded with music, dancing and even more restaurants. It was even busier than usual with street performers on stilts and so many sequins, feathers, sparkling high heels and eye shadow that I found it hard to know where to look.
“The festivities will make it easier to spot our interloper.”
I looked at Weiss in surprise.
“How can you see any one person through all this?” I demanded.
Weiss drew me to one side. “The Agency reported a top hat and that the character was probably from a Victorian or even Elizabethan era novel. In a rainbow of colour, they are bound to stick out.”
“How so?”
“Because the trend at the time, was black.” I thought about this and realised she was right. Almost never had I seen anyone depicted in a top hat that was any colour other than black. The outfit was usually black too. “Unless they have changed their clothes, in which case I doubt they will be found for a long time, you are looking for someone dressed in black, possibly in a long coat and tails with a top hat. They will look bewildered or lost, searching for meaning or a grip on the reality of the world they have stumbled into.” She put her hand on my shoulder. I noticed she made sure not to grip the shoulder that Dracula had dug his talons into. “Sam, they may be frightened and very much alone.”
I nodded and Weiss did the same.
“I will look through some of the darker places. You stay in the light.”
“What if I find him?”
“Most of the time you can engender trust simply by understanding where they have come from. They will look to you for guidance. Guide them back to ‘Beyond The Page’. E.J. will take it from there and I will follow. And whatever you do, do not hand him over to the Agency and do not make a scene.”
Before I could ask why, she slipped away, from my side, disappearing into the crowds.
With no real hope that I would spy this guy that they were so intent on capturing, I walked casually along the promenade, trying not to look like I was hunting for someone. The crowds were thick and the music was loud. It was kind of hard to concentrate.
I moved down the promenade, around the apex of the river were it curved, creating a sort of pinnacle of land that joined up to the other side by a number of bridges.
Yep, this would be the place to lose people who were trying to follow you.
I didn’t have to be James Bond or Jason Bourne to recognise that.
I was just pondering over the fact that both of those secret spy movie types had that initials, J.B., when someone grabbed by arm.
I confess, since the Dracula moment and finding out just how flammable the characters are, I kept a lighter in the pocket of my pants at all times. A bit like the cross tucked beneath my top, it was a reassurance that I was ready for anything.
So when I was yanked around, my hand was already lunging for it.
“Sam!” I froze when I saw Lucas standing behind me with Willow and James nearby.
I gave a short laugh, relieved I didn’t have to incinerate anyone and released my death grip on the lighter.
“Hey guys, what are you doing here?”
“Um…we said we were going to the promenade for the Maadi Gras, remember?”
I blinked, my world shifting so fast from my work life to my neglected personal life that I was struggling to keep up.
“That was tonight?”
“Yeah, isn’t it a blast!”
Suddenly Willow’s makeup made sense. She’d probably had it done at one of the booths around the promenade. Willow had even braved heels, helping her five foot two inch height attempt to reach James who was near six foot. He wore no glitter or feathers but he was wearing fitted leather trousers that had a bit of a sheen to them, pointed shoes and a simple white t-shirt. Lucas was dressed as he always was, black on black and the only glitter on him had probably fallen off one of Willow’s ridiculously long eyelashes.
“Not really my thing but, gotta love a parade!” Lucas chuckled. “Why didn’t you say you were coming? We would have waited for you.”
“Oh, I’m not here.” I paused. “I mean, I am…”
They all laughed like I was being hilariously funny. Lucas’ eyes were a bit glassy and I wondered what he’d been smoking before coming out. His casual habit was more regular than I think he’d admit too.
“Come on! We don’t want to miss the party boat with all the drag queens on it!”
“I can’t.” I finally admitted. “I’m working.” They stared at me for a moment then erupted into laughter. “I’m serious.”
“What work could you possibly be doing on a Thursday night at the promenade during Maadi Gras?” Lucas grabbed me and for a moment I wanted to slug him. Smoking and drinking. He turned me around to face the colourful backdrop of the promenade. “Seriously, do any of these guys look like they’re working?”
I went to reply when I suddenly saw a figure in black leaning against the decorative fence that ran around the edge of the riverbank. He looked like he was dressed in a coat with tails that hung down to the backs of his knees. He wasn’t wearing a top hat but there was something off about him that didn’t fit the rest of the festivities. Even Lucas, dressed in black, looked like he was part of the crowd.
Whoever this was, they were displaced.
“I gotta go.” I said, instantly and completely distracted. I don’t know how they felt about being sidelined. I wished I had time to explain but then again, what could I have said?
I approached the man cautiously. I couldn’t see any details around him except the tails he wore so I decided to lean on the fence nearby. I pretended to look around at the boats on the water while glancing at him. He had a top hat in his hands which were bony and his fingers turned the hat around slowly in his grasp, as though he was hanging onto a shred of sanity in the midst of chaos.
His head was quite bulbous, probably due to a hairline that the term ‘receding’ does little to truly capture the extent his hairline was retreating from his forehead and his eyes were sunken and fixed, not looking at the parade but, rather, gazing at the water that rippled from every passing vessel.
I wished desperately that Weiss would make an appearance out of nowhere but then reminded myself that he was hardly drawing a long sword to run me through.
“Excuse me, sir,” I said, trying to sound confident but sure my tremor was heard, “are you lost?”
“Lost…” He said in an empty voice. “Am I lost? I suppose I am. Out of all the possible calculations, the predictions I could ever have logically come to, this…was not where I was meant to arrive.” He turned and looked at me and I saw analytical intelligence in his mind. It was almost as if his skull were transparent and I could see the networking, the instant connections and processes zipping around as he leapt from conclusion to conclusion faster than I could blink. “Yes, I am indeed lost…but I think that you know where I am.”
How he had deduced that amazed me. He seemed to be more sure about who I was than I was about who he was…did that make sense?
“And I can help you get back.” I said, hoping I wasn’t just talking to a crazy person but an actual fictional character…which is a sentence that proves I needed therapy all by itself.
The man turned to face me, standing up as straight as his bowed shoulders would allow. He was quite tall and thin and his gaze was piercing.
“Back…why would I want to go back? I was on my way to the Riechenbach falls to confront my enemy. I knew the game was up and only sought to revenge myself upon the one person who had outwitted even one such as I. One moment I was surrounded by black rocks, sharp enough and high enough to cut me to pieces and a torrent so fearful it threatened to drown the world with its roar and the next,” he glanced around him, shaking his head, “I was here and the end I knew I was about to meet has escaped me.”
I was racking my brain, trying to figure out who this guy was. With the mention of the Riechenbach falls, I recalled a Sherlock Holmes series I’d watched. Despite the fact that he wasn’t wearing the distinctive hat I would have associated with Sherlock, he did seem to fit the mental image conjured when thinking about the detective.
“Sherlock Holmes?” I asked tentatively.
His piercing gaze narrowed and he leaned towards me with an almost reptilian look about him. “You see but you do not not observe and, so, speak with false authority.” It was a very intellectual way of saying I was wrong and as I stared at him, only one other name popped into my head.
“Moriarty…” I whispered.
“So my legend exists also here?” Moriarty remarked. “Even here…I can start again, without Sherlock’s interference, though he challenged me so. No, here, I am free. I will simply start afresh, in this world and build my empire once more,” my blood ran cold as he moved closer, “and you will help me escape from the net I can feel drawing tighter and tighter around me. Come.”
He moved towards me and, in the blink of an eye, separated me from the crowd by forcing me to walk along the fence line of the promenade.
Fear makes you stupid. When I think about it I could have jumped the fence and into the water…or simply shouted for help as I ran from his side. However, Weiss’ words stayed with me. While I wasn’t against handing Moriarty over to the Agency, and getting him far away from me, I knew, from her warning, that making a scene would only attract attention that they tried so hard to avoid. So I simply walked with him, hoping that Weiss had seen my predicament.
We were stopped several times by parade goers, some throwing glitter on us and others, throwing feathers and laughing a little too loudly and coarsely. Perhaps it was all in my head, the sounds echoing in my skull, their overwhelming cacophony enough to blur my vision.
“No, no, do not rush. It would not do to run.”
I had not realised I’d been getting faster in my walking. Moriarty grasped my arm and drew me back. Had a cop seen us, they might have realised there was something amiss about it all. But no one could see anything except the shouting and gleeful declarations.
It occurred to me that my lighter was in my pocket but, aligning itself with all the luck I’d had recently, it was in the pocket that was closest to Moriarty and he held my arm tight.
“We shall cross the river here. Have no fear, child, for when I know that I have escaped the net which you and your kind have flung so clumsily over me, you shall be released.”
We climbed up the stairs to the arch of the bridge and began to move across it.
I had just made up my mind to fling my lighter at him the moment we were out of sight of the crowds, when I realised Moriarty was no longer with me.
I turned and saw him standing at the apex of the bridge, looking at the ferry that came towards us. It looked like one giant stage with platforms all over it, balloons, glitter, heels, waxed legs, plunging necklines and so many feathers it looked like someone had plucked Big Bird and his entire flock.
I was out of his grasp, hand already in my pocket, holding tight to my lighter and wanted to take off and leave his capture to someone more experience than I. But I hesitated.
He seemed to be, suddenly, consumed by sadness.
Though the mood around him was celebratory and there were people everywhere clapping, dancing and singing, he was not just removed from it. He was alienated by it.
If I had not known him to be who he was, I might have thought he was about to jump.
Not that the fall would kill him when the water would provide a less unyielding end than a concrete floor. There were higher bridges along the promenade with some that boasted spectacular views of the city but the one we were on was simply not high enough. But if he fell onto the boat…
I approached him warily, recalling Weiss’ warning to not create a scene.
The suicide of a fictional character would definitely fall under the category of making a scene.
But perhaps I was wrong. Maybe he was just…bemused by the world.
“Moriarty?” I asked, a safe distance from him, still grasping the lighter. His eyes blinked slowly. I didn’t think he’d heard me so I inched closer and said his name again.
“I have no place here.” He said softly. “Look.”
I looked at the ferry then back to him.
“I don’t understand.” I said honestly.
“How could you?” He whispered. “My whole life has been dedicated to the hidden and secretive and yet, for all to see, the debased and vile going ons that rippled beneath the surface of my world are here, exposed and celebrated. If this,” he gestured to the drag queens, “display is a hint of the depravity that you find tolerable, acceptable and even promotable, then what else do you praise that I did in secret?”
I paused, trying to comprehend what he was saying. To me, this had always been the way.
Moriarty shook his head, confidence shattering in the blink of an eye.
“What mark could I possibly leave on this world?”
“You’ve already left a mark.” I confessed. “Moriarty, it’s becoming clear that I know very little about anything…but I knew your name. You are the greatest adversary of Sherlock Holmes there ever was and people have been trying to recreate your complexity, alluding to it, for years. You are the Napoleon of crime! No one else deserves that title. Just you.”
Moriarty blinked again. “Then…I am immortal?”
“I don’t know about that,” I admitted, “but you’re unforgettable.”
I was surprised as that big brain of his receded to show a softer, vulnerable side of him.
“Can you return me to my own time? To my world?”
“I can take you to someone who can.” I promised.
He glanced at the ferry and the world that rippled around him then turned back to me.
“Take me back,” he decided, “to Sherlock, the games we played, the thrust and parry of our dance to the very end. I wish to return home.”
I nodded and jerked my head to show him the way to go. He moved beside me.
“Though I know I go to my death, I am comforted that my legacy lives on. Thank you.”
And then he put his hand on my shoulder.
I really wish he hadn’t done that.
It was the same place Dracula had grabbed and I had felt death hiss from his jaws. I was already wound up so tight I felt like I would snap. The hand on the shoulder was the tipping point to go from controlled response to panic reaction.
I whipped out the lighter and flicked it, a tiny flame igniting.
And, just like Dracula, Moriarty disappeared, quite literally, in the blink of an eye or the click of fingers.
I stopped breathing or moving…I probably didn’t even blink. I just stared at the empty space he had been.
The ferry began to pass beneath us, their feathers stroking the underside of the bridge and their loud music and antics drawing attention away from me and my moment. I think a few people caught the flash in their eyes but as there was so much going on, it would have been dismissed as part of the celebrations. And no one was watching the bridge. They had all been focussed on the ferry.
Eventually I had to breathe again but my chest hurt. I looked down at the lighter in my hand and felt sick.
“What have you done?”
I looked up to see Weiss standing a few feet from me, her face hardened into fury, her mouth turned down and her eyes as sharp as katanas.
My apology died on my lips.
It seemed like an insult to the gravity of the situation.
“We are leaving.”
I followed her numbly off the bridge and towards the train station. As I passed a bin, I dropped the lighter into it.
“You incinerated Moriary, Napoleon of crime?” E.J. said after Weiss relayed what had happened. He had contacted the Agency and told them that the interloper had been dealt with. I don’t think he mentioned my name. I didn’t want the credit. Goodness knows I felt the blame.
“Burn first, ask questions later…is that what you think we do here?” Weiss demanded. “You may not think that he had a right to return home with respect and dignity but if you work here, you will respect our methods and not those carried out by the Agency.”
Have you ever been dressed down by your principal or teacher? Whether it be in front of the entire class or school or just in an office, reprimanded so thoroughly that you felt like they were peeling skin from your body? There are times when you fight back, protest or make a scene because you felt that they would only see your side if they understood the full story.
This was not one of those times.
I stood and accepted the rebuke to my core…because I felt I deserved every inch of it.
It wasn’t Weiss’ way of doing things, and the fact that I hadn’t, that got me down.
It was the knowledge that Moriarty had wanted to go home. He had been prepared to return to his world to die because that’s what was meant to happen. He had trusted me…and I had reacted in an instant to an old fear…and he was gone.
No, I didn’t fight it at all.
“Weiss…” E.J. said and I knew he was trying to break through her angry rant. “Weiss…Adele!”
“What is it?”
“Take a breath, step back and look at Sam’s face for a moment.”
Weiss did so then must have caught sight of the grief on my features. She closed her eyes and turned away.
“I will get the book.”
E.J. nodded then turned to me. “We’ll fix it, Sam. Just like we fixed Dracula.”
“No, this wasn’t like Dracula.” I whispered. “Moriarty wanted to return home…but then he put his hand on my shoulder…” My voice caught in my throat and I swallowed the tears back hard.
“And it was over in an instant.” E.J. said firmly. “Sam, there isn’t time for pain. It happens,” he snapped his fingers, “like that.”
“But Weiss…”
“She’s angry because she sees the way the Agency handles things. They treat interlopers like they are part of some insidious plan to overthrow our world…but they have no idea why they’re here or what’s going on. She defends them because no one else will.” E.J. sighed. “You didn’t do what you did out of convenience or superiority. Weiss knows this. She’ll calm down and, over time, you’ll learn when to stay your hand and when to make a move.”
“Here is the book and the reference card needed is inside the cover.” Weiss announced, approaching us. She handed me a hefty, well read volume. It was ‘The Original Illustrated ‘STRAND’ Sherlock Holmes’ by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the complete edition. “You will need to take it to twelve Delores Street, Kingsbury. Ask for Miss Miller.”
“Use this card to pay for the taxi.” E.J. handed it to me.
“You want me to go now?” I asked.
“No. You won’t be allowed in. Aim to be there by ten in the morning. And mind your manners.”
I nodded, ready and willing to take any punishment they gave me. “And this person, Miss Miller, will know who I am?”
“Oh yes, she’s been told about you.”
I cringed, imagining a very cross female boss of the Agency. I was going to get chewed out again.
“Head home. You’ve had an eventful evening.” E.J. limped to the door, without his crutches, against the doctor’s orders. I ducked out of the front door. “You going to be okay?”
I just stared at the book. “He was a bad guy. The ultimate arch nemesis of Sherlock…but in our world he just looked…lost.”
“Because, with his great intellect, he would have realised that he didn’t belong.”
“Dracula was the bad guy too.”
“And had he wanted to return home, I would have taken him rather than destroy him then pick up the pieces afterwards.”
“Even after what he did to that poor woman and Jasmina?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
E.J. leaned on the doorframe. “Because their creators wrote them to be a certain way. They didn’t have a choice in the matter, not instinctively and without someone to guide them, they fell back on who they were created to be. I’ve only ever known of one author who gave his creations the ability to choose…and sometimes I wonder myself if that was such a good idea.”
I didn’t ask who. I was reeling from the evening and walked home.
Mum saw the book in my hand when I walked in. She was a little surprised but even more pleased.
“You see, I knew you’d grow to like books.”
I wasn’t sure if I liked them or dreaded what was inside anymore. I knew I wasn’t going to let it out of my presence until I saw Miss Miller. Oh gosh…what would she be like if Weiss was anything to go by?
My phone was flashing up a storm. I checked it. Messages from James and Willow, both asking what happened to me. Lucas hadn’t sent anything but he was easily offended…or just too high to have realised I’d blown him off.
I messaged all of them, saying I was home and that I was sorry I had to run off. With James and Willow, it let them know I was okay. With Lucas, I hoped it would counteract any attitude that might have been forming.
It was hard to go to sleep that night, imagining the shocked and betrayed expression in Moriarty’s eyes as he disappeared into a bright spark. I woke up early as well. I was ready to leave by nine and figured I could just wait outside the building until I was allowed inside.
I held the book tightly in my hands as the taxi transported me through the streets, across two suburbs before turning onto Delores Street.
“We’re here.” The driver announced.
I peered out at the building. “Kingsbury Aged Care? Is this right?”
“12 Delores Street, Kingsbury.” The driver confirmed.
I paid him and climbed out of the taxi. He drove away as I looked up at the large building of pinky red bricks and cream rooftop and trim around the doors and windows. The building was a large horseshoe shape. Around the inside, against the building, were parking spots. In the middle was a pretty lawn area with some garden beds and benches for people to sit on. I looked at it, confused.
“Maybe I’m on the wrong side?” I mused, turning around.
Nope. Only a sound wall behind me.
“Maybe I’m at the wrong end?” I went for a little walk but Delores Street began and ended with the aged care facility. From what it looked like, there had been a number of little houses crammed into the short street. Half were demolished when the sound wall went up. The other half were demolished and Kinsbury Aged Care stood there instead.
So I couldn’t possibly be in the wrong place.
Ten o’clock rolled around and I dodged a few cars coming into the carpark and headed to, what I guessed was, reception located in the middle of the building. As I approached, a middle aged woman was putting a sign out the front that stated visitors may call between ten in the morning and four in the afternoon. Visitors outside of those hours needed to make an appointment prior to just showing up.
“Visiting hours.” I mused as I went in. “This is where Weiss went?”
It was a new facility so the walls had yet to have that decrepit, salmon pink faded colour and the magazines on the coffee table were only six months old and not six years.
I waited for the lady to appear behind the counter.
“Can I help you?” She asked.
“I’m here to Miss Miller.”
“Friend or family?”
I thought frantically. If I said family, I’d have to prove it but friend was pushing the truth as well.
“Friend. My name is Sam Baker.”
“I’ll just check as we’ve not had you visit before.” I nodded, trying not to fidget. The lady called someone on her phone and talked quietly behind the glass. Then she leaned back out. “Sign in here.” She brought out a little map of the building, like something you would get if you stayed at a holiday park. “Miss Miller is on the second story. Take the lift or stairs and turn right. Her room is the fifth door down on the right hand side. She has a lovely view of the rose garden.”
“Great. Thank you.”
I opted for the stairs, needing to burn off some nervous energy and turned right. I counted the doors but there was no need. Their names were painted in pretty plaques on the doors. Clearly someone had put some thought and care into the people who were placed in the facility.
At the fifth door, Miss Miller’s name clearly visible, I took a deep breath and knocked.
“Come in.”
I opened the door and peered inside. It was a light coloured room with roses on the curtains and bedspread. There were a heap of cushions as well and it surprised me that anyone could fit on the bed with the cushions taking up most of the space. Then I saw Miss Miller and knew it was easily possible. She was a tiny lady, not much over five foot if anything at all. She was round but cuddly round not, she snaffled all your birthday chocolate, round. She was sitting at her open door window that looked out onto the balcony and the promised rose garden. Her feet drifted above the carpet in her armchair and she looked at me with twinkly eyes and rosy cheeks. She had her hair caught up in a bun and it was a very pale shade of blonde.
I was immediately taken to her, this kindly old lady who looked like she’d fallen out of one of those Enid Blyton books where adventures happen, friendships are formed, everyone lives happily ever after and you wanted to eat every edible thing she wrote about.
“Hi.” I said waving like a fool. “My name is Sam Baker.” She looked at me long and softly. I floundered, trying to think of what to say. “I have this book…”
“I know who you are and why you’re here, Sam Baker,” she said suddenly with a surprisingly firm but warm voice, “Weiss told me all about you.”
Oh great. My biggest fan.
She tilted her head and eyed the book. “So…who did you incinerate?”
So she was aware of the great fictional conspiracy.
“Um…Moriarty.”
She burst out laughing and shook her head, her little body quivering with her chortles.
“That’s one heck of an initiation.”
“You’re…not angry?”
She waved me to the matching armchair opposite her, shaking her head.
“Good heavens, you made a mistake. It won’t be the last, especially in this line of work. Do yourself a favour and learn from it. I don’t take kindly to having my naps interrupted just to insert someone back into his or her book.” She held out her hand so I gave her the book. “It would have to be one of the heaviest…but at least he’s just in the one volume. It’s tedious when it’s a large series then there’s cross referencing and back tracking…go to the wardrobe and bring me my writing box.”
I swallowed the urge to say ‘yes ma’am’ and did as I was told. The writing box was a beautiful ornate box with gilded edges and a hand painted quill pen on the curved top.
Miss Miller had a table that could be lowered to be a coffee table or raised to become a dining table. She pumped it with her little foot until it was at dining table height, opening the book and pulling the reference card out.
“You have to hand it to Doyle,” she said casually as though talking about an old friend, “Moriarty really only appears for a brief time in the Sherlock Holmes canon and yet, he is almost as well known as the detective is. He is only in two stories and mentioned in a handful of others. What an impact he has had.”
“You’re not wrong.” I said, putting the box down. “Um…Miss Miller…”
That sent her into a fit of the giggles. “Oh heavens, no one has called me that for years. Jeanette is my first name but everyone calls me Jean or Jeanie.”
“Okay…Jean,” I tested it out, “so…you know I’m new…”
“Rookie was the word E.J. used. Amateur, apprentice, trainee…noob.”
“All those things.” I could hardly deny it. “So I don’t really know what it is you do here.”
“Fix your mistakes.” Was the curt reply.
“Ouch.” I winced. “You’re talking about my incinerating Moriarty? How can you undo that?”
“By putting him back where he belongs.” Jean opened the hefty volume and flicked to a page. She tapped it. “What’s missing on this page?”
I looked at it. The writing on the pages was split into two columns and my eyes drifted across the words.
“I don’t really know.”
Jean picked it up. “Finish this sentence for me. ‘You have probably never heard of Professor…’”
“Moriarty?”
She nodded then handed it to me and pointed. “Where is he?”
I found the sentence and looked up. “There’s a gap where his name should be.”
“Exactly. When you vaporised him, his name was removed from the book that he came from. Every mention of him. It is my job to put him back.”
“You’re going to put this thing,” I eyed the book, “through a printer?”
“Heavens no.” She opened the writing box and let her fingers drift over the collection of pens of all shapes and sizes, eyeing the font in the book before settling on one with a fine tip. “I am going to write his name back in.”
“And that works?”
“As long as you turn the ‘do not disturb’ sign over on my door and keep watch for the morning tea tray.” She pulled out a pair of thick glasses and pushed them up her nose much like Weiss was prone to do. Must be a glasses thing. “I may not want to be disturbed but I’m not missing out on my biscuits and tea.”
I did as I was bid, hoping the tea lady would understand. She seemed to be expecting it.
“It’s so lovely for Jeanie to have visitors.” She gushed, handing me a tray. “She has the most beautiful penmanship you have ever seen. It is she who did all the hand lettered signs for the doors of the residents. When a poor soul leaves us, the sign goes home with the family and she is never tardy in making a new one for the next person on the waiting list. What a treasure.”
Jean had warned me not to interrupt her with a door knock but to leave it ajar and to come in quietly when I had the tea. I did so like a wildlife documentary crew enters the cave of a bear.
If the bear was soft and cuddly and drank tea.
At the end of her work she looked up and sighed. “Thank heavens he was important but not excessive. Imagine putting Sherlock’s name into the book over and over?”
“Did I really erase him from the book?” I asked, setting the tray down. The tea lad had kindly given us two cups and enough biscuits for the both of us. I hadn’t the heart to tell her I didn’t drink tea. It turns out I was equally as gracious to Jean and sipped my tea slowly, drop by drop.
“Every mention of him. And not just of this book but of every copy of Sherlock Holmes that has his name in it.”
I paled at the thought. There had to be millions of copies of these books in the world, especially since fandom had gone mad with two tv series and a set of movies in the last decade.
“You don’t have to do all of them, do you?”
Jean laughed, her little body jiggling like a jelly. I couldn’t get angry with her, laughing at my expense. It was like getting angry with an otter. They just turn their head sideways at you and your heart melts.
“No, dear, just one but it has to be one of the first in which the name disappears.”
“So…they don’t all disappear at once?”
“It’s a ripple effect, burgeoning out from the crisis point. It would take days for the effect to truly reach every copy of the book. Most of the time no one notices and other times, the claim that the name of ‘so and so’ disappeared only to reappear, is dismissed as someone just trying to get attention. That’s why it’s so important to get me a copy of one of the first books as soon as possible, then the rest of the books follow suit.” She paused. “Well, me or whoever the Agency employs.”
“So…you’re not with the Agency?”
She giggled and consequently jiggled. “Heavens no. We’re a motley crew from the hub of ‘Beyond The Page’. The Agency didn’t know about me until it was too late to do anything about me.”
I looked at her, curious. “I know how I ended up part of the motley crew…how did you fall into it?”
“I did the sign work on the front of the bookstore.” I closed my eyes, instantly recalling the beautiful artistry on the front window of the place where I worked. “Weiss, who was just starting out with her little business, was impressed with my work and I recall thinking that she was odd when she said, ‘I’ll keep you in mind for future jobs’. Usually my work was a one off and then back to painting folk art. But months later she contacted me and asked if I would ‘put back’ a character into her book.”
I leaned forward. “Who was it.”
“Hermione from the first Harry Potter book.” Jean sighed and shook her head. “What a job that was. She was one of the main characters and after she fell out of the first book, subsequent books…”
“And you do it by hand?”
“I have been able to mimic any font type I’ve been presented, given enough time to study it. Most books these days are printed with standard fonts so there isn’t as much variety however,” she tapped the copy of Sherlock Holmes, “Weiss is very particular about being loyal to the original text and while she does not have the stories of Sherlock as they were originally published, printed in the ‘STRAND’, this book reproduces the pages from the newspaper which gives a much more authentic appeal. The Agency has special printing techniques and font matching algorithms that calculate the text to an accuracy of ninety nine point nine percent…” She shook her head as though their efforts were ludicrous. “You fell into a good crowd, Sam. They don’t just protect this world. They look after the ones who fall through it as well.”
Jean enjoyed her biscuits immensely. I let her have mine. I think I made an instant friend.
“They’re not homemade biscuits.” She lamented. “Just store bought but a cup of tea isn’t a cup of tea without a biscuit to go with it.”
I trusted her on that score as I drank soft drink and, under sufferance, water. I was yet to understand the allure of coffee although E.J.’s coffees always brought a rich aroma to the bookstore.
“Jean…”
“Yes Sam?”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Like what?”
I put my cup down, hoping she wouldn’t notice how little I’d drunk. “About anything really. E.J. seems to be evasive when I ask questions and Weiss…she’s not the most approachable person. But I feel like if I ask you something…”
“I won’t betray confidence, but you have a right to know what it is you’re up against.”
I paused. “What about the other books Moriarty has been in?”
“Such as?”
“Like all the others. There are heaps of books written about Sherlock and I’m sure some of them contain Moriarty. Don’t we need to fix those?”
Jean’s glasses sparkled as the sun glanced off them. “Who created the character of Moriarty?”
I looked at the book’s author. “Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.”
“Then any other author who uses characters from the book are simply borrowing, or in some instances, ruining them. The characters remain true to their creator. No one, no matter how researched and dedicated, can begin a new book, use the same characters and have the same claim upon them as their creator.”
I thought about this. “So fan fiction wouldn’t play a role in this?”
“Not at all. They are great for writing exercises, like a young artist practicing the styles of the great masters to try out difference compositions and paints. A good fan fiction writer will stay true to the original character to the point that it is as if the author was writing it. Yet I have never had any to put a character back into a book that was not written by the author.”
I couldn’t really think of any more questions to ask her although I was sure I’d have a million rolling around in my head when I was trying to go to sleep.
“Come back anytime just for a visit. It’s nice to be needed but the visit is nice as well. Ever since I had a bad fall, I’ve been ensconced in here. Thank heavens for Weiss, E.J. and now you or else I wouldn’t get a single visitor.”
I promised to do so, called a taxi and took the book back to ‘Beyond The Page’.
I felt like I had stumbled onto a new chapter in this world with a whole lot of new information to digest, as though my life were a novel in of itself. The motley crew had expanded to include a little old lady stuck in a nursing home. She was by far the easiest to get along with and the most helpful…and if she saw fit to praise up Weiss and E.J. for their tactics, then maybe I should pay more attention to the way they did things and try to fit in. After all, the lesson that Moriarty had taught me was that you don’t have to agree with what a person did to be kind to them. I was glad, as I clutched the book, to know that he was back in the pages, driving Sherlock up the wall. It was a strange kind of comfort.
It was just after midday when I walk through the door, brandishing the book.
“Done and done.” I declared to Weis and E.J. who were standing in the store facing each other, E.J.’s back turned towards me. “Moriarty is…”
“Sam,” E.J. said sharply and cut my words off in a flash, “you have company.”
He shifted out of the way and I saw Lucas standing between Weiss and E.J., his arms folded and his expression, grim.
“Sam, we have things to talk about.”