Ashes (16 page)

“Over there,” Suzanne said, pointing at a display piled high with velvet and fringe and beads. Suzanne had a cautious but excited look in her eyes, as if she was watching a dangerous circus act. Not sure where this was heading but not wanting to miss a moment.

Four hours, two shopping carts, and a considerable amount of money later, Jennifer and Suzanne drove in the laden-down VW to get some lunch. Over cheesecake — by now, they needed the sugar badly — Jennifer said, “I think it’s either going to look great or awful. But either way it won’t be boring.”

"Here's to an end to the drab." Suzanne raised her water glass in a toast.

* * *

S
everal days later Jennifer, in paint-spattered jeans, her hair coming down out of its ponytail, walked out her front door and waved to the Delacroixs, who were pruning their roses. “Is it ready?” Bill asked. “From what Suzanne told me, I can’t wait to see it.”

“For better or worse, it’s ready,” Jennifer said.

She’d done the work — even the wallpapering — herself. She didn’t know why, it just seemed right to have this room be hers. Entirely hers. She felt almost shy asking them to come over, fearing that she had bored and inconvenienced poor Suzanne with that marathon shopping. But the Delacroixs immediately dropped their pruning shears and bag of rose food, and were on her doorstep in a matter of seconds. She hung back in the hallway while they walked into the bedroom, then followed them inside.

The white walls were now covered in cream wallpaper, with a pattern of roses in muted red and gold tones, almost a moiré effect. Red velvet drapes, pulled aside by gold braid ropes, bordered the windows; cream-colored sheers let the sunlight into the room while softening the light’s harsh edge. The old brass headboard was gone, replaced by a wrought-iron one, and the bed itself was covered by a red velvet duvet and piled high with pillows in red, green, and dark blue velvet, beaded and fringed. By the south window, overlooking the ocean, a wrought-iron table and two chairs sat, waiting for someone — Jennifer, for instance — to enjoy her morning coffee. The old overhead light was gone, replaced by a ceiling fan with a Tiffany-look stained glass shade; another Tiffany lamp, this one with beaded fringe hanging from its shade, rested on the night table. On the wall above the bed, a framed print of Leighton’s
Flaming June.

“I know, I know, San Francisco cathouse,” Jennifer found herself babbling. “And the wallpaper’s kind of crooked but —”

“Hush,” Suzanne said, the way she did to the kids she watched when they started getting rowdy. “It works. I wasn’t sure it would, but it really does.”

“And how,” Bill said. “And it’s yours.”

Mine,
thought Jennifer, and basked in the ruddy glow of her room, and in the Delacroixs’ praise. It was the first time in nearly a year that anyone had anything good to say about something she’d done.

* * *

T
hey invited her to dinner, and she was too tired to refuse. Over potstickers and beef fried rice Bill said, “Jen, you still looking for a job?”

“I should be. But I’ve been so busy with the decorating I haven’t given the help wanteds a good look yet.”

“Well, I happen to know that Mr. Bradbury, who runs the main library — down on Victoria Drive? — is looking for an assistant. Not a whole lot of money, but he’s a good sort. Arthritis is really slowing him down, unfortunately, so he’s in need of help,” Bill said. “Give him a call, if you’re interested.”

Jennifer had no library experience, other than a semester’s worth of work-study back in her community college. Still, what was there to lose? “That sounds nice.” Nice would be good, after her last employment experience. “Thanks for the word, Bill.”

Bill smiled, the smile of Santa Claus filling a stocking. “My pleasure.”

* * *

I
f Bill Delacroix was Santa Claus, Mr. Bradbury was one of his elves. Or a garden gnome. The world’s tallest garden gnome, though Mr. Bradbury was not tall, in fact was a half-inch shorter than Jennifer. He had a very round head and almost no neck, his hair and beard were silver. The lenses of his glasses were thick; she thought of the bottoms of wine bottles. Behind the lenses his eyes were bright blue, and the first time his gaze fell on her she felt she was on a stage, the spotlight shining on her. It should have made her uncomfortable but it did not, for he smiled as well, and she felt special rather than singled out.

“Good afternoon, Ms. Thomson,” he said when she arrived. His voice was naturally low from years of a library’s hushed tones.

“Hello, Mr. Bradbury. It’s good to meet you.” Jennifer pitched her voice low to match his. They shook hands. His grip was very gentle, no more than a clasp.

“Dawn,” Mr. Bradbury said, turning to the girl at the circulation desk. “Would you look after things for a few minutes?”

Mr. Bradbury ushered Jennifer into the back office. It was a small room, with only one window, but the dimness felt cozy rather than cramped. In one corner a small refrigerator, on top of that a hot plate with a teapot resting atop it. The walls were adorned with prints of Victoria Island, Tigertail Beach, Ansel Adams’ photos of Yosemite. Mr. Bradbury’s desk, an old mahogany rolltop with a laptop that provided a jolting touch of modernity, was awash in papers, but apparently there was a method to his madness; he plucked her resumé from the desk without a moment’s searching, from under a granite paperweight. Carved into the paperweight:
If we are willing to attempt the impossible, God is willing to perform the miraculous.

He offered her tea; it felt like a genuine offer, not like Alex Salto’s offer of refreshment, which had felt like a ploy. She accepted the offer. He looked at her through the Darjeeling-scented steam rising from his mug, smiled. “How are you liking it here in Haven Cove, Ms. Thomson? A bit of a change from California, no doubt.”

“That’s very true,” she replied. “But please, call me Jennifer.”

The talk turned to her months in Haven Cove, the weather, the people. He knew the Delacroixs well; in fact, seemed to know almost everyone in town. When she mentioned her most recent place of employment, his mouth turned down slightly at Alex Salto’s name, and she was relieved, knowing that the shortness of her employment there would not be held against her.

“I see that you worked in the library one semester at your community college,” he said. “How did you like that?”

“It was all right,” she said. “I didn’t really work with the books themselves, I was at the reference desk, mostly looking up things for people.”

“What was the strangest thing someone asked you to look up for them?”

She thought it over for a moment. “A lady once called and asked what temperature to bake an angel food cake.”

He chuckled. “I had the same thing happen once, only the caller wanted to know how long to bake an apple pie.”

Jennifer was expecting a question about her library experience, such as it was, and was trying to remember if she’d dealt with Library of Congress or Dewey Decimal. She didn’t even know what system they used here in Canada.

Instead, he asked, “Tell me, do you like to read?”

“Some. Not as much as I probably should.” She immediately regretted her answer. Of course she should have said she was a complete bookworm. But there was something about Mr. Bradbury’s gaze, keen and patient, that made a lie in his presence difficult.

He must have seen some of this on her face. “Don’t worry, that’s all right. The inveterate readers are usually the worst people to work in a library. They spend all their time reading and none of the books get put away. I can’t lie to you, Ms. Thomson. This isn’t a very high-paying job. And it isn’t very exciting. I can take care of the administrative end of things, answer the reference questions. Even the ones about the angel food cake. What I need...” He sighed, held up his hands. Even her inexpert eyes could see the slightly swollen joints of his fingers. “Arthritis. My hands simply aren’t what they used to be. I need someone who can take care of the books and the day-to-day hands-on tasks of the library. And I need someone who’s here more than one school quarter at a time. I love the high school students, of course, but these days they’re more interested in the Internet than in musty old books. Do you see what I mean?”

“You need someone to be your hands,” she said.

His face lit up. More than ever he looked like a garden gnome. “Yes, that’s what I need. Are you interested?”

She was.

The Haven Cove library was well-stocked, and seemed to be rather larger on the inside than its outside dimensions would have permitted. There was the large room with the main stacks, fiction and nonfiction. There was a separate room for reference books, including three coin-operated photocopiers, and not once did Jennifer see all three in working order. “I keep trying to get funds for new copiers,” Mr. Bradbury said with a deep sigh, “But that’s not easily done.” The children’s books also had a separate room with bright-colored posters on the walls, the shelves crammed with thin, tall books with colorful spines. That room always seemed to smell like crayons, a waxy, nostalgic scent.

Within a few days she had mastered the classification and shelving. Canada did indeed use a different system from the States, but learning it presented no problem. “If you can count and know the alphabet, you can find any book here. And if you don’t, well, perhaps we can find you a literacy program,” Mr. Bradbury said with a smile. In those same few days, she got to know the routine. She arrived at nine, half an hour before opening. Mr. Bradbury, who did not drive, was dropped off by the bus a block away and usually walked through the library doors at a quarter past, always with his umbrella in his right hand, a book or magazine or newspaper tucked under his left arm. She found herself looking each morning to see what he was reading, for it changed from day to day. On Monday it might be a collection of Emily Dickinson poems. On Tuesday, a Margaret Atwood novel. Wednesday, a weekly news magazine; Thursday, a biography of the wives of Henry the Eighth; Friday, the
New York Times Book Review.
Saturdays she had off, and Sundays the library was closed.

Jennifer liked the Haven Cove library. Most of all she liked its smell, a slightly musty, cinnamon scent that reminded her of her grandmother’s old house in San Francisco. She liked her work: the orderliness of it, the comforting surroundings. And most of all, she was doing something useful rather than serving as a cog in a machine. Perhaps it was only a very small sort of usefulness, nothing important in the great scheme of things, but that did not diminish her pleasure in it.

Most of all she liked Mr. Bradbury. There was something familiar about him that she could not pin down. He did not remind her of her grandfathers; both now dead, one had been obsessed with golf and the other’s mind was lost in the fogs of dementia. He did not remind her of any teachers she’d had, though in his way he was a teacher. Not a day went by without Mr. Bradbury quoting some writer or other, or making an allusion to some novel or poem. Yet she never felt he was doing this to show off his knowledge, or even to persuade her into reading something. His head was simply full of things, and they spilled out without him being aware of it.

They were organizing the little office, making room for a small desk she could use. “I’ve been needing a reason to clean up my desk,” he said. “It’s all gone to wrack and ruin.” He stacked papers, crammed them into the cubbyholes of his desk. She knew that in a matter of days they would be all over his desk again.

Jennifer had noticed the ancient radio he kept in the office. Depending on the time of day it was tuned to the classical station, the jazz station, or the NPR station from the States, reception thin and crackly. “I brought in a boombox,” she said. “Not a real big one, but I think it might get better reception. And we can play CDs, if that’s all right.”

“As long as the volume is low, it’s fine. Here, I’ll go get it.”

He left the room to get the boombox. After he left, she walked over to his desk, where she’d seen the picture, earlier that day. She did not mean to pry but could not help it, needed to look up close and see if it was what she thought it was.

A younger Mr. Bradbury. Some forty years younger, she could see that even if the date hadn’t been written on the matte bordering the photo. A Mr. Bradbury in a black robe, a soutane they called it, she’d read that somewhere, with a white collar. Beside him a man and a woman, older than he. He had the man’s round head and nonexistent neck, the woman’s bright keen eyes and her smile.
Holy orders,
said the writing on the mat, and a date forty years ago.

It did not answer all her questions about Mr. Bradbury — who he was, why she felt calmed in his presence. In fact, raised even more questions. But she understood now why she had not been able to lie to him.

A
new year, and nothing was different at Du Lac’s Grace Methodist Church save that the Christmas decorations had been taken down, leaving the church hall looking bereft and, though the meeting was well-attended, rather empty.

Sean sat a bit more toward the front than he usually did, the better to put himself in Doug MacReady’s field of view and demonstrate that yes, he was interested in meeting with those who had sent MacReady. He waited, engaged in small talk about the weather with those seated nearby. Without craning his head around he looked about for MacReady, and finally saw him off to one side.

MacReady was talking to another man. He had only seen this other man once before, and through binoculars, so it took Sean a second to recognize him. Tall, bearded, a certain air about him. Almost kingly, you could say. Richard Blaine.

MacReady and Blaine had their heads together, talking. Sean curbed his desire to watch them, only gave quick glances their way, as if he was just interested in saying hello to MacReady. Out of the corner of his eye he saw MacReady nod, tilt his head slightly, and then both of them were looking directly at him. Their scrutiny lasted for no more than two seconds, but he felt it keenly, like a floodlight appearing out of darkness, making him visible for a moment, and then sliding away. He felt nothing in their gaze beyond assessment; whether it was positive or negative he would have to find out later.