Now that fall is here, everyone in Melford is finishing up the last of their yard care. Everywhere one looks, people are raking and bagging, preparing for the first snows. It is also the time of year when many people cut back on their socializing and retire to the coziness of home, turning their attentions inward. But the affairs of others never lose their hold on some.
I was walking through the main floor of the Library just this morning, when I looked across the room towards Reference and saw Eunice at her desk. Rather than talking to patrons or organizing books as she should normally be doing, I saw her with her nose buried in a stack of archived newspapers, while on her computer she had opened up several issues of the New York Times. I returned to my desk until lunchtime, when I got up and went back to Reference.
By sheer coincidence, Eunice was away at lunch, so I took the opportunity to examine her desk, and was quite puzzled to see that she was going over copies of various international newspapers from ten years ago, along with some books on terrorism. She had also accessed several editions of the Times from 1996 and ’97, and had printed hard copies of some articles on the Middle East.
Around mid-afternoon, I chanced to walk past Eunice’s desk and greeted her. She seemed somewhat put off, knowing me to be someone frequently absorbed by my work. We exchanged some conversational pleasantries, though all the while she was nervously shuffling the papers on her desk, which I took no notice of. I commented that it was a beautiful fall day, and that she might like to come have a look at the garden with me. She rose slowly from her desk and we went upstairs.
The second floor of the Library has a large window with an excellent view of the garden. As we walked up to it, I was quite surprised by the unexpected sight of Leo and Yussuf out in their gardening clothes, gathering huge piles of limbs and branches from a recently felled tree. The noise outside must have been deafening, for they had hauled onto the Library lawn an enormous, gas-powered wood chipper, into which they were feeding whole limbs at a fiendish rate.
Eunice expressed her horror that her favorite elm had been felled. I wondered aloud if perhaps the tree had grown too close to the Library, overreaching itself, thus leaving Leo and Yussuf no choice but to dispose of it. I commented on the machine, saying how remarkable it was that it could take whole limbs of green wood and grind them to a colorless pulp. I suggested it would be impossible for even the most experienced investigator to guess the origin of that pile of dust. What a mercy, I said, that those men are skilled at handling so dangerous a device.
The recent frost seems to have brought a bug around town. I can scarcely go into a shop in Melford without hearing someone coughing or sneezing. Eunice, too, must have caught the virus, for as I turned to look at her, she had gone completely pale, and stared at me with parched, unmoving lips. She did not seem at all well.
I took the poor creature by the arm and guided her back to her desk. After she seated herself, I stacked up all her recent findings and offered to clean the mess up for her. What a dreadful thing it is to be ill. All she could do was sit there and stare straight ahead, her chubby little hands clasped tidily before her on the desk, her face damp with perspiration. Thus I left her, and once back in the Security Section had Albert dispose of the whole mess in the incinerator.
The workday is over and I should be going too. I have a stew simmering in the crockpot, and plan to enjoy that comforting cold-weather food by the fire tonight while listening to the radio.
Safe reading,
Margaret
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