I spotted a dirty plate and crumpled napkin on a side table close to the alcove and hurried to pick it up. Ronald was pouring drinks and laughing at something a woman said. Charlene stood next to the historical display, ready to show it to Bertie’s guests, and Louise Jane hovered at her elbow, prepared to leap in with interpretations of her own. I picked up the plate and had started to head down the hallway to the break room when Mary-Sue Delamont passed me, returning from the ladies room. I heard a sharp intake of breath and glanced at her.
She was frozen in place with a look on her face that I can only describe as one of horror as she stared at the women gathered around the display. No, she wasn’t staring at the women. She was focused on Helena Sanchez, who’d pulled a pair of drug-store reading glasses out of her bag and propped them on her nose.
“Are you okay?” I asked Mary-Sue.
She started at the sound of my voice, and the expression faded. She gave me a weak smile. “Perfectly okay, thank you. I saw someone I didn’t expect, that’s all. That woman wearing the ugly brown cloak wasn’t in our class. Why’s she here?”
“That’s Helena Sanchez, the previous library director. The one before Bertie. She’s visiting Nags Head, and Bertie thought she’d enjoy the historical display we put together. Do you know her?”
“No. No, I don’t. Never seen her before. Excuse me.” She headed for the bar.
Chapter Three
“As well as a few pictures of your class at college,” Charlene said, “and old photos we were sent from near and far, Lucy and I—”
“With my advice,” Louise Jane interrupted.
“—plus Louise Jane McKaughnan thought you’d get a kick out of these library artifacts. Most of the items were found in the basement of the town hall, where it would seem everything ends up that no one has any use for, but doesn’t want to throw out. It’s a twentieth-century historian’s gold mine down there.”
“So that’s what happened to Mayor Cardamon,” a woman said, to much laughter. I had no idea who Mayor Cardamon was. Which, perhaps, was the point.
“Those things sure bring back memories,” another woman said.
“Do you remember,” Sheila said to Lucinda, “the time Jackie White knocked over the entire row of card catalogues all by herself?”
“Oh gosh, yes. She fainted. We were worried that she was deathly ill.” Lucinda’s laugh was loud, her accent as Southern as shrimp and grits and sugar pie.
“Turned out she was so completely hungover, she couldn’t see straight,” Ruth said. “Old Lady O’Brian threatened to expel her.”
“Whatever happened to Jackie White, Bertie?” Sheila asked. “I didn’t see her name on the list. I don’t remember if she graduated.”
“She didn’t,” Bertie said. “She decided libraries weren’t for her. She went to law school and is now a state senator. She sent her regrets—an important vote’s being held tonight.”
Lucinda let out a bark of laughter. “I could have guessed that. Jackie was perfectly suited to either jail or politics.”
“Helena,” Bertie said, “are you all right?”
The group stopped talking to peer at the older woman. I put down the plates I’d gathered and took a step toward her. Ms. Sanchez had gone frighteningly pale. She held an old volume in her shaking hand. The Celestine Prophecy. The book was open to the flyleaf. A paper pocket had been glued inside the cover to hold the record of withdrawals. With a shaking hand, Ms. Sanchez pulled out the withdrawal slip. Names were written on one side in a variety of hands, and due dates stamped next to them. “Where … where did you get this?”
“I’m not sure,” Charlene said. “Lucy?”
“I found it in the storage rooms in the basement of town hall in a box of books that have been withdrawn from circulation, but not destroyed. I grabbed a few books at random to show how libraries used to keep track of who had books out, when they were due, and when they were returned. That particular book looks to have had an encounter with a cup of coffee. I guess that’s why it was taken out of circulation.”
“Is something wrong?” Bertie asked.
Ms. Sanchez’s entire body shuddered. She let out a long breath and almost visibly gathered her strength around her. Her shoulders straightened, and she lifted her head to look directly at Bertie. “Wrong? No, not at all. A flood of memories, that’s all. How quickly time passes.” She glanced once more at the withdrawal slip and then returned it to its pocket. She closed the book and placed it on the table. The other women looked between her face and the book.
“That was most interesting,” Ms. Sanchez said. “Thank you, young lady. It’s getting warm in here, don’t you think?” Beads of sweat had popped out on her forehead. She finished her wine in one swallow. “I could use another.” She thrust the empty glass at me.
“What would you like?” I asked.
“A white wine.”
“It’s going well, I think,” Ronald said as he poured the drink for me.
“Seems to be. Something quite odd happened just now.”
“What?”
Lucinda flashed her empty glass in Ronald’s face.
“Tell you later,” I said.
“You’re the children’s librarian,” I heard Lucinda say. “Isn’t that lovely? I always said we need more men working in the library system. Does your wife work here also?”
“No,” Ronald said, “she’s an artist. She works out of a studio in our house.”
“Oh.” Lucinda tried not to sound too disappointed. Ronald handed her a glass, and she walked away.
By the time I returned with Ms. Sanchez’s drink, Charlene was explaining how we’d gathered the old library things and the archive photos. Ms. Sanchez was pretending to listen, but her attention kept returning to The Celestine Prophecy.
I’d never read the book, but my mom had. A great many people had. Mom talked for
