Part 3 (1/2)
”I'll tag along anyway. Makes me feel wanted,” he says, turning the depths of his brown eyes on Bryony, who takes his hand.
As Jill watches them retreat to the opposite side of the shop, Woody says ”If there's anything you need to be reminded of, let me know.”
”I can't think of anything.” 45 He takes a breath that sounds like a sigh played backwards. ”Not discussing customers in public would be one. We were nearly sued over that in Florida.”
It strikes Agnes that he's discussing Jill in public. Presumably he realises, since his voice sinks as if it's being dragged down. ”Counter routines,” he barely utters out loud.
”The till was playing up.”
”I guess we'll know if it happens again. Yes, Agnes, Anyes. Were you waiting for something?”
”I thought you'd want to see this,” she says, pa.s.sing him the defaced book from the Returns shelf behind the counter.
The first page he opens tugs his head down. When he speaks he seems to be casting his voice into some profunchty of the book. ”We need to be a whole lot more vigilant.”
”I wonder if whoever did it wrote in any others.”
”Madeleine can check for that while you finish your shelf end.”
She didn't intend to give Mad another task. Bryony and her father are returning to the counter, and she beckons them to save Jill from making any more trouble for herself. Bryony presents her with a book of poems from the Tennish Tennish section. section. ”You were quick,” Agnes remarks. ”You were quick,” Agnes remarks.
”My dad's taking me for lunch in Chester and then we're going to the zoo.”
”Maybe you'll see some mating routines,” says Jill. ”It can make you laugh, what animals get up to when they meet.”
”I don't think it's the time of year,” Bryony's father says.
”Some of them seem to think they're hot all year round.”
Woody emits a sound like a grunt that has snagged on a cough, but only Bryony looks at him. The till Agnes is using feels sluggish, or time does. The machine lingers over regurgitating the spent voucher for her to slip in the drawer; the details gather on the screen with all the speed of objects floating up through mud. She's about to draw Woody's attention to this in Jill's defence when the till 46 sticks out a receipt. As Agnes drops it in the Texts bag she hands Bryony, Jill is told ”I'll have her back with you for Sunday dinner.”
”It'll be waiting for you, Bryony. Sleep well. Dream you're somewhere special,” Jill says, and faces Woody as if challenging him to speak.
Agnes is making for her shelf end when he follows her. ”Anyes? Any call?”
”For what?”
She turns to find him gazing barely patiently at her. ”Did your customer call back?”
”Not yet.”
”So long as you've got something for them.”
”They won't be disappointed,” she's anxious to persuade herself at least as much as him.
Her entire conversation with her father is repeating itself in her head, leaving little room for thoughts. As she stands guidebooks on the brackets under her Winter Breaks notice while Woody helps Mad return the chairs to the stafriendroom, she realises how sunlit all the places in the books may be. Half her display invites people to visit countries she has never seen, but that's part of her job. When she's home she can reminisce about holidays with her parents. Outside the fog is edging closer to the shop, and sunlight is a memory--one that she decides it's unwise to indulge just now. Memories won't lighten the greyness that is Fenny Meadows. They make it seem eager to grow dark. 47
WILF.
”Mist dumber.”
”I beg your pardon?”
”Mist dumber, wasn't it? A Mist Dumber Night A Mist Dumber Night 'so Dream by Speakshape.” 'so Dream by Speakshape.”
”Ah, is it a parody?”
”About as much of one as you. Are you hauling on my chain or do you really not recognise me? That's too sad. You don't want to forget old times.”
”Forgive me, I--was ”Slater. I expect you thought it looked like Staler. Fred Slater, and you're Lowell. Wilfred Lowell, only didn't you sign Wildfed Wellow or some such c.r.a.p once?”
By now Wilf has remembered him. Slater's face hasn't aged much in ten years, but it has ended up on the front of a lump of pallid mottled flesh wider than itself. He still lets his mouth droop until it tugs at the rest of his face while he waits for his victim to catch up with the joke, and Wilf wonders if he'll pinch or poke or punch to gain the reaction he wants, as he used to when their school desks 48 were next to each other. ”I must have been having a bit of fun,” Wilf says.
”You never seemed to be having much not being able to spell.”
”Well, I am now.”
”We'd all have had a good laugh if you'd said you wanted to work in a bookshop.”
He never read a paragraph more than he had to. It was Wilf who was so hungry to read he felt he was starving until the dyslexia tutor taught him how. ”What about you?” says Wilf. ”Have you made much of yourself?”
”Maybe you'll hear from me some night soon.”
”Sorry, why would I do that?”
”Don't you like hearing from old friends?”
Can he really believe he was ever one of Wilf's? Wilf's politeness is starting to feel like thin ice under entirely too heavy a burden. ”If you'll excuse me, I ought to--was ”Hang on. You're helping me, or you will be in a minute. I'm your customer.”
Nigel glances at Wilf along the counter from the till he has just arrived at, and Wilf daren't seem unworthy of working at the shop. ”How may I help, then?” he makes himself ask.
”Try listening.” Slater treats him to a pause that isolates the dwarfish music in the air before he says ”h.e.l.lo there, Mr Lowell. I wonder if you realise how the changes in our climate may be affecting where you live?”
”I really couldn't say. I shouldn't think--was ”The winter's getting wetter every year. Can I ask when you last had your damp course checked?”
”I haven't got one,” Wilf says with some triumph. ”I'm on the top floor.”
”Don't feel too safe. It can still reach you, what's happening. How am I doing so far?”
”I'm afraid I don't think I'd be buying.”
”Where would you say I'm going wrong?” Slater says 49 and lets his face droop like a bloodhound's. ”What's your secret as a salesman?”
”I don't know if I've got any.” At once he's afraid Slater will betray it to Nigel--Wilf's old problem, even if he has solved it for good. He feels as if his teenage self is desperate to burrow out of reach inside him. ”Just enjoy it,” he suggests.
”Oh, I am. So are you going to show me what I need?”
”What do you think that is?”