As she slid the fragile book back into its spot, she knocked over a gadget that had been hanging from the shelf’s edge. She picked it up. It looked like a pager with a blank readout. Looking more closely, she saw it had a label: GOTECH HYGROMETER. She slipped out her phone and googled the words. Apparently it measured temperature and humidity and sent an alert when its parameters were breached. When it was charged. This one was as dead as the person it would have alerted.

Emily stepped outside again for a few quick breaths of fresh air, then ventured to the far end of the unit. Across the back was a sturdy wooden workbench. Behind it, shelves were loaded with glues and adhesives, cleaning supplies, and paintbrushes. The lid on a bottle of rubber cement was coated with dust.

Emily took a series of pictures of the interior from various angles, and close-ups of some of the most badly damaged books. Then she turned her attention to the rows of containers that lined the shelves. She raised the lid of a medium-sized plastic bin that was labeled DOORKNOBS. As promised, it was filled with them. Crystal octagons, one of them a deep amethyst. Brass, embossed with the raised image of a hand holding a torch encircled by the words BOARD OF EDUCATION. White porcelain, still mounted to a rusted keyhole plate. This was not junk. It was a collector’s collection. She lifted the lid of an adjacent cardboard shoebox. Inside was a vintage thermostat, mounted in a brass cage with lovely filigree work. Wires dangled out the back.

Emily replaced the lids. Mrs. Murphy’s Murph and Emily’s Frank would have been soul mates. She could imagine their poker game: I’ll see your 1936 thermostat and raise you a World War I copper fan.

Emily counted the books on a length of shelving (twenty-six), counted the number of shelves loaded with books (twenty-four), and multiplied. Around six hundred. Next, she counted boxes: thirty, ranging in size from shoeboxes to liquor boxes. Judging by the labels, they contained all manner of building hardware.

Then she turned her attention to the document storage tubes. Some were no more than a foot long, others as long as three feet. There were at least sixty of them. She pulled out a tube at random. The end had been chewed away. No climate control, and rodents.

Emily was about to open the tube when she noticed, at the far end of the shelf, an anomalous, unlabeled black hatbox with the New York City skyline around it in yellow. She tucked the document tube under her arm and pulled the hatbox from the shelf. It was light—not filled with hardware. The edge of the lid had come unglued.

Just then her phone chirped. Becca. Juggling the hatbox and the document tube, she stepped outside and removed the mask to take the call.