The mood in the room was volatile. Feeling threatened by the angry muttering, Anne watched her husband glare around at the assembled crowd. Balding and well built, his customary air of confidence had been torpedoed by the level of hostility he faced. Every time he wiped his sweaty forehead with the back of his sleeve she winced, knowing he had been taken by surprise on seeing how many people had turned up for the council consultation meeting. The closure of a small library hardly warranted much fuss, yet the local community had turned out in force.

A tall man who had grumbled loudly all through David’s speech called out again. ‘Why can’t you be honest with us? The council could keep this library open if they wanted to. You’re just choosing to close it because you don’t give a toss about the needs of disadvantaged people.’

A small group of people standing with him mumbled their agreement.

‘This is just a cost-cutting exercise, isn’t it?’ the tall man went on in an unpleasantly nasal voice.

David raised a plump white hand for silence. ‘Unfortunately, you’ve hit the nail on the head, sir,’ he replied with a shrug of his broad shoulders. ‘Like everyone else, we’re having to cut costs.’

While David was speaking, the tall man leaned down to speak to a ginger-haired man beside him.

‘How much did it cost to produce this glossy questionnaire?’ the ginger-haired man shouted out, sounding excited.

The tall man flapped the brochure above his head and raised his voice. ‘Every question in this extravagantly produced leaflet is pushing us to provide evidence that the library is underused. There’s no space for comments, just a load of tick boxes which are all geared in one direction. Look at the last one: how would you feel if this branch library closed? And now look at the options we’re given: pleased, indifferent, or disappointed.’ He turned back to the councillor. ‘Why isn’t there an option to express outrage, which is what most of us are feeling right now? “Disappointed” doesn’t come anywhere near describing it. Disappointed?’ He let out a snort of derision. ‘We’re bloody livid!’

‘You all know that libraries up and down the length and breadth of the country are facing closure,’ David replied, wiping his brow on his shirt cuff. ‘Some people feel strongly enough about the closures to keep the facilities open as community libraries, run by volunteers, and there’s nothing to stop you from taking over this library and running it yourselves.’

‘While all the trained and experienced librarians who curate the stock are put out to grass,’ one of the librarians commented sourly.

‘And there won’t be any funding for purchasing new books,’ another librarian added. ‘Community libraries survive on volunteers to run them and books donated by readers.’