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Back The Silence of the Library Save as PDF
Chapters (50)
  1. COVER
  2. PRAISE FOR TITLES BY MIRANDA JAMES
  3. ALSO BY MIRANDA JAMES
  4. TITLE PAGE
  5. COPYRIGHT
  6. DEDICATION
  7. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  8. ONE
  9. TWO
  10. THREE
  11. FOUR
  12. FIVE
  13. SIX
  14. SEVEN
  15. EIGHT
  16. NINE
  17. TEN
  18. ELEVEN
  19. TWELVE
  20. THIRTEEN
  21. FOURTEEN
  22. FIFTEEN
  23. SIXTEEN
  24. SEVENTEEN
  25. EIGHTEEN
  26. NINETEEN
  27. TWENTY
  28. TWENTY-ONE
  29. TWENTY-TWO
  30. TWENTY-THREE
  31. TWENTY-FOUR
  32. TWENTY-FIVE
  33. TWENTY-SIX
  34. TWENTY-SEVEN
  35. TWENTY-EIGHT
  36. TWENTY-NINE
  37. THIRTY
  38. THIRTY-ONE
  39. THIRTY-TWO
  40. THIRTY-THREE
  41. THIRTY-FOUR
  42. THIRTY-FIVE
  43. THIRTY-SIX
  44. THIRTY-SEVEN
  45. THIRTY-EIGHT
  46. THIRTY-NINE
  47. FORTY
  48. AFTERWORD
  49. LETTER TO THE READER
  50. SPECIAL EXCERPT FROM BLESS HER DEAD LITTLE HEART

My erstwhile assistant hadn’t moved from the bed during my labors. That surprised me because normally Diesel adored boxes—as indeed most cats do—and he couldn’t resist snooping in them and trying to get inside.

While I looked at him, though, he began to stir. He yawned and stretched before he rolled over into a sitting position. He stared at me, yawned again, then meowed. He spotted the boxes and immediately leaped off the bed to investigate. I watched, ready to intervene if it looked like he might damage anything, but he seemed content to play with flaps and poke his head inside.

My glance fell on the two boxes of scrapbooks.

Scrapbook.

I felt like an idiot. How had I forgotten the one I found a few days ago when I came to pick out books for the exhibit? The one devoted to children’s series books and their authors.

“Come on, Diesel, we’re going downstairs.”

THIRTY-FOUR

Diesel looked up at me from the box he was investigating and meowed with what sounded like an indignant edge.

“Yes, I know you just started playing with those boxes, but I have something I need to do. You can’t stay here by yourself.”

He stared at me and meowed again. Then he darted under the bed.

“Diesel, come out from under there. Right now.” He was like a contrary child sometimes.

I waited for perhaps thirty seconds before I repeated my command.

Still no results.

Aggravated, I got down on my hands and knees to look under the bed. Luckily for me it was an old-fashioned one, high enough off the floor that I didn’t have to lie prone to see exactly where he was.

Against the wall halfway between the legs of the bed, naturally. I wasn’t going to crawl under to drag him out, however. I knew a better way to get him to come with me.

I put my left hand on the bed for leverage. I stood, wincing as my knees creaked. As I steadied myself, I glanced across the bed at the wall beyond where an old chifforobe stood.

A six-drawer chifforobe.

Why hadn’t I thought about checking there for the newsletters? The antique piece was the only other furniture in the room that could hold them.

I moved around the bed, and momentarily left Diesel to his own devices. I pulled open the door of the wardrobe half, but it was empty except for three hangers on the rail.

The top two drawers held old linens, now yellowed with age. The middle two were empty, but the fifth drawer down held a wooden box of a size appropriate to contain the newsletters. I checked the bottom drawer, and it was empty.