The used section was darker than the upstairs. It was very quiet. Maggie looked around. There wasn’t anyone else on the floor.

Her skin prickled with goose bumps. Her scalp tightened. A fast rattle stole the silence. It was the sound of her own breathing. She deliberately slowed her exhalation, tried to shrug off the panic, told herself, This isn’t the same. Stay calm. She was alone, after all. She could hardly be any safer.

Until someone follows me down here. Until someone unsafe shows up.

She glanced uneasily over her shoulder. Instead of exploring the packed shelves along the walls, she stuck with the sales table at the foot of the stairs. The books were divided into sections, labeled CHEAP, CHEAPER, SUPER-CHEAP. She decided quickly, choosing a few classics she’d never read. The novels smelled musty, as if the previous owners had stored them for too long in damp basements, but they were only a couple of bucks each, so that settled it. Maggie didn’t have much cash.

Upstairs, two of the customers Maggie recognized from earlier had made their way to the back. The girls sat cross-legged on either end of an overstuffed couch, unopened books in their laps and steaming mugs in their hands. They were talking about someone’s Twitter addiction but fell silent when Maggie reached the top of the stairs.

She smiled stiffly and hurried out of the reading nook.

The person working at the desk looked like she was waiting for her. When Maggie set the books by the register, the clerk smiled and asked, “Find everything okay?”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

The late-day sunlight spilled through the front windows and over the girl, teasing a blueness out of her black hair, and cast a shadow across the counter that (because of the buns) might have belonged to Mickey Mouse. The clerk drew the paperbacks closer to her and arranged them on the counter side by side.

Maggie found her change purse in her cardigan pocket and took out a wrinkled ten.

“Aha!” The girl brandished one of the paperbacks. “Good choice. Some French in the dialogue.” Eagerly: “Do you speak French?”

“No.”

“Not even a little?”

Maggie frowned. “No.” What the hell?

“Oh.” She sighed. “That’s too bad. I thought maybe you would.” She set down Villette. “You kind of look French.”

“I do?” Huh.

“Well, I think so. I’ve never actually been to France.” She clasped her hands under her chin and considered the other two books’ covers. “The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.” She hummed appreciatively. “One of the first feminist novels. Haven’t read it. Not yet. And a third Victorian. Middlemarch.” She twinkled a smile. “That’ll keep you busy.”