“Hold on there!” she called out. “Did you have something for me?”
The man and his cart disappeared altogether, and she called out, “Do you have the map I requested?”
Again, there was no answer. Annoyed, she slipped on the shoes she had kicked off under the desk, and muttering under her breath, closed the door of her carrel without bothering to twirl the combination lock, and went off to find him. Only one other carrel, at the far end of the row, showed any light through its little window.
But by the time she got to the end of the stack where the cart had disappeared, there was no sight of it.
She stopped to listen, and she could hear the rattle of wheels a couple of aisles across, and deeper into the gloomy stacks. Lighted by only forty-watt bulbs, the bookshelves seemed to go on forever; in fact, Princeton had one of the largest open-access libraries in the country, with over two million books on display, and though she was normally grateful for that, right now she might have wished for a less expansive space. Every time she thought she’d spotted the corner of the cart, it vanished into the maze again, and she had to follow it down another aisle.
“Excuse me,” she called out. “Could you hold still for a moment? I think you have something I want.”
The assistant was either deaf, obtuse, or both. Whatever the reason, she got no reply. She began to wonder if she was on a wild goose chase. Maybe she should just go back to her carrel and put in a fresh request with the head librarian on the main floor on her way out.
A solitary student, his nose buried in a book, passed her by without even looking up.
Then, just as she was about to give up, the creaking of the cart came again, almost as if it were trying to tease her, and she couldn’t resist going a little farther. More and more, it was like swimming through some murky underground sea, moving from one pool of light to the next, around blind corners and down towering rows of books. Simone’s eyes scanned the titles as she went, many of which were in foreign languages. Some of the books were so old that the words imprinted on their spines had become illegible. They looked as if they’d been there since the college was founded in 1746, and it was a miracle that they were still in circulation. Lucas had once joked to her that he’d found George Washington’s name on a check-out card.
Ever since the night he had come to her hotel room, she had struggled to keep herself focused on her work. Sometimes, she was able to carry it off, for half an hour, maybe a bit more. But try as she might, she’d find her thoughts turning to that night at the inn. Minutes would pass and in her mind’s eye all she could see were his arms lifting her up and laying her on the bed, all she could feel were his hands, tearing at her clothes, caressing her body. It had been years since she had felt anything like it. No, she thought, that wasn’t true, either; she had never felt anything like it at all.
As she turned into the next empty aisle — no surprise there — she picked up a faint loamy scent. Like wet soil that had been recently turned.
“Hello?” she said, swiveling in all directions. “Can you hear me?”
At the distant end of the stacks, she now saw something sticking out, and she promptly marched toward it. “Ah, so there you are.” It wasn’t until she got closer that she realized it wasn’t the cart, but only one of the footstools that the library left here and there for the benefit of its shorter browsers.
Finally, she had reached a dead end. The basement went no farther than this, nor did her patience. Turning to thread her way back, she thought she saw a shadow move on the floor.
“Hello?” she said. The shadow shifted, but no one answered.
She peered over the top of the books and into the next aisle. “Hello?”
This time, when there was no answer again, something told her to stop asking.
To stop advertising her position.
As stealthily as she could, she slipped into the next aisle. And then, when that one proved clear, into the one beside that.
But she could sense the presence of another living thing. Close by.
The smell of sod grew stronger.
She placed each foot on the floor with the greatest deliberation, though her heels still made a noise.
She thought she could hear breathing. A snurfling sound, like something whose mouth was crowded with too many teeth. She flashed on the old etchings of the beasts assailing Saint Anthony.
Leaning against the end of a bookshelf, she slipped off one shoe, and then the other, and holding them in her hands, crept in the direction of the stairwell that led to the main floor.
The labored breath came again, closer than before. Lowering her head, she peeked through the stacks into the neighboring aisle. Something moved there, dark and indistinct, its back to her.
Ducking down, and swallowing hard — her mouth was suddenly as dry as the Sahara — she inched away, down the narrow passage between two rows of books, and when she thought she’d put enough distance between them, stopped to take another glance back.
Over the top of a collection of atlases, she saw a pair of eyes staring back at her. Sunken, black, buried deep in a face the color of mud.
She bolted. Throwing the shoes behind her, she raced down the aisle, turning left at the end, then racing down another and turning right. She could hear the sound of padding feet — or was it paws? — keeping pace with her.
She ran harder, desperately trying to orient herself. Was she heading toward the stairs or another dead end? She had the vague notion that she was being deliberately stampeded, that her pursuer had no intention of overtaking her yet — that it was only playing with her, like a cat with a mouse. Trying to scare her to death.
Her elbow caught on a volume, knocking her off balance, and the sleeve of her blouse ripped on the sharp end of a metal shelf. Several books toppled to the floor. She slipped on one, then took off again, the sweaty soles of her feet sticking to the linoleum. A red Exit sign glowed ahead, its arrow pointing to the stairwell and elevators.
Somehow the hunter seemed to have gotten ahead of her. Even before she saw its looming shadow again, she could sense that it stood between her and the stairwell. It was as if the damn thing could be in two places at once. She changed course, racing instead toward the carrel, where at least she could throw the sliding door closed, and lock it from the inside.
She burst into the wider corridor that ran along one wall of the basement and followed it down, past the ends of one stack after another, all of them nearly identical, until she finally rounded a corner and saw the lit island of her carrel straight ahead.
But that was when she skidded to a sudden halt, the breath ragged in her throat.
There was something in the carrel already.
How could it always be everywhere? Through the narrow window in the sliding door, she could see something moving, and she could hear the sounds of papers being ripped to shreds, books torn to pieces. The light from inside wavered as the intruder crossed in front of the desk lamp, back and forth, tending to his destructive work.
Reversing course, she headed back toward the stairwell, expecting at any minute to see the shadow blocking her way, but this time there was none. Her hands shaking, she threw open the steel fire door and scrambled through; the door clanged shut behind her, and she was halfway up the first flight of stairs, her head down like one of those football players she had seen, when she crashed into someone or something on the landing. She looked up, wild-eyed, as it snatched her by the arms and held her there.