The Librarian of Boone's Hollow - Kim Vogel Sawyer Page 0,96
if she saw it again. Took some doing, snatching them while Emmett was over at the livery. He hardly left the library, except for meals and visiting the outhouse. But she’d been clever enough to not get caught. “You still workin’?”
“I’ve got lots of reports to fill out, Bettina.” He unscrewed the lid on a fat little inkpot.
“Ain’t you gonna have a cookie?” She pushed the plate a little closer to him. “I put chopped walnuts an’ cinnamon in ’em. Them walnuts come from a tree growin’ up the mountain some behind our place.” Pap was out wandering, but he could smell Maw’s cookies from a mile away. If Emmett didn’t get these ate fast, Pap might bust in and take them.
“I’ll have one before I turn in. It’ll be my reward for finishing these reports.”
If Pap didn’t get to ’em first. She roamed up and down the shelves, searching for anything with Addie’s writing on it. “Too bad you ain’t got a cookie jar.” She’d ask to take Maw’s when she married and moved out. Pap’d probably let it go. “You should ought to put ’em in somethin’, keep bugs off. Pests’ll find a way in every time if you ain’t careful.”
“Mm-hmm.” He scritch-scritched his pen against the page. “I’ve experienced that myself.”
He was busy with his notebooks, not even looking her way, so she peeked behind the blankets hiding the living quarters from view. She’d never snooped when Miss West lived in the library, but since this might end up being where she lived with Emmett for a while until they found a decent place, she needed to know what all was there. A narrow cot, a bureau with four drawers, and a chair. Not even a rug on the floor. She huffed out a little breath. Not much. This place needed some fixing, but she could see to it, if he’d let her.
She’d put a rug on the floor, the quilt Maw’d made on the cot, some framed pictures or a little ceramic figurine on the bureau, and her Dionne quintuplets calendar on the wall. Those things would make a heap of difference.
She walked back to the table. She turned her hands backward and leaned on the edge. She’d figured out holding her arms that way pushed her shoulders back and made her chest seem a little bigger. She hoped he noticed. “What you thinkin’ on doin’ tomorrow? Now that you don’t gotta go to the mine on Saturdays, you should oughta plan somethin’ fun.”
He glanced at her. Did a little bit of guilt show behind them spectacles? “I’m going to Lynch tomorrow, to the depot. I need to pick up a delivery for the library.”
A prickle made its way up Bettina’s back. He’d spoke the truth, but he was leaving an awful lot out. “That right? I ain’t been to Lynch in a good long while. I hear they got two movie houses now. Me an’ Glory, we’ve visited the Lyric Theater four, maybe five times. Her an’ me went with Shay one time.”
Would her having gone to the picture show with his friend make him jealous? She wanted it to. If he said he was jealous, then she could tell him what was good for the goose was good for the gander—let him know how she felt about him taking Addie to get a soda.
He kept writing.
She gritted her teeth and forced a little giggle. “Sure is somethin’, watchin’ them actors up on that big screen. You get to hear ’em talkin’, too, just like they was in the room with you. Yessir, it’s somethin’.”
He blew on the ink, flipped a page, and wrote some more.
She leaned closer. “You ever been to the picture shows, Emmett?”
He ran his finger down the page and started writing in a little square. “Went to some in Lexington.”
Jealousy struck as hard as Pap’s fist. “Oh, yeah? You go with a friend, like I did with Shay?” She nudged his shoulder with her elbow. “Didja?”
He laid the pen down. “Bettina, I’m really sorry if I seem unfriendly, but if I’m going to catalog new books tomorrow, I need to finish this paperwork tonight.”
“That’s all you’ll be doin’? Fetchin’ an’ catalogin’ books?” She waited for him to spill the other part of his plans. If he’d come out and tell her, she’d know he wasn’t trying to hide things from her. She’d feel a whole lot better about it if he’d say all his plans.