Jonah found his old language tutor, who had been placed at the central library. Wallace, although very tall, had never been much more than a mouse. Librarian was all anybody else could manage to believe him to be. And so it was decided for him by the elders two years ago. Wallace is four years older than either of them, and still growing into his own huge shoes. His overriding honesty is what Johan is counting on when he asks him that same question. “Yes, there are some files in the basement, but you can’t read them,” Wallace said ever so quietly in reply.
Jonah wants to yell, but in the old library loud voices can get you expelled for a year. He asks, “Why not? Is there a law or something that’s supposed to keep the books out of the public’s hands?”
“No, you don’t understand. You need a machine to read them. They are little books, like the size of this bookmark. There’s only one machine that works anymore, and they only turn it on once every decade.”
“A machine that reads?” Ben asks incredulously over the checkout counter. “This gets more unbelievable every minute.”
Wallace waves them to the end of the counter. “No, I can show you. Follow me.” Wallace slides a few hardbacks and leatherbacks with him to the end of the counter, and then grabs some keys from the last desk drawer. He looks to be sure nobody else is watching, and waves for them to follow. Leaving footprints behind on the dusty stairs, to the sub basement they go. Wallace retrieves the keys, opens the heavy door, and fumbles for the light switch.
The cavern as large as the library above has a concrete floor, rows of concrete columns, gobs of dust, but only two pieces of furniture. One is a gang of school desks, welded together to make a large desktop with fixed chairs. The other is a bookcase of sorts, too shallow front-to-back and too short from shelf to shelf to hold real books, but sealed with dusty glass. “Over here,” Wallace says, and points to a desk in the middle of the gang. “This one works, but I don’t know how to turn it on.” Wallace removes a plastic bag from a small skinny box, and sets it gently back on the desk. “Be careful with it. If the boss finds out I’ve let you in here, I’ll get nothing but hard labor for the rest of my days.” They shiver at the thought of working outside in winter time repairing high windows and heavy concrete and rock walls. It’s labor assigned by the elders for the morally wicked.
Chained to the desk is a device the likes of which Ben has never before seen. He sits down. It’s too big to fit in a pocket, but smaller than most books he’s ever read. He lifts it carefully and turns it over. There are no obvious buttons, just a silvery face imbedded in a white plastic case, and two holes in the end. One is a mere slit, the other a small round impression with a metal stud inside. Wallace adds, “The power cords are under the desk.” Ben fishes for the wire, and pushes the round plug in the round hole.
Ben says, “We might have to wait a bit. The batteries, if there are any, are probably discharged.” From here, they wait for the four rotors on the roof to dump a small fraction of electricity into the device, and hope it doesn’t fail. Unlike the top story of the building, in the basement they can’t hear the constant groaning of the wind turbine gears above. “How old are these things?”
“Centuries. Nobody knows for sure.” Wallace opens a dusty glass case, and fishes out a thin item. “This is the card catalog for this library.” He hands it to Jonah, who looks it over and passes it to Ben. The words on the end confirm Wallace’s words, and an arrow on the end tells them what to do with it. Ben shoves it in the slot until it stops moving. The silver screen lights up and it shows the words and asks out loud, “State your search criteria.”
Befuddled, Ben doesn’t know what to do. He’s never heard a machine talk before. Jonah asks over his shoulder, “Why is the world only four hundred years old?” A list on the screen shows items like ‘The Geologic Ages of Earth’ and a match criteria of 65%. Several dozen items appear, all with lower ratings, and a pull-bar on the side shows the list growing as they read.
“Try that one,” Jonah suggests the first with the highest match.
“What do I do?” Ben asks, almost afraid of it.
“Touch it,” Wallace says. Ben does, the screen flitters and shows a number. “That ten digit number corresponds to a number on this card catalog. You just get the card, and shove it in. Then you read.” Jonah is already muttering the number over and over. Once he’s convinced he won’t forget, he runs to the cases. He continues repeating the number over and over as he wipes dust off the glass.
“Maybe that isn’t what I want to ask,” Ben says. He pushes the screen in the corner a few times, before asking a new question, “Why does Winterhaven have no Leibniz family?”
The resultant list is disorganized, containing mostly entries for Calculus. The item ‘Winterhaven Founding Families and Exclusionary Genetic Control’ appears on the second page. Ben taps that one, memorizes the number and begins his search among the dusty cases.
{ 0 comments… add one now }