An Imperfect Librarian (22 page)

I watch his office door. Margaret comes back and hands me a mug. “There's lots more where that came from.” She sits next to me again. I gaze at his door. She gets up to go to the credenza. If “The Little Drummer Boy” wasn't playing in the background I might be able to hear what's happening in his office.

She lays a heavy plate of fruitcake in my lap. “There's more rum in the cake than in the eggnog. And that's saying something. Let me fill that up for you. You were thirsty after all.” She leaves the room again. The phone rings. She returns. “They're calling to remind us about the party. They'll leave a message if it's important.” She hands me a fresh mug of eggnog. It tastes smooth.

The Chief's door opens finally. “Brunet! Merry Christmas!” he says. He gives me a slap on the back just as I'm standing. I burp. The room moves.

“Come on in.” He leads the way. “You know Francis. I don't need to introduce you.”

Francis nods.

The Chief gets a chair for me. “Take a seat, Carl. Let me get you something to drink.” He calls to Margaret.

Francis and I sit side by side facing the Chief's desk. Margaret didn't tell me he'd be at the meeting. I slide my foot along the floor to push my briefcase under his desk. The Chief lays a mug of eggnog in my hand. The briefcase is not at my feet. I remember that I left it in Margaret's office. I stand up. The room spins so I sit down.

“Are you going to the party this afternoon?” the Chief asks us.

Francis laughs. He moves his chair closer to mine to let the Chief get in behind his desk. “We might as well celebrate,” he says. The room is too warm. My shirt is too tight around the neck.

“A toast to a new year, new projects, new alliances! Merry Christmas,” the Chief says. “That's it, Carl. Drink up. Time to relax. Staying in town for the holidays?”

I nod.

“Well, here we are,” he says. “And like Francis was saying, we might as well celebrate. Privacy policy's pretty much passed. First of its kind anywhere in Canada, maybe even the US. Who knows? We're very proud of our accomplishments.” He raises his mug. “Here's to Francis Hickey for his dedication and diligence and–”

Francis smiles and shakes his head. “Stop.”

The Chief leans back and swivels slightly, side to side in his chair. “You're sitting next to a modest man, Carl.” He raises his mug to me. “Francis. Why don't you lead from here? I want to enjoy my eggnog.” He calls to Margaret for refills.

“I'll get to the point,” Francis says. “Most intelligent people today recognize the value of protecting personal information. They don't appreciate people spying on them virtually through a database any more than they would want someone snooping around in their office while they're not there. I'm sure, Dr. Brunet, you can appreciate the merit of these arguments.”

Margaret comes back to the room with a jug of eggnog plus three plates of cake and fudge. She tops up our mugs.

“All ready for Christmas, are you, Margaret?” the Chief says.

“Thank God, the stores are open till midnight,” she replies.

“Doesn't matter as long as you bought my gift.” He laughs. Margaret laughs. Francis looks at his watch. Margaret leaves.

“Close the door behind you, will you?” the Chief says.
“Francis...you were saying.”

“We'll need to make some changes to ensure the policy is implemented the way it should be. One of those changes involves database access and who gets to see what and why. That brings me to the point of your project. What is it called again? Bibliophishing?”

I don't bother to correct him. He knows the difference.

“I'll be back in a minute,” the Chief says. “I'll have Margaret top up that jug of eggnog before she heads off to the party. Eat your cake, Brunet.” He walks around the side of his desk. Francis moves his chair again. I study the back of his head, wondering how he manages to shave it so smoothly. I catch a whiff of men's cologne as he turns his head back towards me. The smell triggers a wave of nausea.

The Chief reappears. He refills our glasses then sits down with a thud. “Margaret says the party's started. They're setting up the mikes to play a few tunes,” he says. “How about we move things along, Francis?”

Francis checks his watch again then turns to face me. “In a nutshell, you won't be working on your project anymore. Instead, you'll be responsible for devising systems that promote efficiency of information management within the library. Those systems will safeguard the privacy of patrons, staff and management. They'll be progressively refined to the point where they can be scaled to other units of the university such as Human Resources.” He looks over at the Chief. The Chief raises his mug again. I raise mine to my lips and gulp down what's left.

“I'll be the sole person in charge,” Francis adds. “We don't want too many cooks spoiling the broth, poking their noses in where they shouldn't or setting off alarms, do we, Dr. Brunet? Brunet?
Brunet!
BRUNET!!!”

The last thing I remember as I fall to the floor is the expression on Francis' face as I throw up in his lap.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

M
R
. M
ERCER SHARES HOSPITAL ROOM
2A Northeast with me. He updates me hourly on meteorological conditions. “We'll be snowed in till July if this continues,” he says. His television never strays from Channel 19, the weather station. Unlike me, Mr. Mercer entertains no visitors: no Mercedes to perform personal nursing care, no Henry to humour, no Edith for the talk of the town, no Norah to hold a hand. His diagnosis comes before mine: his pancreas is under-functioning and my thyroid is over-functioning. The doctor promises me, once they have my condition under control, I'll be feeling like a new man: no more sleepless nights, exhausting days or unexplained weight loss.

“Will I qualify for a new job?” I ask him. The humour goes unappreciated.

Henry, Mercedes, Cyril and Edith are gathered around my bed. I tell them about the prediction for the new man. Henry predicts that my transformation will make Lazarus' resurrection look like a mere yawn. The conversation turns to what happened
after I passed out in the meeting. Henry asks who's going to pay the dry-cleaning bill for Francis' suit. Edith and Henry laugh. “Margaret gave me your briefcase, by the way,” he says. “You should have–”

Before he can finish his sentence, the door opens and Norah walks in. She sits on the side of my bed. I hold her hand. “Thanks for coming. Everyone, this is my friend Norah. You know Edith, I believe. You don't know Cyril and Mercedes, my landlords.”

“Don't be calling us landlords,” Mercedes says. “We're more like family, wouldn't you say, Cyril?”

“Family, yes. Carl and me are brothers and you're the mother.”

Even Mr. Mercer can spare a smile in spite of the seriousness of the approaching low weather system. “Did you hear about what's on its way up the eastern seaboard?” he says. “If the winds stay nor' east, she'll be some storm. We'll be in for another thirty-five centimetres.”

“I was on the phone to Dublin with my youngest lad,” Henry says. “I was telling him, ‘Imagine a week of steady rain squeezed into one storm. Imagine snow instead of rain.' He won't believe me. ‘Go on, Da. Yer exaggeratin,' he says. Forty centimetres in December. Bring in the army. Either that or raise the white flag. Surrender now while we're still standing.”

“If the power station in Baie d'Espoir is damaged in the storm, the whole city will be in the dark,” Cyril says. “That's excluding Carl. They've got their own generator here at the hospital.”

“He's been in the dark most of his life. Isn't that so, Carl?” Henry adds.

Mercedes frowns. “That's a sin. Poor Carl.”

“I never seen the likes, not in seventy-four years and I seen plenty,” Mr. Mercer says. “We had no forecasts to warn us once upon a time. No such thing as the Weather Channel. We kept an
eye on the wind and the barometer. Those were the days.” He sighs and drops his head onto his pillow.

Cyril bounces off Mr. Mercer's memories to tell a story about how someone in Labrador was caught chopping down an electrical pole for firewood. Mercedes bounces off that story to complain about cabin break-ins. Edith ricochets off Mercedes to talk about the cost of property insurance. Norah bounces off nothing or no one besides the silence in between.

“I need to hit the road before the drifts turn into barricades,” she says not long after she arrived.

Cyril asks Norah where she lives.

She fumbles in her pockets for her keys. “In Cliffhead, near Cape Spear where there's so much snow, you can't distinguish the valleys from the hills anymore.”

Norah leaves. The room is quiet.

“It's about time we met your friend,” Mercedes says. “Nice looking woman, isn't she, Cyril?”

The nurse peeps around the door to announce the end of visiting hours. Henry says goodnight for everyone. “I must go chat with those lovely nurses and congratulate them on the fine job they're doing. Stay alive till tomorrow, Carl. You too, Mr. Mercer. I'll be by for another visit.”

Mr. Mercer falls asleep shortly after they leave. His snoring is steady except for the gaps in between when he doesn't breathe and I wonder if I should call for a doctor or nurse to check on him. The weatherman's voice plays in the background. It's interrupted now and then by the loudspeaker in the corridor: “Paging Dr. Linegar. Paging Dr. Linegar. Dr. Linegar, please go to the emergency ward. Dr. Robert Linegar to emergency.” When I close my eyes I can hear everything brilliantly, including pages for Linegar, Mr. Mercer's snoring, not to mention ice pellets hitting the window. The cacophony plays on like a raucous marching band until the nurse prescribes earplugs and a sleeping pill.

Early the next morning, they wheel me off for tests. The real test comes when they bring me back to the room. “Your wife called the main desk and your girlfriend visited,” Mr. Mercer says. “Too bad you weren't here when she was describin' the storm surge. The size of the waves! Right up to her window, she said. She left you some bread and jam there. She brought me some statistics from the Internet. Marvellous source of information. Ever used it?”

It doesn't take much to piece together the details of what happened. Tatie contacts Elsa to tell her I'm hospitalized. Meanwhile, Norah comes for a visit but I'm not in the room so she goes to the nursing station. A nurse asks her if she's my wife. The other nurse interrupts to say she already received a long distance message from Mr. Brunet's wife in Norway.

I leave messages on Norah's phone at work and home. “What happened today at the hospital was a mistake. In fifty-three days, I'll be divorced. Call or come see me.” Later that day when I call again, she answers. There's a trivial exchange of questions about my health, a description of damage caused by the storm surge at Cliffhead, then Norah lets loose with her own surge. “You've made things far more complicated than they needed to be. I don't want to say more. I'm at work. You're not well. I'll come by later.”

I call her name. In reply, I hear the monotone hum of a disconnected line.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

I
'
LL SOON NEED A SPREADSHEET
to manage my list of should haves: SH told Norah about Elsa; SH divorced Elsa ages ago; SneverH married Elsa. Henry arrives for a visit and I'm in a SH mood. He sits on the edge of the bed even though there's a chair for visitors. He brings me a double espresso and a box of Tim Hortons Timbits. One by one, he pops the small round donuts into his mouth and sucks on them like they were sugarplums.

“Listen, about Norah. I know you advised me to stay away from her but I think she's good for me.”

“Drink Guinness if you want something good for you. The woman is mixed up with Francis,” he says.

“It's more complicated.”

“No kidding.”

Mr. Mercer isn't wearing headphones. Nor is the nurse who comes by to update my chart. Henry follows her around the room like he was tied to her with a string. She checks my blood pressure and temperature then leaves. Henry sits on the
bed again. “They're saying kinder things about you now: ‘We worked him too hard.' I laughed at that one. ‘Nobody made him feel welcome.' Josephine from binding said that. She must have forgotten about my efforts, right, Mr. Brunet?”

“Surely, yes, Mr. Kelly.”

He hops off the bed, pops another Timbit in his mouth then looks in the drawer of my bed table. “If you change your mind about going after Francis, you've only to say the word.'' He walks over to Mr. Mercer's bed. “How are you today? Heart still beating? How's that storm progressing?” He helps him with his pillows then adjusts the arm of the suspended television set.

“Where's it gonna end?” Mr. Mercer says. “One good thing: it's keepin' the weather forecasters busy, that's for sure. The Weather Channel'd have nothin' to report if it wasn't for Newfoundland. They'd have poor ratings without us.”

“Well, you and Carl have plenty to keep your mind off the weather with those healthy, young nurses dancing around your bedside like sugarplum fairies. By the way, Carl, Mercedes offered to introduce me to her friend Nancy. We're going to dinner on Saturday. Nancy's another woman you've been hiding from me. Mr. Mercer, you're sharing a hospital room with a real Casanova. Did you not hear him reciting: Elsa, Edith, Norah or Nancy. I've so many, I'll pick my fancy.”

“Thanks, Henry. The only thing Casanova and I have in common is that he was a librarian.”

He plops another Timbit in his mouth, sits on my bed again and bounces. “What's she like?”

I move to the side in my bed to give him more room. “Norah?”