The Haunted Bookshop

ia Ar

e flight, his mind eagerly meditating the congenial task of arranging the little spare room for the coming employee. Then, at the top of the steps, he found that his pipe had already gone out. "What with filling my pipe and emptying it, ligh

im, so he ran downstairs aga

ry to palm off any bogus doctrines on me so early in the morn

ening on to a narrow passage that connected through a door with the gallery of the bookshop. Two small windows commanded a view of the modest roofs of that

r have some of the prunes for supper to-ni

reserved a hum

d allotted, could discern a glimpse of the bay and the leviathan ferries that link Staten Island with civilization. "Just a touch of

such a fashion as (he thought) would convey favourable influences to the misguided young spirit that was to be its tenant. Incurable idealist, he had taken quite gravel

ause (as he had said) if Sir Galahad were living to-day he would be a bookseller. "We don't want her feasting her imagination on young Galahads," he had remarked at breakfast. "That way lies premature matrimony. What I want to do is put up in her room one or two good prints represen

ell Wright and Stephen Leacock, and chose pictures of Shelley, Anthony Trollope, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Robert Burns. Then, after further meditation, he decided that neither Shelley nor Burns would quite do for a young girl's room,

RETURN

TO A

having endured the perils of my friend's bookcase, and the bookcases

give this book to his infant as a plaything, nor use it as an ash-

s resigned to the bitterness of the long partin

Bring hither the fatted morocco and let us rebind the volume and set it

return some of the books t

will convey to her the firs

the walls, he bethought himself of the bo

painless repose. This school advises The Wealth of Nations, Rome under the Caesars, The Statesman's Year Book, certain novels of Henry James, and The Letters of Queen Victoria (in th

classic of the railway bookstalls whereof its author, Mr. Thomas W. Jackson, has said "It will sell forever, and a thousand years afterward." To this might be added another of Mr. Jackson's onslaughts on the human intelligence, I'm From Texas, You Can't Steer Me, whereof is said (by the author) "It is like a hard-boiled egg, you can't beat it." There are other of Mr. Jackson's books, whose titles escape memory, whereof he has said "They are a dynamite for sorrow." Nothing used to anno

had the good fortune to meet her; I have never been able properly to supervise her mental processes. But this Chapman girl will come to us wholly unlettered. Her father said she had been to a fashionable school: that surely is a guarantee that the delicate tendrils of her mind have never begun to sprout. I will test her (without her knowing it) by the books I put here for her. By noting which of them she responds to, I will know how to proceed. It might be worth while to shut up

le student of letters, who hides his brilliant parts under the unassum

tairs: "Front! someone wants to know if

gests Shakespeare and the Elizabethans. It's a remarkable name, Titania Chapman: there must be great virtue in prunes! Let's begin with a volume of Christopher Marlowe. Then Keats, I guess: every young person ought to shiver over St. Agnes' Ev

nt author who had graced the borough since the days of Walt Whitman. Archy, the imaginary cockroach whom Mr. Marquis uses as a vehicle for so much excellent fun, was a constant delight to Roger, and he had kept a scrapb

rth is it?"

e said, and beg

e vault under

sitting they we

arments hair and

ercoat but ha

cars through the s

y people going h

cks the hunters

sailing down

le tot for to

otty she could

grandpa kiss yo

beaned her with

owflakes began

hips were sailin

word did ang

ckled and pledged

cond man he was

s face which ot

arents who comm

aid you struck

e you all her

as posies from h

tunnel underne

um caused your h

hat?" said Mrs. Mifflin. "Poor lit

cried Roger, and opene

or using the meter of Love in the Valley that way. I'm going

ss Titania's shelf, and went on brows

tler, just to give her a little intellectual jazz. The Wrong Box, because it's the best farce in the language. Travels with a Donkey, to show her what good writing is like. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse to give her a sense of pity for human woes-wait a minute, though: that's a pretty broad book for young ladies. I guess we'll put it aside and see what else there is. Some of Mr. Mosher's catalogues: fine! they'll show her the true spirit of what one book-lover calls biblio-bliss. Walking-Stick Papers-y

Whispers about Women, to amuse her. I bet that title will start her guessing. Helen will say I oug

lavender dispersing a quiet fragrance in each. "Very nice," he remarked. "Very nice indeed! About the only thing missing is an ashtray. If Miss Titania is as m

streets early that afternoon. A chauffeur in green livery opened the door, lifted out a suitcase of beautiful

ant me to carry

dwards. Some of my mad friends might worm it out of you, and I don't want them coming down

worshipped the original young h

for me," said Titania. "Call up my

have run the limousine into a governm

w out a nickel-it was characteristic of her that it was a very bright and engaging looking nickel-and handed it gravely to her chario

bag, lady?" and she was about to agree, but then remembered that she was now engaged at ten dollars a week and waved him away. Our readers would feel a jus

nnsylvania Railroad; that her person was both slender and vigorous; that her shoulders were carrying a sumptuous fur of the colour described by the trade as nutria, or possibly opal smoke. The word chinchilla would have occurred irresistibly to this observer fro

he would pass her on the right side where her tilted bonnet permitted a wider angle of vision. He would catch a glimpse of cheek and chin belonging to the category known (and rightly) as adorable; hair that held sunlight through the dullest day; even a small platinum wrist

eyes he would have scanned the bright pedestrian, and caught the full impact of her rich blue gaze. He would have seen a small resolute face rather vivacious in effect, yet with a quaint pathos of youth and eagerness. He would have noted the cheeks lit with excitement and rapid movement in the bracing air. He would certainly have noted the delicate contrast of the fu

ng of the Ritz-Carlton lobbies and Central Park riding academies

said, as he advanced all

aking her bag. "Helen!" he ca

to take me in," she said. "Dad has told me so much about you. He says I'm impossib

dog in the world, named after Botticelli or somebody. I'

to spats, was examining t

o see you. I hope you'll be happy with us, but I rather

tn't believe a word of what Dad says about me. I'm crazy about books. I don't se

aptivated already. "Come along, we'll put t

shop was rather a dingy place for a young girl. "I wish I had thought to ge

'm making some pastry, so I'm going to turn you over to your employer.

kage of tissue paper and, unwinding innumerable layers, finally disclosed a stalwart bone. "

d give it to him," said Helen.

a retreat. The bookseller's ingenious carpentry had built it into the similitude of a Carnegie library,

that kennel fixed to his liking. You might have thought he was going to live in it instead of Bock. Al

. Bock was much flattered at this attention fro

'The Rubaiyat of Omar Canine

atechisms on Dogma' and goodness knows what. If Roger paid half as much attention to business

cticing sticking it in my hair. I can do it quite nicely now. I hope you have some of those big red books with all the carbon paper in them and everything. I've been

they ask us to. They come in and browse round, and if they find anything they want they come back here to my desk and ask about it. The price is marked in every book in red pencil. The c

it's charged?

d to see people drop in here and spend several hours reading. Lots of them look on this as a kind of club. I hope you don't m

lls something like this, but not quite so strong. And I want to se

poke around and see what there is, until you know the shelves so well you could put your hand on any given book in the dark. That's a game my wife and I used to play. We would turn off all the lights at night

cried Titania. "I do thin

up notices about books that interest me

of cardboard and affixed it to the b

SHOULD HAVE PR

ant to sell it, because it is one of the greatest treasures I own. But if any one will gua

read The Dynasts before July, 1

e could be made to read it before the se

MIF

s it so good as all that? P

onto his ship. My, what a book! It makes one positively ill with pity and terror. Sometimes I wake up at night and look out of the wi

t her busy mind made a note of its own: H

said Roger. He had vowed to wait until she made some c

d. "Why, I'm sorry, I