There was a man in a tracksuit working his way along the shelves, taking each book down and looking at it. He had started at the back of the library and was moving steadily in one direction, removing each book one at a time, staring at the cover and then replacing them. Hanna watched him for about half an hour and then couldn’t stand it any longer. Getting up from her desk, she walked down the room and, lowering her voice, spoke to him briskly.
“Can I help you at all?”
The man looked round, peered at her through glasses like goggles, and spoke in a voice like a foghorn.
“Oh no, you’re all right there, girl, I’m grand.”
“Could you lower your voice, please?”
“No, no, I’m fine, honestly.”
“Yes, but could you speak quietly . . .”
“No, not at all, not a bother on me, Conor has me sorted.”
Turning away, he reached for a paperback, inspected its cover, and replaced the book on its shelf. Then, having come to the end of a row, he reached up and began the same process on the one directly above it. Hanna gave up. Pursuing the question of keeping his voice down seemed pointless. He was doing no harm, and, after all, he hadn’t made a sound until she herself had spoken to him.
Shrugging, she returned to her desk and prepared to battle with her computer. Yesterday it had started to behave oddly and today trying to access data had become like Russian roulette; often she’d have no trouble at all, but sometimes files would disappear and reappear mysteriously in inappropriate folders. The IT guy at the County Library was obviously convinced she was incompetent. After twenty minutes on the phone he had sighed deeply and said he’d be over next week.
“Well, I can’t sit here till next week with a useless computer!”
“Sorry, Miss Casey, that’s the best I can do. Are you sure you’ve been following my instructions?”
“Of course I have. And before I rang you I did everything I could think of myself.”
Even as she said that, she knew that she shouldn’t have. The bored voice on the other end of the phone became even more patronizing.
“Look, you’re probably best to leave it so, you’ll only make things worse if you mess with it.”
Controlling herself with an effort, Hanna had thanked him curtly and hung up. She might not be fluent in computer-speak but she wasn’t in the habit of messing with the tools of her trade, and if it hadn’t been likely to antagonize him further she would have loved to have said so. Still, what mattered was to get the damn thing up and running, not to outsmart some pimple-faced youth in Carrick.
She had just sat down at her desk again when Conor came into the library. He was shrouded in the zip-up overalls he wore on the Vespa and still wearing his crash helmet.
“How’s the computer?”
“Driving me mad. But, Conor, you’re not supposed to be here.”
“I know, yeah, but I was coming in to town for a part for the tractor and I had an inspiration on the road. I’d say you might want to reinstall that last program.”
Hanna stood aside as he went behind the desk and removed his crash helmet.
“That yoke yer man set up the last day he was here”—Conor sat down and frowned at the screen—“I thought at the time he was making a bags of it.”
“He just said on the phone that I wasn’t to mess with it.”
Conor snorted. “I bet he did. He knows that he did something wrong. Give me a minute here now and I’d say I’ll sort it for you.”
Ten minutes later, he swung the chair away from the desk and beamed at her.
“What am I?”
“You’re a genius!”
“I am, of course. Hold your breath now, and keep your fingers crossed and you shouldn’t have any more trouble.”
“I don’t suppose you’ll take a cup of coffee?”
“No. Cows to milk, tractor to mend.” He picked up his crash helmet. “I’ll see you the next day.”
Hanna opened the door for him as he struggled with his chinstrap. At the far end of the room a head appeared round the shelving and the man in the tracksuit and goggle glasses bellowed a cheerful greeting.
“There you are, Conor, how’s it going?”
“Grand, thanks, Oliver, any luck yet?”
“Not a sign of him yet, Conor, but, sure, I’ll keep at it. Twenty minutes every second day, that’s my stint.”
As the head disappeared behind the shelves, Hanna grabbed Conor’s arm.
“Who in the name of God is that?”
“That’s the dog man. Do you not remember?”
“What dog man?”
“Yer man who sent the email about the book. It had a picture of a black dog on the front and he couldn’t find it.”
“So he’s working his way through the entire library?”
“Well, he’d already done the bookshops.”
“How long has this been going on?”
“A few weeks now. I suppose he’s usually here on mobile days when you’re out. I said it was fine. Is there a problem?”
Hanna shook her head. “No, no, of course not.”
“I told him he should try to remember the title while he’s at it.”
“Probably a good idea.”
Back at her desk, Hanna clicked on her mouse and watched the file she required appear on her screen exactly as it should. Beyond the library door, the sound of the Vespa’s engine bounced off the forecourt walls and then faded away as Conor shot off into the distance. Ten minutes later there was an influx of parents and kids choosing and returning books on their way home from the school run. Behind them, with his hands in his pockets and his waxed jacket pulled round his skinny hips, came Fury O’Shea, closely followed by The Divil.