Free Ajax Penumbra 1969 (Kindle Single) by Robin Sloan Page A

floor space.
    The small-but-concentrated crowd wraps itself around several low tables, each sprouting a small handwritten sign, like POETRY and SCIENCE FICTION and AS SEEN IN THE
WHOLE EARTH
CATALOG . Some in the crowd are browsing the books; two bushy-bearded men pick at the CINEMA table, arguing and gesticulating. Others are reading outright; a woman in a green dress stands in place, mesmerized by a
Fantastic Four
comic book. Mostly, though, the crowd is paying attention to itself: talking, nodding, laughing, flirting, lifting hair from eyes, tucking it back behind ears. Everyone has long hair, and the visitor feels suddenly self-conscious about his number 3 buzz.
    He snakes his way through the crowd, heading for the cash register, trying not to touch anyone. Hygiene levels range widely. Voices echo on the bare floorboards, and he picks up scraps of conversation:
    “… a trip, you know …”
    “… up in Marin …”
    “… at the Led Zep …”
    “… like, dog food …”
    There is more to the bookstore. Beyond the low tables, dominating the back half of the store, there are shelves that stretch taller and disappear into the darkness above. Ladders extend perilously up into the gloom. The heavy denizens of those shelves look altogether more serious than the books up front, and the crowd seems to leave them alone—although it is possible, the visitor supposes, that some furtive activity is taking place in the deepest shadows.
    He feels profoundly uncomfortable. He wants to turn around and leave. But … this is a bookstore. It might hold some clue.
    When the visitor reaches the cash register, he finds the clerk arguing with a customer. The figures contrast sharply: two different decades facing off across a wide, heavy desk. The customer is a bendy twig of a man with stringy hair tied into a ponytail; the clerk is a sturdy plank with thick arms that stretch the wales of his sweater. He has a neat mustache under dark hair slicked back from his brow; he looks less like a bookstore clerk and more like a sailor.
    “The restroom is for customers,” the clerk insists.
    “I bought a book last week, man,” the customer protests.
    “Is that so? I have no doubt that you
read
a book last week—oh, I saw you doing it—but as for
purchasing
…” The clerk hauls out a fat leather-bound tome, flips deftly through its pages. “No, I’m afraid I don’t see anything here…. What’s your name again?”
    The customer smiles beatifically. “Coyote.”
    “Coyote, of course…. No, I don’t see any Coyote here. I see a Starchild … a Frodo … but no Coyote.”
    “Starchild, yeah! That’s my
last
name. Come on, man. I gotta take a whiz.” The customer—Coyote … Starchild?—bounces on his heels.
    The clerk clenches his jaw. He produces a skeleton key with a long gray tassel. “Be quick about it.” The customer snatches the key and disappears between the tall shelves; as he goes, two others fall into step alongside him.
    “No loitering!” the clerk calls after them. “No …” He sighs, then snaps his head around to face the visitor. “Well? What?”
    “Ah. Hello.” The visitor smiles. “I am looking for a book.”
    The clerk pauses. Recalibrates. “Really?” His jaw seems to unclench.
    “Yes. Or rather, I mean that I am looking for a
particular
book.”
    “Marcus!” a voice calls out. The clerk’s gaze lifts. The woman with the portable radio is hoisting a book up above the crowd, jabbing a finger at its cover:
Naked Came the Stranger
. “
Mar
-cus! You been reading this while nobody’s around, right?”
    The clerk frowns, and does not favor her with a reply, but bounces a fist on the surface of the desk and mutters, to no one in particular, “I don’t know why he would stock anything so tawdry….”
    “A particular book,” the visitor prods gently.
    The clerk’s gaze snaps back. He presses his mouth into a tight line; something well short of a smile. “Of course. What’s the title?”
    The