Free The Peculiars by Maureen Doyle McQuerry Page A

it’s not really a soul.”
    “Well, our vicar in Northerdam would agree with you. Besides, science hasn’t proved we even have souls.”
    “But it hasn’t proved that we don’t.” Again Lena felt hollow inside and she wondered if it was because she was different from everyone else.
    “Mr. Beasley collects all kinds of wonders from his travels. In this case”—Jimson led her by the arm to a very small glass case on the top of a low bookshelf—“we have a pipe made from the femur of a Chinese pirate.” Lena recoiled, but he held her arm more tightly. “It isn’t so bad. Take a look.”
    She peered into the case. A long and delicate pipe lay on a bed of satin. It was carved with strange vines and yellowed at the mouthpiece. “How does he know it was from a Chinese pirate?”
    “Because he got it from a Malaysian pirate who had lost an ear in the battle.”
    A sudden whizzing noise flew by her ear. Lena jumped. For the first time she noticed a series of glass tubes suspended overhead crisscrossing the library.
    “They’re pneumatic. It’s the way Mr. Beasley sends requests from his study.” Jimson walked to a large desk and opened the end of the tube and removed a copper cylinder from which he extracted a folded sheet of paper. “He wants his copy of Swinburne’s
Poems and Ballads
. He’s a great fan of poetry.”
    Lena watched openmouthed as Jimson rolled the ladder to an upper shelf, climbed up, and returned with a book in hand.
    “I don’t know Dewey’s decimal system yet, but I’m working at it. I know most modern libraries are using it now. Come on. It’s time I introduced you to Mr. Beasley.”

 
    MR. BEASLEY’S STUDY WAS SEVERAL DOORS DOWN FROM THE library, on the side of the house that faced the sea. Jimson rapped on the dark paneled door and waited until a deep voice asked him to enter.
    One wall of the study was mostly windows, with a view of the sea stretching into eternity. The rest of the room was dark-paneled and dim, and from the depths of that dimness a man arose.
    “Here’s your book, Mr. Beasley. I have a friend visiting—the girl from the train, Lena Mattacascar.”
    Had he been talking about her? Lena suddenly felt flustered. She looked up into the face of a very tall, mostly hairless man. She tried hard not to stare, but it seemed impossible. Above his gray eyes two brown arching lines had been neatly drawn where eyebrows should be. The rest of his face was smooth—there was no stubble of beard. And the top of hishead was crossed lightly with only a few strands of pale hair.
    “I’m delighted to meet you. Tobias Beasley at your service.” He extended both of his large hands and enclosed her right hand. When the fingertips of her pale butterscotch glove extended well beyond his, his eyes lit with interest. But he said nothing other than “Welcome to Zephyr House.”
    She remembered the marshal’s words—
He’s up to something in that strange house of his, and you’re going to help me find out what it is
—and shivered. “Thank you. Jimson has already shown me the library. It’s amazing.”
    “It is wonderful, isn’t it? But you must be tired after the drive out here, and I suspect Jimson didn’t think to offer you any refreshment. I’ll ring for Mrs. Pollet. We’ll have tea.”
    He ushered them over to chairs by the large mullioned windows, and Lena found herself looking out over the endless blue sky and the sea. The way they merged into one gave her a strange feeling in the pit of her stomach.
    “Jimson told me that your mother is a librarian. Does she use this new Dewey decimal system? I’m having Jimson recatalogue all my books using it.”
    “That’s not how the books are arranged now, but the librarians have been talking about it. I remember my mother coming home and complaining about the new system.”
    Mrs. Pollet strutted into the room with a tea tray loaded down with sandwiches and cups and a steaming red teapot. She wiped her hands on her apron