THE LIBRARIAN SPY BY MADELINE MARTIN – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Authors: Madeline Martin
- Language: English
- Genre: Historical Fiction
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 2.3 MB
- Price: Free
Ava
April 1943
Washington, DC
There was nothing Ava Harper loved more than the smell of old books. The
musty scent of aging paper and stale ink took one on a journey through
candlelit rooms of manors set amid verdant hills or ancient castles with
turrets that stretched up to the vast, unknown heavens. These were tomes
once cradled in the spread palms of forefathers, pored over by scholars,
devoured by students with a rapacious appetite for learning. In those
fragrant, yellowed pages were stories of the past and eternal knowledge.
It was a fortunate thing indeed she was offered a job in the Rare Book
Room at the Library of Congress where the archaic aroma of history was
forever present.
She strode through the middle of three arches to where the neat rows of
tables ran parallel to one another and carefully gathered a stack of rare
books in her arms. They were different sizes and weights, their covers worn
and pages uneven at the edges, and yet somehow the pile seemed to fit
together like the perfect puzzle. Regardless of the patron who left them after
having requested far more than was necessary for an afternoon’s perusal.
Their eyes were bigger than their brains. It was what her brother, Daniel,
had once proclaimed after Ava groused about the common phenomena—
one she herself had been guilty of—when he was home on leave.
Ever since, the phrase ran through her thoughts on each encounter of an
abandoned collection. Not that it was the fault of the patron. The
philosophical greats of old wouldn’t be able to glean that much information
in an afternoon. But she liked the expression regardless and how it always
made her picture Daniel’s laughing gaze as he said it.
They’d both inherited their mother’s moss green eyes, though Ava’s
never managed to achieve that same sparkle of mirth so characteristic of her
older brother.
A glance at her watch confirmed it was almost noon. A knot tightened in
her stomach as she recalled her brief chat with Mr. MacLeish earlier that
day. A meeting with the Librarian of Congress was no regular occurrence,
especially when it was followed by the scrawl of an address on a slip of
paper and the promise of a new opportunity that would suit her.
Whatever it was, she doubted it would fit her better than her position in
the Rare Book Room. She absorbed lessons from these ancient texts, which
she squeezed out at whim to aid patrons unearth sought-after information.
What could possibly appeal to her more?
Ava approached the last table at the right and gently closed La Maison
Reglée, the worn leather cover smooth as butter beneath her fingertips. The
seventeenth century book was one of the many gastronomic texts donated
with the Katherine Golden Bitting collection. She had been a marvel of a
woman who utilized her knowledge in her roles at the Department of
Agriculture and the American Canners Association.
Every book had a story and Ava was their keeper. To leave her place there
would be like abandoning children
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