Mr. Berger had wanted to raise the issue of space with the librarian, and this seemed like the opportune moment.
“I did notice that the building seems significantly larger on the inside than on the outside,” he remarked.
“It’s funny, that,” said Mr. Gedeon. “Doesn’t seem to matter much what the building looks like on the outside: it’s as though, when they all move in, they bring their own space with them. I’ve often wondered why that might be, and I think I’ve come up with an answer of sorts. It’s a natural consequence of the capacity of a bookstore or library to contain entire worlds, whole universes, and all contained between the covers of books. In that sense, every library or bookstore is practically infinite. This library takes that to its logical conclusion.”
They passed a pair of overly ornate and decidedly gloomy rooms, in one of which an ashen-faced man sat reading a book, his unusually long fingernails gently testing the pages. He turned to watch them pass, and his lips drew back to reveal a pair of elongated canines.
“The Count,” said Mr. Gedeon in a worried manner. “I’d move along if I were you.”
“You mean Stoker’s Count?” said Mr. Berger. He couldn’t help but gawp. The Count’s eyes were rimmed with red, and there was an undeniable magnetism to him. Mr. Berger found his feet dragging him into the room as the Count set aside his book and prepared to welcome him.
Mr. Gedeon’s hand grasped his right arm and pulled him back into the corridor.
“I told you to move along,” he said. “You don’t want to be spending time with the Count. Very unpredictable, the Count. Says he’s over all that vampiric nonsense, but I wouldn’t trust him farther than I could throw him.”
“He can’t get out, can he?” asked Mr. Berger, who was already rethinking his passion for evening walks.
“No, he’s one of the special cases. We keep those books behind bars, and that seems to do the trick for the characters as well.”
“But some of the others wander,” said Mr. Berger. “You met Hamlet, and I met Anna Karenina.”
“Yes, but that’s really most unusual. For the most part, the characters exist in a kind of stasis. I suspect a lot of them just close their eyes and relive their entire literary lives over and over. Still, we do have quite a competitive bridge tournament going, and the pantomime at Christmas is always good fun.”
“How do they get out, the ones who ramble off?”
Mr. Gedeon shrugged. “I don’t know. I keep the place well locked up, and it’s rare that I’m not here. I just took a few days off to visit my brother in Bootle, but I’ve probably never spent more than a month in total away from the library in all of my years as librarian. Why would I? I’ve got books to read and characters to talk to. I’ve got worlds to explore, all within these walls.”
At last they reached a closed door, upon which Mr. Gedeon knocked tentatively.
“Oui?” said a female voice.
“Madame, vous avez un visiteur,” said Mr. Gedeon.
“Bien. Entrez, s’il vous plaît.”
Mr. Gedeon opened the door, and there was the woman whom Mr. Berger had watched throw herself beneath the wheels of a train and whose life he felt that he had subsequently saved, sort of. She was wearing a simple black dress, perhaps even the very one that had so captivated Kitty in the novel, her curly hair in disarray, and a string of pearls hanging around her firm neck. She seemed startled at first to see him, and he knew that she recalled his face.
Mr. Berger’s French was a little rusty, but he managed to dredge up a little from memory.
“Madame, je m’appelle Monsieur Berger, et je suis enchanté de vous rencontrer.”
“Non,” said Anna, after a short pause, “tout le plaisir est pour moi, Monsieur Berger. Vous vous assiérez, s’il vous plaît.”
He took a seat, and a polite conversation commenced. Mr. Berger explained in the most delicate terms that he had been a witness to her earlier encounter with the train, and it had haunted him. Anna appeared most distressed and apologized profusely for any trouble that she might have caused him, but Mr. Berger waved it away as purely minor and stressed that he was more concerned for her than for himself. Naturally, he said, when he saw her making a second attempt — if attempt was the right word for an act that had been so successful first time round — he had felt compelled to intervene.
After some initial hesitancy, their conversation grew easier. At some point Mr. Gedeon arrived with more tea and some more cake, but they barely noticed him. Mr. Berger found much of his French returning, but Anna, having spent so long in the environs of the library, also had a good command of English. They spoke together long into the night, until at last Mr. Berger noticed the hour and apologized for keeping Anna up so late. She replied that she had enjoyed his company, and she slept little anyway. He kissed her hand and begged leave to return the next day, and she gave her permission willingly.
Mr. Berger found his way back to the library without too much trouble, apart from an attempt by Fagin to steal his wallet, which the old reprobate put down to habit and nothing more. When he reached Mr. Gedeon’s living quarters, he discovered the librarian dozing in an armchair. He woke him gently, and Mr. Gedeon opened the front door to let him out.
“If you wouldn’t mind,” said Mr. Berger as he stood on the doorstep, “I should very much like to return tomorrow to speak with you and Ms. Karenina, if that wouldn’t be too much of an imposition.”
“It wouldn’t be an imposition at all,” said Mr. Gedeon. “Just knock on the glass. I’ll be here.”
With that the door was closed, and Mr. Berger, feeling both more confused and more elated than he had in all his life, returned to his cottage in the darkness and slept a deep, dreamless sleep.
CHAPTER
TWELVE
The next morning, once he had washed and breakfasted, Mr. Berger returned to Caxton Library. He brought with him some fresh pastries that he had bought in the local bakery in order to replenish Mr. Gedeon’s supplies, and a book of Russian poetry in translation of which he was unusually fond but which he now desired to present to Anna. Making sure that he was not being observed, he took the laneway that led to the library and knocked on the glass. He was briefly fearful that Mr. Gedeon might have spirited away the contents of the premises — books, characters, and all — overnight, fearful that the discovery by Mr. Berger of the library’s true nature might bring some trouble upon them all, but the old gentleman opened the door to Mr. Berger’s knock on the glass and seemed very pleased to see him return.
“Will you take some tea?” asked Mr. Gedeon, and Mr. Berger agreed, even though he had already had tea at breakfast and was anxious to return to Anna. Still, he had questions for Mr. Gedeon, particularly pertaining to Anna.
“Why does she do it?” he asked as he and Mr. Gedeon shared an apple scone between them.
“Do what?” said Mr. Gedeon. “Oh, you mean throw herself under trains.”
He picked a crumb from his waistcoat and put it on his plate.
“First of all, I should say that she doesn’t make a habit of it,” said Mr. Gedeon. “In all the years that I’ve been here, she’s done it no more than a dozen times. Admittedly, the incidents have been growing more frequent, and I have spoken to her about them in an effort to find some way to help, but she doesn’t seem to know herself why she feels compelled to relive her final moments in the book. We have other characters that return to their fates — just about all of our Thomas Hardy characters appear obsessed by them — but she’s the only one who reenacts her end. I can only give you my thoughts on the matter, and I’d say this: she’s the titular character, and her life is so tragic, her fate so awful, that it could be that both are imprinted upon the reader and her in a particularly deep and resonant way. It’s in the quality of the writing. It’s in the book. Books have power. You must understand that now. It’s why we keep all of these first editions so carefully. The fate of characters is set forever in those volumes. There’s a link between those editions and the characters that arrived here with them.”