Polly Shulman - The Grimm Legacy

“Bye-bye, Libbet,” said Andre, waving at me.

“Bye, Andre.”

“Thanks, Elizabeth,” said Marc, more warmly this time. “Thanks for taking care of him. Sorry for the trouble.”

It felt good to have Marc Merritt thanking me. I watched as he carried Andre off down the hallway.

I noticed he was wearing the brown work boots again. Were they his? I found myself wondering. Or were they the mysteriously misshelved ones? Stop it, I told myself. If I wanted to make friends, I needed to be more trusting.

I finished putting away the opera gowns and trundled my hand truck back to the staging area. Aaron was sitting at his usual desk. He was mending something under a bright lamp, which cast the usual sharp shadows across his cheekbones.

“Anjali?” he said, looking up.

“No, just Elizabeth,” I answered, slightly testily.

His face fell. “Oh. Hi, Elizabeth.” I could hear the disappointment in his voice. How flattering.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“I’m darning a sock,” he said, holding it up to show me.

“What’s that lump inside it?”

“A sock egg.”

“A sock egg? I didn’t know socks hatched from eggs.”

“Only the best ones do. I can’t wear the cheap kind, the ones that grow on trees. They give me blisters.”

“Riiiiight, okay. Is that from the Grimm Collection?” I asked.

“Of course not. It’s just an ordinary sock egg,” he said shortly.

“I meant the sock.”

“Why would it be? And why do you keep asking about the Grimm Collection?”

“Because it makes you mad, and you look so funny when you snarl,” I said. “Is it? The sock, I mean. From the Grimm Collection.”

“No, it’s from my sock drawer. It got a hole. My toe was poking through—it was very uncomfortable.”

“Oh.” I was kind of impressed, despite myself. How many guys would bother to sew up a hole in their sock? “Seriously, what’s a sock egg?” I asked.

He reached into the sock and pulled it out. It looked like an ordinary chicken’s egg made of wood. “You put it in the sock to stretch it out where the hole is so you can sew it up more evenly,” he said.

“I see,” I said. “That’s kind of a clever idea. I wonder who thought of it. Do you think the first sock eggs were real eggs?”

“No way. Too fragile. That would be pretty gross, if you broke an egg in your sock.”

“So what do you think the first ones were?”

He shrugged. “Round stones, probably. If you’re really curious, you could take a look at the egg collection.”

“The Egg Collection? Is that like the Grimm Collection?”

He snorted. “Of course not. I just meant the various eggs in the repository.”

“There are eggs here?”

“Sure, lots of different kinds.”

“Hard boiled? Over easy?”

“Ukrainian Easter eggs. China eggs for tricking hens into laying. Ostrich eggs with scenes painted on them. Even a few fossilized dinosaur eggs.”

“Wow, what do those look like?”

“Big and round.”

“Could you use them to darn socks?”

“If you had giant feet.” He looked at my feet and grinned.

I’m a little sensitive about the size of my feet, and I felt myself begin to blush.

To cover my embarrassment, I said, “How do you know they’re dinosaur eggs and not giant eggs from the giant bird?”

“What giant bird?” Aaron sounded alarmed.

“The one that’s supposedly following people around and stealing their objects.”

His eyes narrowed with suspicion. “Who told you about that? Marc?”

“No, Anjali.”

“Oh. Well, she shouldn’t be talking about that. And you certainly shouldn’t be joking about it!”

“Why not? Do you honestly believe there’s a giant bird stealing things?”

“Maybe. But it’s nothing to joke about, anyway.”

“Elizabeth?” said someone behind me. This time it was Anjali.

“Anjali!” Aaron said again, his voice full of pleasure like a kid who hears the ice-cream truck. He hadn’t sounded like that when he was talking to me. I decided I hated him.

“Hi, Aaron, mind if I borrow Elizabeth for a minute?” Anjali asked.

“What do you need her for? Maybe I could help you instead,” said Aaron hopefully.

“It’s girl stuff,” said Anjali. She drew me into a dark corner near the *V room. “I need your help with something . . . personal,” she said.

“Of course! What is it?”

“It’s those boots again. I need you to help me get them downstairs to the GC before someone requests them. Ms. Minnian is expecting me up on Stack 6 right now. She sent me down here to pick up that hand truck.”

“Okay,” I said, though I didn’t understand why Anjali couldn’t just put the boots on the return truck with the rest of the stuff for reshelving. “Wouldn’t it be better to have Aaron do it, though? He knows his way around the Dungeon, and he’s obviously dying to help you.”

“No—don’t tell him! He’d decide it was his duty to tell a librarian. He hates Merritt, for some reason. You’ll keep it a secret, won’t you? Promise?” She sounded terribly alarmed.

“Of course,” I said. I didn’t exactly see what Marc had to do with it, but returning the boots didn’t seem like such a big deal to me. After all, putting something back in the right place wasn’t like stealing it. Besides, I was flattered that Anjali wanted me to help her—and even more flattered that she trusted me to keep her secret.

“Thank you, Elizabeth! I really owe you.” She handed me a plastic shopping bag. I peeked in and saw the familiar boots. “Take these down to Stack 1,” she continued. “They go in the Grimm Collection, I *GC 391.413 S94. Can you remember that? Here, I’ll write it down. There’s another pair that look just like them where these are supposed to go. Switch the boots and bring the other pair up here, Stack 2. They go in that aisle with the rest of the boots, call number II T&G 391.413 S23, like it says on this tag. Remember to switch the tags too.”

“Okay. So I can just walk into the Grimm Collection? It’s not locked?”

“No, you need a key. A key and a password.”

“Is that the key you were talking about in the MER? The one I don’t have yet?”

“Yes, the Grimm Collection key. It’s irreplaceable, and I’m not supposed to give it to anyone. You’ll take really good care of it, won’t you?”

“I promise.”

“Then here.

Anjali took a barrette out of her hair and handed it to me.

“What’s this for?”

“That’s the key.”

“This is a key?” I turned it over. It still looked like a barrette.

“It’s . . . disguised. For security. When you get to the Grimm Collection, hold it against the door and sing this:

Out is out and shut is shut,

Turn the key and crack the nut.

Push the door and break the shell:

Let me in and all is well.”

Anjali had a sweet, high singing voice.

“What’s that, some kind of voice recognition thing?” I asked.

“Something like that. Sing it back so I know you know it. You have to get the tune right.”

“Maybe you’d better write it down, so I don’t forget,” I said.

She scribbled hastily. “Don’t lose this! I could get in big trouble if the wrong person finds it.”

I sang the rhyme until I got it right, feeling pretty silly. No surprise Mr. Theodorus never picked me to do solos in chorus. “Will the door know my voice?” I asked.

“It responds to the words and the tune, not the voice. It only works when you have the key, though.”

“Anjali,” called Aaron from the front of the stack.

“Boy, that’s some sophisticated security! How does it work?” I asked.