|
the southwest corner of the library.
Madge motioned Karen to try Marin's card on the lock. With a snick,
the panel eased open enough to pull. Karen followed Madge up the
dimly lit stairway to the upper level where Marin's card was again
necessary.
As the panel closed behind the women, Tar led Drew to a
section devoted to Shadow Earth. A computer workstation had the
Great Books of the Western World on optical disk. "Merely a quick
reference," teased Tar. Nearby, stacks contained complete sets of
St. Augustine, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Cervantes, Montaigne,
Machiavelli, Castiglione, Sidney, Bacon, Ben Johnson, Samuel
Johnson, Hegel, Heidegger, Newton, Einstein, Pope, Boccaccio,
Milton, Rabelais, and Virgil. First editions of seminal works
from ancient to postmodern took up proximate stacks.
Madge led Karen along the walkway which extended around the
perimeter of the upper level. Tracked ladders reached the highest
shelves near the ceiling.
The entrance to the study room was cleverly concealed from
view below. As Madge stepped across the threshold a gent
|