The Geographer's Library

The Geographer’ s Library
“Hit-and-run. Car didn’t even stop.”
Austell took his glasses off and peered at me as though seeing me for the
first time. “Really? Really? How awful. Well, that’s just . . . Has anyone gone
to the police?”
The way he leaned on the word “police” emphasized its exoticism for him:
violent men who wear cheap blazers and run through doors with guns raised.
I wondered whether he had ever met a policeman (the Olafssons not
included). “Yeah, the police were called in just after the accident. No suspects
yet; the witnesses couldn’t agree on the type of car or who was driving.”
“You actually spoke to the police?”
“I did. Not that much came of it.”
“Pity. And how is the rest of your work coming?” he asked in an almost
paternal tone.
“Fine, no complaints, thanks.”
“Ah, good. You know, I hear Verrill’s is adding a vegetable section. Causing
a lot of excitement around here, I can tell you. Any more visits to
Clougham for you?”
“No, none on the horizon. Looks like everything’s either local or in Wickenden.”
“Excellent to hear. As I advised you before, Clougham has always been a
rather odd place. I wouldn’t go there myself if I could avoid it.”
I nodded amicably and turned back toward my desk. For the rest of the
morning, we worked in silence, broken occasionally by Austell’s reading a
sentence to himself and by my tapping on the computer keys, transcribing
the previous day’s conversation with Hannah. As I did, she kept jumping
uninvited into my mind, and as I began counting first the hours and then converting
into minutes the amount of time before I would pick her up, I found it
increasingly difficult to work. Austell had taken to humming tunelessly while
he worked; he sounded like a stoned hornet. By late morning I had gotten so
antsy at the thought of an actual, real-live date with an actual, real-live woman
that I couldn’t sit still at all. I told Austell I was going to talk to the Verrills
about their expansion. I left before he could ask me to bring something back
for him.
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