Roger Harpell collected his notebooks and set off in what he hoped was a southerly direction from the Entry Cathedral. His précis for his thesis was due in three weeks, and so far the library at school was missing more pages than it had. According to a scrap of printout he'd found in the kitchen, this house had a well stocked library... somewhere.
Down a narrow hallway were several doors on both sides, each made of a different wood and style. Upon reaching the first door on the left, he took a deep breath and pulled the ornate west Indian handle. Inside was a bathroom that looked much more stable than the previous one he had used.
Roger closed the door again and turned to the door on the right side of the hallway. It was heavy oak with a carving of King Henry III in a clown suit. With a strange feeling that this wasn't the right door, he opened it anyway. Upon opening the door fully, he was greeted by Bip the Michelin Man who had a great set of tires under his left arm.
"Hi. Are you the new owner?"
"Uh, yeah."
"Interest you in a set of white walls?"
"No, I don't have a car, and I really can't see putting them under the TV."
"Oh. How about a position as manager for the Cleveland Indians?"
"How stupid do I look?"
"Alright, alright, I had to try!"
"It's alright. You don't happen to know where the library is, do you?"
"Hey, man, I'm a cartoon. I don't read much, y'know what I'm saying?"
"I guess... but that doesn't mean you can't know where the place is."
"Well I don't. I can sell you a road map to the continental United States though."
"I don't think that'll help. Thanks anyway." Roger closed the door and hurried down the hall. At the end, it turned left, and so did Roger. He followed it through an arch, and found himself on the field of a baseball stadium. He looked about; there were twenty-five decks of seats, and far above he could see open sky. The white lines seemed to be made of a strange sort of powder. He kneeled down to get a closer look, but couldn't identify it. The base bags were easier; they were either silk or rayon.
"Uncle Sturmgosse must have been a hell of a baseball nut. Emphasis on the `nut'."
Roger looked around the decks and in the dug-outs. Empty. The whole place was barren, then he noticed a pair of legs sticking out from behind the tarp roll. Approaching the pair of legs, Roger noticed they quivered as if the upper body was working on something. The man was in a suit, and appeared to be working on a pump under the first row of seats.
"Excuse me?"
"Oh what the hell do you want ya blasted runt?"
"Umn, I'm the new owner of this house.."
"Well, there goes the bloody dimension."
"Who are you?"
"I'm Klaus!"
"Ahh, the grounds keeper!"
"No, the mechanic. Of course I'm the grounds keeper, you dumkopf!"
"Ya know, your job isn't exactly unassailable, Klaus."
"My job is what?"
"Negotiable."
"Huh? Talk sense, you twit!"
"The point is you probably shouldn't piss off the boss."
Klaus pulled out from under the seats. "Oh, well, if you're going to stand on the employer-employee relationship, sir, you should know that I'm owed one hundred thousand dollars in back pay."
"What!?"
"Yer uncle never quite got around to paying me," said Klaus, disappearing under the seats again. "So, either pay me or piss off."
"Uh, yeah." Roger didn't think his student loan would cover that kind of check. "By the way, you wouldn't know where the library is, would you?"
"Of course I do."
"Well?"
"Well what?"
"Where is it?"
"Lift up home plate and follow the tunnel. Just get out of my hair, numb nuts."
Roger shook his head and wandered over to home plate, which turned out to be a manhole. He yanked it up, and found a set of red-carpeted stairs going down. He started down to find that the carpet was soaked. Roger lost his footing and slid to the bottom of the stairs where it turned into a chute, and he continued to slide around corners and then into a small wire grating, which fortunately popped out of the wall, and Roger landed on the floor. Shaking his head and trying to settle his stomach, Roger looked around a dimly lit room filled with rows upon rows of book shelves. A row of tables ran along the one wall. Several other people sat at these tables reading diligently.
Roger approached the first person. It was Abraham Lincoln and he was reading some of the original works of Ayn Rand.
"Excuse me...Abe?"
Abe slowly turned to him with a scowl and pulled a finger up to his mouth in a gesture to shoosh.
Walking further along the table, Roger found King Arthur thumbing through the Magna Carta. He sat in full armor with the sword Excalibur at his side. Roger decided not to bother him.
After passing Ghenghis Kahn (reading up on advanced macrame) and Queen Victoria (checking out a book on the latest sexual techniques and their use in unarmed combat), he ran across a distinguished looking gentleman wearing a brown suit and perusing a book on comparative religion as pertaining to property rights and regulations.
"That's an odd subject, isn't it?"
"Perhaps, my boy, but that really depends on one's faith. Allow me to introduce myself, I am Rodney Locke, Barrister and Solicitor." Rodney extended his hand.
Roger shook it, saying, "Roger Harpell."
"Ahh, Sturmgosse's nephew, glad to meet you, me boy. So, what brings you here?"
"Well, I just inherited the place, so I thought I'd do some research for my thesis."
"Inherited? Interesting, I wasn't aware Sturmgosse had died."
"That's okay, I wasn't aware he'd lived until a week ago."
"Touché. Well, I'd best let you get back to your studies. If you should need any legal assistance, about the house, say, give me a call. My card."
Roger took the card. "Thanks." He wandered into the stacks, looking for medieval English volumes.
About to put Rodney's card in his pocket, he glanced at it quickly.
Locke, Schtocke & Bahrl
Barristers and Solicitors
Slipping it into his pocket, Roger looked up to see the collected works of Eduardo Madino. He was obviously in the wrong section.
Roger looked left. Then he looked right. To the left was the wall he had fallen through. To the right there didn't appear to be a wall for more than half a mile.
`This place could really use a catalog.'
He wandered down the row, scanning titles. `The Complete Guide to Belly Button Lint.' `A Taxidermy of Presidents.' `Literary Criticism of the Gulf War.' `Morphasite.' `Cyberdoom.' Uncle Sturmgosse's book collection sucked, as far as Roger could tell.
Looking around a corner of the shelf, he saw the rows seemed to go on indefinitely. Millions of books for inquiring minds, or just lost ones.
Travelling down a few rows, Roger inspected some more titles `The Rogues Guide To Bubble Gum Under Cafe Tables.' `Putting Your Typewriter To Work.' `Self-Employment For The Under Nourished.' `How-To Build Your Own Titanic.' Nothing relevant.
And so it went, down the row.
At the end, he found a door. It was made of high tensile steel, and had a giant combination lock. Scratched into the wall beside the doors were the numbers 42, 69, and 812. Roger shrugged and spun the lock to those numbers. The lock clicked.
"What the fuck, let's go for it." Roger opened the door.
