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“Where did they all come from?” I ask, gesturing toward the volumes stacked on the table and lining the walls.
“The books? Oh, they appeared over time. A resident took one and left two behind. The study simply grew. I’m sure they stocked it when the Coronado was first converted, leather-bound classics and atlases and encyclopedias. But these days it’s a delightful mix of old and new and odd. Just the other night I found a romance novel mixed in with the directories! Imagine.”
My pulse skips. “Directories?”
Something nervous shifts in her face, but she points a ringed finger over her shoulder. My eyes skim the walls of books behind her until they land on a dozen or so slightly larger than the rest, more uniform. In the place of a title, each spine has a set of dates.
“They chronicle the residents?” I ask casually, eyes skimming the years. The dates go all the way back to the earliest parts of the past century. The first half of the books are red. The second half are blue.
“They were first used while the Coronado was still a hotel,” she explains. “A kind of guestbook, if you will. Those red ones, those are from the hotel days. The blue ones are from the conversion on.”
I round the table to the shelf that bears the books’ weight. Pulling the most recent one from the wall and flipping through, I see that each directory comprises five years’ worth of residential lists, an ornate page dividing each year. I go to the last divider, the most recent year, and turn until I get to the page for the third floor. In the column for 3F, someone has crossed out the printed word Vacant and added Mr. and Mrs. Peter Bishop in pencil. Flipping back through, I find that 3F has been vacant for two years, and was rented before that to a Mr. Bill Lighton. I close the book, return it to the shelf, and immediately take up the previous directory.
“Looking for something?” Ms. Angelli asks. There’s a subtle tension in her voice.
“Just curious,” I say, again searching for 3F. Still Mr. Lighton. Then Ms. Jane Olinger. I pause, but I know from reading the walls that it was more than ten years ago, and besides, the girl was too young to be living alone. I reshelve the book and pull the next one down.
Ms. Olinger again.
Before that, Mr. and Mrs. Albert Locke. Still not far enough.
Before that, Vacant.
Is this how normal people learn the past?
Next, a Mr. Ke
And then I find what I’m looking for. The wall of black, the dead space between most of the memories and the murder. I run my finger down the column.
Vacant.
Vacant.
Vacant.
Not just one set, either. There are whole books of Vacant. Ms. Angelli watches me too intently, but I keep pulling the books down until I reach the last blue book, the one that starts with the conversion: 1950 – 54.
The 1954 book is marked Vacant, but when I reach the divider marked 1953, I stop.
3F is missing.
The entire floor is missing.
The entire year is missing.
In its place is a stack of blank paper. I turn back through 1952 and 1951. Both are blank. There’s no record of the murdered girl. There’s no record of anyone. Three entire years are just…missing. The inaugural year, 1950, is there, but there’s no name written under 3F. What did Lyndsey say? There was nothing on record. Suspiciously nothing.
I drop the blue book open on the table, nearly upsetting Ms. Angelli’s tea.
“You look a touch pale, Mackenzie. What is it?”
“There are pages missing.”
She frowns. “The books are old. Perhaps something fell out.…”
“No,” I snap. “The years are deliberately blank.”
Apartment 3F sat vacant for nearly two decades after the mysterious missing chunk of time. The murder. It had to have happened in those years.
“Surely,” she says, more to herself than to me, “they must be archived somewhere.”
“Yeah, I—” And it hits me. “You’re right. You’re totally right.” Whoever did this tampered with evidence in the Outer, but they can’t tamper with it in the Archive. I’m already out of the leather chair. “Thanks for your help,” I say, scooping up the directory and returning it to its shelf.
Ms. Angelli’s eyebrows inch up. “Well, I didn’t really do—”
“You did. You’re brilliant. Thanks. Good night!” I’m at the door, then through it, into the Coronado’s lobby, and pulling the key from my neck and the ring from my finger before I even reach the door set into the stairs.
“What brings you to the Archive, Miss Bishop?”
It’s Lisa at the desk. She looks up, pen hovering over a series of ledgers set side by side behind the QUIET PLEASE sign, which I’m pretty sure is her contribution. Her black bob frames her face, and her eyes are keen but kind—two different shades—behind a pair of green horn-rimmed glasses. Lisa is a Librarian, of course, but unlike Roland, or Patrick, or most of the others, for that matter, she really looks the part (aside from the fact that one of her eyes is glass, a token from her days as Crew).
I fiddle with the key around my wrist.
“Couldn’t sleep,” I lie, even though it’s not that late. It’s my default response here, the way people always answer How are you? with Good or Great or Fine, even when they’re not. “Those look nice,” I say, gesturing to her nails. They’re bright gold.
“You think so?” she asks, admiring them. “Found the polish in the closets. Roland’s idea. He says they’re all the rage right now.”
I’m not surprised. In addition to his public addiction to trashy magazines, Roland has a private addiction to stealing glances at newly added Histories. “He would know.”
Her smile thins. “What can I do for you tonight, Miss Bishop?” she asks, two-toned eyes leveled on me.
I hesitate. I could tell Lisa what I’m looking for, of course, but I’ve already used up my quota of Lisa-issued rule-bending coupons this month, what with the visits to Ben’s shelf. And I don’t have any bartering chips, no tokens from the Outer that she might like. I’m comfortable with Lisa, but if I ask her and she says no, I’ll never make it past the desk.
“Is Roland around?” I ask casually. Lisa’s gaze lingers, but then she goes back to writing in the ledgers.
“Ninth wing, third hall, fifth room. Last time I checked.”
I smile and round the desk to the doors.
“Repeat it,” orders Lisa.
I roll my eyes, but parrot, “Nine, three, five.”
“Don’t get lost,” she warns.
My steps slow as I cross into the atrium. The stained glass is dark, as if the sky beyond—if there were a sky—had slipped to night. But still the Archive is bright, well-lit despite the lack of lights. Walking through is like wading into a pool of water. Cool, crisp, beautiful water. It slows you and holds you and washes over you. It is dazzling. Wood and stone and colored glass and calm. I force myself to look down at the dark wood floor, and find my way out of the atrium, repeating the numbers nine three five, nine three five, nine three five. It is too easy to go astray.
The Archive is a patchwork, pieces added and altered over the years, and the bit of hall I wander down is made of paler wood, the ceilings still high but the placards on the front of the shelves worn. I reach the fifth room, and the style shifts again, with marble floors and a lower ceiling. Every space is different, and yet in all of them, that steady quiet reigns.
Roland is standing in front of an open drawer, his back to me and his fingertips pressed gently into a man’s shoulder.
When I enter the room, his hands shift from the History to its drawer, sliding it closed with one fluid, silent motion. He turns my way, and for a moment his eyes are so…sad. But then he blinks and recovers.
“Miss Bishop.”