Book Scavenger: Chapters 11-16

Even though James had his window open upstairs, too, they seemed to have made an unspoken agreement that there would be no verbal conversations when the message bucket was in use. Encrypted conversations only.

As they approached, the door to the bookstore swung open with a jingle and out stepped a black man with gray-frosted dreadlocks tied loosely at the nape of his neck.

His upper body rocked like a metronome when he walked, swinging his ponytail of ropes side to side across his back.

A morose cloud had settled around the man’s shoulders, and Emily didn’t know him well enough to understand if that was normal or due to his dwelling on Mr. Griswold.

But the way he acted, talking about Mr. Griswold, made her worry that maybe it was a touchy subject.

In the back half of the store there was a loft and a spiral staircase that led up to it.

Your query is incomplete.

“You mean semantics...Try reading more books instead of stealing them.”

If Emily felt jittery before, she was full-fledged Mountain Dew soda plus five packs of Skittles jittery now.

Emily stifled a groan.

Now the mushroom-cap girl gnawed on her thumbnail and glared at the linoleum.

Emily’s pen was poised over her open binder, ready to take notes.

Emily did her best to discreetly slide The Gold-Bug inside her binder as Mr. Quisling walked down her aisle.

Emily jerked her head back and forth so emphatically her pencil flew out of her ponytail and clattered to the floor.

James intently studied the pencil he rolled back and forth under his fingertips.

“Ciphers play an interesting role in the history of our world. Battles have been won and lost because of them. Assassinations have been diverted because coded plots were intercepted and deciphered, or conversely, assassinations have been successful. The twists and turns history has taken have often relied on secret messages and whether those messages were able to remain secrets.”

Emily gave Jose a small smile of gratitude, but his interjection didn’t deter Mr. Quisling.

Emily gave Jose a small smile of gratitude, but his interjection didn’t deter Mr. Quisling.

James joined in the renewed titters, but the tips of his ears looked suddenly sunburned.

Chatter and excitement permeated the classroom.

“Don’t lose your heads, people,” Mr. Quisling bellowed over the din.

It was clear from Maddie’s expression she hadn’t considered the flip side of this wager.

“I made him up. As I suspect you made up your Joe. Sorry, kids, but this is a business. We can’t let just anyone go gallivanting through our hallways.”

Jack didn’t say this in a mocking or condescending tone.

“But all the well wishes and positive thoughts you can muster for him will help.”

There were also odds and ends of books, and then unusual things, like tangrams glued onto poster board and a laminated map of San Francisco that had sticky notes attached to it with letters and numbers scrawled on them.

“These are all the ‘games’ other people have found and sent to us. We’ve been inundated with them, as you can see.”

“Books and games are how people feel close to Mr. Griswold. That’s what connects them to him. They want his game to exist, and so they find it in the unlikeliest of places. All of these”—Jack waved a hand over the odds and ends—“are examples of what Mr. Griswold has instilled in people: the ability to see something in nothing, to find a puzzle in what someone else would call trash.”

You two are the epitome of the types of readers Mr. Griswold was most hopeful about reaching—young, enthusiastic, dedicated.

The hallway opened to a large space filled with cubicles, the hum of computers, the rustle of papers, and a few low voices.

But it was his name on the placard that really caught Emily’s attention.

She wouldn’t have guessed Jack Kerouac would be this young, and from her dad’s descriptions she hadn’t pictured him as someone who wore argyle.

Windows spanned the far side of the room, showing a view that encompassed the Ferry Building and the bay beyond.

Something moved in her peripheral view, and Emily turned to see an actual man standing there, scanning the titles on the bookcase alongside the entrance.

For a fleeting, hopeful second—before she got a good look at him—Emily thought it was Mr. Griswold himself.

“Sorry about that, guys. He put a damper on my fun surprise now, didn’t he?”

Jack flourished his arm and said, “I give you Mr. Griswold’s sanctuary.”

“It is indeed. Mr. Griswold has a special affinity for his work.”

An eccentric artist and a publisher worked together to create a book called Masquerade. It was a picture book with clues, hidden in the illustrations.

Mr. Griswold loved this bit of publishing lore.