After Hours In The Library

The Library had been closed for hours.The librarian left for the day as soon as she had replaced all the books in their proper sections and shelves. Sometimes she wished the patrons would put books back where they had found them. At other times she used the books to log what was being read the most so she knew what to order in the future. Now nothing moved or made a sound in the small country library. The sun had finished setting leaving the library in complete darkness. 

A pair of eyes shone as a car’s headlights briefly invaded the darkness. Tiny feet were silent as they ran from one aisle to another as if searching for something. A squeak broke the silence followed by another squeak an aisle away. Soon quiet once again reigned but mice do not talk while eating pages of books carefully chosen for taste left behind by fingers coated with chocolate or other sumptuous flavors.

The pair of mice felt a chill in the air and knew they had to hide. The legend of the first librarian’s ghost was passed down to every generation. She died in early 1900 from bubonic plague that turned into pneumonic plague. She contracted bubonic plague when she drank water contaminated by the inevitable mice in the library. Even before her body was in the grave she stalked all rodents in the library to catch them where she could nightly cause books to slam down and squash them to death. Only the mice heard her cackling laugh as each one died.

The mice had learned not to congregate on the book shelves. She had no power to harm them except by squashing them with the books. She has just enough power to knock books over but not to move other objects. At least that was the legend these two had been told but they wondered about her powers. They had witnessed more than books squashing their friends. One night they saw a bust of the first town mayor fall from its pedestal and land on a rat. The marble pinned the rat to the floor where it bled to death and she laughed so hard it was a wonder the town did not hear her. Every librarian after the first one died had to replace books on the shelf each morning while wondering how those books fell so often on mice. Most of them attributed it to other mice knocking the books down as they sought tasty pages but none could explain the dead rat crushed by a bust of the first mayor..

Last week the mice saw half a shelf of books topple to the floor on top of two more of their friends. They not only nibbled on books tonight, they searched information on how to escape from this haven that was becoming a death trap. Both mice had recently mated and wanted to get their females out of this sure death trap so their babies could grow up without the fear they were living with. A squeak almost too low to be heard signaled Souris that Topo had found something. He quickly scurried to that shelf and what he read there gave hope they could stay where they were. The book was a handbook for witches. 

All they had to do was redirect the anger of the first librarian to something or someone else. Neither of them had any ideas how to accomplish that. They knew their ancestors were responsible for her death but that was many generations ago. The current library mice had done nothing to warrant her anger except nibble some of the tasty pages of books. The many times great-grandfathers of the living may have been responsible for her death but the living should not have to pay for the sins of the long dead. They had to find some way to redirect her anger. They read through the pages together.

Most of what they read did not make sense. What are spells? What were these things called sage, mushrooms and candles? They knew what toads were because at least once in their lives they went outdoors just to see what it was like and usually encountered some of the wildlife. Cats were the worst! They pounced and ate some of the younger mice who had not learned to run at the first glimpse of a cat. A fox almost ate Topo when he took his exploratory journey to the lake in back of the library. Souris had been lucky and had time to explore the plants on his journey. When he returned to the library, he spent most nights studying what the plants were called and what their use was but the picture of sage was not among the plants he knew. When he looked up the picture of a mushroom it looked like the local toadstools so maybe it had different names depending on where it grew. The picture of a candle was something he had never seen before. Even when he read it was made of wax and used for light made no sense to him. Humans had light from something on the ceiling that gave them light. No one had ever used the word wax so he would have to study where that came from if they were to do the spell.

For many nights the two mice read books without the good smells trying to find out what these strange objects were and where their source was. When they discovered sage was grown so far away they could not hope to reach it in their lifetime and mushrooms grew mostly in wooded areas but they lived in desert their hope dimmed. Then they learned wax was impossible for two mice to obtain and make into a candle. There may be candles at the grocery store but the rats claimed it as theirs and no mouse who ever went into the grocery store came out alive. Their hope vanished.

In the quiet hour or so after the librarian closed for the day, the entire mouse community discussed the promise of freedom that was ended for Souris and Topo. The two friends stayed in the back of the mouse hole while their leader asked for suggestions from the crowd. No one had any ideas. Suddenly Femelle jumped up and shouted, “I have it. I know how to transfer her hatred of us. Find a book describing her illness and death. It will tell how the doctor failed to properly treat her bubonic plague and that is why she developed pneumonic plague. It was more failure of a human to prevent her death than it was of our ancestors infecting her. After all, we have no control over our fleas and ticks that infest us with diseases. But the human did have control over the treatment he failed to give her. Once you find that book, leave it open for the ghost to read. All the decades we have been punished should end and she will want to harm humans instead of us.”

That night every mouse attacked the books looking for the history book that would free them. It took many nights but no one gave up. The current librarian could not understand why so many books were on the floor every morning. There were no earthquakes in their desert. But she picked all of them up and returned them to their shelves. It struck her as strange that the books varied from night to night. It was like someone was searching for something and did not know where to look. But who could enter the library at night after she locked up? She and the mayor had the only keys. The mayor wasn’t doing it because he was too drunk by the time she locked up to read anything. She knew he stayed at the neighborhood bar until it closed and had to be taken home and put to bed because he could no longer function on his own with all the alcohol in his system. You would think he knew better than to drink like that. His grandfather and father were both doctors after all. Come to think of it his grandfather was the one who treated Miss What’s Her Name before she died with some kind of plague. The avalanche of books suddenly stopped but one book was lying on the floor looking as if it had survived a tornado. She picked it up and saw it was a history book about their town.

She took it to the only reading table and began reading the story of the great plague in 1900. A customer came in before she could read much and the book was so tattered she tossed it in the waste basket as she passed on her way to the front desk. Perhaps she could find another copy to put on the shelf next month. The rest of the day she was just busy enough to have no time to search the archives for the replacement. Since the book was the only thing in the waste basket, she decided not to empty it before she left. 

When darkness enveloped the library that night the mice remained in their mouse hole. They witnessed the tornado last night and did not want to chance her anger tonight. Though she was a ghost, she could not enter their sanctuary for some reason. Perhaps it was fear because she blamed them for her death and she did not want to be infected again. Or maybe she could not fit in the small space that was an entire community to them. Whatever the reason, they huddled in that space hoping she did not suddenly change. Souris and Topo stood watch at the entrance and they saw her levitate the trashed book to the reading table. It was still open to the section describing her death. The longer she read, the angrier she looked. The two friends pulled back into the mouse hole and warned the others another tornado was imminent. 

They heard the same sounds as last night. She was probably throwing the book against any surface she could. Souris peeked out and saw parts of the book everywhere. She had destroyed almost all of it. Pages were lying everywhere he could see. The covers were in tatters among the pages relating her story. Very little could ever be read again. The librarian’s ghost was nowhere to be seen. Cautiously the mice crept out into the library but she was not there. The current librarian must have had a pastry for breakfast because the scattered pages smelled delightful. Tonight the mice feasted in celebration of their freedom. They nibbled the areas where she had touched and congratulated themselves on their new life. 

Suddenly they heard sirens loudly screaming outside. Running to the windows they saw what must have been every emergency vehicle in the county. Buildings were burning everywhere. The largest fire seemed to be at the tavern on the edge of town. The mayors house was burned to the ground. The doctor’s office was blazing but no amount of water put out the fire. The mice edged outside and the last one exited just as the library went up in flames. The entire town was destroyed. Not one building remained. All were piles of ashes or still burning with a fire that could not be stopped. They heard one of the firemen say it was like some kind of unholy fire. The mayor was too drunk to find his way out of the tavern and was cremated with his favorite place. The current librarian had stepped out to take her dog for a walk and avoided any injury. It was strange that the only lives lost in all the fires were relatives of the mayor. Every relative had perished ending the bloodline of the town’s original doctor. The townspeople decided it would be bad luck to rebuild the town where so many had perished so they had the minister say a prayer for all the lost souls then they got into their vehicles and drove to the next town that had rooms available for the rest of the night. They never looked back and never returned to the ashes of their former homes. They did not see the specter laughing wildly as it floated to a certain spot in the cemetery and disappeared into the ground.

The mice huddled at the edge of the lake until daylight when they could seek new shelter in the wild. They too refused to return to what was left of the town and they no longer wanted to be library mice anywhere. The closest library was several days travel and it just might be haunted like this one was.