These days, I buy far fewer books than I once did, but still I can
seldom resist entering a newly-discovered second-hand bookshop, even one that
looks as unpromising as this one did. It was no more than a little terraced
house converted to a shop, in a squalid back-street. The meagre display in the
window scarcely invited further investigation, but even so I ventured into the
dark and cramped interior. The aged custodian in her fusty dress did not speak
as I entered, but glared suspiciously at me as though she suspected me of intending
to pilfer her stock. And this was indeed as feeble as might have been expected;
faded paperbacks, redundant outmoded textbooks with battered covers and what
are essentially non-books, puffing transitory media and sporting “personalities” and forgotten TV
soap-operas. I might have walked out at this point, but instead something
prompted me to approach the aforementioned custodian and say I was really
interested in old and rare books.
To my surprise, she responded. “Och, we keep those
up in the attic”, she told me, in a strong
Glaswegian accent. “I’ll go and unlock it for ye”.
I followed her up the creaking staircase to the top of the house. The
attic, under its low and steeply-sloping roof, was unsuitable for the display
of books, most of which lay in heaps on the floor. I soon discovered that, whilst old, they
could hardly be considered valuable enough to merit being kept under lock and
key. There were Victorian novels by writers whose very names had been forgotten,
and 19th century collections of the works of Byron or Wordsworth, in
very small print. They felt grimy to the touch. But now that I was in the attic
I continued to scrabble amongst them, hoping against all the evidence that I
might chance upon something worthwhile. The custodian continued to watch me
with silent suspicion, and showed no sign of animation until I picked up a
volume which appeared no more promising than the others.
“That’s the colonel’s book”, she told me. No further elucidation was forthcoming,
but I felt I should at least open it. I ruffled through its leaves until I came
to a full-page engraving entitled, “The Skraelings
greet the dawn”, which in the inadequate
light appeared to show a party of mounted figures. I find it very difficult to
describe what happened next, though at the time it seemed perfectly normal. I
can only say that as I peered at the picture I somehow found myself absorbed
into it, so that I was no longer in a slum attic but on the summit of a low
ridge, facing a party of warriors. Very fierce they looked, bearded and
helmeted, though their equipment did not resemble any I had seen before, and to
call them horsemen would be a misnomer, for the beasts they rode were monstrous
multi-legged creatures. Exultantly they raised their spears to salute the crimson
glow of a rising sun. (Did I explain that the engraving had mysteriously
acquired colours?) I realised I had strayed from earth to some other planet:
perhaps one where the coming of the dawn was less frequent than on earth;
separated maybe by months or even years of our time. It did not occur to me to
wonder who the colonel, whose book this was, had first found this place, and
how the discovery was recorded in this strange way; for now I was there myself,
and if I waited a little longer, the Skraelings would start to move, like a
film which resumes after pausing on a single frame, and I would be amongst them
……….
Then I awoke, and found I was at home, lying in bed; but the book was
still in my hand.
