Page 13 of The Librarian Spy

“I’m a librarian,” Ava answered proudly. “I love to learn.”

“You’re perfect for this job. Don’t ever let Mr. Sims tell you different.”

Peggy pulled the car past the square. As she did so, Ava’s attention was drawn from the calçada to the swarms of people. Chairs and tables spilled from the cafés into the sunlit pavement in such numbers, it was impossible to tell one establishment from the other.

In Ava’s research through the OSS manual and other various books in the library, Portuguese women did not spend time in cafés. However, there were scores of women leaned casually back in the wooden and metal-framed seats, their legs absent stockings as they blew out graceful streams of cigarette smoke. Not a single one wore gloves, let alone a hat.

“The refugees have changed things a bit here.” Peggy turned down a side street called Rua de Santa Justa and pulled the car to a stop. “Don’t let this casual setting fool you. These people are in desperate circumstances. They don’t care if they have hats on their heads or stockings on their legs. They’re all biding their time, churning in the endless hell of transit visas, exit visas, whatever other kind of visas that can trip them up.”

“Like those outside the embassy.” Ava sobered as she recalled the crowd of people.

“Right.” Peggy frowned to herself. “If they’re lucky enough to get those visas, then they need tickets to boats that might never come and cause the crazy cycle to start all over again. You’ll see.”

She slid out from the car. Each woman took one of the suitcases, though Ava ensured she grabbed the heavier of the two, and lugged them up a flight of stairs in a town house to a door marked 101. Peggy pulled out a set of keys and opened the door. “It’s small, but it’s more than most have. Housing and hotel space is tight. Lucky for you, it was available just before your arrival.”

Ava walked into the narrow apartment where the living room, kitchen, and dining room were all rolled into one central location and a door to a bedroom was off to one side. Yet another door revealed her own bathroom, a luxury she’d never had.

“It’s perfect.” She set her suitcase down. “I’m from DC. This is practically a mansion.”

“In that case, you’re welcome.” Peggy handed the apartment keys and a thick envelope to her. “Escudos, the local currency, and quite a bit. Get some rest, then snap up as many publications as you can tomorrow morning. There’s a kiosk just down the street where you can get most of what you need. Someone will be by to pick you up around noon to take you back to the embassy.”

Ava held the envelope. “Is that all I need to do? Buy a few newspapers?”

Peggy shrugged and headed for the door. “You’ll be fine. You’re made for this job.”

The door to Ava’s apartment slammed closed, and she was completely alone with two packed suitcases and soul-deep exhaustion.

In DC, Ava was made for the job in the Rare Book Room, a library where she could name the artist of each painting and sculpture, where the history of every nook and cranny was as familiar to her as her own. She knew the catalog of ancient tomes like the back of her hand as well as her fellow librarians and the etiquette surrounding the hushed splendor of the Library of Congress. Lisbon was a city she had only a week to study for, like a dilettante cramming for a final exam, where she didn’t know the language and everything she’d learned about the culture was wrong.

To everyone, she was perfect for this job. Everyone, that is, except her.

She took nearly an age to fall asleep that night and struggled to rise at eight the next morning, her internal clock still set to DC time. Her suitcases were unpacked, her clothes pressed with an old iron she found in the closet, and her books were neatly shelved in the living area. With the exception of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women, which sat on the nightstand near the bed, where it always lay no matter where she lived.

When her mother was alive, they often read the same books together. It started with Anne of Green Gables when Ava was eight. She’d spoken of the story with such ebullience that her mother read it after her. The shared story made for many hours of lively conversation between them, smiling at Anne’s witty commentary and lamenting over the foulness of that nasty Josie Pye. Ava and her mother always read the same books after that—at least, until her mother’s death five years later.

Her mother had read Little Women first, as she often did when it came to books she feared might be too old for twelve-year-old Ava, and deemed it not only age-appropriate, but a masterpiece to be shared. Ava finished the story in her mother’s absence and was near bursting with all the things she wished to discuss. Knowing her mother was scheduled to arrive the next morning, she left it on the nightstand so she could grab it first thing.

Except the plane carrying them back from France had been caught in a terrible storm and crashed into the sea. When Ava ran out of her room that morning, it was not her mother and father who waited for her, but her nanny, red-eyed and sobbing.

The copy of Little Women by Ava’s bed did not mean her mother would come home, of course, but it was forever a reminder of her mother and their shared love of books that seemed to—even now—bring them together.

Somehow that small piece of her childhood, the familiarity of a beloved book, made these foreign surroundings feel more like home. She hadn’t realized how much she’d craved the comfort until it settled around her like an embrace and bolstered her determination.

While she was no polyglot, she knew French and German and even a bit of Spanish. Surely she could puzzle out more Portuguese than she anticipated. And she would only be on her own until noon when she was to go to the embassy. How hard could her first day be?

Ava almost left her hat behind, but at the last minute fixed a black pillbox to her victory curls and slid into her new black pumps to match her dark A-line wraparound skirt and pink sweater. When she opened the door to her apartment, the man on the other side was just leaving his.

His hair was mussed with threads of silver at his temples and a weariness slackened the skin under his eyes. He took one look at her and his heavy brows shot up. “You are American.”

Ava frowned. Was it so obvious?

“Do you have any American magazines?” he asked in accented English. “Time, perhaps?”

“Actually, I do,” she answered slowly. The magazine had been purchased on impulse at the airport before her flight in a bid to settle her nerves. It hadn’t worked and now lay on the table, still untouched.

“May I have it?” he asked.

It was such a bold question, without preamble or decorum, and she was so taken aback that she agreed before her thoughts could catch up. She slipped back into the apartment and reemerged with the magazine, its cover still crisp and glossy.