The Haunted Bookshop | Page 5

a copywriter by the Grey-Matter Advertising Agency.
The little room in which he found himself was plainly the bookseller's
sanctum, and contained his own private library. Gilbert browsed along
the shelves curiously. The volumes were mostly shabby and bruised;
they had evidently been picked up one by one in the humble mangers
of the second-hand vendor. They all showed marks of use and
meditation.
Mr. Gilbert had the earnest mania for self-improvement which has
blighted the lives of so many young men--a passion which, however, is
commendable in those who feel themselves handicapped by a college
career and a jewelled fraternity emblem. It suddenly struck him that it
would be valuable to make a list of some of the titles in Mifflin's
collection, as a suggestion for his own reading. He took out a
memorandum book and began jotting down the books that intrigued
him:

The Works of Francis Thompson (3 vols.) Social History of Smoking:
Apperson The Path to Rome: Hilaire Belloc The Book of Tea: Kakuzo
Happy Thoughts: F. C. Burnand Dr. Johnson's Prayers and Meditations
Margaret Ogilvy: J. M. Barrie Confessions of a Thug: Taylor General

Catalogue of the Oxford University Press The Morning's War: C. E.
Montague The Spirit of Man: edited by Robert Bridges The Romany
Rye: Borrow Poems: Emily Dickinson Poems: George Herbert The
House of Cobwebs: George Gissing
So far had he got, and was beginning to say to himself that in the
interests of Advertising (who is a jealous mistress) he had best call a
halt, when his host entered the room, his small face eager, his eyes blue
points of light.
"Come, Mr. Aubrey Gilbert!" he cried. "The meal is set. You want to
wash your hands? Make haste then, this way: the eggs are hot and
waiting."
The dining-room into which the guest was conducted betrayed a
feminine touch not visible in the smoke-dimmed quarters of shop and
cabinet. At the windows were curtains of laughing chintz and pots of
pink geranium. The table, under a drop-light in a flame-coloured silk
screen, was brightly set with silver and blue china. In a cut-glass
decanter sparkled a ruddy brown wine. The edged tool of Advertising
felt his spirits undergo an unmistakable upward pressure.
"Sit down, sir," said Mifflin, lifting the roof of a platter. "These are
eggs Samuel Butler, an invention of my own, the apotheosis of hen
fruit."
Gilbert greeted the invention with applause. An Egg Samuel Butler, for
the notebook of housewives, may be summarized as a pyramid, based
upon toast, whereof the chief masonries are a flake of bacon, an egg
poached to firmness, a wreath of mushrooms, a cap-sheaf of red
peppers; the whole dribbled with a warm pink sauce of which the
inventor retains the secret. To this the bookseller chef added fried
potatoes from another dish, and poured for his guest a glass of wine.
"This is California catawba," said Mifflin, "in which the grape and the
sunshine very pleasantly (and cheaply) fulfil their allotted destiny. I
pledge you prosperity to the black art of Advertising!"
The psychology of the art and mystery of Advertising rests upon tact,
an instinctive perception of the tone and accent which will be en
rapport with the mood of the hearer. Mr. Gilbert was aware of this, and
felt that quite possibly his host was prouder of his whimsical avocation
as gourmet than of his sacred profession as a bookman.
"Is it possible, sir," he began, in lucid Johnsonian, "that you can

concoct so delicious an entree in so few minutes? You are not hoaxing
me? There is no secret passage between Gissing Street and the
laboratories of the Ritz?"
"Ah, you should taste Mrs. Mifflin's cooking!" said the bookseller. "I
am only an amateur, who dabbles in the craft during her absence. She is
on a visit to her cousin in Boston. She becomes, quite justifiably, weary
of the tobacco of this establishment, and once or twice a year it does
her good to breathe the pure serene of Beacon Hill. During her absence
it is my privilege to inquire into the ritual of housekeeping. I find it
very sedative after the incessant excitement and speculation of the
shop."
"I should have thought," said Gilbert, "that life in a bookshop would be
delightfully tranquil."
"Far from it. Living in a bookshop is like living in a warehouse of
explosives. Those shelves are ranked with the most furious
combustibles in the world--the brains of men. I can spend a rainy
afternoon reading, and my mind works itself up to such a passion and
anxiety over mortal problems as almost unmans me. It is terribly
nerve-racking. Surround a man with Carlyle, Emerson, Thoreau,
Chesterton, Shaw, Nietzsche, and George Ade-- would you wonder at
his getting excited? What would happen to a