Five

It was a wolf.

A large grey wolf.

The Mate and Cook tried to hide behind each other, failed and stood, shivering slightly, as it paced around them.

‘Why are you here?’

‘Cookbooks!’  The Cook said.  ‘We were told….’

‘Why would there be cookbooks on the reference floor?’  The wolf stopped pacing and glared at them.  ‘Where are your forms?’

‘Forms?’  The Mate dug in his pockets.  ‘I’ve got tax forms, insurance forms, ship license, cabin boy NVQ evaluation forms, …’

‘You should have a reference enquiry form.’  The wolf growled.   ‘Access to the reference floor is restricted to users with bona fide reference enquiries as ascertained by completion in triplicate of a reference enquiry form.’

‘But we didn’t know that.’  Protested the Cook.  ‘We’re pirates we don’t go about filling in forms or checking signs. ’The Mate coughed rather resentfully at this and the Cook sighed. ‘Very well, most of us don’t go checking stuff.’

‘Thank you.’ Said the Mate.  ‘I’m sure we could fill in a set of forms for you Mr Wolf if you would be so kind as to provide them.’

‘You realise that an incorrectly completed form, or an enquiry which is not sufficiently complex to justify entry to this floor will result in me eating you?’

Mate and Cook looked at each other, and then back to the wolf.  He was a big wolf, much larger than either of them.  Of course a good pirate was perfectly capable of fighting off anything be it a Leviathan, Loch Ness Monster, or Godzilla, but that was at sea, on a ship.  Marooned in this strange dusty land of old books they felt much less confident about their ability to tackle a wolf.

‘Is that not against some sort of librarian ethical code?’ 

The Wolf grinned.  ‘I am a Siberian Reference Wolf.  In the frozen wastelands of the steppe there is no ‘ethical code’.  It is eat or be eaten. Banished from our native Russia the fiercest of us survive to make our homes amongst the reference materials of distant lands.  Now, will you fill in forms to prolong your pathetic pirate existences a little longer – or will you admit to having no business here?’

‘Forms!’  cried the Mate and Cook as one.

As the Captain and Miss Taciturn went to enter the lift to the first floor, they were stopped by a cavalcade of kittens, who tumbled into them.

‘Arrrgh’  cried the kittens on seeing the Pirate Captain.  ‘Another one!’  They made to run off, but 

Miss Taciturn caught on by the scruff of the neck and shook it hard.

‘No running, no shouting, no playing in the lifts.  Now, have you seen two other pirates?’

‘One with a spotted headscarf.’  Added the Captain. 

The kitten squirmed a little, but Miss Taciturn held firm, and its friends had long since run to the anarchic safety of the children’s library.  ‘Yes, yes.  We sent them up to Wolfy!’

‘Wolfy!’  Miss Taciturn dropped the kitten and turned to the Captain.  ‘Oh I am so sorry.  Your friends have very likely been eaten.’

‘Eaten!’  The Captain was shocked.  Everyone knew libraries were dangerous places, but surely being eaten was not amongst the normal hazards of such a place. 

‘You can have some free DVD vouchers to make up for it.’  Miss Taciturn hoped this would suffice.  Surely DVD vouchers were close enough to treasure that the Pirate Captain would accept them in lieu of his shipmates. 

‘DVD vouchers?  DVD vouchers?  Can a DVD voucher organise our tax returns, calculate wages and negotiate, at gunpoint, with insurance salesmen?  Can a DVD voucher bake a brioche loaf and brew the perfect pot of Earl Grey?’  The Captain drew himself up to his full height (roughly an inch shorter than Miss Taciturn)  ‘This is not acceptable!  I demand to see the manager!’

‘That won’t help.’  Miss Taciturn shook her head.  ‘It really won’t’

‘Why not?’

‘Well, partly due to the fact that our Reference Librarian is under the jurisdiction of the Siberian Library Authorities and they fully condone being eaten as an appropriate punishment for failure to comply with the regulations governing access to materials and partly…’

‘Yes?’  The Captain raised an eyebrow.

‘She’s a rabbit.’  Miss Taciturn shrugged.  ‘A very lovely, incredibly nice rabbit.  But still of no use whatsoever when negotiating with wolves.’

‘So there’s no one who could help?’ 

Miss Taciturn said nothing.  Technically the Captain’s question could be taken as rhetorical and she was damned if she was being dragged on a fools errand to the basement this close to closing time.  She shut her eyes and hoped the idiotic pirate man would just give up.

The Captain watched Miss Taciturn tense up.  She didn’t reply, not even to offer more vouchers.  He wondered if there was a formula for working out the worth of a pirate in DVD vouchers.  If there was the only one of the crew who would have known it was the Mate.  He opened his mouth to ask her about the vouchers when a thought occurred.  Librarians had to answer a question to the best of their abilities.  It was a code of sorts, though not one the pirate Captain approved off.  Lying was a core value of pirates and being around people who were honour bound not to do that was a bit like being a fish among bats.  But if Miss Taciturn couldn’t lie….

‘Who could help me and where are they?’  Miss Taciturn opened her eyes and glared at him.  The pirate Captain gave her his best rakish smile.   ‘I’m not just a pretty face girly.’

‘Huh.  The only person with the power to handle our Reference Librarian is Mr Croft.  He has rooms in the basement.’

‘And he won’t eat me?’  The Captain felt it wise to check on this point.

Miss Taciturn looked him up and down.  ‘I don’t think you're quite his type.’