Three

‘What about names?’ asked the librarian.  She was focusing on her computer screen and trying to ignore the pirates bickering.

‘Captain Horatio Arthur Nelson Wellesley.’ Said the Captain.  His crew were trying hard not to snigger. ‘My mother was a great admirer of the navy.’ 

‘Aye.’ Said the deckhands  ‘and the navy were great admirers of hers.’

At this the Captain turned round and growled.  ‘My mother was a saintly woman.  Unfortunate naval inclinations aside.’

‘Aye aye Captain.’  The Mate glared at the deckhands.  ‘tis well known that Floozy Flo was a most hospitable lady.’

‘That nobody can deny.’ Agreed the Cook.  ‘Many a man was offered a bed for the night at Flo’s.  Often with Flo in it if it was a cold night.’

‘Gentlemen.’  The librarian interrupted in the hope of preventing the Captain from staining the library carpets with the blood of his crew.  Not least because if he killed his crew he’d have to recruit more, and she suspected that pirating paid much better than library assistanting.  No pirate Captain was stealing away her staff with the promise of treasure, books and grog.  ‘What are the rest of your names?’

‘Jack Every.’ Said the Mate

‘Henry Kidd.’ Said the Cook.

‘Bart Read.’ Said the Cabin Boy

‘Ed, Ned and Ted Morgan’ Chorused the deckhands.  ‘after Blackbeard, proper pirate names.’

‘And what be your name lass?’  The Captain leaned over the desk and winked his one green eye in what he hoped was an alluring fashion.

‘Miss Taciturn’ replied the librarian.  ‘and if you come any closer I’ll be forced to use these scissors on your whiskers.’

The Captain stepped back sharply.  His whiskers were very long and fine and he’d no desire to lose them to some demented female.  Why librarians were being allowed sharp objects was beyond his understanding.  They weren’t pirates – and surely the landlubbers were not so far gone that they were permitting females to have access to weapons or cutlery.

‘Your tickets.’ The librarian handed over seven small pieces of plastic.  The Captain gave these to the Mate, who filed them away in his ‘definitely not a handbag’.  ‘You can have up to twenty books for three weeks.’

‘140 books’  the crew cheered and then cheered a bit quieter when Miss Taciturn waved her scissors at them.  ‘tis a grand number Miss.’

The pirates spread out to find themselves twenty books a piece. 

Now the library of Brighton was a large library – spread over many floors.  The mate and cook quickly lost the other pirates among the fiction and headed for the lifts to find some cookbooks and investment advice (the mate was worried about the performance of the pirates pension fund).

They found the lifts full of kittens, who were riding up and down in them as though they were a fairground ride.  Which was no problem for pirate kitties.  They bared their teeth and claws and growled like sea monsters, till the children ran from the lifts.  The mate grabbed one by the scruff of his neck and gave him a shake. 

‘Where be the cook books?’

The kitten wailed and got another shake for his trouble.  ‘The second floor, the second.’

‘Arrgh,’  cried the mate for good measure before dropping the kitten.

The lift shuddered as it stopped at the second floor.  The Mate and Cook stepped out into a dark cavern.  There were bookshelves, crammed close together and without the neat Dewey numbers and strange genre pictograms of the ground floor.  The air was cold, and as they shivered in the gloom their breath formed clouds.

‘What manner of library is this?’  whispered the Cook.

The mate opened his mouth to reply, but there was a low growl from behind him.