“You’re lying to us. You say that you love books, but that’s not true.”
“What a thing to say.” The man’s reply was too quick. “You’re just a kid. Before you incur the wrath of your superior, you’d better take that offensive eyesore of a cat and get the hell out of here.”
“You don’t love books at all,” repeated Rintaro, standing up straighter and looking the man directly in the eyes. His opponent noticeably flinched.
“On what evidence—”
“Just look around you.”
Rintaro’s voice came out more powerfully than he’d expected. But it wasn’t only the force of his voice; it was that he knew exactly what to say.
“I agree that there’s an amazing number of books here. I’m sure it’s rare to find such a variety in one place. And you even have precious old books that are really difficult to find these days. But that’s all.”
“All?”
“Take for example this ten-volume edition here: The D’Artagnan Romances.”
Rintaro pointed to a row of ten beautifully bound books on a shelf to his left. The titles stood out boldly in gold lettering against a white background. Alexandre Dumas’s greatest works, translated into Japanese, were enshrined in a display case.
“It’s not every day you get the chance to see all these works together like this. All ten books looking as if they’ve never been opened, in perfect condition. Look at the size of these volumes. No matter how carefully you read them, they must surely end up with a mark or two, perhaps even a bent spine. And yet they look as if they have only just been delivered, brand new.”
“Books are treasures to me. I read each book with the utmost care and place it into the display case when I finish. It’s a part of my daily routine, and it gives me great pleasure.”
“Then where’s volume eleven?”
The man’s eyebrow twitched.
“In the Japanese translation, The D’Artagnan Romances is an eleven-volume set. The final volume, Farewell to the Sword, is missing,” Rintaro said, causing the man to freeze.
Rintaro ignored him. He gestured at the shelf to his right.
“Over there you have Jean-Christophe by Rolland. I can see the first and the last groupings of volumes, but there should be a middle grouping, too. And what about The Chronicles of Narnia? Where’s The Horse and His Boy? You say that books are your treasures, but it doesn’t look that way. On the surface, everything seems to be in perfect order, but when you look closely, these shelves are a mess.”
Rintaro looked up at the ceiling of the great hall. At some point during his speech, the raging wind had dropped to a breeze.
“This isn’t a library for holding your precious books. They’re for showing off whatever books you managed to get your hands on. The whole place is nothing but a showroom.”
He paused a moment, then turned to look the man straight in the eye.
“People who truly love books don’t treat them this way.”
Into his mind had slipped a memory of his grandpa, smiling contentedly as he read one of his favorites over and over until it fell apart. He’d been completely absorbed in every story.
Rintaro’s grandpa had always handled the books in his store with the greatest of care, but that didn’t mean he treated them as decorations. He hadn’t been obsessed with having some sort of gorgeous exhibition—he had concentrated on creating a well-maintained space filled with the kind of books people wanted to reach out and pick up, no matter how old or well-worn they might be. That was what had made Rintaro a reader.
Rintaro repeated something his grandpa had told him that had always stuck with him.