I had decided to add raised bands to the spine, even though there were none on the original clothbound book. These days, raised bands were mainly decorative unless the book was handmade, but I thought the addition would provide a bit more support to the spines of these books.
A raised band looked like a horizontal bump stretched across the spine of a book. Back in the old days, the cords used to sew the pages together were tied in knots and stretched across the spine. The leather binding was then stretched and molded around the cords. Once bookbinding became mechanized, the raised bands were no longer necessary to hide the cords, but the look was maintained because it was an attractive feature.
Once I had the spine liner in place and the glue had dried, I cut the individual bands from a long strip of leather, coated each piece with PVA glue, and attached them at evenly spaced intervals across the spine. Later, when the leather cover was completely finished, I would gild the book title, the author, and the volume number in separate spaces on the spine.
Now that the bands were in place, I began to strip away the old cloth cover. I used a razor, cutting it from the fore-edge and then pulling the cloth easily across the board.
I was happy to find that the boards were still in good condition so I wouldn’t have to replace them.
“Meow.”
I glanced down and saw Charlie gazing up at me, her little head cocked as though she were wondering what I was doing here since I wasn’t playing with her.
“I’m sorry I haven’t been playing with you, little one.” I’d kept an eye on her all day, filled her water bowl, and made sure she didn’t hurt herself. Mostly, she pushed her mouse around or napped in the rays of sunlight streaming through the windows along the south side of the studio.
“You’ve been very good all day,” I said, checking my watch. “I think it’s time to go home and see Derek.”
“Meow.”
“I’m glad you agree.” Smiling, I picked her up and nuzzled her neck. She was the sweetest thing. I wondered if she would grow to ignore me someday, as cats sometimes did. I hoped not, because I was just tickled by her affection. I set her down and cleaned up my mess on the worktable, tossed the old book cloth into the trash can, gathered up my sleepy kitten, and walked up the hill.
Because of our middle-of-the-night sojourn to the caves the evening before, Derek and I had decided to spend a quiet evening at home. Thanks to Mom, we didn’t have to make dinner. She’d prepared her famous taco casserole and had generously set aside a second smaller pan for us. It was an embarrassingly easy dish to make in the microwave, but I was still grateful that she’d done the work for us.
After dinner we took Maggie for another long walk along the ridge above my parents’ home. We had both fallen for Maggie and talked about getting a dog when we returned to the city. If only we could find one just as sweet in one of the shelters around town. The only thing holding us back was that we lived in SoMA, a busy section south of Market Street in San Francisco. Would it be fair to keep a dog inside the apartment all day long except for the occasional walk down our crowded sidewalk? We did have a small park a block away, but was that enough? We decided to continue talking about it and see how we felt once we returned to our remodeled apartment.
Monday morning, Derek and I were having our second cup of coffee and laughing at Charlie’s pitched battle with her new stuffed mouse. Maggie got in on the action, bumping the mouse with her nose and swatting it a few times across the floor, causing Charlie to skitter after it. It was as if they were playing mouse hockey.
I was halfway through my bowl of granola with fresh blueberries and bananas, and Derek had just finished his. He stood and checked the time on his watch. “I’ve got to join a conference call shortly. What are you up to today?”
“I’m spending the morning at Abraham’s, working on my medical texts. I want to finish the first book today. Afterward, I thought I might swing by and say hello to Annie. Do you want to come with me?”
“If it’s much later in the afternoon, yes. I have a meeting with Gabriel and his team directly after lunch.”
“Is something wrong with the security?”
“No, and we want to keep it that way.”
“Good.”
He took his cereal bowl to the sink and rinsed it out. The subject of security reminded me of the other night.
“Have you heard from the sheriff about Darlene and Shawn?” I asked.
“Brace yourself,” Derek said, taking a last sip of coffee. “They were released on bail yesterday.”
I grimaced. “I figured they couldn’t keep them for long.”
“No. They didn’t actually break into the caves, after all.” He rinsed his mug and tucked it into the dishwasher.
“I know, but still,” I groused. “I just hope they were smart enough to leave the area.”
“They informed the deputy who processed them that they were headed directly back to San Francisco.”
“They’d better be.” I was still smarting over the fact that I’d fallen for their friendly act.