Davenport, sitting to my left, had put a period to the exchange in only six words, because he knew that no man of business wanted an obligation to give details of his purpose, and for Hines to press us would violate that unspoken rule. Business was a word that stopped conversation. Hines grumbled slightly, his teeth back to their clench.
This man was particularly displeased with me, though I identified no logical reason for animus. I am believed overly garrulous by many—oh, I know how a peddler is seen by other people. We talk and talk until money changes hands for our wares and then we shut up and move on. But we do not talk in order to sell, contrary to what people believe; we talk because to sell, to convince, to persuade, is a life of loneliness, whether the goods are books, gold watches, or flowers. In any case, Captain Ormond, with his clay pipe always fixed in his mouth, and his officers seemed to enjoy my company, laughing at my anecdotes about some of the colorful characters who would come to my stall in London. I make no personal claims as raconteur. But they were hearing only complaints from the mouth of Hines, and little of anything out of Davenport, who stayed in his tiny berth for four or five hours at a time. There were no female passengers aboard. Many of the other passengers were even more seasick than I was. I was the best option for amusement, in other words, in a place with little competition.
There was a small chamber belowdecks the crew called a library. It had three benches, a broken table, no librarian, no shelves, and no more than twenty inexpensive books kept in an old trunk, half of which were related to sailing or marine matters. Even the semblance of a library was a siren song calling me to it, and as storms overtook the craft and we were forced to spend most of the time between decks it became my usual station. I would put the books out on the table and benches to organize them, even though they would be tossed around again by the waves once they were back in the trunk. This is how Hines found me occupied on an afternoon when the ship was pulled hard by the waves in every direction.
“Rough go of it, isn’t it?” I greeted him. “They say it helps to keep the eyes away from the water.”
He paced back and forth. “Well?”
“Pardon, Mr. Hines?” I had a Walter Scott book in my hand and could not imagine what he was expecting me to say. “Is there something I can help you with, Mr. Hines? I would be happy to help you choose a book.”
“‘Mr. Hines! Mr. Hines!’” he echoed mockingly. “Do you know what it is that so irks a man like me about a bookworm like you?”
I felt the blood drain from my face and said I did not.
“You look like you’re reading even when there is no book in your hands. A shadow falls in circles around your eyes even when you do not wear your dapper little eyeglasses. Savvy?”
“Spectacles. If my eyesight were a bit better, perhaps eyeglasses would suffice. But I confess I do not understand—”
“You read instead of going to church; you forsake God.”
“I did find church rather repetitive in my childhood, for it was like reading the same book again and again, and back then I was reading one or two books every day. But see here! I have never forsaken God, and have lived by righteous principles.”
“You think you’re better than the rest of us. Better than a man like me without a formal education. Is that what you think about while you hide yourself behind your precious books?”
He was leaning into me and shouting as he revealed his anger, and my answers did nothing to assuage him. I could smell liquor on his clothes and breath, an indication of how he was coping with the increased time belowdecks. I stretched my arm out toward the nearest bell to call for a steward, but it was just past my reach. His hand came toward my face and I prepared to be struck. Instead he snatched off my spectacles.
Here you go, Mr. Clover, take a look at the world through my spectacles. Everything blurs, doesn’t it? Thank you—now, don’t drop them! Mr. Clover, you see how much hard work they do for me, and what happens when I am deprived of their help. Everything blurred together. I stumbled to my feet and backed away to try to see better. I could make out enough to determine that Hines had put my spectacles over his own face, stretching the metal roughly to fit over his ears. He was using a nasal pitch to imitate my voice. I could hear another man enter the chamber from behind me and I burned with greater shame at having a witness. When I became a bookseller, I sometimes think it was to ensure, however little money I earned, I would not have to encounter men like Hines.
The second man was an utter kaleidoscope of warm colors from where I stood.
“This is between me and your book-obsessed friend. You stay clear,” warned Hines.
“Fergins. Mr. Hines,” he finally greeted us. It was Davenport. When he fell quiet I could hear his calm breathing as he was assessing the scene.
Hines threw my spectacles back at me as though to remove evidence of taking them. I put them on and blinked a few times to gain my bearings.
“Just a little conversation between men, I say,” Hines went on. “No, I stand corrected. Not between men. Between man and bookworm. Savvy?”
“You do not like that my friend is in the book trade.”
“It’s nothing to me what he is,” groused the merchant, slipping into a more civilized tone. “I simply do not appreciate being condescended to by men who think they are better than me because they carry the leathery odor of books on their skin.”
“I tend to agree with you,” Davenport said, situating himself on one of the benches with a lit cigar and handing a cigar to the Australian.
“Do you?”