Bartholomew

A short excerpt from my book, 'Bartholomew' by Mary Aris copyright 2010 by Lulu Enterprise, ISBN 978-1445789583 All Rights Reserved

Mary Aris

All Rights Reserved

2nd Edition

No part of this publication can be duplicated, reproduced or stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author and publisher.

ISBN 978-1-4457-8958-3

Published by Lulu.com

© 2009-2010

 

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my husband, Alexander.

Special mention to my nephew and Godson, Antonio John

 

 

Also by the Author:

Melodies of the Heart

Portraits of Life

Gilded Dreams

Princess Rose

 

 

The names and characters in this story are fictitious

 

                                  Bartholomew

 

Bartholomew lived on a shelf at the Children’s Department at the William Wayne Memorial Public Library between Aesop’s Fables, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and The Three Musketeers. Bartholomew loved books. He grew up between the pages of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and had great fun hopping from page to page, visiting the Cheshire cat and having tea with the Mad Hatter.

 

Everyday Ms Dubois, the children’s librarian, would come around with her big trolley full of books that had to be shelved. Bartholomew would get startled. Suddenly he’d wake up at the squeaky sound that the trolley made, as Ms Dubois wheeled it from shelf to shelf as she shelved the library books. Putting on his glasses, Bartholomew yawned and stretched. Quickly he inched himself away.

He didn’t want to get squashed between the heavy books. He hid behind the back of the bookshelf so that nobody would know he lived there.

On this particular day Ms Dubois took a copy of David Copperfield and shoved it tightly between Peter Pan, Pinocchio and the Hound of the Baskervilles. Ms Dubois did not notice it, but behind the shelf four pairs of eyes were looking at her nervously.

The Library Director, Mr Watson was standing tall and firm at the circulation desk. ‘Ms Dubois, are you finished shelving those books yet?’ he asked, as he finished stamping a date- due card. ‘I need you here at the circulation desk.’ Ms Dubois shoved the book on the shelf with such a force that she almost crushed Bartholomew.

 

Ms Dubois immediately walked across the room and went behind the busy circulation desk to help. There was a long line of children waiting to check their books out. As Ms Dubois was busy attending the queue of children, she noticed a loud noise coming from the fiction section.

‘Silence!’ she yelled from across the room. ‘Quiet, in the library!’ She rapped her desk with a ruler. The children jumped to attention, but then went on shouting.

Little Elena Marie Guzman screamed.

‘There’s a bug! I saw a great big green slimy bug in between the books!’ Her brother, Charles Ernesto Guzman rolled his eyes. ‘Elena..........what is it now? You’ll get us both kicked out of the library.’ His eight year old sister walked over to the table where her older brother and two other children sat reading. ‘I saw a bug!’ she said with tears in her eyes. ‘You’re seeing things!’ her brother snapped.

‘I did see a bug! It was long and green and slimy!’Elena Marie cried. ‘Oh, brother!’ said Charles. ‘Sit down here, Elena, and I’ll go check it out.’ Charles Ernesto boldly got out of his chair and walked over to the Fiction section marked A-D. ‘I don’t see any green slimy bugs here, Elena. You’re imagining things!’

‘I am NOT um-egging things!’ cried Elena, her voice rising in decibels with each mispronounced syllable. ‘He’s there! I saw a bug between those books!’

 

Her brother picked out a copy of Aesop’s Fables. He sneered as he flipped the pages. When he returned the book to the shelf his fingers caught something. It felt slimy and clammy.

‘What the........’ Charles looked at the shelf and to his surprise four pairs of eyes looked right at him. Speechless, Charles looked back at the long, green bug that lived on the shelf between Aesop’s Fables and the Three Musketeers. ‘Pardon me’ said a small voice. ‘Who said that?’ asked Charles. ‘My name is Bartholomew Barnel.’ said the voice coming from deep within the shelf.