The Pepper in the Gumbo (Men of Cane River #1)(9)
Paul ran a hand through his hair and opened one more email. He needed to figure out how to handle the wave of correspondence or he’d have to become unreachable. His daily life couldn’t support a five-hour website babysitting job.
Dear Mr. B. W. Keats,
I am an eighty-six year old retired librarian. My grandson gave me an e-reader last year but I never used it. I don’t even have a computer. I think the Internet is a terrible waste of time. This machine stayed in its box on a shelf until my friend Rhonda told me about your project. I was curious, so I went to the library and looked you up.
Mr. Keats, I cannot tell you what a joy it was to see Mother Carey’s Chickens was available from your website. I called my son right away and he helped me set up my account. In seconds, the book was in my hands. This was my twin sister’s favorite book and she knew most of it by heart. After she passed away, her children cleaned out her house and sold all her books. When I realized it was missing, I felt like I had lost her all over again. When I got it on the screen and read those familiar words, I heard them in her voice even though I’d forgotten what she sounded like. I heard her voice and I cried.
Bless you, Mr. Keats, whoever you are. You have given an old lady tremendous joy.
Sincerely,
Beulah Ditzner
P.S. I’m going to send you another email with a list of books that you might consider adding. I know you must receive many recommendations and requests. I will understand if you choose other works. These are simply books that I remember enjoying in my childhood and would like to read again before I die.
Paul sat back in his office chair. This was why he started the Browning Wordsworth Keats project. This was how he’d meant the books to be used. Of course he’d dreamed of people debating the classics that had drifted into obscurity. He wanted to see folks discovering books that should be on every shelf but had been lost amid the glossy hardback Stephen Kings and James Pattersons. But most of all, he’d hoped to reunite old friends who’d been separated by time and space, lost amid the ever-growing greed of big publishing chasing the next best seller. He’d hated seeing vapid reality TV stars, scandal-plagued politicians and child beauty pageant queens given million-dollar book deals while great literature went out of print. So, he’d decided to do something about it, using the tools and technology he knew best.
Paul clicked the button to respond, rushing to type out a few lines. This sort of letter confirmed that he was doing the right thing. He wished he could use his own name but it was impossible. No matter how much he wanted to take credit for the project, it would always be attributed to Mr. B.W. Keats, not Paul Olivier. He covered his cyber tracks: connecting through proxy servers that changed IP addresses every few minutes, and using dummy accounts to send packets of information. He carefully chose only books that were no longer under copyright. Still, that wouldn’t stop the lawsuits if publishers thought there was easy money to be made. So far, they seemed to think it was a waste of time to try and track down his alter ego. And that’s the way he wanted it to stay.
“Mr. Olivier, your meeting is in ten minutes and it’s down on the twenty-fifth floor, which leaves you approximately two minutes and thirty seconds before you need to get your jacket on and get in the elevator.” Mrs. Connors kept her voice carefully neutral.
Paul glanced at the jacket on his chair. The woman was uncanny. “I’m done here, Mrs. Connors. Thank you.”
She disconnected without responding and he sat for a moment, staring at the intercom. Maybe Mrs. Connors could take over the email sorting. She was professional, intelligent, and exact. But she also had enough to do as his assistant. Paul sighed and logged out, grabbing his suit coat. Folks liked to say money could buy everything, including happiness, but the only people who believed it were the ones who’d never had as much as he had. He knew the truth. Money bought a lot of shiny things, but when it came down to it, money couldn’t buy loyalty, trust, or love. Or someone to keep your secrets. There would always be someone who would offer more, and you’d never know when that betrayal would come.
Punching the button to his private elevator, he stared into his own reflection. As a kid, he’d felt like he could only count on a few good friends and his family. Even though the world called him “tech genius” and “wunderkind,” his face was on magazine covers, and journalists begged for interviews, Paul knew that he was still that geeky kid from the lowlands of Louisiana.
The doors slid open and he stepped inside. Andy said this project was his superhero identity, but he felt like he’d been living a double life for years. At least this one made him feel like he was doing some good.
Chapter Four
Technology… is a queer thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand,
and stabs you in the back with the other.—Carrie Snow
“A businessman from New York is needing a place to live while his company finishes some project here. He contacted me through the ad on the rentals site. Maybe you need some time to Hoover? I’d like to show him the apartment this afternoon, if that’ll work for you.” June LaTraye’s nasal voice made this a statement, not a question.
“Of course. You have a key. And thank you for working on this so quickly.” Alice couldn’t help grinning. Natchitoches was a tourist town, not a place many wanted to come to live permanently. And if they did, they were usually looking to retire in a nice place on the river, not a walk-up apartment in the historic district. This was promising. Even a few months’ rent would really help the book store’s bottom line.