5 Books For Eveline

33

33

Doctor Chesterton advised rest and, of course, Purdy ignored him. A few days after the appointment, Purdy renewed her search for the final volume of the book, regardless of her hip. She had rested enough and, if the notes of the author were anything to go by, the final volume now sat out there, somewhere in the wild.

As a nod towards resting, Purdy had decided to spend the first day of searching around the city, where the few locations that appeared in the books were not that far from each other. She had made a note of each of those locations that followed a sort of circle, minimising the distance she had to walk and ending up back at the train station, ready to return back to Bishop's Fall.

From the station, she could tour around, seeing the location of the telephone box (now long gone after the advent of mobile phones), the statue, the fountain in the tiny park, off the centre of the city, and ending in the shopping centre, where Purdy would check the photo booth and the security office. She doubted the author would leave the book in any of the places where they had hidden the copies of the previous volumes, but it couldn't hurt to check.

On a dull day, the city seemed less busy than usual. Fewer people thronged the streets. Not as many shoppers or workers milling about the city centre and that made things all the more easy for Purdy. With fewer people around, she would feel less embarrassed in her search, something she did not have to consider in the locations around Bishop's Fall, where most of the locations were in out-of-the-way places and people tried not to interfere in other people's strange obsessions. One thing she very much appreciated about the town.

The area around where the telephone box once sat came up empty. In this place, in the fourth volume, Eveline had begun to call Raya, only to stop at the last digit, unable to follow through and talk to the girl she had spent her entire childhood with. That part had saddened Purdy. Not least because it paralleled the situation she found herself in with Briar. The difference between both situations came down to time.

Purdy had only known Briar for a few weeks. Eveline had known Raya for years. They were inseparable, until that one, silly argument about a boy. Even now, remembering those lines, Purdy wanted to climb into the pages of the book, bring Eveline and Raya together and force them to work things out. A friendship like that should never end.

Before Purdy knew it, she had visited every location within the city, except the two places in the shopping centre. Not one of the locations held that elusive book, but Purdy had expected as such. Somehow, she felt she had come to know this author. An invisible bond had become forged between them, whether the author knew it or not. Purdy had an instinctual understanding of the author's intent.

No-one would find the book outside of Bishop's Fall. The town, itself, had become a character within the story. A living, breathing, evolving character, as much a part of Eveline and Raya's lives as each other. Likewise, the author would choose to place the book somewhere important. Somewhere significant to both the girls. Not only some random place they happened to pass by and mention.

That didn't narrow down the possibilities anywhere near as much as Purdy had hoped, however. In her eyes, so many places were significant and important to the girls' relationship and their life together. Even with the most narrow of criteria, that still left almost a hundred of the four hundred locations as greater possible locations. Purdy had prioritised those on her list, for later.

Right now, she had to eliminate the last two locations within the city. Once they were out of the way, she could knuckle down to searching the more likely places. Back home, in Bishop's Fall. When the photo booth drew a blank, the book neither inside, behind or, after borrowing a cleaner's steps, on top. That only left the security office and that held its own problems.