Page 56 of The Secret Christmas Library
‘You’d be amazed,’ said Esme, snootily. ‘Lots of people like being considered to be in an algorithm of family castle owners.’
‘Not me,’ said Jamie, quietly.
Esme showed her face to her phone, then held her long, elegant arm up in the air. ‘Okay, stand by . . . ’
She pulled it down.
‘It’s 2G! OMG, I didn’t realise they even still made 2G.’
‘Bugger,’ said Theo. ‘It’ll probably give us the search results right back in binary.’
‘Just give me the number! I’m on six . . . no, now it’s five per cent.’
‘Okay, okay, quick, if it’s an old book, ISBNs hadn’t filled up so fast . . . try starting with a zero. 0862411793.’
Esme finished and brought the phone down and they watched in silence, as the phone took an age to search, a tiny circle going round and round.
‘Gah,’ said Jamie. ‘I thought we could maybe check the news.’
‘Or the weather forecast,’ added Mirren. They turned to look at her, as if confused. ‘What?’ she said.
‘Smell the air,’ said Jamie. ‘Can’t you smell it?’
She did, and all she could smell was a slight icy briny smell; the air had a foggy feel. She shrugged.
‘Okay,’ said Jamie. ‘Well, it’s going to snow again. In a bit. Look.’
He pointed north, up past the house; low down on the horizon, thick clouds like duvets were gathering. They looked cosy. Mirren figured they would be anything but.
‘Okay, it’s coming, it’s coming . . . YES! Itisa book!’
Theo tried to look modest but failed.
‘It is a house full of books, I suppose,’ he said, in case anyone had forgotten that it had been his idea.
‘Well, bloody hell,’ said Esme. She showed them. ‘It’sSunset Song,’ she said, naming the famous Scottish novel.
‘What?’ said Mirren, who, growing up in London, had never heard of it.
‘Did you not do it for your Higher English?’ said Jamie.
‘What’s Higher English . . . wait: sunset. Sunsets!The setting of the sun, Theo! In the poem!’
‘But that’s so weird,’ said Esme, displaying the cover on her phone. ‘It’s a modern edition, that one, with the painting on the cover. You can still buy it. It’s not that old.’
Esme’s phone suddenly collapsed into black. She stared at it for a second, as if she could will it back into existence, then sighed heavily and put the useless chunk of glass back in her pocket.
‘There’s hardly any modern stuff in the house,’ she said.
‘Well, that’s the book Google found for you – might it be a different edition?’ said Jamie.
‘All the editions have different ISBNs,’ said Theo. ‘But . . . oh.’
‘What?’
‘Well, only books after – I don’t know, but they’re quite recent, ISBNs, I think. Old books don’t have them.’
‘So,’ said Jamie, his voice going dangerously quiet. Mirren felt chilled suddenly, and stamped her booted feet on the crusting snow, putting her arms around herself. ‘So we just have to go round and look at every book in the house anyway.’
