Harmony in Flesh And Black
“Nothing on the table betrayed the name of its user.
If he asked Joan who used carrel sixteen, he could in time find out not only the kid’s name but even his address—it would all be on their computer. The trouble was, Joan was an absolute stickler for routine, and for propriety, and she was also an incurable busybody. There was no way to ask her without setting off a chain reaction that Fred didn’t want to risk. Ask a question, leave a record.
The student would come back. He’d have to. Sometime.
Fred went upstairs and emptied his bladder, picked up a couple of magazines to look through, took them back down to the stacks, and chose a place to wait where he could keep an eye on the kid’s desk.
He’d dressed that morning in unostentatious academic fashion, in sport jacket and plain green tie with blue button-down shirt. He sat at carrel eight, leaned back, put up his feet, and waited for four hours.
Enforced inactivity can lead to strange expansions in one’s fund of knowledge.
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