Raisins and almonds - Poisoned Pen Press (UK)

Chapter One
trans 1.4. polyisoprene
The ranked books exhaled leather and dust, a comforting
scent. The noise of the Eastern Market—the roar of traffic and
voices and feet—was almost inaudible inside Lee’s Books New
and Secondhand, prop. Miss Sylvia Lee, a haven of peace and
scholarship at the top of the city. Miss Lee’s shop was always
ordered, always quiet, and always scented with the gum leaves
she bought from Miss Ireland on the upper floor: an arrangement
of gum leaves and poppies was her favourite decoration,
and when there were no poppies she made do with gum leaves
alone. She specialized in abstruse works in Latin and Greek,
though her concession to popular taste was the brightest point
in the shop: a table of yellow-jacketed novels for railway reading.
The space was small and closely packed with volumes in leather
bindings. The shelves extended to the ceiling, which was white.
The room was lit by a large electric light in the middle, and a
working lamp over Miss Lee’s desk. Miss Lee herself wore sub
fusc garments, a skirt of a dark colour and a beige or white blouse
and a cardigan under her neat working smock. Her mousebrown
hair was cropped short. She lived across Exhibition Street in
an apartment, a perfectly self-contained young woman, who