Chapter 15 Chapter Fourteen

I haven't been to the university library for a while.One was that I was very disturbed by the research I was doing there, and the other was that I also felt that Mrs. Clay was suspicious of me not coming home after school.Still, the temptation was too great, and I decided to go to the library again, even if I felt uneasy. Mr. Binnarz left me another book.It would be great for me to find this book, I thought.Although I know it now, it was just a primer on Byzantine history in the fifteenth century - Michael Ducasse's Byzantine History in Turkey.Ducasse covers a lot in the book about the conflict between Vlad Dracula and Mehmed II.It was on that table in the reading room that I first read about the famous sight of Mehmed when he invaded Wallachia in 1462 and advanced to Dracula's abandoned capital of Targoviste.Outside the city, Ducasse writes, Muhammad saw "thousands of sticks, bearing corpses instead of fruit."In the center of this garden of death lies Dracula's entrée: in the midst of a crowd, Muhammad's love general Hamza is impaled to death, still wearing his "thin purple uniform".

I turned to see where Mr. Binnaz was, when suddenly I heard a noise from the back of the reading room, a thud, more like a floor shaking.A feeling made me immediately get up and follow the direction of the vibration to see what it was, whatever it was. I rushed into the back workshop and looked in through the window, feeling a little relieved that I didn't see Mr. Binnarz.But when I opened the wooden door, I saw a leg on the floor, a leg in gray trousers attached to a curled up body, a blue sweater crookedly put on the incomplete limb, gray hair full of It was blood, and the face—well, half exposed—had been completely smashed, and part of it remained on the corner of the table.

It was obvious that a book had just fallen from Mr. Binnarz's hand, and it was lying on its back like Mr. Binnarz.On the wall above the table was a pool of blood and a large, delicate handprint, like a child's finger painting. I tried so hard not to make a sound that my scream sounded like it was coming from another person. I stayed in the hospital for a few nights—my father insisted on staying there, and this was the third time the police had questioned me. The police had my father tell me repeatedly not to worry about being a suspect and that I was just the most likely witness.But I saw nothing, no one came in--I'm pretty sure of that--and Mr. Binnartz didn't call for help.There was no wound on the rest of his body, except that someone had knocked the poor man's head against the corner of the table.That requires extraordinary strength.

The cop shook his head, confused.It was a strange handprint, with the swirls of the fingers being particularly worn.It wasn't that hard to verify the handprints—the police and the father talked it out—unless they had no such handprints on file. As soon as the police left, my father sat next to my bed and asked for the first time what I had been doing in the library. I said that I have been studying, and I like to go to the library to do my homework after school, because the reading room there is quiet and comfortable.He fell silent. I didn't tell him, and after a scream, I instinctively stuffed the book Mr. Binnaz had been holding before he died into my bag.It was a nineteenth-century French book about churches in Romania.

My father carefully sat on my hospital bed, shaking his head.He said calmly, "I want you to study at home from now on." I nodded, though I knew I'd rather be alone, reading that book about the church by Snagov Lake, than Mrs. Clay with me. A few weeks later, my father said that a trip might be good for my nerves. “The French,” he explained, had held the talks in a secluded resort area near the Spanish border instead of Paris, as they usually do, when he was going to give a series of lectures in Eastern Europe that winter. I pointed out that, going further inland, Le Bain and St. Matthew's Church in the Eastern Pyrenees were soon there.But when I mentioned those names, my father's face fell.

We had breakfast at the hotel and it was very good.The morning air was also fresh and pleasant. My father walked into the conference hall among the people in gray suits. I stayed behind and took out my book reluctantly. I'm already on my second glass of bitter continental chocolate.Suddenly, there was a child screaming below, and I was startled, and the chocolate was spilled.