By the Letter – 1 –

This tale begins in a library where Deirdre (our main character in this tale) was looking for a guide book about Guernsey, a small island in the English Channel. For some reason she had always wanted to go there. Not that she knew that much about the island, but she knew it existed. None of her friends wanted to keep her company for various reasons; it was the wrong time of year and they had husbands, children and work to think of.

But that didn’t bother Deirdre; in fact she had planned it that way, in short notice taking a week off to be on her own, no husband, no children, nothing. But she felt she needed to ask so no one could blame her for not asking.

For this trip, Deirdre didn’t want a standard guide with exclusive maps and all that, no. Instead she wanted something different, perhaps some history about the island so she could visit places where something had happened, where people had lived or something special. It was a rather big library she went to near her home, but with not many books there about Guernsey, only a half shelf, and those were mainly map-like books covering the whole of the Channel Islands. But while searching through the shelf, she noticed something … wasn’t there something, a small book stuck in between? Deirdre picked the small book out, Path Walking was the title, but it was old, in fact very old.

“Nothing in here will probably be the same today,” Deirdre thought. “The paths have probably turned to paved lanes or something, if they even existed at all.”

But wasn’t that what she wanted? Deirdre looked at the book one more time. There were no maps, pictures, drawings or illustrations, just text. Strange, she thought after having read some, but, on the other hand, the alternative books on the shelf she felt were too ordinary and boring, so this book it had to be.

At the library reception she learnt that the book was not listed, as there were no authors connected to it and nobody really knew where it had come from in the first place, like it had been there already from when the library had been built (and that was at least ninety years ago). But an elderly librarian told her that she could borrow the book anyway without a library card. “You will bring it back like the others,” she told her.

Deirdre wondered about that, and one more thing the librarian said. “Those who have borrowed the book before you have all been very pleased with it, wanting to pass it on to others, but no one has ever told us why.” Strange! And like the others, Deirdre didn’t want to tell why she even wanted to borrow the book in the first place.

A few days later Deirdre was on her way to Guernsey reading her new book on the plane. The day after her arrival she took a bus out to where this cliff path she had been reading about could lead her back to town again.

The path was there all right, Deirdre had no problem finding it, and even if it were popular with people out there walking it was pretty much the same as the book described as being long ago. In fact very much the same, as Deirdre started to discover when she walked the path back to town again.

It was a nice day even though a bit windy, just as described in the book. The sky was shattered with clouds, with the sun breaking through now and then. The wind was kind of chilly blowing towards land, but still the high cliffs offered some protection with the path winding up and down and taking turns in and out from the cliff, revealing small bays and beaches down below. It was a beautiful landscape, and Deirdre enjoyed it very much.

But as she walked, the resemblance with the description in the book became increasingly detailed and uncanny. The weather was the same as in the book, and she could even recognize trees by their descriptions, young trees. But how could that be? Those young trees couldn’t have been there when the book was written. Perhaps it had been similar young trees here back then? But again, even specific branches were described, like everything fit in here the farther she walked the path. How could that be?

Half way to town Deirdre came to a rather large bay with a nice looking view from high above. There was a stone wall high up on the beach with an ancient, small tower behind it and another smaller building next to it. When Deirdre followed the path down, the building turned out to be a restaurant and it was open, just like in the book. And yet the building couldn’t be more than thirty years old. Perhaps it had been renovated to look the same, Deirdre thought.

She of course went in, and from the menu she choose the same dish as was described in the book, scallops and bacon, and a pint of beer, of course. It was a meal Deirdre appreciated very much. And to finish off, as the book recommended, she had a cup of cappuccino. Hmm… did cappuccino coffee exist back then?

Deirdre enjoyed the hour walk from there back to town, and along the way she stopped often to sit on benches that had been placed along the path to verify sites with the book, and it was all there, even bushes and flowers, too. However, that didn’t scare her; instead it intrigued her to look around even more.

Following the path, as the book had described it, took Deirdre safely back to town again. The book had held her company all along, and she didn’t miss any one of her friends, or anyone else for that matter.

The evening seemed to develop nicely; she was overlooking the harbor from a holiday apartment she had rented so she could cook her own food if she so wanted. The wind had calmed down considerably, and the only plan before going to bed was to read some more chapters, as the book didn’t just describe one path walk one day but covered her whole week stay on the island.

Whatever weather tomorrow would bring, out cliff walking, bringing her book—that she was determined to try once again.