Penny turned the gift over in her hands, admiring the wrapping paper’s silver swirl of snowflakes over a rich blue background. “From the Christmas markets in Europe? You shouldn’t have —though I’m glad you did. Okay if I open it now?”
“Please do.”
Nancy hurried over, curious.
Taking care to avoid tearing the paper, which looked exquisite, Penny gently unwrapped the box and opened the lid.
Inside, nestled in a bed of soft white wrapping paper, was a gorgeous green glass ornament shaped like a Christmas tree.
“Oh, Hettie Mae,” Penny murmured. “This is beautiful.”
“Hand-blown and hand-painted,” she informed her. “Made by a family-run ornament company in Strasbourg.”
“The details are incredible,” Penny said as she feasted her eyes on the red, blue, silver, and gold paint dabs depicting the tree’s colorful ornaments. “I’ve heard so much about the Christmas markets in France and Germany.”
“Les marchés de Noël, as they say in Strasbourg. Well worth the visit.”
“We’ll have to find the right place to hang this —it’s so beautiful.”
“I can do that, boss,” Nancy volunteered. “Maybe in the front window, where the glass can catch the morning light?”
Penny handed her the ornament. “Thank you, Nancy.” She returned her attention to Hettie Mae. “And thankyoufor the wonderful, thoughtful gift.”
Hettie Mae gestured to the back. “Need help setting up for the reading group?”
“The help is always appreciated, as you know.”
“I’ll get started.”
“I’ll join you in a minute.”
The bell at the front door signaled the arrival of another customer, followed immediately by another. And just like that, the busy shopping day had begun. A few moments later, when another of her employees, a young man named Ben, arrived to take over at the sales counter, Penny headed to the annex to join Hettie.
Unlike the front part of the store, which was built in the 1880s and oozed old-fashioned Victorian charm, the annex was a modern space, open and airy, with a high ceiling, big windows, and plenty of natural light. Added a decade ago, the annexhad not only tripled the store’s retail space but allowed for a dedicated meeting area for a variety of gatherings, including story time for kids, book signings by visiting authors, and monthly meetings of the bookstore’s reader group. In keeping with the holiday season, a colorful banner hung on the wall above the meeting space, featuring a classic Charles Dickens quote fromA Christmas Carol: “I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.”
Several regulars had already arrived and were helping Hettie arrange seats in a circle. Among them was Donald, a dapper fellow in his seventies dressed in a tweed jacket and bow tie. “I must say, Penny,” he said as she joined them, “I was very pleased with your book pick this month.”
“Glad to hear that, Donald,” Penny replied. Her selection,Gathering Pointby Daniel Bedford, a family saga set in New England in the first part of the twentieth century, was that rarest of creatures in publishing: a critically acclaimed work that resonated with readers and kept selling strongly, with no signs of slowing down.
“Speaking of the author, Daniel Bedford,” Hettie Mae said as she adjusted the position of a chair that Donald had just set in place. “Did you read the article he wrote?”
Donald’s eyes narrowed —he’d noticed Hettie moving the chair. “Article? What article?”
“He wrote an article inThe New York Journalthat went viral.”
“What do you mean, ‘viral?’ Are you saying the article contracted a virus?”
Hettie Mae sighed. “In the world of the Internet, Donald, ‘viral’ means a lot of people are reading the article and sharing it with other people.”
“The article is getting good word-of-mouth, you mean.”
“Yes, but on the Internet.”
He frowned. “What you’re actually saying is that the article itself is a virus —a highly contagious virus.”
“If that helps you wrap your head around the concept, Donald, then yes.”
He sighed. “All these changes we’re being asked to absorb, everything coming at us faster and faster…. It gets rather tiring.”
