The Book of Levi by Mark Clark Page A

though there were many books still in existence, these were an eclectic collection that provided no clearly defined path in any one discipline. The great destruction of books, that he suspected probably occurred either during or after the great nuclear war of the twenty first century, had removed the great flow of human knowledge. The consistency was gone. ‘Contiguity of written texts is civilisation,’ he muttered to himself as he pottered about. And that probably explained why there were no universities and places of higher learning; why there were no emerging great artists or scientists. As he saw it, he was living in another Dark Age. The intelligentsia had gone and had not returned. The scraper dwellers organised pleasure; the street dwellers organised survival; there was basic organised business and basic organised government and a noisy bunch of organised lobby groups – but no organised, institutionalised thinking. Everybody was waiting for someone or something to pull the city back into the light.
    ‘So what?’ he thought to himself. ‘If the city is wretched; if the whole planet is wretched, it’s not my concern. There’s nothing I can do about it. The city rejected me a long time ago.’
    And so he thought and he wandered, as he always did, as he was now, up to his small apartment above the library, muttering incoherent bitterness to himself.
    There he cleared his battered spectacles and began to read the small, green book.

    *

    EXT.MOUNTAIN CLEARING.DAY
    A few families are gathered around a camp fire. They are dressed in rags and furs.
    Out of the nearby woods a cavalry of mounted men suddenly appear.
    With rifles and machetes the men, women and children are mercilessly slaughtered.

Chapter 6
    It was a very excited Stefan who burst into Elizabeth’s office late afternoon the following day. He wore his perennial, crisply-ironed beige suit, but Elizabeth noticed with interest that he had several strands of hair marginally out of place, a definite giveaway that he was truly excited.
    ‘I think . . . I’m pretty sure . . .’ he stammered as he sped towards her desk.
    ‘Yes?’ she asked.
    ‘We may have. I think we may have . . . In fact, I’m sure we have . . .’
    ‘Have what?’
    ‘Found it!’ he boomed.
    ‘The book?’ she queried, rising from her seat on the buoyancy of the wave.
    Stefan nodded with an agonised grin, unable to speak with excitement.
    ‘Where?’ she entreated
    ‘The old library.’
    ‘Well, where is it? Can I have it?’ she asked, leaving her desk and approaching him.
    ‘No, no,’ Stefan replied, waving his hands about. ‘He’s got it.’
    ‘Who’s got it?’
    ‘Sebastian Levi.’
    ‘Who?’
    ‘The caretaker of the library.’
    ‘Why has he got it?’
    ‘I didn’t find it. He found it. He found the book. And all the time it was just down the road. To think . . .’
    ‘Alright,’ said Elizabeth, gently taking him by the elbow. ‘Calm down.’
    Stefan clasped the hand upon his elbow in feminine embrace, ‘I’ve tried so hard to find it for you these past weeks and now . . .’
    ‘It’s alright,’ Elizabeth comforted him. ‘It’s alright.’
    He nodded his head in a prelude to tears. She placed her hand on his for comfort. ‘You go and have a nice rest. You deserve it. Just take a deep breath and tell me. Where is he?’
    ‘Waiting for you in the library,’ replied Stefan, biting his lower lip with his upper teeth.
    ‘Good work, Stefan. A job well done.’
    Stefan closed his eyes and pursed his lips together so that they almost disappeared. Then he nodded to indicate that he agreed with the praise accorded him.
    Elizabeth raced out of the room and by the time she reached the library several minutes later, Stefan was still shaking, drinking a cup of water unsteadily, while three young office workers listened intently to his dramatic tale.
    Elizabeth moved confidently into the dank, musty lobby, where one hundred years before Robert and his friends had