The Kreskin Prophecy

Last week, Mrs. C asked if I would substitute for her usual 1-5 Monday shift today. Foolishly I said yes.

I know better than to volunteer for Monday desk duty, but in addition to liking cash I also like to be Mr. Nice Guy Subber whenever I can. It allows me to build up a backstock of favors owed, which I can cash in for prizes later.

Before leaving the house, I remembered that Mrs. A wasn't scheduled to return from vacation until Tuesday. This would mean only one thing: At some point during my day, I was going to get a call from our board president, Mr. Kreskin.

As I've mentioned several times before, the president of our library's board of directors has the mutant ability to sense when both of our librarians are not at work, at which point he develops a sudden desperate, earth-shattering need to speak to one and/or both of them and will subsequently not rest until he has done so. The only time in my experience that this has failed to happen was on a day when he had a really bad cold. Otherwise, an enterprising guy could win a lot of money by wagering on it.

Well, he didn't phone today. However, five minutes after our doors opened at 1 p.m., he walked through them, on the usual desperate mission to speak to Mrs. A/C.

"I'm sorry, neither of them are here today," I said, trying not to grin at my prophecy having been fulfilled so vividly and soon.

"Well, that's okay," Mr. Kreskin said. His tone of voice, however, said it wasn't okay, but that he recognized that there was hardly anything I could do about it. Mr. Kreskin decided to leave them a note, so I passed over the legal pad and continued dealing with the throng of patrons at the desk.

A few minutes later, Mr. Kreskin passed back the note on the pad and started for the door. A quick glance at it showed that he was, as in accordance with tradition, looking for a copy of some sort of correspondence he'd sent out before.

"Uh, sir. I can probably find this for you, if you like," I said. Backstock Board President Favors Owed are better than most other kinds of favors owed. (In fact, it's trumped only by Bedroom-Oriented Wifely Favors Owed, and by quite a large margin.) I figured that the correspondence Mr. Kreskin wanted would be in the previously secret Kreskin Correspondence folder in the filing cabinet. I hauled it out and began flipping through it for him. It wasn't filed in any noticeable order, however, so the search was not an easy one. Finally, Mr. K offered to just look through it himself, freeing me to return to the busy circ desk.

Mr. Kreskin eventually found what he wanted, photocopied it and left happy and grateful.

Chalk another point up for the Juiceman.