Old Mr. Laibury had not gone out that afternoon. When he saw Shade hurrying over with a suitcase, he had vaguely guessed what it was about. Once he opened the case with trembling hands and saw the three ancestral manuscripts he had longed for, his face flushed red with excitement:
"This, this, this really is..."
"Please don't get so excited!"
Shade was afraid the old man might faint from high blood pressure or something similar. Fortunately, the old gentleman still remembered to examine the manuscripts properly.
He brought Shade to his study, put on gloves, and took out a magnifying glass. After confirming that all three were genuine and had not suffered any significant damage since they had been lost years ago, the old man directly embraced Shade. This was hardly a common custom in Kasonlik:
"Mr. Watson, I don't even know what to say anymore. My God, I never imagined I would see them return in my lifetime. Thank you, truly, thank you. On my own, I really could not think of any way to bring them back!"
He had also learned from the newspapers that the auction had been robbed, but he did not ask Shade where the Steam Engine Design Manuscript had come from. He even promised Shade that, at least until his death, he would never let a third person know that the manuscript had returned to his hands.
Old Mr. Laibury was a man of his word. Since he had confirmed that his ancestral treasures had returned, he immediately discussed transferring ownership of the Blue Ink Library with Shade. Shade was also willing to purchase the library's other existing books.
However, just as with the White River Valley Vineyard in Huntington, Shade did not intend to hold ownership of the library himself. Instead, he planned