Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

Clay, Kat and Neel fly to New York and arrive hours before Penumbra’s train; they then stake out the Library and speculate about the Unbroken Spine. Kat is preoccupied because Google is going to announce the new PM and she hopes to be chosen. Soon, a middle-aged man with a round nose opens the library, after which a steady stream of people trickles into the building. At 12.29, Penumbra arrives in a taxi and Clay runs across the road to intercept him. Penumbra is shocked, but then he laughs and explains that he has “not come here to talk of punishment” (130), but rather to make his case for using computers to advance the work of the fellowship. Penumbra arranges to meet Clay and the others after his meeting with Corvina, the First Reader and head of the Unbroken Spine. While they wait, Kat learns that she has not been elected to Google’s PM. When Penumbra arrives, he tells them that Corvina has rejected his proposal, but he has a plan. He then explains that the Unbroken Spine was founded by Aldus Manutius, a fifteenth-century publisher who employed a designer named Griffo Gerritszoon who invented a new kind of typeface.