By Wilhelmina Corley, Library and Bookshelf Correspondent

MAPLE HOLLOW — The church library at Sycamore Ridge Fellowship runs entirely on the honor system: two shelves, one wooden recipe box of checkout cards and a hand-lettered sign asking borrowers to "return within two weeks, or when finished, whichever comes first." Most of the collection has honored the sign. One book has not.

According to its card, Backyard Birds of the Eastern States was signed out on April 14, 1991, by "M. Pruitt." It has not come back. Library committee chair Vernon Ostrander, 72, said the committee first noticed in the summer of 1992 and mailed a polite postcard. Mavis Pruitt, then 49, mailed it back with a single sentence written along the margin: "Two cardinals at the feeder this morning, both very well dressed."

The committee has sent a reminder every spring since. Pruitt has answered every one.

"We have 34 years of replies in a shoebox," Ostrander said, lifting the lid to reveal a stack of postcards rubber-banded by decade. "Goldfinches in 1997. A woodpecker that 'took against' her gutter in 2004. A hawk in 2011 that she described as 'rude but impressive.' She has never once mentioned the book."

The postcards have become something of a congregational event. Since 2015, Ostrander has read the newest reply during spring announcements, right after the nursery schedule and right before the reminder to sign up for Easter lilies. Attendance on reminder-reading Sunday is up 11 percent over the average, according to an usher who keeps count on a pocket tally counter and asked not to be named.

The committee did attempt a firmer approach once. In 2008 a newly elected member proposed a 10-cent daily late fee, which treasurer Gail Brumley calculated would come to roughly $620 at the time. The motion was withdrawn after Brumley pointed out that the book originally cost $6.95 and was donated, and that the church had no way to accept a fine "without it becoming a whole thing."

Pruitt, now 84, still sits in the third pew on the window side, where she can see the feeder the youth group hung outside the sanctuary in 2016. Reached after the early service, she confirmed she has the book. "It's on the kitchen windowsill," she said. "Right where the birds are. That's where a bird book belongs."

Asked whether she planned to return it, Pruitt said she was "still finishing it."

No one else has requested the title in 35 years, which Ostrander attributes to the fact that most members assume it is already checked out to Mavis. The committee briefly considered buying a second copy, then voted it down 4 to 1, on the grounds that it "would feel like going behind her back."

The library's new volunteer, a retired schoolteacher, has proposed replacing the recipe-box card system with a spreadsheet. The committee approved the idea on the condition that one row stay exactly as it is.

At press time, the 2027 reminder postcard had been addressed, stamped and placed in the outgoing mail tray, two months early, because Ostrander said he "wanted to hear about the bluebirds."