Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (11 page)

"This can't wait. I'm afraid it's exceedingly urgent."

"Oh, really?" she said. "How urgent?"

"It's a matter of evolution," I said.

"
E-vo-lu-ti-on
?" She seemed to be caught off guard. "By evolution, you wouldn't be referring to the evolving-over-mil-lions-of-years kind of evolution, would you? Excuse me if I misunderstand, but why then do you need things so quickly? What's one more day?"

"There's evolution that takes millions of years and there's evolution that only takes three hours. I can't explain over the phone. But I want you to believe me, this is dead urgent.

This will affect the next step in human evolution."

"Like in
2001: A Space Odyssey
?"

"Exactly," I said. I'd watched it countless times on video.

She didn't say anything.

"Can't decide if I'm some kind of a maniac or a harmless nut?" I took a shot.

"You got it," she said.

"I don't know how I'm going to convince you, but I'm really not crazy. A little narrow-minded or stubborn maybe, but crazy I'm not."

"Hmph," was all she said to that. "Well, you talk normal enough. And you didn't seem too weird. You even bought me ice cream. All right, at six-thirty, meet me at the cafe across from the library. I'll bring you the books. Fair enough?"

"Unfortunately, it's not so simple. I, uh, can't go into details, but I can't leave my place unattended just now. Sorry, but—"

"You mean…" she trailed off. I could her hear drumming her front teeth with her nails.

"Let me get this straight. You want me—to bring the books—to your doorstep? You must be crazy."

"That's the general idea," I said sheepishly. "Though, of course, I'm not demanding. I'm requesting."

"You're requesting an awful lot."

"I know, I know," I said. "But you wouldn't believe what's been going on."

Another lengthy silence.

"I've worked in this library for five years now and never have I come across any borrower as impudent as you," she fumed. "Nobody asks to have books hand-delivered. And with no previous record! Don't you think you're being just a little high-handed?"

"Actually, I do think so, too. I'm very sorry. I realize it's highly irregular, but I have no other choice."

"I don't know why I'm doing this," she said, "but I don't suppose you'd want to tell me the way to your place?"

The Colonel

"I doubt you can regain your shadow," speaks the Colonel as he sips his coffee. Like most persons accustomed to years of giving orders, he speaks with his spine straight and his chin tucked in. It is greatly to his credit that his long career in the military has not made him officious. Rather, it has bestowed an order to his life, along with many decorations. Exceedingly quiet and thoughtful, the Colonel is an ideal neighbor for me.

He is also a veteran chessplayer.

"As the Gatekeeper warned you," the old officer continues, "one of the conditions of this Town is that you cannot possess a shadow. Another is that you cannot leave. Not as long as the Wall surrounds the Town."

"I did not know I would forfeit my shadow forever," I say. "I thought it would be temporary. No one told me about this."

"No one tells you anything in this Town," says the Colonel. "The Town has its own protocol. It has no care for what you know or do not know. Regrettable…"

"What will become of my shadow?"

"Nothing at all. It waits and then it dies. Have you seen it since your arrival?"

"No. I tried several times and the Gatekeeper turned me away. For security reasons, he said."

"Predictable," the Colonel says, shaking his head. "The Gatekeeper is entrusted with the care of shadows. He shoulders the entire responsibility. The Gatekeeper can be a difficult man; harsh when not called for, blind to his own faults. Your only move is to wait for his mood to change."

"Then I will wait," I say. "Yet what does he have to fear from me?"

The Colonel finishes his coffee, then takes out a handkerchief to wipe his mouth. The white square of cloth, like his uniform, is worn but clean and pressed.

"He fears that you and your shadow will become one again."

At that, he returns his attention to the chessboard. This chess differs from the game I know in its pieces and their movements. Hence the old officer always wins.

"Ape takes High Priest, you realize?"

"Go ahead," I say. I move a Parapet to cover the Ape's retreat.

The Colonel nods, then glares again at the board. The tides of fortune have almost swept victory to the old officer's feet. Even so, he does not rush into the fray as he compounds strategem upon strategem. For him, the game is not to defeat the opponent, but to challenge his own abilities.

"It is not easy to surrender your shadow and simply let it die," he says, deftly maneuvering his Knight between the Parapet and my King. This leaves my King vulnerable. He will have checkmate in three moves.

"No, it is not easy," stresses the Colonel. "The pain is the same for everyone, though it is one thing to tear the shadow away from an innocent child who has not gotten attached
tf>
it, and quite another to do it to an old fool. I was in my sixtf fifth year when they put my shadow to death. By that age we already had had a lifetime together."

"How long do shadows live once they have Been torn away?"

"That depends on the shadow," says the old officef "Some shadows are fit and some are not. In this Town, severed shadows do not live long. The climate is harsh and the winters long. Few shadows live to see the spring." I study the chessboard and concede defeat.

"You can gain yourself five moWs," says the Colonel. "Worth fighting to the end. In five moves your opponent can err. No war is won or lost until the final battle is over." "Then give me a moment," I say.

While I reassess my options, the Colonel walks over to the window and parts the thick curtains slightly to peer out.

"These few weeks will be the hardest for you. It is the same as with broken bones. Until they set, you cannot do anything. Believe me."

"You mean to say I am anxious because my shadow still is not dead?"

"I do," the old officer nods. "I, too, remember the feeling. You are caught between all that was and all that must be. You feel lost. Mark my words: as soon as the bones mend, you will forget about the fracture."

"You mean to say, as soon as my mind vanishes?" The Colonel does not answer.

"Excuse me for asking so many questions," I say. "I know nothing about this Town. How it works, why it needs the Wall, why the beasts are herded in and out every day. I do not understand any of it. You are the only one I can ask."

"Not even I know all the rules," says the old officer under his breath. "There are things that cannot and should not be explained. But there is no cause for concern. The Town is fair in its own way. The things you need, the things you need to know, one by one the Town will set these before you. Hear me now: this Town is perfect. And by perfect, I mean complete. It has everything. If you cannot see that, then it has nothing. A perfect nothing. Remember this well. That is as much as anyone can tell you; the rest you must learn for yourself. Open your eyes, train your ears, use your head. If a mind you have, then use it while you can."

If the Workers' Quarter, where the Librarian lives, is a place of past brilliance, then the Bureaucratic Quarter, which spreads to the southwest, is a place of color fading into parched light. Here, the spectacle of spring has dissolved into summer, only to be eroded by the winter winds. All along the gentle slope known as the Western Hill stand rows of two-story Official Residences. The buildings, originally three-family dwellings with common entrance halls, are painted white. The siding and doors and window frames—every detail is white. None of the these Official Residences have hedges, only narrow flower beds below tiny porches. The flower beds are carefully tended, with plantings of crocus and pansy and marigold in spring, cosmos in autumn. The flowers in bloom make the buildings look all the more tawdry.

Strolling the Hill, one can imagine its former splendor: children playing gaily in the streets, piano music in the air, warm supper scents. Memories feign through scarcely perceived doors of my being.

Only later did this slope become the Bureaucratic Quarter, which, as the name suggests, was an area for government officials, undistinguished ranks of officialdom lodged in mediocrity. They too have gone, but to where?

After the bureaucrats came the retired military. Surrendering their shadows, cast off like molted insect shells, each pursues his own end on the windswept Western Hill. With little left to protect, they live a half dozen old majordomos to a house.

The Gatekeeper indicated that I was to find my room in one of these Official Residences.

My cohabitants proved to be the Colonel, four commissioned officers under him, and a sergeant, who cooks the meals and does the chores. The Colonel passes judgment on everything, as was his duty in the army. These career soldiers have known numerous battle preparations and maneuvers, revolutions and counterrevolutions and outright wars.

They who had never wanted family are now lonely old men.

Rising early each morning, they charge through breakfast before going their own way, as if by tacit order, to their respective tasks. One scrapes peeling paint from the building, one repairs furniture, one takes a wa£on down the Hill to haul food rations back up. Their morning duties done, they reassemble to spend the rest of the day sitting in the sun, reminiscing about past campaigns.

The room assigned to me is on the upper story facing east. The view is largely blocked by hills in the foreground, although I can see the River and the Clocktower. The plaster walls of the room are stained, the window sills thick with dust. There is an old bed, a small dining table, and two chairs. The windows are hung with mildewed curtains. The floorboards are badly damaged and creak when I walk.

In the morning, the Colonel appears from the adjacent room. We eat breakfast together, then repair to a dark, curtained room for a session of chess. There is no other way to pass the daylight hours.

"It must be frustrating. A young man like you should not be shut indoors on such a beautiful day," says the Colonel.

"I think so too."

"Though I must say, I appreciate gaining a chess companion. The rest of the men have no interest in games. I suppose I am the only one with any desire to play chess at this late date."

"Tell me, why did you give up your shadow?"

The old officer examines his fingers, sun-strafed against the curtains, before leaving the window to reinstall himself across the table.

"I wish I could say. It may have been that I spent so long defending this Town I could not walk away. If I left, my whole life would have been for nothing. Of course, it makes no difference now."

"Do you ever regret giving up your shadow?"

"I have no regrets," speaks the old officer, shaking his head. "I never do anything regrettable."

I crush his Ape with my Parapet, creating an opening for my King.

"Good move," says the Colonel. "Parapet guards against penetration and frees up the King. At the same time, it allows my Knight greater range."

While the old officer contemplates his next move, I boil water for a new pot of coffee.

Appetite, Disappointment, Leningrad

While I waited for her, I fixed supper. I mashed an
umeboshi
salt plum with mortar and pestle to make a sour-sweet dressing; I fried up a few sardines with
abura-age
tofu-puffs in grated
yama-imo
taro batter; I sauteed a celery-beef side dish. Not a bad little meal.

There was time to spare, so I had a beer as I tossed together some soy-simmered
myoga
wild ginger and green beans with tofu-sesame sauce. After which I stretched out on my bed, gazed at the ceiling, and listened to old records.

The hour was well past seven, and outside it was quite dark. But still no sign of her.

Maybe she thought better of the whole proposition and decided not to come. Could I blame her? The reasonable thing would have been not to come.

Yet, as I was choosing the next record, the doorbell rang. I checked through the fisheye lens, and there stood the woman from the library with an armload of books. I opened the door with the chain still in place.

"See anyone milling around in the hall?" I asked.

"Not a soul," she said.

I undid the chain, let her in, and quickly relocked the door.

"Something sure smells good," she said. "Mind if I peek in the kitchen?"

"Go right ahead. But are you sure there weren't any strange characters hanging around the entrance? No one doing street repairs, or just sitting in a parked car?"

"Nothing of the kind," she said, plunking the books down on the kitchen table. Then she lifted the lid of each pot on the range. "You make all this yourself?"

"Sure thing. I can dish some up if you want. Pretty everyday fare, though."

"Not at all. I'm wild about this sort of food."

I set out the dishes on the kitchen table.

We sat down to eat, and I watched awestruck as she, with casual aplomb, lay the entire spread to waste. She had a stunning appetite.

I made myself a big Old Crow on the rocks, flash-broiled a block of
atsu-age
fried tofu, and topped it with grated
daikon
radish to go along with my drink. I offered her a drink, but she wasn't interested.

"Could I have a bit of that
atsu-age
, though?" she asked. I pushed the remaining half-block over to her and just drank my bourbon.

"There's rice, if you like. And I can whip up some
miso
soup in a jiff," I said.

"Fabulous!" she exclaimed.

I prepared a
katsuobushi
dried-bonito broth and added
wakatne
seaweed and scallions for the
miso
soup. I served it alongside a bowl of rice and
umeboshi
. Again she leveled it all in no time flat. All that remained was a couple of plum pits.