The Fireman: A Novel Part 29

"We promised her and we promised each other and we blew it. Carol was sick to death when she heard you were gone. Like she hasn't been through enough already."

"Fine. You've said what you had to say. Tell Carol you delivered her message, and next time if I feel like a breath of fresh air, I'll be sure to try and drop her a note. And Allie, you can quit the silent treatment. I'm a little too old to be impressed by that one. Got something to say? Do me a favor and spit it out."

Allie turned her head and glared at Harper with wet, accusing eyes. Jamie snorted.

"What?" Harper asked.

"You think you're in trouble. Ain't nothing compared to the hill of s.h.i.t Allie is under for lettin' you go. Allie is doin' penance for it now. She asked for a chance to make amends and Mama Storey gave it to her."

"How? Did she take a vow of silence?"

"Not exactly. You remember what Father Storey used to do? That thing about suckin' on a stone when he needed to think?"

Snow squealed underfoot as they climbed the hill. Harper needed to the count of three to figure it out. It had been a long night.

"You have to be s.h.i.tting me."

"I s.h.i.t thee not. Allie is carrying a stone in her mouth to think over her mistakes and refocus on her obligations. The last time we let down our guard, someone took a stone and used it to crush Father Storey's head in. We all carry rocks now, to remember." Jamie removed one hand from her pocket and showed Harper a stone as big as a golf ball.

"Oh, for Christ's sake. So how long are you going to walk around sucking on that thing, Allie?" Harper asked her, as if there were any hope of an answer.

Allie looked like she wanted to spit the rock into Harper's face.

"That all depends on you, see?" Jamie asked. "Now, you weren't at the meeting when we agreed there needed to be consequences for people who think they're above the rules. No one is too p.i.s.sed at you. Mikey saw you row out to the Fireman's island, so we've known you were safe for a while. Ben and Mother Storey had a talk and agreed it wouldn't be fair to make a big deal out of you leaving safe territory. At the same time, Carol was worried the rest of the camp would get ugly if you were held to looser standards'n everyone else. So they come to a decision and Allie agreed. Allie only has to carry the stone in her mouth until you take it from her. And you only have to carry it in your mouth for-"

"Jamie, I appreciate you being so direct with me. But you need to know, no matter what you think you all decided, that I am not ever going to suck on a stone in some medieval act of penance. If you think I will, then Allie isn't the only one with rocks in her head."

They emerged at the southeastern corner of the chapel, near the steps down into the women's dorm in the bas.e.m.e.nt. Three Lookouts sat on logs, singing a rustic and curiously brutal hymn, "They Hung Him on a Cross." Their eyes were bright as bra.s.s coins, and the Dragonscale on their exposed hands was lit like burning lace, bathing the snow in crimson light. Their breath unspooled from their lips in threads of red steam. All of them were starved-looking, bones showing in their faces. Thin hands, thin necks, sunken temples, concentration-camp haircuts. A random, disa.s.sociated notion occurred to Harper: When your stomach is empty, so is your head.

"Well, I hope you change your mind, Nurse. 'Cause Allie's contrition doesn't end until yours begins."

"Allie," Harper said, "I take responsibility for my f.u.c.kup. Full responsibility. Which means if you want to play martyr, that's up to you. I'm not making you do it." She cast a sidelong look at Jamie, and added, "And no one is making me do it, either. It's degrading and infantile. If someone wants me to peel potatoes or scrub pans, I'm not afraid to get my hands dirty. But I'm going to pa.s.s on this particular grotesque act of self-abas.e.m.e.nt, thank you."

"Allie is ready to do what it takes to make things right. People look up to you, Nurse-sure would be nice if you'd do the same. Allie is glad to serve as an example, for however long it takes."

"Or until dinner."

"Nope. Wrong on that. If you won't take the stone from her and carry it yourself, it stays in, breakfast, lunch, and dinner . . . although you might recall we Lookouts gave up our lunch a while back, so the likes of you could eat. I guess Allie'll have to take it out and put it under her pillow when she sleeps, but that's it."

"I don't know which of you is worse. Her with her mouthful of stone, or you with your mouthful of nonsense." Harper stopped walking, turned her back on Jamie Close, and spoke to Allie with her hands.

"Stop this," she said, in the language of silence that Nick had taught her.

Allie met Harper's gaze with cold, hating eyes. She had only ever learned how to finger-spell, and so her reply came in a slow trickle that Harper had to sound out in her mind: Y-O-U.

K-N-O-W.

H-O-W.

T-O.

M-A-K-E.

M-E.

The last part of this statement involved the use of Allie's middle finger and was widely known even to people who hadn't studied sign language.

BOOK FIVE.

PRISONERS.

1.

From the diary of Harold Cross: JUNE 30th: BACK FROM THE CABIN. SHOULDN'T HAVE HAD THAT THIRD HOT POCKET. AM HALF-SICK FROM IT AND EVEN MY SMOKY d.a.m.n FARTS SMELL LIKE PEPPERONI.

INTERESTING NEWS FROM CORDOBA. TWO HUNDRED INFECTED KILLED AT THE JESUIT MONASTERY IN ALTA GRACIA, BODIES BULLDOZED INTO A PIT BY THE MILITARY. DR. B WAS ABLE TO RECOVER FOUR CORPSES, INCLUDING THE BODY OF EL HORNO DE CAMINAR, WHO SINGLE-HANDEDLY HELD OFF THE MILITARY'S a.s.sAULT FOR MOST OF AN HOUR BY CREATING SOME KIND OF FLAMING TORNADO, AN ACT THAT ALLOWED ALMOST A THOUSAND PEOPLE WITH DRAGONSCALE TO ESCAPE INTO THE JUNGLE. SOUND LIKE ANYONE WE KNOW? TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH, EL HORNO DE CAMINAR MEANS "THE WALKING FURNACE."

DR. B HAD A CHANCE TO WORK ON THE RECOVERED BODIES AND E-MAILED ME THE PRELIMINARY FINDINGS. INTERESTING STUFF. HE AUTOPSIED THE BRAIN OF A RECENTLY INFECTED CHILD AND IT SHOWED ONLY A DUSTING OF THE SPORE IN HIS SINUSES AND ON THE MEMBRANE SHEATH AROUND THE CEREBRAL CORTEX. BUT THE ARGENTINEAN FIREMAN HAD BEEN INFECTED FOR MUCH LONGER AND THE DRACO INCENDIA TRYCHOPHYTON HAD PENETRATED DEEP INTO HIS SUPERIOR TEMPORAL GYRUS.

EL HORNO DE CAMINAR GAVE AN INTERVIEW TO AN ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE BLOG, IN THE EARLY DAYS OF THE PLAGUE, AND EXPLAINED HOW HE WAS ABLE TO CONTROL FIRE WITHOUT EVER BEING HURT BY IT. "YOU CAN ASK THE SPORE TO KEEP YOU SAFE, BUT YOU MUST FORGET YOUR OWN VOICE FIRST. YOU CAN ASK IT TO FIGHT FOR YOU, BUT YOU MUST COME TO IT AS A SUPPLICANT WITHOUT LANGUAGE." PROBABLY A c.r.a.p TRANSLATION, BUT IT STRUCK ME AS INTERESTING. THE SUPERIOR TEMPORAL GYRUS HARBORS WERNICKE'S AREA, ONE OF THE SEATS OF SPEECH. I FEEL HE HAS EXPLAINED EVERYTHING AND YET I UNDERSTAND NOTHING.

2.

Harper read the notebook in the bathroom, with the door locked, to prevent someone from walking in on her and finding her with it. She felt vaguely like an adolescent, privately examining a work of p.o.r.nography with a dry mouth and a tripping heart.

When she finally stepped back into the wardroom and the milky glow of dawn, she discovered a white rock on the foot of her cot, a sheet of paper under it. WHEN WILL YOU TAKE YOUR MEDICINE? someone had written.

Father Storey drowsed in one bed, Nick in the other. With both of them asleep in the same pose, and with the same frowning look of concentration on their faces, it was impossible not to see the close familial resemblance. The child was still inside Father Storey somewhere, as a fly remains perfectly preserved in a bead of amber. The old man waited for Nick, a baggy overcoat that he would be ready to slip on in six decades.

Harper glanced at the curtain into the waiting room, to be sure she was un.o.bserved, and put the notebook back in the ceiling. Then she picked up the stone and ducked into the next room.

Mindy Skilling, a pretty, waifish girl of about twenty, was on watch. Harper had treated her last month for a urinary tract infection. Mindy gave Harper a dewy, pitying look. She had a lovely, expressive face-bright eyes and long curling lashes-and Harper remembered that in a former life Mindy had studied acting.

"Did you put this on my bed?" Harper held out the stone.

Mindy shook her head.

"Who did?"

"Wouldn't you feel better," Mindy asked, "if you just got your punishment over with? I know Allie would feel better." Her eyes widened in sudden inspiration. She scooted to the edge of the couch. "What if you just put the rock in your mouth for five minutes? I'd tell everyone it was a whole half hour."

"Not five seconds," Harper said. "Oh, and Mindy? Next time you've got an infected bladder?"

Mindy stared at her with apprehensive, ready-to-be hurt eyes.

You can p.i.s.s off, Harper said in her mind, but in real life she only sighed and said, "Forget it," and slipped back into the ward.

She really didn't have the right temperament for vicious comments. The few times in her life she had said truly nasty things to people, it had left her with a bad flavor in her mouth. A stone couldn't taste any worse.

3.

Harper got it again-and she got it worse-the next evening, at first meal.

There was already a line, wrapped halfway around the inside of the cafeteria, when she came in out of the dark, snow melting in her hair. She had half run from the infirmary, with a shrieking wind at her back the whole way. She couldn't feel her ears and was desperately hungry from the first whiff of maple syrup and oats.

Half the camp was already seated, and the room was loud with conversation and spoons sc.r.a.ping in bowls. It was so loud Harper didn't hear Gail Neighbors at first, didn't know someone was talking to her until Gillian Neighbors poked her in the ribs to get her attention.

The Neighbors twins were right behind her, side by side. They wore matching red turtlenecks, an unfortunate wardrobe choice that suggested a resemblance to Thing One and Thing Two from the Dr. Seuss book.

"Allie didn't eat all day yesterday," Gail said. Harper was pretty sure it was Gail doing the talking-she was the one with the pointy chin.

Harper turned her back on them. "If she doesn't want to eat, that's up to her. No one is making her starve."

One of the sisters yanked on her sleeve and Harper had to glance back.

Gillian looked a lot less friendly than Gail. Her lips were a thin white line. She hadn't shaved her head recently and her scalp was blue with five o'clock shadow.

"Is it true it would only cost you half an hour with the stone to make amends?" Gillian asked.

"That and my dignity."

The two sisters did not reply. Harper turned her back on them once more. The line edged slowly forward.

"You're a real stuck-up b.i.t.c.h," one of them said softly.

This time, Harper did not glance back.

"You know, some people think-" said the other, and was shushed by the first.

Harper did not care what some people thought and did not dignify this comment with a response.

She didn't know Allie was on mess duty, dishing out scoops of oatmeal, until she reached the counter. Allie still had the rock in her mouth, Harper could tell by the way she pursed her lips.

Allie lifted her gaze and stared at Harper with watery, loathing eyes. Then she reached under the counter, found a smooth, egg-shaped lump of granite, put it in a bowl, and held it out to her.

Harper set down her tray and walked away, the Neighbors sisters shrieking with laughter.

4.

Late at night-or early in the morning, depending on how you cared to look at it-Nick gave lessons in how to speak without words, and Harper was his attentive pupil, in the lonely cla.s.sroom of the infirmary.

If anyone had asked why Nick was staying in the infirmary, instead of with his sister in the girls' dorm, or with the men in the boys' dorm, Harper would've said she wanted to keep him under observation. She would've claimed she was worried about a late-developing inguinal hernia as a result of his appendectomy in the summer. The word inguinal would be frightening enough to shut down any further questions. But there were no questions, and Harper suspected that few people gave any thought at all to where Nick slept. When you had no voice, you had no ident.i.ty. Most people took no more notice of the profoundly deaf than they did of their own shadows.

They sat across from each other on Nick's cot, in their pajamas. Harper kept three b.u.t.tons undone below her b.r.e.a.s.t.s to show the ripe pink globe of her belly, and when they were finished practicing sign for the night, Nick popped the cap off a Sharpie and drew a smiley face on it.

What are you going to name her? Nick asked. He tried to ask in sign language, but she lost the thread and he had to write it down.

"A boy," she said with her hands.

He pressed both palms on the bulging gourd of her stomach, closed his eyes, and inhaled gently. Then he signed, "Smells like a girl."

"How girls smell?" she asked, her hands finding the words automatically-a fact that produced a small flush of pride.

He gave her a confounded look and wrote: like sugar & spice & everything nice, duh.

You can't really smell if it's a girl, she wrote back.

People who have lost 1 sense, he scrawled, become stronger in the others. Don't you know that? I smell LOTS of things other peeple don't.