The Golden Specific (5 page)

 4 

Truth Telling

P
ART
OF
WHAT
had made the winter and spring so difficult was the broken clock. The city of Boston had clocks on every corner, and every citizen of New Occident carried a lifewatch. Moreover, every citizen carried an inner clock, reliably marking the hours of the twenty-hour day, in his or her mind—every citizen other than Sophia. Her inner clock was broken. It had caused her endless inconvenience and considerable shame to lose track of time so easily, but the previous summer she had made her peace with it. She had realized that a wayward inner
clock could be useful. If she concentrated on a single thought, poring over its every detail, a whole hour could feel like a second. And if she concentrated on the passing moment, imagining its hidden depths, a second could feel like an hour.

But the sadness that had crept in with the cold of winter, first in a trickle and then in an engulfing wave, had made it impossible to concentrate. She could no longer expand and contract the time around her, bending it to her will. Once again, she found herself at the mercy of those boundless hours and seconds, helpless in their limitlessness.

Now she felt her powers of concentration returning. They filled her with a contented thrum, a sense of steady and accomplished intention. Her first day at the Nihilismian Archive, Sophia had scanned as many of the indexes as she could until Remorse shooed her from room 45 so the archive could close. Sophia collected her membership card from the front desk and rushed home to be back by dusk.

Minna did not appear.

Buoyed by her new sense of purpose, Sophia was not deterred. She had decided to tell Shadrack about the Nihilismian Archive. Settling into the chair at her desk, where she had a clear view of East Ending Street, she waited.

To make the time pass quickly, she concentrated on her last sighting of Minna, bringing forth all its detail as if immersing herself in a memory map: the dimming light, the scent of lilacs that tumbled over the gate, the distant rumble of the trolleys. And she imagined Minna herself, dark hair braided and coiled around her head, clad in a colorless traveling dress
that reached the ground. A long row of buttons trailed down the front and along each sleeve. Her voice was gentle and muted, as if she spoke from behind a curtain:
“Missing but not lost, absent but not gone, unseen but not unheard. Find us while we still draw breath.”
When she reached out toward Sophia, her face bore a mixture of tenderness and regret. Her dress hung on her loosely, as if she had grown thin, and the hem was stained with water and mud.

Sophia frowned. Her thoughts had taken an unexpected turn. She shook her head, trying to recall the elation that had coursed through her at the sight of her mother, but it was gone.

Sophia opened her eyes, hearing a rapid step on the cobblestones. As she watched her uncle walk up to the side door, she felt a sudden wave of sadness. She floundered. Was it seeing Shadrack, or was it the marred memory of Minna that had overturned the smooth vessel in which she had sailed through the day? She took a deep breath to steady herself, considering the sadness critically so that she would not be engulfed by it.

It was not sadness about one particular thing, but about many things all at once. She regretted that Shadrack was arriving so late from the ministry and that he would probably have to work more at home. It saddened her to see him tired all the time. And it saddened her that there would be no time, once again, to study cartology. The thought of all the untouched maps in the underground map room filled her with frustration. She felt bad for begrudging Shadrack his time, since everything he did for the ministry was so important. Most of all, she felt wretched about how things seemed so different between
them. She could not tell if it was Shadrack's exhaustion or her own resentment that had brought about the sense of distance, but it was there. In the past, Sophia thought unhappily, she would have run down the steps to meet him. Now, she rose slowly from her chair, dreading his weary look and his rapid departure to the study.

Sophia walked down the steps to the kitchen, where she found Shadrack unpacking a canvas shopping bag at the kitchen table. “You're home,” she said, putting her arms around him.

“I'm finally home, Soph,” he replied, embracing her wearily in return. “You needn't have waited for me. You must be hungry.”

“Oh, I don't mind waiting.” Sophia took up unpacking the food while Shadrack sat down exhaustedly. She heard in her own voice the resentment, the opposite meaning, pleading to be heard:
I do mind. I mind waiting. Every night.
It surprised her. She could hear it now, in the same way that she could see the great expanse of sadness. Could Shadrack hear it?

“Well,
I'm
hungry,” Shadrack said, throwing himself back in his chair. “So hungry that I just took things off the shelves at Morton's without really thinking. I'm glad Mrs. Clay has the chance to escape us on her night off, but our stomachs always suffer when she does.”

He could not hear it.

Sophia turned to the bag and stared at it, overcome by the realization. Slowly and steadily, she pushed the discovery aside. She forced herself to look at the contents of the bag. “Pickles,
cold pork, cheddar cheese, a loaf of rye bread, and four tomatoes,” she said woodenly. “I'll get plates.” It was suddenly apparent to her that this happened every night: she said things she did not mean because she wanted them to be true.

“Another impossible day,” Shadrack sighed. He rested his elbows on the table and put his head in his hands. “Raiders in the Indian Territories, as usual. Or ‘settlers,' as they call themselves. They simply won't see sense. To them, any piece of land without a fence around it is land for the taking. Most of them are simply scoundrels, but some of them are Nihilismian, and they insist on pushing west, because that's what happened in the ‘Age of Verity.'” He rolled his eyes. “They seem incapable of understanding that we inhabit this world around us, not a different one.”

Sophia looked at him.
Now is the moment to tell him about the archive,
she thought.
He will be upset. Then I'll explain, and he'll understand.
She opened her mouth to speak, but the words would not come.

Shadrack shook his head and moved on. “But enough about the ministry—I have more immediate news. Good news and bad news.”

Sophia sank down into her chair. “What is it?”

“I received a letter from Miles today. The man they had gone to find near the Eerie Sea who supposedly knew about Ausentinia is, very recently it seems, deceased.” He stared down at his plate before looking up to meet her gaze. “I'm sorry, Soph.”

She had hoped for better news. “They didn't learn anything?”

“Miles only said that the man was dead. Most of his letter
was about an attack they witnessed. Well, they witnessed the aftermath. Settlers from Connecticut on an Indian town near the border.” Shadrack ran a hand through his hair. “Prime Minister Bligh and I spent three hours today finding absolutely
nothing
by way of solution.”

Ever since the previous summer, when parliament had adopted an uncompromising posture toward foreigners, closing the borders and deporting people of foreign birth, New Occident had changed. To Sophia it was most apparent in the empty storefronts, the neighbors from the Indies who had moved away, the trolley drivers she no longer saw, and the undefinable sense of
sameness
of Boston's inhabitants. There were no more vendors from the Baldlands selling turquoise or palm readers from the Indies offering to tell one's fortune. Even people from the Indian Territories and the state of New Akan, who had every right to be in Boston, had gradually drifted away.

To them, the border closure was pointless. The Territories and New Akan were next door to the Baldlands; their families and friends lived there. People came and went all the time. The
real
foreigners, they argued, were settlers from places like Connecticut, who ignored existing treaties and tried to seize land in the Indian Territories. Tensions between settlers and existing residents had grown strained. Prime Minister Cyril Bligh, who wished to overturn the border closure and who sought a peaceable solution to the disagreements, had been appointed, it seemed, too late. By the time he was appointed in January, so many altercations had erupted that even his
well-known skill at negotiation was ineffectual. Sophia took a deep breath. “And what's the good news?”

“The good news is that Miles said they are returning. It sounds to me as if they are making their way back to us now, even as we speak.” Shadrack attempted a smile. “So they will be home soon.”

Finally,
Sophia thought. “When do you think they'll be here?”

“It could be any day now. I know you'll be glad to have Theo back.”

“Yes.” It was true, she would be glad. The search for Minna and Bronson—and things in general—had become so much more difficult in his absence.

Theo had not been particularly helpful with the search. When they went to the Boston Public Library to look for leads, Sophia spent hours reading, while Theo, after reading for a few minutes, inevitably drifted from his desk to chat with the other library patrons. Moreover, he made a joke out of everything, even things that were very serious. When a promising lead turned into a dead end, his ridiculous comments went on and on until Sophia had to laugh. Perhaps this was why things were worse without him. Dead ends were not funny, but Theo could make them seem like the funniest thing in the world.

Sophia and Shadrack sat in silence, staring down at their untouched food. The kitchen clock over their heads ticked loudly.
This is when I should say something,
Sophia told herself.
I must tell him about the archive.
“I went to a new archive today,” she said, before she could reason her way out of talking.

There was a pause. “Did you?” Shadrack asked. His voice
was falsely bright. Sophia could see in his eyes that he hated himself for that falseness, and it filled her with sympathy.
I feel the same way,
she thought.
I hate the falseness, too.
She wanted to say something that would make it all right—something that would explain that she missed the lessons in cartology and desperately wanted his help, but that she understood, and that even though she was disappointed, he was still her beloved uncle Shadrack.

Somehow, talking about the search for Minna and Bronson had become something that made them both feel guilty: Shadrack, because he was not doing enough to help; and Sophia, because it felt like she was accusing Shadrack of not doing enough to help. Suddenly, she did not want to tell him about the Nihilismian Archive at all. “I did.” She gave her own false smile back. “Nothing useful yet. I'll let you know if I find something.”

“That sounds like an excellent proposal. Come,” he said. “We should eat. We've both had long days. And I'm afraid I'll have to hole up in the study to do more work after dinner.”

Sophia nodded, burying the sense of disappointment. “Let's eat, then.”

—1892, June 1: 7-Hour 59—

S
HE
WAS
WAITING
at the Nihilismian Archive when the doors opened the next day. As the bald attendant appeared in the doorway, Sophia scanned his face quickly for some sign: outrage, suspicion, alarm. None of it was there. He nodded
expressionlessly when she showed him her card and ushered her in.
Safe for today, then
. She nodded in return and made her way up to room 45.