help him." The bush was far too big and prickly to creep underneath. Julian was glad they had brought tools of all kinds. He went to fetch an axe. They had brought a small one with them and it would do to chop away the prickly branches and trunk of the gorse bush. The children slashed at it and soon the poor bush began to look a sorry sight. It took a long time to destroy it, for it was prickly, sturdy and stout. Every child's hands were scratched by the time the bush had been reduced to a mere stump. Then they could see the hole quite well. Julian shone his torch down it. He gave a shout of surprise. "I know what's happened! The old well is here! The rabbits had a hole at the side of it- and Tim scraped away to make it bigger and uncovered a bit of the well-hole- and he's fallen down the well!" "Oh no, oh no," cried George, in panic. "Oh Tim, Tim, are you all right?" A distant whine came to their ears. Evidently Tim was there somewhere. The children looked at one another. "Well, there's only one thing to do," said Julian, "We must get our spades now and dig out the hole of the well. Then maybe we can let a rope down or something and get Tim." They set to work with their spades. It was not really difficult to uncover the hole, which had been blocked only by the spreading roots of the big gorse bush, some fallen masonry, earth, sand and small stones. Apparently a big slab had fallen from part of the tower across the well-hole, and partly closed it. The weather and the growing gorse bush had done the rest. It took all the children together to move the slab. Underneath was a very rotten wooden cover, which had plainly been used in the old days to protect the well. It had rotted so much that when Tim's weight had been pressed on it, it had given just there and made a hole for Tim to fall through. Julian removed the old wooden cover and then the children could see down the well-hole. It was very deep and very dark. They could not possibly see the bottom. Julian took a stone and dropped it down. They all listened for the splash. But there was no splash. Either there was no longer any water there, or the well was too deep even to hear the splash! "I think it's too deep for us to hear anything," said Julian. "Now- where's Tim?" He shone his torch down- and there was Tim! Many years before a big slab had fallen down the well itself and had stuck a little way down, across the well-hole- and on this old cracked slab sat Tim, his big eyes staring up in fright. He simply could not imagine what had happened to him. There was an old iron ladder fastened to the side of the well. George was on it before anyone


town rose up from the dunes, the buildings squat and made of what looked to be adobe, a material Vic had only a cursory knowledge of. No snow, not even trampled melting remnants. What happened to winter? But that mattered not, given the figures in front of the house. Dozens of them, all as the Coachman said, standing single file in a line that wrapped around the side of the house toward the town. Vic’s heart started hammering in his chest when he saw the figures up close. At first, he thought them human, people like him, flesh and blood. That notion was dispelled almost immediately as he got a better look. He saw beings that reminded him of the smooth men. Some had ears. Others did not. Still others had hair, though it appeared to be wigs, big bouffant styles with ribbons styled to form drooping bows. Not all stood on two legs. One was a black cube the size of a large boulder with a row of lights across its front. Some had wheels, some treads, some floated above the ground, clouds of sand and dust rising around them. There were toys, too, though they were far outnumbered. He flinched when a large lizard-like creature tilted its head back and roared, the sound tinny through the screen. He wondered if this was one of the robot dinosaurs that had eaten children. And speaking of children. They too stood in line, interspersed among the other machines, staring ahead with blank expressions. At least ten of them, all different. One had bright red freckles. Another wore glasses. Another had his two front teeth missing, the gap black as his mouth hung open. With all that he’d learned since his father had been taken from him, Vic had never considered that there could be machines designed to look like children. He didn’t know what purpose they served. Why they had been made to look like they had. They were children forever, never aging. He recoiled at the sight of them. “See?” the Coachman said. “Isn’t it exciting? By the time we’re done today, we’ll be the talk of the town! Remember: do what you are programmed to do, and everything will be right as rain.” He moved toward the doorway, pausing with his hand on the doorknob. “Oh, and if, at any point, I feel that you are endangering myself, my house, or any of my treasures, there will be consequences. I happen to know at least three machines who can make anything feel pain. Something to keep in mind on this, the first day of the rest of your lives. And remember: have fun with this!” With that, he went through the door, closing it behind him. Only to appear on the screen a moment later, standing on the porch of the house, a wide smile on his face as he raised his arms above his head, streamers shooting from the sleeves of his coat. “Welcome!” the Coachman cried, his tinny voice crackling through the speakers. “Welcome, indeed. How delightful it is


not reach; and perhaps sinking at last into drunkenness. Of late Philip had been captivated by an idea that since one had only one life it was important to make a success of it, but he did not count success by the acquiring of money or the achieving of fame; he did not quite know yet what he meant by it, perhaps variety of experience and the making the most of his abilities. It was plain anyway that the life which Clutton seemed destined to was failure. Its only justification would be the painting of imperishable masterpieces. He recollected Cronshaw's whimsical metaphor of the Persian carpet; he had thought of it often; but Cronshaw with his faun-like humour had refused to make his meaning clear: he repeated that it had none unless one discovered it for oneself. It was this desire to make a success of life which was at the bottom of Philip's uncertainty about continuing his artistic career. But Clutton began to talk again. "D'you remember my telling you about that chap I met in Brittany? I saw him the other day here. He's just off to Tahiti. He was broke to the world. He was a _brasseur d'affaires_, a stockbroker I suppose you call it in English; and he had a wife and family, and he was earning a large income. He chucked it all to become a painter. He just went off and settled down in Brittany and began to paint. He hadn't got any money and did the next best thing to starving." "And what about his wife and family?" asked Philip. "Oh, he dropped them. He left them to starve on their own account." "It sounds a pretty low-down thing to do." "Oh, my dear fellow, if you want to be a gentleman you must give up being an artist. They've got nothing to do with one another. You hear of men painting pot-boilers to keep an aged mother--well, it shows they're excellent sons, but it's no excuse for bad work. They're only tradesmen. An artist would let his mother go to the workhouse. There's a writer I know over here who told me that his wife died in childbirth. He was in love with her and he was mad with grief, but as he sat at the bedside watching her die he found himself making mental notes of how she looked and what she said and the things he was feeling. Gentlemanly, wasn't it?" "But is your friend a good painter?" asked Philip. "No, not yet, he paints just like Pissarro. He hasn't found himself, but he's got a sense of colour and a sense of decoration. But that isn't the question. it's the feeling, and that he's got. He's behaved like a perfect cad to his wife and children, he's always behaving like a perfect cad; the way he treats the people who've helped him--and sometimes he's been saved from starvation merely by the kindness of his friends--is simply beastly. He just happens to be a great artist." Philip pondered over the man who


hungry, and clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is the secret of religion,--these are the two things that govern us. And yet--" "Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good boy," said Hallward, deep in his work, and conscious only that a look had come into the lad's face that he had never seen there before. "And yet," continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, and with that graceful wave of the hand that was always so characteristic of him, and that he had even in his Eton days, "I believe that if one man were to live his life out fully and completely, were to give form to every feeling, expression to every thought, reality to every dream,--I believe that the world would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we would forget all the maladies of mediaevalism, and return to the Hellenic ideal,-- to something finer, richer, than the Hellenic ideal, it may be. But the bravest man among us is afraid of himself. The mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the self-denial that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every impulse that we strive to strangle broods in the mind, and poisons us. The body sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, or the luxury of a regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said that the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, with your rose-red youth and your rose-white boyhood, you have had passions that have made you afraid, thoughts that have filled you with terror, day-dreams and sleeping dreams whose mere memory might stain your cheek with shame--" "Stop!" murmured Dorian Gray, "stop! you bewilder me. I don't know what to say. There is some answer to you, but I cannot find it. Don't speak. Let me think, or, rather, let me try not to think." For nearly ten minutes he stood there motionless, with parted lips, and eyes strangely bright. He was dimly conscious that entirely fresh impulses were at work within him, and they seemed to him to have come really from himself. The few words that Basil's friend had said to him--words spoken by chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in them--had yet touched some secret chord, that had never been touched before, but that he felt was now vibrating and


panel. Yesterday afternoon, I said goodbye to her before we flew to Nevada, and Finn humored her by taking no fewer than a thousand selfies and then made her the happiest I’ve ever seen by giving her a ticket to December’s reunion taping. “Noemie’s really great,” he said this morning on the plane. “I can see why you two are close.” “She was definitely more excited to see you than me. But I forgive you.” A pause, and then he asked: “You told her, didn’t you?” The look I gave him must have communicated my shock. “I’m not mad,” he clarified, holding up a hand. “I kind of figured you would.” “She won’t say a word. I swear to god.” “I trust you,” he said, and for some reason, those three words sent an odd shiver up my spine. We haven’t hooked up since Memphis, and I’m no longer sure whether I’m missing it or grateful for the distance. Probably both. After the conversation with Noemie, I’ve decided to try my best to forget Finn’s drugged confession. It’s simply safer for all of us. I see the Chihuahuas first, a whole pack of them on the front porch, as a middle-aged woman with chin-length dark hair approaches the car. “Finnegan!” she calls, the dogs trotting along behind her, tails going wild, a tornado of black and white and tan. Finn scoops up one of the dogs as he gives his mom a hug and a kiss on the cheek. “Mom, hi. How many did you adopt since I last saw you?” She makes an exaggerated pout. “Only one,” she says before stage-whispering to me, “Two.” A white one is at my heels, and I bend down to give him some love. “This is, um, a lot of dogs,” I say stupidly. “They’re all rescues,” Finn’s mom says. “I started with one, and then I thought it might be nice if she had someone to play with and, well, it kind of spiraled from there. Now I can’t imagine life without them.” She picks up two of them. “Isn’t that right? You manipulated me with your tiny noses and perfect little paws.” Then she extends a hand to me. “Sondra. Pleasure to meet you.” “Chandler. Thanks so much for having us.” Finn is scratching his dog under the chin, dropping kisses onto its head. “That’s it. I’m really not going back to LA this time.” “Tell me that again when they wake you up at six in the morning for breakfast.” Sondra fusses with his hair for a moment. “Did you pay someone to make it look like this?” “Yes. Probably too much,” he says, and then to me: “She gave me bowl cuts at home for a solid two years, so I can’t fully trust her opinion.” “And every little old lady at synagogue complimented you,” she says, patting his cheek. “Please tell me you have pictures,” I say, and Sondra assures me she does. After his mom introduces the dogs, Freddie and Waffles and Moose and Galileo and Duchess, we make


expression and so the Parliament would serve as an inspirational centrepiece, like the great town squares from past civilizations, something to remind people that life was more than body temperatures and calorie counts. The structure had been designed by a Chilean-born architect responsible for some of his country’s wilderness hotels, saucer-shaped timber lodges at the foot of the Andes Mountains. At the time he’d been given the commission, he’d been suffering a bout of Antarctica-induced depression and the challenge rejuvenated him, working with feverish passion to overcome the limitations of his materials and the adversity of these conditions, not merely the cold but also the wind. The finished building was magnificent. Rising up from a rectangular base, he’d created towers of uneven heights, the shortest on the outer edge, the tallest in the centre, each tower consisting of steel shipping containers twisted a fraction. When gilded with ice during the winter, these steel towers turned silver and white, shimmering like a fantasy palace. Though it was impractical – some of the towers were far too cold to use in the winter – it remained the central hub of the town, holding together a community, the location for festivals and celebrations throughout the year, a place of joy where anyone could turn up at any time and simply say ‘I need help’ and help would be provided. It was ironic that in the coldest of cities, the warmest of communities had been created. In front of a packed auditorium, Liza stood at the podium, addressing the citizens of Hope Town. Without microphones or loudspeakers, the acoustics in the hall were modelled on Musikverein in Vienna, built in 1812 without any of the technological advances of the recent designs, such as Philharmonie de Paris. Having returned from the family vacation in the mountains, Liza had no intention of complying with the orders to surrender custody of her daughter. For years this ritual collection of the ice-adapted children had been presented as being no more controversial than a child leaving home to begin college. Rejecting this analogy, typical of the condescending rationale handed down by McMurdo City, Liza had demanded an open session of Hope Town’s Parliament, where she asked: ‘The three survivor settlements do not exist to serve McMurdo. We exist in our own right. We have given so much and for what? McMurdo City hasn’t shared any of its resources. The only promise they made was the creation of people who could survive the cold. Which they have done. And these children we love and consider part of our community. They gave us ice-adapted children and now they’re taking these children back as if they were only ever on loan, claiming they need them more than we do.’ The citizens of Hope Town listened, nodding in agreement. For years they’d provided whatever McMurdo asked, whether it was lichen to smoke, or volunteers for experiments. This couldn’t carry on. These three towns were great; they had their own culture and vibrancy, their own ethos and character. Hope Town had found a groove, emphasizing joy


it in the cellar. I deny having taken part in such a thing. "I heard 'em!" was the cry that awoke the Misses Barber's neighbors at dawn next morning. "Heard 'em drive a truck up to the door! Stomped around like horses. They're in New Orleans by now!" Miss Tutti was sure those traveling fur sellers who came through town two days ago had purloined their furniture. "Da-rk they were," she said. "Syrians." Mr. Heck Tate was summoned. He surveyed the area and said he thought it was a local job. Miss Frutti said she'd know a Maycomb voice anywhere, and there were no Maycomb voices in that parlor last night- rolling their r's all over her premises, they were. Nothing less than the bloodhounds must be used to locate their furniture, Miss Tutti insisted, so Mr. Tate was obliged to go ten miles out the road, round up the county hounds, and put them on the trail. Mr. Tate started them off at the Misses Barber's front steps, but all they did was run around to the back of the house and howl at the cellar door. When Mr. Tate set them in motion three times, he finally guessed the truth. By noontime that day, there was not a barefooted child to be seen in Maycomb and nobody took off his shoes until the hounds were returned. So the Maycomb ladies said things would be different this year. The high-school auditorium would be open, there would be a pageant for the grown-ups; apple-bobbing, taffy-pulling, pinning the tail on the donkey for the children. There would also be a prize of twenty-five cents for the best Halloween costume, created by the wearer. Jem and I both groaned. Not that we'd ever done anything, it was the principle of the thing. Jem considered himself too old for Halloween anyway; he said he wouldn't be caught anywhere near the high school at something like that. Oh well, I thought, Atticus would take me. I soon learned, however, that my services would be required on stage that evening. Mrs. Grace Merriweather had composed an original pageant entitled Maycomb County: Ad Astra Per Aspera, and I was to be a ham. She thought it would be adorable if some of the children were costumed to represent the county's agricultural products: Cecil Jacobs would be dressed up to look like a cow; Agnes Boone would make a lovely butterbean, another child would be a peanut, and on down the line until Mrs. Merriweather's imagination and the supply of children were exhausted. Our only duties, as far as I could gather from our two rehearsals, were to enter from stage left as Mrs. Merriweather (not only the author, but the narrator) identified us. When she called out, "Pork," that was my cue. Then the assembled company would sing, "Maycomb County, Maycomb County, we will aye be true to thee," as the grand finale, and Mrs. Merriweather would mount the stage with the state flag. My costume was not much of a problem. Mrs. Crenshaw, the local seamstress, had


stand up—and hisses in pain. Coach, who’s been frozen in confusion since opening the door, springs into action. “Hold on there, young lady,” she orders, kneeling and taking Celine’s wrist in her hand. “Oh dear.” She shakes her head, blond ponytail swinging. My stomach drops. “What? What’s happened?” Coach gently presses Celine’s wrist. “Does that hurt?” Her reply is a stifled squeak. “And this?” A nod. Mr. Gallagher, who is small and twitchy and pink, peers over Coach’s shoulder. “Hmm. I think a trip to Student Support may be in order.” “What?” I repeat. You only go to Student Support if you’re having a total breakdown or if you’re sick and you need them to call your parents. “What’s wrong? I’ll take her—” “No,” Celine says, so quick and sharp I’m almost hurt for a second, before I remember that I don’t like her, and she doesn’t like me, and we are enemies. Coach gives me a grim look as she helps Celine to her feet. “I’ll take her. Brad, tell the team I’m going to be late for practice.” “Yes, Coach.” Oh, wait a minute. “Um, actually, me and Celine were supposed to stay here and do some work for Mr. Taylor?” “Well, Celine won’t be doing any work this afternoon, so you can run and let him know about that too.” She puts an arm around Celine, and they head for the stairs. Mr. Gallagher follows behind them. I run my hands over my hair. “Shit, shit, shit.” Did I just break Celine’s arm or something? The possibility rolls around in my stomach like a concrete ball of anxiety. Acid climbs up my throat. Why the hell did I drop her? I stare down at my hands and whisper, “What the fuck?” They don’t reply. I sigh, then crouch down to pick up the textbook she dropped. There’s something sticking out from between the pages. I flick them open, and a vaguely familiar woman with brown skin and long hair stares back at me. Breakspeare Enrichment Program, the glossy leaflet says. Breakspeare. Katharine Breakspeare. That’s where I’ve seen this woman: on the inspirational pinboard Celine used to keep in her bedroom. Back when I was welcome in Celine’s bedroom, which I’m certainly not now. I close the book. MONDAY, 4:34 P.M. BANGURA GIRLS Mummy: Keep me updated please. Giselle: doc’s sent us for an X-ray, in the waiting room now Celine: sorry mummy Mummy: Your wrist is broken and still you’re on this blasted phone??? I bet that’s how you fell. Celine: it’s not! Mummy: talk to the hand little girl Giselle: skdhfjsjkfhs MUM CHAPTER THREE BRAD It’s a good thing Celine’s addicted to technology and that I have a finsta for the express purpose of stalking people without embarrassment. By the time I pull up outside my house, her Instagram Story tells me she’s going to Queen’s Med with her sister Giselle,which is not exactly home safe and sound, but also isn’t completely terrible. My brain decides this would be an ideal moment to present me with images of


Australia. And he stood in the door and paid all the ugly women two dollars not to come in. One big meriny colored woman was so ugly till it was worth five dollars for her not to come in, so he gave it to her. They had a big time till one man come in who thought he was bad. He tried to pull and haul over all the chickens and pick out the livers and gizzards to eat. Nobody else couldn’t pacify him so they called Tea Cake to come see if he could stop him. So Tea Cake walked up and asked him, “Say, whut’s de matter wid you, nohow?” “Ah don’t want nobody handin’ me nothin’. Specially don’t issue me out no rations. Ah always chooses mah rations.” He kept right on plowing through the pile uh chicken. So Tea Cake got mad. “You got mo’ nerve than uh brass monkey. Tell me, what post office did you ever pee in? Ah craves tuh know.” “Whut you mean by dat now?” the fellow asked. “Ah means dis—it takes jus’ as much nerve tuh cut caper lak dat in uh United States Government Post Office as it do tuh comes pullin’ and haulin’ over any chicken Ah pay for. Hit de ground. Damned if Ah ain’t gointuh try you dis night.” So they all went outside to see if Tea Cake could handle the boogerboo. Tea Cake knocked out two of his teeth, so that man went on off from there. Then two men tried to pick a fight with one another, so Tea Cake said they had to kiss and make up. They didn’t want to do it. They’d rather go to jail, but everybody else liked the idea, so they made 146 Zora Neale Hurston ’em do it. Afterwards, both of them spit and gagged and wiped their mouths with the back of their hands. One went outside and chewed a little grass like a sick dog, he said to keep it from killing him. Then everybody began to holler at the music because the man couldn’t play but three pieces. So Tea Cake took the guitar and played himself. He was glad of the chance because he hadn’t had his hand on a box since he put his in the pawn shop to get some money to hire a car for Janie soon after he met her. He missed his music. So that put him in the notion he ought to have one. He bought the guitar on the spot and paid fifteen dollars cash. It was really worth sixty-five any day. Just before day the party wore out. So Tea Cake hurried on back to his new wife. He had done found out how rich people feel and he had a fine guitar and twelve dollars left in his pocket and all he needed now was a great big old hug and kiss from Janie. “You musta thought yo’ wife was powerful ugly. Dem ugly women dat you paid two dollars not to come in, could


do this, but he wants to watch Andy do it to him, he wants to feel Andy do it to him. If there’s a contradiction there, then that’s just going to have to be okay. Sex with Andy is full of contradictions, anyway: a little clumsy but always easy; a little rough but always tender. When he’s buried deep inside Andy, he feels exposed, but also as safe as he’s ever felt. And it turns out that when Andy’s inside him, he feels the exact same way. “This okay?” Andy asks about fifty times, asking again even as his rhythm falters and his breathing goes ragged. One of his hands has found its way to Nick’s, clasping it against the mattress. Nick can’t stop watching his face, can’t stop watching the emotions play out over it—pleasure and concern and love. Nick pulls him closer and kisses the triangle of birthmarks at the corner of his mouth. “Don’t leave,” Nick says later, when Andy is half on top of him, boneless and sweaty. “Not going anywhere,” Andy mumbles into Nick’s shoulder. “Can’t make me.” “I mean, forever.” He’s not sure he made that crystal clear before, and besides, he’s on a roll with saying embarrassing things. Andy lifts his head a little bit to look at Nick. He smiles, as if he’s slowly realizing that Nick is in the palm of his hand, and Nick never could have imagined that this would be a good feeling. “There’s nowhere else I want to be,” Andy says. Chapter Twenty-Seven It’s sheer bad luck that Nick happens to run into Mrs. Martelli on the stairs. “Let me get those,” he says, taking a string bag from her hand and giving her his arm. “God willing I’ll only have to do this a few more times,” she says when they reach her door, making the sign of the cross. “You moving to the ground-floor apartment?” If you ask Nick, that’s what she should have done years ago. “I’m moving to Long Island,” Mrs. Martelli says. “I’d have thought your nice young man would have told you.” “Andy? What does he have to do with it?” Nick asks, pretending he didn’t hear the part about Andy being his young man. “He’s made an offer on the building,” she says, as if talking about the drains or the water heater or something, not Andy buying a building. Andy isn’t home yet—he has some top-secret dinner with the editors—so Nick has plenty of time to turn this new information over in his mind. Andy knows that Nick isn’t keen on the idea of Andy being his boss—why on earth would he think being Nick’s landlord would be any different? And that doesn’t even touch on how ridiculous it is that Andy has the kind of money where he can just buy a building. What’s Andy going to do with a building, anyway? Is he going to fix people’s broken windows and leaky sinks? Nick pours himself a glass of bourbon and settles irritably on the couch. Toward the bottom of


in Kennington she was tired out and ashamed. She was glad to be left alone. It was a comfort to think that there was no rent to pay; she need not go out in all weathers, and she could lie quietly in bed if she did not feel well. She had hated the life she led. It was horrible to have to be affable and subservient; and even now when it crossed her mind she cried with pity for herself as she thought of the roughness of men and their brutal language. But it crossed her mind very seldom. She was grateful to Philip for coming to her rescue, and when she remembered how honestly he had loved her and how badly she had treated him, she felt a pang of remorse. It was easy to make it up to him. It meant very little to her. She was surprised when he refused her suggestion, but she shrugged her shoulders: let him put on airs if he liked, she did not care, he would be anxious enough in a little while, and then it would be her turn to refuse; if he thought it was any deprivation to her he was very much mistaken. She had no doubt of her power over him. He was peculiar, but she knew him through and through. He had so often quarrelled with her and sworn he would never see her again, and then in a little while he had come on his knees begging to be forgiven. It gave her a thrill to think how he had cringed before her. He would have been glad to lie down on the ground for her to walk on him. She had seen him cry. She knew exactly how to treat him, pay no attention to him, just pretend you didn't notice his tempers, leave him severely alone, and in a little while he was sure to grovel. She laughed a little to herself, good-humouredly, when she thought how he had come and eaten dirt before her. She had had her fling now. She knew what men were and did not want to have anything more to do with them. She was quite ready to settle down with Philip. When all was said, he was a gentleman in every sense of the word, and that was something not to be sneezed at, wasn't it? Anyhow she was in no hurry, and she was not going to take the first step. She was glad to see how fond he was growing of the baby, though it tickled her a good deal; it was comic that he should set so much store on another man's child. He was peculiar and no mistake. But one or two things surprised her. She had been used to his subservience: he was only too glad to do anything for her in the old days, she was accustomed to see him cast down by a cross word and in ecstasy at a kind one; he was different now, and she said to herself that he


to cast off their melancholy. He would talk in a cheerful accent, with an expression of goodness that bestowed pleasure even upon me. Agatha listened with respect, her eyes sometimes filled with tears, which she endeavoured to wipe away unperceived; but I generally found that her countenance and tone were more cheerful after having listened to the exhortations of her father. It was not thus with Felix. He was always the saddest of the group, and even to my unpractised senses, he appeared to have suffered more deeply than his friends. But if his countenance was more sorrowful, his voice was more cheerful than that of his sister, especially when he addressed the old man. "I could mention innumerable instances which, although slight, marked the dispositions of these amiable cottagers. In the midst of poverty and want, Felix carried with pleasure to his sister the first little white flower that peeped out from beneath the snowy ground. Early in the morning, before she had risen, he cleared away the snow that obstructed her path to the milk-house, drew water from the well, and brought the wood from the outhouse, where, to his perpetual astonishment, he found his store always replenished by an invisible hand. In the day, I believe, he worked sometimes for a neighbouring farmer, because he often went forth and did not return until dinner, yet brought no wood with him. At other times he worked in the garden, but as there was little to do in the frosty season, he read to the old man and Agatha. "This reading had puzzled me extremely at first, but by degrees I discovered that he uttered many of the same sounds when he read as when he talked. I conjectured, therefore, that he found on the paper signs for speech which he understood, and I ardently longed to comprehend these also; but how was that possible when I did not even understand the sounds for which they stood as signs? I improved, however, sensibly in this science, but not sufficiently to follow up any kind of conversation, although I applied my whole mind to the endeavour, for I easily perceived that, although I eagerly longed to discover myself to the cottagers, I ought not to make the attempt until I had first become master of their language, which knowledge might enable me to make them overlook the deformity of my figure, for with this also the contrast perpetually presented to my eyes had made me acquainted. "I had admired the perfect forms of my cottagers--their grace, beauty, and delicate complexions; but how was I terrified when I viewed myself in a transparent pool! At first I started back, unable to believe that it was indeed I who was reflected in the mirror; and when I became fully convinced that I was in reality the monster that I am, I was filled with the bitterest sensations of despondence and mortification. Alas! I did not yet entirely know the fatal effects of this miserable deformity. "As the sun became warmer and the light of


in the moment can seem wrong later, and that a lot of things are reversible but killing yourself isn’t. She said this matter-of-factly, not unlike the way she used to say that you don’t brush your teeth because it’s interesting, you brush your teeth because you need to brush your teeth (as a kid, I complained that brushing my teeth was “boring”). I suspect that my dad’s demons are part of what drew my mother to Jerry’s stability and reliability. But from the time I was young, there was this category of things my mother would refer to as Mommy-Sally secrets, like eating leftover cake for breakfast, or both of us taking a sick day and having a picnic just because the weather was beautiful, or, even though she didn’t curse in front of Jerry, if just she and I were in the car and she thought another driver was being unsafe, she’d say in a quiet but crisp voice, “What a fucking asshole.” She conveyed to me without ever saying it outright that we all have public and private selves, which also was a very important lesson. Oddly, this ties into why I’ve been thinking I should leave TNO. With every passing year, I can feel how the writers coming up behind me are increasingly different from me. This, to be honest, is anxiety-inducing but also refreshing and appropriate and cycle-of-lifey—like, maybe it’s time for me to make way for other people. And one of the ways that the writers in their twenties are different is that they DON’T seem to think we all have public and private selves. They’re fine just having public selves and openly discussing their mental health issues and their medical issues and their sex habits and their family trauma. I find it really nice to be able to talk to you about all this stuff (or, so far, some of it), but I wouldn’t talk about it with most people. Would you? Regarding my relationship with alcohol, in normal life, I have a drink or two at the TNO after-party, and I don’t drink much otherwise—maybe a glass of wine if I’m meeting Viv for dinner, but after she got pregnant, when she didn’t order one, I didn’t either. The one time besides the TNO party when I always have a drink is on a first date, to calm my nerves. So I guess the truth is that I do use it as a crutch, just not very often (oops, did I just reveal I don’t go on first dates very often? By choice!). But it seems very understandable that you wonder about other people’s drinking habits. You actually are not my first pen pal. You’re probably my best one, though, or at least this little diversion we have going is very enjoyable. Do you think it’s beautiful when two people are each other’s firsts, or do you think that inevitably creates awkwardness and it’s better when one is more experienced and can guide the other? from: Noah Brewster <NoahRBrewster@gmail.com> to: Sally Milz <Smilz@TNOshow.com> date: Jul


there are ingots in here!" Chapter Thirteen DOWN IN THE DUNGEONS Contents- Prev/Next FOUR torches were flashed on to the wooden door. It was big and stout, studded with great iron nails. Julian gave a whoop of delight and rushed to it. He felt certain that behind it was the dungeon used for storing things. But the door was fast shut. No amount of pushing or pulling would open it. It had a great key-hole- but no key there! The four children stared in exasperation at the door. Bother it! Just as they really thought they were near the ingots, this door wouldn't open! "We'll fetch the axe," said Julian, suddenly. "We may be able to chop round the keyhole and smash the lock." "That's a good idea!" said George, delighted. "Come on back!" They left the big door, and tried to get back the way they had come. But the dungeons were so big and so rambling that they lost their way. They stumbled over old broken barrels, rotting wood, empty bottles and many other things as they tried to find their way back to the big flight of rock-steps. "This is sickening!" said Julian, at last. "I simply haven't any idea at all where the entrance is. We keep on going into one dungeon after another, and one passage after another, and they all seem to be exactly the same-dark and smelly and mysterious." "Suppose we have to stay here all the rest of our lives!" said Anne, gloomily. "Idiot!" said Dick, taking her hand. "We shall soon find the way out. Hallo!- what's this-" They all stopped. They had come to what looked like a chimney shaft of brick, stretching down from the roof of the dungeon to the floor. Julian flashed his torch on to it. He was puzzled. "I know what it is!" said George, suddenly. "It's the well, of course! You remember it was shown in the plan of the dungeons, as well as in the plan of the ground floor. Well, that's the shaft of the well going down and down. I wonder if there's any opening in it just here-so that water could be taken into the dungeons as well as up to the ground floor." They went to see. On the other side of the well-shaft was a small opening big enough for one child at a time to put his head and shoulders through and look down. They shone their torches down and up. The well was so deep that it was still impossible to see the bottom of it. Julian dropped a stone down again, but there was no sound of either a thud or a splash. He looked upwards, and could see the faint gleam of daylight that slid round the broken slab of stone lying a little way down the shaft- the slab on which Tim had sat, waiting to be rescued. "Yes," he said,"this is the well all right. Isn't it queer? Well- now we've found the well we know that the entrance to the dungeons isn't very


it been only half as warm as it looked, a trellis of grapes might at once have turned purple under its summer-like exposure. It may have been his purpose, indeed, to melt poor Hepzibah on the spot, as if she were a figure of yellow wax. "Hepzibah, my beloved cousin, I am rejoiced!" exclaimed the Judge most emphatically. "Now, at length, you have something to live for. Yes, and all of us, let me say, your friends and kindred, have more to live for than we had yesterday. I have lost no time in hastening to offer any assistance in my power towards making Clifford comfortable. He belongs to us all. I know how much he requires,--how much he used to require,--with his delicate taste, and his love of the beautiful. Anything in my house, --pictures, books, wine, luxuries of the table, --he may command them all! It would afford me most heartfelt gratification to see him! Shall I step in, this moment?" "No," replied Hepzibah, her voice quivering too painfully to allow of many words. "He cannot see visitors!" "A visitor, my dear cousin!--do you call me so?" cried the Judge, whose sensibility, it seems, was hurt by the coldness of the phrase. "Nay, then, let me be Clifford's host, and your own likewise. Come at once to my house. The country air, and all the conveniences, --I may say luxuries,--that I have gathered about me, will do wonders for him. And you and I, dear Hepzibah, will consult together, and watch together, and labor together, to make our dear Clifford happy. Come! why should we make more words about what is both a duty and a pleasure on my part? Come to me at once!" On hearing these so hospitable offers, and such generous recognition of the claims of kindred, Phoebe felt very much in the mood of running up to Judge Pyncheon, and giving him, of her own accord, the kiss from which she had so recently shrunk away. It was quite otherwise with Hepzibah; the Judge's smile seemed to operate on her acerbity of heart like sunshine upon vinegar, making it ten times sourer than ever. "Clifford," said she,--still too agitated to utter more than an abrupt sentence,--"Clifford has a home here!" "May Heaven forgive you, Hepzibah," said Judge Pyncheon, --reverently lifting his eyes towards that high court of equity to which he appealed,--"if you suffer any ancient prejudice or animosity to weigh with you in this matter. I stand here with an open heart, willing and anxious to receive yourself and Clifford into it. Do not refuse my good offices,--my earnest propositions for your welfare! They are such, in all respects, as it behooves your nearest kinsman to make. It will be a heavy responsibility, cousin, if you confine your brother to this dismal house and stifled air, when the delightful freedom of my country-seat is at his command." "It would never suit Clifford," said Hepzibah, as briefly as before. "Woman!" broke forth the Judge, giving way to his resentment, "what is the meaning of all this?


there in Mr Fitzpatrick’s trousers and a long overcoat, similarly at odds with the constraints of our gender. It was also a disguise, in case Lyndon had his spies out. After Patrick Brontë’s death, the entire contents of the house were either auctioned off or gifted to those who worked at Haworth. The Society was fortunate enough to have acquired much of these effects and their archives were quite impressive. I came across poems by Emily, annotated by elder sister Charlotte, immediately giving me the impression of a sibling power struggle, albeit a loving one. It was common knowledge that Charlotte was critical of her younger sister’s masterpiece. In the preface to the 1850 edition of Wuthering Heights, where Emily’s authorship was finally recognised, Charlotte wrote: Whether it is right or advisable to create beings like Heathcliff, I do not know: I scarcely think it is. Wuthering Heights was hewn in a wild workshop, with simple tools, out of homely materials. Charlotte was the only one of the sisters to marry. She married Arthur Bell Nicholls, a curate who worked with her father and was not particularly liked in the village. I read that he inherited all of her belongings after her death, just nine months after their marriage. Perhaps marriage didn’t suit her after all. He later moved back to his native Ireland and married his cousin. The Honresfield library acquired many of the manuscripts and effects in his possession, so that gave me a spark of hope that I might find some clue there on my visit the following day. I decided to dine at the inn, which was only a short walk from my lodgings. I ordered a hearty shepherd’s pie and sat by the window, drinking a small glass of gin as an aperitif. I spoke briefly to the landlord, who seemed well versed on all things Brontë. They were starting to make quite a bit of money out of visitors to the parsonage and saw it as their civic duty to fill tourists in on whatever the museum’s curator left out. I sat there, reading Elizabeth Gaskell’s biography of Charlotte Brontë. Unfortunately all that was known about Emily could scarcely fill a page. There was, however, mention of a Martha Brown – the maid who worked at the parsonage. As the landlord’s son cleared my dish and wiped down the table, I ordered another drink and asked if he knew anything about her family, being from the area. ‘Oh aye, the sexton’s daughter. She never married,’ he said, in a way that sounded so desperately forlorn. I gulped a mouthful of gin. Why was marriage always seen as the key to happiness? ‘So there was no family to look after her when she got sick.’ He continued in his relentless character assassination of the unmarried woman. ‘I think she died alone in a small cottage.’ I took another gulp of gin. My future suddenly looked quite grim. ‘It says here in my book that she inherited quite a bit of the Brontë family memorabilia. I wonder if


for repeal of the union twenty years before O'Connell did or before the prelates of your communion denounced him as a demagogue? You fenians forget some things. Glorious, pious and immortal memory. The lodge of Diamond in Armagh the splendid behung with corpses of papishes. Hoarse, masked and armed, the planters' covenant. The black north and true blue bible. Croppies lie down. Stephen sketched a brief gesture. --I have rebel blood in me too, Mr Deasy said. On the spindle side. But I am descended from sir John Blackwood who voted for the union. We are all Irish, all kings' sons. --Alas, Stephen said. --PER VIAS RECTAS, Mr Deasy said firmly, was his motto. He voted for it and put on his topboots to ride to Dublin from the Ards of Down to do so. LAL THE RAL THE RA THE ROCKY ROAD TO DUBLIN. A gruff squire on horseback with shiny topboots. Soft day, sir John! Soft day, your honour! ... Day! ... Day! ... Two topboots jog dangling on to Dublin. Lal the ral the ra. Lal the ral the raddy. --That reminds me, Mr Deasy said. You can do me a favour, Mr Dedalus, with some of your literary friends. I have a letter here for the press. Sit down a moment. I have just to copy the end. He went to the desk near the window, pulled in his chair twice and read off some words from the sheet on the drum of his typewriter. --Sit down. Excuse me, he said over his shoulder, THE DICTATES OF COMMON SENSE. Just a moment. He peered from under his shaggy brows at the manuscript by his elbow and, muttering, began to prod the stiff buttons of the keyboard slowly, sometimes blowing as he screwed up the drum to erase an error. Stephen seated himself noiselessly before the princely presence. Framed around the walls images of vanished horses stood in homage, their meek heads poised in air: lord Hastings' Repulse, the duke of Westminster's Shotover, the duke of Beaufort's Ceylon, PRIX DE PARIS, 1866. Elfin riders sat them, watchful of a sign. He saw their speeds, backing king's colours, and shouted with the shouts of vanished crowds. --Full stop, Mr Deasy bade his keys. But prompt ventilation of this allimportant question ... Where Cranly led me to get rich quick, hunting his winners among the mudsplashed brakes, amid the bawls of bookies on their pitches and reek of the canteen, over the motley slush. Fair Rebel! Fair Rebel! Even money the favourite: ten to one the field. Dicers and thimbleriggers we hurried by after the hoofs, the vying caps and jackets and past the meatfaced woman, a butcher's dame, nuzzling thirstily her clove of orange. Shouts rang shrill from the boys' playfield and a whirring whistle. Again: a goal. I am among them, among their battling bodies in a medley, the joust of life. You mean that knockkneed mother's darling who seems to be slightly crawsick? Jousts. Time shocked rebounds, shock by shock. Jousts, slush and uproar of battles, the frozen


a wild turkey. I’d need to shoot a second turkey to trade for an orange. Goat’s milk would have to substitute for cream. We can grow peas in the garden. I’d have to get wild onions from the woods. I don’t recognize the grain, our own tessera ration cooks down to an unattractive brown mush. Fancy rolls would mean another trade with the baker, perhaps for two or three squirrels. As for the pudding, I can’t even guess what’s in it. Days of hunting and gathering for this one meal and even then it would be a poor substitution for the Capitol version. What must it be like, I wonder, to live in a world where food appears at the press of a button? How would I spend the hours I now commit to combing the woods for sustenance if it were so easy to come by? What do they do all day, these people in the Capitol, besides decorating their bodies and waiting around for a new shipment of tributes to roll in and die for their entertainment? I look up and find Cinna’s eyes trained on mine. “How des- picable we must seem to you,” he says. Has he seen this in my face or somehow read my thoughts? He’s right, though. The whole rotten lot of them is despicable. 65 “No matter,” says Cinna. “So, Katniss, about your costume for the opening ceremonies. My partner, Portia, is the stylist for your fellow tribute, Peeta. And our current thought is to dress you in complementary costumes,” says Cinna. “As you know, it’s customary to reflect the flavor of the district.” For the opening ceremonies, you’re supposed to wear something that suggests your district’s principal industry. Dis- trict 11, agriculture. District 4, fishing. District 3, factories. This means that coming from District 12, Peeta and I will be in some kind of coal miner’s getup. Since the baggy miner’s jumpsuits are not particularly becoming, our tributes usually end up in skimpy outfits and hats with headlamps. One year, our tributes were stark naked and covered in black powder to represent coal dust. It’s always dreadful and does nothing to win favor with the crowd. I prepare myself for the worst. “So, I’ll be in a coal miner outfit?” I ask, hoping it won’t be indecent. “Not exactly. You see, Portia and I think that coal miner thing’s very overdone. No one will remember you in that. And we both see it as our job to make the District Twelve tributes unforgettable,” says Cinna. I’ll be naked for sure, I think. “So rather than focus on the coal mining itself, we’re going to focus on the coal,” says Cinna. Naked and covered in black dust, I think. “And what do we do with coal? We burn it,” says Cinna. “You’re not afraid of fire, are you, Katniss?” He sees my ex- pression and grins. 66 A few hours later, I am dressed in what will either be the most sensational or the deadliest costume in the opening ce- remonies. I’m in a


She stood next to the couch, looking at him, and he in turn looked at the ceiling, clasping his hands together and resting them against his chest. They’d played at pirates, but Montserrat played at vampires. Sometimes she made him pretend he was the vampire in a coffin made of cardboard, his hands pressed against his heart like that. But vampires didn’t grow old, and when he’d looked in the mirror a few hours earlier, he was definitely riddled with gray hairs. “Ten years,” she said. Tristán clasped his hands tighter. Karina would have been thirty-six. He could hardly believe it. Time had slipped through his fingers. “I forgot about it, yeah: a whole decade next week. The reporter started asking questions, and I thought she wanted a story about me. But it was about her.” “I forgot, too.” Tristán shook his head. “Yes, but I wouldn’t expect you to remember. She didn’t die in your car, after all.” “What did the reporter say?” “You know what she said. And if she didn’t say it, she implied it. They all do. Fuckers.” He hadn’t been driving, but nobody seemed to care or remember that. What they remembered was that Tristán Abascal was a party animal who demanded that innocent, pure-hearted Karina Junco drive him home after feeding her a vast number of drugs during an orgy in Cuernavaca. Every single quote and commentary had been about how Tristán had guided her to perdition. It was the way Karina’s father sought to cleanse his child’s image. It was a lot better to say her perverted boyfriend had practically murdered Karina than to admit she’d been an alcoholic and a junkie. The shame of it…the fucking shame he felt, in the hospital, his body aching, and then the shame as his mother cried on the phone, as his eldest brother read him a headline…Shame, pain, guilt. It didn’t end. “They always talk shit.” “I should have called someone,” Tristán muttered. She sat down, resting on the couch’s arm. “Tristán, don’t start. It wasn’t your fault.” “I should have gotten help.” “Your face was smashed with glass. You couldn’t run to a pay phone.” “She needed help, that night—” he muttered and stopped, catching his breath. He remembered he’d been wearing a burgundy jacket, and they’d both overdone their drinking. He remembered the tears in her eyes as she clutched the wheel and kept begging him to look at her, and then he pretended to fall asleep. Tristán unlaced his hands and now dug his fingers into the couch, as if he could rip the upholstery apart and puncture his hands with wooden splinters and metal springs. “I should have gotten her help before that. I knew she was overdoing it with the drugs and the drinking, but I never complained.” Karina and Tristán looked good together, and they were going to have another major hit, and if the press found out about her addiction maybe they’d cancel the project. He wanted that role. It was a great part. What a selfish thing to think!


returned his attention to Paul. "I have killed a friend for you," he said. "Let us always remember that." "You're my prisoners," Paul said. "You submitted to me. Whether you live or die is of no importance." He motioned to his guard to take the two Sardaukar, signaled the lieutenant who had searched the prisoners. The guard moved in, hustled the Sardaukar away. Paul bent toward his lieutenant. "Muad'Dib," the man said. "I failed you in . . . " "The failure was mine, Korba," Paul said. "I should've warned you what to seek. In the future, when searching Sardaukar, remember this. Remember, too, that each has a false toenail or two that can be combined with other items secreted about their bodies to make an effective transmitter. They'll have more than one false tooth. They carry coils of shigawire in their hair -- so fine you can barely detect it, yet strong enough to garrote a man and cut off his head in the process. With Sardaukar, you must scan them, scope them -- both reflex and hard ray -- cut off every scrap of body hair. And when you're through, be certain you haven't discovered everything." He looked up at Gurney, who had moved close to listen. "Then we best kill them," the lieutenant said. Paul shook his head, still looking at Gurney. "No. I want them to escape." Gurney stared at him. "Sire . . . " he breathed. "Yes?" "Your man here is right. Kill those prisoners at once. Destroy all evidence of them. You've shamed Imperial Sardaukar! When the Emperor learns that he'll not rest until he has you over a slow fire." "The Emperor's not likely to have that power over me," Paul said. He spoke slowly, coldly. Something had happened inside him while he faced the Sardaukar. A sum of decisions had accumulated in his awareness. "Gurney," he said, "are there many Guildsmen around Rabban?" Gurney straightened, eyes narrowed. "Your question makes no . . . " "Are there?" Paul barked. "Arrakis is crawling with Guild agents. They're buying spice as though it were the most precious thing in the universe. Why else do you think we ventured this far into . . . " "It is the most precious thing in the universe," Paul said. "To them." He looked toward Stilgar and Chani who were now crossing the chamber toward him. "And we control it, Gurney." "The Harkonnens control it!" Gurney protested. "The people who can destroy a thing, they control it," Paul said. He waved a hand to silence further remarks from Gurney, nodded to Stilgar who stopped in front of Paul, Chani beside him. Paul took the Sardaukar knife in his left hand, presented it to Stilgar. "You live for the good of the tribe," Paul said. "Could you draw my life's blood with that knife?" "For the good of the tribe," Stilgar growled. "Then use that knife," Paul said. "Are you calling me out?" Stilgar demanded. "If I do," Paul said, "I shall stand there without weapon and let you slay


half hidden by his long hair, as it streamed over the pillow. The honest gentleman held the curtain in his hand, and looked on, for a minute or so, in silence. Whilst he was watching the patient thus, the younger lady glided softly past, and seating herself in a chair by the bedside, gathered Oliver's hair from his face. As she stooped over him, her tears fell upon his forehead. The boy stirred, and smiled in his sleep, as though these marks of pity and compassion had awakened some pleasant dream of a love and affection he had never known. Thus, a strain of gentle music, or the rippling of water in a silent place, or the odour of a flower, or the mention of a familiar word, will sometimes call up sudden dim remembrances of scenes that never were, in this life; which vanish like a breath; which some brief memory of a happier existence, long gone by, would seem to have awakened; which no voluntary exertion of the mind can ever recall. 'What can this mean?' exclaimed the elder lady. 'This poor child can never have been the pupil of robbers!' 'Vice,' said the surgeon, replacing the curtain, 'takes up her abode in many temples; and who can say that a fair outside shell not enshrine her?' 'But at so early an age!' urged Rose. 'My dear young lady,' rejoined the surgeon, mournfully shaking his head; 'crime, like death, is not confined to the old and withered alone. The youngest and fairest are too often its chosen victims.' 'But, can you--oh! can you really believe that this delicate boy has been the voluntary associate of the worst outcasts of society?' said Rose. The surgeon shook his head, in a manner which intimated that he feared it was very possible; and observing that they might disturb the patient, led the way into an adjoining apartment. 'But even if he has been wicked,' pursued Rose, 'think how young he is; think that he may never have known a mother's love, or the comfort of a home; that ill-usage and blows, or the want of bread, may have driven him to herd with men who have forced him to guilt. Aunt, dear aunt, for mercy's sake, think of this, before you let them drag this sick child to a prison, which in any case must be the grave of all his chances of amendment. Oh! as you love me, and know that I have never felt the want of parents in your goodness and affection, but that I might have done so, and might have been equally helpless and unprotected with this poor child, have pity upon him before it is too late!' 'My dear love,' said the elder lady, as she folded the weeping girl to her bosom, 'do you think I would harm a hair of his head?' 'Oh, no!' replied Rose, eagerly. 'No, surely,' said the old lady; 'my days are drawing to their close: and may mercy be shown to me as I show it to others! What can


by serene, landscaped gardens. They offered art, music, and canine therapy. There was a vegetable garden, a high-end chef, a small movie theater, and a crafts room. My mother no longer knew who I was, but she was happy. She was comfortable. It was all I had wanted. So, I signed Benjamin’s TPE contract. I made a few stipulations to protect myself, but I agreed to give him complete control. The prenup he later presented was even simpler because I had only one request. My husband was to look after my mother for the rest of her life. “As long as we’re married,” Benjamin negotiated, “your mom will be taken care of.” The words didn’t set off any red flags for me. Not then, anyway. A few days later, when we stood up before that crowd of well-wishers, I promised to love, honor, and obey him. 25 CONSENSUAL NONCONSENT IS NOT UNCOMMON in sexual relationships: pretending to resist and protest while prior consent has been given. Plenty of normal, loving couples play this way. For the first few years, it was all a game. But I wasn’t a good enough actress to please Benjamin. Eventually, my pain and humiliation had to be real. He had to break me. The physical abuse was sporadic, but the mental and emotional torture were constant. I was criticized and disparaged. If I displeased him, I was sent to the room. It would be hyperbole to call it a dungeon, but it was in the basement. There was no furniture, only a small rug and a rough woolen blanket. A true submissive would have reveled in the punishment, but it did not arouse me or provide me any kind of satisfaction. I used the time alone to dwell on my isolation, my alienation, my misery. And to hate myself. Since I was a girl in the suburbs, struggling at school, I had dreamed of something more. But not this. Never this. I’d sold my freedom for a life of privilege and luxury. And I had agreed to an arrangement that was destroying me. Outside of the bedroom, our marriage resembled a fifties-style relationship. My role as Benjamin’s wife was to meet his needs. I did his laundry, ironed his shirts, and kept the house clean (with the help of a weekly housekeeper). He told me what he wanted to eat for dinner, and I dutifully shopped for ingredients and prepared the meal. In the evenings, I dressed to greet him—sometimes in a pretty frock, sometimes in a schoolgirl costume, other times naked except for a black leather hood. Whatever Benjamin dictated I wore. When we went out, we had “in the world” protocols. I had to walk slightly ahead of him, to his right, never straying farther than three feet from his side. If I needed to use the restroom, I asked his permission. If he said no, I suffered. He ordered for me at restaurants—halibut and pinot grigio, a cheeseburger and a Coke, or a green salad and a glass of water. I always ate it.


it close to the light, and felt it, and smelt it, and tried every way possible to arrive at some satisfactory conclusion concerning it. I can compare it to nothing but a large door mat, ornamented at the edges with little tinkling tags something like the stained porcupine quills round an Indian moccasin. There was a hole or slit in the middle of this mat, as you see the same in South American ponchos. But could it be possible that any sober harpooneer would get into a door mat, and parade the streets of any Christian town in that sort of guise? I put it on, to try it, and it weighed me down like a hamper, being uncommonly shaggy and thick, and I thought a little damp, as though this .. <p 20 > mysterious harpooneer had been wearing it of a rainy day. I went up in it to a bit of glass stuck against the wall, and I never saw such a sight in my life. I tore myself out of it in such a hurry that I gave myself a kink in the neck. I sat down on the side of the bed, and commenced thinking about this head-peddling harpooneer, and his door mat. After thinking some time on the bed-side, I got up and took off my monkey jacket, and then stood in the middle of the room thinking. I then took off my coat, and thought a little more in my shirt sleeves. But beginning to feel very cold now, half undressed as I was, and remembering what the landlord said about the harpooneer's not coming home at all that night, it being so very late, I made no more ado, but jumped out of my pantaloons and boots, and then blowing out the light tumbled into bed, and commended myself to the care of heaven. Whether that mattress was stuffed with corn-cobs or broken crockery, there is no telling, but I rolled about a good deal, and could not sleep for a long time. At last I slid off into a light doze, and had pretty nearly made a good offing towards the land of Nod, when I heard a heavy footfall in the passage, and saw a glimmer of light come into the room from under the door. Lord save me, thinks I, that must be the harpooneer, the infernal head-peddler. But I lay perfectly still, and resolved not to say a word till spoken to. Holding a light in one hand, and that identical New Zealand head in the other, the stranger entered the room, and without looking towards the bed, placed his candle a good way off from me on the floor in one corner, and then began working away at the knotted cords of the large bag I before spoke of as being in the room. I was all eagerness to see his face, but he kept it averted for some time while employed in unlacing the bag's mouth. This accomplished, however, he turned round --when, good heavens! what a sight!


altering his voice, Drinking hot rum toddies with me every night, till he couldn't see to put on the bandages; and sending me to bed, half seas over, about three o'clock in the morning. Oh, ye stars! he sat up with me indeed, and was very severe in my diet. Oh! a great watcher, and very dietetically severe, is Dr. Bunger. (Bunger, you dog, laugh out! why don't ye? You know you're a precious jolly rascal.) But, heave ahead, boy, I'd rather be killed by you than kept alive by any other man. My captain, you must have ere this perceived, respected sir --said the imperturbable godly-looking Bunger, slightly bowing to Ahab -- is apt to be facetious at times; he spins us many clever things of that sort. But I may as well say --en passant, as the French remark --that I myself --that is to say, Jack Bunger, late of the reverend clergy --am a strict total abstinence man; I never drink-- Water! cried the captain; he never drinks it; it's a sort of fits to him; fresh water throws him into the hydrophobia; but go on --go on with the arm story. Yes, I may as well, said the surgeon, coolly. I was about observing, sir, before Captain Boomer's facetious interruption, that spite of my best and severest endeavors, the wound kept getting worse and worse; the truth was, sir, it was as ugly gaping wound as surgeon ever saw; more than two feet and several inches long. I measured it with the lead line. In short, it grew black; I knew what was threatened, and off it came. .. <p 438 > But I had no hand in shipping that ivory arm there; that thing is against all rule --pointing at it with the marlingspike -- that is the captain's work, not mine; he ordered the carpenter to make it; he had that club-hammer there put to the end, to knock some one's brains out with, I suppose, as he tried mine once. He flies into diabolical passions sometimes. Do ye see this dent, sir --removing his hat, and brushing aside his hair, and exposing a bowl-like cavity in his skull, but which bore not the slightest scarry trace, or any token of ever having been a wound -- Well, the captain there will tell you how that came here; he knows. No, I don't, said the captain, but his mother did; he was born with it. Oh, you solemn rogue, you --you Bunger! was there ever such another Bunger in the watery world? Bunger, when you die, you ought to die in pickle, you dog; you should be preserved to future ages, you rascal. What became of the White Whale? now cried Ahab, who thus far had been impatiently listening to this bye-play between the two Englishmen. Oh! cried the one-armed captain, Oh, yes! Well; after he sounded, we didn't see him again for some time; in fact, as I before hinted, I didn't then know what whale it was that had served me such a trick,


class="Apple-converted-space">

Oh, back in 2008?

Yes.

We’d talked briefly over the radio that night, I recalled.

I remember how gutted you were.

Yeah.

I could hear it in your voice.

Yeah. I was devastated.

He smiled wider. Now look at you.

37.

| fis. TURNING TWENTY-FIVE in a few days, and it felt like more than just

another birthday. Mates told me twenty-five was the Watershed Age, the

moment when many young men and women come to a fork in their personal

road. At twenty-five you take a concrete step forward...or else begin to slide

backwards. I was ready to move forward. I felt, in many ways, that I’d been

bag-flying for years.

186

https://m.facebook.com/groups/182281287 1297698 https://t.me/Afghansalarlibrary

I reminded myself that it ran in the family, that twenty-five had been a

big year for many of us. Granny, to name one. At twenty-five she’d become

the sixty-first monarch in the history of England.

So I decided to mark this milestone birthday with a trip.

Botswana again.

The whole gang was there, and in between cake and cocktails they said

how different I seemed—again. I had seemed older, harder, after my first

combat tour. But now, they said, I seemed more...grounded.

Odd, I thought. Through flight training...I’ve become more grounded?

No one gave me more praise or love than Teej and Mike. Late one night,

however, Mike sat me down for a somber heart-to-heart. At their kitchen

table he spoke at length about my relationship with Africa. The time’s come,

he said, for that relationship to change. Until then the relationship had been

all take, take, take—a fairly typical dynamic for Brits in Africa. But now I

needed to give back. For years I’d heard him and Teej and others lamenting

the crises facing this place. Climate change. Poaching. Drought. Fires. I was

the only person they knew who


tea table, Jo brought wood and set chairs, dropping, over-turning,and clattering everything she touched. Beth trotted to and fro between parlor kitchen, quiet and busy, while Amy gave directions to everyone, as she sat with her hands folded. As they gathered about the table, Mrs. March said, with a particularly happy face, "I've got a treat for you after supper." A quick, bright smile went round like a streak of sunshine. Beth clapped her hands, regardless of the biscuit she held, and Jo tossed up her napkin, crying, "A letter! A letter! Three cheers for Father!" "Yes, a nice long letter. He is well, and thinks he shall get through the cold season better than we feared. He sends all sorts of loving wishes for Christmas, and an especial message to you girls," said Mrs. March, patting her pocket as if she had got a treasure there. "Hurry and get done! Don't stop to quirk your little finger and simper over your plate, Amy," cried Jo, choking on her tea and dropping her bread, butter side down, on the carpet in her haste to get at the treat. Beth ate no more, but crept away to sit in her shadowy corner and brood over the delight to come, till the others were ready. "I think it was so splendid in Father to go as chaplain when he was too old to be drafted, and not strong enough for a soldier," said Meg warmly. "Don't I wish I could go as a drummer, a vivan -- mdash; what's its name? Or a nurse, so I could be near him and help him," exclaimed Jo, with a groan. "It must be very disagreeable to sleep in a tent, and eat all sorts of bad-tasting things, and drink out of a tin mug," sighed Amy. "When will he come home, Marmee? asked Beth, with a little quiver in her voice. "Not for many months, dear, unless he is sick. He will stay and do his work faithfully as long as he can, and we won't ask for him back a minute sooner than he can be spared. Now come and hear the letter." They all drew to the fire, Mother in the big chair with Beth at her feet, Meg and Amy perched on either arm of the chair, and Jo leaning on the back, where no one would see any sign of emotion if the letter should happen to be touching. Very few letters were written in those hard times that were not touching, especially those which fathers sent home. In this one little was said of the hardships endured, the dangers faced, or the homesickness conquered. It was a cheerful, hopeful letter, full of lively descriptions of camp life, marches, and military news, and only at the end did the writer's heart over-flow with fatherly love and longing for the little girls at home. " Give them all of my dear love and a kiss. Tell them I think of them by day, pray for them by night, and find my best comfort


you, son." Walking toward the office, Dill and I fell into step behind Atticus and Jem. Dill was encumbered by the chair, and his pace was slower. Atticus and Jem were well ahead of us, and I assumed that Atticus was giving him hell for not going home, but I was wrong. As they passed under a streetlight, Atticus reached out and massaged Jem's hair, his one gesture of affection. 16 Jem heard me. He thrust his head around the connecting door. As he came to my bed Atticus's light flashed on. We stayed where we were until it went off; we heard him turn over, and we waited until he was still again. Jem took me to his room and put me in bed beside him. "Try to go to sleep," he said, "It'll be all over after tomorrow, maybe." We had come in quietly, so as not to wake Aunty. Atticus killed the engine in the driveway and coasted to the carhouse; we went in the back door and to our rooms without a word. I was very tired, and was drifting into sleep when the memory of Atticus calmly folding his newspaper and pushing back his hat became Atticus standing in the middle of an empty waiting street, pushing up his glasses. The full meaning of the night's events hit me and I began crying. Jem was awfully nice about it: for once he didn't remind me that people nearly nine years old didn't do things like that. Everybody's appetite was delicate this morning, except Jem's: he ate his way through three eggs. Atticus watched in frank admiration; Aunt Alexandra sipped coffee and radiated waves of disapproval. Children who slipped out at night were a disgrace to the family. Atticus said he was right glad his disgraces had come along, but Aunty said, "Nonsense, Mr. Underwood was there all the time." "You know, it's a funny thing about Braxton," said Atticus. "He despises Negroes, won't have one near him." Local opinion held Mr. Underwood to be an intense, profane little man, whose father in a fey fit of humor christened Braxton Bragg, a name Mr. Underwood had done his best to live down. Atticus said naming people after Confederate generals made slow steady drinkers. Calpurnia was serving Aunt Alexandra more coffee, and she shook her head at what I thought was a pleading winning look. "You're still too little," she said. "I'll tell you when you ain't." I said it might help my stomach. "All right," she said, and got a cup from the sideboard. She poured one tablespoonful of coffee into it and filled the cup to the brim with milk. I thanked her by sticking out my tongue at it, and looked up to catch Aunty's warning frown. But she was frowning at Atticus. She waited until Calpurnia was in the kitchen, then she said, "Don't talk like that in front of them." "Talk like what in front of whom?" he asked. "Like that in front of Calpurnia. You said Braxton Underwood despises Negroes right in front


royal shrouds, to and .. <p 282 > fro I idly swayed in what seemed an enchanted air. No resolution could withstand it; in that dreamy mood losing all consciousness, at last my soul went out of my body; though my body still continued to sway as a pendulum will, long after the power which first moved it is withdrawn. Ere forgetfulness altogether came over me, I had noticed that the seamen at the main and mizen mast-heads were already drowsy. So that at last all three of us lifelessly swung from the spars, and for every swing that we made there was a nod from below from the slumbering helmsman. The waves, too, nodded their indolent crests; and across the wide trance of the sea, east nodded to west, and the sun over all. Suddenly bubbles seemed bursting beneath my closed eyes; like vices my hands grasped the shrouds; some invisible, gracious agency preserved me; with a shock I came back to life. And lo! close under our lee, not forty fathoms off, a gigantic Sperm Whale lay rolling in the water like the capsized hull of a frigate, his broad, glossy back, of an Ethiopian hue, glistening in the sun's rays like a mirror. But lazily undulating in the trough of the sea, and ever and anon tranquilly spouting his vapory jet, the whale looked like a portly burgher smoking his pipe of a warm afternoon. But that pipe, poor whale, was thy last. As if struck by some enchanter's wand, the sleepy ship and every sleeper in it all at once started into wakefulness; and more than a score of voices from all parts of the vessel, simultaneously with the three notes from aloft, shouted forth the accustomed cry, as the great fish slowly and regularly spouted the sparkling brine into the air. clear away the boats! luff! cried Ahab. And obeying his own order, he dashed the helm down before the helmsman could handle the spokes. The sudden exclamations of the crew must have alarmed the whale; and ere the boats were down, majestically turning, he swam away to the leeward, but with such a steady tranquillity, and making so few ripples as he swam, that thinking after all he might not as yet be alarmed, Ahab gave orders that not an oar should be used, and no man must speak but in whispers. So seated like Ontario Indians on the gunwales of the boats, .. <p 283 > we swiftly but silently paddled along; the calm not admitting of the noiseless sails being set. Presently, as we thus glided in chase, the monster perpendicularly flitted his tail forty feet into the air, and then sank out of sight like a tower swallowed up. There go flukes! was the cry, an announcement immediately followed by Stubb's producing his match and igniting his pipe, for now a respite was granted. After the full interval of his sounding had elapsed, the whale rose again, and being now in advance of the smoker's boat, and much nearer to it than to


in the room, and Estella said to me as she joined it, "You are to go and stand there, boy, till you are wanted." "There", being the window, I crossed to it, and stood "there," in a very uncomfortable state of mind, looking out. It opened to the ground, and looked into a most miserable corner of the neglected garden, upon a rank ruin of cabbage-stalks, and one box tree that had been clipped round long ago, like a pudding, and had a new growth at the top of it, out of shape and of a different colour, as if that part of the pudding had stuck to the saucepan and got burnt. This was my homely thought, as I contemplated the box-tree. There had been some light snow, overnight, and it lay nowhere else to my knowledge; but, it had not quite melted from the cold shadow of this bit of garden, and the wind caught it up in little eddies and threw it at the window, as if it pelted me for coming there. I divined that my coming had stopped conversation in the room, and that its other occupants were looking at me. I could see nothing of the room except the shining of the fire in the window glass, but I stiffened in all my joints with the consciousness that I was under close inspection. There were three ladies in the room and one gentleman. Before I had been standing at the window five minutes, they somehow conveyed to me that they were all toadies and humbugs, but that each of them pretended not to know that the others were toadies and humbugs: because the admission that he or she did know it, would have made him or her out to be a toady and humbug. They all had a listless and dreary air of waiting somebody's pleasure, and the most talkative of the ladies had to speak quite rigidly to repress a yawn. This lady, whose name was Camilla, very much reminded me of my sister, with the difference that she was older, and (as I found when I caught sight of her) of a blunter cast of features. Indeed, when I knew her better I began to think it was a Mercy she had any features at all, so very blank and high was the dead wall of her face. "Poor dear soul!" said this lady, with an abruptness of manner quite my sister's. "Nobody's enemy but his own!" "It would be much more commendable to be somebody else's enemy," said the gentleman; "far more natural." "Cousin Raymond," observed another lady, "we are to love our neighbour." "Sarah Pocket," returned Cousin Raymond, "if a man is not his own neighbour, who is?" Miss Pocket laughed, and Camilla laughed and said (checking a yawn), "The idea!" But I thought they seemed to think it rather a good idea too. The other lady, who had not spoken yet, said gravely and emphatically, "Very true!" "Poor soul!" Camilla presently went on (I knew they had all been looking at


got." "Mr. Finch." Mr. Tate was still planted to the floorboards. "Bob Ewell fell on his knife. I can prove it." Atticus wheeled around. His hands dug into his pockets. "Heck, can't you even try to see it my way? You've got children of your own, but I'm older than you. When mine are grown I'll be an old man if I'm still around, but right now I'm- if they don't trust me they won't trust anybody. Jem and Scout know what happened. If they hear of me saying downtown something different happened- Heck, I won't have them any more. I can't live one way in town and another way in my home." Mr. Tate rocked on his heels and said patiently, "He'd flung Jem down, he stumbled over a root under that tree and- look, I can show you." Mr. Tate reached in his side pocket and withdrew a long switchblade knife. As he did so, Dr. Reynolds came to the door. "The son- deceased's under that tree, doctor, just inside the schoolyard. Got a flashlight? Better have this one." "I can ease around and turn my car lights on," said Dr. Reynolds, but he took Mr. Tate's flashlight. "Jem's all right. He won't wake up tonight, I hope, so don't worry. That the knife that killed him, Heck?" "No sir, still in him. Looked like a kitchen knife from the handle. Ken oughta be there with the hearse by now, doctor, 'night." Mr. Tate flicked open the knife. "It was like this," he said. He held the knife and pretended to stumble; as he leaned forward his left arm went down in front of him. "See there? Stabbed himself through that soft stuff between his ribs. His whole weight drove it in." Mr. Tate closed the knife and jammed it back in his pocket. "Scout is eight years old," he said. "She was too scared to know exactly what went on." "You'd be surprised," Atticus said grimly. "I'm not sayin' she made it up, I'm sayin' she was too scared to know exactly what happened. It was mighty dark out there, black as ink. 'd take somebody mighty used to the dark to make a competent witness..." "I won't have it," Atticus said softly. "God damn it, I'm not thinking of Jem!" Mr. Tate's boot hit the floorboards so hard the lights in Miss Maudie's bedroom went on. Miss Stephanie Crawford's lights went on. Atticus and Mr. Tate looked across the street, then at each other. They waited. When Mr. Tate spoke again his voice was barely audible. "Mr. Finch, I hate to fight you when you're like this. You've been under a strain tonight no man should ever have to go through. Why you ain't in the bed from it I don't know, but I do know that for once you haven't been able to put two and two together, and we've got to settle this tonight because tomorrow'll be too late. Bob Ewell's got a kitchen knife in his craw." Mr. Tate added that Atticus wasn't going to


say it. I didn't mean to offend the memory of your mother. He had spoken himself into boldness. Stephen, shielding the gaping wounds which the words had left in his heart, said very coldly: --I am not thinking of the offence to my mother. --Of what then? Buck Mulligan asked. --Of the offence to me, Stephen answered. Buck Mulligan swung round on his heel. --O, an impossible person! he exclaimed. He walked off quickly round the parapet. Stephen stood at his post, gazing over the calm sea towards the headland. Sea and headland now grew dim. Pulses were beating in his eyes, veiling their sight, and he felt the fever of his cheeks. A voice within the tower called loudly: --Are you up there, Mulligan? --I'm coming, Buck Mulligan answered. He turned towards Stephen and said: --Look at the sea. What does it care about offences? Chuck Loyola, Kinch, and come on down. The Sassenach wants his morning rashers. His head halted again for a moment at the top of the staircase, level with the roof: --Don't mope over it all day, he said. I'm inconsequent. Give up the moody brooding. His head vanished but the drone of his descending voice boomed out of the stairhead: AND NO MORE TURN ASIDE AND BROOD UPON LOVE'S BITTER MYSTERY FOR FERGUS RULES THE BRAZEN CARS. Woodshadows floated silently by through the morning peace from the stairhead seaward where he gazed. Inshore and farther out the mirror of water whitened, spurned by lightshod hurrying feet. White breast of the dim sea. The twining stresses, two by two. A hand plucking the harpstrings, merging their twining chords. Wavewhite wedded words shimmering on the dim tide. A cloud began to cover the sun slowly, wholly, shadowing the bay in deeper green. It lay beneath him, a bowl of bitter waters. Fergus' song: I sang it alone in the house, holding down the long dark chords. Her door was open: she wanted to hear my music. Silent with awe and pity I went to her bedside. She was crying in her wretched bed. For those words, Stephen: love's bitter mystery. Where now? Her secrets: old featherfans, tasselled dancecards, powdered with musk, a gaud of amber beads in her locked drawer. A birdcage hung in the sunny window of her house when she was a girl. She heard old Royce sing in the pantomime of TURKO THE TERRIBLE and laughed with others when he sang: I AM THE BOY THAT CAN ENJOY INVISIBILITY. Phantasmal mirth, folded away: muskperfumed. AND NO MORE TURN ASIDE AND BROOD. Folded away in the memory of nature with her toys. Memories beset his brooding brain. Her glass of water from the kitchen tap when she had approached the sacrament. A cored apple, filled with brown sugar, roasting for her at the hob on a dark autumn evening. Her shapely fingernails reddened by the blood of squashed lice from the children's shirts. In a dream, silently, she had come to him, her wasted body within its loose graveclothes giving off an odour of wax and


--I'll do that, Mr Bloom said, moving to get off. That'll be all right. --Right, M'Coy said brightly. Thanks, old man. I'd go if I possibly could. Well, tolloll. Just C. P. M'Coy will do. --That will be done, Mr Bloom answered firmly. Didn't catch me napping that wheeze. The quick touch. Soft mark. I'd like my job. Valise I have a particular fancy for. Leather. Capped corners, rivetted edges, double action lever lock. Bob Cowley lent him his for the Wicklow regatta concert last year and never heard tidings of it from that good day to this. Mr Bloom, strolling towards Brunswick street, smiled. My missus has just got an. Reedy freckled soprano. Cheeseparing nose. Nice enough in its way: for a little ballad. No guts in it. You and me, don't you know: in the same boat. Softsoaping. Give you the needle that would. Can't he hear the difference? Think he's that way inclined a bit. Against my grain somehow. Thought that Belfast would fetch him. I hope that smallpox up there doesn't get worse. Suppose she wouldn't let herself be vaccinated again. Your wife and my wife. Wonder is he pimping after me? Mr Bloom stood at the corner, his eyes wandering over the multicoloured hoardings. Cantrell and Cochrane's Ginger Ale (Aromatic). Clery's Summer Sale. No, he's going on straight. Hello. LEAH tonight. Mrs Bandmann Palmer. Like to see her again in that. HAMLET she played last night. Male impersonator. Perhaps he was a woman. Why Ophelia committed suicide. Poor papa! How he used to talk of Kate Bateman in that. Outside the Adelphi in London waited all the afternoon to get in. Year before I was born that was: sixtyfive. And Ristori in Vienna. What is this the right name is? By Mosenthal it is. Rachel, is it? No. The scene he was always talking about where the old blind Abraham recognises the voice and puts his fingers on his face. Nathan's voice! His son's voice! I hear the voice of Nathan who left his father to die of grief and misery in my arms, who left the house of his father and left the God of his father. Every word is so deep, Leopold. Poor papa! Poor man! I'm glad I didn't go into the room to look at his face. That day! O, dear! O, dear! Ffoo! Well, perhaps it was best for him. Mr Bloom went round the corner and passed the drooping nags of the hazard. No use thinking of it any more. Nosebag time. Wish I hadn't met that M'Coy fellow. He came nearer and heard a crunching of gilded oats, the gently champing teeth. Their full buck eyes regarded him as he went by, amid the sweet oaten reek of horsepiss. Their Eldorado. Poor jugginses! Damn all they know or care about anything with their long noses stuck in nosebags. Too full for words. Still they get their feed all right and their doss. Gelded too: a stump of black guttapercha wagging limp between their haunches. Might be happy all the same


was a row immediately. Boys stood up and shouted and Ralph shouted back. "Because if you want a fire to cook fish or crab, you can jolly well go up the mountain. That way we'll be certain." Hands were reaching for the conch in the light of the setting sun. He held on and leapt on the trunk. "All this I meant to say. Now I've said it. You voted me for chief. Now you do what I say." They quieted, slowly, and at last were seated again. Ralph dropped down and spoke in his ordinary voice. "So remember. The rocks for a lavatory. Keep the fire going and smoke showing as a signal. Don't take fire from the mountain. Take your food up there." Jack stood up, scowling in the gloom, and held out his hands. "I haven't finished yet." "But you've talked and talked!" "I've got the conch." Jack sat down, grumbling. "Then the last thing. This is what people can talk about." He waited till the platform was very still. "Things are breaking up. I don't understand why. We began well; we were happy. And then--" He moved the conch gently, looking beyond them at nothing, remembering the beastie, the snake, the fire, the talk of fear. "Then people started getting frightened." A murmur, almost a moan, rose and passed away. Jack had stopped whittling. Ralph went on, abruptly. "But that's littluns' talk. We'll get that straight. So the last part, the bit we can all talk about, is kind of deciding on the fear." The hair was creeping into his eyes again. "We've got to talk about this fear and decide there's nothing in it. I'm frightened myself, sometimes; only that's nonsense! Like bogies. Then, when we've decided, we can start again and be careful about things like the fire." A picture of three boys walking along the bright beach flitted through his mind. "And be happy." Ceremonially, Ralph laid the conch on the trunk beside him as a sign that the speech was over. What sunlight reached them was level. Jack stood up and took the conch. "So this is a meeting to find out what's what. I'll tell you what's what. You littluns started all this, with the fear talk. Beasts! Where from? Of course we're frightened sometimes but we put up with being frightened. Only Ralph says you scream in the night. What does that mean but nightmares? Anyway, you don't hunt or build or help--you're a lot of cry-babies and sissies. That's what. And as for the fear--you'll have to put up with that like the rest of us." Ralph looked at Jack open-mouthed, but Jack took no notice. "The thing is--fear can't hurt you any more than a dream. There aren't any beasts to be afraid of on this island." He looked along the row of whispering littluns. "Serve you right if something did get you, you useless lot of cry-babies! But there is no animal--" Ralph interrupted him testily. "What is all this? Who said anything about an animal?" "You did, the


If she manages to best you, you deserve to die, Hanim said. I frowned, resisting the urge to check the circumference of my neck. The stairs flattened into a small landing. A light flickered to life, revealing Vaida holding a candle. I could only see a few feet in either direction. The darkness at the edges roiled. Alive. Hungry. My skin crawled. I felt like an intruder, violating the sanctity of a space only meant to be occupied by the woman in front of me. “This hideaway belonged to Baira. Every Sultana after her inherits this chamber, and the darkness shapes itself to the will of its new owner. If you think it’s daunting now, you should have seen it when my mother commanded it.” She raised the candle higher, and my attention fixed on her ring. A ring that essentially doubled as a key to the Sultana’s most private hideaway. The seed of an idea took root in the back of my mind. “Why am I here?” The lights flickered over her smiling mouth. Behind her head, strips of parchment were stuck to the wall, dozens and dozens of them, names scrawled across each one with black ink. “I need a favor from you, Sylvia.” She spoke my name with a familiarity reserved for lifetime friendships. “You have to lose the Alcalah.” I paused. She lured me into a dungeon teeming with malice to ask if I would forfeit the Alcalah? I picked through possible replies, searching for the most respectful version of “I would rather choke on a muddy sandal.” “Can you read?” Vaida asked abruptly. She held the candle toward the wall, sending shadows over the pinned names. I was fluent in every kingdom’s native language, even the ones rarely used anymore. A skill Arin had discovered by tricking me into reading the scroll on his table. Our languages blended into uniformity a century ago, and only a few villages spoke anything else. “No.” A village orphan would have traded literacy for labor. She glanced over her shoulder, assessing me for dishonesty. Apparently, it was only Arin whom my stoicism could not fool, because she turned back without arguing. “These are names. Members of Sultana Bisai’s council. Palace staff. Everyone who played a role in murdering my mother is on this wall.” Sultana Vaida moved to the left, illuminating an entirely new set of names. “These are suspected Nizahl spies in Lukub. There are many I cannot locate. Spies sent under Supreme Munqual’s reign have been in Lukub for decades. Supreme Rawain instituted a practice early in his power where Nizahl orphans were trained and sent into foreign kingdoms. They could grow older there, become part of the community. Supreme Rawain planted children in our kingdoms to spy on us, left those insidious seeds to take root and drain our resources.” The light shifted for an instant, outlining rows and rows of different names before Vaida spun around. “Do you think I killed my mother?” She sounded vaguely entertained, like a child asking their parent to guess a number.


little distressed--did look a little foolish at first: but having once owned that she had been presumptuous and silly, and self-deceived, before, her pain and confusion seemed to die away with the words, and leave her without a care for the past, and with the fullest exultation in the present and future; for, as to her friend's approbation, Emma had instantly removed every fear of that nature, by meeting her with the most unqualified congratulations.-- Harriet was most happy to give every particular of the evening at Astley's, and the dinner the next day; she could dwell on it all with the utmost delight. But what did such particulars explain?-- The fact was, as Emma could now acknowledge, that Harriet had always liked Robert Martin; and that his continuing to love her had been irresistible.--Beyond this, it must ever be unintelligible to Emma. The event, however, was most joyful; and every day was giving her fresh reason for thinking so.--Harriet's parentage became known. She proved to be the daughter of a tradesman, rich enough to afford her the comfortable maintenance which had ever been hers, and decent enough to have always wished for concealment.--Such was the blood of gentility which Emma had formerly been so ready to vouch for!-- It was likely to be as untainted, perhaps, as the blood of many a gentleman: but what a connexion had she been preparing for Mr. Knightley--or for the Churchills--or even for Mr. Elton!-- The stain of illegitimacy, unbleached by nobility or wealth, would have been a stain indeed. No objection was raised on the father's side; the young man was treated liberally; it was all as it should be: and as Emma became acquainted with Robert Martin, who was now introduced at Hartfield, she fully acknowledged in him all the appearance of sense and worth which could bid fairest for her little friend. She had no doubt of Harriet's happiness with any good-tempered man; but with him, and in the home he offered, there would be the hope of more, of security, stability, and improvement. She would be placed in the midst of those who loved her, and who had better sense than herself; retired enough for safety, and occupied enough for cheerfulness. She would be never led into temptation, nor left for it to find her out. She would be respectable and happy; and Emma admitted her to be the luckiest creature in the world, to have created so steady and persevering an affection in such a man;--or, if not quite the luckiest, to yield only to herself. Harriet, necessarily drawn away by her engagements with the Martins, was less and less at Hartfield; which was not to be regretted.-- The intimacy between her and Emma must sink; their friendship must change into a calmer sort of goodwill; and, fortunately, what ought to be, and must be, seemed already beginning, and in the most gradual, natural manner. Before the end of September, Emma attended Harriet to church, and saw her hand bestowed on Robert Martin with so complete a satisfaction, as no