The Unnameables (16 page)

A hand grasped a bar in the cell door. "Is that his language?" Earnest asked. "I never heard him talk like that."

"He's calming himself," Medford said. "Hullo, Earnest. Did you see that crowd?"

"Aye. I saw it." Earnest pressed his cheek against the bars as if he could bend them to get his head into the
cell. "Hullo-o-o!" he called to the Goatman, in a voice the Fishers probably could hear. "How fare ye?"

The Goatman blinked up at him. "How fa-a-are...?"

"Just say, 'Well. I fare well,'" Medford said.

The Goatman hauled himself up onto his hooves and bowed. "I fa-a-are well."

Earnest turned to Medford. "How fare ye?" he asked.

"I'm well enough now. I thank thee, Earnest."

Silence fell. Earnest stood there holding on to the bars, staring in at the Goatman's horns as if seeing them for the first time. "Prudy is upset," he said at last.

"So I should hope," Medford said.

"She told Pa about your carvings last night, and he told her not to say anything. She went to see Deemer Learned this morning. She didn't tell Pa she was going."

Twig let Prudy become a Learned, and then he wanted her to keep an Unnameable secret?
How strange,
Medford thought.

"I don't think she slept," Earnest said. "I heard her pacing her room at midnight."

"What did Twig say to her?"

"Who's Twi-i-ig? Who's Pa-a-a?"

"They're both Prudy's father," Medford said.

"Two na-a-ames? He has
two
na-a-ames?"

"Twig is his name," Medford said. "Pa is what ... what someone calls his father."

"I see," the Goatman said, brow furrowed.

"What did Twig tell Prudy?" Medford asked Earnest again.

"She wouldn't say. They were closeted for more than an hour. He got loud once, said, 'Life is not so simple, Prudy.'"

"Did she say what Master Learned told her?"

"Nay, just that he was angry. He scared her, his eyes were so ... bright, she said, and he made her feel cold."

Earnest stopped to ponder, then continued: "That big wind came just as she arrived at his house, and it knocked her over. Shingles everywhere, and she heard a tree fall. Councilor Learned came out and she told him about the Goatman. She hadn't meant to."

"So she believes after all," Medford said. "About the Goatman calling the wind."

"Aye, guess she does now. And she said Master Learned went all white and had to sit down. 'Horned man,' he kept saying. 'Horned man.' She stayed with him awhile for fear he might fall into a fit. But when she left him he was talking of the Constables."

Medford stared at his feet. He'd known Prudy had told on him, but hearing it confirmed was unexpectedly depressing.

Earnest dragged the
TOWN RECORDS
crate next to the door and sat down on it. "Wisht you weren't in there, Medford. Nothing in the Archives prepared me for this—I don't remember anything about carving small beasts." He contemplated the squirrel bowl as if he could
take it apart. "Course, Master Learned was careful what he let me read."

"Wha-a-at's archives?"

"Books," Earnest said. "There's a record of every Council meeting. And there are shelves and shelves of journals, starting with the Originals but going right through the centuries. Some were written by people who just died a little while ago."

"What di-i-id they write about?"

"Oh, the weather, the tides. Same as my pa does now. What they did that day. 'Tisn't that interesting." He contemplated the door frame, seeking inspiration. "Essence got to read things I didn't. I heard her laughing once. Master Learned didn't like it."

Earnest poked at the plaster in the door frame, wearing the stony look he got when he or anyone else mentioned Essence. A chunk of plaster fell to the floor.

"Why do you think she was banished?" Medford asked quietly. He'd never dared discuss this with Earnest.

Earnest pulled his finger away and watched a second chunk of plaster hit the floor. "No one would tell me anything," he said, as if the plaster were all that mattered. "Pa said he tried to find out but ... Well, I guess he gave up."

He brushed his finger against his trouser leg to get the plaster dust off. "Anyways, I always figured it was because of something she saw in the Archives."

'Tis a Parent's duty to foster Healthy Growth in a child, providing Example and Instruction in How to Benefit Society.

—A Frugall Compendium of Home Arts and Farme Chores by Capability C. Craft (1680), as Amended and Annotated by the Island Council of Names (1718–1809)

M
EDFORD FELT
his brain was expanding too fast. He and Prudy had been so busy wondering what Essence had done, it had never occurred to them that the problem might have been what she knew.

What could Essence have seen that was serious enough to banish her? How could anything surprise a Learned? Hadn't they been steeped in the Archives from childhood?

Could there be other journals like Cordelia Weaver's?

"What do you think she read up there, Earnest?"

Earnest managed to pluck out a chunk of plaster, which he examined with interest. "Not enough horsehair," he said, holding it out to Medford. "See how it—"

"Earnest."

"Oh, I don't know what she read, Medford. More than sunsets and tides, anyways. Somebody wrote something her pa doesn't want us to know, that's all."

"Good notion, son," said a voice down the hall. "Mind you keep it to yourself."

"Aye, Pa," Earnest said. "Same as always." He held out the chunk of plaster as Twig sauntered into view, hands in the pockets of his knee breeches. "See this?"

Twig took the chunk and examined it at nose-length. "Not enough horsehair," he said. He crumbled the plaster in his fingers, then noticed the dust and plaster bits on the floor around the crate Earnest was sitting on. "Planning a jailbreak?" he asked his son. "Hullo in there, Medford. How fare ye?"

"Well enough, Twig, thanks. What's a jailbreak?"

"Did I say
jailbreak
?" Twig winced. "I meant ... Oh, the Book, Medford, 'tis just a Mainland word I heard on the radio one time. Fellow got away from a prison, that's all. Kind of a Useless word for us ... well, Useless in normal times."

He shook the door to see if it really was locked. It was. His head twitched as if he were bothered by an insect. Then he caught sight of the Goatman huddled in the corner and stood there with his hand still wrapped around the bar, lost for words.

The Goatman grabbed his staff and pulled himself
to his hooves, got his balance, and bowed. "I am a goat-ma-a-an...," he began.

Twig held up his hand to stop him. "I know what thou art. How ... how fare ye?"

"I fa-a-are well," the Goatman said, beaming.

"Pa," Earnest said, "why don't you ever let me say what I think about Essence?"

Twig leaned his shoulder against the door frame, got out his pocketknife, and became interested in working a wood splinter out of his thumb. He gave no sign that he'd heard Earnest, but Medford knew he had.

In the silence, dockside chatter floated through the cell windows. "Tie 'er up good 'n' tight," Medford heard. "Case we get another of them big blows."

Twig worked the splinter out and flicked it away. He closed up his knife and stowed it in his pocket.

"Pa," Earnest said.

Medford sat down on the bench next to the squirrel bowl. The Goatman lowered himself back down to the floor.

"I heard you, son," Twig said. "And I don't have an answer for you."

"But—"

"I keep telling you, boy—I don't know what happened to Essence. Deemer said he was following the Book and that's all he'll say. If a person was to have a hunch he'd keep it to himself for the time being, especially around anybody named Learned."

Anybody like Prudy,
Medford thought.

"That's what you always say," Earnest said. "You always say to keep things to myself. And 'tis always for the time being."

Twig grabbed a bar in the door and leaned back, straightening his arm to let the bar take his weight. Swinging a little, he regarded his son. "No sense starting a hurly-burly unless thou hast an end in view, boy. Bide thy time now, that's all I can tell thee."

He let go of the bar and did a controlled totter backward to get his balance. Then he bent over to peer at the large square lock on the door. "Mmm. Must be one of them big iron keys in the Constables' room. Surprised it hasn't rusted up."

He looked his son in the eye. "We'll know soon enough what Essence saw, boy. Someone's certain to find out sooner or later. Need anything, Medford? Food? Drink?"

"The Constables will bring something, thankee, Twig." Medford felt let down—he'd been hoping Twig would say something about Prudy and how she'd betrayed him.

Maybe Twig didn't know she had.

Twig gave his son's shoulder a friendly slap and nodded to the Goatman. "Pleased to make your acquaintance," he said. "Fare well."

"I fa-a-are well," the Goatman said.

Earnest watched his father walk down the hallway. They heard Twig mount the stairs. "So," Earnest said, "we need a jailbreak."

"What?"

"You heard him. A jailbreak."

"He didn't mean—"

"Aye, that's exactly what he meant. You know Pa. He doesn't tell you what to do—wisht he would sometimes, but that's Pa. He just says a few things and walks away."

"But what did he say? I didn't hear him say anything."

"He said people break out of jail sometimes and where the key is. And that he thinks Essence saw something upstairs that made Deemer send her away. And he said someone—that's us—will find out what it was."

"Your father would never send us to do that. If he wanted it done, he'd do it."

Earnest just looked at Medford, a half smile on his face.

"Anyways," Medford said, feeling desperate, "how will that help me?"

"Don't know. Don't think Pa knows. Guess we'll find out."

"Earnest." Medford got up and grabbed two bars in the door, thrusting his nose between them. "You want to steal the key, let us out, and go up to the Archives? When is all this going to happen?"

"Tonight. Got to—Town Meeting tomorrow."

"Earnest. How are we going to get the key? The Constables will be right there."

Earnest pondered. Then he got up and flipped open the lock on the door to Harbor Lane. He worked the door back and forth until it stopped creaking. "I'll be back," he said. He stepped outside.

"Earnest, wait." Medford thrust his hand through the bars in a hapless attempt to stop his friend. Earnest ignored him and pulled the door shut.

He was gone. To do ... who knew what?

Medford sat down, hugged the squirrel bowl to his chest. It was good to have his hands on something familiar, something that remembered his workshop and the sparkling sea out the window.

"You all ri-i-ight, Fretting Boy?"

"This is Uselessness," Medford said. "This is insanity."

"I don't understa-a-and about the Archives yet. But your friends are sma-a-art."

"There are so many things that can go wrong." Med-ford set the bowl down so he could count on his fingers. "One, we have to get the key out from under the Constables' noses. Two, everything has to happen in the dark and there's no moon tonight. So three, we need a lamp. Four, Deemer lives behind Town Hall and all he has to do is look out his window and he'll see that there's a light in the Archives. Five..."

"What's a la-a-amp?"

Oh, the Book.
"You saw lamps at my house. At night, after supper, I lighted them when we sat by the stove to
talk. You said they smelled funny."
Look who's talking,
Medford had thought at the time.

"Oh, those things. Very pretty, but I don't under-sta-a-and why you need them. All they do is smell bad and make it bla-a-ack outside."

"They don't make it black outside. It gets black all by itself and you light them so you can..."
Wait a minute.
"What do your people use to light up the dark?"

"What's da-a-ark?"

"Dark. When the sun goes down. The world gets ... black."

"No, it doesn't." The Goatman was patient, instructing a child. "Well, it does in the ci-i-ity and at your house because you light ... la-a-amps, and they make your eyes squint. I've seen it at home when we have a fi-i-ire. It looks black near the walls of the shelter when the fire's bla-a-az-ing, but not when it burns down."

"You can see in the dark," Medford said. "Like a night creature."

"I can see at night. Not in the da-a-ark, but it only gets da-a-ark when you light—"

"You can see at night." Medford chewed his lower lip, thinking. "This helps."

"You will ha-a-ave to show me how."

"We cannot see at night. That's why we light lamps. The night is ... black for us without them."

"That's just a ta-a-ale."

"Nay, 'tis true. If there be no moon to guide us, we need a light."

"Ah," the Goatman said. "I wi-i-ill be the moon."

"Aye," Medford said, feeling ceremonial. "Thou wilt be the moon."

For some reason, this minor bit of good news lightened Medford's heart. There was still the problem of how to get the key, plus the fact that they didn't know what they were looking for and had only one night to find it.

But he'd leave all that to the stars. Or to Earnest.

The sun was dropping toward the sea when the Constables returned. The covered basket Ward was carrying smelled so enticing that Medford, who had thought he'd never enjoy anything ever again, found himself looking forward to whatever was in it.

Bailey unlocked the cell door. As Twig had guessed, the key was made of iron and was huge, about six inches long. The lock was squeaky. The cell door screeched halfway open.

Supper proved to be one of Myrtle Cook's Beef Creature pies, with rolls by her husband, Clayton Baker, plus late green beans and a flask of root beer. The Constables brought in blankets and an oil lamp.

The Goatman saw the lamp and smirked at Med-ford.

"Ye can bed down on the floor," Bailey said, setting the
lamp on a bench. "Floors clean, I think." He bent over and scrutinized it. "Aye. 'Tis fine."