The Unnameables (17 page)

He shut the windows. "I brought extra blankets, because there ain't much heat. We got a stove down in our room and we'll stoke it up and leave the door open, but I guess nobody ever thought about someone sleeping in the cell in cold weather."

Or didn't care if the prisoners were cold,
Medford thought.

"Thankee, Bailey," he said. "We'll be comfortable, I'm sure. My thanks, Ward." He tried not to mind when Bailey locked the cell door again.

Comfortable
wasn't quite the word for their situation. But they made nests for themselves out of the blankets and they ate every scrap of the food. The Goatman ate the napkins. Medford caught himself saving some of the pie for the dog, then remembered that she wasn't around. So he ate it.

"Don't worry about her," the Goatman told Medford. "She wa-a-as on her own when I met her. She'll be fi-i-ine."

"I hope she wasn't hurt," Medford said. "And she isn't afraid of us now."

"She's smarter than tha-a-at," the Goatman said.

"I think I saw her running through the woods as we came to Town."

"I sa-a-aw her, too."

"You were asleep."

"I was thinking. And trying to hit those me-e-en with my horns."

"What were you thinking about?"

"How to escape. If I wa-a-anted to."

"You didn't even try."

"I wanted to see what would ha-a-appen. I was sorry when they put me in here but then it was too la-a-ate."

"This will make quite a tale."

"Bweh-eh-eh. My cousin never got put in ... what is this ca-a-alled?"

"Jail."

"Jail. My cousin ne-e-ever was in jail."

Medford watched the Goatman pummel his blankets into a shape he liked. The question was out of his mouth before his brain knew anything about it. "What is it like, calling the wind?"

"How would I know?" the Goatman said. "I don't do it ri-i-ight."

"You call it and it comes. What is that like?"

The Goatman closed his eyes. "I feel it—the ca-a-all-ing—and it gets strong and it fetches the wind so fast I can't tell it what to do."

"But what does it feel like, this ... calling?"

"A whoosh. A zoom," the Goatman said. "A whiz. A fweeee."

"You don't have a word for it?"

"You mean a na-a-ame?"

"A word doesn't have to be a name. You have words for
shelter
and
dog
and..." It occurred to Medford that he didn't have a word for that buzz or hum he felt when he saw shapes in the wood. He wouldn't think about that. "So you need to slow it down and ... and command it, this ... this whoosh."

"Te-e-ell me something I don't know," the Goatman said, giving the blankets another punch.

"'Tis a matter of practice and discipline, I'll be bound. Work on it a little each day..." He sounded like New Prudy. "And ... and take deep breaths."

"
Aaahhhh-hoooo,
" the Goatman said.

"Maybe not right now," Medford said.

The windows darkened. The Constables came back for the basket and said their good nights. Medford could hear them rustling and thumping at the other end of the hall. Then all was silent. Medford turned the lamp down low so the Goatman's eyes would have an easier time adjusting to the dark when Earnest came back.
If
Earnest came back.

Medford had almost dozed off when he heard a creak out in the hallway. Then a whisper, saying something he couldn't catch. Something white scuttled past the cell, having slipped through the door from the harbor. It headed toward the Constables' room.

Medford caught a whiff of something. Something indescribably terrible, more terrible than anything he'd ever smelled before. Something dead, perhaps.

Something dead quite a long time. Dead in chunks. With a hint of seaweed.

Medford breathed through his mouth, afraid he'd gag. The ramp door was open a crack—he could hear water lapping against the docks outside, feel cold air seeping into the cell.

Then down the hallway came the sound of two large Constables surprised by a smell and retching as one. "
Gargh,
" Medford heard. "
Ohgg,
Bailey, what..."

"There, Ward! See, it's white, there ... no, there ... Oh, the Book, it's up the stairs."

Heavy feet pounded on the stairs. Four paws' worth of toenails skittered down the hallway overhead. He ran to the cell door. The harbor door banged open and Earnest pelted down the hall. He was back in an instant, hands full of keys.

"That one," Medford said, pointing.

Earnest unlocked the door, not worrying about the creak from the lock. Then he dashed back down the hallway to return the keys. Judging by the diminishing noises overhead, Medford thought the dog had led the Constables up another flight to the auditorium.

Freed from its latch, the cell door swung open. Med-ford stepped into the hall, uncertain what to do. "Earnest," he hissed.

From behind, someone shoved a strip of leather into his hand. "Lock the harbor door after us and tie the cell door shut," Prudy whispered.

Earnest was back, panting. Brother and sister hustled out the door. "Prudy," Medford whispered. "The Goatman can see in the dark. That'll help, won't—"

"Sssshhh. We'll be back."

And Prudy and Earnest were gone.

Funny to think that, thanks to the Learneds and their Archives, future generations may read this journal. Future generations of Learneds, I suppose. What's the Use of anybody else reading about dead people?

—Journal of Honey Cook, 1905

T
HE CONSTABLES
never did catch the dog. They had to content themselves with opening Town Hall's front door and driving her outside, shutting the door behind her with a bang.

In the jail cell, Medford and the Goatman huddled under their blankets. When Bailey came down the hall to check on them, Medford snored a couple of times. Bailey pulled at the harbor door, said, "Hunh," and tested the door into the cell. Everything held. The leather thong was invisible in the dim light, tucked under the latch in the cell door.

"Don't know how that Herding Creature got in here," Medford heard Bailey say, back down the hall. "Door's
locked. Cell's locked. Medford didn't even wake up. Everything all right in here?"

'"Cept for the stink."

"Open the window a minute. Then I'm going to sleep. Tomorrow's a big day."

Medford lay there for what seemed like an hour while the Constables creaked around. Finally he heard the thumps and squeaks of two large men snuggling down on wooden cots that weren't quite strong enough. The Constables began to snore like summer thunder.

Medford turned the lamp off completely.

The Goatman might have been asleep, too. He didn't exactly snore, but every breath had a distinct life cycle. The rhythm of his breathing, combined with the snores from down the hall, began to get on Medford's nerves as the night darkened.

He wanted to doze off but his mind kept gnawing on one thought:
Prudy.
At daybreak she was telling Deemer Learned about Medford's carvings. At midday she was accompanying Medford to Town with two straight braids down her back. At nightfall she was helping him escape from jail.

Summoning the wind would be easier than figuring this out.

Was Prudy his friend again? Maybe. Would she remain his friend? Maybe not. He couldn't trust her; he had to keep reminding himself of that. She was a Learned. So
why had Earnest gotten her involved? And why had she agreed to join them?

Maybe she just wanted to know what they were up to so she could tell Deemer.

Medford was overcome by longing for Old Prudy chewing on a braid, collecting shells. For simpler days, when he knew who hated him and thought he knew who didn't.

But he was feeling something else, he realized, something almost like hope. He didn't know what was in the Archives or how it would help him, but at least he wasn't just sitting there waiting for his boat to Mainland.

What in all the Names does Prudy think she's doing?

The fretting and puzzling finally exhausted him. He was almost asleep when he didn't quite hear—just sensed, in a jangled-nerve kind of way—that someone was outside one of the cell windows. A fingernail tapped against the glass.

Medford eased to the window, freezing every time a floorboard creaked, listening for any change in snoring volume. The only light was from the stars, faint and gray.

He opened the window an inch. Earnest's whisper floated in, barely audible. "Prudy says let us in the front door."

"Wha-a-at...," the Goatman said.

"Hissshhh," Medford said. He eased his way to the cell door, stumbling over blankets, felt for the leather knot,
and picked at it, wishing he hadn't pulled it so tight. The hand he'd used to punch Deemer was stiff, although it no longer ached.

He heard a light
clip, creak, clip.

"Let me-e-e," the Goatman whispered.

Undoing the knot probably was easier if you could see it and had long yellow nails. Sure enough, the leather strip fell to the ground and the cell door swung inward. Med-ford stopped it with his hand before it could squeak. "Give me your sash," he breathed.

He bunched up their blankets as best he could, hoping they'd look like sleeping bodies if one of the Constables came by to check. He arranged the Goatman's sash to look as if it had flopped out from under the covers.

He eased back to the Goatman. "Go slow," he whispered. "Watch for squeaky floorboards. I'll hang on to you."

He grabbed a handful of robe. The cloth felt thick and stiff, yet oddly soft on the surface. When they were in the hallway, Medford tied the door closed with the leather strip. They inched down the hall past the piles of Trade goods. Medford leaned by mistake into a stack of baskets, felt it sway. He steadied the pile and breathed again.

When they neared the Constables' room, the Goatman slowed their pace even more. Not that they needed to worry. The Constables snored together, not missing a beat:
SNO-O-ORE-snork SNO-O-ORE-snork SNO-O-
ORE-snork.
On the stairs Medford and the Goatman matched their gait to the snores, taking a step when they were louder, waiting through the softer noise, moving when the noise got loud again.

Medford flipped the front door lock on a loud snore so Prudy and Earnest could slip in. "The Goatman leads," Medford whispered. "We hang on to one another in a line."

"Medford," Prudy whispered.

"Shhh," Medford said, and turned away. Let her face an unfriendly back for a change. He took a handful of purple robe, felt Prudy grab the back of his sweater. The hooved leading the blind, they inched toward the staircase to the second floor.

It was a slow, tortured climb up that flight of stairs, down the hallway outside the auditorium, up another flight. Finally they were on the third floor, the Archives door to their right at the head of the stairs. They huddled there, staring at what they could see of the doorknob, a Mainland metal import gleaming dully in the starlight from the stairwell window.

"Is it locked?" Medford whispered.

"Aye," Prudy said. "But there's a key." She swished her hand down the doorjamb. "Oh, the Book. There's a nail to hang the key on, but 'tis empty." She rattled the doorknob but it wouldn't budge.

"I'll have to take it apart," Earnest whispered.

"In the dark?" Medford asked.

"Aye." Earnest sounded as if he'd been waiting all day just for this chance.

"Oh, the Book," Prudy said again. But they didn't have much choice. Medford, Prudy, and the Goatman stood there trying not to creak, hardly breathing. They heard Earnest fumbling around in his pocket, the
tick-tick-chink
of a miniature screwdriver on metal, the
gnarl-gnarl-gnarl
of screws being unscrewed. Earnest kept handing things to Medford and Prudy—screws, faceplates, lock innards—and they tried to place all of them in a neat pile in the corner. Who knew, maybe they'd want to put the lock back together.

At last it was all over. Earnest pushed the door open with just a tiny squeak of the hinges and they stepped inside the Archives. There were holes in the door where the lock used to be.

Medford was conscious first of a deadness in the air. His hearing seemed to have dulled, as if something were soaking up the sound. He knew, suddenly, that he was in the presence of paper, a great deal of paper. More paper than he'd ever experienced in his life. He smelled dust, dry mold, time. Faint, gray light came from three windows, one just inside the door and two at the far end of the room.

And then he had a terrible thought, a thought so startling that he almost cried out.
The Goatman can see in the dark, aye. But can he read?
How could he have been so stupid? Why hadn't he thought about this? What, oh what, would New Prudy say?

But maybe she'd known this would happen. Maybe she had her hand over her mouth even then, stifling her laughter at Medford's incompetence.
Show not thy Mirth.

The starlight ... wobbled or something. A human shape showed briefly against the gray rectangle of window nearest him. Another shape appeared in one of the windows at the other end of the room. He couldn't make out what the shapes were doing. The rectangles disappeared. A dark human shape appeared at the second window on the far wall. That rectangle vanished, too.

Medford was giddy, floating in the dark. He concentrated on the floor under his feet, not sure he could keep his balance with nothing to look at. He held his hand up before his nose and could see no glimmer of flesh.

A match snapped. Earnest appeared, golden and flickering. He was lighting a large oil lamp.

By lamplight Medford saw that the room's three windows had heavy brown blankets covering them.

"No sense trying to read in the dark," Prudy said briskly, her voice low.

She kept her wits about her, he had to give her that.

They were in a large attic room with sloped ceilings. It was lined with bookshelves, not one of them completely full. Additional freestanding shelves dotted the room, but
Medford couldn't see why they were necessary—all of them had large gaps, too.