The Silk Road

by Kathryn Davis

  You were collecting evidence! said the Geographer.

  Collecting evidence? said the Cook. More like collecting trash.

  The Botanist did that thing of hers, leaning across the banquet table with her head resting on her upper arm, looking up at the Cook coquettishly. Those hallways, she said with a sigh. You never knew what you’d find there.

  Don’t be silly, said the Keeper. How could that be evidence?

  He’s an Archivist. He keeps everything, said the Astronomer.

  I read The Lonely Thoroughfares, said the Topologist. I had to read it for a class. I thought it was pretty good.

  The further the Archivist walked into the tunnel, the more muffled the sound of the machinery; short hallways continued to materialize off to the left, each one culminating in a door with a name card taped to the window. Professor This, Professor That, though clearly no one down here ever came close to making full professor. The Archivist recognized some of the names—Professor Bunting had been a noisy feminist. Professor Liu had been dead for years. All these offices were dark and the tunnel itself seemed to be growing darker, the light fixtures stationed at greater and greater intervals. Occasionally a door would have been left open, revealing a room that looked like it had been abandoned under emergency evacuation orders.

  A period ensued during which the Archivist thought he was merely imagining the sound of an animal padding along ahead of him; in its place all he could hear was the sound of his stomach. He’d been prone to anxiety attacks for as long as he could remember and he hadn’t had a thing to eat all day. Meanwhile the tunnel floor was showing signs of increasingly bad drainage. The Archivist had to watch where he put his feet in order to protect his new shoes and to keep from slipping—at first he could step over or around the puddles, though eventually there was no way to avoid stepping right into pools of standing water. The quality of the light, too, seemed to be decaying, though ironically enough, the dimmer the tunnel got the farther ahead in it he could see. At last he thought he could make out the shadowy shape of what certainly looked like an animal, low slung and with a tail that was surprisingly full, resplendent even. The animal was slinking along the left-hand side of the tunnel, disappearing from time to time into one or another of the secondary hallways, only to emerge once again farther ahead. It was difficult to tell what color she was: sometimes her coat seemed spectral and gray, at other times russet, vulpine. Despite what his eyes told him, though, his sense of the creature—the image her coat created in his mind—was pure white.

  P would be upset that the Archivist wasn’t there to hear her. She planned to read from her latest collection, the title of which she refused to reveal to anyone, though her editor must know it. The publication date was a week off.

  She used to like it when the Archivist brushed her hair, which was surprisingly thick for being so straight, and which she wore long, though often wrenched into a small, tight knob at the back of her head. That was one aspect of their relationship that always went smoothly—P liked to be groomed, though not for too long, and not with any sense of personal involvement on the part of the groomer. If the Archivist made it clear that the act of grooming her was arousing him, she would bat the brush from his hand. How many letters? she would ask, leaning in, her gray eyes sparkling. She would pick up a pad of paper and draw a gallows.

  The first bite, when it came, was more like a playful nip; the second tore through the light wool of his pant leg and sank deep, drawing blood.

  The main axis of the campus, as the Archivist knew, ran east to west, in homage to the Trail of Tears. The January Tunnel, on the other hand, ran south to north, in homage to the Suspension of Misrule, also known as Thule.

  False Foxes, said Jee Moon. That’s the name of the new book.

  How do you know? asked the Archivist.

  We were best friends, Jee Moon said. Since we were little girls.

  I thought she was partners with me, said the Botanist. I thought you were off somewhere else.

  We smiled at the good and frowned at the bad, Jee Moon said. And sometimes we were very sad. I can’t believe you don’t remember.

  Of course the question is: Was she there when we arrived or did she arrive after? Like the place in the dream where you always get lost, a well-traveled, well-known road shaking you loose into fear and confusion, propelling you toward that house just around the bend but there is no toward, there is no house, there is no bend. Because, finally, none of us could remember a time when she wasn’t with us, Jee Moon, just as it was never determined which of us saw her first, a red speck approaching from each of the cardinal directions, her red parka coming closer from outside the circumference of the known world.

  Whoever saw her first must have had the best eyesight. Who would that have been?

  Not the Topologist. Hers was the worst.

  It had to be me, the Astronomer said. I was the one who told everyone she was coming.

  Like that’s even important, guys, Jee Moon said.

  It was extremely cold and she had been wearing a red felt parka embroidered with scenes showing seals pierced by harpoons, the cuffs and hood trimmed with the fur of a fox whose paws crossed decorously under her chin. Red was a good color on Jee Moon, given her pitch-black hair and spectral skin.

  With the exception of the Cook, who was indoors cooking dinner, all of us had been outdoors on skis. The dogs were outside with us too; there were enough of them for a team, though we were just figuring out how to attach a harness. In northern lands the power of frost and the falls of snow are generally so severe, and the weather with its thick, sudden mists that darken the air so dreadful, that a person can’t tell whether a traveler they meet at close quarters is friend or foe. In any case, Jee Moon was impervious to routine displays of etiquette.

  She had a nice smile, though. We all agreed.

  She extended her hand knuckles first, the way everyone knows to approach an unfamiliar dog. The lead male licked her as did the gray. The Astronomer was obviously smitten—we could see this from the initial encounter. He got as close as he could, ski tips permitting, a besotted expression on his long, flat face. Also an attractive face—handsome even, if you went for that kind of look. Though he’d tried to keep it a secret, we knew the Astronomer had already broken several hearts.

  But do you expect heartbreak once you’re past a certain age? Does anyone? Our heartbreak had all happened such a long time ago: a pair of eyes in a thicket, a saint in a shrine. We knew marriage didn’t betoken true love. Romantic heartbreak was nothing compared with what came later.

  Maybe it wasn’t until we were gathering for cocktails that we noticed her—a slim woman standing alone by the fireplace, nursing a shot of the single malt whiskey we had discovered in the cellar not long after our arrival. She’d tucked her hair behind her ears and she was smiling at something no one else could see out one of the great mullioned windows facing the interior. Standing there smiling in the teeth of the “gray cold” as it approached with the lengthening night.

  They’re babies now but just wait, Jee Moon told the Cook. The father’s off getting dinner. That’s what fathers do, Jee Moon said, looking across the room at the Astronomer.

  The Cook, yes, it had to have been him, wiping his thick, freckled fingers on his blood-stained apron. The Cook was definitely the first to approach her, before the Astronomer, before everyone.

  They never had such a supper in their life, the Cook sang, and the little ones chewed on the bones-oh. He had a pleasant voice, sweeter than you’d expect given his manly physique. The song was about a fox stealing a goose for his family. Do you have any dietary restrictions? the Cook asked.

  I restrict my diet to ingredients, Jee Moon replied. She was looking at him from over the rim of her glass, from under her thick eyelashes.

  The Cook was a widower, his heart already broken. Reduced to dust, really. He had adored his wife from the beginning to the end, from A to Z—an eternal transit. He had adored his wife without cease, and that i
s why his story was the shortest.

  Jee Moon had on a heavy white pullover, black leather pants, and felt boot liners, at some point having discarded her outdoor gear. The hooks were in the entryway, on either side of the door to the cellar; she must have opened the door and gone downstairs without anyone noticing. She was a curious woman, despite her strangely fixed aura, like a reliquary or a carapace, something designed to hide something better left unseen. When you went into the cellar you needed a flashlight since there wasn’t any electricity. The oak casks containing the whiskey were lined up against the south wall. There were lots of them, more than enough to keep us in good spirits for a long time, the Iceman’s heroic thirst notwithstanding. The cellar ran the length of the hall and was deep enough for the tallest of us—i.e., the Iceman, whose self-appointed job it was to retrieve the evening’s libation—to walk around in without having to stoop. It must have required a prodigious amount of work to carve away the permafrost.

  But the Iceman hadn’t been down there yet. He was still outside, playing with the dogs while the rest of us, Jee Moon excepted, had come inside and impatiently awaited our cocktails. The Iceman was like a dog, rolling on his back in the recently fallen snow while the dogs licked his face. Unlike the rest of us he thrived on the cold—it used to get hot in the summer on Fairmount Avenue and he hated heat. The colder it was, the better. He was big like an oven.

  Jee Moon’s coming coincided with the coming of the gray cold. The gray cold burned the eyes of animals and stiffened their hairs. It deprived all creatures living near the pole of their eyesight. The gray cold made them gather in packs to hunt their food. It caused the pelts of all creatures to be thicker and handsomer. Gray cold turned white the crests of cocks and the beaks and feet of geese. It made hares, foxes, and ermines change color. Gray cold made the skin peel off human lips, fingers, and nostrils. It caused lips that touched other lips to stick as if held by indissoluble pitch. It opened up all pathless territories to travelers and hunters.

  Meanwhile the Cook was leading Jee Moon around the room as if to introduce her to the rest of us. Soon enough, of course, she came to assume knowledge of our names, just as each of us had done upon arrival, our presence unheralded yet inevitable.

  This was the force of the space. It intruded on our bodies, which is how we originally had come into being. At first there wasn’t sky or earth or skin or house or anything to separate us one from another. It was not nothing though! At first there was something that was everywhere and everything. You might call it space and it was, truly, intrusive, full of folds and pockets, thickenings and spheres, taking up the places where our bodies needed to be. Some of us had been kept in the labyrinth and fed there; others felt the ice crack beneath us as if we had hooves instead of feet. Such was the force of the space that it could summon to its grasp a faraway thing visible to it alone, however intricate a string of knots the thing had been tied with.

  We all watched with interest as the Iceman approached the window where Jee Moon and the Cook were standing. A chill smell clung to his clothes from his time in the cellar, as well as multiple cobwebs. Bottoms up, he said, downing his drink in one swallow and cocking an eyebrow in Jee Moon’s direction. The Iceman was always most cheerful drink in hand.

  Yes, please, Jee Moon said, holding out her glass.

  The Cook excused himself and returned to the kitchen, at which point the rest of us approached, eager to have our drinks freshened and to get a closer look at the stranger.

  Me too? said the Geographer. Usually she dressed native-style in caribou leggings and sealskin boots—tonight for some reason she’d put on an evening dress of crushed dark green velvet.

  Say when, said the Iceman.

  The Geographer explained that tomorrow an expedition had been planned into the interior. Snow was forecast, she said, which might complicate our mission. Once the snow fell it obscured everything, a cairn no longer distinguishable from any other element in the landscape. Heavy snow, she added, and then she apologized—being a theoretical meteorologist, Jee Moon no doubt knew this already. We were always respectful of each other’s area of expertise. It was the realm in which our sensitivity to someone else’s feelings was most evident. Otherwise, with the possible exception of the Botanist, we often acted as if none of us had feelings.

  The thing is, though—we did. We loved one another. That was the arrangement, after all. We were so feral, so damp, so swift to bolt. We might have been the silverfish Nanny shook from the bedclothes every morning. She considered them household pests, eating book bindings and carpet, coffee and glue, photographs, linen, plaster and sugar. Nocturnal, silverfish, and wingless—their complex mating ritual lasts well over half an hour, the male and female standing face to face, antennae shivering and touching, both parties repeatedly backing off before returning to their former position, the male running away and the female chasing him until, at long last, they stand side by side, head to tail, and the male produces the elegant gossamer-covered sperm capsule that the female invites into her body.

  An expedition? asked the Iceman. I seem to recall an excursion. But where to and for what purpose?

  Maybe that’s not the right word. The Geographer looked into the fire and straightened her shoulders. If we leave early there shouldn’t be a problem. We can use the sleds.

  You still haven’t said where we’re going. The Iceman poured himself another drink.

  Away from the edge, I hope, Jee Moon said, leaning up against him, laughing.

  The smell and thickness of him—it was like sinking into peat.

  Jee Moon could never hold her liquor. That first night she had too much to drink and went to bed early, pleading exhaustion. Her room was in Dormitory Number Two; it took her forever to fall asleep. Outside, the landscape extended itself in all directions. It looked the way the moon looked to the early astronauts, milk-white and serrated peaks rising above bone-white craters.

  Our dormitory rooms were perfect squares. According to the Topologist, squares were spaces in which completeness made sense, their many points separated by what are called neighborhoods.

  There was a hallway, long and thin, running down the center of each dormitory. The hallway was a slack space, incomplete, a place where things went to settle. The minute we opened our doors and left our rooms to enter that space we belonged nowhere. Thoughts flew over us like birds, their eyes seeking the narrow straits. If we hadn’t been used to swerving we would have fallen down like drops of rain through the deep void, and nothing would have been begotten.

  Jee Moon lay in her bed, her face lit by snow light, the light that is more beautiful than any other, a collaboration of heaven and earth, star and ice crystal, like the empty place inside a body where the life resides. She woke and saw the Astronomer standing in her doorway.

  It wasn’t love at first sight—they’d already met, remember? In the Aubrac. We came up the long hill that went on forever. For once Mother wasn’t watching us like a hawk.

  Or maybe they never met—they’d just known one another forever.

  It was always so exhausting to find a mate, said the Geographer.

  It’s exhausting to survive, said the Keeper, when you’re raised by Darwinists.

  The hill was the longest hill any of us had ever seen. Even though there were trail markers we got lost. The paths crisscrossed, split apart, wandered off to die.

  Cattle tracks, said the Keeper. Those were cattle tracks, not trails.

  Soon enough we developed the tendency common to lost travelers to go in circles. Queenly clouds dragged long trains of rain-shower behind themselves and over us. Roaring blackness up above and all around and underfoot and two birds flying over the lake, linked by a chain of gold. Who was it said, How I wish I could have those birds, one of them upon each of my two shoulders? My little birds from the Palace, my little lambs, welcome!

  The shrine presented itself as a welcome shelter from the rain; in our dark cloaks we huddled together just inside the door. Most of us w
ore the rosaries we’d been given by the Bishop. There were a lot of people in the shrine besides us, some of them lighting candles, some of them praying, some chatting or looking for romance. A bell was ringing. Danger was abroad in the land.

  Plus the Swede was there! the Botanist said to Jee Moon. And you were too! You were kneeling at the altar.

  That wouldn’t have been me, Jee Moon said. Not kneeling.

  No one wanted to get too close to anyone else. Everyone had discarded their little moons and chains, their necklaces and bracelets, their jewels hanging on the forehead and the crisping pins and looking glasses. Instead of a girdle, there would be a cord. Instead of a stomacher, haircloth.

  The Geographer glared across the banquet table at the Botanist. I kept the windows of the car closed, she said. Everyone knows what gets loose when you open a window. After the crash my husband took the medicine, she said. He took it. She sounded upset.

  If you say so, said the Botanist.

  In the hospital, the Geographer added. In case you’ve forgotten. She gave the Botanist a look.

  The rosaries were pale blue plastic. They were junk but even so they were powerful, more powerful than the rosaries some of us were wearing when we ran into the shrine to escape the rain.

  I still have mine, said the Geographer. The cross is gold and the beads are semiprecious stones. They’re garnets, to ward off plague.

  How did that work out for you? said the Iceman. His rosary had gotten lost somewhere but he hadn’t noticed it was missing until recently.

  In fact the rosaries didn’t make sense, since we weren’t religious. Apart from the Cook, that is, though in his case it was to honor the memory of his wife, who had been Catholic. He lit a candle for her and left his rosary in the shrine, in the pile of blue plastic rosaries at the saint’s feet.