Lighthouse Island

by Paulette Jiles

  Nadia hurried along that latticework of remembered paces and turns, counting her steps, into the great main hall, prisoners lined up in front of the monitors, shouts and commands. She bent down the brim of the little hat and pulled down its veil. She walked through the big doorway to the screen-test room, nodded briefly to the C&E guy at his desk, and headed for the outside door.

  When she stepped outside she calmly flipped open a file and even though she only glanced up briefly she could tell that something was different with the world since she had been in jail. It was cloudy and very cold and a bitter thin drizzle was falling that seemed to threaten to actually turn into sleet or cold rain. Everything looked washed. She checked the files, nodded to herself, and strode on in Jeanne Uphusband’s shoes. They were too big. She had to curl her toes at every step to keep them on.

  She was in a courtyard and the only way out was through the courtroom building.

  At the entrance there was a security gate with a metal detector; as she approached it she saw a man go in ahead of her with a metal sippy cup in one hand. The alarm did not go off. It was just for looks. Nadia held up her badge on its string and showed it to the guard and he barely lifted his eyes from a TV screen.

  She saw other women counselors dressed like herself look at her curiously and Nadia thought, Somebody is going to recognize this hat, the picture on the badge is not me, I have to get out of here. Where is an exit? Nadia heard the women talking about shopping at the New Curiosity Shop and filed it away; local information, specific places.

  She kept her head down but watched on all sides for bars of clouded, outdoor light that would tell her there was an exit, an open door into the street and the wide world and freedom. The accused slumped guiltily on benches alongside their lawyers. Their tattered shoes said, There is no way out. Messenger girls slunk along respectfully; in this legal atmosphere they had lost all their street brash.

  Nadia saw a man with a white cane approaching her through the crowd of people. People bumped into him. She could use this man to get out of here.

  She came up to him. She laid a hand on his shoulder, her tote-bag straps on one shoulder and the files in her other hand.

  Can I help you?

  Yes. Yes. Help me find the men’s room.

  Nadia patted him on the shoulder. It’s all right. I’ll find somebody. Just a minute.

  She reached out and stopped a lawyer. She hoped it would not prove to be Jeanne Uphusband’s boss or boyfriend or brother.

  She said, Look here, this man needs to find the men’s room. The one near the exit.

  Certainly, glad to help. Here, sir, I’ll take you.

  Nadia followed them at a distance. After a while the lawyer and the blind man turned into a very wide hall and headed toward a large open portal that led to the street. She heard a bleeping sound behind her coming from some hidden loudspeakers. People stopped and looked up, then at one another. Nadia glanced down at the ID badge. The little purple light was blinking. She walked out of the entrance in a slow, self-assured pace mainly because Jeanne Uphusband’s shoes wallowed around on her feet.

  In the street she bent her head against the bitter wind and the fine drifting mist in the air. It was terribly, startlingly cold. She looked weird without a coat. She had to hold on to her little felt hat with the veil against the wind and after a block she stopped at a street vendor’s cart. The street vendor was selling hot drinks at prices now far beyond Nadia’s reach. As she bent over to look at the coffee and hot tea containers she deliberately caught her badge string on the push-handles and tore it off.

  Whoops! said the vendor.

  Oh, it’s always catching on things, said Nadia. So irritating. She took it in one hand so as to cover the blinking light and went on. In a crowd of people who had lined up for something she saw a woman with a toddler in one arm. She was peering ahead at the line.

  Cute kid! Nadia said and slipped the badge into the toddler’s baggy pants.

  The woman glared at her. Get one of your own, she said.

  Blocks went by. Five, seven, nine. Then ahead of her she noticed a building with a peaked roof and white stone facing. Outside people were sitting and smoking on the steps. It must be noon. They were on their lunch break. Over the double doors: Urban Print Regulatory and Security Directorate.

  This was where books were transferred to memory plates to save them for the archives, for some putative future generations who might care to read books. Even though there was no way at present to replay the memory plates. People were sitting around outside taking a break and cigarette smoke drifted around their heads.

  Are they hiring? Nadia said. She paused with an ill-fitting shoe on the step. She had to get off the street. She strode on so fast that she was temporarily warm. She had to get rid of her counselor’s tunic and get into her old street clothes. She put her hands in the pockets.

  Yeah. Just temps. You don’t have to have a work assignment card. Alls you need is an ID. A young man threw down his cigarette and stepped on it. The smoke and ashes streamed across the steps in the nipping wind.

  Oh good, she said.

  He said, Looks like you work for Forensics?

  Yeah. A temp. I do temp work for anybody.

  She walked into the building. Transferring books to archival memory plates was low-level work, they weren’t going to be too choosy but on the other hand she had no ID and she was tortured by thirst and the thought of those hot drinks in the vendor’s carts. An entire silver quarter apiece. Never mind. She had to get rid of the gray tunic. She was no longer Jeanne. Jeanne was in a baby’s diaper. She slipped into a janitor’s closet and changed. The khaki top was wrinkled as wadded paper.

  Inside the computer room she spotted an empty chair in front of a monitor, one in a long line of monitors and busily typing people. She edged her way down the line and sat in the empty chair, pulled out the keyboard. She put the veiled hat on top of the computer tower. She bent down and took out her own high heels with the rosettes on the toes and kicked the counselor’s shoes far under the desk and out of sight.

  A young man with a crafty expression and dark hair falling in his face was poised with arachnid fingers over the brassy keyboard. He hoarded a pile of Quench candies to one side. He turned to her.

  Are you a temp for Julie?

  Yes. She continued to stare at the blank monitor. Then down at the keyboard.

  You go up there and the desk lady gives out the books, said the man. People hammered away at keyboards, and sighed, and pressed their hands against their eyes, blinked, looked away and then back to the open book on the stand and the monitor in front of them.

  I still have my book from last week. Nadia reached into her tote and took out The Girl Scout Handbook. I took it home with me. I love reading. She opened it at random and read out loud:

  A shadowgraph screen may be as simple as an old sheet stretched across the doorway, with newspaper covering the space above and below the screen.

  Hmmm. Then she said, Oh, I forgot to show my ID to the desk lady. She slumped in her chair. I’m tired already. It’s only just after lunch and I’m tired.

  The young man said, Nah, you don’t need to. Just slip it in there. He pointed to a slot below the Menu button. He didn’t ask why she didn’t know that but stared at her curiously.

  Oh, right. She sat there and wondered if she could pretend to type. People to either side of her couldn’t see her screen.

  Then she thought of the blister card. She groped around in her tote bag and found it wrapped in a crumpled page and jammed safely inside the notebook. She slid it into the slot. After a few moments the screen lit up with a dull gray light. Letters swam across it. Welcome to the Urban Print Regulatory and Security Directorate. She watched in a kind of tired fascination. It worked. The card worked here as well as in vending machines.

  She turned to the young man. He gazed at her wit
h a loose, fascinated smile.

  You’re cuter than Julie, he said.

  Thanks. I guess. She smiled back. Are there vending machines around here? I have one bottle allowance coming to me.

  No, sorry, not in this building. He reached down and lifted a two-pint bottle of water and handed it to her. There. You can owe me.

  She tipped it up and tried not to appear too thirsty. She felt him studying her in her wrinkled khaki top and the gray prison skirt. Her little hat with the veil poised on top of the monitor.

  There’s vending machines at the bicycle repair. The water is two silver quarters.

  Good Lord! Well, I’ll pay you back tomorrow, she said.

  That’s a deal. Go ahead, it’s yours. I got a quart coming tonight.

  She finished it and handed him back the glass bottle. She felt water flowing into her veins and arteries and flushing her skin. The relief was unbelievable. She sat stunned for a moment and then said, Thanks. Thank you so much, and as she turned back to her monitor there was a loud explosion.

  It was a hard, deafening crack and a flash of intense light through the windows, and then it rumbled on and on. Everyone in the room ducked, and then turned to stare at one another.

  What the hell was that? said the young man.

  Thunder and lightning, said Nadia. I read about it once.

  Chapter 30

  On her screen a sentence appeared:

  Nadia you r safe where you r 4 about 4 hours. J.

  She stared at it.

  Nadia r u there

  The whole enormous room full of typers and enterers buzzed with the shock of the lightning. After the screams they all slowly went back to work. Nadia glanced at the young man to her left and the older woman on her right. Both clattered rapidly at their keyboards on the big brass-bound keys that used so much finger-muscle in pressing down and they were frowning and from time to time glancing uneasily at the windows.

  She glanced over at the Handbook and then typed:

  Yes, I am here. Who r u? Get off my monitor. I’m trying to enter a book here.

  Don’t be coy. This is James. I have no idea how u got out but you did. Go north, Crow Creek Valley, scrap heaps.

  How do I know you r James?

  No way I can prove it we just have to go on here.

  How could you have known where I wz?

  The card.

  Of course.

  U r safe there 4 a few hours. Then get out out hey r starting a search at the other end of street this program is degrading.

  I couldn’t believe it was u there. I saw u move yr foot.

  Yes. Later. U must get out of the area.

  Nadia flipped a page of the handbook as if she were copying it.

  Which way is north?

  When u go out of the directorate main entrance turn right.

  Tired. Jail terrible. Can’t get much farther. Minutes away from some disaster.

  I admire u, brave girl. Go on. Keep on. You must, you can.

  The black-haired young man sighed and stretched his arms, locked his fingers behind his neck, and turned his torso from side to side.

  What are you entering? he said. He smiled at her.

  The Girl Scout Handbook. She smiled back. What’s yours?

  He rubbed his eyes. William Cobbet’s Rural Rides Volume I. It’s so boring. I just enter a page or two of wingdings or a letter, like D for instance. Hit copy over and over. Who’s to know? Hey? And so where do you live?

  Nadia turned back to her screen. Down the street, she said. Near the New Curiosity Shop. Four of us. Amanda borrowed, ha ha, my water this morning.

  A punishable offense.

  Am I going to turn in one of my roommates?

  Nah, nah.

  I better get to work here.

  They keep a lot of records here. The young man pulled at his tie and smiled. More than books.

  Really?

  Yeah. In the basement archives. Four million laws. And all the ordinances and regulations.

  Oh. Nadia felt something coming and was a little nervous. Who knew? she said.

  He jumped around in his chair and waved one hand in a circle. I mean there are so many laws and regulations everybody breaks them all the time and they don’t even know it. You could be breaking a law right now, just sitting there.

  Nadia typed busily. No kidding.

  Someday a bunch of us are going to go down there and erase them all from the computers. Zap. Phhhhht. Gone. Including the new one allowing public executions. He sat up straight and smiled at her. Hey?

  I don’t want to know about it, she said. I’m busy. And afraid. Nadia turned a page of the Handbook and pretended to read. Then she typed:

  I can’t do anything else. Now heavy charges.

  I know. My arrest is coming, problem with surgery, explain later don’t ask. I have arranged a ride 4 u in the e-waste so

  Losing you.

  Program degrading.

  I don’t want u 2 b arrested. U r my hero, my savior. Could not believe u were there. How did u do that?

  Always wanted to blow up Old Book Dump Jail there in Cheyenne. Where u r now, Cheyenne Wyoming. Demanded random inspection, including kitchen # 14 just so I could c u.

  Good to c u.

  Nadia. Brave .

  U switched files. S.B for me.

  Yes. Memorize this. U r much farther N&W of dog town towers. 320 miles. Scrapping and industrial area ahead about 15 miles, follow H.J. Road and stay nw. Come to old riverbed, stay north. This program has a short kill time. Memorize please.

  Done.

  Electronics scrap yard. Enter with the card. Find van # GAN22VP1–928LES. Get on the van. Memorize the #.

  Done.

  repeat r u sure?

  Sure.

  This is the only time I will be able to give you that number. In a moment I will erase it.

  Done.

  Big rain coming. Move fast.

  OK

  Signing out now. I will get u 2 litehouse island. I will take u if I am not arrested 1st.

  How?

  A flight.

  Is this 2 good 2 b true?

  Put cursor on this ~~~~~ and bring up map of island. Marine chart but will have to do.

  She did so and there it was; strange numbers were on it and peculiar lines. A coast, an island, an asterisk for the tower light and around it the blue paper sea said forty fathoms, sixty fathoms where at some time in the distant past people had been able to measure the depth of the sea.

  What was the medication in the card? Why r u taking it? Dangerous?

  Yes, dangerous but a chance for nerve regeneration in my legs. More later.

  Why me?

  Have 2 make choices. Mon choix est fait, tant que je vive. Do u know French?

  Some. This, yes. Pour nulle vivant, tant soit and so on. Riche de hault lignaige. Dunnett. Lymond.

  Get out of there now.

  OK. R u sure u can delete all this.

  Deleted. Bye.

  Bye.

  She turned to the young man. Do these print out?

  Yeah. He was disappointed that Nadia was not interested in zapping the four million laws. In a resigned voice he said, You need to go up to the desk and get a permission slip.

  Ah well.

  Nadia dug the pencil from her tote bag and made a quick sketch of the map of Lighthouse Island and then deleted the map on-screen. Everyone turned to the window. Another blast of thunder made people cower and rain came down in a pounding intensity, a noisy waterfall at the glass.

  Happy Jack Road was a small villagelike quarter within the greater overcrowded megacity, and its street-side buildings were no more than four stories high and did not seem to have ever been decapitated. People stared out of the upper windows into the cold
with curtains streaming around both sides of them and called down to people on the street. Nadia knew that this made the area dangerous. They all knew one another.

  There were a great many shops with green-and-yellow banners, offers of handmade jewelry and hats and boots. The agencies were more lenient here, obviously. Maybe police surveillance wouldn’t be so intense. Everything streamed in the wet. Shopkeepers ran out to grab at their displays and signs and things made with feathers and silver and beads and wide-brimmed hats on display, things she vaguely recognized as “western.”

  Nadia ran into a fire shop, printing wet footprints and dripping.

  Rain! she said.

  I got eyes, said the woman behind the counter.

  Nadia took out her coin purse and counted her dimes as if she were about to buy something. In actuality she was checking out her possessions and glancing out the dusty window for any sign of Forensics agents. She stood among the shelves of matches, kerosene lamps and glass containers of kerosene, candles, rolls of lamp wick, candlesticks, and pierced tin candle-lanterns. The shop woman sat with her hands inside her sleeves and shivered and stared, fascinated, at the drops rolling down the front window.

  They had left her almost everything except the coins. They had stolen all her coins; no, there were five dimes and some pennies and nickels that had fallen to the bottom. Almost everything else was there except the sewing kit, which she had left on the floor of Jeanne Uphusband’s office.

  You don’t have an umbrella or something? said Nadia.

  The woman laughed.

  Nadia bought two candles for a penny and said, A person can’t go anywhere without spending something.

  The shop woman said, So?