Lexicon (15 page)

INDIGENOUS AUSTRALIAN LANGUAGES

At the time of European arrival, the indigenous peoples of Australia are estimated to have spoken between 250 and 400 languages, making it one of the most linguistically diverse places in the world.

Almost all indigenous languages share several distinctive phonological features (e.g., lack of fricatives), which suggests the existence of a relatively small set of ancestors, or perhaps even a single common language. Why this would have been abandoned, given its utility to intertribal communication, is unclear.

[THREE]

The waitress brought food and coffee and instructed them to enjoy. Wil watched Eliot spread a napkin across his lap, pick up his cutlery, and begin to dissect his eggs. He popped bacon into his mouth and chewed.

“Go on,” Eliot said through bacon. “Eat.”

Wil picked up his knife and began to push food around. It was beyond him how Eliot could shoot people dead and fly all night and then tuck into a hearty breakfast. It was wrong. Because Eliot had known those people at the ranch, including a woman he’d shot dead, Charlotte Brontë, and you shouldn’t have an appetite after something like that. It suggested that Eliot really was psychopathic—not the crazy,
voices-told-me-to-kill
way, but actually, medically psychopathic, in the sense of lacking the ability to feel anything. But even this bothered Wil less than the
way
Eliot was eating, which was with quick, purposeful movements, his eyes sectioning up the plate for maximum efficiency. This was wrong because Eliot hadn’t slept since Wil had met him. He should be exhausted.

“This is even better than I expected,” Eliot said. He pointed at Wil’s plate with his knife. “You need to eat.”

Wil ate without enthusiasm. His bacon tasted like nothing. Like a dead animal, fried. His eggs, aborted chickens.

“I’ll say this for the Midwest,” Eliot said. “They know how to do a breakfast.”

Wil poked a bacon strip with his fork. In its
rufescent flesh he saw the man he’d shot on the overturned pickup. The way he’d folded up. He put down his cutlery.

“Are you all right?” No concern in Eliot’s voice, of course. It was just a question. An inquiry after facts. Wil rose and tottered to the rear of the diner. He found a single, dirty toilet, lowered himself to his knees, and vomited. When he was done, he sat back against the wall, eyes closed, sweat popping all over his body. He decided to stay here awhile. You were safe in a bathroom. It was a four-by-six cubicle of sanctuary, for as long as you wanted.

When he could no longer believe this, he washed and reentered the diner. A man in a trucker cap with hollow cheeks and serial killer glasses eyed him over hash browns. Wil could read his face clearly: He thought Wil had been doing drugs. The waitress was sneaking looks at him, too. And there was a red-cheeked man wedged into a booth seat, who was watching a burbling TV bolted into the ceiling corner but hadn’t been a moment ago. He felt an urge to explain himself.
It’s not what you think. I’ve just had a really rough day.
But that would be crazy. He would convince no one.

He shuffled back to the booth. Eliot had finished his own breakfast and switched plates with Wil. “Hey,” he said. “Order more. I’m paying.”

“Are you?”

“Well, no,” said Eliot. “But you know what I mean.”

Wil sat.

“You could use the protein,” said Eliot, chewing.

“What’s your plan?”

“Hmm?”

“These people, they’re going to find us again, aren’t they? They’re looking for us right now.”

“No doubt.”

“So we need a plan.”

Eliot nodded. “True.”

“Do you have one?”

“No.”

“You don’t?”

“I have a short-term plan,” Eliot said. “I plan to finish your eggs.” Wil said nothing. “Food is important. I’m serious about the protein.”

“Do you have a plan or not?”

“No.”

“Shouldn’t you, I don’t know, be concerned about that?”

“I am concerned about that.”

“You don’t look concerned.”

“Would it make you feel better if I were sweating? Running to the bathroom to blow my cookies? It shouldn’t. A panic state is not helpful to good decision making.”

“It would make me feel better if we were
moving
,” Wil said. “Like if you got your eggs to
go
.”

“Well, I like to know where I’m going before I try to get there. It’s a mistake to try to execute a plan before you’ve thought of one, in my experience.”

Wil exhaled. “Can you call them?”

“Pardon me?”

“Get a poet on the phone. You used to be one of them. Call them.”

“And say what?”

“I don’t know. Persuade them to stop chasing us. That’s what you do, isn’t it?”

“Yes. But it’s also what they do.”

“Then offer them something. Make a deal. Give them something they want.”

“But what they want is you.”

“Something else.”

Eliot retired his cutlery. “You’re the key to an object of biblical power. They’re not interested in substitutes.” He stretched his arms. “And when I say biblical, I mean literally from the Bible.”

He rubbed his face. Every time Eliot spoke, Wil felt that he knew less.

“Keep talking, though,” Eliot said. “I feel like it’s helping, in a process of elimination kind of way.”

“We should hide, then. Go somewhere, you do your poet thing, make people hide us. That’s possible, right?”

“Before yesterday, I would have said yes. We thought we were hiding. In light of recent events, though, it seems what we were actually doing was being observed until we led Woolf to you.”

“So we can’t hide.”

“We can try. But to date it hasn’t been very successful.”

The waitress arrived to refill Eliot’s coffee. She was young and pink cheeked. Her name tag said
SARAH
. She seemed to be in awe of Eliot, although Wil didn’t know why. “Thank you, Sarah,” said Eliot, and she flushed.

“So we
can’t
hide,” Wil said, once she’d left, “and we can’t negotiate, and we can’t stay here, and you don’t want to leave until we know where we’re going, is that about right?”

“Yes,” Eliot agreed. “That’s about right.”

“Then what are we going to do?”

“I believe our only option is confrontation. Specifically, the kind of confrontation that leaves them dead and us alive.”

“Okay,” he said. “This sounds like a plan.”

“It’s not. It’s a goal.”

“Jesus!” Wil said. “Talking to you is like herding cats.”

Eliot raised his coffee and blew at it. “The problem is that Woolf and I are evenly matched, but she is excellently resourced and supported by skilled poets, while I have nothing and no one but you, and you’re useless. That’s not a personal commentary. It’s a statement of fact. So I’m finding it hard to imagine any scenario wherein we confront Woolf and survive. It also means our enemies will continue to pursue us rapidly and relentlessly, since we represent little danger. It’s more or less the same problem that those of us who left the organization have faced for some time. Our enemies have a bareword and we don’t.”

“They have a what?”

“The word that killed Broken Hill,” Eliot said. “They have that.”

“And it’s a bareword.”

“Yes.”

“Which is what?”

“Useful.” He gazed at Wil. “Hence our attempt to lift it from your brain. Still a good plan, if it’s in there.”

“You wanted it to
use
? I thought you wanted my immunity. You said you wanted to
stop
it.”

“Mmm,” said Eliot. “Some untruths were told, in the interests of acquiring your compliance. I was actually somewhat concerned at the time that you might use the word against me.”

“But I don’t remember it.”

“No.”

“If I did . . .”

“Oh, things would be different.”

“Woolf wouldn’t be chasing us?”

“She would,” Eliot said, “but more cautiously.”

Wil looked out the window, at snow and clouds like granite. He could not imagine living in dirt and desert. “I really don’t remember anything about Broken Hill.”

“Well,” Eliot said. He drained his coffee. “That’s a shame.” The waitress, Sarah, descended on them, refilling his cup. “Aren’t you a peach,” Eliot said.

“Are you from the East Coast?” She reddened. “It’s just, your accent.”

“You’re right!” Eliot said. “Well, I am. He’s from Australia.”

“
Really
,” Sarah said, looking at Wil in a new way. “I’d love to travel, one day.”

“Oh, you should,” Eliot said. “The world is closer than you think.” Wil looked out the window again. He felt tempted to rise, toss his napkin on the table, and walk out. Just walk on down the road, snow falling in his hair, until something happened. One way or the other. At least it would be doing something. Something stupid, most likely. But something. “Now that necklace is truly beautiful,” Eliot said. “Did you make it?”

“It’s my grandmother,” said the waitress. A carved piece of wood, a woman in profile. A
relief
, was that what you called it? The woman looked stern. “I carved it from a photo.”

“I think you’re very talented,” Eliot said. “Sarah, I apologize, but would you give me a few minutes? I’ve just thought of something I need to discuss with my colleague.”

“Oh, sure. No problem.”

She left. Wil looked at Eliot.

“Fuck me,” Eliot said. “The fucking necklace.” Wil waited. From now on when Eliot said something he didn’t understand, he was going to wait. “We’re going to Broken Hill.”

“Why?”

“We thought she got it out. But she didn’t. She made a copy.”

Wil waited.

“Fuck!” Eliot said. “We need to move.” He rose.

•   •   •

The chopper sat above the road, billowing snow, making the power lines dance. Below them sat a small plane. It had been abandoned; she could see the steps hanging out of its side. The pilot’s voice crackled through her headphones. He was sitting right next to her, but sounded like he was dialing in from Mars. “You want to set down?”

She shook her head. The pilot pulled back on the stick. The world below dropped away. They flew over snowfields that were like a million brilliant daggers, and she turned away, because it hurt the star in her eye. She had a little supernova searing her retina. That was how it felt. It never really went away but was always worse in the light. Anyplace she could see the sun. Sometimes she thought she could see it: a little white hole in the world.

“Two minutes,” said the pilot. “We have a diner. Center of town. We’ve encircled but haven’t approached. How do you want to do this?”

“Safely,” she said. “Have them sweep it, please.”

The pilot nodded. She heard him passing on the instruction:
Sweep it; we’re staying airborne.
The town emerged as a smudge in the snowscape. It had one road in and one road out, perhaps a dozen buildings. As they hovered, she watched black cars rocket up from each direction and disgorge tiny figures. They moved from building to building, gesturing and sometimes stopping to consult each other. The chances of them finding Eliot and the outlier here were a thousand to one. But she had to be careful. The thing to remember was that all the power in the world didn’t stop a bullet. She had been taught chess at the school, years ago, and the point was the pieces differed only in terms of their attacking power. They were all equally easy to kill. Capture. It was called capturing. The lesson was that you should be cautious about deploying your most powerful pieces, because it only required one dumb pawn to take them down.

The pilot got the signal and began to settle the chopper toward the street. She watched the town tilt toward her through the bubble windshield.
Now’s your chance, Eliot. I’m just sitting here.
Eliot was a bishop, she figured, prone to sneaky long-range attacks, and more mobile than you expected. She had never liked bishops.

“We’re green,” said the pilot. She unbuckled. A young man with long hair, Rosenberg, opened the door and offered her his hand, which she found kind of insulting and ignored. The chopper’s blades pulled at her hair. She studied the street, trying to sense trace elements of Eliot.

“Diner’s clear,” said Rosenberg. “I’m guessing they acquired a car here, maybe a couple hours ago. Three proles inside, segmented and compromised, instructed to obey. We haven’t questioned them.”

“Thank you,” she said. “I’ll take it from here.”

She made for the low diner. A few poets moved toward her and Rosenberg waved them away. Inside, behind the counter, was a young, scared waitress in a green apron. In a booth was a red-cheeked man she presumed was a farmer. A skinny guy in big glasses was manning a table. The door wheezed closed behind her. The man with glasses rose unsteadily from his table. “I ain’t cooperating with the government. You want to—”

“Sit down, shut up.” He dropped into his seat. She pointed to the waitress. “You come here.”

The waitress jerked forward, clutching a notepad. Her eyes were huge.

“Two men. One dark, one white. You know who I’m talking about?”

The waitress’s head bobbed.

“Tell me everything you saw and heard.”

The waitress began to talk. A minute later, the farmer began to fish a cell phone from his jeans pocket. He was trying to be surreptitious, but his wide checked shirt telegraphed every twitch. She found it fascinating: Did he think she was blind? She let him go awhile, until he got the phone out and opened its lid as carefully as if it contained an engagement ring. Then she said, “Put your hand in your mouth.”

“And I poured him another refill,” said the waitress. “He was real nice and we got to talking and I asked if he was from L.A. or New York or somewhere like that, and he said yes, he’d been all over, he’d seen fireworks in London and riots in Berlin, and I should go, he said. He said the world was closer than I imagined. Those were his words.” The farmer began to gag. “And then he wanted to talk to his friend, the Australian, and after he asked if he could borrow a car. I said sure, and gave him the keys to my car, and I felt bad, because I hadn’t cleaned it for like a year and I wished I had something nicer. I thought—”

“I don’t care what you thought.”

“I asked where he might be going and he said where did I recommend, and I said anywhere but here, and he smiled at that. Then we talked about places I had been, and I said when I was a girl my mom once took me to El Paso, just the two of us, and—”

“Right,” she said. “Stop.” She pondered. The farmer made a sound like
gwargghh
and threw up around his hand. He had wedged the whole thing in there. She wouldn’t have thought that was possible. She watched him twitch and gag. She should tell him to take that out. There was no benefit in a dead farmer. “Did you hear any talk of towns? States? Airports?”