The Gray House

The sight of my shaking bald pate must be especially depressing when viewed from above.

“Sorry. Can’t. You don’t talk about these things.”

“Yeah, figures. The House Laws, may they be forgotten. Right?”

“The Laws don’t enter into it. That’s just how it goes. Take me, for example. I’m not superstitious, but it’s quite possible that, should I choose to share my experiences with you right now, my next visit to the Underside might not end well. I wasn’t planning on dropping by over there anytime soon, but you never know. No one knows much about things like that. And where you don’t know about something, you don’t talk about it.”

We smoke in silence. The floor under me is all covered in gouges left by the wheels of the bed. The walls are tiled to about three feet from the floor, blindingly white, reflecting the light from the lamps. I acutely feel that the circumstances are inappropriate, the setting is inappropriate, and the topic is inappropriate. But there is going to be more, no doubt. Noble is too unsettled right now to put on the brakes just because I asked him to. I have no doubt that, sooner or later, this way or that, this is going to rebound on me. The small of my back is freezing, the nightstand drawer handle is digging into my spine, but I’m exhausted beyond apathy and simply unable to move.

“How do you know about the others, then?” Noble asks. “Somebody must have been talking at some point.”

Now this is called “stalking the prey.” Even though we seemed to be talking about something else, but then what else is there? I lift up my head. From here I can only see his elbow and whispery tendrils of smoke. He shakes the ash off into the oatmeal bowl. Barbaric, that is. But better than having it all over the linens. I am jealous of him. Nobody ever explained anything to me back then. No matter how I phrased my questions. No matter from what side I tried to sneak in or how artfully I disguised the interest. In my case none of that made any difference whatsoever.

“Noble, listen,” I say soothingly. “Why don’t you try answering that question yourself. You’re not Smoker, after all. Think.”

This is Blind’s approach. Boy, would he be amazed if he heard me using it. He himself switched on the meaningful silences in situations like this one. I was supposed to hear the hallowed “Think for yourself” hidden in those silences, do my own thinking and then, provided I arrived at some insight, keep it to myself. Very convenient. If it somehow fell on the Pale One to teach someone how to swim, he’d just toss the subject overboard and wait for the results. I am the only graduate of this drastic method of learning. Sometimes I feel proud of my own resilience.

While I am deep in the recollections of the good old days of my apprenticeship, Noble suddenly brightens up.

“Fairy Tale Night?”

“Precisely!”

Blind’s education system had no use for positive reinforcement, but then, I’m not him.

“Do you know what it was called before?” I add. “Night of Permitted Talking. But that would be too obvious, you see.”

“The poems . . . The songs . . . ,” Noble mumbles. “Somebody might let something slip when drunk. Tabaqui’s drunken songs do sound very weird sometimes . . .”

I turn toward him and rest my chin on the edge of his bed. This is both comfortable and risky. If I lose control, I am going to fall asleep. Noble would never forgive me if I did.

“Right,” I say drowsily. “And? You’re making great progress. You’re exactly right about being drunk. And about the songs. Also you might want to visit the poets’ assemblies some Thursday evening in the old laundry room. Sit through an hour and a half of inane wailing and figure out some interesting details in the process. Though not an experience I’d like to repeat.”

Noble cogitates for a while longer.

“I’m coming up empty,” he admits. “No more insights. Unless there are people who are even less superstitious and can talk about it openly.”

I can see that he is indeed empty. His face looks tired. I decide to take pity on him.

“The walls. Do you always read everything that’s on them? Of course not, no one does. Except those who know what to look for and where. Now you, for example, are a card player. So you know where the latest scores are displayed, right? While nonplayers would never find them in a million years.”

Noble slaps his forehead.

“Of course! I was an idiot! All those hundreds of times . . .”

Done. For the next couple of days we are going to observe our packmate glued to the walls. We’ll have to pry him off at mealtimes. This is when it hits me again that he most likely won’t have that couple of days, and the thought paralyzes me. No walls, no poets’ assemblies. I completely forgot about this while trying to affect serenity, and went over the top. The loss is already gnawing at my insides. It won’t do to show this to Noble, who is still right here.