The Gray House

“I don’t, usually,” Black said. “Only when the day is particularly shitty. Like today.”

He smoked in silence and with great concentration. Like everything he did: eating, drinking, reading . . . Every action he performed possessed this thoroughness, as if announcing to the world: “Now this is how it’s supposed to be done.” Probably that was why no one ever interrupted him while he was doing something. When he found himself in need of an ashtray, Black rummaged under the sofa with the same absorbed look on his face and hauled out a flat copper saucer in the shape of a maple leaf. The old-timers would do magic tricks like that sometimes, producing unexpected objects out of the most unlikely places.

“Listen,” he said, installing the leaf on the sofa’s arm, “I wanted to ask you something. How come you stayed? Why didn’t you go with them?”

I paused. It was not an easy thing to explain. In all honesty, I didn’t want to leave Black alone. After his conversation with Sphinx in the morning, when I saw the way they looked at him, or rather, avoided looking at him . . . It all had this horribly familiar feel. Familiar and unpleasant.

“I’m not sure,” I said. “I guess I’m still too much of a Pheasant. I can’t even imagine how this could work—turning up at the hospital wing, at night, without permission, carrying supplies. For me that would be the same as, I don’t know, busting into Shark’s office and stealing his fire extinguisher. I thought I would be out of place there. And it’s not because I’m scared. I just don’t see the point.”

Black nodded.

“I get it. It’s the same with me. I wouldn’t have gone even if this whole thing with Noble hadn’t happened. In times like this someone has to stay back and secure the base.”

It seemed that, despite the approaching lights out, Black wasn’t in any hurry to leave. He was, if anything, open for a discussion. Or maybe it was just that his leg hurt and he was simply resting it. I decided to go for it and clear up some things that had been bothering me ever since that talk with Sphinx.

“I’m sorry if this is not a comfortable topic,” I said, “but why is it that Sphinx dislikes you so much?”

Black choked on the smoke.

“Sorry!” I repeated hurriedly. “It’s just that the impression I got—”

“It’s not an impression,” he interrupted. “And that’s a mild way of putting it. It’s not just that he doesn’t like me. He hates me. But generally that wouldn’t be any of your business, agreed?”

“Sorry,” I mumbled again. “Of course it isn’t.”

Black disgustedly crushed the cigarette stub against the ashtray.

“When Sphinx first got to the House, I did kick him around. It’s been nine years already, but he never forgot. Good memory, for that kind of thing. He’s so cool and tough now, but back then he was a spoiled mama’s darling. Crying into his pillow every night, tailing Blind’s every step. You know, everybody’s little pet. All of them fussing around him, wiping the snot off his nose.”

I remembered the photo out of the Moby-Dick. Where I couldn’t find Sphinx. Maybe he hadn’t arrived at the House yet. Or maybe he was somewhere else, crying into his pillow, as Black put it.

“So,” Black said, shoving the ashtray back under the sofa. He bumped into something there, pulled out a pink rubber bunny, and stared at it in apparent surprise. “What was I talking about? Oh, right. It’s a long story. Everything was fine until he came in. And then it all went screwy. First he wanted a separate room. Then he wanted separate friends. And whatever he wanted, he always got. Half of my pack defected into that damn room of his. All drawn in by his pretty smile.”

Black was fiddling with the rubber bunny, regarding it thoughtfully, as if he was in fact seeing something else there in front of him.

“And ever since that time we kind of can’t stand each other. Silly, I know. I bet you’re thinking right now, ‘This is nonsense, those grown-up guys still nursing their childish grudges.’ Well, these grudges keep getting reinforced. A lot of other things get added in. And they keep adding. Like this one, with Noble. Sphinx makes it look like I doomed him to something horrible. When in fact all I did was save him. But would anybody say it like it is? Of course not, how could they? There is only one truth, and Sphinx is the one telling it. He’s the smartest here, and we’re all like nothing before him.”

“He certainly has charm,” I offered carefully.

“You should have seen him when he was nine,” Black chortled. “The shining light of the House. One smile and swoons all around. It’s not the same now. He’s been cranky lately. But he’s still got it, no question. So I’m surprised you haven’t dashed off after him to the Sepulcher, trailing smoke. Usually that’s more or less the effect he has on people.”

It wasn’t a pleasant experience, listening to what Black was saying, but in some sense I’d brought it on myself. And maybe, just maybe, there was a grain of truth in all of this.