Shades of Grey (32 page)

“That broth last night was excellent, wasn’t it?” he said.

“I’ll have to take your word for it.”

“What was for pudding?”

“Pickled onions and custard. Can I ask a question?”

“It depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“On whether you have any jam.”

“I’ve got lots,” I replied, delighted that the Apocryphal man could be bought so cheaply.

“But not any jam,” he added with a mischievous grin. “I want . . . loganberry!”

This was another matter entirely. Jam was expensive, but you could get it. Loganberry, however, was a bit like off-gamut color. It existed, but was almost impossible to get your hands on. It was the preserve of the Ultraviolets, and its manufacture was strictly controlled. The Apocryphal man saw my face fall and giggled.

“Yes, loganberry. My question-to-jam ratio is three to one. One jar, three questions. It’s a good deal.”

“One jar for five questions,” I suggested.

His face fell.

“You have loganberry?”

“Possibly.”

“Then . . . two questions and a follow-on.”

“You said three just now!”

“That was when I thought you didn’t have any.”

“Four.”

“I respect a hard bargainer,” he conceded. “Three questions, a juicy snippet and some wisdom. Final offer.”

“Okay.”

“You do have some loganberry, I take it?”

As chance would have it, I did. A jar that I’d been given many years before, just after Mother succumbed to the Mildew. I fetched it from my valise and handed it over. The Apocryphal man took the jar gratefully and, using his grubby fingers in a most revolting manner, proceeded to eat the entire pot. I watched in dismay as he devoured in a couple of minutes something that would have taken me at least six months. I stood in silence until he had scraped out the last atom of jam and licked his fingers, which were now a good deal cleaner.

“That was good,” he remarked agreeably, handing back the empty jar. “What’s the first question?”

I thought for a moment. His demi-postcode was intriguing, but there were bigger questions to ask.

“Why are you Apocryphal?”

“I’m actually a historian. Head Office always felt it would be easier to study society if those doing the studying were invisible, so that’s why I am ignored by statute. It’s just been a while, and I think I may have become muddled. But then they canceled history during one of those interminable Leapbacks, and here I am, like a cobbler in a world without feet.”

“Why did they Leapback history?” I asked.

“It was a logical extension to the deFacting,” replied the historian with a sigh, “and in a world devoted to Stasis, there’s no real need for it. After all, this week is not substantially different from last week, or next week, or a week I can remember thirty-seven years ago. Oh, no, hang on, I got married that week. Okay, the week
after
that.”

“I wasn’t in the world thirty-seven years ago,” I replied, “so it was substantially different to me.”

“What was your grandfather’s name?”

“Same as mine: Eddie.”

“And his postcode?”

“Same . . . as mine. I see what you mean. But my grandfather wasn’t me.”

“He might as well have been. In the grand scheme of things, there’s no real difference. Not to the Collective as a whole, and certainly not to Head Office.”

I pondered on this for a moment. My grandfather would have used the same furniture and lived in the same house. He would have known the same facts and wanted the same things in life. He had even looked like me. The only thing different was that he would have seen less red. I mentioned this last fact to the historian.

“Stasis, but with
circulation
. But color, you recall, has no color. You’re not
really
Red—just one soul in transition, making his spiraling way through the hive—part of the Chromatic Circle.”

He was right. The circle principle was sound and embodied in Munsell’s writings:
“Today a Purple, tomorrow a Grey,”
I quoted.
“Tomorrow a Yellow, a Blue today.”

“Simple, isn’t it? It’s not by chance the longest time anyone has been Grey is five generations.”

“In
theory,
” I said, since some families had “ovaled the circle” by being brightly hued for longer than was usual—the Oxbloods and the deMauves, the Cobalts and the Buttercups. In fact, the lack of Grey families was the chief reason for the overemployment problem—that and the lack of postcodes to reallocate.

The Apocryphal man shrugged.

“It’s only been going for five hundred years and might need some tweaking. Second question?”

“What happened to Robin Ochre?”

The Apocryphal man stared at me.

“Careful,” he said, “information can liberate but also imprisonate. Ochre was skittering right on the edge of the Rules and drew attention to himself.”

“You mean he
was
murdered?”

“They wouldn’t see it as such, and if it
was
murder, it was committed in a very pleasant way. I’ve not partaken of green myself, but I understand that if you have to go, the Green Room is an exceptionally agreeable way to do it.”

“Who murdered him?”

He shook his head and sighed deeply. “I blame myself. He had questions and I directed him toward the truth. But if you want answers in a world where hiding them is not only desirable but mandated, you have to take risks. I understand Zane is dead as well?”

“Yesterday at Vermillion. The Mildew.”

“It was as he expected,” he muttered. “Last question?”

“Are wheelbarrows made of bronze?”

The Apocryphal man raised an eyebrow.

“That’s it?”

I shrugged.

“Listen,” he said, “perhaps you don’t get it, but I was once a
historian
.

The closest thing you’ll ever get to meeting the Oracle. I can remember the days when Ford flatheads were the vehicles of choice, and Model Ts languished in museums. I’ve seen the advance of the rhododendron and the retreat of general knowledge. I’ve got more information in my head than you’ll forget in twelve lifetimes, and you ask me if wheelbarrows are made of bronze?”

“It’s been annoying me since this morning.”

The Apocryphal man tilted his head on one side and stared at me.

“Wheelbarrows aren’t made of bronze.”

“Then how did I fall on it when I trod the roadway last night? Perpetulite automatically
removes
all debris—except bronze, as far as I can see.”

“Be careful with all that dangerous
reason,
” he said after a pause. “The Collective abhors square pegs.”

“Unless the hole is
meant
to be square,” I said with a sudden erudition that surprised me, “in which case, all the round pegs are the ones that are wrong, and if the
round
hole is one that is not meant to be square, then the square ones will, no, hang on—”

“Shame,” said the historian, “and you were doing so well. Keep your head down, Edward. Those that see too much quickly find themselves seeing nothing at all.”

I didn’t really understand, but then I don’t think I was meant to.

“You’ve had your three questions. So here’s the the bonus snippet: Sally Gamboge uses Tommo for carnal relief.”

“That . . . explains quite a lot.”

“It does, doesn’t it? Being the invisible part of the Spectrum can be lonely, but one does get all the best gossip. Okay, this is the wisdom: First, time spent on reconnaissance is never wasted. Second, almost anything can be improved with the addition of bacon. And finally, there is no problem on earth that can’t be ameliorated by a hot bath and a cup of tea.”

“That’s good wisdom.”

“It was good jam. And jam is knowledge. Will you be at the Chromogentsia meeting this evening?”

I told him that I would—but as a helper and unlikely to speak.

“I always drop by. It’s quite amusing, really—and the food is generally good.”

“I’ll see you there, then.”

“No, you won’t. I’m Apocryphal, remember?”

I
sat cross-legged on the window seat and watched the evening rain. It was a cloudburst of unusual heaviness, and in the distance peals of thunder could be heard. I watched as the gutters filled, then overflowed, and the path outside turned into a stream.

I picked up a piece of paper in order to write a list of the various puzzles in the village. I planned to start with the most intractable and work my way down. I wrote “Wheelbarrow” at the top, then stopped to think. After my conversation with the Apocryphal man I had returned to where I’d tripped over the wheelbarrow the previous night. The wheelbarrow was still there, resting on the grass beside the Perpetulite. I had put it back on the roadway and timed it. The Perpetulite had taken nine minutes and forty-seven seconds to sense that the wheelbarrow was foreign, and another five minutes and twenty-two seconds to remove it. Slower than the boulders we’d seen removed on the way to Rusty Hill, but the principle was the same. The problem was, it had been dark for over half an hour by the time I walked out there, so who—or
what
placed the wheelbarrow on the Perpetulite.

“Wheelbarrow?”

It was the Colorman, and he had walked up unnoticed because of the noise of the rain outside and read over my shoulder. I started to rise, but he magnanimously indicated for me to stay seated, then asked if he could join me.

“Of course,” I said, shuffling aside to let him sit.

“Writing a list?” he asked in a friendly manner.

“My birthday list,” I explained, then started to gabble. “It’s unusual, I know, and my birthday isn’t until October. We don’t have a garden, either—not one big enough to warrant a wheelbarrow, anyway—but I thought I might make a few extra cents by hiring out garden implements—with the prefect’s permission, of course.”

“A surfeit of information often hides an untruth,” he said, with annoying clarity.

“No untruth, sir. I’ll freely confess to feeling nervous in your company.”

He nodded, and seemed to accept my explanation. “Your father said you were interested in queues.”

I told him this was so.

“Then perhaps you can reveal why I never get into the fastest queue at the cafeteria back at National Color?”

“That’s easily explained,” I replied. “Since only one queue can be the quickest, in a set of five checkouts, eighty percent of the queues will be slower than the fastest. It’s not a question of your choosing badly. It’s more that the odds are stacked against you.”

He thought about this for a moment. “So the more checkouts there are, the less chance I will have of getting into the fastest queue?”

“Absolutely,” I replied, “but conversely, if you were to reduce the number of queues to one, you would always be certain of being in the fastest.”

“I had no idea queuing could be so interesting,” he said, “nor that anyone might have invested so much thought in the matter.”

It was an ambiguous remark. It could have been either praise or criticism, but I was unsure which. I had skillfully avoided the wheelbarrow question, and now, as Jane had requested, I had to find out what he was doing here. But he had other things on his mind.

“May I ask an indelicate question?”

“I will answer it as best I can.”

“Is there anyone who can fix me up with some youknow? A Colorman’s life is a lonely one, and I spend many weeks on the road.”

The question placed me in a difficult situation. He may already have known about Tommo from the Council, and if he did, then he was simply testing my loyalty. If he didn’t and this was a sting, then I would be as guilty as Tommo. But I needed him to trust me.

“I could make inquiries on your behalf,” I replied slowly, “on account of your position, hue and kin. I would be stepping across the line as a favor, and would trust that I would not be compromised on account of it.” It had come out better than I’d imagined. It made me sound almost intelligent.

“An answer worthy of a prefect, young man. Neither yes nor no, but somewhere in the middle—and with the ball firmly back in my court.”

It was going well, and now it was my turn. “May I ask a
hypothetical
question, Your Colorfulness?” I was using an obsolete term to impress, but annoyingly, the Colorman knew it.

“I positively welcome it, young cousin—and please, call me Matthew.”

“Thank you. Just
supposing
there are two people with whom I was vaguely acquainted. One is a mid-Purple and the other an ex-light Purple, now Grey. Let us also suppose they are both young and foolish. They desire to be together, but their parents have other ideas.”

“And would these hypothetical young lovers be living, hypothetically speaking, in East Carmine?”

“I couldn’t say.”

“Ah! Go on.”

“They plan on running away, but they have nowhere to go. I was wondering whether a contact might be found in Emerald City who would be willing to employ a hardworking young couple with no questions asked.”

He smiled. “I appreciate your hypothetical concern, and give you full marks for compassion, which is certainly a trait worth cultivating. The short answer is that you should report these two for the infraction, pocket the bounty and move on with your life, happy in the knowledge that you have dutifully served the Collective.”

“And the long answer?”

The Colorman stared at me, considering the matter. “Let’s just
suppose
I have a friend in Emerald City,” he said. “Let’s also suppose that I decide to put your theoretical couple in touch with her. I should imagine that providing such a contact—hypothetically speaking—would be worth a thousand merits, in cash. Once they are there, they will have to negotiate privately with my contact. Do I make myself clear?”