XIII [PART II].

The two children speak over one another.

“He’s late—”

“No, he’s early, it just depends on the—”

“Mother, did you bring it with you or—”

“There’s an extra spot right beside grandpa!”

A hand reaches past me and sets another plate at the edge of the Table.

“I am expected,” I say.

“Yes,” says the old guard. “That is why you are here, of course.”

“No, you misunderstand me. What I mean to say is—”

Suddenly I am swooped into the air—the matriarch of the family has bundled me in her armpit. She glides a chair where I had just been standing and then sets me down upon it. A cup is placed before me.

“Will you be taking coffee,” asks the wife, already pouring.

“That won’t be—” I begin, but the cup fills.

The children continue chatting, each addressing a different matter, while the old guard massages his temples and studies the Table grain.

“—the axis is off again—”

“No, it was corrected this morning—”

“You didn’t see it, you were—”

“—pass the pitcher—no, not that pitcher!”

A utensil is set beside my plate. It is too large to hold comfortably. I mutter thanks anyway.

“You’ll find it all in order,” says the old guard distractedly. “As it should be, of course. Though you’ll admit that isn’t always enough.”

I squint down the length of the Table. The far end remains out of sight. “I really cannot stay long,” I say. “You see, I am expected—”

“Oh, hush,” says the wife. “Eat, eat, you must first eat. A man in haste loses the race. So it is said.”

“Who says that?” demands a hoarse voice from somewhere in the darkness of the Table. I crane my neck, peering towards its source. The children go silent at once.

“Now, now,” says the wife, rolling her eyes. “There are no new ways to arrange words into sentences. They—someone, somewhere—no doubt has said it.”

Chair legs scrape against the stone. Two hands strike the Table as a head breaks through the boundary of darkness. A haggard face, lined with creases and sunk in shadow, emerges panting into the flickering light. “That right? Here’s a tried and true sentence for you then: Serve me my dinner, wench.” His guttural voice reverberates through me. I shrink myself until only my eyes clear the edge of the Table.

“Father, please,” says the old guard, rubbing his eyes. “We’re in company.”

The old man does not look at him. His hands remain spread on the Table. They are broad, scarred hands, the veins throbbing audibly. Between his wrists sits an empty plate. I had not seen it a moment before. It is a tarnished brown and gives off a dull shine like the inside of a spent toilet.

“You bring a guest,” says the father, hammering his fists down once more. “And no plate?”

“He is not staying,” says the old guard.

“At Table, all are staying,” corrects the wife.

I turn at once to the guard. “I am only passing through. You see, I was just on my—”

“No one merely passes through at Meal Time,” says the wife. “Not even the Conductor himself.”

The old man lifts his bearded chin. The skin of his neck hangs in folds like bedsheets limp on a clothesline. One eye is larger than the other, or else set more deeply. He studies me with a look not of curiosity but of grievance.

“What office?” he asks.

I hesitate.

“He has no office,” says the guard.

The father gives a short, contemptuous snort.

“No office and a place set for him. That is how things are done now, is it?”

“There is no place set for him,” says the wife. “That is what I have been saying. It can be set now.”

The old man turns to me again. “If no place is set, why are you seated? Are you an uninvited guest?”

This alarms me. I drop my gaze to the hands in my lap. They are, for want of any better arrangement, tugging at my tunic. The chair beneath me is firm, so firm my bones begin to ache. Or perhaps they have always ached.

“I was… placed here,” I say at last.

“That is plain enough,” says the father.

The wife reaches across me without apology and removes the cup of coffee. “We do not waste in this house. No, we do not let it sit at room temperature.”

“I have not agreed to drink,” I say. “Nor eat.”

“No one asked you to agree!” roars the father. “And yet you remain!”

The guard shifts in his chair, massaging his temples. “Father, that’s enough. Please.”

The wife notices the look on my face. She leans over me. “Oh, not to worry, dear,” she whispers. “He gets like this whenever the soup is late.”

“I see,” I reply.

“That’s right. You needn’t concern yourself,” says the old guard. “He is bearable tonight. His spirits are high.”

At this, the father gives the guard a look of such cold impatience that I understand immediately this remark has been made before and judged unhelpful.

“What my husband means,” says the wife, “is that there is no danger. Nothing to fear. Provided no one stands abruptly.”

“I am standing!” says a voice in the dark.

“Not you,” says the wife.

A hand appears briefly in the periphery of the light beside her, takes up a crust of bread, and withdraws. I am unable to judge from that hand whether its owner is a child, an old woman, or a figment.

“You have… more children?” I venture.

“Only the two,” says the wife.

“More guests, then? More family?”

The old guard chuckles. “Only you,” he says.

The father presses both hands to the Table and begins, with visible effort, to rise. As he does I understand something I had not, namely that his chair is not at the Table’s head at all but some distance behind it, and that his leaning forward into the light had covered a span I failed to adequately gauge. He stands in place for a very long time.

“You opened the door yourself?” he says at last, making his way towards me.

“Yes.”

“And yet you required assistance.”

“I required advice.”

“That was not my question.”

“Late,” I say, lowering myself in my seat. “I was running late.”

The guard makes a small sound, as if to intervene, then thinks better of it. The wife busies herself with the butter dish, while the children whisper excitedly. Somewhere in the dark, cutlery is dropped.

The father considers me with bulging eyes. I can smell the fermented rye on his breath as he leans forward. His face alone is several times the size of my body.

“At last,” he says. “A bureaucrat.”

I hold my breath. My muscles tense as I wait for him to continue speaking, or tear me in half. Instead, he spits at my feet—a viscous tidal wave of green and yellow froth—and slowly recedes back into the darkness until I hear the chair receive him.

“No appetite,” he mutters unseen. “Only deadlines. Excuses, excuses.”

“As I have already said—” I begin weakly.

“You have had your time to speak!” he growls. “And you have overstayed your welcome!”

My feet are cold in his spit.

The wife and the guard exchange glances. “Well, yes… that’s true,” he says after a moment, as if continuing an unspoken conversation between himself and her. “The hatch is still where you remember it.”

“You are speaking to me?” I say.

He does not reply; he merely gestures vaguely behind himself, into the inky black.

“The hatch?” I repeat. “I am… not familiar with it.”

“It is like a door,” says the wife gently, “but above you. Or below you. Rather than in front of you.”

The children have resumed babbling loudly, their voices slipping between one another.

“—only when seated—”

“No, when cleared—”

“You’re thinking of the hanged man—”

I walk to the edge of the chair, sloshing through the muddy phlegm. I clasp my hands along the rim, then carefully lower myself to the ground. Glancing around, I try to take stock of my surroundings. My eyes pass over the ceiling, but it is so swallowed by shadow that I cannot determine its endpoint.

“You are not where you were the last time,” says the wife. “The hatch will not move for you. Go to it.”

Only then do I see—a square interruption in the ceiling, directly behind the guard. Its edges are clean, darker than the prevailing darkness. A ladder descends from it, though not far enough to be of any use. Still, I hurry forward.

“The rung,” I say.

“Yes,” replies the guard.

I extend my arm. My fingers close on air beneath it. “I cannot reach it.”

“Oh, this will not do,” says the wife, almost to herself. “This will not do at all.” She lifts her skirts and rushes away until she is absorbed by the black.

There is movement at once at my sides. Two towering bodies, then a third from behind, press in without announcement. Hands take hold of my limbs, my sleeves, the collar of my tunic.

“Wait,” I say. “Wait, wait.”

But the children do not wait. They lift me up, giggling all the while. Their effort, however, is uncoordinated. My left side rises first. My shoulder strikes the rigid end of the ladder, sending a sharp pain right down through my feet. My right hand shoots up to steady myself against the nearest rung. For a moment I am held at an angle that suggests I may be dropped.

“Higher!” shouts one of them. “Push higher here!”

I am righted. My second hand finds the rung; the metal is worn smooth. I draw myself up, first with my arms alone, until my feet catch—and then the hands release me.

I climb higher, then higher still.

“Mind the hatchdog,” the guard calls up. “Counterclockwise. It’s the only way back.”

Below, the Table recedes. Sounds grow indistinct. And yet I can hear the father stomping about again.

“Let go—” the wife’s voice, then lost.

“Father—” the guard begins.

“Nonsense!” comes the father’s reply, clearer than the rest. “No direction. No order.”

A sound follows. Something dense striking the Table.

“—this instant—” the guard again, thinner now.

I climb faster. My grip slips, then takes hold.

“Spineless roach!” the father says. “No authority!”

My head strikes the hatch. I steady myself. With one hand, I begin turning the hatchdog counterclockwise. It resists, then gives, then gives a bit more.

Far below, two heavy thuds followed by glass shattering.

Light breaks along the seam of the hatch. Then, with a hiss, it opens.

I peer down one last time.

Dinner, I think, has been served.