Gene Wolfe - The Land Across

I was thinking about that a lot.

You will be way ahead of me on the other one. I could go back to Naala’s apartment. If she was there, I could tell her what happened and explain that Rosalee was scared of her and why. But if she was not, I was supposed to tell the cops. It was early yet, and I thought the odds that she would not be there were pretty good. So I would have to tell the cops, probably make a fool of myself, and maybe get sent back to the prison.

A third thing was that I could have ditched the whole business and gone to the American embassy, if I could have found out where it was. I did not know and Rosalee did not know, but maybe Russ knew if I could find him.

Which got me nowhere, so I went off to see Papa Iason again—if I could find him .

Like I said in the last chapter, I was planning to go back and look up Papa Iason. What stopped me was looking to my right down one of those short, crazy streets and seeing the front gate of the women’s prison. I was tired and hungry and my feet hurt, and it seemed to me that if I went there I could sit down and question a bunch of people—eight or ten, easy—and probably promote a sandwich and a cup of coffee or a beer. As far as anybody there knew, I was some kind of minor JAKA guy, and that ought to be plenty.

So I tried it. I went to the gate and said hello to the guards and told them I wanted to talk to the warden. They said it was too late. She had gone home, and the deputy warden was in charge. I said that was fine, I would talk to her, it was just routine anyway.

The deputy warden was a little skinny lady in a black dress with black hair that I would bet the rent was dyed and a face that had worn out three bodies. By the time I saw her, I had cooked up a story. I started by asking if she was familiar with Naala, a lady who was high up in JAKA, and the deputy warden said she had heard she had been here.

“I’m working for her,” I explained, “and she sent me here to do a little follow-up. We found out there’s a prisoner here who looks quite a bit like Rosalee Rathaus. This prisoner’s name is Yelena, and I’m supposed to ask her a few questions.”

I expected the deputy warden to say, “Yeah, no sweat,” or words to that effect. But she did not. Instead she looked like she had just tasted something sour. “She is in the infirmary.”

I said, “You’re kidding.”

“I do not jest. Ordinarily I do not know her. I would look up the name and so discover her full name and number. In this case I need not. She collapsed in the prisoners’ dining hall and was carried to the infirmary. She is turn blue. This I am told when I come in, and I look her up then.”

I said, “Are you sure this is the right Yelena? There must be plenty of them.”

“A scant handful, yes. More it might be. The Yelena you seek is where to sleep? Do you know?”

“Building One Twenty-four.”

“You must look here.” She pointed to her screen and I went over and looked at it. There was a picture of a blond girl who might have been a little bit younger than Rosalee. She did not look exactly like her because she did not have the cute nose or the cheek bones, but except for those they were pretty much the same type. The deputy warden pointed to a number in one of the spaces on the screen. I could not read what that space was for, but I could guess pretty easily because the number was 124.

Naturally I said I would have to go to the infirmary and ask her some questions and after that I would probably want to go to Building 124 and talk to some of the women there. I got a guide, not the same one, to take me to the infirmary. This one was a trustee and did not want to talk, which would have been super with me except that I was still hoping for certain things. So when I was sitting next to Yelena’s bed I pointed at her and said, “You! Go get me a sandwich and something to drink.”

It was magic. She hurried off without a word, and I looked down at Yelena and asked, “How are you feeling?”

She just shook her head.

So I told her, “I’m not a doctor, just a friend of Rosalee’s. You remember Rosalee?”

That got a nod.

“You look a lot like her. I bet people got the two of you mixed up sometimes.”

Another nod.

“Now I’ve got a serious question. Maybe you hated Rosalee, and if you did you don’t have to answer. Hell, you could just tell me to go off and have an intimate affair with a powdered-sugar doughnut. But if you like her, a little bit of cooperation might save her life. Do you know anybody, anybody at all, who would want to kill you?”

It brought back the head shake.

“Don’t just leave it there. Husband, ex-boyfriend, anybody. You’re really nice looking even when you’re so sick, and nice-looking girls have to tell guys to take a hike pretty often. Was there some guy who kept hanging around when you didn’t want him to? Maybe he followed you?”

That time she nodded and gave me a name, Ferenc. I asked, “Is that his first name or his last name?”

“Narkatsos.” She took time off to breathe. “Ferenc Narkatsos. He is a good man. He would not.”

“Nobody else?”

She shook her head.

“Somebody’s trying to kill Rosalee,” I told her. When I said that, I thought it was stretching things a little, but as soon as the words were out of my mouth I realized that I believed it and was probably right. “It looked to us like there was a chance he thought you were her, so I’m trying to check that out. I don’t like to pester you, and you’ve already given me one name, Ferenc Narkatsos. All right, I appreciate that very much, but I’m going to have to keep after you and try to get another one. Like maybe your boyfriend dumped some other girl and went for you? Is there a girl like that who might hold a grudge?”

“Nurse,” she said. It was more of a gasp. “Call the nurse.”

I looked around for a button or something like we would have in one of our hospitals, but I did not see anything. Finally I just went out in the hall and yelled, “Nurse!”

When I went back in, Yelena said, “Sit up. Please. I want to sit up.”

There was a crank on the bed for that. It was pretty obvious. I turned it until Yelena motioned for me to stop. Then I sat down again.

“Closer. I wish to die sitting up.”

I told her she was not going to die, she was going to get well.

When I had finished with that, she said, “I would die standing, if I could. Take my hand.”

I did.

“You are good man. I meet you so late. There are so few good men.”

We were quiet for a while after that. Then she said, “My heart jumps about and falls silent.”

And then she shook and threw her arms around and died. I heard her go and watched her eyes glaze over. I have hardly ever prayed in my whole life, but I did then. I was still praying when my guide brought my sandwich and a mug of something that was probably tea.

Here I am not going to write any more about it, okay? About leaving that place or tramping through the city asking directions or any of that shit. To tell you the truth, I hardly noticed it myself. I kept thinking about Yelena.

It was after dark before I found the rectory, but I figured that was good because a priest would probably be back home by that time. I knocked and the housekeeper opened the door and told me Papa had not come home yet. He was visiting the sick.

I said, “Maybe this is better. May I come in, please? I need to talk to you.”

She shook her head. “It is not permitted.”

“Please? I won’t hurt anything. I have to talk to Papa, and I have to talk to you, too.” I had my foot in the door, but she had not tried to shut it.

“Come closer, so the light is on your face.” I did, and she said, “You have been crying.”