William Gibson - Spook Country

He closed his own eyes, and flew through the night, somewhere above the country he hoped was still America.

52. SCHOOL CLOTHES

M ilgrim found the housekeeper in the kitchen, where Brown had said he would be, rinsing breakfast dishes before putting them in the washer. He was a small man, in dark trousers and a crisp white jacket. Milgrim walked into the kitchen barefooted, wrapped in an oversized robe of thick burgundy terry cloth. The man looked at his feet.

“He said you’d give me a haircut,” Milgrim said.

“Sit,” the housekeeper said. Milgrim sat on a maple chair, by the matching table, and watched as the housekeeper tidied the last of the breakfast things into the washer, closed it, and turned it on.

“Any chance of some eggs?” Milgrim asked.

The housekeeper looked at him blankly, then brought out electric clippers, a comb, and a pair of scissors from a black briefcase on the white counter. He covered Milgrim in what Milgrim assumed (jam spots) had been the breakfast tablecloth, ran the comb through Milgrim’s damp hair, then began to cut it, as if he knew what he was doing. When he was done with the scissors, he used the clippers on the back and sides of Milgrim’s neck. He stepped back, considering, then used comb and scissors for a few minor adjustments. He used a napkin to swipe Milgrim’s hair clippings off the tablecloth, onto the floor. Milgrim sat there, waiting to be presented with the mirror. The man brought a broom and long-handled dustpan, and started sweeping up the hair. Milgrim stood up, thinking that there was always something sad about seeing one’s own hair on the floor, removed the tablecloth, shook it out, and put it on the table. He turned to go.

“Wait,” said the housekeeper, still sweeping. When the floor was clean again, he put his barber things back in the briefcase and brought out a yellow cloth measuring tape, a pen, and a notebook. “Take off robe,” he said. Milgrim did, glad that he hadn’t followed Brown’s orders too literally, and was wearing his underpants. The housekeeper quickly and efficiently took his measurements. “Shoe size?”

“Nine,” Milgrim told him.

“Narrow?”

“Medium.”

The housekeeper made a note of this. “Go,” he said to Milgrim, making a shooing gesture with his notebook, “go, go.”

“No breakfast?”

“Go.”

Milgrim left the kitchen, wondering where Brown might be. He looked into the office-study, where Brown had taken his whiskey the night before. It was furnished like the rest of the house, but with more dark wood and more vertical stripes. And, he saw, it had books. He stepped to the door, peered around, swiftly crossed to what he’d taken for a bookcase. It was one of those pieces where the doors of a cabinet have been covered with the leather spines of antique books. He bent, taking a closer look at the remains of these skinned volumes. No, this was a single piece of leather, molded over a wooden form shaped like the spines of individual books. There were no actual titles, or authors’ names, in the carefully faded gold stamping across these. It was a very elaborate artifact, mass-produced by artisans of one culture in vague imitation of what had once been the culture of another. He opened it. The shelf behind was empty. He quickly closed it.

In the hallway, he examined the housekeeper’s handiwork in a mirror dotted with faux age spots. Tidy. Hyperconventional. A lawyer’s haircut, or a prisoner’s.

He stood on the cool gray marble, at the foot of the slit of stairwell. He clicked his tongue quietly, imagining the sound sucked up the slit.

Where was Brown?

He went upstairs and collected the plastic garbage bag from the bathroom, along with his razor, toothbrush, and toothpaste. He went to the boy’s bedroom, where he added his underpants to the contents of the bag. Naked under the oversized robe, he removed his book from the Paul Stuart coat draped over the ladder-backed chair. He’d helped himself to the coat from the rack in a deli, shortly before Brown had found him. It hadn’t been new when he’d gotten it, already a season old, and it was past cleaning, now. He put the book on the blue desk, picked up the coat, and took it into the closet. He put it on the hanger closest to the boy’s blue blazer. “I’ve brought you a friend,” he whispered. “You don’t have to be frightened anymore.”

He closed the closet door behind him, and was picking up his book, when Brown opened the door from the hall. He looked at Milgrim’s haircut. He handed him a crisp paper bag from McDonald’s, marked by a few translucent spots of grease, picked up the garbage bag, tied a knot in its neck, and left with it.

Grease from the Egg McMuffin dripped on the robe, but Milgrim decided that that was not his problem.

In what he took to be little more than an hour, the housekeeper entered, carrying two paper shopping bags and a black vinyl hanger-bag, all marked JOS. A. BANK.

“That was quick,” Milgrim said.

“McLean,” said the housekeeper, as if that explained it. He dropped the two bags on the bed, and was turning to the closet door with the hanger-bag when Milgrim took it from him.

“Thanks,” Milgrim said.

The man turned and left.

Milgrim opened the hanger-bag and found a black, three-button jacket, wool-poly blend. He laid it on the bed, atop the hanger-bag, and started unpacking one of the shopping bags. He found two pairs of navy-blue cotton briefs, two pairs of medium-weight gray socks, a white sleeveless undershirt, two blue oxford button-downs, and a pair of dark-gray wool trousers with no belt loops, tabs and buttons at either side of the waistband. He remembered Brown having taken his belt, the first day. The other contained a shoebox. In it was a pair of rather sad rubber-soled leather oxfords, generic office-wear. Also a black leather wallet and a plain black nylon carryall.

Milgrim dressed. The shoes, which he thought visibly cheap, actually helped. They made him feel less like he was heading back to boarding school, or joining the FBI.

Brown entered, a blue and black striped tie in his hand. He was wearing a dark-gray suit and white shirt. Milgrim had never seen him in a suit before, and assumed he’d just now removed the tie. “Put this on. We’re taking your picture.” He watched while Milgrim removed his jacket and knotted the tie. He assumed ties were like belts, as far as he was concerned.

“I need an overcoat,” Milgrim said, pulling on his new jacket.

“You have one.”

“You told me to put everything in the bag.”

Brown frowned. “Where we’re going,” Brown said, “you’ll want a raincoat. Downstairs. You’re having your picture taken.”

Milgrim went downstairs, Brown behind him.

53. TO GIVE THEM THE PLEASURE

I nchmale’s cell wasn’t answering. She tried the W, and was told he was no longer there. Was he on his way? Probably. She hated the idea of missing him, although she assumed he intended to be here for a while, if he was going to be producing an album. Vancouver wasn’t that far away, and she didn’t imagine she’d be there very long.

Odile called from the Standard to ask the name of the hotel in Vancouver. She said she wanted to tell her mother, in Paris. Hollis didn’t know. She called Pamela Mainwaring.

“Where are we staying?”

“The flat. I’ve only seen pictures. All glass. Over the water.”

“Hubertus has a flat?”

“The company. No one lives there. We haven’t opened in Canada. We’re starting in Montreal, next year. Hubertus says we need to start there; he says Quebec is an imaginary country.”

“What does that mean?”

“I only work here,” said Pamela. “But we do have people in Vancouver. One of them will meet you and take you to the flat.”