Alison Lurie: The Nowhere City

“How, Chief,” Paul said. During the last month Skinner had been promoted from Assistant Chief Technical Writer to Chief Technical Writer; this had resulted in some joking with American Indian references.

“Yeah, Cattleman?”

It was company policy for employees to call each other by their first names. Fred Skinner, as if in deliberate contravention of this policy, called his friends by their last names; they called him “Skinner.”

“I’m hungry. Say.” He gestured at a disreputable object on Skinner’s immaculate desk—a dirty, creased, half-charred piece of paper. “Where’d you get that?”

“A guy in Systems found it on the road, outside the north fence.”

Paul looked closer. Most of the paper was burned black or scorched brown, but he could make out:

learning period in which practice sig

adjustment of the outputs is accomplis

improves in efficiency, that is, in fr

Hence varies with each particular real

Another legible area farther down the page was covered with equations. He frowned, puzzled.

“Outside the fence,” Skinner repeated, “‘constituting evidence of an unauthorized conveyance and/or removal of classified documents from the premises of N.R.D.C.’” Paul still looked puzzled. “Not to tax your brain, it probably blew out of the incinerator.”

“Ah.” The security system for pieces of paper at Nutting extended from birth to death. Paul was allowed to use the wastebasket in his office only for envelopes, cigarette packages, newspapers, and so on. When he wished to dispose of any classified piece of paper he had to get up from his desk, walk down the hall, and place it in the special Classified Trash Container, located in full view of Howard Leon’s office. Ordinary trash from the wastebaskets was collected by a city garbage truck; classified trash was ceremonially burned once a week. It was Fred Skinner’s job to supervise this process, which meant that he had to stand out by the incinerator every Friday afternoon and watch while two classified janitors reduced the documents to ash. “So that’s why it’s burned,” Paul said, and smiled.

“Wipe off that grin. This could mean the end of a damned important career. Mine.” Skinner did not grin himself; he grimaced. “I think Leon’s planning to get me for this.”

“To get you? But hell, he just promoted you.”

“Yeah, but he has to pin the blame somewhere. When there’s a breach of security, you have to turn in your pals if you want to save your own skin. You’ll find out.”

As usual, Paul could not be sure how serious Skinner was, or whether (behind his tough-ironic tone) he was serious at all. “So what’s going to happen now?” he asked.

“Whadayou think? Skinner is going to prepare-an-extensive-report-on-the-problem and make detailed recommendations. What’s going to happen after that is the question.”

“Maybe nothing,” suggested Paul; even his brief experience at Nutting had led him to expect this outcome. “If you make the report good and long.”

“Got any ideas?”

“Yeah; I think we should go to lunch.”

“Good idea. Let’s eat civilian.” This meant, not in the plant cafeteria.

Skinner took down his old Marine raincoat from the hook behind the door, though it was not raining. It had not rained in Mar Vista for one year and three months, as a matter of fact; but this stained and worn coat, which did not match the Esquire polish of Skinner’s other clothes, was one of his props.

Skinner and Paul passed the two obvious eating-places outside the N.R.D.C. gate, both much patronized by other employees, turned a corner, and entered the Aloha Coffee Shop, a small building set between two giant feather dusters on thirty-five-foot stems: fan palms.

Over sandwiches, they discussed what Skinner might say in his report on the burned piece of paper. “It has to be long. And we’ve got to dream up some completely new approach to the problem. Something that’ll knock them flat.” Skinner pounded the flat of his hand on the table in demonstration.

“What the hell, I’ll think of something,” he concluded in a worried tone.

“It’s all crap anyhow,” he announced a little later. “But hell, there’s crap everywhere—everywhere you go you got to eat crap—only at Nutting we really get paid for it. In the academy you make the poor bastards eat crap for nothing.”

An early bond between Paul and Fred Skinner had been that Skinner was also a former (or as he put it, renegade) college professor. He had taught English for seven years at a local university without attaining tenure, and when he left abruptly he had been followed into industry by three of his graduate students, causing some consternation (or, as he put it, a fucking big blow-up) among his former colleagues. Skinner’s resentment of “the academy” was still considerable, and he liked to express it. Paul didn’t mind that, but it irritated him when his friend insisted on personifying the enemy as “you.”

I do not do so, Paul thought now, and he looked away from Skinner down the aisle between the booths, observing the back of their waitress as she walked away from them, balancing a loaded tray with professional skill. At the end of the room she pushed the swing door open with her hand, deftly catching it against her round arm and shoulder as she turned to steady the tray. Then she gave the door a neat shove with her foot and vanished into the kitchen, under an arch of crudely painted tropical fruits and flowers.

Paul enjoyed watching this waitress. She was young, and even pretty, with a chunky but good figure under her coarse starched green and white uniform. Moreover, there was a kind of charming proficiency and directed energy in everything she did which was lacking at Nutting. Some of the secretaries in the Publications Department were pretty and some were competent, but not both. Apparently girls who were both pretty and competent were not sent to Publications, but were routed instead to Systems or Administration. The secretary who Paul and Skinner shared was neither pretty nor competent.

Paul kept his eyes on the kitchen door, and in a few moments his waitress reappeared. Again she flipped expertly round the door under the painted garlands, with a half-smile of concentration on her tanned, snub features. Not a drop spilled from the brimming glasses on the tray.

“Off in a hot dream world,” Skinner said loudly. Apparently Paul had failed to answer some question; he had not really been listening for some minutes. “Well, I’m going to get on back and get started on that report. Have fun.” He put a dollar down on the table, and went out.

Paul looked at his watch. Hardly half an hour had passed since he left the plant, so he sat on, finishing his sandwich.

“More coffee?”

“Oh yes, please.” One of the better things about Los Angeles, Paul thought, is that when you buy a cup of coffee you always get as many free refills as you want. He smiled gratefully at the waitress as she poured it. She smiled back, showing white but crooked teeth, and remarked:

“Hey, you forgot your book today.”

“That’s right,” Paul agreed.

Until last week, he had found his lunch hours at Nutting embarrassing. Though he was always welcomed in a friendly way by the other Publications Department people in the cafeteria, as soon as he sat down with them their conversation faded into inanities, for they were afraid of inadvertently mentioning some Nutting secret in front of someone who was merely Confidential, and who might (they knew about Reds in Eastern universities, after all) turn out to be a bad security risk. All except Skinner were so obviously uncomfortable with him that Paul often chose to eat alone in the Aloha Coffee Shop with a book.