"The Red Tie" - 5
Weekly serialisation of my short dystopian thriller.
There are individuals who — even when they are on a day’s holiday — might be tempted to drop into their office should they find themselves in close enough proximity to it. On leaving the outfitters and regaining the square, Vincent is near enough to the Ministry to be able to see the beginnings of the complex, yet he is not the sort of individual to ‘drop in’ anywhere. Had he been closer to his colleagues (emotionally that is) he might have been inclined to wander down and see who was in; but he is not made that way — and in any event, as far as he can recall, only Fran and Noah have been excluded from the bonus long-weekend. As departmental administrator, Fran is always up to her neck in paperwork, chasing progress on this book or that, liaising with printers and libraries, bookshops and other departments. Or she is running errands for Verna. She could hardly be spared. And Noah? He has been told that the deadline for the volume on which he is working has been tightened and therefore also couldn’t be spared; indeed, he might be required to work part of the weekend too. Whether Vincent found that demand more surprising than Noah he can’t possibly say. The book on which Noah is working is a textbook that has recently been upgraded to become required reading for a level-2 science examination — and now the date for the national exams have been brought forward by two weeks. Hence the pressure. When Noah found out, his reaction had been to raise his eyebrows (his favoured mode of non-verbal expression) and say “well, who would have guessed?”, as if he had known all along that something would stymie his chance for an extra day off. Aided by the use of his eyebrows, such fatalism is also part of Noah’s make-up.
Like Vincent, he had begun working in non-fiction; then, after three years, was moved into children’s books. Not having sufficient empathy or insight to be an effective controller there, he was given a chance in fiction for a short while before being moved back to non-fiction, specifically focussing on dry educational texts. It had been Noah’s post Vincent had filled when he moved into fiction.
“They can’t trust me there,” he had said to Vincent during a quiet moment in their brief handover.
“Trust?” At the time, Vincent didn’t entirely understand how trust could be relevant when it came to made-up stories. In non-fiction yes, especially as it was important to get the facts right; but in fiction?
“That’s why they want me somewhere safe like school and college books where there’s a right and wrong answer, and where opinions don’t matter.”
They had all been through copious training in relation to opinion and belief, and controllers were provided with multiple techniques for recognising and then eradicating their personal selves from the work. Their duty was to give readers the most accurate and appropriate books they could, not to insert themselves into them.
“You must have noticed,” Noah had said to him another time when they were on a coffee break, his voice lowered even though in the Ministry’s vast canteen it was almost drowned out by the clink of cutlery and thrum of background chatter.
“Noticed what?”
“All those things that aren’t in the books — especially the histories.”
“How can I notice something that isn’t there?” Vincent had laughed.
“Ah, you’ve the perfect profile to work in fiction my friend!”
*
“Hello again!”
Vincent glances up from his coffee to find Marina standing in front of him.
“I thought it was you,” she continues as she places her tray on his table.
“How did you find me?” He looks out across the throng knowing it is impossible to locate anyone in the canteen unless you had made a prior arrangement as to roughly where you would be sitting.
“Just luck,” she says cheerfully. “I happened to be a few people behind you in the queue, and then when I saw you sit down I thought I’d come over; no point us both sitting on our own. You are on your own?”
He sees her struck with a moment of doubt, suddenly worried she may have been intruding. “This morning I am. My usual canteen partner didn’t make it into work.”
“Oh?”
“Nothing untoward I’m sure. He was working on an important textbook over the weekend — there was a deadline — and so they’ve probably given him today off instead.”
“That makes sense.” Momentarily she glances down from his face to his shirt. “Did you buy a new tie?”
“A tie?”
“Yes. On Friday you told me you were shopping for a new tie. When we met in the café.”
“Did I tell you that?”
She nods.
“Well I’m afraid I didn’t. It was a wasted trip.”
“That’s a shame.” She pauses just an instant, allowing the background hum to intrude for a moment. “They didn’t have any?”
“No, it wasn’t that. The shop had some, but not as many as they used too — and just about all of them were blue.” Vincent glances around the room, trying to focus on the men; without exception they are wearing ties, and these are nearly all blue. Here and there is a hint of colour, but from the shape and style of those he can tell they are very old. He looks back to Marina; she seems to be expecting more from him. “And not just the ties. Shirts, jackets, trousers; very limited choice all of a sudden.”
Marina lifts her cup to her lips. “That must have been frustrating.”
“Frustrating? I don’t know. I was a little bit annoyed, I’ll admit that much.” Vincent tries to recall his reaction. “And confused too. I don’t understand why there’s suddenly so little choice.”
Marina takes her turn to glance around the refectory. “Don’t you think it looks smart, professional, the way people dress? Isn’t there something in uniformity that suggests — I don’t know — a common goal, a common purpose?”
He follows her eyes for a moment then, returning his gaze to her, finds she is looking at him intently.
“I don’t mean to pry,” she says. “I’m just interested. Being a woman it’s slightly different of course, though we too have our norms.”
Vincent remembers the second thing that had bothered him about his shopping expedition.
“So — being a woman — have you also found that things have suddenly got really expensive?”
“‘Things’?”
“Like shoes. I noticed how expensive shoes and boots had become — not that I was shopping for any, you understand. And books too! That was a real surprise.”
She laughs. “When was the last time you shopped?”
Vincent looks sheepish. “A while I suppose.”
“And what about food, and everyday staples?”
“Like most people I have mine delivered, the money taken straight from my salary by the Ministry.”
“I thought so.” She raises her mug again. “Well, if you’d been paying attention — and how like a man not to! — you would have noticed that everything has gradually been getting more expensive. It always does, doesn’t it? But if you go looking for boots once every year then you’re bound to notice the difference in price, aren’t you?”
He feels as if he has just been lectured. “I suppose so.”
“You didn’t wonder” — and here she lowered her voice just a little — “whether there was something ‘wrong’…” Her question trails away, partly formed.
Vincent wonders what he had thought. Hadn’t he merely been surprised? Surely it was no more than that.
“No. Of course not.”
*
“I’m afraid I have some disturbing news.” It is the afternoon and Verna is standing at the head of the Common Room delivering the weekly team update. It is a ritual with which few people actually engage, a repetitive round of Ministry messages, departmental updates, and so forth. But to begin as she does immediately suggests something different. “It’s about Noah.”
There is something theatrical about her delivery, as if the administration of a coup de grâce. Everyone is suddenly paying attention.
“Is he unwell?” comes a voice from the back — though no-one turns to see who has spoken. All eyes are fixed on Verna, looking for a response.
“He has been arrested,” she says, knowing flatness of delivery will only heighten its impact.
“Arrested! What for?” Another semi-anonymous voice asks the obvious question. This time Verna scans the back of the room to identify the speaker.
“Sedition.” Another bland punch. “After a long and not insignificant investigation it has been discovered that during his time in fiction he was planting his own ideas into the novels on which he worked, surreptitiously making suggestions, accusations against the Ministry, our work here.”
“But that’s treason.” The first voice from the back of the room again. “If found guilty…”
“Indeed,” Verna wastes no time, “and at the moment — based on what I have been told — things do not stand well with him. In fact the evidence seems overwhelming, and they expect a verdict within days. Which can only mean…” She allows her own voice to trail away, then strafes the room with her eyes.
She settles on Vincent.
“You took over from him, Vincent. He never gave you any indication as to what he had been up to? No clue? No” — a brief pause — “instruction?”
He reddens slightly at being singled out, even if he understands why she has done so.
“Nothing. Nothing at all. I’m stunned.” Yet even as he utters the words he isn’t sure he believes them. There has always been something slightly odd about Noah. “We never worked on the same books. I mean, he didn’t hand over anything to me that needed finishing.” It is the answer to a question he hasn’t been asked. He is conscious of the colour in his face.
“Exactly according to protocol. And I’m sure if he had tried to ‘involve’ you in some way, you would have reported it.”
“Yes, of course.”
If his statement is untrue it is not that he wouldn’t have reported Noah, but rather the result of a sudden and disturbing notion that he couldn’t be certain as to what he would have done.
Verna’s gaze releases him and returns to the rest of the room.
“This is, of course, another reminder of the vital work we do, the important role we play. Ours is a great responsibility, to look after and protect all those who read the books we work on. But it is a burden too, one that can weigh heavily on the weak,” her eyes are back to Vincent, “or the misguided.” She pauses, almost as if she expects to be prompted, then answers a question no-one has asked. “Our last such case was nine years ago. I know this would have been before some of you started working here, but you will probably have heard of Marcus F.” A few nods. “Although I was new here myself, I met Marcus. He was a charming and erudite man, full to the brim with knowledge and brilliance. Yet he was also tainted with revolutionary thoughts, corrupted by ideas from some of the old texts, the pre-Ministry books. Being in his presence was — quite frankly — dangerous for the young and impressionable. Noah knew him, though until recently it was assumed only tangentially. And there were others who might have fallen under his spell had he not been apprehended.”
The silence that follows contains the rest of the warning Verna needs to deliver. Then she moves on to more mundane matters.
Immediately abstracted, Vincent recalls how Noah had spoken of Marcus in hushed tones, talked him through the events when they came and removed him from the office. It had been pure theatre; deliberately so. What Vincent hadn’t told Noah in reply — indeed, had told no-one — was that he too had met Marcus.
If you can’t wait for the rest of the serialisation, you can buy a discounted copy of the book.