Read Online The Builders by Daniel Polansky - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Daniel Polansky
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principles of mathematical purity unseen in any organic creature—that fired his imagination, that gave him a secret and delicious thrill. The conductor was the sort of creature whose wildest fantasies were filled with ledgers that balanced perfectly, and rows of clocks chiming in eternal unison.
He had signed on as a ticket-taker, a private soldier in that small army of creatures whose function was to mark paper and look at the marks on paper and mark the paper again, and sometimes, if the marks were not right, to look up from the paper and squint their bespectacled eyes (spectacles were virtually a professional requirement) and say, “Sorry, sir, but it seems your luggage was sent to Poughkeepsie and not Kalamazoo. You will receive it within eight to seventy-five business days, a business day being defined as Tuesdays and alternate Thursdays.” This last was the part the shrew liked the most.
He had fulfilled his duties faithfully, moving up the ranks from junior assistant ticket-taker to assistant ticket-taker to ticket-taker to conductor. He was never sick and never late for work. He never took time off for personal reasons, never visited an ill relative or attended a friend’s nuptials. Two years earlier, in reward for this diligent service, he had been assigned to the Antelope Limited. “A critical posting,” his supervisor had informed him, “a sign of our trust in your sagacity, your prudence, and, most importantly,” he had said, raising his eyes archly, “your discretion.”
In the years since the conductor had wondered, occasionally, why there was a massive metal door dividing the front carriage from the rest of the train, and also who lived inside said carriage, and why their presence necessitated armed guards, and finally, whether those guards were meant to ensure the safety of this precious cargo or make sure that it never left. But the conductor didn’t wonder much. Wondering wasn’t his job, after all. Whatever was going on in the front carriage, it gave him the right, in his own mind at least, to be twice as carping and cantankerous as he might otherwise have been, to scan every rider with thorough, even exaggerated, scrutiny.
Though even under normal circumstances he wouldn’t have allowed them on the train. Maybe the badger. Despite his size he seemed good-humored, with an open face and a generous smile. And the opossum, she looked harmless enough, lazy and slow as sweet molasses.
But not the salamander. The conductor didn’t like cold-bloods as a rule, and there was something about this burnt-red specimen that was particularly off-putting. No, not the salamander, and certainly not the mouse, with his nasty scar and his eye that stared at the conductor as if waiting to repay an injury.
The conductor was making his rounds before the train left the station, checking on the functionaries beneath him, ensuring that they were just the right amount of peevish, unhelpful without being aggressive. When he entered the car and saw those two sitting together, the salamander and the mouse, he made a mental note to find something wrong with their papers, or their luggage—to detect or invent a reason why it was that they needed to miss this particular train. He would be very apologetic about it, of course; he would blame it on regulations and his own superiors, sympathize with them in their misfortune, but march them back onto the platform all the same.
With this serious but secretly enjoyable task ahead of him, the conductor was waylaid by the sudden chirrup of a nearby mole. “Excuse me, sir. Excuse me!” The second time she yelled loudly, though the conductor had already been stopping. “Sir, I require your assistance, please!”
The conductor bristled. The conductor did not like being interrupted in the course of his duties, and he did not like being yelled at. He didn’t like a lot of things, truth be told. Still, a customer was a customer, and the conductor was nothing if not professional.
He had signed on as a ticket-taker, a private soldier in that small army of creatures whose function was to mark paper and look at the marks on paper and mark the paper again, and sometimes, if the marks were not right, to look up from the paper and squint their bespectacled eyes (spectacles were virtually a professional requirement) and say, “Sorry, sir, but it seems your luggage was sent to Poughkeepsie and not Kalamazoo. You will receive it within eight to seventy-five business days, a business day being defined as Tuesdays and alternate Thursdays.” This last was the part the shrew liked the most.
He had fulfilled his duties faithfully, moving up the ranks from junior assistant ticket-taker to assistant ticket-taker to ticket-taker to conductor. He was never sick and never late for work. He never took time off for personal reasons, never visited an ill relative or attended a friend’s nuptials. Two years earlier, in reward for this diligent service, he had been assigned to the Antelope Limited. “A critical posting,” his supervisor had informed him, “a sign of our trust in your sagacity, your prudence, and, most importantly,” he had said, raising his eyes archly, “your discretion.”
In the years since the conductor had wondered, occasionally, why there was a massive metal door dividing the front carriage from the rest of the train, and also who lived inside said carriage, and why their presence necessitated armed guards, and finally, whether those guards were meant to ensure the safety of this precious cargo or make sure that it never left. But the conductor didn’t wonder much. Wondering wasn’t his job, after all. Whatever was going on in the front carriage, it gave him the right, in his own mind at least, to be twice as carping and cantankerous as he might otherwise have been, to scan every rider with thorough, even exaggerated, scrutiny.
Though even under normal circumstances he wouldn’t have allowed them on the train. Maybe the badger. Despite his size he seemed good-humored, with an open face and a generous smile. And the opossum, she looked harmless enough, lazy and slow as sweet molasses.
But not the salamander. The conductor didn’t like cold-bloods as a rule, and there was something about this burnt-red specimen that was particularly off-putting. No, not the salamander, and certainly not the mouse, with his nasty scar and his eye that stared at the conductor as if waiting to repay an injury.
The conductor was making his rounds before the train left the station, checking on the functionaries beneath him, ensuring that they were just the right amount of peevish, unhelpful without being aggressive. When he entered the car and saw those two sitting together, the salamander and the mouse, he made a mental note to find something wrong with their papers, or their luggage—to detect or invent a reason why it was that they needed to miss this particular train. He would be very apologetic about it, of course; he would blame it on regulations and his own superiors, sympathize with them in their misfortune, but march them back onto the platform all the same.
With this serious but secretly enjoyable task ahead of him, the conductor was waylaid by the sudden chirrup of a nearby mole. “Excuse me, sir. Excuse me!” The second time she yelled loudly, though the conductor had already been stopping. “Sir, I require your assistance, please!”
The conductor bristled. The conductor did not like being interrupted in the course of his duties, and he did not like being yelled at. He didn’t like a lot of things, truth be told. Still, a customer was a customer, and the conductor was nothing if not professional.
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