[Original Novel] Not Long Now, Part 5

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They all kept a close, seemingly disturbed eye on me for a while. Agnes was polite enough that it was difficult to accurately gauge how severe my transgression was. I determined to study their ways more closely in the coming week, so as to avoid any similar blunders going forward.

In time, they lost interest in me and I began to detect a sort of jovial camaraderie among them. A rhythm developed as we all worked together to complete our shared task. Each of us knew just which part of it we were assigned to perform and who to hand it off to next.

It is sort of beautiful when you get a ‘flow’ going. Like all the parts of an engine moving synchronously, for however long it lasts. Life becomes unusually simple. The hundreds of things you must normally stay on top of to be considered competent are suddenly reduced to just one, or a few.

The lifting of this burden was something I found curiously joyful, and soon I invested myself fully in the task at hand. I felt sincerely satisfied to perform it as efficiently as I could, one small cog doing its part amidst a larger assembly of spinning gears.

It was finished in no time to my astonishment, and I may even have skipped on my way back to my room. Aside from my misstep earlier, I felt I was starting to fit in. To understand what my life here would be, rather than viewing it all as a tourist might.

What a prospect. No longer will I be a begrudgingly tolerated stowaway! The dismal life of a kitchen mouse. Here, I might actually make friends. At least I might be of some use to somebody! There was a lingering warm feeling, that of belonging to something larger than yourself.

Yet despite my invigorated state, some unnamed thing troubled me. Tucked away in the back of my brain, a faint little voice insisting something’s not right. Something to do with the rules, with Alice. With the way that they talk, their mannerisms, and mechanistic way of life.

I buried it more deeply. That’s the last thing I need right now. Surely it’s enough to let a good thing be a good thing, without dissecting it to scrutinize its insides? In spite of whatever vague sliver of all this feels wrong, the rest of it feels unexpectedly right.

All I have to do in order to avoid ruining the good hand life’s finally dealt me is to mind my station. What a simple, wise rule that is. I contemplated it as I lay on my bed, recalling the recitation of rules over dinner.

Sleep did not come easily though. The longer I lay, the harder my mind worked. Trying to piece it all together, wrestling with the persistent feeling that there was something I missed. Gears turning, chugging away, my thoughts slowly swirling about like the formative stages of a hurricane.

I recalled the letter I meant to read before the interruption of dinner, pulling it free from between the brittle pages. It consisted of fine red paper with elaborate inked designs in the corners, fastened shut with a wax seal rather than the usual adhesive.

For the first time I wondered whether I might be invading someone’s privacy by reading these. Not Grandfather’s, certainly, but that of a living person. An insignificant transgression I decided, my guilt easily overpowered by ravenous curiosity.

“In reply to your letter dated the fifteenth of October, it is my pleasure to have met someone with your considerable experience in this area. I, too, have on occasion tarried here and there in the world of limited run, exclusive items targeted at the boutique crowd.

You may recall four years ago, I built and sold a series of twelve original automobiles with cutting edge hybrid petrol electric drivetrains, each boasting a hand crafted one of a kind chassis, interior and exterior designed by the unnaturally talented Hermann Strauss.

Just the latest in a long line of brief but profitable distractions I have found necessary to fund the orphanage, my magnum opus. I am, now more than ever, bombarded by letters from journalists requesting information about it.

I fear if they could see the big picture, what I hope to accomplish in this world with the completion of the orphanage, they would recoil. For that is the typical reaction the public has to something so grand as to exceed their comprehension.

I compared it to the reaction an ant might have as it crawls across your shoe, were it intelligent enough to suddenly grasp what shoes are, what sort of creature wears them, and how it relates to our species.

You no doubt relate, as your line of work often sees your involvement in the procurement of delicacies, curios and all manner of exquisite items that might confuse, repulse or outrage laymen whose palettes are after all limited to what they can afford.

Such a person might spit out caviar, wondering why on earth anybody might wish to eat fish eggs rather than the fish itself. They might turn their nose up at fois gras, regarding as perverse the consumption of offal which, in their view, should be thrown away in the course of butchering geese.

Pearls before swine! We are, you see, very much congruent in our appreciation of unusual rarities, and the necessity of sometimes practicing that appreciation out of public view. I am only too happy to fulfill the demand for a product of such an exclusive nature, for one whose clients as are discerning as yours.

Already, the considerable financial return from the samples you so quickly found buyers for has ensured the continuation of construction for the next three months. A new batch of the product should be ready for you to pick up on the first Saturday of January. As usual it’s imperative that it be delivered with the greatest haste, as it does not keep for long.

Quality will only improve from here. The source of this urgency is well known to you, surely? I would never have engaged in such a risky, discreet venture if there were any simpler way to raise the tremendous sums I need, in a timely manner and employing as few extra pairs of hands as possible in the interest of maintaining secrecy.

I look forward to handing off the next batch, and to doing continued business with you and your clientele. It is my great fortune to have met you, and to have found an appetite of the wealthy which someone else had not yet satisfied.”

I stared at the last sentence for a time. Of course it must’ve cost a fortune to build this place. Less by far if he’d followed traditional construction methods, but then there was never any chance that he would. I suppose, even from the moment that the orphanage came into view over the hill, I took it for granted.

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