Often years were referenced in what Marina had come to call ‘Orchard Years’. The orchards were interspersed throughout the dirt farms and many of the dirt farm entries started out a new section with a reference to the trees.
On one the heading might be ‘30th Year of Oranges’ along with some location designation in one of the farms. It made sense in a way. The orange trees at that location would be there from year to year. From there the entire year for that whole dirt farm might be recorded. But when was the 30th year of the oranges?
When she had mentioned her idea of Orchard Years to the others, Greta had perked up and said that might be a good place to find out how long they had been down the silo overall. She explained that if they could collate all the orchards and all their years over the successive generations of trees, then perhaps they could count backward until they reached a point in which all the orchards started at year one.
They had all been excited and galvanized into action by the thought but after the endless books and binders and an increasing certainty that they were missing almost as much material as they had, the work had descended back into drudgery. She had found a single year that seemed promising and that was in the first year of some other olives on some other level. The entry stated that the previous trees had endured through 65 years and that the new trees planted in their stead were twelve years old when they were decanted from their growing pots.
She had flipped forward in the book until she came to the next year and her heart sank a little. It started with the trees being designated as in their thirteenth year. How old were the previous trees when they were planted? How old were the ones before them? Greta was dutifully tallying anything found by any of them in hopes of working it out anyway.
As she went through the book it was just as she thought it would be. Only there seemed to be an obsession with beets and corn in this book as they passed through one Olive Year after another. As she flipped past a mind-numbing report on the amount of beet greens that could be harvested per beet before the size of the root was affected a name caught her eye. She returned to the page and located it again.
It was a burial record. It gave the specific area of the dirt farm and the date, though not the year. It was the name and the little blurb next to it that caught her eye. It was Graham Newton and the blurb said that the body was brought for planting by Mayor Wallis Short. Graham and Wallis.
There were a lot of men named Graham and Wallis recorded in these books of the past. She had seen that herself. Most were called something else along with it, needing three names to distinguish them from the myriad others. It was usually a Graham-Scott or Wallis-Peter or something like that. It was only in the last few generations that the council passed a resolution that no more children could be named Grace, Graham or Wallis because it had become too confusing.
But this was different. This Graham’s death was recorded with an age of sixty and his profession listed as ‘Head of IT, Level 34’. That and the title of Mayor in front of the name Wallis sent a shiver of certainty up Marina’s spine. It was the delightful shiver of having found something combined with the strange feeling of having touched someone so much a part of the silo that he was almost superhuman.
When she went to call out to the others, her voice came out a tiny squeak so she cleared her throat and called, “Hey! Guys! I found something. Something good!”
The tone in her voice must have spoken more eloquently than her words because Greta looked over her shoulder in Marina’s direction. She held up the book and the look on her face caused Greta to put down her stack of papers and rise from her knees. She scattered one of her precise stacks as she turned to make her way down the row towards Marina.
“What? What is it?” asked Greta.
“You’ll never believe it unless you look.” She handed it over carefully and reverently. Though she didn’t realize it, that care more than anything alerted Greta that there was something very special.
Taylor and Piotr came around the corner and into their row just as Greta found the passage and gave a gasp of shock. Greta completely ignored the men and looked at Marina and asked, “Do you think it’s them?”
Marina shrugged but the grin on her face was huge and unmistakable. “I don’t know. You’re the expert. It sure looks like it to me, though.”
Piotr stepped around Marina, still cross-legged on the floor and asked, “For Silo’s sake, what is it?” He craned his neck to try to read over Greta’s shoulder but she was too tall and at the moment, completely absorbed in looking at the book.
“It’s a burial entry,” Marina said, a gleam in her eye. At Piotr’s ‘so-what’ expression, the gleam became a teasing one and she said, “It’s for a Graham. A head of IT. Body brought in by the Mayor, Wallis.”
Marina was gratified to see Piotr’s expression drop along with his lower jaw as his mouth fell open. His fingers plucked at the edge of the book to turn it a little and he asked, “The Graham and the Wallis?”
Greta had kept on examining the book and the entries around it while the others babbled but she looked up at them, apparently satisfied with what she found. The expectant look on the faces of her fellow searchers varied in intensity, with Piotr’s looking almost angry with impatience, Marina’s a bit smug and Taylor’s tinged with confusion. She turned the book toward the impatient Piotr and said, “I don’t know for sure if it is them.”
Marina burst out laughing as if she expected that answer but saw that Piotr had gone vaguely purple. He gritted his teeth and said, “You’ll never be sure. You could have a signed letter from him that specifically declares it and you would still find some reason not to be sure.” He stopped himself there, pursing his lips and clearly making an effort not to say anything really nasty.
The historian seemed to retreat a little into herself at his outburst. She didn’t step back or change expression or anything, but Marina sensed the retreat nonetheless. When she spoke, she sounded more distant. It was clear to Marina that Greta’s feelings were hurt. “You’re probably right. I’ve only spent my whole life training myself not to jump to conclusions so perhaps I’m a just a tad more cautious than you might like,” Greta said flatly.
Piotr deflated a little, clearly realizing his hastily spoken words had created a rift and were far ruder than he had probably intended. He handed the book off to Taylor and turned back to Greta before he said, “I apologize. That was really rude and uncalled for. I just got very excited and I’m not as…as…”
“Patient?” Marina supplied from her spot on the floor.
Piotr nodded and confirmed, “That’s it exactly. I’m not as patient as you or as patient as I need to be. I’m very sorry.” He ended with a little inclination of his head toward Greta. Just the quickest dip of the head that might have gone missed by many but Marina recognized it for what it was. It was the assenting nod of a shadow being corrected by their caster. It was a humble gesture.
Marina thought she saw the stiff stance of the historian loosen a little but if she did, it was so slight as to be indefinable. Greta said, “Let’s say nothing more about it, then.”
Taylor had stayed back a step or two from the others and studiously looked over the page in the book while the outburst was going on. As Piotr reached back for the book, Taylor didn’t give it up to his caster but instead stepped forward with it and joined the little circle of people. He said, “So what if it is them? What does that do for us? Other than it being a nifty tidbit to find out.”