Annalee was stunned. She could hear herself producing a strange nasal whining sound, but until she actually blurted ‘No!’ she had no idea she was trying to speak.
‘April Fool!’ Dave Jaspars yelped with glee. ‘Got you!’
‘You miserable fucker,’ Annalee said coldly, ‘it’s a good thing I don’t know what you look like or I’d hunt you down and show you some serious foolishness.’
‘My goodness, Mrs Wyatt,’ he said, ‘I had no idea you thought of me like that. Didn’t you know that April Fools’ is the only religious holiday we celebrate?’
‘No,’ Annalee said, smiling, ‘but it figures.’
When Elmo Cutter entered the main salon, he took the cigar out of his mouth and whistled softly. ‘Holy shit.’
Daniel thought it was a good moment to press his case for complete restoration. ‘It would be really beautiful on the river, but that’d mean getting the engine rebuilt, or maybe putting in a new one.’
‘Nope, Daniel, it ain’t gonna happen. It’s gonna serve as a stationary communication center. She’d attract way too much attention on the water.’
Exasperated, Daniel flung his arms out to indicate the salon. ‘Then why bother doing this? Any of this? Why not just make it cheap, practical, functional?’
‘Because it wouldn’t be doing it right,’ Elmo said. You could have broken a fist on his voice.
‘Is doing it halfway doing it right?’
‘In this case, yes. Shit, son, we couldn’t really afford to do this much right, and a power plant would double up the budget and make it worthless for what we have in mind.’
Daniel muttered, ‘It just makes our work seem pointless.’
Elmo dropped a meaty hand on Daniel’s shoulder. ‘Now that’s up to you, whether it’s pointless or not. Far as I’m concerned, you two did one helluva job, and before you go on bulldogging my ass about this engine and get me feeling mean, let me say thanks, okay? Now you can keep chomping if you want, or we can sit down at this fine table here and talk.’ He lifted his hand from Daniel’s shoulder and touched the polished tabletop. ‘What kinda wood is this anyhow?’
‘Walnut,’ Daniel said.
Elmo caressed it with his thick fingers. ‘That’s just plain fine.’
Annalee said, ‘A long way from that scabby old card table, isn’t it?’
‘A million miles.’ He glanced at Daniel. ‘You done chewing?’
‘If it makes any difference,’ Annalee said, ‘I agree with Daniel.’
‘It makes a difference, but it doesn’t change nothing.’
Annalee sat down. ‘Then let’s talk about something else, like the million miles between here and there and where we’re going next.’
‘That’s up to you,’ Elmo said, sitting down across from her. ‘Next month the boat here’ll be fitted out with radio equipment. There’ll be a permanent crew of about a dozen, and occasionally a full house. You’re welcome to stay on and learn some communication engineering, which is a good skill to have these days, or there’s an opening in our Waco language school if you want to learn Spanish while making sure our borders stay open to certain goods and people. There’s a communal salmon boat in Washington that could always use some extra hands; it’s got an engine, too, at least most of the time, and a crew that would have been pirates a hundred years ago. Or, if you want to learn the fine arts of printing and photography, there’s a paper house about to start production––’
‘Paper house?’ Daniel interrupted.
‘Documents. Licenses. Stuff like that.’
‘Forgeries.’ Daniel nodded.
Elmo shrugged. ‘Well, we have a lot of official seals; we just don’t have a lot of official authorization to use them.’
‘Where is this paper house,’ Annalee asked.
‘Berkeley. In California.’
‘Berkeley, California,’ Annalee repeated with a dreamy joy. ‘Credentials of identity, certificates of accomplishment. Perfect. We’ll take it.’ She looked at Daniel. ‘Assuming it’s acceptable to you.’
‘I’d like to live in a city,’ Daniel said.
‘For how long?’ she said to Elmo.
‘Till you get tired of it or it burns up – paper houses tend to do that. But the better the papers, the lower the heat.’
Annalee nodded. ‘When?’
‘Now, if you want. It’ll be another month before all the tools and materials are delivered, but the house is ready.’
‘It doesn’t need an engine, does it?’ Daniel said, but he was smiling.
Elmo grinned in return. ‘You know what they call a bulldog that knows when to let go?’
Daniel shook his head.
‘Smart.’
‘Do you know what they call a boat without an engine?’ Daniel said.
Elmo sighed. ‘Let me guess. Dumb?’
‘No. They call it a communications center.’
‘You know, I’m gonna start packing a spoon with me.’
Daniel didn’t bite.
Elmo explained anyway. ‘All the shit I have to eat on this job, I could use one.’
Annalee said, ‘As long as we’re asking questions, and since you trust us enough to run a print shop, there’s something I want to know. Where’s Shamus Malloy these days?’
‘Out at sea with a small crew of treasure hunters. That batty scientist still hasn’t showed.’
‘What sort of treasure,’ Daniel asked.
‘Silver and gold.’
Annalee smiled. ‘I bet he’s happy.’
‘Jesus,’ Elmo said, ‘let’s hope so.’
The house in Berkeley was on McKinley Street, not far from the high school. When the Helmsbro Movers (‘If we can’t truck it, fuck it,’ their typically Berkeleyan card proclaimed) delivered some ostensible furniture a month later, Annalee and Daniel found reams of blank birth certificates, drivers’ licenses from every state, draft cards, passports, and various official seals of sundry state governments and federal agencies. The small darkroom in the second-floor bathroom had been completed before their arrival, and the Multilith and platen press, flanked by a battery of typewriters, were set up in an adjoining room. After the friendly tutelage of Jason Wisk, their nominal real estate agent, they could document a new identity in half a day. Since Annalee enjoyed the camera work and embossing while Daniel was particularly fond of the printing, the labor divided itself along lines of natural interest. Jason coordinated the job orders, which were steady enough to keep them busy but not enough to be a burden. No customers came to the house; if photos were required, Annalee either worked from negatives shot elsewhere or shot them herself at Jason’s real estate office.
Because Daniel was often hassled for not being in school, he seldom left the house before 3.00 on weekdays. He usually printed till noon and read after lunch for at least a couple of hours before going out to explore Berkeley’s street life.
By mutual agreement, the nights belonged to Annalee. She was particularly taken with Dr Jamm’s Get-Down Club out on Shattuck. She quickly made friends with the musicians and artists who hung out there. Soon she was a singer and lead kazoo in a perpetually ripped aggregation known as the Random Canyon Raiders, whose repertoire included traditional, if obscure, favorites, as well as spontaneous and raucously pornographic sociopolitical polemics. The Random Canyon Raiders were devoted to high times and low art, and Annalee rediscovered a social life. She began to cut loose.
But some trajectories are immune to change: A year later, early in May, looking for a book of poems recommended by one of her Random Canyon friends, she saw Shamus Malloy standing by the chemistry section in the Berkeley Public Library. His hair was black, he was clean-shaven, and, to judge by the pinned sleeve on his jacket, he’d lost his left arm. But she was so sure it was Shamus that she browsed over beside him and tugged his empty sleeve.
Shamus closed the book he was examining and slipped it back on the shelf without acknowledging her. ‘I’ve loved you and missed you every minute for the last two years,’ he whispered, staring at the stacks, ‘and I’m afraid to look at you, afraid it won’t be you, that’ll it be some desperate hallucination, some hungry dream.’