<<< Back Table of Contents Next >>> 4 Behind the Veil Anton stood at the counter of Deb's Diner, nursing a cup of coffee as he looked out the window. He was alone in the place, watching the wet street outside without really seeing it. He'd gotten this job two days after his arrival in Portland. The diner was just down the street from his hotel. A dark-haired kid came in with a burst of activity, having said goodbye to a man in an overcoat who ambled off down the street. Through the window, Anton watched the older man's retreat. The kid sat at the counter and lit a skinny, hand-rolled cigarette. He was dapper in a corduroy jacket, hair wet from the drizzle. He had intense eyebrows that almost grew together, and fur on his upper lip. He smoked with exaggerated gestures, spilling ashes on his lapels. He was about sixteen. "Mind if I sit here a minute?" "Not personally, but the owner doesn't like people coming in without paying for something. You want a coffee maybe?" "Want to buy me one?" "Why would I do that? I work here." "I'm supposed to meet someone in ten minutes, but it's raining out." "I can see that." "I need somewhere to sit, so I won't get wet." "Look, why don't you put fifty cents on the counter. I'll pour you a coffee and you can sit." "I don't drink coffee." "It's for cosmetic purposes, get it?" "Oh, yeah. That I understand." Still, he made no effort to pull out any money. Anton decided it would be best to ignore him. He busied himself with refilling the mayonnaise tin, scraping down the grill. Suddenly the kid asked, "Say, are you new here? I ain't seen you around." "You mean you keep track?" The kid grinned. "I've got to." He gestured up the street. "You live in that hotel there, don't you? The Windsor." Anton shrugged. "For about three weeks." Anton glared at him. "You see? I told you! I know all about this town." He took a drag on his cigarette, nearly dropping it, and brushed the ashes from his coat. "You hitchhike?" "No, bus." "When I came here from Flagstaff, I hitchhiked all the way. Twelve hundred miles." Despite himself, Anton was impressed. "Oh yeah? What do—" He'd been about to ask, "What do you do?" but it was a foolish question. "Do you like it here?" he said instead. The kid shifted on his stool, a full-body shrug. "It's okay," Anton answered for him. "Yeah. I got warrants on me back home, that's why I came here." Anton perked up at the word "warrants." "They won't catch me, though. They don't know what I look like or nothing." Anton considered this. "I was reading about this guy who worked in the gas chambers back in World War Two. After the war he moved to Cleveland, where he was a car mechanic. He changed his name, and no one knew it was him for thirty years." "Yeah, see what I mean?" "Well, they found him, though." "They won't find me." There was another silence, which this time Anton broke first. "Is it a small town, where you're from?" "Not like here. This is the city. They've got a lot of bud back there, though. A lot. Fields and fields of it." "Is that what you did, grow pot?" "More than that. Stuff you don't want to know about. My dad was a coke dealer and lots of other stuff. He passed away when I was seven, so I kind of took over the business." "When you were seven!" "I tried, but there was trouble and I had to leave town." "So you came here? Hitchhiked?" "I was eleven then. I lived with my aunt for a while in Tucson." Anton shook his head. "But why Portland? Do you know people here?" The kid got off his stool and gestured for Anton to follow. "Come on. You're new here, I'll show you around." He was already at the door. "Hey, I'm working! I can't just leave when I feel like it." "Why not?" He glanced around the diner impatiently. "You can do better than this." "If I leave, I'll be fired! You know that. I'm not making much money in this job, but it keeps things together 'till I can get gigs." He bit his lip. He'd said more than he'd intended. The kid returned to the counter with a triumphant grin. "I said you can do better." Anton was furious. "Why do you care? Why are you so eager to help me, all of a sudden?" The kid leaned toward him, his eyes dark pools of sincerity. "Because it's the right thing to do—and because I can." He turned away again. At the door he shot back, "You're right, it's still too soon. You want to find your own way, and who can blame you? But don't be so sure I can't help you. Don't be so sure I don't know how. Ask people about me. Ask them, 'Kliff, is he connected? Is he someone who'll call you in the middle of the night with an idea? Or is he some junky, some dumpster diver?' You know, we're not so different maybe. You're not so innocent as you pretend, and dude!—I'm not here to waste time." The door slammed shut as Kliff vanished into the rain. Cascades of water crashed against the diner's windows and the roofs of parked cars. Low, dark clouds, frayed by the wind, moved swiftly through the streets. "Now, that's an aggressive rain," Anton thought. He went back to wiping the counter. • • • The neighborhood where he lived and worked depressed him. He felt under the weather and forgot to shave. "I'm starting to feel like a lowlife," he thought. At night after work, he went to clubs and cafes in the part of town called Zombieland, a warehouse district along the river where an alternative scene had developed in recent years. Its sense of exotic desolation appealed to the undesirables in Portland's midst, the sort who are drawn to art as to a scab that won't heal. Zombieland was a fashionable yet highly suspect place, where violent and degrading back-alley transactions added a sense of authentic danger to the cultural refinements one could sample there, like finger food at a party—designer piercings, latex undergarments, dances performed nude on small shrinelike stages, Buddhist tea rooms where poems were read. It made him feel like he was swimming in an aquarium of rare fish who must be fed ambrosia or they would die. While he was there, he became an exotic fish himself. He was pretty enough to be let in everywhere, but this life of appearances did not appeal to him. The popularity he'd enjoyed all his life was confirmed by strangers who picked him out on the street or when he entered a room, but whatever pleasure this would have given him was dampened by being a short-order cook in the city's worst diner. As Becky would have reminded him, "You've traveled two thousand miles to get a job you could have had back home." The sting of her imagined reproach made him bite his lip. He was a kid from the Midwest, a grease monkey changing tires at the local gas station, a cornfield boy with pimples and big feet. He carried this image within him as a symbol of his innocence of the city and its ways. All he knew about Portland came from his own observations, and he knew better than to trust that. "I'll bet they're tossing me curve balls all the time," he told himself. He felt that the real event was always leaving the room just as he walked in. He could tell it had been there by its afterglow, its influence on people, but the source of the fascination remained a mystery to him. He thought of the city as an infinitely complex puzzle, a series of nested spheres carved out of jade. It would always defeat his attempts to understand it. If he jumped in too soon with his conclusions, he would be reacting to surfaces rather than penetrating to the mysteries they concealed. Instead he remained off to one side, watching. One night in a bar, someone nudged his elbow and whispered, "There's Boyd Franklin of Enemy Airspace," so he shifted his head for a better look. Boyd Franklin was famous from the early hardcore days, but Anton remembered the name for another reason. At the age of eleven he'd sent the man six dollars for a tape about alien abductions and germ warfare that had never come. At the time he'd blamed his mother for intercepting the mail, but now, looking at the man, he felt he'd been unfair to her. "Here's Boyd Franklin in the flesh," he thought, "an ordinary asshole. A man who resents his bit of genius, because he has to use it to make a living. Myself, I'd love to have that privilege." The exotics and freaks of Zombieland interested him only briefly. His main reason for being there was to figure out what he could do with his music. What he found was discouraging. The talented musicians had no ambition, and the ambitious ones had no talent. Either they didn't trust their own gifts and shackled themselves with self-doubt, or they jumped into the arena before they were ready, with no idea of what to say. No one was doing the kind of raw, experimental stuff he'd hoped to find in the big city. "Maybe I'm looking in the wrong places," he told himself. "Or then again, maybe this is it." He was already tired of hearing people his own age complain they had nothing to do. "Stop whining!" he wanted to say. "Two or three committed people could make things happen in this town." But he kept those thoughts to himself. One night, he snuck into a construction site and plugged in his amp. For a couple of hours, his music vibrated through the concrete and steel skin of the building. His heart left his chest and whirled in the air before him, pulsing with an electric fire that got brighter as his playing grew in intensity. The fire started to shape itself into an arsenal of weapons—rifles, machetes, grenades—with which to demolish his foe. He armed a squadron of phantom horsemen and sent them into battle. The sight of so many young men riding off to die in his name was inspiring, even if they were just demons. In the end the fire died down, and his heart fell back into his chest. The kingdom he'd been constructing collapsed into silence, and the city's roar took back the night. • • • Kliff had been following Anton's efforts to find musicians he could work with, but he was growing impatient. "He's too arrogant for his own good. He doesn't think he's met anyone on his level, and he's right. But the ones he wants aren't hanging around Zombieland waiting for him. He's got to go looking for them. He's got to learn where they are." He figured that the best way to get Anton's attention would be to help him put together a band. What Anton needed were other musicians like himself, self-taught prodigies with nothing to lose. Maybe he would find such people on his own, but that would take time. Meanwhile, precious opportunities were being lost. Kliff felt it was his duty to step in. He went back to the diner, picking a moment when it was empty and about to close. As he went in, a bell jangled against the glass. It was a cat bell on a string that Anton had put there to warn him of customers. Each time the door opened it swung wildly back and forth, making a racket. Deb, the owner, had seemed puzzled by it at first, but she had never said anything and now it was part of the decor. Anton was busy scraping down the grill when Kliff came in. Hearing the bell, he looked up sharply. Recognizing Kliff, his frown deepened. "Are you hungry for it yet?" Kliff said with a grin. "Hungry for what?" He wiped his hands on a rag. "I'm closing now, you know." "I can see that." "Hungry for what?" "You know, the invisible world behind the veil." "What are you talking about?" "The place where dreams become real." "You mean like Disneyland?" "I'm not getting through." Pushing the hair out of his face, he jabbed a finger at Anton. "If you could cross over into the world of signs and omens, would you do it? Step behind the curtain, see how things really work? If you could strip away the lies everyone else sees, think of the time you'd save. Obstacles would vanish and you'd go straight to your goal." "You can cross over like that?" A vein throbbed at Anton's temple, a tendon in his neck tightened. "It's not that easy, you know." "I didn't say it was easy! It just makes more sense than what you're doing now." Anton returned to his work with added fury. The grease in the deep fryer was dirty, so he began to drain it. He removed the wire baskets, dropping them in the sink. He poured soap into the mop bucket and filled it with water. Kliff's voice rose over the din. "Do you like working in this rathole, Deb's Diner? I suppose you think it suits you. You'll spend the rest of your life here, right, serving these people coffee? Or do you want to play music, like you came here for?" Anton stopped what he was doing. "What difference does it make to you?" "Dude, pay attention! I'm trying to be your friend and get you out of here. So far, you haven't found the right musicians, or even a place to play. You're new here and you need help, and I know some people you should meet." Anton was listening now. "There's only a handful of musicians in this town you could work with, and most of them are busy with other things. I know the ones who'll do it, and who'll be good for you. I can get you free rehearsal space, too. Besides, I know all the cool parties, and how to get food without paying." "You're doing all this out of friendship? That's what you said." "Doesn't it seem like a friendly thing to do?" "But you don't know me. What do you get from this?" In a flash of paranoia, he wondered if Kliff had been spying on him. Has he been looking through my notebooks? Did he hear me play at the construction site? Has he been in my dreams? "All I know is, you want to start a band. You're talented, and you're not afraid to use it. You'll look good on stage, too. I keep my eyes and ears open, that's all. It's important in my line of work. As to why help you—that's what we do in this town, help each other. Maybe where you're from, they do the opposite. I've heard of that. In extreme cases, it can lead to lynching. Here in the city, we give each other a hand up." Anton could see that a kid like Kliff, who made his living on the street and knew his way around, might know a thing or two that could help his music career. Still, he was wary. "I have to be careful who I can trust. The city's a dangerous place for sheep like me." Kliff clucked his tongue. "On your own, you'll spend months or years learning what I know. You'll get there, sure, but think of the time wasted. Even if you don't believe me, what have you got to lose?" "A few hours of my precious time." He knew it wasn't much. But he was afraid of being distracted him from his true path before he even learned what it was. His instinct was to do everything for himself, so he wouldn't owe anyone any favors. Yet he enjoyed taking risks if they led to something he wanted. "I'll check out that rehearsal space you mentioned. If you know any musicians I can jam with, bring them along. To tell the truth, I've hardly played since I got here." They decided to meet outside the Windsor on his next day off. "We'll walk around a bit, I'll point things out," Kliff told him. "Bring your instrument." He left, and Anton locked the door behind him. He wanted no more intruders on this dark night. • • • They stopped in front of an industrial building that looked like those around it, except for a spraypainted mural by the entrance, stenciled markings on the sidewalk, and a pirate flag flying from an upstairs window. Kliff pummeled the door with his fist and rang the buzzer in long bursts. There was no response. It seemed like no one was home, but he rang again. Choosing a moment when no one was in the street, he yelled up to the window. Finally, someone opened the door. It was a newcomer he hadn't met, but she instantly recognized him. "Is Blake here? Cynthia?" She opened the door wide enough for them to pass. The entryway was dark and cluttered, uninviting to guests. The girl vanished down a long hallway, returning to whatever work they'd interrupted. Fortunately, Kliff knew his way around. He guided Anton up a stairway to the second floor, through a window under which a milk crate had thoughfully been placed, across a rooftop with skylights looking down, and through another window into a long, empty room they crossed together, holding hands. There was the sound of African drumming, guitar riffs and bursts of song. Finally they arrived at a place where people were gathered in their cast-off and reworked clothing, their wild and matted hair, sitting in a rough circle in the middle of the floor, drumming, juggling, playing chess, hunched over sketchpads, drawing on their shoes or passing a blown glass pipe. Someone handed Kliff the pipe. He took a hit and passed it to Anton. Anton followed his example, inhaling a cloud of fragrant smoke and passing it around the circle. "Now we're all guilty," he thought. He slipped his bass from his shoulder and set it against the wall. They moved to take their place in the circle, sitting crosslegged on the floor. "This is Anton," Kliff announced. Several among them offered their hands. "Sasha." "Emily." "Sebastian." "Blake." In the corner, a game of chess was underway on a board of painted slate. A girl with vibrant red hair wrapped in a scarf played a tune on her flute, accompanied by staccato, high-pitched drums. Blake stood up, dusted off his knees, and went in the other room. Soon he returned with an amp and a shiny black guitar. As he was setting up he nodded to Anton, indicating the amp. "There's another one in there, if you want to plug in." Anton got up. Beyond the doorway was a storeroom filled with junk and spare parts—a dismantled motorcycle engine, a pair of enormous stage lights, an ancient sound board with the guts missing. He found the amp and returned. Blake had already begun to play. He listened with one ear as he set up. Blake had a dark soul, he could tell, in contrast to his own pale fire. He seemed like the solid, slow-to-anger type, but there was a quiet eloquence in him like moonlight on a reflective pool. His look blended Jimi Hendrix and the Velvet Underground. His raven-black hair fell in waves past his shoulders. His black T-shirt and jeans were set off with shades he wore even indoors, under fluorescent light. His snakeskin boots had silver tips. Anton learned later that they had been made by his uncle, back on the ranch where he'd grown up. Blake was part Basque, part Navajo, from a small town near Bakersfield. Blake started slowly, building the song's texture layer by layer. Anton added a firm foundation, then broke into a series of arpeggios that leapt wildly from chord to chord without losing their balance. Sasha, the guy with the staccato drums, hit the accents, and the scarlet-haired girl wove through it with her flute. Blake looked over as if to say, "I didn't know you could do that with a bass, but I like it," then went off on a high-wire act of his own, scaring himself with his notes before touching down gracefully at the end of a line with a grin. "I never tried that before." "And I never tried this." Anton did something tricky and new. "But I didn't come to show off, I came to rehearse. Kliff told me he'd show me a place to play, is this it?" He took a look around. "It's better than what I've got now, I'll admit that. I've got nothing." Kliff liked this show of attitude. Anton didn't wait for permission, he stepped in and took charge. He was no random kid from the Heartland, he was here with a job to do. That was a good tactic for someone new on the scene, if you had the talent to pull it off. Act cocky so people think you're bluffing, then follow through in a way that makes your bragging look modest. But how often could this be repeated? Each time there would be higher expectations. No matter how brilliant, no one could stay ahead of the curve forever. Anton played a riff that sounded like a helicopter's ominous approach. "Anyone want to hear a new song? Blake, would you do something like this," he demonstrated, "between here and here...and then," he demonstrated again, "this is the basic theme from there. I'm sorry to butt in like this," he apologized to the other players. "I just really want to do this song." I wish I was a priest, A man in a velvet coat, Standing on a frozen lake. I want to be a grinning skull, Hanging from a virgin's neck. I want to be crucified, Not nailed to a cross but tied there. He worked through the song with Blake, stepping him past some difficult transitions he'd devised. As a result, the session turned from an unstructured jam into a real workout. They went over certain sections three or four times until Blake, too, was satisfied with his own playing. Anton was impressed by the young guitar player with the quiet disposition and the surprising ear. Blake did more than capture his melodic ideas, he transformed them on the spot into something of his own. "Sure beats my hometown band," he thought. For his part, Blake was happy to find someone with skills to match his own, along with focus and dedication. He'd been enjoying himself until now, but he realized that it had simply been a way of killing time. "Now things will get interesting." He released an inspired, almost accidental stream of notes. The afternoon passed quickly, with continuous wine drinking, ganja smoking, and musical accompaniment from the others in the room. Through it all, Kliff lay back on his elbows, grinning and feeling pleased with himself. Once the mutual tryout was over, the contestants collapsed in exhaustion on a part of the floor that was covered with carpet and large, scattered cushions. For the first time, it occurred to Anton to look around. His eyes swiveled here and there, probing his surroundings. Although the building had been designed for industrial use, it had a lived-in feel. "What sort of place is this?" he asked Kliff. "It's a squat. Don't you have squats back in Iowa?" He'd read about squats somewhere, but had never been sure what one was. "All right, that's like...a group of people, right, a political commune?" Blake told him, "A squat is where you take over an empty building to live in. That's all." "Is that legal?" "Not exactly," Kliff said. "But it ain't exactly illegal, either. It depends on the situation. Here in this place, we got a sponsor." "So the owner lets you stay?" "Nah, we got an outside sponsor. The bottom line is, nobody's asking us to leave, and we don't pay rent." Anton shifted uneasily. "Who's involved in this?" "It's a mutual support network. We help people out, they help us out. Maybe they donate art supplies, put in a word with the building inspector, give us a writeup in the local paper. But there's more to it than that. We're the innocents in this picture. If the whole thing collapses, we just walk away. Who are we? Addicts, perverts, runaway kids. The ones deeper in will never get caught." "What do you mean, 'get caught'? Is this some kind of conspiracy?" Blake stepped in smoothly. "A squat can be a roof over your head, but it's also a community, a network with roots all over society. Some of our supporters can't be involved publicly because of their high position, and others have their own reasons to keep out of sight. Then there's the 'tourists' who hang out here because they think it's cool, but would never do anything to help us if there was trouble." Anton wondered if he was a tourist. If he started coming here to rehearse with Blake, he would be at the squat all the time. He wanted to believe that in case of trouble, he was the sort of person who would help and not run away. Kliff guessed his thoughts. "You should move in with us. We've got plenty of space, as you can see. It'll be great for us, because we can start doing shows. It'll be great for you, too, because you can quit your job and devote all your time to your music. You know what? It suits you here. It's got the freedom you need." Anton laughed. "To think I was ready to go for months or years without meeting anyone who understood what I was trying to do." He'd often dreamed of being part of a community like this, but only after a long struggle. Chased from town to town, he and his friends would sleep in sheds or under bushes until finally, like the Mormons, they were allowed to settle down together. Instead, he'd walked into a situation where he could plug in without effort. He was surprised, almost resentful, that others had gotten there before him. "If I told you we've had our eye on you since before you left Iowa," Kliff said, "would you believe me?" "Of course not!" "Well, we have known about you since you got to town. It's part of my job to keep track of new arrivals. I spotted you at the bus station, but you didn't see me. That gave me a few days in the shadows before I introduced myself. I would never have brought you here if you didn't fit the profile. You're not just anyone to us, you're someone we can use." Anton tried to object, but Kliff cut him off. "We need you, or someone like you, for the same reason you need people to hear your music. Without new blood we'll die out, just like your music will die unless it's heard. So we're in this together. You've probably noticed the world is full of scary motherfuckers these days. Our aim is to take back the territory, share it among our own." "You make it sound like a cult." "We're the opposite of a cult. If you ask people why they came here, you'll get a different answer from each one. But there's one thing we have in common. When we see something that needs doing, we don't wait to ask permission. We act. This is a free zone, and the more people involved, the bigger it gets. But not everyone likes freedom. We have to be prepared for that." The three of them were the only ones left in the room. Blake nudged Anton with his elbow and stood up. "I think dinner's on." They stretched and put away their equipment. Blake persuaded him to leave his bass in the storeroom with the other gear. "You'll be moving in soon, right?" They retraced their steps until they came to the stairway they'd used on the way in. They went up another flight and found themselves in a room dominated by a large, round table. It was made of a thick piece of wood that had split down the middle, and was patched together with wooden blocks. A door in one corner led to a small kitchen. Most of the people Anton had met earlier were there. Kliff greeted friends around the table, drawing Anton forward. Someone passed them a bottle of wine, and they each took a long swallow. Kliff put his hand on the back of Anton's neck and drew him closer. "Don't take offense," he said in a whisper. "I'm just happy is all." Grinning, he pressed his mouth to Anton's ear. "I do like you, it's true. You're a good-looking dude, you know that? More to the point, I'm glad there's someone from outside—fuck, from Iowa!—who can relate to what we're doing. That makes it all worthwhile." "It's always worthwhile. Even in Iowa." Anton was feeling a little drunk himself. He tapped Kliff's chest. "I'm cool with it, you know. It's just, everything is changing so fast for me right now, I'm beginning to lose my place. A month ago I was a small-town kid without a thought in my head, or so I thought. Then for no reason, I took the next bus out of town. And ever since I got here, I feel like everything that's happened to me is meant to happen. Like meeting you at the diner, or deciding to live in the squat. I can hang with it, sure, but it freaks me out. Honestly, it's a lot of changes." • • • Anton returned to the squat two days later with his duffelbag over his shoulder. Catching sight of the weatherbeaten facade with its pirate flag flying from the window, something tightened in his chest and he felt joy. Impulsively he put his arm around Kliff, drawing him in. "We're home!" Kliff flashed a grin, his teeth lighting up for a second. "You were right about this," Anton said, letting him go. Portland was beginning to reveal its promise. He had no regrets about leaving the hotel, or his job at the diner. Suddenly he was among musicians, artists, people with something to say. "Raised in your cage, filled with your faulty vision"—he'd seen this stenciled on a Zombieland sidewalk. False teachings were everywhere, society not to be trusted. His new companions shared this view. They would rather live as refugees within a hostile culture than give in to its illusion. A spirit of creative action drew them together. They invented their own reality, defined their own relationships. Kliff stuck two fingers in his mouth and let out a whistle. A face flashed in the window above them, then vanished. "Don't thank me yet, it's too soon." "Huh?" His expression clouded over. "Someday, you may wish you'd never started down this road." "But it's what I want." "That's why I'm helping you. But one thing leads to another." "Isn't that the point?" From inside they heard wood grating against metal, and a solid thump. The heavy beam that barred the door had been removed from its brace and set on the floor, and now the door swung open. Anton recognized Doreen, a high-spirited Southern girl he'd met on his first visit. She greeted them with paint-smeared hands. "Back so soon?" she asked him. Noticing his duffelbag, she squealed and gave him a kiss. The door swung shut, the beam was replaced. They were in cool semi-darkness, the confines of the castle. "What have you been up to?" Kliff asked her. "Painting," she said, embarrassed because it was obvious. She spoke in a Mississippi drawl, which she was afraid would make her sound stupid. "Women with long torsos and small, pointed breasts." Anton licked his lips. "I'd like to see that." "Would you now? Just come up to my studio once you're settled in." She pinched him hard on the cheek and vanished up the stairs. "Oww!" He rubbed at the smear of paint she'd left. "This way," Kliff gestured. "I found you a private room." He led Anton down a corridor along the front of the building, past a row of former offices. Turning through a doorway covered in thick plastic strips, they entered a huge room filled with winches and hoppers, conveyor belts and bins. "What is this?" Anton stopped in his tracks. "It was a coffee factory before we moved in. There's still some of the stuff around." He opened one of the hoppers and beckoned. Anton went over and peered inside, watching as he stirred the coarse brown powder with a stick. "Smells funky. It's been here for years." Anton wrinkled his nose and backed away. "They moved to Honduras, but kept this place for tax purposes. It's been sitting empty all this time." He pointed to a ladder that led to a metal catwalk. "This way." He started climbing. Anton was at the foot of the ladder when he spotted something shiny in the corner of his eye. He was looking at a group of sculptures made from copper wire and machine parts, clearly salvaged from the devices around them. They were intricate yet grotesque, human forms twisting and struggling against unseen forces, their guts visible like exposed clockworks. "They're beautiful. Who did these?" Kliff was at the top. "Oh, that's Cynthia's stuff. C'mon, I'll show you your room. You can explore later all you want." Anton handed up his duffelbag, and followed with the rest of his things. The catwalk took them to the back of the building, where they found a series of small storerooms. Boxes of papers were scattered about, along with broken-down chairs and other debris. One of the rooms showed signs of recent life. A thin mattress lay on the floor, along with piles of clothes and dirty plates. "Here?" Anton asked. Kliff shook his head and pointed up. He opened the door to a stairway at the end of the building. "This place is huge." "You'll be a little isolated up here," he said as they climbed. "If there's a raid, you'll be on your own pretty much. On the other hand, the building folds in on itself, so you're right across from the rest of us. You'll be close enough to hear the ruckus, but you can get away unnoticed. There's two escape routes—over the roof, or down these stairs to the street." At the top landing now, he threw open the door. They were in an attic room with a peaked roof and skylights, some fifty feet long. Besides some dust and cobwebs and a couple of wooden benches, it was empty. Anton's jaw snapped shut. "This is for me?" "The way things work around here is, if you can use something, it's yours—as long as you use it the way you said you would do. But if you start to slack off or not care, someone will come along and take it. Keep it in circulation, we like to say." He shuffled his feet in the dust. "It's true, though, I did save this place for you. So far, no one's even thought to look this far into the house." <<< Back Table of Contents Next >>>