Dusk - Chapter 1

Dusk
Chapter I

They were pulling up strands of pond weed with forked sticks when the cars nosed around the bend of the wooded road and tensed, rumbling, before the house. Raff dropped his stick in the water as he recognized the slashed yellow and blue insignia on the car door. The door swung open, and both he and Gene cowered low in the johnboat as the first man got out of the car. Guns bristled as the men approached the front door; there were nearly twenty members of the Protectorate, from commanders to common guards. Raff heard the crack as the wooden door of the two-story house was forced open.

Next to him, Gene was starting to sit up.

“Stay down,” he whispered.

The car door opened and the first man got out. Guns bristled as the men approached the front door; there were nearly twenty members of the Protectorate, from commanders to common guards. Raff heard the crack as the wooden door of the two-story house was forced open.

The two boys glanced into each other’s stricken faces and knew what to do without saying a word. Gene lay down in the boat – he was younger, and Raff knew his friend was more afraid. As the sound of shattering glass floated from the house, Raff took the long pole from the bottom of the boat, eased it over the side, and shoved off against the bottom. Then he lay down opposite Gene and willed the boat to drift to the center of the pond. The sun was bright in his face, and the damp fabric of his trousers itched at his ankles, but he didn’t move again. The boat slid out as if it were on ice. It was quiet enough that they could hear men’s voices shouting, a high-pitched scream from Gene’s sister.

As the boat spun listlessly, Raff thought of the guards rummaging through Gene’s house, overturning desks. He pictured his mother sitting in the living room now with Gene and Mia’s parents, kept under guard. He hoped his mother had hidden the pamphlets and the membership lists she had brought. He watched a hawk spin overhead like a piece of paper.

Gene began to fret and twist in the bottom of the boat.

It’s too hot,” he said.

Raff reached over the side, wet his hand in the pond, and wiped Gene’s face, then his own. There were no yells or gunshots from the yard, so he knew nobody had seen them yet.

It was hours later when Mia called them, the sun past its zenith. Raff sat up instantly, squinting to see her standing at the far end of the pond. They had drifted clear to the opposite side, and the maple trees shaded them now; behind there was nothing but a dense forest.

She was standing stiffly, her arms clumsily crossed as if to hide fear. A lock of dark brown hair had fallen into her face, but she didn’t move it. A member of the Protectorate towered behind her, the butt of his gun propped near his boot. Raff knew what the guard carried; his mother had told him. His blue jacket was dotted with steel buttons and zippers, sealing pockets that held more steel in the form of knives, cuffs, extending batons that could break a man’s spine. Nervous, Mia bent to pull up the elementary school knee socks she wore, then stood and called again, her voice catching. Gene looked at him and they began poling their way to her side of the pond.
Gene climbed out first and ran to his sister. Raff stepped out of the johnboat and stood uncertainly as the soldier moved behind them.

“Go on, get in the house,” the guard ordered.

As the soldier herded them to the house, arms out behind the three of them in an oddly sheltering gesture, Raff remembered to tie up the boat. He turned back but Mia stopped him.

“The boat.”

“Leave it,” she said.

“But it will go out to the middle and then we can’t get to it,” he argued, pulling his sleeve away.

“Leave it. It doesn’t matter now.”

He was scared then, more than when the car doors had slammed and the sound had come across the water. They were not coming back for the boat, she was trying to say. They would never come back to the lake house, either. It had happened.

The soldier took the three of them into the house and he waited to see his mother, sitting at the table or flanked by soldiers. But the study was empty and they were left alone.

Mia leaned back in her chair and took a deep breath as if to convince them she was relaxing, not worrying. But the corners of her mouth were tight, as if she wanted to cry instead. She was twelve, twice Gene’s age.

“Mia,” Gene whimpered. “I want mother and father.”

“Shh,” she answered. “Just wait.”

Gene got up and began walking around the room, running his hand along the walnut wainscoting. After a few minutes, Mia told him to stop. He pouted and roamed to the bookshelves. Slowly he began tipping the heavy history books on their edges and letting them drop level on the shelves again with a thud.

“Father says don’t touch those,” she told him, but she didn’t get up.

Raff glanced at the books, leather-bound and rich with pre-Protectorate history. He
felt a shaky sickness in his stomach and hoped they would just take his friends’ parents and let his mother go.

“Do you know if they found the membership lists?” he whispered to Mia.

“No,” she said. “I keep hearing them knocking things around in the other room, I think they’re going through the desks.”

She was quiet a moment.

“Did anybody new visit your mother’s apartment?” she asked finally. “Back in the city?”

“No,” he answered. “Just Underground people.”

“Did she lock up when you left?”

“We come to your house every summer,” he answered. “She wouldn’t forget to lock it.”

His throat was dry and he wished he’d thought to get a drink, even from the pond. In the light from the mullioned window, dust motes spun in unpredictable patterns.
After a few minutes Gene went to the door and put his ear to the crack. His face was red in the stuffy room, his blond, curly hair smashed in a funny crown against the wooden panels. Mia watched him, twisting the blunt toe of one shoe against the rug. Gene straightened at once and said,

“They’re coming.”

He flung himself towards one of the chairs, but he couldn’t remember which one he had been in earlier. Panicked, he darted between the two and finally sat just in time. It was the wrong chair and Raff knew it didn’t matter, not really, but he felt a terrible suspense as the soldiers entered. They would know they had listened in and would do something to make them deaf or simply take them to the second story and push them out over the windowsill. His mother had told him a story about that one night when he had asked her why she stayed out so late at night.

“I’m at the meetings. You know that.”

“But I’m at home.”

“We’ll be going out to see the De Vries soon. We parents have business to attend to, and you’ll get to spend the rest of your vacation with Gene and Mia. Won’t you like that?” she asked, chucking his chin gently.

He refused to be made happy by the news. “Why are you gone all the time? You like your meetings more than me.”

She looked hurt and he felt miserably satisfied. She tucked him in tighter beneath the cotton sheet.

“There’s nothing I care about more than you.”

“Then why – ”

“Because the world is going to be like a prison, soon. Our world. Where we live.”

She sighed, looking at the narrow window of their apartment. The moonlight was bright, and the light struck her face and throat like a stroke of white paint.

“Did anyone at the edu-fac talk about the Handley Arrests?”

He shook his head, disappointed. She was avoiding his question, going off on one of her stories that only distracted him from what he had asked.

“The Protectorate,” she said, the word coming out with a vague sneer, an undertone of contempt, “found out about this cult. It was a lot of nonsense, but they weren’t hurting anyone.”

In spite of himself, Raff was interested. She didn’t use easy words when she spoke to him, like the edu-fac women did, or like grown-ups did when they realized a child was listening. She used the same language she did when speaking with adults.

“The Protectorate said they were doing irreparable – ”

“What’s that mean?”

“It means it can’t be fixed. Irreparable harm to the children’s minds, and they went in to take the children away. The parents fought back with baseball bats; they let the dogs loose. The Protectorate drove them up to the fourteenth story of this commune building with tear gas, and they shoved them out the windows, one by one.”

“Everyone?”

“All the adults.”

Did they pile up? he nearly asked, but although he was genuinely curious and not making a sick joke, he knew his mother wouldn’t see it that way. Instead he asked,

“What does that have to do with – ”

"That’s why I go to meetings. That’s why I do the underground work. So you don’t grow up in that kind of world.”

She left the room and he heard the faucet running for a few moments. He had clutched the edge of the sheet and listened to the door close. They lived on the third floor of the apartment. It was a long way down.

He thought of it now, watching two guards move into position on either side of the door. With their rifles strapped across their backs, their heavy buckled boots clinking as they moved, they could do irreparable harm.

They took him first, walking him to the living room, where the unused fireplace still held the ashes of last winter’s fires. A squad of Protectorate men stood or sat in the room, the yellow and blue collars of their jackets marking them as high-level soldiers. One of them had a stiff knee that didn’t bend quite right when he approached.

“Have a seat,” he said, as if in kindness.

Raff knew not to believe the friendly look; his mother had told him again and again that no Protectorate guard could be trusted. He avoided the man’s gaze, staring instead at the two porcelain figurines on the mantle. It was a man and woman, painted blue and white, molded in a fluid dance.

The man knelt in front of him and said,

“I’m Sherman Welck. We’re just here to make sure things go smoothly for you – for your friends.”

Raff didn’t answer, looking down at the floor.

“And you’re Raff, right?”

Welck didn’t wait for an answer, but asked,

“So what does your mother do for a living?”

He was silent. The other guard stalked over suddenly, his face pinched with anger. He reached into his jacket for something and Raff jumped, shrinking lower in the chair. Welck barked at the other guard to get back to his post.

“What does your mother do for a living?” Welck asked again, quieter this time, more serious.

The room was silent for a few minutes. Raff didn’t speak; he glanced at the aggressive guard and saw his hand resting lightly on the coiled strip of leather he wore at his hip. It became clear that none of them were going to say anything more until he answered.

“She cleans,” Raff said warily, looking from the kneeling commander to the other guard.

“Ah, good boy,” Welck said, seemingly pleased by this trivial information. “And does she have a lot of friends that she cleans for?”

Raff felt he was in a dangerous spot.

“I don’t know,” he answered.

“Come on, Raff. You’ve been there when she has her card nights – when the apartment is swarming with people. Who comes? Do you know them? Where do they live?”

“I don’t know.”

Welck stood up suddenly.

“You’re a smart kid,” he said. “You’ve never met any of these people?”

“I don’t know their names.” He paused a moment. “She sends me to bed early when they play cards.”

Welck leaned down into his face.

“Who comes to the meetings?” he asked.

Raff broke the gaze, studying his knees. The other guard sighed heavily.

“General Welck.”

“What?” Welck snapped, straightening up.

“With kids like him, it’s best to show them who’s in charge.”

Raff looked up, hoping to see the same look of benevolence he had seen before. Welck raised one gray eyebrow at him.

“Is that true?” he asked.

Raff didn’t know what to say. The other guard had left his post again and was standing right beside him. From the corner of his eye, Raff saw a hand flash towards him. He whimpered as the guard gripped his ear, leaning his head toward the man to ease the pull.

“But you do know Mrs. Shipton,” Welck said, kneeling in front of him again and looking into his face. “She’s old, kind of heavy – right?”

Raff didn’t answer for a moment and the guard twisted his ear.

“Yes,” he said, tears springing to his eyes.

“And does she come to the meeting but not play cards?”

“She leaves before the meeting,” Raff answered at once, feeling the fingers tightening on his ear again.

At once he realized what he had admitted – that there were meetings. He tried to pull away but the guard gave his ear a wrench. An involuntary cry of pain broke from his lips.

“Alright, that’s enough,” Welck said in anger, and the guard let go of him.

Raff kept his head down.

“He’s nine years old,” Welck said in disgust. “Get out of here, lieutenant.”

Raff rubbed his ear, choking back tears. The general put a hand on his shoulder and he stiffened.

“You know things will be easier for all of you if you work with us.”

Raff glared at him, but when Welck began hammering him with questions he could not even think of how to lie. His mother was upstairs and he was telling too much, admitting to things even though he wasn’t sure of the meaning of Welck’s words. At last a young guard took him back to the study, collecting Gene for his turn. Raff didn’t make it to the chair, dropping to the floor instead. The door closed and Mia slipped out of the leather chair and sat beside him.

“Are you okay?” she asked. “They didn’t hurt you?”

“No,” Raff answered. “They just asked me about Mom, and about your parents.”

She glanced sharply at the door and dropped her voice so low that he had to read her lips.

“What did you tell them?”

“Nothing,” he whispered back. “I didn’t say anything.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes, Raff hoping that he really hadn’t said anything that would get them in trouble. She was biting a hangnail, tearing at it. He was to old to be afraid, but if Mia was worried then he could be worried, too.

“Where’s Mom?” he whispered. “What happened up here?”

She shook her head. “I was in the kitchen and I heard them break open the front door. Your mother and my parents were both upstairs, but they were already in the house before I could warn them.”

“Did you see your parents yet?” he asked, half afraid that the three adults were now lying beneath the back window, broken limbs positioned with puzzling variety.

“No.”

The door opened with a bang this time. Gene came in looking even redder than before, and didn’t try to hide that he had been crying. He twisted away from the young guard and dropped to the floor with the other two, grabbing Mia around the shoulders. The guard stalked into the room behind him.

“They said we’ll go to a holding-fac,” Gene wailed. “If we don’t start answering them like they want.”

“They can’t send us there,” she replied, looking at the young guard with a stone face. “It’s against the law without evidence.”

He scowled back. “We are the law. Come on, you’re next.”

“There’s nothing to tell,” she replied.

The man stomped over and stopped, looming above them.

“You might scare them,” she said, “but you don’t scare me.”

She scrambled to her feet, furious now, crossing her arms. Toe to toe, they gave the
illusion of being nearly the same height from Raff’s perspective from the floor. The guard said nothing else, seizing her by the arm and stalking out the door, pausing only to slam it behind him.

Gene had gotten over his crying spell and was brooding over a crack in the wood flooring. After a while, he said,

“I’m hungry. Aren’t you?”

It was long past suppertime. Raff wondered if they were going to be there all night with nothing to eat or drink.

“A little,” he admitted.


Even the long light of the summer day had begun to fade by the time the guards brought Mia back. The two boys looked at her and then looked at their shoes, or at the floor, because she had been crying. Her eyes were dry, though, and she sat with them on the floor. After the Protectorate had left them alone again, she told them not to be scared.

Gene cast a glance at the door. “Aren’t they going to send us – ”

“No,” she answered. “They can’t. But Mom and Dad – and your mom, Raff – they’re going to take in for investigation.”

Raff was silent, struck by the news as solidly as if a clod of clay had hit him in the chest.

“Where will we go?” he asked after a long while.

Mia shrugged one shoulder, as if that was unimportant.

“As long as they don’t take us, I’d be glad to live on the street,” she replied.

“That doesn’t have to happen,” a voice said as the door swung open softly.

It was Welck. The crinkles at his eyes lay nearly flat at the moment, but they proved that he did smile sometimes; the younger guards seemed to wear the expressions of professional boxers, stoic when getting or giving vicious blows. Welck looked like he was somebody’s uncle, someone who could have been nice if he hadn’t been part of the Protectorate. The three children stood at once, facing a common enemy on their feet.

“What do you mean?” Mia asked.

“Let’s take a ride and discuss that,” he answered. “I’m assigned to your cases.”

He offered his hand but Mia didn’t take it.

“Nothing’s going to happen to you,” he said, “as long as you just come along and don’t make a fuss.”

She looked at Raff, then at the guards who were standing in the doorway. One of them came in and went behind the children. Raff glanced at her face, and saw that she was pale and about to cry.

“We’ll go,” she said, telling the two boys rather than Welck.

Gene tried to hang back, but she was already following Welck out the door and down the hall. They went outside; the cicadas were riotous in the trees ringing the yard, and there were ducks scudding to their resting places on the lake’s ruffled surface. The cars were all still there, and the men with guns stood, pointing at them. No, past them, at something else. Raff looked over his shoulder and saw Mia’s parents, and off by herself, his mother. They were standing near the boat shed, where the johnboat would have been.

In the dusk, Raff saw her, hands folded calmly against her skirt. Her hair was in a braid over her head and she wore the double length of scarlet ribbon that hung six inches from the waistband of her skirt. It looked like a mere decoration, but he knew better. It was a symbol of the fight, she had told him. But you must never tell anyone. If they’re on our side, they’ll know and they don’t need to be told. If they’re not on our side, they must not know. He wondered if they knew now.

His mother looked up at him and lifted one hand. He replied in kind, and felt a tightening of fear, not for himself this time, but for her.

Welck was walking in front of them, still talking as he led them between the Protectorate line, eight strong and all with guns held at a taut angle to the ground. At the car, the three of them hesitated by common impulse. Nobody wanted to get in the car; even Gene hung back, one hand on Mia’s elbow.

Raff was the first into the car, slipping into the velvety leather seat. Mia and Gene followed him and Welck got up front. The driver was the rude Protectorate guard who had escorted Gene and Mia to the den.

“We’re finding a place for you to stay,” Welck said. “Calls have been made. Two good couples are going to host you for… an indefinite period of time.”

“Where?” Mia asked.

But the car had started to pull smoothly from the driveway, and Raff twisted around in his seat to look at his mother. Her shape was limned by the gentle glow of summer dusk, and as he watched she became less distinct until she faded completely, smoothed into an old photograph, flattened against the boathouse until the dim light was gone altogether, and with it his mother.