Chapter 41The Card Nobody Signed

A laminated rule sheet, five rules, each followed by a line of small writing giving the time it was added.

The rule sheet hung on the wall of the climbing crew’s break room, to the left of the whiteboard. A small hole had been punched through the edge of the laminate, and a cord ran through the hole and hung on a nail. The back of the rule sheet was blank, and in one corner of the back there was a small air bubble, below the third rule. The break room sat inside the glass of the outer ring walkway, one room, its door open. The glass reflected the lights inside the room. The lights were white, three of them, in a row. On the wall by the door was a row of hooks, and on them hung two sets of charcoal-grey work clothes, both with their cuffs buttoned, their collars flat. Under the hooks stood a steel locker, its door shut, and on the door was taped a slip of paper listing what was inside: hard hats, four; safety ropes, six; carabiner, one. On the floor in the corner stood a pair of rubber boots, wet sand on the soles, the toes pointing at the door. Coils of rope were piled in the corner, and from each coil hung a small tag. The writing on the tags was in the same hand as the writing on the rule sheet, stroke by stroke, every stroke ending evenly. The rule sheet was handwritten. It had been heat-pressed when it was laminated, and a ring of fine wrinkles had come up along its edge.

On the windowsill stood a cup, upside down on a sheet of paper. At the bottom of the cup was a dried ring of tea stain, and the edge of the stain was even. Under the window was a long bench, one end of its seat worn smooth, worn by long sitting.

There was another chart on the wall, a printed one, this month’s duty roster. All the writing in the boxes had been crossed out, leaving only the dates. The dates went box by box to the end of the month, and the last box was empty.

One. A rope must be tied on to go up the tower. — Year One

Two. A rope counts as tied on only once another person has checked it. — Year One

Three. The gate of the carabiner must be screwed all the way down, and a tag with a name hung on it. — Year Two

Four. A carabiner may be opened only by the one clipped to it; someone who has checked the rope, and is not on that rope’s list, may open it for him. — Year Eleven

Five. The rope of the last person on the tower must be checked by someone not on the list before that person may come down. — Year One

The small writing on the first, second and fifth rules said Year One; on the third, Year Two; on the fourth, Year Eleven. All five rules were written by one person, and the final stroke of every word came down on the same line. At the very bottom of the rule sheet a line had been left blank for a signature. There was nothing on it.

On the counter under the whiteboard lay a duty book, white-covered, its page edges curling. The columns in the book were printed: ship number, name, entered, status, remarks. On every page the remarks column was empty. The date on the first page was eleven years old, and the writing was by hand, every stroke ending evenly. In the last few pages there was a line: LM-1-08, the name column reading the Take-the-Load-Off, the status column reading tag not removed. The line above it was LM-1-03, the status column reading outside the harbour.

The chart on the whiteboard, box by box, a number in each box, some ticked and some empty, about half and half.

The drawer was under the counter. Pulled open, it held a stack of cards. A band of white cloth was wound round the drawer’s handle, and the edge of the cloth had frayed. On the bottom board of the drawer lay a ring of dust, its edge even, untouched. Taped to the inside of the drawer was a chart, one box for each year, and the number in each box was the number of cards for that year. Every year’s number was different. Only the number for the first year had been circled. The cards were review cards, one after another, one bundle a year, held with rubber bands. On the outside of each bundle was a slip of paper, the writing on it in the same hand as the tags on the rope coils, giving the order: one, two, three, all the way to eleven. The eleven bundles were stacked together. The bottom bundle’s rubber band had gone hard, had broken once, and had been tied back together. Every bundle was a different thickness. The fourth year’s bundle was the thinnest, only a few fingers thick; the eighth year’s was the thickest, the edges of its cards frayed, leafed through by fingers many times. The slip on the top bundle was new, the edges of its letters still black.

The boxes on the card were printed: date, location, rope number, person reviewed, content, reviewer. In the person reviewed box was printed a string of digits, with no name. Every card had a signature in the reviewer box, and every signature was different. Some slanted, some were small, some were only a circle that did not close, pressed so hard the edge of the box had gone dark. Some signatures had a diagonal stroke after them as well, and the stroke dragged on into the next box.

In the bottom bundle there was one card. The location box read: outer ring walkway. The rope number box held a run of digits, the last digit circled. The content box read: Rope checked. Those words were in that hand, stroke by stroke, every stroke ending evenly. The signature in the reviewer box was the Fail-Safe’s, in the same hand as the rope coil tags and the rule sheet, only more even than those words, every stroke the same thickness, every turn stopped exactly, not a single tremor anywhere. Of all the cards in the drawer, this was the only one with that signature as reviewer. The date box gave that day eleven years ago, and across that row of digits ran a pressed groove, pressed very deep.

On the back of this card was a line of writing, unsigned. It was a stretch shorter than the fifth rule on the rule sheet, stopping at “the last person’s rope must be checked by someone not on the list”. The words added after that had been crossed out, crossed out hard, and the ink showed through on the other side of the paper. This was the draft of the fifth rule. The draft had no signature, and no date. Below the draft was a large blank space.

At the very bottom of the drawer, under that bundle, lay the original of the suspension notice. Printed paper, never folded, all four corners flat, never curled. The printed heading read: Climbing Authorisation Suspended. There was no name on the paper, only a string of digits, a licence number, the same string as in the rope number box of that card. The basis box read: Climbing Crew Review System. The body was a single line: Review not passed. Climbing not permitted from this date. In the signature box was the Fail-Safe’s handwritten signature, one word, in the same hand as the signature on the card, its strokes less even than the one on the card. The date was that day as well. The back of the paper was blank.

The climbing licence lay face down on top of the suspension notice. Its front was printed with the climbing terms, one after another, and the last of them had been struck out with a horizontal line. Turned over, the back carried a black stamp, and the stamp read “Review not passed”. The stamp had been pressed hard, and a ring of ink had seeped out round its edge. The licence’s plastic case had a crack across it, taped over with clear tape, and the edge of the tape had curled up.

A hospital visitor card was tucked behind the climbing licence. In its bottom right corner was printed a ward number, in very small type. The date was three days ago. The patient box was empty. The visitor box was empty too, the paper flat, with no mark of a pen pressed into it. Below the visitor box was one more box, marked “ID”, and there was nothing in it.

The suspension notice and that stack of cards were in the same drawer. The notice did not mention a single card, and the cards did not mention the notice. The two lay pressed together, with no divider between them, only a layer of dust.

※

Eleven years earlier, at the boatyard door. There were two concrete steps at the door, and the second had a crack in it, and a blade of grass grew in the crack. On the steps was a single footprint, left by a large rubber boot, its edges already dry. The door was iron, painted over many times, and on the frame was a patch, white, newer than the frame. Above the door was nailed a wooden board, its letters burnt in with a hot iron, giving the boatyard’s name and the number of the ramp. One corner of the board had broken off, showing the white wood inside.

From inside the boatyard came the sound of a saw, one stroke, a stop, then another. Under the shed lay a fishing boat, hull up, a large patch of paint gone from its bottom, showing the wood beneath. The wooden rails on the slipway had gone dark after the rain, and a layer of fine sand had collected in the gaps between them.

A man in charcoal-grey work clothes stood just inside the door, holding a sheet of paper, handing it out. His gloves were charcoal-grey, worn pale at the knuckles. The paper was printed, a photocopy, and the writing in the signature box had come out grey in the copying. It was already light, and on the ground at the door lay a ring of water not yet dry, the shadow of the door frame reflected in it. There was very little wind at the door, and the edge of the paper did not move. Ioane was twenty-two, standing below the steps, one shoelace undone. He did not tie it. He took the paper. Its edge was rough, not trimmed straight. He looked at the heading. The string of digits under the heading was the number on his climbing licence.

He folded the paper in half, then in half again, and pushed it into the back pocket of his work trousers. The mouth of the pocket was stitched with two lines of thread. He pressed it once with his palm, pressing it flat.

From that day on, his route did not go along the street at the foot of the tower. He took the lane behind the boatyard. That way took ten minutes longer, the lane was unpaved, and water pooled on it after rain.

※

Five minutes past two. The tower keeper’s right foot was still on the crossbar, and the rope had slackened by an inch. His body leaned a little forward, and the carabiner at his waist came with it, stopping inside the line, a finger’s width from it. His two hands did not move, backs turned out, hanging at his sides. Seen from outside, his chest did not rise or fall.

On the crossbar was a new scrape, its edges bright, worn there by the sole of a shoe again and again. Beside the scrape were several older ones, their colour already gone grey.

Jaewon’s left hand reached across from outside the line. His wrist passed over the white line, his palm hanging above it, and his fingers touched the body of the carabiner. The metal was cold, its surface beaded with fine drops of water. His feet did not cross the line. The violet markings on the back of his left hand shone in the white light, line after line, moving as his fingers bent. His shoulders rose and fell, breath after breath, some long, some short.

His forefinger lifted the tape at the join first. The edge of the tape curled up, and it came away turn by turn, unwinding half a circle round the gate. The turn that came away was white, a layer of dust stuck to its back, the pressed marks in rows, all the same depth. At the end, the last piece came free of the gate and fell onto the steel plate, face up. As it tore there was a faint, thin sound, the dust between the tape and the gate being torn apart.

There was no tape on the gate now. A fine gap showed on the front of the gate, the gap between the gate and the body of the carabiner. In the gap was a little white paint, rubbed in when the gate had closed.

His thumb pressed on the locking sleeve. To the left. The threads, bitten in hard, moved, loosened one turn, then another. On the edge of the locking sleeve was a worn bright patch, where a thumb usually pressed, worn to a shine, the edge of the shine even. On the side of the locking sleeve was a line of tiny writing, very small, scratched on with the point of a needle, below the worn bright patch. Along the spine of the carabiner ran a narrow groove, pressed in by the rope year after year.

The gate opened. A very faint sound.

The carabiner’s gate stood open, its nose drawn back against the frame, showing a length of bright steel. The rope, with its figure-eight knot, slipped out of the mouth of the carabiner. The three white marks dropped one by one onto the steel plate. The rope’s shadow moved once, then was still. The tail of the rope spread out on the steel plate, the two bands of white thread whipped round its end still there, the sheath whole, not fuzzed, its colour grey, an even grey. The drops of water on the line rolled off one by one into the seams of the steel plate, without a sound.

The tower keeper drew a breath. The breath went down below his chest, his ribs opened, and the fabric of his clothes was pushed out. Once it was drawn in, his chest stayed there.

He came down off the crossbar, his right foot on the steel plate. His left foot followed and stepped across the line. A small piece of the line’s white paint was scuffed off by his sole, the edge of the scuff even. On that steel plate there had been only Jaewon’s footprints before, two of them, left when Jaewon came to stand at the line, the toes pointing at the line. The tower keeper came to stand beside those two footprints, his toes pointing at the line as well.

The Fail-Safe: “Please go down first.”

Once the words went out, they travelled round between the posts of the railing before they came back. The tower keeper’s voice had an echo. That ring of echo bounced back off the posts one by one, eleven posts, eleven times.

※

At seven minutes past two, the clouds parted to either side. They parted very slowly, at first a gap, black showing through it, the edges of the gap white. The gap grew wider and wider, and the top of the tower came into view.

The tower stood whole at the edge of the harbour, from base to top. The base was white, ringed with lights, the lights evenly spaced. The door of the base was shut, and on its frame was stuck a sheet of paper, soaked soft by the damp, its words all run, leaving only the topmost word, “Please”. The glass on the body of the tower rose storey by storey, silver-grey, reflecting the water of the harbour, reflecting the lights on the far shore, and the reflected lights were all broken. The cone narrowed all the way up, narrowing into the mast. The mast reached above the clouds. The tower’s full height was three hundred and twenty-eight metres, and all of it was in the picture. The cone’s lights came on level by level, up to the top. The beacon light at the tip of the mast flashed every few seconds. While it was out, the tip of the mast was black. After a while, it lit again.

The water of the harbour was moving. On the lowest ring of wet stones the water began to climb, and climbed a finger’s width. The cranes on the far shore stood still, in a row, all of them tall, and the arm of one moved once and stopped again. In the buildings on the far shore, three windows were lit, each in a different place, one at the top, two lower down. The car lights on the streets were still a string, and the string broke off where it went over the hill. The people in the street did not look up. They walked with their heads down, or stood at the roadside with their heads down. The lighthouse at one corner of the port turned its light this way, and it was bright. Once it turned away, only a little white was left.

The edges of the clouds were lit by the lights, the lit edges white, moving east in clumps.

A patch of sky to the south by west was empty. That patch was greyish white, with nothing hanging in it, no cloud pressing on it. Where the disc and the opening had hung, there was no pale violet edge, no fine white ring, and no black mouth. The stars that had been twisted outside the ring were each of them straight now. The straight stars ran in rows to the edge of the sky, close together, and not one of them was slanted.

Halfway up the body of the tower, the panel stretched between two of the struts slid open. That panel was a bay door, and behind it was that very large thing. The panel gave way to a square opening, and in the opening was a row of lights, white, very small. The lights came on one by one, up to the edge of the opening. That very large, unmoving thing moved. It slid out from between the two struts, first the bow, then the bridge, then the belly, section by section, leaving the body of the tower. A little dust fell from the edge of the opening, onto the edge of the steps, and nobody went to sweep it.

The ship was whitish grey. Its hull was pieced together plate by plate, the seams grey, the seams running parallel, line by line. The bow was a wedge, tapering at the front to a chisel point. Along the belly ran a thin orange line, from bow round to stern, as thin as a single thread. At the throat of the stern a single point glowed, only one point, warm, too small for its shape to be made out. On either side of the stern was a pair of long cylinders, the front end of each sheathed in three rings, and the rings were grey. Two parallel radiator fins stood up from the stern, leaning back. Under the belly was a row of white lights, evenly spaced, unlit. The bridge was low, with several faces, its glass dark, no lights. Behind the bridge, on each side, ran a row of round windows, dark inside. On top of the bridge was a small dome.

Under the bridge a serial number was sprayed in one line: LM-1-08. The lettering was grey, one shade darker than the hull. There was no name on the ship.

A tag had hung on the side of the ship. The tag was sheet metal, with holes at its four corners, hung on a hook on the ship’s side. The tag had been taken down. The hook was empty, and the tag lay on the steps of the bay door, face down. Its back was white, with no writing. The writing on its face was pressed against the stone slab of the step, out of sight. There was only this one thing on the steps. There was nothing anywhere else.

The ship hung above the harbour. A hundred and twenty-eight metres long, water below it, the lights on the water falling on its belly, and the ship did not touch the water. The ship held still in the wind, and did not drift.

Jaewon did not board the ship, and did not walk away. He was still standing outside the line, and his left hand had come back from above the line. On his forefinger was a little white paint, rubbed on when he lifted the tape, and he did not wipe it off. The print on his back stopped half a beat behind his body. The tower keeper stood on the steel plate, his two hands hanging at his sides, backs turned out, his fingers bare. The carabiner still hung at his waist, its gate open.

※

The next day, at ten past five in the morning, Ioane read the tide table. The table was clipped inside the lid of the toolbox, its edges already soft. The first row was today’s date, followed by four times, two highs, two lows. He pressed his thumb on that row and read down it square by square. The second row was tomorrow’s, and tomorrow’s low tide was nearly fifty minutes later than today’s.

A short length of tissue was wound round the forefinger of his right hand, its edge damp, the same length he had pressed there yesterday. He turned the paper with his left hand.

The boatyard door was not locked. The key was still in the lock, turned through the second turn, not taken out. Ioane had opened the door in the night when he hauled the boat, and it had not been shut since. In the bucket by the door was half a bucket of water, and a leaf floated on it, its edge curled. Under the boatyard shed the tools hung on the wall, and the place of each one was outlined in white paint, a frame with the tool inside it. The concrete floor was grey, with an old oil stain that trailed from the door all the way to the edge of the slipway. On the slipway were the wet marks the tide had left as it went out, ring after ring, their edges even. On the stones below the slipway lay a row of white shells, all empty, their mouths all facing the same way. On the slipway stood the Old Wind, a catamaran, thirteen metres long, a coil of rope hanging on the crossbeam between her two hulls. Her hull was white, and the name on her bow had been painted over many times, its letters half faded. Wood was packed beneath her, new wood, still smelling of sawdust.

The apprentice was nineteen, with a new oil stain on his glove. His sleeves were rolled to the elbow, and on his elbow was an old graze, already scabbed. He strapped the sling to the Old Wind’s lifting point, strapped it twice, pulled it tight, and patted the sling’s buckle once. The buckle was steel, and its inner side had been worn to a bright line. Then he took his hand away and let Ioane look. The apprentice stood to one side, put both hands into his pockets, took them out again, and let them hang at his sides.

Ioane looked at the sling. The first time he looked at the buckle, the second time at the knot, the third time from the head of the strap to its tail, and from the tail back to the head. There was a thin fraying along one edge of the sling. He looked at it. The fraying was on the outer side of the sling, not on the side that took the load. He flicked the sling’s buckle. The buckle did not move. It was fastened tight.

There was nothing wrong with the knot.

When he had finished looking, he folded the tide table in half, then in half again, and clipped it back inside the lid of the toolbox. He closed the lid, and as it closed its edge struck the rim of the toolbox and made a sound.

The apprentice clipped a review card to a board and held it out. The board was wood, the clip was steel, and in the clip was a small hole with a pencil pushed through it. The boxes on the card were printed: date, location, rope number, person reviewed, content, reviewer. The date box held today’s date. The content box read: Sling, two turns, strapped. The rope number box held a run of digits. The reviewer box was empty. The back of the card was blank.

Ioane took the pencil. It was that pencil, drawn out of the hole in the clip. In the reviewer box he signed his own name. The last stroke dragged on a little way, out past the edge of the box.

Across the road, Jo’s van was parked, its window open, the light on inside. On the counter the change was stacked in a row, largest to smallest, to the end. She reached out of the window and set a cup of coffee on the rail. The notch in the lid faced the handle side. Steam rose from the notch, a thin thread, and dispersed just above the rail. The cup was paper, coated outside with a thin layer of wax, and the edge of the wax was even. The rail was wood, painted over many times, the paint shiny where hands had touched it.

Ioane crossed the road. He picked up the cup from the rail, drank the coffee down, and set the empty cup back on the rail, upside down. He did not look up.