Hearts of Oak Read online

  “What are you doing?” asked Carter, giving Iona no time to think about what she was looking at—she had to act. As per the instructions she pushed on both top corners of the hatch simultaneously and the hatch fell open.

  Carter stopped. That was the only way she could describe it—he simply stopped. He didn’t move or speak or display any awareness of anything.

  Iona walked back around to the other side of the chair, still expecting Carter to move at any moment. Her colleague sat motionless, jacket dangling from his fingers. Iona carefully extracted the jacket and hung it on the back of her own chair, then she sat back down and faced Carter again.

  Carter stared back at Iona. But he didn’t, Iona now realized, because Carter had no eyes—his head was contoured to suggest eyes but there were no eyeballs or sockets. Neither did he have a nose or ears. A slit was positioned where the mouth should be but it was a crude rendition of a mouth, narrow and almost rectangular. Carter’s features were smoothed over, like a dummy’s head.

  Iona moved her chair closer and hesitantly touched Carter’s face. Carter didn’t react. Iona traced the contours of his head. It remained entirely immobile. It was carved from a single piece of wood.

  During their acquaintance Iona was sure she had seen Carter smile, frown, sniff, raise his eyebrows—and yet she was looking into a face that could do none of these things. Had it changed when she’d opened the hatch? No, Iona realized—it was just that she was seeing him differently now that he’d stopped moving. His movements had been so human, his manner so real, she’d assumed he was a human being and some part of her mind had filled in the details, stopped her from seeing his real face. This was the face Carter had always had and she’d simply never noticed—had never really looked at him properly. Like a building you walk past every day and you think you know what the upper floors look like, then one day you actually look up and they’re completely different.

  If Carter was not, in fact, a human being—what was he?

  Carter’s wooden head sat on wooden shoulders, which in turn supported articulated wooden arms and sat atop a wooden torso. Iona examined Carter’s hands, noting that—unlike the head—each was made up of at least twenty discrete moving wooden parts. It was a very fine piece of mechanical engineering.

  Iona glanced around the room and suddenly became very aware of her open windows. Hoping nobody had seen anything untoward, she made a quick circuit and closed every shutter. Then she walked to the front door, locked it, went to the kitchen, retrieved the instruction manual, and returned to Carter. She had completed the first step and with some trepidation she supposed she should proceed with the rest. She walked around Carter’s chair again, leaned over, and peered at what lay inside the hatch: could it really be as the diagrams depicted?

  It was. Carter’s body was occupied by machinery—all made of wood. Cogs, pistons, and dozens of tiny switches. The wood was warm with recent activity and gave off a rich smell but the workings lay still. There was a clockwork mechanism that presumably powered them. She reached a hand up to her own back but felt nothing similar there. Her skin was unbroken.

  Iona consulted the instructions again. One of the diagrams was headed MOTION TEST and an arrow indicated one of the switches. Iona reached her hand inside, suppressing a churn of revulsion, and flicked the switch.

  Carter jolted and Iona jumped back, grazing her hand on the edge of the hatchway as she pulled it clear of the workings. Carter rose from the chair, stepped clear of it, and turned a full circle on the spot. Iona panicked, her mind racing through apologies and cover stories, until she realized Carter wasn’t conscious. This was a purely mechanical operation with no intelligence guiding it. Carter flexed his arms, raised his legs high, and moved his head from side to side and up and down, performing what looked like an obscure military drill. Inside the cavity in Carter’s back the cogs and pistons were in motion. Then he sat back down and returned exactly to his starting position, his hand positioned as if still holding his jacket.

  Startled, Iona waited a moment to ensure Carter had finished moving. Then she returned to the cavity in his back and consulted the instructions again. Another diagram was labeled VOICE TEST and an arrow indicated another switch. Iona operated it, noting how clean the switch felt under her fingers: these had rarely been used, if at all. Iona felt glad she didn’t have to look into Carter’s face while this happened: what she was doing felt sickeningly intimate, performed without consent.

  A sound emitted from the slit in Carter’s face. Iona recognized the sound as his voice but, as with the face, she realized she’d perceived it inaccurately until now. It didn’t sound as smooth as she’d thought: it had a broken, slightly harsh quality. “Voice test in progress,” Carter said, then he recited the first few lines of Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (a poem that was familiar to Iona even though she couldn’t think where she might have heard it before). As Iona listened to the texture of the voice she thought she detected something percussive. The diagram indicated a sliding switch labeled PITCH. Iona reached around, slid the switch downward, and listened as Carter’s voice deepened and slowed. Iona slowed it right down to the point where the voice was exposed as being made up from a series of incredibly rapid taps or clicks, the binary pattern of noise and silence building into more complex shapes.

  The slow sound unsettled Iona and she slid the switch back up. However, the voice was higher and faster than Carter’s ought to be. Iona moved it down a little—and now found it too low. Her pulse suddenly rose, her hands trembling as she tried to locate the switch’s original setting, desperate to undo her meddling. The more she listened to the voice in subtle variations, the less she felt able to recall Carter’s true voice. Eventually she settled on something that sounded more or less right, but would other people notice if it was a little bit off? Would Carter notice if his voice was not quite his own?

  The next diagram was headed PERSONALITY SETTINGS. Iona did not dare touch any of these but in case she did so accidentally, she fetched a pencil and on the back of the diagram she made a note of all the positions. There were perhaps fifty switches covering the personality functions. On the diagram they were labeled things like CHARM, STABILITY, MELANCHOLY, HUMOR, INTENSITY and each had a range of four settings. How much variation could be created with these simple controls? How many different personalities? The permutations were not infinite but the city could go through many, many generations before it had to start repeating the patterns.

  The penultimate diagram had been annotated by hand. A series of switches at the bottom was marked with numbers 1 to 9 and then 0, and next to this was a long code. Iona guessed perhaps this was some security code to confirm her interference was authorized, and had to be input before closing the hatch? Whatever it was, it was part of the sequence and it seemed wise to carry it out.

  The code contained over fifty digits and the switches were small and fiddly. When pressed, they made a click and then slid back into position of their own accord. Iona entered the code steadily, ticking off each number on the sheet as she went to ensure she made no mistakes. Finally she pressed a switch marked ENTER at the end of a row, and as instructed by the final diagram, closed the hatch.

  Abruptly Carter stood and marched toward the door. Iona was startled and blurted, “Wait!” but he ignored her. No—it was as if he hadn’t heard her at all. He lifted the latch on her front door and walked outside.

  Iona didn’t know what to do. Was Carter going to tell someone what had happened here? She had to make him listen—assure him she’d meant no harm by it. But right now he was walking away. She stepped outside, closed her door, and ran after him.

  * * *

  Iona caught up with Carter as he strode down the street away from her house. She fell into stride alongside him and spoke his name in a low voice but again, it was as if he had not heard.

  “Where are you going?” said Iona.

  Carter said nothing and kept walking.

  Iona looked around. Nobody was near
by, so she quickened her pace and stood in front of Carter, blocking his path.

  Without missing a beat Carter took a step to his left, walked round Iona, and kept going. He hadn’t reacted like you would to a person being in your way—it was like he was walking around a pillar.

  Iona followed, this time a few steps behind so she could observe him. He walked at a constant, brisk pace and stared straight ahead. When he reached the end of the street he turned neatly on his heel, faced right, and walked down the next street. He seemed to be going somewhere and it wasn’t his home, or the school, or even the bureau: if he was going to any of those places he’d have turned the other way at the junction. And wherever he was going, he wasn’t speaking to anyone or looking at anything on the way.

  Iona wanted to know where he was going and the only way to find out was to keep following.

  * * *

  The king rolled over to find Clarence sitting on his pillow. “There’s a rumor going around that you’re dead,” the cat said.

  The king blinked. “Okay, tell them I’m not.”

  “They’re gathering outside the tower and demanding to see you.”

  “But look what happened last time I went outside.”

  “I’m not suggesting you go outside—just go downstairs and wave at the window.”

  “But what if someone gets a bow and arrow and shoots me?”

  “We’re policing the crowd. If anyone’s got weapons we’ll pick them up.”

  “How big’s the crowd?”

  “A hundred, maybe two.”

  “Ohh . . . I don’t know about this.”

  “People have to know you’re not dead—it’ll only cause more unrest if—”

  “Alright, alright.” The king got out of bed and looked for some trousers. He couldn’t wait until they caught the people who were causing all this chaos and things finally got back to normal.

  * * *

  Carter attracted no attention from other pedestrians. To them he just looked like another person going about his business. And he did look like just another person, Iona noted: it wasn’t just Carter she’d perceived wrongly all these years—it was everyone. Her fellow citizens might all be different heights and builds, with their own distinct body language, but they were beings made of wood like Carter and they always had been. The engineering of their bodies was precise and elegant but the face had been left out entirely, as if that level of subtlety was not even worth attempting. Perhaps blankness left more space for the observer to read their own meaning into it—after all, this was exactly what Iona had done. Their expressions were entirely suggested by their movements and tone of voice, and her own imagination filled whatever gap remained.

  But how could she have not seen? Did she simply see what she wanted to see? She looked down at her own body, spreading her fingers, expecting the illusion of flesh to fall away and be replaced by wood: but nothing changed. She was different from the others. Perhaps she’d wanted to believe she lived among her own kind and her perceptions had obliged. Or perhaps it was a trick she had only now seen through. Whatever it was she could not unsee it. The action of opening Carter’s hatch had broken the spell. Everywhere she looked she was surrounded by wooden automata and it was all she could do not to panic.

  She focused on the simple task of following Carter. He led her past buildings she had designed. Rows and rows of houses. Machines for living in. Machines for machines to live in.

  They were in the suburbs now, in places Iona had rarely visited since construction there had been completed. Iona had to keep pace with Carter but as she passed close to an apartment block she peered in the windows. Every apartment had an identical table and chairs in the center of the living room and every table had two citizens sitting at it, facing each other, unmoving. Every apartment.

  * * *

  As they reached the edge of the city Iona noted a street corner in the suburbs had been cordoned off. The bureau was investigating a crime here. Usually anyone passing a crime scene would look up, at least to register that it was there, but Carter continued to stare straight ahead.

  They walked on, left the city behind, went into the woods. Iona had always seen the trees as raw material for the next house, office, public facility, etc. Now inside each one she saw a person waiting to be carved out. The forest seemed a vast, silent womb, its unwitting children vested with infinite patience.

  Eventually Iona and Carter reached the mouth of a disused mine shaft. It had been decommissioned several years ago because of concerns it might cause subsidence under the suburbs if it was extended farther. Surrounding the shaft were the traces of foundations where the site offices had once stood—when the mine closed down they had been broken up and sent to the furnace. The city never let a building stand empty when its materials could be put to good use elsewhere.

  Carter didn’t stop at the mouth of the mine shaft—he just walked inside and started to descend. Iona hesitated. Going into the old mine shaft was forbidden, although the penalties for trespassing were not explicit. The fact it was known to be unstable was enough to put most people off. But Iona had to know why Carter had come here. So she followed him down.

  The air inside the mine was dank, the ground moist. Rain would run down here and take a long time to disperse. Iona was accustomed to having the hearty smell of clean-cut wood around her. Down here she could taste only decay.

  More pressingly, the inside of the mine was dark and Iona had no source of light. When the mine was in use the struts that supported the roof would have had torches attached to them but these had long since been removed. Before long it would be impossible for her to see anything. She was faced with a decision and had barely any time to make it: if she turned back toward the entrance now she would lose Carter and never find out why he’d come here. Maybe there was no logic, maybe he was leading her to nowhere—but instinct told her there was a purpose.

  As the light dwindled Iona put her hand on Carter’s shoulder before she lost sight of him. He didn’t react, just kept walking—and she let him lead her farther and farther into the darkness. She swallowed down the fear that she would never get out again and hoped that when Carter stopped walking this would all make sense.

  Iona’s thoughts and fears were interrupted by splitting pain as she walked into something, cutting her forehead in the process. She put out a hand to touch whatever it was.

  There was a wall ahead of her, and it wasn’t made of soil or wood. It wasn’t quite metal either. It was hard and smooth—a little like the wall at the edge of the forest. But it was underground.

  Iona heard a movement from nearby. She wondered if it was Carter—in the last few moments she had lost track of where he was. “Who’s that?” she said—but she received no answer.

  A knife was held to her throat.

  * * *

  Fresh rumors washed from one side of the crowd to another. There was nothing malicious in these rumors. Nobody here wanted to get rid of the king. The rumors were driven by uncertainty, verging on panic. New editions of the newspaper were being printed as fast as details could be confirmed, in an effort to calm the populace—but these were just words on a page. Could they be trusted? If the king could be attacked in public, who knew what to trust anymore? Were they foolish even to trust each other?

  More than once a hush came over the crowd as they anticipated the king’s arrival, but when he didn’t appear the murmurs would start again and then build. Who had said he would be here anyway? Perhaps that was just another rumor? What would they do if they didn’t get to see him?

  Then a figure appeared at the window. It was not the king but an attendant in household uniform. He signaled for silence and got it.

  And the king appeared. He smiled and waved to his people. He didn’t even look that badly hurt.

  The crowd cheered and applauded.

  Up at the window the king allowed the sound of their adulation to wash over him. He found something oppressive about the noise, even if it was well meant. His conce
rns over his personal safety were replaced by a deeper unease. All he’d ever wanted was for the citizens to be happy and to like him, and now he feared his relationship to them had changed forever.

  He wondered how much longer he needed to stand here.

  7

  SOMEONE SWITCHED ON A LIGHT, so that was something at least, even if the knife was still threatening to slice open Iona’s windpipe. The light shone directly into her eyes and obliterated everything else in her vision. Its source was a handheld torch. (Not fire, Iona thought: electricity. Another dream-word with newfound purpose.) The hand that held it did not belong to the person who held the knife: the holder of the knife was behind her, the holder of the torch was in front.

  “It’s her,” said the holder of the torch. “The architect.” Iona recognized the voice as Alyssa’s and found she wasn’t surprised. If anyone had an electric torch, of course it would be Alyssa.

  “What’s she doing here?” said the holder of the knife, who was a man. “Did you tell her—”

  “No,” said Alyssa. “She doesn’t know anything.” Alyssa raised the torch a little, shining it toward the ceiling so its light was no longer in Iona’s eyes. “How did you find us?”

  “I followed Carter,” said Iona. Her eyes were adjusting to the darkness and she could see Alyssa was standing in a doorway, just to the side of the wall she’d walked into. Carter must have gone through that doorway.

  “Who’s Carter?” said the man with the knife.

  “A colleague of mine—look, do you really think I’m a threat?”

  “What do you reckon?” the man said to Alyssa.

  Alyssa peered at Iona. “I don’t think so.”

  The man lowered the knife and walked around to join Alyssa, and Iona now saw he was Victor—a slightly built man in his early forties, darker-skinned than herself, whose default expression was a scowl. But most significantly both he and Alyssa were real people like herself, not things made of wood. Iona realized this with relief—she was not the only one. Perhaps they could help her understand.