The Ask and the Answer

by Patrick Ness

  Found something of yers.

  38

  I don't say nothing. I don't think nothing.

  I just watch as he reaches behind him and holds something up toward me.

  Even this far away, even by the light of the moons, I know what it is.

  My ma's book.

  Davy Prentiss has my ma's book.

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  2 THE FOOT UPON THE NECK

  ***

  [TODD]

  EARLY NEXT MORNING, a platform with a microphone on it gets built noisily and quickly near the base of the bell tower and, as the morning turns to afternoon, the men of New Prentisstown gather in front of it.

  "Why?" I say, looking out over 'em.

  "Why do you think?" Mayor Ledger says, sitting in a darkened corner, rubbing his temples, his Noise butt sawing away, hot and metallic. "To meet the new man in charge."

  The men don't say much, their faces pale and grim, tho who can know what they're thinking when you can't hear their Noise? But they look cleaner than the men in my town used to, shorter hair, shaved faces, better clothes. A good number of em are rounded and soft like Mayor Ledger.

  Haven musta been a comfortable place, a place where men weren't fighting every day just to survive.

  Maybe too much comfort was the problem.

  40

  Mayor Ledger snorts to himself but don't say nothing.

  Mayor Prentiss's men are on horseback at strategic spots across the square, ten or twelve of 'em, rifles ready, to make sure everyone behaves tho the threat of an army coming seems to have done most of the work. I see Mr. Tate and Mr. Morgan and Mr. O'Hare, men I grew up with, men I used to see every day being farmers, men who were just men till suddenly they became something else.

  I don't see Davy Prentiss nowhere and my Noise starts rumbling again at the thought of him.

  He musta come back down the hillside from wherever his horse dragged him and found the rucksack. All it had in it anymore was a bunch of ruined clothes and the book.

  My ma's book.

  My ma's words to me.

  Written when I was born. Written till just before she died.

  Before she was murdered.

  My wondrous son who I swear will see this world come good.

  Words read to me by Viola cuz I couldn't-And now Davy Moody Prentiss-

  "Can you please," Mayor Ledger says thru gritted teeth, "at least try--" He stops himself and looks at me apologetically. "I'm sorry," he says, for the millionth time since Mr. Collins woke us up with breakfast.

  Before I can say anything back I feel the hardest, sudden tug on my heart, so surprising I nearly gasp.

  I look out again.

  The women of New Prentisstown are coming.

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  ***

  They start to appear farther away, in groups down side streets away from the main body of men, kept there by the Mayor's men patrolling on horseback.

  I feel their silence in a way I can't feel the men's. It's like a loss, like great groupings of sorrow against the sound of the world and I have to wipe my eyes again but I press myself closer to the opening, trying to see 'em, trying to see every single one of 'em.

  Trying to see if she's there.

  But she ain't.

  She ain't.

  They look like the men, most of 'em wearing trousers and shirts of different cuts, some of 'em wearing long skirts, but most looking clean and comfortable and well fed. Their hair has more variety, pulled back or up or over or short or long and not nearly as many of 'em are blonde as they are in the Noise of the menfolk where I come from.

  And I see that more of their arms are crossed, more of their faces looking doubtful.

  More anger there than on the faces of the men.

  "Did anyone fight you?" I ask Mayor Ledger while I keep on looking. "Did anyone not wanna give up?"

  "This is a democracy, Todd," he sighs. "Do you know what that is?"

  "No idea," I say, still looking, still not finding.

  "It means the minority is listened to," he says, "but the majority rules."

  I look at him. "All these people wanted to surrender?"

  42

  "The President made a proposal," he says, touching his split lip, "to the elected Council, promising that the city would be unharmed if we agreed to this."

  "And you believed him?"

  His eyes flash at me. "You are either forgetting or do not know that we already fought a great war, a war to end all wars, at just about the time you would have been born. If any repeat of that can be avoided--"

  "Then yer willing to hand yerselves over to a murderer."

  He sighs again. "The majority of the Council, led by myself, decided this was the best way to save the most lives." He rests his head against the brick. "Not everything is black and white, Todd. In fact, almost nothing is."

  "But what if-"

  Ker-thunk. The lock on the door slides back and Mr. Collins enters, pistol pointed.

  He looks straight at Mayor Ledger. "Get up," he says.

  I look back and forth twixt 'em both. "What's going on?" I say.

  Mayor Ledger stands from his corner. "It seems the piper must be paid, Todd," he says, his voice trying to sound light but I hear his buzz rev up with fear. "This was a beautiful town," he says to me. "And I was a better man. Remember that, please."

  "What are you talking about?" I say.

  Mr. Collins takes him by the arm and shoves him out the door.

  "Hey!" I shout, coming after them. "Where are you taking him?"

  Mr. Collins raises a fist to punch me-

  43

  And I flinch away, (shut up)

  He laughs and locks the door behind him. Ker-thunk.

  And I'm left alone in the tower.

  And as Mayor Ledger's buzz disappears down the stairs, that's when I hear it.

  March march march, way in the distance. I go to an opening. They're here.

  The conquering army, marching into Haven.

  They flow down the zigzag road like a black river, dusty and dirty and coming like a dam's burst. They march four or five across and the first of them disappear into the far trees at the base of the hill as the last finally crest the top. The crowd watches them, the men turning back from the platform, the women looking out from the side streets.

  The march march march grows louder, echoing down the city streets. Like a clock ticking its way down. The crowd waits. I wait with them. And then, thru the trees, at the turning of the road-Here they are. The army.

  Mr. Hammar at their front.

  Mr. Hammar who lived in the petrol stayshun back home, Mr. Hammar who thought vile, violent things no boy should ever hear, Mr. Hammar who shot the people of Farbranch in the back as they fled.

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  Mr. Hammar leads the army.

  I can hear him now, calling out marching words to keep everyone in time together. The foot, he's yelling to the rhythm of the march.

  The foot.

  The foot upon the neck.

  They march into the square and turn down its side, cutting twixt the men and the women like an unstoppable force. Mr. Hammar's close enough so I can see the smile, a smile I know full well, a smile that clubs, a smile that beats, a smile that dominates.

  And as he gets closer, i grow more sure.

  It's a smile without Noise.

  Someone, one of those men on horseback maybe, has gone out to meet the army on the road. Someone carrying the cure with him. The army ain't making a sound except with its feet and with its chant.

  The foot, the foot, the foot upon the neck.

  They march round the side of the square to the platform. Mr. Hammar stops at a corner, letting the men start to make up formayshuns behind the platform, lining up with their backs to me, facing the crowd now turned to watch them.

  I start to reckernize the soldiers as they line up. Mr. Wallace. Mr. Smith the younger. Mr. Phelps the storekeeper. Men from Prentisstown and many, many more men besides.

  Th
e army that grew as it came.

  I see Ivan, the man from the barn at Farbranch, the man who secretly told me there were men in sympathy. He stands

  45

  at the head of one of the formayshuns and everything that proves him right is standing behind him, arms at attenshun, rifles at the ready.

  The last soldier marches into place with a final chant.

  The foot upon the NECK!

  And then there ain't nothing but silence, blowing over New Prentisstown like a wind.

  Till I hear the doors of the cathedral open down below me.

  And Mayor Prentiss steps out to address his new city.

  "Right now," he says into the microphone, having saluted Mr. Hammar and climbed his way up the platform steps, "you are afraid."

  The men of the town look back up at him, saying nothing, making no sound of Noise nor buzzing.

  The women stay in the side streets, also silent.

  The army stands at attenshun, ready for anything.

  I realize I'm holding my breath.

  "Right now," he continues, "you think you are conquered. You think there is no hope. You think I come up here to read out your doom."

  His back is to me but from speakers hidden in the four corners, his voice booms clear over the square, over the city, probably over the whole valley and beyond. Cuz who else is there to hear him talk? Who else is there on all of New World that ain't either gathered here or under the ground?

  Mayor Prentiss is talking to the whole planet.

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  "And you're right," he says and I tell you I'm certain I hear the smile. "You are conquered. You are defeated. And I read to you your doom."

  He lets this sink in for a moment. My Noise rumbles and I see a few of the men look up to the top of the tower. I try to keep it quiet but who are these people? Who are these clean and comfortable and not-at-all-hungry people who just handed theirselves over?

  "But it is not I who conquered you," the Mayor says. "It is not I who has beaten you or defeated you or enslaved you."

  He pauses, looking out over the crowd. He's dressed all in white, white hat, white boots, and with the white cloths covering the platform and the afternoon sun shining on down, he's practically blinding.

  "You are enslaved by your idleness," says the Mayor. "You are defeated by your complacency. You are doomed"--and here his voice rises suddenly, hitting doomed so hard half the crowd jumps-"by your good intentions!"

  He's working himself up now, heavy breaths into the microphone.

  "You have allowed yourselves to become so weak, so feeble in the face of the challenges of this world that in a single generation you have become a people who would surrender to RUMOR!"

  He starts to pace the stage, microphone in hand. Every frightened face in the crowd, every face in the army, turns to watch him move back and forth, back and forth.

  I'm watching, too.

  "You let an army walk into your town and instead of making them take it, you offer it willingly!"

  47

  He's still pacing, his voice still rising. "And so you know what I did. I took. I took you. I took your freedom. I took your town. I took your future." He laughs, like he can't believe his luck. "I expected a war," he says.

  Some of the crowd look at their feet, away from each other's eyes.

  I wonder if they're ashamed. I hope so.

  "But instead of a war," the Mayor says, "I got a conversation. A conversation that began, Please don't hurt us and ended with Please take anything you want."

  He stops in the middle of the platform.

  "I expected a WAR!" he shouts again, thrusting his fist at them.

  And they flinch.

  If a crowd can flinch, they flinch.

  More than a thousand men flinch under the fist of just one.

  I don't see what the women do.

  "And because you did not give me a war," the Mayor says, his voice light, "you will face the consequences.''

  I hear the doors to the cathedral open again and Mr. Collins comes out pushing Mayor Ledger forward thru the ranks of the army, hands tied behind his back.

  Mayor Prentiss watches him come, arms crossed. Murmurs finally start in the crowd of men, louder in the crowds of women, and the men on horseback do some

  48

  waving of their rifles to stop it. The Mayor don't even look back at the sound, like it's beneath his notice. He just watches Mr. Collins push Mayor Ledger up the stairs at the back of the platform.

  Mayor Ledger stops at the top of the steps, looking out over the crowd. They stare back at him, some of them squinting at the shrillness of his Noise buzz , a buzz I realize is now starting to shout some real words, words of fear, pictures of fear, pictures of Mr. Collins giving him the bruised eye and the split lip, pictures of him agreeing to surrender and being locked in the tower.

  "Kneel," Mayor Prentiss says and tho he says it quietly, tho he says it away from the microphone, somehow I hear it clear as a bell chime in the middle of my head, and from the intake of breath in the crowd, I wonder if that's how they heard it, too.

  And before it looks like he even knows what he's doing, Mayor Ledger is kneeling on the platform, looking surprised that he's down there.

  The whole town watches him do it.

  Mayor Prentiss waits a moment.

  And then he steps over to him.

  And takes out a knife.

  It's a big, no-kidding, death of a thing, shining in the sun.

  The Mayor holds it up high over his head.

  He turns slowly, so everyone can see what's about to happen.

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  So that everyone can see the knife. My gut falls and for a second I think-But it ain't mine-It ain't-

  And then someone calls, "Murderer!" from across the square.

  A single voice, carrying above the silence. It came from the women. My heart jumps for a second-But of course it can't be her-

  But at least there's someone. At least there's someone.

  Mayor Prentiss walks calmly to the microphone. "Your victorious enemy addresses you," he says, almost politely, as if the person who shouted was simply not understanding. "Your leaders are to be executed as the inevitable result of your defeat."

  He turns to look at Mayor Ledger, kneeling there on the platform. His face is trying to look calm but everyone can hear how badly he don't wanna die, how childlike his wishes are sounding, how loud his newly uncured Noise is spilling out all over the place.

  "And now you will learn," Mayor Prentiss says, turning back to the crowd, "what kind of man your new President is. And what he will demand from you."

  Silence, still silence, save for Mayor Ledger's mewling.

  Mayor Prentiss walks over to him, knife glinting. Another murmur starts spreading thru the crowd as they finally get what they're about to see. Mayor Prentiss steps behind Mayor Ledger and holds up the knife again. He stands there,

  50

  watching the crowd watch him, watching their faces as they look and listen to their former Mayor try and fail to contain his Noise.

  "BEHOLD!" Mayor Prentiss shouts. "YOUR FUTURE!" He turns the knife to a stabbing angle, as if to say again, behold--

  The murmuring of the crowd rises-Mayor Prentiss raises his arm-

  A voice, a female one, maybe the same one, cries out, "No!"

  And then suddenly I realize I know exactly what's gonna happen.

  In the chair, in the room with the circle of colored glass, he brought me to defeat, he brought me to the edge of death, he made me know that it would come--

  And then he put a bandage on me.

  And that's when I did what he wanted.

  The knife swishes thru the air and slices thru the binds on Mayor Ledger's hands.

  There's a town-sized gasp, a planet-sized one.

  Mayor Prentiss waits for a moment, then says once more, "Behold your future," quietly, not even into the microphone.

  But there it is again, right inside yer mind. He puts the kn
ife away in a belt behind his back and returns to the microphone.

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  And starts to put bandages on the crowd.

  "I am not the man you think I am," he says. "I am not a tyrant come to slaughter his enemies. I am not a madman come to destroy even that which would save himself. I am not"--he looks over at Mayor Ledger--"your executioner."

  The crowds, men and women, are so quiet now the square might as well be empty.

  "The war is over," the Mayor continues. "And a new peace will take its place."

  He points to the sky. People look up, like he might be conjuring something up there to fall on them.

  "You may have heard a rumor," he says. "That there are new settlers coming."

  My stomach twists again.

  "I tell you as your President," he says. "The rumor is true."

  How does he know? How does he ruddy know"?

  The crowd starts to murmur at this news, men and women. The Mayor lets them, happily talking over them.

  "We will be ready to greet them!" he says. "We will be a proud society ready to welcome them into a new Eden!" His voice is rising again. "We will show them that they have left Old World and entered PARADISE!"

  Lots more murmuring now, talking everywhere.

  "I am going to take your cure away from you," the Mayor says.

  And boy, does the murmuring stop. The Mayor lets it, lets the silence build up, and then he says, "For now."

  The men look at one another and back to the Mayor.

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  "We are entering a new era," Mayor Prentiss says. "You will earn my trust by joining me in creating a new society. As that new society is built and as we meet our first challenges and celebrate our first successes, you will earn the right to be called men again. You will earn the right to have your cure returned to you and that will be the moment all men truly will be brothers."