The Ask and the Answer

“You liar,” Todd says to the man. “You coward.”

“For the good of the town, Todd,” the man says.

“All that moaning,” Todd says, his voice and Noise fiery. “All that bitching and moaning about how he’s ruining everything and yer just another spy.”

“Not at first,” the man says, walking towards us. “At first I was just how you saw me, the former Mayor disgraced and left alive in all his inconvenience.” The man passes Todd and comes up to me, putting Todd’s book under one arm. “Give me your pack.”

“What?” I say.

“Give it to me.” He swings his arm back and points the gun right at Todd’s head. I slide the pack off my shoulders and give it to him. He doesn’t even open it the regular way, just feels along the bottom, feeling right for the secret pouch, the secret pouch where if you press right, you can feel my gun.

The man smiles. “There it is,” he says. “The Answer don’t change, do they?”

“You touch a hair on her head,” Todd says, “and I’ll kill you.”

“So will I,” Lee says.

The man keeps smiling. “I think you have a competitor, Todd.”

“Who are you?” I say, annoyance at all this protection making me brave.

“Con Ledger, Mayor of Haven, at your service, Viola.” He gives a little bow. “Since that’s who you must be, isn’t it?” He walks around Todd. “Oh, the President was very interested in the Noise of your dreams, my boy. Very interested in what you thought about while you were sleeping. About how much you miss your Viola, how you would do anything to find her.”

I see Todd’s face starting to glow red.

“And suddenly he became far more agreeable to me, asking me to pass along certain information to you, see if we could get you to do what he wanted.” Mayor Ledger looks ridiculous, all the things he’s carrying, a gun in one hand, pack in the other, book under his arm, and still trying to appear threatening. “I must say, it worked a treat.” He winks at me. “Now that I know when and where the Answer are going to attack.”

Lee’s Noise rises and he takes a furious step forward.

Mayor Ledger cocks the pistol. Lee stops.

“Like it?” asks the Mayor. “The President gave it to me when he gave me my own key.”

He smiles again then sees how we’re all looking at him. “Oh, stop it,” he says. “If the President defeats the Answer then all this will be over. All the bombings, all the restrictions, all the curfews.” His smile’s a bit weaker now. “You have to learn how to work within the system for change. When I’m his deputy, I’ll work very hard to make things better for everyone.” He nods at me. “Women, too.”

“You’d better shoot me,” Todd says, Noise coming off him like flame. “Cuz there ain’t no way yer life is safe if you ever put down that gun.”

Mayor Ledger sighs. “I’m not going to shoot anyone, Todd, not unless–”

The side door suddenly opens and the man who let me in steps out, surprise lighting up his face and Noise. “What’re you–”

Mayor Ledger points the gun at him and pulls the trigger three times. The man falls back into the doorway and all the way to the floor until only his feet are sticking out.

We all stand there, shocked, echoes of gunfire still ringing off the marble floors.

There’s a clear picture in Mayor Ledger’s Noise, of himself with a black eye and split lip, of the man on the floor giving him the beating.

He looks back at us, sees us staring at him. “What?”

“Mayor Prentiss ain’t gonna like that,” Todd says. “He knows Mr. Collins from old Prentisstown.”

“I’m sure the prize of Viola and the Answer’s attack will make up for any other misunderstandings.” Mayor Ledger’s looking around now, trying to find a place to free up his hands. He finally just tosses the book to Todd, as if he doesn’t want it any more. Todd bobbles it in his hands but catches it.

“Your mother wasn’t much of a writer, Todd,” Mayor Ledger says, bending forward and zipping open the pack with his free hand. “Barely literate.”

“You’re going to pay for that.” Todd looks back at me and I realize I’m the one who said it out loud.

Mayor Ledger digs around in my bag. “Food!” he says, his face lighting up. He takes out a crested pine from the top and immediately shoves it in his mouth. He digs some more, finding bread and more fruit, taking bites of almost everything. “How long were you planning on staying?” he asks, his mouth full.

I see Todd starting to edge forward.

“It’s not like I can’t hear you,” Mayor Ledger says, waving the gun again, digging down to the bottom of the bag. He stops, his hand deep inside, and looks up. “What’s this?” He feels around a little more and starts to drag something larger out of the pack. At first I assume it’s the gun but then he shakes it free of the bag.

He stands up.

And looks curiously at the Thrace bomb in his hand.

There’s a second where it can’t be true. There’s a second where my eyes can’t be seeing what they’re seeing, not believing that I know what a bomb looks like by now. There’s a moment where it’s in his hand but it doesn’t mean anything, it doesn’t mean anything at all.

But then Lee gasps beside me and it all makes sense, it all makes the worst goddam sense I can even think of.

“No,” I say.

Todd spins around. “What? What is it?”

Time slows down to nothing. Mayor Ledger turns it over in his hand and a beeping starts, a fast beeping, a beeping obviously set to go whenever anyone searched through my bag and picked it up, the pulse in his hand setting it off, a bomb you know is going to kill you if you let go of it.

“This isn’t–” says Mayor Ledger, looking up–

But Lee is already reaching for my arm–

Trying to grab it so we can bolt for the front door–

“Run!” he’s yelling–

But I’m jumping forward, not back–

And I’m pushing Todd sideways–

Stumbling towards the room where the dead man fell–

Mayor Ledger isn’t trying to shoot us–

Isn’t doing anything–

He’s just standing there, realization dawning–

And as we’re falling through the doorway–