Lexicon

refinery plant causing a catastrophic toxic leak. Town is fenced off at a radius of five miles. Scary signs promise death to all who enter. The funny part is the signs don’t lie. We send people in, they don’t come out. Hence the theory that the word is still in there.” He pulled his shirt out of his pants and flapped air. “Crazy idea, isn’t it? That a word can persist. Hang in the air, like an echo.”
    “It can’t.”
    “What, then? Because something bad is in there, and it ain’t a toxic leak.”
    He almost didn’t say it. “Maybe Woolf.”
    “Mmm,” said the kid. “Yeah, nobody really thinks that’s plausible, Eliot. We’re all pretty sure Woolf’s dead.” He tapped idly on the window. “We have satellite on that town. We’ve imaged it a hundred different ways. Nothing moves.”
    Eliot drove in silence.
    “I’m the best there is, defensively,” said the kid. “I mean, not to boast. But that’s why I’m here. I was selected because I can’t be compromised. There’s not going to be a problem.”
    “You realize you’re betting your life on that.”
    “I realize it.”
    Eliot glanced at him.
Twenty-one
, he thought. “Who chose you? Yeats?”
    “I have had the honor of speaking with Yeats, yes.”
    “You don’t have to do this.”
    The kid looked at him.
Give me a sign
, Eliot thought,
and we’ll blow right by Broken Hill, Campbell, keep going until we reach an airport. By sundown we’ll be a country away. You ever think about quitting, Campbell? Just walking away? And let me ask you something else: Have you noticed there’s something wrong with Yeats? Like something dead? Notice that?
    The kid turned away. “You’ve been in the desert too long, Eliot.”
    He watched the endless road. “You’re right about that,” he said.
    • • •
    He drove up to the chain-link fence and killed the engine. They sat in silence, looking at the signs. CONTAMINATION. TOXIC. TRESPASS. DEATH. Skulls and thick red lines. The heat pressed in like a hand. “They’re words, aren’t they?” said the kid. “Fear words.” He unbuckled. “I need to get out of this car.”
    Outside was no cooler but at least the air was moving, stirring dust and sand. The road was blocked with a snarl of razor wire. To the left and right, the chain-link fence stretched away, signs flapping every few hundred feet. A few scrubby bushes protruded from the red soil. This continued as far as one could see.
    He had wire cutters in the trunk, just in case, but nothing had changed since last time: The wire looped across the road but was not secured. It didn’t need to be. The kid was right: It was the words that kept people out. Eliot dragged the wire from the road.
    The kid was trying to wrap his linen jacket around his head. “I have a hat in the back,” said Eliot. “Take that.”
    “I’m okay.”
    “Take the hat.” He opened the back door and retrieved the cap and a bottle of water.
    “Fine. Thanks.” The kid jammed the cap on his head. The peak said: THE THUNDER FROM DOWN UNDER . Eliot had picked it up from a street vendor in Adelaide. “How do I look?”
    “You have a satellite phone?”
    “Yep.”
    “Call me.”
    “It works. I checked at the airport. I’ll call you when I get into town.”
    “Call me now.”
    The kid produced his phone and poked at it. Eliot’s phone trilled.
    “Okay?” said the kid.
    “You have a backup battery.”
    “I do.”
    “And your main is full?”
    “It’s fine.”
    “Is it full?”
    “Look.” The kid showed him the screen. “See the little battery? I know how to use a phone.”
    “Call me as soon as you can no longer see me clearly. Then keep the line open. If the call drops, keep trying me until you get through.”
    “Will do.”
    “What’s your segment?”
    “
What?
”
    “Is it ninety-three?”
    The kid’s face blanked. It was how they trained them. The kid was thinking about something else: something happy, something sad, something traumatic; only he knew. It was supposed to make him unreadable, by adding noise to his facial expression.
    “You’re a ninety-three.”
    “Shit,” said the kid. “You’re not supposed to do that. Why’d you do that?”
    “For your protection.”
    “It doesn’t matter. I can’t be compromised. You want to try me? Go ahead.”
    Eliot considered it. He didn’t doubt that the kid was good. But he’d probably done most of his work in a relatively controlled environment. If Eliot jumped him, put a gun in