Shades of Grey

“Suns,” repeated Gra

“Stars?” murmured Lucy. The obsolete word sounded ancient to our ears. But we all murmured our understanding. We’d heard about them but hadn’t considered that we would ever be able to observe them in any meaningful way. Like the Pyramids, the Great Sweat, Chuck Naurice, Tariq Al-Simpson, M’Do

“But these are not points of light,” observed Aubrey. “They’re circles.”

“Arcs,” repeated Mrs. Lapis Lazuli. “Let’s just stick to the facts, eh?”

“They move,” said the Apocryphal man, “and describe a circular motion in the night sky. What you see is not a moment in time, but seven hours of time, seen as one.”

Gra

There was another silence as we all took this in, and I felt a thrill of discovery, of gained intelligence. But there was something else, too: an overwhelming sense of inconsolable loss. Progressive Leapbacks had stripped so much knowledge from the Collective that we were now not only ignorant, but had no idea how ignorant. The moving stars in the night sky were only one small part of a greater understanding that had gone for good. And as I stood there frowning to myself, I had a sense that everything about the Collective was utterly and completely wrong. We should be dedicating our lives to gaining knowledge, not to losing it.

“But why do the stars move?” asked Mrs. Crimson.

“They don’t.”

“They don’t,” repeated Gra

“But you said—”

“We move,” remarked Lucy with a flash of understanding. “The earth rotates about its axis once a day. If you think about it, our own sun also describes a circle about us.”

I saw the Apocryphal man nod his head agreeably, and everyone went silent, pondering the notion carefully.

“I must say I find this extremely far-fetched,” said Mrs. Gamboge, who was doubtless miffed that we were debating anything at all. “It is well known that mental incapacity places Gra

“Arcs,” said Mrs. Lapis Lazuli.

“I suggest,” replied Gra

We all fell into a hushed silence. The Apocryphal man spoke self-evident truths with such clarity that we all felt humbled. But my father put it best. He looked straight at Gra

“I’ll get the rice pudding,” said Mrs. Ochre, and hurried from the room.

“Perhaps,” said Mr. Lemon-Skye, addressing the Apocryphal man but looking at Gra

The Apocryphal man made no sound, but Aubrey didn’t get to ask his question, for Lucy interrupted to pose one of her own. “What is the music of the spheres?”

The Apocryphal man stared at her for a long time, then, with great deliberation, said, “Once, music was everything. It answered all problems, fulfilled all needs. It powered industry, transport, entertainment. It delivered comfort and light, information, books, communications and death. It could even bring . . . music.”

He then yawned as though tired of the proceedings. He took out a pocket handkerchief, filled it with food and walked out of the room.

Before Gra

Ridiculous!”

There was a sharp intake of breath at Aubrey’s rudeness. He had almost—but not quite—raised his voice.

Lucy stared back at him, hot with indignation. “Their relevance might be in doubt, sir,” she replied with a thin veneer of cordiality, “but compared to your question, they are raised to a level of unprecedented profundity.” She was talking heavily out of hue—Crimson was higher and redder than she—but we were all guests in the Ochre house, so her conduct, while unacceptable, was not technically actionable.

“And I say it is all poppycock and fiddle-faddle,” a

Lucy said nothing but quietly stood up, took a lead ball and a length of thin steel wire from her pocket and, after fetching a thumbtack from the bureau, attached the pendulum to the top of the door frame, set it swinging and then returned to her seat.

“And what is that supposed to prove?” asked Aubrey, just as Mrs. Ochre brought in the rice pudding I had made, plus her own treacle sponge and custard “just in case.”

“Have I missed something?” asked Mrs. Ochre, since Aubrey’s rudeness toward Lucy had caused something of a silence to descend on the room, and we were all staring at the pendulum with mild embarrassment, for it would reflect badly on Lucy when it did what pendulums do, which was to stop.

“Your daughter is demonstrating her theory of harmonics,” said my father, and after Mrs. Ochre had said, “Fancy that!” we concentrated on the dessert, and the conversation turned to approximating the migration cruising altitude of the species Cygnus giganticus, and a reason why they seemed to constantly fly in large figure-eight patterns.

“Sometimes they are so high they barely look like swans at all,” remarked Mrs. Crimson.

The talk didn’t stay on swans for long, however, as everyone’s attention turned back to the lead ball, which had not slowed and stopped, as one would expect from a pendulum of less than a foot in length, but seemed to be increasing.

“How curious!” remarked Mr. Crimson, echoing our thoughts perfectly.

As we watched, the pendulum increased its swing until the lead ball came into contact with the underneath of the door frame with a sharp snock, swiftly followed by another as the ball struck the other side. From then on the swing increased ever more dramatically, and within a minute the wire was invisible, the lead ball a semicircular blur and the noise a sharp staccato of sound that increased in volume until it was a continuous howl and several of the diners leaned back in alarm.

As the wood on the door frame began to splinter with the constant hammering, the wire suddenly broke and the lead ball shot off, bounced on the sideboard, shattered a tumbler in front of Mrs. Lapis Lazuli and then vanished out the window, leaving an almost perfect hole in the glass.

Lucy said nothing, for there was little to be said. Aubrey gamely said that he would pay for the damage, which was about as good an apology as one might expect from someone born a Yellow.