“We should have that tattoo removed. It’s blasphemous. The word God is holy, it does not belong on an arm.”
“Removal would be too painful for her at the moment. It can wait until later. We don’t want to discourage our young Supplicant.”
“If she is a true one, which I very much doubt. It would be typical of Mayday to attempt a ruse of this kind. I think she should be interrogated.” By herself, was what she meant. She does enjoy those interrogations a little too much.
“The more haste, the less speed,” I said. “I prefer more subtle methods.”
“You didn’t prefer them in the early days,” said Vidala. “You were all for the primary colours. You didn’t used to mind a little blood.” She sneezed. Perhaps we should do something about the mildew in this café, I thought. Then again, perhaps not.
* * *
—
It being late, I called Commander Judd in his office at home and requested a crash meeting, which was granted. I told my driver to wait for me outside.
The door was opened by Judd’s Wife, Shunammite. She was not looking at all well: thin, white-faced, hollow-eyed. She’d lasted a comparatively long time for a Judd Wife; but at least she’d produced a baby, Unbaby though it had been. Now, however, her time appeared to be running out. I wondered what Judd had been putting in her soup. “Oh, Aunt Lydia,” she said. “Please come in. The Commander is expecting you.”
Why had she opened the door herself? Door-opening is a Martha’s job. She must have wanted something from me. I dropped my voice. “Shunammite, my dear.” I smiled. “Are you ill?” She had once been such a lively young girl, if brash and aggravating, but she was now a sickly wraith.
“I’m not supposed to say so,” she whispered. “The Commander tells me it’s nothing. He says I invent complaints. But I know there’s something wrong with me.”
“I can have our clinic at Ardua Hall do an evaluation,” I said. “A few tests.”
“I would have to get his permission,” she said. “He won’t let me go.”
“I will obtain his permission for you,” I said. “Never fear.” There were tears then, and thank yous. In another age, she would have kneeled and kissed my hand.
* * *
—
Judd was waiting in his study. I have been there before, sometimes when he was in it, sometimes when he was not. It is a richly informative space. He should not bring work home with him from his office at the Eyes and leave it lying around so carelessly.
On the right wall—the one not visible from the door, as one must not shock the female inmates—there is a painting from the nineteenth century, showing a barely nubile girl without any clothes on. Dragonfly wings have been added to make her into a fairy, fairies having been known in those times to be averse to clothing. She has an amoral, elvish smile and is hovering over a mushroom. That’s what Judd likes—young girls who can be viewed as not fully human, with a naughty core to them. That excuses his treatment of them.
The study is book-lined, like all these Commanders’ studies. They like to accumulate, and to gloat over their acquisitions, and to boast to the others about what they have pilfered. Judd has a respectable collection of biographies and histories—Napoleon, Stalin, Ceausescu, and various other leaders and controllers of men. He has several highly valuable editions that I envy: Doré’s Inferno, Dalí’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Picasso’s Lysistrata. He has another kind of book, less respectable: vintage pornography, as I knew from having examined it. It is a genre that is tedious in bulk. The mistreatment of the human body has a
limited repertoire.
“Ah, Aunt Lydia,” he said, half-rising from his chair in an echo of what was once considered gentlemanly behaviour. “Do sit down and tell me what brings you out so late.” A beaming smile, not reflected in the expression of his eyes, which was both alarmed and flinty.
“We have a situation,” I said, taking the chair opposite.
His smile vanished. “Not a critical one, I hope.”
“Nothing that cannot be dealt with. Aunt Vidala suspects the so-called Jade of being an infiltrator, sent to ferret out information and put us in a bad light. She wishes to interrogate the girl. That would be fatal to any productive future use of Baby Nicole.”
“I agree,” he said. “We would not be able to televise her afterwards. What can I do to help you?”
“To help us,” I said. It is always good to remind him that our little privateer holds two. “An order from the Eyes protecting the girl from interference until we know she may be credibly presented as Baby Nicole. Aunt Vidala is not aware of Jade’s identity,” I added. “And she should not be told. She is no longer fully reliable.”
“Can you explain that?” he said.
“For the moment, you’ll have to trust me,” I said. “And another thing. Your Wife, Shunammite, ought to be sent to the Calm and Balm Clinic at Ardua Hall for medical treatment.”
There was a long pause while we gazed into each other’s eyes across his desk. “Aunt Lydia, you read my mind,” he said. “It would indeed be preferable for her to be in your care rather than in mine. In case anything might happen…in case she might develop a fatal illness.”
I will remind you here that there is no divorce in Gilead.