THE DAY WITHOUT MAPS
by Fr. Andrew Marr
As soon as he woke up, Gerald Kaylen felt that something was wrong. A glance at his glowing alarm clock told him that it wasn't time to wake up, but he heard voices and rumbling sounds from the dining room. Could it be that his parents had stayed home from work and he had the chance to see them for the first time in several days? Could it be that his mother was actually fixing him breakfast for the first time in months? In a flurry of excitement, Gerald threw on his bath robe, slid his feet into his slippers, put on his glasses, and trotted out of his room.
To his surprise, Gerald hardly knew which direction to take in the hall. It was much longer than he remembered it. However, there was no mistaking the smell of fresh bacon and where that was coming from.
"Don't even know my own house," Gerald muttered, as he made a beeline for the dining nook.
Gerald's hopes were more than dashed when, instead of his mother and father, he saw two strange men sitting at the breakfast table, helping themselves to bacon and eggs as if they owned the place. One of the men was dressed in a tuxedo. The other man wore a black sweat shirt and blue jeans. Inscribed on the sweat shirt was a picture of a man wearing a striped prison suit with a chain around his wrist happily snoring away. The shirt's captions was: "Get a rest -- get arrested." With the two men looking at him, Gerald decided it wouldn't do to run away, so he decided to face them with the tenacity of an animal defending its territory.
"Will you please tell me who you are and what you are doing in my living room?" Gerald asked.
"I suppose I could tell you if I wanted to," said the man dressed in a tuxedo, "but I do not choose to tell you."
"Perhaps I should ask you what you are doing in the dining room that we found in this coordinate of space/time," said the man wearing a sweat shirt.
"Coming -- for breakfast," Gerald's voice almost faltered, "in myliving room!"
"Is it?" asked the man in the tuxedo.
It had not occurred to Gerald to doubt that he was still in his own apartment, but this prompting from the stranger, he looked around. To Gerald's shock, it was clear he found himself in a large dining room which he had never seen before. The ceiling was at least twenty feet high. Sumptuous curtains adorned a picture window that looked out on the pre-dawn sky line of the city. Gerald hung his head.
"I guess not."
"Thought so," said the man in the sweat shirt. "Now that you have invadedourdining room, could you please identify yourself?"
"And what will you do if I identify myself?" asked Gerald.
"Put you under arrest, of course," said the man in the tuxedo.
The fresh bacon and eggs smelled good and they reminded Gerald of how hungry he was, but he couldn't bring himself round to sitting at the table now that he knew he did not belong there.
"Then I choose not to identify myself."
"Then we will have to arrest you for not identifying yourself," said the man in the sweat shirt.
"Do you mean that you're going to arrest me, no matter what I do?" asked an outraged Gerald.
"You will be arrested," said the man in the tuxedo, "if we choose to arrest you. You can be anybody you want to be and you can be anybody wewant you to be and it will be the same thing in our log of arrests for the day."
Now that he had been awake for a bit of time, the strange events of the day before, the first day of the World CUP System, were beginning to come back to Gerald. And that gave Gerald an idea of how to handle the two strangers.
"Will you please show me your personalized maps, authorized by the World Cartological Unification Project System, that delineates the route to this particular apartment?" Gerald demanded.
"Maps? What do maps have to do with this?" asked the man in the tuxedo.
"If you can't demonstrate that you reached this apartment by an authorized, mapped-out route, then you are the ones who will be arrested.
"There are no maps," said the man in the sweat shirt.
"There aren't?" Gerald asked, his voice falterning. "Why, just yesterday there were maps all over the place and everybody had to use them."
"But today there are no maps," said the man in the sweat shirt.
"Anything can be anywhere," said the man in the tuxedo. "There are no more boundaries. All boundaries have been abolished."
"Which is how we got here," said the man in the sweat shirt. "We just picked a nice place for breakfast and here we are!"
"Does that mean I could be anywhere?" Gerald asked.
The man in the tuxedo stroked his chin.
"I suppose it does mean that," he said finally.
"Then I'm not really here for you to arrest me," said Gerald.
"That is an even more interesting point," said the man in the tuxedo.
The man in the sweat shirt nodded in agreement.
"Since you just found this dining room," said Gerald, emboldened, if unnerved by the absurdity of the situation, "what makes you think you should arrest me? For trespassing? What about you when it comes to trespassing?"
"You don't understand," said the man in the tuxedo. "Anyone who is suitable for an arrest comes to us. It just happens that way."
"What do you propose to arrest me for?" asked Gerald.
"We don't know that," said the sweat shirt.
"HOW CAN YOU ARREST SOMEBODY WHEN YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT THEY'RE GUILTY OF?" Gerald yelled.
The man in the tuxedo eyed Gerald calmly.
"It isn't our job to know what you are being arrested for," he replied once Gerald's outburst was over. "Neither is that our department. It's only our job to arrest you. It is the job of other employees to know what you are arrested for. We are professional arresters, Picklebody & Peapoodle at your service."
"My parents will get the best lawyer in town and sic him on you!" Gerald threatened.
"Assuming you can find your parents and they can find you, and assuming they can find their lawyer and your lawyer can find them," said the man in the tuxedo.
All this time, Gerald had the feeling that he was acting out a story he had heard or read before. Then the story he was hunting for came to the surface of his memory.
"My teacher at school told our class about a book where this guy wakes up and goes downstairs and finds two guys eating his breakfast, and then these two guys tell the guy that he is under arrest and they won't tell him what he is being arrested for."
"Now ain't that a coincidence!" cried the man in the sweat shirt. "I've never been inside a book before that I know of!"
"My teacher said the book is about how people try to make other people feel guilty when there's nothing to feel guilty about."
"Hmm, we're not in that part of the story," said the man in the tuxedo. "We're just arresting you. You don't have to feel guilty about anything. All you have to do is get arrested."
Just then Gerald heard his alarm go off from his bed room. He was sure of it. He would know his own alarm anywhere, having been tortured by it every morning of his life.
"Uh -- excuse me," said Gerald, turning to run back to his room. "I'd better turn off my alarm."
"You are under no moral or legal obligation to do that as far as we know," said the man in the tuxedo.
"Uh -- maybe so, but it would be awfully unpleasant for you to have to listen to it while you take me down to the paddy wagon."
Without waiting for permission, Gerald made a mad dash back to his bedroom. All the while, the alarm rang all the louder in his ears. He was so frantic, he hardly noticed how many twists and turns he had to make in the strange hallway while following the sound, but somehow, he made it to his bedroom.
That room was still the way he had left it with books and papers and toys and clothes everywhere and hardly a place to walk in. When Gerald got a hand on his alarm clock, he found that he was strangely reluctant to turn it off. Instead, he held it up in front of the window, so as to use the alarm as a call for help. Gerald's inarticulate hope was rewarded when he saw a shadow in the dark sky. When the flying object drew near, its golden scales shone weakly in the first light of dawn.
A loud banging on his bedroom door made Gerald more frantic than ever to get away.
Eagerly, Gerald dropped the still -ringing alarm clock and opened his window as the dragon grabbed a hold of the sill.
"Did you call?" the dragon asked in a high-pitched, gravelly voice over the still-ringing alarm clock.
It looked at Gerald with bright green eyes. At least the eyes weren't red, or Gerald would have been in a quandary as to what to do or whom to trust.
"My alarm clock went off," said Gerald.
"I know," said the dragon, "it woke me up."
"Come back here!" cried one of the men as he pounded again on the door. "You're under arrest!"
"Who are they?" asked the dragon.
"Two guys who came to arrest me. Can you quick give me a lift before they cart me away?"
"Sure thing. Hop on!"
Gerald climbed out of the window just as the two men piled into his bed room. No sooner was he on the dragon's back, then a chill wind shook him to the bone. Too late, Gerald realized that he was still wearing his bathrobe and slippers. Hearing the shouts of the would-be arresters dying away gave Gerald some satisfaction, but before long he was too cold and hungry to be satisfied with anything. Looking down, the world gave every appearance of having fallen into chaos. There were traffic jams everywhere, streets meandered in all directions with few connections, and buildings seemed to move from place to place at will.
"Where do you want to go?" the dragon asked Gerald.
"Away from those guys," Gerald answered with what little breath he had.
"I've done that."
"Good."
There was a pause during which Gerald shivered some more. If the dragon's body wasn't as warm as it was, he would have caught pneumonia by this time.
"I can't just keep going away from something or someone forever, you know," said the dragon. "We have to go somewhere eventually."
"Just land in a safe place and I'll think about it," Gerald replied.
"There are no safe places."
"Then find a place that isn't as dangerous as other places."
"Will do."
The dragon made a wide downward spiral and landed in a small city park. Skyscrapers surrounded them on every side, casting long shadows over the park benches. Gerald climbed off the dragon and sat on a bench that chilled his behind. Cars and trucks piled up on top of each other with no relief from the traffic jam in sight. The buildings jostled one another while cars and trucks scooted in between them. Other cars and trucks crashed into buildings that suddenly shifted into their paths. The sound of car horns filled the air, making it hard for Gerald to think.
"Any ideas?" asked the dragon.
"Maybe I should try to find my school, if I can find it now that there aren't any maps."
"Did you find it yesterday when there were maps all over the place?" asked the dragon.
"No."
"Hmm."
"Besides, maybe those guys will be at the school waiting for me."
"A reasonable hypothesis if there ever was one," said the dragon. "Assuming they can find the school without a map."
A sudden flood of morning light poured into the park as the skyscrapers receded and a cluster of single-story shop fronts took their place. With a leap of the heart, Gerald recognized the candy store where he had bought some chocolate and toffee just a morning ago, and, better yet, he saw the sign for Tindy's Cartological Shop just down the street. A stage coach from an old Western drove by on the cobblestone street. Gerald hopped off the bench and ran to the candy store.
"Let's get some candy!" Gerald yelled back to the dragon.
"I'm with you on that one!" the dragon yelled back, following on Gerald's heels.
But Gerald's heart sank when gasoline pumps spring up in front of the candy store and the shop was transformed into a gas station. A long line of sports cars came out of nowhere and jammed up the gas station. Horns honked from all directions as the cars blocked each other's way for getting in and out of the station.
"Get out of there, kid!" yelled a man from a sports car Gerald wished he owned already.
"Look at the traffic jam you caused!" yelled a woman from an even sportier car.
Gerald ran back to the park, disconsolate. The dragon swooped down on the bench next to him.
"Gosh! The candy store is gone! Tindy's is gone!" Gerald complained. "I guess there really are no maps. Maybe none of us will find my school and it will be lost forever."
"Nothing is lost. Not ever and certainly not forever," said the dragon.
"How do you know?"
The dragon cupped a claw over Gerald's ear and whispered:
"An old dragon told me that when I was a little dragon."
"Do you always believe what another dragon says to you?" Gerald asked.
Then he wished he hadn't asked another confidential question when the dragon cupped its cold claw over his ear once again and whispered through its hot and not totally fragrant breath:
"I have always believed every word said by a dragon with green eyes and I have never regretted it."
Several more questions came to Gerald's mind as to why dragons with green eyes always told the truth and, apparently, dragons with red eyes always lied. But he had had enough of dragon claws tickling his ear.
Before Gerald had the time to think further over his questions, a new group of city buildings zoomed in, knocking the shops away as if they were bowling pins. A Mack truck roared up to the curb and two men carrying large nets over their shoulders sprang out of the cab. The sign across the side of the truck read: PARAGON DRAGON CATCHERS. Motorists suddenly trapped behind the truck blared their horns.
"Dragon catchers!" Gerald cried as he hopped on the back of the dragon.
"By thunder and lightening and hail in the golden skies, you're right!" the dragon replied as the dragon catchers closed in on them with their nets.
"We've got you now!" one of the dragon catchers cried.
"You and your secret maps!" cried the other.
"We don't need maps to find our way around," the dragon retorted.
Gerald wondered for a second if the dragon would shut up long enough to get away, but as it happened, he was back into the air just before the dragon catchers swooped their nets in the air. As the dragon flew low over the city at breakneck speed, helicopters circled round them. The dragon careened downward, crashed through a window and landed in a store where they were surrounded with musical instruments. Pieces of shattered glass lay all over the floor and over a group of double basses. The cold morning air rushed in through the broken window.
Mountains of music manuscripts and large bins of musical instruments towered above Gerald like mountains. The thunderous sound of somebody running down a flight of wooden steps filled the storeroom.
"Good place to land," said the dragon as it looked about. "Vivaldi's Music Store!"
"Sounds familiar, sort of," said Gerald.
"Should be," said the dragon, "you've been here."
"I have?"
"You have to have been. Else we wouldn't have landed here."
Gerald scratched his head.
"Oh, I remember stopping at a music store to drop off that guy with the broken violin."
A door opened in the midst of piles of musical scores and a large woman wearing a night gown and carrying a candle entered the shop. When he saw her, Gerald wished again he was wearing more than his bath robe and slippers.
"O musical masters and metrical metronomes!" the woman cried. "What have we here?"
"One dragon, one boy, and one broken window, for which I apologize, but all three in a good cause," the dragon answered.
The woman seemed remarkably unruffled about the broken glass and the wind blowing in and stirring the manuscripts.
"Dragons with green eyes only break a window in a good cause, so I suppose this particular boy is embarked on a good cause as well."
"They - they tried to arrest me this morning, so I ran away," Gerald blurted out, obviously angling for sympathy.
"And what did they try to arrest you for?" asked the woman, already putting an arm around Gerald.
"I - don't know. They wouldn't tell me."
"Hmpf! They never tell people what they've done."
"And they ate up my breakfast -- at least I thought it was my breakfast, but now I don't know anymore where I was or where I am!"
"They did, did they! Well, I'll have to admit I don't know where this store is this morning, either. Leaving that detail aside, come with me and I will fix you a breakfast with not an allegro beat's delay. "
Those words were music to Gerald's ears. When the dragon held back, Gerald did the same and nodded toward the dragon.
"Can he have breakfast, too?" Gerald asked. "He gave me a ride all the way here."
"Why semiquavers and quavering strings during a cadenza! Of course the dragon can come for breakfast!"
In just a matter of minutes, Gerald was sitting at a round table, helping himself to piles of pancakes covered with maple syrup and the thickest, crispiest bacon he had ever tasted. He couldn't help but think he was getting an even better breakfast than the two men who tried to arrest him. Between mouthfuls, he told Mrs. Vivaldi, as she had identified herself, his story in more detail. The dragon didn't go for pancakes, but he had more than his share of the bacon, slurping happily all the way.
"Now that you have escaped, where are you going?" asked Mrs. Vivaldi.
"Uh - I thought I'd try to find my school. I never found it yesterday, thanks to the World CUP System. I guess I can't be any more lost without a map than I was with one."
"Oh Largos and Lentos!" cried Mrs. Vivaldi, "if you think you were lostwitha map just try to find your way without any map at all. I heard on the radio just now that all maps have been declared illegal and anybody knowing where he or she is going will be arrested and put in jail."
"So maybe that's what I did wrong," said Gerald, "but I hadn't even woken up yet when those guys came, so how could I have figured out where I was going?"
"Maybe a sense of direction came to you during a dream," suggested the dragon.
"I hope so," said Gerald.
A loud ringing at the front door interrupted any further conversation. Mrs. Vivaldi went to answer it while Gerald devoured what seemed an infinite pile of pancakes.
"What do you mean Guido Vivaldi is still sleeping in?"boomed a familiar voice from inside the store.
"What I mean," said Mrs. Vivaldi, "is that you kept Guido up half the night talking about violins and violin concertos and sonatas. I hope you understand."
"Not really. If he had stayed up with me the rest of the night while I played twenty sonatas and forty etudes, he'd be up now, just like me!"
A few seconds later, a man with gray hair growing down to his shoulders and dressed in overalls like a farmer stepped into the breakfast room. Something under the man's checkered shirt made it bulge. The neck of a violin stuck out just under the musician's chin. Gerald recognized him as the man who had escaped from prison with him and Sharon the day before.
"Well look who's here!" cried the musician.
"Look who's here, yourself," Gerald replied with a smile.
"And look who's here!"
"Look who is here!"
"Adagios and moderatos and prestos!" cried Mrs. Vivaldi, "how the two of you do carry on!"
There was a pause in the barrage of words while the musician looked about.
"Where is your lovely friend?" the musician asked Gerald.
"What friend?"
"The girl who was with you yesterday."
Gerald flushed a bit with embarrassment that he had been so forgetful about Sharon after she had stuck with him throughout the day before.
"Do you mean Sharon?"
"I should hope I mean Sharon. How come she's not with you?"
"Cause she wasn't about to get arrested this morning like I was -- " Gerald gulped. "Crashing computers! What if they came for Sharon too?"
"What's the matter, dearie?" asked Mrs. Vivaldi.
"Uh -- my friend -- Sharon -- I'm afraid those guys came to arrest her. Maybe she's in jail right now and needs to be freed!"
Gerald jumped on the dragon's back, ready to fly.
"That is a hypothesis that has enough reason behind it to qualify as a working hypothesis," said the dragon.
"So you really think Sharon's in trouble?" asked the violinist.
"Yes -- at least she could be. We've got to check out all the jails and find out where they put her."
"I don't fancy getting put back in jail myself," said the musician with his mouth full of the bacon that Mrs. Vivaldi had offered him.
"I don't fancy making Sharon languish in a prison cell any longer than I have to," said Gerald
"I'll come with you!" cried the musician chivalrously. "We'll save her! Charge!"
With Gerald and the musician on its back, the dragon took off from the floor and headed for the broken window.
"Bassoons and bazookas!" cried Mrs. Vivaldi, "are you going to go out again dressed like that?"
In spite of his haste, there was nothing Gerald would have liked better than to put on some more clothes, but there was no stopping the dragon. He barely had time to yell back a "thank you" before he was out the broken window and into the freezing morning.