This story originally appeared in the now out-of-print fanzineTunnelCon II, in 1992. Beauty and the Beast and itscharacters are owned by Witt-Thomas Productions and RepublicPictures. This story is presented merely for the enjoyment offans.

A Wandering Soul

by BeeDrew

July, 1978

"Thien, ya got point. Take 'er easy."

The crew boss bent and pulled up the manhole cover, waiting whileThien clambered awkwardly into the opening and found the rungs of theladder with his boots.

"Two jerks onna feed line if yer goin' farther in. One if ya spotthe leak and yer comin' up. And if ya unhook that line, yer buttbetter be topside onna double."

Thien began to descend, moving with the compact efficiency of hissmall, muscular people. O'Brien's rough Bronx tones followed him intothe darkness, but Thien didn't reply. The bark of that voice startedand ended most of his days, and anyway, he couldn't have answered ifhe wished to. He had no voice.

His boots scraped bottom and he stepped off the ladder. He stoodstill a moment, letting his eyes go as dim as the tunnel he'dentered. As always, he felt as though he'd been swallowed. But therewas no fear. He had not feared the tunnels since he'd realized whatthey were: A quiet place, a deep place. A place where ancestorswalked.

Deep in the stomach of the leviathan city, Nguyen Thien Le tiltedhis head to look up at the white crescent of light some fifteen feetabove him. His feed line dangled from it and ran toward its fastenerat his belt. It was humiliating to be leashed like a dog or a youngchild--he was seventeen and doing a man's work, even if his skinnyframe and berry-dark eyes made him look years younger. But much as hehated it, the tether could not be avoided. O'Brien wouldn't let himgo down without it, since he couldn't call out for help.

Thien thumbed on his light and looked around him, utterly stillfor the moment. His nostrils flared as he exhaled the scent of wetmotor oil and gutter stench, and drew in the cool, mineral-scentedair of the underground. He smiled.

He was here for the water. The city's arteries--water pipes, gaslines, power cables--threaded throughout and under and above theManhattan bedrock like a human's nerves and blood vessels. But he hadno obligation where gas or power were concerned, other than to reportany irregularities that made themselves known to him. He was here forwater only. Residents in this neighborhood had reported a loss ofwater pressure, and he was to check for a leak in one of themains.

I find it close to uptop, he told himself. This part ofcity, nothing breaks far below. Curious, mister.

Moving within the tight circle allowed by the slack in thefeedline, he found little moisture beyond what was to be expectedfrom rain runoff. He looked up at the eye of light once more, andgave two firm pulls on his feedline. After a moment, he got two backin response, and began to move deeper into the tunnel.

He imagined the clank of the cylinder unwinding above as O'Brienjealously fed out the feedline. A bulky tool pouch patted his thighsin rhythm to his gait, and he swung his light in even arcs, watchingfor signs of free-flowing water.

They'd localized the leak to a two-block area. In theory, hiscrewmates would check the pipes at the second tunnel access pointnearby. One would go down while the other stayed above in contactwith O'Brien, and they'd take it in turns. Hopefully, someone wouldfind the leak before lunch.

Thien knew better. He could count on O'Brien to back him up, butPulaski and Skink would already be on their way to the donut shop.Let the dummy go down first. He'll find it.

Not that Thien minded. He was welcome in this murky quiet, welcomeamong the rocks as mute as he. Somewhere ahead, precious water wasescaping its prescribed path, and his job was to guide it back intoits safe ways, as he'd done since a child in the rice paddies. Then,he'd dug the irrigation canals with hands and hoe; now he used awrench and gleaming lengths of new pipe, or a soldering iron andjoints. But his square brown hands were as quick as ever, and it wasgood work.

If luck walked with him, he might even see the ancestor-spirithe'd glimpsed once before, that had the shape of a man and anunearthly face, and light for its head and hand, and darkness for itsbody. An old spirit. A sacred spirit.

*****

A half-hour later he poked his head out of the tunnel, squintingagainst the white glare of daylight. Horns brayed as ten o'clocktraffic inched around the neon cones, so many annoyed, shiny-backedbeetles. Thien coughed as he caught a lungful of exhaust.

O'Brien grasped his hand and helped pull him up. The crew bossstudied his wet knees and sleeves. "Found it, didn't ya?"

Thien nodded. Skink ambled over from his reclining positionagainst the truck. He still had powdered sugar in his mustache. "Heneed any help with the fix, Big O?"

A paunchy, unkempt man who ate constantly, Skink addressed hisquestion to O'Brien, as though Thien could not be expected to form aresponse.

Your fat hangs over the belt, Thien threw at him silently,and turned away to stow his equipment in the truck.

O'Brien glowered at Skink. "Don't call me that, jerk. Thien,what's the op?"

Ignoring Skink, Thien removed a short, stout length of pipe largeraround than his arm from the back of the truck, and held it up. Hepointed to one end and raised his eyebrows.

"Busted pipe?"

Thien shook his head, stifling a small pang of impatience. It hadall been so much easier when Norm had been alive--his second father,who understood the language of the hands. He made a "ring" with onehand and "fitted" it to the end of the pipe. Then he separated twofingers, and looked at O'Brien expectantly.

"Joint's cracked," O'Brien announced. He barely waited for Thien'sconfirming nod.

"Pulaski, double-time it back to the end of the block and cut offthe water there. Skink, you'n the kid'll go down and patch 'erup...."

Thien tapped a fingernail against the pipe until the tiny ringingcaught O'Brien's attention.

"Yeah, what?"

Thien pointed to himself, and then to Skink, shaking his head.

"Ya wanna fix it by yerself?" O'Brien questioned.

Off Thien's nod, the crew boss looked thoughtful. He thumbedthrough the yellow repair orders on his clipboard. "A guy needs someextra hands down there. Ya sure?"

Thien nodded. He turned back to the truck and started to gathertools and materials, as though the matter were decided.

O'Brien grunted assent. "Lemme call in and tell 'em whichbuildings we're cutting off. Then you two jokers--" he shot a look atPulaski and Skink--"can go over to Sixty-fifth an' get started onnanext sob story."

As the crew boss walked toward the cab of the truck, Pulaskinudged Skink. "See that, son? The gook's afraid to go down in thedark with ya. Better tell him yer not that kinda guy."

Skink punched Pulaski's arm. "Shut up, Pulaski, willya?" His eyesslid scornfully over Thien and settled elsewhere.

Thien took a high-powered portable lamp out of the truck. Withouta backward look he descended into the hole. O'Brien would be angrythat he'd gone down without a feedline. He didn't care.

Once below, he hurried down the tunnel toward the leak, heedlessof the noise he made with his jingling equipment. By the timeO'Brien's yell echoed down the corridor in search of him--"Thien!Dammit, boy, the feedline!"--he had set up the lamp and begun to layout his tools.

He had also removed and stuffed out of sight the sodden rags andtape he'd found around the offending joint. Someone had made astopgap repair, one that hadn't lasted. And that someone was not acity employee. Of that Thien was oddly, excitedly certain.

As he waited for Pulaski to shut off the main, he let the escapingwater flow over his hands. In the cone of light from the lamp, hishands were beautiful, bony and brown and covered with a flowing,glassy sheet. He looked away down the tunnel, where the small streamrushed into darkness. He'd follow it soon.

The rivulet coughed and slowed to a dribble, then to a drip. Heset to work, and began to whistle through his teeth--softly, so asnot to pierce the silence he so cherished. In the memory of his earswas his mother's happy voice, singing one of the endless songs of warthat were passed round the village.

Sitting in the doorway, Cool breeze passing over me,

I look for my family

In a sad and empty house.

With tears, I miss my father,

With anger, I hate the Viet Cong.

You brought the elephant home

To walk upon our graves.

You took our pretty country,

And sold it to the Soviets. . . .

Within twenty-five minutes he had the joint drum-tight and hisequipment packed away. The job would have taken Skink a while longer,which meant Thien had the time he needed.

He found a dry spot for his tool bag and left the portable lampbehind as a marker. Taking a fat orange candle from the pouch at hiswaist, he touched a match to its wick and began to walk deeper intothe tunnels.

This time he went noiselessly, his eyes and ears ranging ahead andto the side and behind, seeking whisper or flicker that would tellhim he was not alone. His stealth reminded him of home; of sneakingalong roadsides and hiding in ditches to avoid VC. Quiet, mister,quiet, he warned himself, and moved like a puff of smoke throughthe darkness. It was a long walk, and his thighs began to ache withthe pace he set.

Even if he were not meant to see the ancestor today, perhaps therewould be some sign of the others who came here to care for thespirits--the ones who made the clumsy pipe repairs, or left theburnt-end matches he sometimes found. He felt a tingle of exciteddread at the thought.

He came to the place--a fissure in the smooth walls that lookedlike nothing more than a notch draped in shadow, until you touchedit. He put his hand out, and felt the rush of air through the crack.At its base, it widened just enough for him to squeeze through on hisbelly, like an eel escaping a net.

He doused his candle, shoved it and his bag through the crackahead of him, and zipped his jacket to keep it from being caught onthe rough stone. Then he wriggled through the gap, holding hisbreath. He was in a small pocket that branched off another widetunnel. He stood still, listening, but the only sound was his ownsoft breath.

His heart pounded as he stepped out into this tunnel that was sodifferent from the one he'd come from. He looked up and down as faras his weak light reached, seeing again what had caught his attentionthat first day--the gritty floor that was clean of rocks or otherdebris; the rush of fresh air that came from somewhere above; and,most telling of all, the metal mountings that studded the walls,meant for torches. It meant people . . . or, something else.

Despite himself, Thien shivered. Honoring the ancestors should bea community rite, held before the family shrine--not a sneaky tripinto a dank, empty tunnel.

With a sigh, he knelt and shook out the contents of his pouch, andmade his second offering of incense--a poor sacrifice, and not evenon a proper altar, but all he had. Come back, spirit, heprayed, as the burning incense sent up a ribbon of pungent smoke.Come back. I honor your wisdom. I pray for yourguidance...

Today, as before, his prayers went unheeded. He waited as long ashe dared, but no one and nothing appeared. Leaving the bowl as a signof his reverence, he returned the way he had come. I come back,spirit, he promised silently. I go deeper, next time.

*****

O'Brien was red-faced and mad as a hornet when Thien appeared. "Yajackass! I was about to climb in an' muck around after ya. What tookso long?"

Thien lifted his hands and signed a few phrases, as though tryingto explain. O'Brien's face reddened even more.

"Ya know I'm no damn good at them charades. Were ya introuble?"

Thien affected the blank, bird-like stare that usually frustratedO'Brien the most. The man heaved a disgusted sigh.

"Never mind. Well, didja fix it?"

Thien nodded, and turned toward the truck to put away his tools.He folded his face carefully, blandly around his secret.

*****

"Ye gods, what a mess," Jacob Wells murmured, shaking his head indisgust. His lame hip stabbed a protest as he braced his hands on thedesk and squinted at the maps spread before him; indeed, over everyflat surface in the study.

"There's no possible way we can cope with all the leaks, isthere?"

A clawed, golden hand reached past his elbow and gently settled afragrant cup of tea by his hand. "It's like this every spring,Father."

The old man turned and shot a sharp look of annoyace at thespeaker. "True, but the problem is no less frustrating with thepassage of time!" he snapped.

His eyes softened as he surveyed his tall adopted son. Vincent'sblue eyes were calm as he delicately sipped his own cup of tea. Attwenty-three, he still had the unfinished, gangly look of youth,though he was nearly the tallest man in the tunnels and by far themost powerfully built. He was also, currently, quite damp.

"You've been out with the crews already, I see," Father said,wrinkling his nose as he caught the rank smell of tunnel mud and wetfur.

Vincent apologetically backed away a step and offered, "We'remaking progress."

Father snorted. "Fingers in the dike, as it were. Ah, well. We canonly do our best. The city crews will be underfoot for a few weeks,that's sure. I'd best post extra sentries, and tell Mary to keepthe--Vincent, what is it?"

He had caught the telltale downward flick of Vincent's eyes at themention of city crews. "My God, have they spotted us? Vincent!"

His son raised a placating hand. "No, Father. Two crews have beenBelow today, but they've not seen us. It's only...."

His voice trailed away, and Father didn't need Vincent's empathicabilities to sense his son's reluctance to speak. A parent knew howto deal with that, however.

"Let's have it. This instant, young man."

As always, that particular tone commanded perfect obedience.Vincent fished something out of the pocket of his vest and meeklyplaced it before his father. "Rebecca found this beyond the SpiralStaircase, in a tunnel near the surface, just where we found thefirst one. There were candles, too."

Father picked up the small, earthenware pot and sniffed it. Thefaint aroma of burnt herbs clung to the little bowl, which wasotherwise unremarkable, if one discounted the fact that it had nobusiness being anywhere near the inhabited tunnels.

Father sighed. He felt sorely put upon, to have this dropped inhis lap on top of the plethora of leaks and gushes and sludge thathad recently plagued his underground. "No one admits to this? And itcan't possibly be Narcissa's?"

Vincent shook his head, and reached to take the pot back, rotatingit in his elegant hands as he examined it.

"The others all say they have no knowledge of it, and I went toNarcissa when we found the first bowl. She says only that there areothers who worship as she does, and that I have looked too deep."

Father cast an appealing glance at the ceiling. "A phantom voodoopractitioner loose in our tunnels, or something even more sinister.Lovely."

Vincent smiled. "You mustn't take Narcissa's words so literally,Father. Voodoo is not the only religion that employs herbs andincense."

Embarrassed that he hadn't thought of that himself, Father leanedforward eagerly. "You're absolutely right! Perhaps we could checkwith some of our Helpers who practice the Eastern faiths. One of themmight have come down for some purpose or other, wanting privacy.Vincent, could you--?"

Vincent nodded. "I'll see to it. Don't worry." He pocketed thebowl and headed for the exit. He was half-way down the corridorbefore Father's voice echoed after him.

"Vincent! What was Rebecca doing that far from home? A child herage--"

Vincent smiled, and kept going.

*****

"My-fa-ther-is-a-ba-ker. My-fa-ther-is-a-ba-ker."

The teacher's mouth, round and painted pink, shaped the words withexaggerated care. Thien watched his pencil point as he transferredthem onto paper.

The other students parroted the teacher solemnly, and then bent tothe task of writing the sentence, leaving Thien at a point of pausein his lesson. His mind filled the blank instantly:My-fa-ther-is-dead. My fa-ther-is-dead.

He shifted restlessly in his chair and wished for the nextsentence to drive out the thought, but it was like the deep toll of achurch bell on a clear morning. It reached everywhere, into everyopen space, and he was helpless to halt the tumble of half-formedvisions that swept up his throat and behind his eyes. He felt sweatbreak from his skin. He remembered.

*****

Fire. It was always fire. Billows and sheets of it, racing throughthe small printshop where Norm had been amiably cursing the antiqueplumbing as he plunged out a toilet. Electrical fire, O'Brien hadtold him later. Already loose in the walls before any alarm had goneup, and the place full of paper. Fire was the same, in the old lifeand the new. It ate, it crackled and spat, it wanted water, even thewater trapped in the fleshy envelopes of men.

His village, a green, bamboo pocket amid the vast Mekong RiverDelta, had burned after a fierce mortaring. He was thirteen, hisfather's firstborn, the one who would stay with the land and honorthe ancestors. A good worker with a strong back.

He'd run, run from the loud dragon-belching . . . the family's hutswooping at him, close. . . . He sobbed, with his hands pressed tohis ears, until a hot blow to the neck knocked him flat. No air.Blood thick on his fingers as he gagged and writhed in the dirt. Thefire was eating his home. It licked through and over the hut, lungedfor the forest and toward the path that led to the burial grounds,and people ran until they fell, red-spattered....

He'd awakened into olive-drab confusion, in a strange bedsuspended off the floor. He'd awakened voiceless, and there was anawful sucking sound somewhere below his chin. It was a tube, and hewas breathing through it.

A small piece of shrapnel had gone cleanly into and out of histhroat, miraculously missing vital arteries and his spine. A medichad gotten to him, made an airway, stemmed the blood flow. The peopleof the American field hospital thought he was a very lucky boy. Thenurses made much of him, smiling and babbling their odd tongueendlessly into his uncomprehending face.

And gradually he had come to realize that there was no one left.Everyone he'd ever known had gone to the land of spirits, and he didnot know their burial places, where they might be honored, where theymight help him. His family, the living and the dead, were gone.Just--gone.

The hospital could not keep him long, and later there was a placein a Saigon orphanage--really, just floorspace in an old church. Henever regained his speech. The tube came out, and he breathed throughhis throat again, and his lips moved, but he still couldn't bring upany sound.

The doctor said it was scar tissue, and that he might learn tospeak after a fashion, but Thien remained silent. If he opened hismouth, what would come out? His father's voice, his mother's, hisbaby sister's? Perhaps the wind through the mangrove trees, or thesoft lowing of the buffalo he'd tended at day's end, or the tiny hissof incense burning in a pot. No. His home was burnt. His voice wasgone.

And then, finally, the airlift to a camp in Thailand. A barrentime there, eating watery rice and avoiding the taunts of theboy-gangs who played dice all day and would not go to school. Thienhad gone, but he could not speak the lessons like the others, and theteachers had no special time to give him, and he might well haveremained there forever, since he was an orphan past babyhood, andcrippled besides.

Until one day they came and got him off his sleeping mat, and saidhe was going to New York. That there was a church--"You understandchurch, don't you? God? Aw, hell, never mind"--willing to sponsor hisemigration. He was again a very lucky boy. And they'd given him toNorm.

Norm had wanted him especially because he couldn't speak. A small,pot-bellied plumber with a ruff of dark hair circling a bald head, hewas a widower whose wife had been hearing impaired. Norm knew Sign,and meant to teach it to Thien.

"Twenty years! Twenty years I've talked with my hands. I need you,mister. I don't hardly know what to do with myself, with no one totalk to," he'd said, with a big sailor's laugh. "We'll get you up tospeed on the lingo, and then I'll show you some Sign. With a fewshortcuts of the wife's, of course."

Norm had worked laboriously with Thien, helping him learn tounderstand and write English passably well. Thien had gone to school,where he excelled at algebra and played fullback on a soccer team,and went to Yankees games on the weekends with Norm. Yet Norm hadn'tlived long enough to teach Thien all he knew about Sign. Two yearsafter Thien had come to America, just before his seventeenthbirthday, his father had burned to death. Again.

"Poor little bastard. Orphaned twice," O'Brien had said at thefuneral. O'Brien was Norm's partner in the plumbing business. Hehadn't liked Thien much, but he had liked Norm. And for that reason,once the business was sold and O'Brien had taken a supervisory jobwith the city, Thien found himself employed as an apprentice plumber,strictly due to string-pulling by O'Brien.

"A minority, and handicapped at that," O'Brien had said, pleased."They'll score big EOE points with you, kid. You're eighteen now.Remember that."

Thien had left school, enrolling in evening classes instead. Therewasn't much money left after Norm died, but O'Brien helped him find aroom, and had him over for dinner with his noisy brood once a week.Thien was grateful. He was hazy about what might be done with a muteVietnamese who kept outliving his parents.

*****

"I-can-read-a-map. I-can-read-a-map."

Thien started. He'd missed a sentence, and the teacher wasspeaking again. He bent to write, and then sat helpless as herealized he'd snapped off his pencil point, a small wooden sacrificeto the past. The class went on without him.

"I-go-up-town-by-bus. I-go-up-town-by-bus."

I have nowhere to go, Thien whispered silently, to thebroken pencil. The wandering one did not come.

He had promised one more try . . . a glimmer of hope opened insidehim as his listless eyes fell on the date he'd written so carefullyat the top of his paper. In three days, he decided with gatheringexcitement. One more offering. Three days to wait.

*****

Vincent thought about the problem for the rest of the day as heand Winslow and Pascal wrestled with slippery, uncooperative, elderlypipes. The bowls and their evidence of burned incense puzzled him,but did not trouble him unduly, a fact which infuriated his father.Vincent knew that the incense-burner was not dangerous. He could nothave told how he knew, and wouldn't have cared to justify his opinionto a grizzled, snap-eyed physician. He just knew.

Yet it was exciting. It was a mystery, a tantalizing bit of theunknown to disturb the even, pleasant tenor of tunnel life. In theend, he decided to go and see Le Long. The young Vietnamese and hisfamily were very new Helpers, only recently moved out of the tunnelsto start their own business. Vincent still met Long once a week tohelp him with his English.

After Winslow had called a halt, thoroughly disgusted with themini-Niagara they'd discovered on the fourth level, Vincent sent oneof the children with a message for the greengrocer. He felt ratherodd doing it, since it wasn't so many years ago that he'd runmessages hither and yon himself. He had a bath, and went to joinFather for a meal.

He consumed two plates of stew amid Father's maps andgrousing.

"I'd best go and see Long about the bowls," he ventured.

Father, muttering evilly over his work, didn't even look up. Hewaved a distracted hand at Vincent and groped for a pen.

Feeling rather guiltily relieved that he had an excuse to absenthimself tonight, Vincent found a pen, placed it by Father's glasses,and set off on the long walk toward Long's home and shop.

He paced the tunnels on suede-booted feet, thinking of nothing inparticular as his mind automatically collected and spoke to him thesounds of the community preparing for night. Someone doused torcheswith a clink of metal on metal, and a pop of vanishing flame. Mary,gentle in all ways, called gently for her charges and herded them tobed. The faint, constant din of Pascal the Elder's pipes slowed to anoccasional stutter, and a quavery older voice begged a pot of tea.Evening settled easily over the tunnels, and all was at peace.

Vincent had loved this quiet time since boyhood. Then, he'd havebeen chased to bed by an exhausted Father; would have demanded andreceived a drink of water and two stories. He still loved thetwilight quiet, but he no longer shared it.

Since he'd been a man, he had known a restless searching whenothers were tired and ready to sleep. As night approached, new energycoursed his blood, circling round and round until he must move withit, or roar. He carried in his gut an odd, formless ache that couldonly be soothed in darkness. Part of him, he'd come to know--andthere was dread in the knowing--was for the night.

He would walk in the Park after seeing Long, he decided. Therewould be a sickle moon; perhaps a concert. Certainly people, whosesteps and voices he could follow, though it cut him to know that hecould never touch or speak to them. And if there were no people, hewould run--fast, and silent, and onward until he could bear stone andstillness again.

But first, there was the matter of the incense pots, and Father'speace of mind. Vincent climbed the curves of the Spiral Staircase,bent against the wind that funnelled up from the long nothingness. Itwhipped his cloak and hair unmercifully, and tried--he fancied--topull him out over the abyss. He exited the stairway at a landingmidway up, climbed through a round chute he'd made himself as ashortcut, and was in the tunnel that led him, after ten blocks hetook at a jog, to Long's basement. He hoped he was not calling toolate.

Long was in the basement waiting for him, with the cabinent thatcamouflaged the tunnel entrance pulled aside.

"Vincent! Good you come."

Long's welcoming smile was all over his round face, and Vincentsmiled back. "It's good to see you, too, Long."

"Come up," Long invited, with a broad wave toward the stairs. "Bahave tea for us."

Vincent followed Long up the narrow stairway, breathing asilent--and apparently, effective--prayer that the old planks wouldbear his weight. Next to the compact little figure of his friend, hefelt clumsy and overlarge in the tiny shop. It was closed anddarkened now, but still redolent with the fresh tang of onions andparsely and oranges. Long's wife and son waited to welcome him in theliving quarters behind the storefront.

Vincent took the chair Long offered and accepted tea from Ba, agentle young woman with whom he'd exchanged perhaps fourteen words inhis entire life, but whom he liked very much. Baby Edward toddledover, absurdly small. He braced pudgy hands on Vincent's knees, andstared up at him with frank wonder. Vincent, quite used to this,returned the look blandly.

"Up," Edward decided, holding his arms out imperiously. He seemedhappy, once ensconced on the visitor's lap, to play with the fringesof Vincent's vest and poke curious fingers into his ears.

Long beamed. "Soon he speak better than me, right?"

Vincent smiled. "Your English improves all the time, Long. Butit's true, Edward will have the advantage, growing up a native."

"Your note say you have something to show me?"

Vincent nodded, and dug the two identical bowls out of the foldsof his cloak. Deftly avoiding Edward's grab, he passed them toLong.

"We found these in the tunnels, with some candles that were notmade Below. Father is worried. We don't know who put them there, orwhy."

Long accepted the little bowls and held them up to the light. Thenhe lowered them to his lap, his straight mink hair falling across hisbrow. He scraped some of the black residue out of one pot with afingernail, and sniffed it.

"I know them," he admitted. But he still looked puzzled."Come."

Ba took the baby from Vincent, and Long led the way into thenarrow hallway off the kitchenette. He snapped on an overhead light,and Vincent saw that they stood before a closet whose interior wasopaqued by a bead curtain.

Long drew the clicking strands aside, revealing a tiny shrine. Hebowed before it. Somewhat awkwardly, Vincent copied him. Wooden,scribed tablets stood on a shoulder-high shelf of sorts, and therewere bowls more ornate than those Vincent had brought, but of similarshape.

"It is the shrine of my ancestors," Long told him quietly. "Ibring the tablets from Vietnam. They my father, my grandfather, andthree before them. Sometime, I written here too, and Edward the onewho burns incense and makes offerings to the spirits."

Vincent nodded his understanding, and Long dropped the beadcurtain back into place and placed the bowls in Vincent's hands."Someone wish to honor ancestor spirits with incense, but I not knowwhy he do it in the tunnels."

Vincent's brows drew together. "I don't know either. We bury ourdead far below the tunnel where these were found, in the catacombs.And I saw no shrine or tablets."

Long frowned, his eyes nearly closing. "Can not say for sure. Manyof my people in this country. Was war for many years. Enemydifferent--war the same. People had to go, leave everything,including ancestors. And a man with no ancestors...."

His voice trailed into helpless silence as he groped for words."This man lost, Vincent. Orphan. The spirits, they guide theirchildren, protect from bad harm. They never far away, and they makehome for you in their land. You lose them, you lost."

Vincent absorbed this, turning the enigmatic incense pots in hishands. Long's words touched him. How close he had brushed to becominga lost soul, with no family. If it were not for Father, and theothers....

"Do you think he will come back?"

Long thought about that for a long moment, squinting into thespace beyond Vincent's left shoulder as though making a calculation.Finally, he nodded.

"He come back. Three days from now is--is--" He fished for thetranslation. "Feast of Wandering Souls. All can cross from the spiritworld and go to villages again. We give offerings--food, clothes toour ancestors, and also to the wandering ones, who have no living tohonor them."

Vincent's eyes sharpened at that. "Three days. I'll remember.Thank you, Long."

*****

It was nearly time. Thien had stayed away from the tunnels sincehis last visit. He had gotten special things to offer at hismakeshift shrine. Hope burned white within him. Surely the spiritwould speak to him on this, the Feast of Wandering Souls.

After work, Thien walked ten blocks to Central Park, and climbedup on a slate-grey jut of rock to wait for darkness. He and Norm hadcome here a lot.

He rummaged in the bag he had brought to be sure everything wasthere. Satisfied, he ate some popcorn, and coaxed the bold pigeons toshare his snack. After he held still for a long while, one evenhopped up on his outstretched leg, and minced up the length ofit.

Come, mister, he said silently to the pigeon. A smilecurved his lips. To fill your belly you must be brave. And thebird plucked a morsel from his fingertips, and it was time to go.

He headed for the tunnel entrance he'd used that first day,carrying his loaded pouch carefully against his body. It wasdangerous to go down without sawhorses and cones to divert traffic,and no one to see that he came out again. He did it anyway.

He used no light at first, feeling his way down the ladder untilhe could pull the manhole cover back into place. It settled with amelodious clang, and he surprised himself with a shiver.

For a few moments he listened, breathing lightly through hismouth, until he was sure he was alone. Then he turned on the largeflashlight he carried, and went down. His light threw false figuresand shadows on the walls and his footsteps seemed as loud as agiant's.

He came to a split in the tunnel he didn't remember, a place wherethe tunnel snaked off in two directions. Hesitating, he swung hislight from one black mouth to the other. It all seemed so differentat night, though this seasonless place did not know, and would neverknow, the tyranny of daylight.

He chose the path to his left and walked on. After a time hespotted some of the repairs he'd made in recent weeks, and was moresure of the way. He went down and down, until he could almost feelthe immense tons of rock pressing the air against his head. He saw noone, and sensed no one. Far off there was the muted rush and rattleof subway trains, and, closer, the sound of water dripping. I findthe leak later, he told himself, and hurried on.

He came at last to the fissure, and stood before it, feeling hispulse begin to speed. He remembered, with the eerie clarity of adream twice dreamt, how he'd come here first, weeks ago, still rawand lost and afraid of what they'd do with him if he lost his job,the way he'd lost his father. . . .

*****

"Stoopid little slit-eye! Watch yerself," Skink muttered, with aglare. Thien, carrying too big an armful of orange cones, had bumpedinto him and made him slosh a big Pepsi stain onto his overalls.

Thien cringed away from the acid tone and ducked behind the truck.He settled the cones against the bumper and looked arounduncertainly. O'Brien had gone to a gas station to "see a man about ahorse," and Thien had no desire to spend his lunchtime in the companyof Skink and Pulaski.

Just a few feet away, a manhole cover sat ajar over the hole thatgave access to the underground pipes. Thien's look brightened. Godown, he decided. Quiet there, anyway.

He slipped his lunchbag inside his shirt and climbed down into thetunnel. Instantly, the clamor of the city was blunted, and he wasblessedly alone. He stood at the foot of the ladder, and grinned.

He found a dry place to sit, and ate his sandwich and apple. Afterhe'd wadded up the trash and stuffed it in his pocket, he sat stillfor a few minutes, arms folded around drawn up knees. He still didn'twant to go up--not till he was sure O'Brien was back. He looked downthe tunnel, wondering idly where it went, where he might end up if hefollowed its meanderings.

He decided to find out. He had a flashlight, and a half hour orso. He'd go exploring. The tunnels didn't bother him the way theybothered his crewmates, who were forever moaning about the damp andmuttering "rats and gators, for Chrissakes." You just had to watchwhere you put your hands and feet, and you were fine.

He got to his feet and looked one way, then the other,considering. There was something calm and unchanging down here,something that drew him. He ran his fingertips lightly over the roughstone. Cool, it felt. Solid.

He took the downward slope and walked fast, casting his lightaround to see what there was to see. The tunnel forked after aquarter-mile or so. One passage led upward at a slight angle andlooked man-made. The other was of granite bedrock, different from thedirty, cement-girded tunnels he was used to. He chose the second.

If he hadn't been shining his light against the walls, watchingthe sparkle of the minerals, he'd never have found the fissure. Asplit in the wall like a lightning strike, that widened as it met thefloor, it didn't seem to offer any opportunities for exploring. Then,he felt a rush of air against his hand and bent down to look moreclosely. He thought there was another tunnel beyond.

Without a second thought, he flattened himself onto his stomachand pulled himself through the gap by his elbows. He barely fit.Maybe not much good idea, mister, he told himself, panting.When he finally climbed to his feet, he stood in a niche off anothertunnel; nothing more. He felt a flare of disappointment. This washardly worth his trouble.

Or so he thought, until he noticed the floor. Though covered in afine, even grit, it was clean of the usual leaves and small stones.Fresh air cycled through this passage from somewhere; it gave a senseof connecting two places that he might actually want to visit. Andthere was something odd fastened to the far wall.

When he recognized it, a cold sweep of fear shook him, and hetried to look in all directions at once, failing because his lightwas not as strong as the dark around him. The thing was atorch-holder. And it supported an unlit stump of wood, blackened atone end. People.

Breath hitching, eyes rolling from side to side, Thien flattenedhimself against the tunnel wall and cut off his light. People livedhere, and he'd broken into their home, and he'd never come up out ofthe earth and O'Brien would never know what had happened....

But no one came. After a while, gathering his courage and holdingit tight in both hands, Thien turned his light back on, and dared tomove farther down the tunnel, starting at every slight echo of hisown movements.

He found more torch-holders, and a set of four chiseled stairs,but nothing else. This place....this place, with its darkness andstrength of stone, reminded him of nothing so much as a tomb, aburial place where ancestors' bodies were housed and where the livingwent to consult them.

And then it hit him, with a shock that was half fright and halfjoy: Maybe it was a burial place. That seemed to fit. It waskept clean, yet was not in general use, as was proper for an ancestorplace. True, if any were honored here, they were not hisancestors--those he'd lost, left behind in his own land. Theirresting ground had been burned black; their heroic tales lost to theworld of the living. He, their son, was forever bereft of theirprotection.

No. This was a place of other ancestors--perhaps even the gatewayto Hell itself. That idea had sent a delighted shiver up his spine,and made him scuttle back to the hole through which he'd entered. Hesquirmed back through the opening, feeling every moment thatsomething might grab his ankles from the other side and haulhim into the underworld.

Still. . . . He got himself turned around and inched his head andshoulders back through the opening, for one last look.

And it was then that he'd seen the spirit. Cloaked in night,carrying a torch that made the shadows go from black to brown toamber, it walked toward him steadily. Thien's blood froze in horror.His lips moved silently--Ma ruoc hon! He knew he would have screamed,if he'd had a voice. It was ma ruoc hon, the ancestral spirit come towalk him into the land of the dead.

Yet the figure had passed him, all unknowing. He'd felt the airmove in its wake, and could have reached out to touch its cloak. Allhis muscles went soft with relief. . . until it turned, perhapssensing that it was watched, and he saw its face, jagged in theyellow torchlight.

It was a tortured marriage of cat and man. A demon's face and aman's form--This was no ma nuoc, water ghost; or matroi, ghost of the air. This was ma le, a wandering ghost.One who had died childless, without any connection to the land of theliving, and suffered for it. Thien stared, gaping and not breathing,until it turned within the swirl of its cloak, and was gone.

Thien had remained as he was for a long time, panting softly andletting the fear leak out of him. Since babyhood his grandmother hadfilled his ears with tales of hell and its denizens; how the mannerof a man's death determined his lot in the afterlife. What had thisman done, to deserve such harsh karma?

He knew that the spirits did not move without reason. He'd beenmeant to see the demon, yet had been left untouched. Why?

He decided, after a while, that he was meant to help the ghost. Tooffer sacrifices and honor it with the burning of candles andincense, and so ease its suffering. And maybe . . . maybe it wouldthen help him. It might seek for him in the world of the spirits andfind his father, mother, and sister; tell them he still lived, andneeded them. . . .

*****

So he'd come back twice before, to burn his incense and whisperhis hopeless prayers, at the proper times of the month. One could notcommand a spirit, but Thien saw no reason for it to reveal itselfonce, and not again, unless Thien himself was doing something wrong,or not doing something right.

If the wandering one does not come tonight . . . . Thienfound himself at a loss for the consequences. With a shrug, hereached through the gap to set his flashlight on the floor.

He got down on his belly and inched his body through the crack,being less careful than he ought to have been. He scraped one elbowpainfully against the stone. Once kneeling in the little pocket offthe main tunnel, he gingerly touched his fingers to the wound. Theycame away sticky.

First offering, he thought. For a few moments he sat still,breathing in pants, eyes squeezed shut. Come tonight, spirit.Please come.

He set to work. He'd brought more than before--fruit, and a littleflour to burn, and a whole row of squat candles. The white lightthrown from his flashlight seemed somehow alien to this place and tohis rituals, but he didn't click it off until the candles were lit.Then, in their dance, he laid out his sacrifices, and set the incenseaflame.

Rising, he bowed before the makeshift altar, and began to pray. Onimpulse he Signed the prayer as best he could, and chanted itsilently, following his father's phantom voice in his mind.

I pray for safety. I pray for good health and long life. I prayfor my family, that they will know I still honor their ghosts, andall the ancestors who have gone to the soil. I pray for your goodfortune in the afterlife, spirit. I have brought these humble giftsto ease you--

"Your prayer is very beautiful."

For an instant, every muscle locked, and Thien couldn't evenunbend from his bow. Then, slowly, he straightened up, and turned hishead, feeling the blood leave his lips. The spirit's eyes methis.

White eyes, his reeling thoughts told him. Blue and round like thema duong rach mac--the slash-faced soldiers of his nightmares.Yet, the face was the same.

It stood close by, its shadow just a little deeper than those castby his candles. It moved neither toward him, nor away.

"Ma le," Thien gasped. He did not realize he formed thewords with his lips, with a rush of air through his ruined throat, asthough he would speak.

"Don't be afraid," it said, in the language of his second father.In English.

Thien felt the onrush of loss like a subway train hurtling towardhim, not about to stop. He lifted his hands.

Spirit? he questioned, a jerky flutter of his fingers.

Its brow furrowed. Then it, too, raised its hands--such hands;clawed and coated with fur that caught the candlelight--and began tospeak to him as no one had since Norm's death, in Sign.

I am no spirit. I am real. This is my world, where I live, andyou are welcome here. What is your name?

Thien didn't realize he was crying, that the great, gutturalwhoops he heard were his, until the spirit-man reached out andtouched him. One broad palm covered Thien's shoulder in a warm, humangrip, and the voice flowed over him--just as warm, just as human."It's all right. I know. . . I know. . . ."

*****

Father shoved and pushed with almost gleeful satisfaction as hestowed away his dogeared maps. At last! Life could return to itsordained course, now that the worst of the spring leakages were undercontrol. And, though still livid with Vincent for breaking one of thetunnels' guiding principles, Father was the first to admit that thejob would have taken an extra month without the able assistance ofThien, their newest Helper.

"Thien has promised to bring down copies of the city's mapsperiodically, so that I can update mine," he remarked to Vincent, wholeaned nearby against the desk, tranquilly overseeing Father'soperations.

"That's kind of him."

"He's been more than kind, though I still shudder when I think ofhow he got in. A gap--that let him right into the perimeter, underthe very noses of the sentries!"

Father's grey eyes flashed their indignation, and Vincentshrugged, spreading his hands. "What can I say, Father? Virtually allof us have used that passage, and none thought that spot to be morethan a split in the rock. Winslow swears Thien must be double-jointedto have fit through it at all."

"Be that as it may, it is being sealed?"

"Yes, with Thien's permission."

Father's eyebrows shot up at that. "His permission?"

"It is his gap," Vincent pointed out reasonably.

Father got ready to sputter, but then he caught the teasingglimmer in the blue eyes, and chuckled instead. After all, he himselfhad taught Vincent the trust in others that was even now hoisting himon his own petard. How mean-spirited, if he were to tell thisinnocent, "Trust only those you know."

He waved a gloved hand in his Vincent's direction, and laboredmightily to make his voice gruff; to flatten out the pride he felt inhis son. "Go on with you. Out. I have work to do."

Vincent went, and didn't let himself smile until he was severalpaces gone from the library. He had thought Father was going to havean apoplectic fit when he'd shown up with a strange young man in tow,and named him the one responsible for the mysterious incense bowls.Yet, a spate of explanatory words--Thien's prayer, his belief thatVincent was a spirit, his seeking after ancestors gone from him sincethe war--had softened the harsh protest and outraged glare, just asVincent had expected. To be sure, he himself had received a pepperingfrom Father later, but Thien was welcomed with openhandedfriendship.

A month had gone by. The boy was often Below, though he'd declinedtheir invitation to make his home in the tunnels. Instead he boardedwith Le Long and his family, and instruction in Sign had been addedto Long's English lessons.

Thien had explained in stilted Sign that he believed he'd be moreuseful to his friends Below in his present job. He could supply themwith repair materials far superior to rags and tape, and he couldwarn them of where the crews would be. All he wished for, he'd letthem know, was speech.

Vincent came to the master pipe chamber, and looked within, movingso as not to be observed by its occupants. What he saw made him givethanks, once again, for the peculiar, everyday miracle that was lifeBelow.

*****

Thien had to work hard to keep up with these new lessons. He saton a stool alongside sunny-haired Rebecca, one hand poised lightlyover a "dead" teaching pipe, and watched Pascal the Elder strikespeech from the metal. Rebecca Signed and spoke the messages, so thathe could know what the dings and taps and double-beats meant. In thisway he learned two languages in one lesson--Sign and pipecode--andoh, it was hard; much harder than night school. But wonderful.

He lifted his head, sensing something in the shadows at the farend of the chamber, beyond the musical cacophony of the pipes. Hegrinned, knowing Vincent stood there, a black outline few would beable to spot. His very own "spirit," who had granted the guidance andhelp Thien had begged, though he was not a ghost at all.

"Thien! Pay attention," Rebecca demanded, swatting him on theknee. "Pascal just told you to try something. In code. He wants tosee how much you remember."

Thien took the slender pipe the old man held out with a littlebow. Pascal was nearly as silent as Thien, preferring to let thepipes do all his talking. That was just fine with Thien.

He held the pipe poised, formed his message in his thoughts, andtapped it out, slowly, but with no mistakes.

*I learn to speak. Vincent brought me to Below*

Thien looked toward the unmoving shadows, and tapped again.

*Thanks Mister*

End