For the greater part of the first two years, I spent weekends and public holidays searching the bluffs for the way out of this prison. I’d take the back seat out of the Chevie tourer and fill it with camping gear and cans of extra gas, prepared to sleep rough. A butterfly net and some capture bottles gave me the excuse to want to enter private land. A boyhood hobby now had its uses. I come from a farming family (two farming families it would seem) and always made a point of seeking the landowner’s permission first. I was never once refused and families who had known my valley parents and me since I was ‘so high’ would insist on putting me up for the night. There could be no polite way to refuse and it would mean an evening of reminiscences. For me a slight problem. I have two pasts and they tend to get entangled. And I continue to have some problem at spending the night with those who will shortly be dead even if it is to be only temporarily.
I can say definitely that there is no way out of here and the bluffs are vertical, smooth, almost polished, and most definitely solid. There is nothing illusory about those bluffs. Which raises questions. The most obvious being, “ How are heavy items, anything forthat matter, spirited in and out?” I think I know how I got here but what about the original people? There were no sailplanes or helicopters then.
Another problem is the electricity supply. We have a Valley Power Company which is bank debited for its bulk supply. But debited to whom? I have asked and been told that it’s none of my business. We have no generating plant in this valley and I can state it as a definite fact that no power lines come into the valley. So where does the power come from? It’s no use looking at the overhead reticulation in an effort to see which way it’s flowing. Every part of the system is a ring-feed. Every line is fed from both ends which is good practice anyway. I rather think that even if tried to find the source by a planned series of switch openings, one would find that the power was just there: inherent to the system impossible though that is.
Since there has never been a power outage, no-one has ever thought to ask what should be the obvious questions but me. It is just one small facet of communal acceptance. And there will never be an outage. That is one of things that I am sure of.
The same holds true for telephone lines. None come in. There is a manual exchange here in Crothal and another in Gatewell and either exchange can put you through immediately to the other. This service is not considered a toll call. It is when you ask for toll that something strange takes place. Neither town has a toll exchange and yet the operator can put you through to tolls simply by putting your plug into the appropriate socket. A woman’s voice, always the same voice, greets you with, “Tolls here.” Toll calls are necessarily business calls. No-one but myself is aware of having family or acquaintances on the outside. I have asked for my real home number only to be told that no phone number can have that many digits.
Normally, there is no need to give the number. It is enough just to name the company, “Grigsby-Grunow”, “Atwater-Kent”, or “Zenith please” and this seemingly omniscient woman can put you straight through. I ring out occasionally when a part is needed urgently but I don’t believe that the woman I speak to next is the switchboard operator at the relevant companynor or that the man she switches me through to is really in the spare parts department but never-the-less I get my parts.
Several times I have tried to draw these men out—if men they be—to get them to let slip their mask a little. I have asked in a friendly fashion such conversation starters as, “What’s the weather like over your way?” or “Who do you fancy in the world series?” I am probably being too obvious but, just the once, I had some slight success. I got an out of character, “”Why can’t you just be happy like everyone else?”
What would happen if one day I answered “Tolls here” with “Would ya get me Zenith, sweetheart?”
I am their failure. Even when apparently alone, I can feel their attention. ( Yes chaps. Like right now. I know that you’re aware of every word as I put it down.) I talk to them. Have a bit of a grizzle. Tell them what it’s like to live with these constant anomalies. I expect no reply but there’s no one else to understand me in this ant farm. Just knowing that there is an ear there somewhere seems to help although I really need answers.