Chapter 15: Twenty-One Conversations

Katja stopped at the Landing end of the bridge and wrote a card.

BORROWING THIS WEEK. I'LL PAY IT BACK.

She pinned it to her jacket over the clicker pocket, and the guard in the gold lanyard read it twice.

"Warden," he said. "Who are you borrowing from?"

"Me," said Katja, and that was the first click.

She had never spent a week's conversations in two days. She meant to be efficient about it.

This week the clicker would not reset at midnight, and it would count up to twenty-one before she owed anyone anything.

Lyle met her in the visitor center doorway with both hands out, and she let him take one.

"You came," he said. "I knew you'd come. Everyone needs a good dinner."

He did not mention Harvey, and she did not ask.

She told herself that was strategy.

"Tier 2, window seat," Lyle said. "Your usual."

"I want to see the kitchen."

He beamed and wrote something on his clipboard.

"Of course. Take as long as you like."

The kitchen was a long steel room behind the gift shop, and the Tier 3 people lived in it.

A woman at the dish sink looked up at the card on Katja's jacket and wiped her hands very slowly.

"I was a six," she said, before Katja asked. "Until I asked for a second cup. Now I'm a four."

"How do you move up?"

"Compliments."

"One point for each one. You say it to the Mayor at breakfast, and he rates it."

She dried her hands on her apron.

"'Nice polo' is worth nothing, because everybody says it. You have to be specific."

"Specific how?"

"Last week a man earned eleven points for noticing Lyle's cuff links."

"Then he told Lyle he looked rested. Lyle docked him for sounding sarcastic."

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