“Agreed.” I said. and I felt in my pocket.
I had three full packages of matches and part of a fourth.
I pressed the spoon into his hand and led him to the wall.
“Do you have the feel of the instrument?” I asked him.
“Yes, it’s a sharpened spoon, isn’t it?”
“Yes. I’ll make a light as soon as you say you are ready. You’ll have to sketch rapidly, because my supply of matches is limited. I’ll allot half for the lighthouse and the other half for your own business.”
“All right,” he said, and I struck a match and he began to trace lines upon the moist gray wall.
First he did an upright rectangle to frame and contain the thing. Then with several deft strokes, the lighthouse began to appear. It was amazing, daft as he was, his skill was intact. I held each match at its barest base, spat on my left thumb and forefinger, and when I could hold it no longer in my right I took hold of the blackened end and inverted it, letting the match burn away completely before I struck another.
When the first book of matches was gone, he had finished the tower and was working on the sea and the sky. I encouraged him, I murmured appreciation at every stroke.
“Great, really great,” I said, when it appeared to be almost finished. Then he made me waste another match while he signed it. I was almost through the second book by then.
“Now let’s admire it,” he said.
“If you want to get back to your own apartments, you’ll have to leave the admiring to me.” I told him. “We’re too low on matches to be art critics at this point.”
He pouted a bit, but moved to the other wall and began sketching as soon as I struck a light.
He sketched a tiny study, a skull on the desk, a globe beside it, walls full of books all around.
“Now that’s good.” he said, when I had finished the third pack and was starting on the remaining partial pack.
It took him six more to finish up and one to sign it. He gazed at it while the eighth match burned—there were only two remaining—then he took a step forward and was gone.
The match was burning my fingertips by then and I dropped it and it sizzled when it hit the straw and went out.
I stood there shaking, full of mixed feelings, and then I heard his voice and felt his presence at my side. He was back again.
“I just thought of something,” he said. “How can you see the picture when it’s so dark in here?”
“Oh. I can see in the dark,” I told him. “I’ve lived with it so long that it has become my friend.”
“I see. I just wondered. Give me a light so I can go back now.”
“Very well,” I agreed, considering my second to last match. “But you’d better bring your own illumination next time you stop around, I’ll be out of matches after this.”
“All right.” And I struck a light and he considered his drawing, walked toward it. and vanished once more.
I turned quickly and considered the Lighthouse of Cabra before the match failed. Yes, the power was there. I could feel it.
Would my final match serve me, though?
No, I didn’t think it would. A longer period of concentration than that was required for me to use a Trump as a gateway.
What could I burn? The straw was too damp and might not take fire. It would be horrible to have the gateway—my road to freedom—right there with me and not be able to use it.
I needed a flame that would last awhile.
My sleeping roll! It was a cloth liner stuffed with straw. That straw would be drier, and the cloth would burn, too.
I cleared half the floor, down to the bare stone. Then I sought the sharpened spoon. to use to cut the liner. I cursed then. Dworkin had carried it off with him.
I twisted and tore at the thing.
Finally, it came open and I pulled out the dry straw from the middle. I made a little heap of it and I set the liner nearby, to use as extra fuel if I needed it. The less smoke the better, though. It would attract attention if a guard passed this way. This wasn’t too likely, though, since I had just recently been fed, and I got one meal a day.