Alice's Arc

Chapter 14 of 20

Sunday morning Alice climbed the ridge before the light was full. Rose was already there in her green and yellow boots. The tall creature crouched behind his cedar. The raccoon in the blue-green shirt sat on a stone, cleaning his paws. The red-headed bird watched from a low branch. Alice set her satchel down and pulled out her notebook. She had a problem she had worked half the night, and no solution yet. The light stick had three signals. Short-short meant mark. One long meant sit. Two long meant wait. That was all she could get from the circuit without rewiring it again. Yesterday it had been enough. Today she wanted to teach heel, recall, and quiet, and she had no more pulses to give. She raised the stick and tried a short-long. The ball flickered and went dark. She thumbed it back on. The creature tilted his head. Biscuit looked up at her, waiting. "I'm out of words," Alice said. Rose walked over and looked at the stick. "He can learn ten. He can learn fifty. You only have three." She said it plain, no blame in it. "Fix the stick." Alice sat down in the pine needles and opened the housing with her pocket knife. The circuit was a small board she had soldered herself. She had wired it for on and off, then for pulse. She could not fit a second dial without a second switch, and she had no second switch. She stared at the board. Biscuit pressed his shoulder against her knee. She thought about the phone line at home, how one ring meant a call and two rings meant her father's brother. Length was one channel. Color could be another. She dug in her satchel and found the strip of red cellophane from the newspaper's flash. She cut a piece, wedged it under the glass on one side of the ball, and closed the housing. Now the light burned white on one face and red on the other. She turned the stick and the color changed. Six signals. She wrote them down. White short-short: mark. Red short-short: recall. White long: sit. Red long: quiet. White long-long: wait. Red long-long: heel. She stood and pointed the stick at Biscuit, red face out, one short pulse. "Come," she said. Biscuit came. She turned the stick, red still out, and pulsed short-short toward the creature. Rose spoke a low string of sound. The tall one rose from his crouch and walked to Alice's side. He stopped four feet off, careful of the space. The raccoon scampered up and sat by his foot. The bird dropped down and landed on Rose's shoulder. "Six words," Rose said. "Better." Alice closed the notebook. She had a bridge that carried more than she could yesterday, and a second student who now answered to recall. The ridge felt smaller. Biscuit was still her first dog. He was no longer her only one.