I: What did you feel?
X: Anger. I wanted to tear Ambergris apart stone by stone. I wanted to lead a great army and batter down its gates and kill its people and raze the city. Anger would be too weak a word.
I: And do you believe this was the manta ray’s purpose when it gave you the gift of returning to Ambergris?
X: “Gift”? It was not a gift, unless you consider madness a gift.
I: Forgive me. I did not mean to upset you. Do you believe the curse visited upon you by the manta ray was given so you could destroy Ambergris?
X: No. I was always, deep down, at cross-purposes with the creature. It destroyed my life.
I: What did you do when confronted by the sight of Ambergris? Or what do you think you did?
X: I climbed up the wall and over into the other world.
I: And this, according to the transcripts, is where your memory grows uncertain. Would it still be accurate to say your memory is “hazy”?
X: Yes.
I: Then I will redirect my questioning and come back to that later. Tell me about Janice Shriek.
X: I’ve already—never mind. She was a fan of my work, and Hannah and I both liked her, so we had let her stay with us—she was on sabbatical. She painted, but made her living as an art historian. Her brother Duncan was a famous historian—had made his fortune writing about the Byzantine Empire. Duncan was in Istanbul doing research at the time, or he would have come to see us too. He didn’t get to see his sister much.
I: And you wrote them into your stories?
X: Yes, I’d given them both “parts” in stories of mine, and they’d been delighted. Janice even helped me to smooth out the art history portions of “The Transformation of Martin Lake.”
I: Did you feel any animosity toward Janice Shriek or her brother?
X: No. Why would I?
I: Describe Janice Shriek for me.
X: She was a small woman, not as small as, for example, the actress Linda Hunt, but getting there. She was a bit stooped. A comfortable weight. About fifty-four years old. Her forehead had many, many worry wrinkles. She liked to wear women’s business suits and she smoked these horrible cigars she got from Syria. She had a presence about her, and a wit. She was a polyglot, too.
I: You said in an earlier interrogation that “sometimes I had the feeling she existed in two places at once, and I wondered if one of those worlds wasn’t Ambergris.” What did you mean?
X: I wondered if I hadn’t so much written her into Ambergris as she’d already had a life in Ambergris. What it came down to was this: Were my stories verbatim truths about the city, including its inhabitants, or were only the settings true, and the characters out of my head?
I: I ask you again: Did you feel any animosity toward Janice Shriek?
X: No!
I: You did not resent her teasing you about the reality of Ambergris?
X: Yes, but that’s no motive for …
I: You did not feel envy that, if she indeed existed in both worlds, she seemed so self-possessed, so in control. You wanted that kind of control, didn’t you?
X: Envy is not animosity. And, again, not a motive for … for what you are suggesting.
I: Had you any empirical evidence—such as it might be—that she existed in both worlds?
X: She hinted at it through jokes—you’re right about that. She’d read all of my books, of course, and she would make references to Ambergris as if it were real. She said to me once that the reason she’d wanted to meet me was because I’d written about the real world. And once she gave me a peculiar birthday gift.
I: Which was?
X: The Hoegbotton Travel Guide to Ambergris. She said it was real. That she’d just ducked into the Borges Bookstore in Ambergris and bought it, and here it was. I got quite pissed off, but she wouldn’t say it was a lie. Hannah said the woman was a fanatic. That of course she had created it, and that I’d better either take it as a compliment or start asking lawyers about copyright infringement.
I: Why did you doubt your wife?
X: The guidebook was so complete, so perfect. So detailed. How could it be a fake?
I: Surely a polyglot art historian like Janice Shriek could create such a work?
X: I don’t know. Maybe. Anyway, that’s where I got the idea about her.
I: Let us return to your foray into Ambergris. The manta ray had become an opening to that world. I know your memory is confused, but what do you recall finding there?
X: I was walking down Albumuth Boulevard. It was very chilly. The street was crowded with pedestrians and motor vehicles. I wasn’t nude this time, of course, for which I was very appreciative, and I just … I just lost myself in the crowds. I didn’t think. I didn’t analyze. I just walked. I walked down to the docks to see the ships. Took in a parade near Trillian Square. Then I explored the food markets and, after a while, I went into the Bureaucratic Quarter.
I: Where exactly did it happen?
X: I don’t … I can’t …
I: I’ll spare you the recall. It’s all down here in the transcripts anyway. You say you saw a woman crossing the street. A vehicle bore down on her at a great speed, and you say you pushed her out of harm’s way. Would that be accurate?
X: Yes.
I: What did the woman look like?
X: I only saw her from behind. She was shortish. Older than middle-aged. Kind of shuffled as she walked. I think she was carrying a briefcase or portfolio or something …
I: What color was the vehicle?
X: Red.
I: And after you pushed the woman, what happened?
X: The van passed between me and the woman, and I was back in the real world. I felt a great heat on my face, searing my eyebrows. I had collapsed outside of my writing room, which I had set on fire. Soon the whole house would be on fire. Hannah had already taken Sarah outside and now she was trying to drag me away from it when I “woke up.” She was screaming in my ear, “Why did you do it? Why did you do it?”
I: And what had you done?
X: I had pushed Janice Shriek into the flames of the fire I had set.
I: You had murdered her.
X: I had pushed her into the fire.
We faced each other across the desk in that small, barren room and I could see from his expression that he still did not understand the crux of the matter, that he did not understand what had truly happened to Janice Shriek. How much would I tell him? Very little. For his sake. Merciless, I continued with my questioning, aware that he now saw me as the darkness, as his betrayer.
I: How happy do you feel having saved the life of the woman in Ambergris in relation to the sadness you feel for having killed Janice Shriek?
X: It’s not that simple.
I: But it is that simple. Do you feel guilt, remorse, for having murdered Janice Shriek?
X: Of course!
I: Did you feel responsible for your actions?
X: No, not at first.
I: But now?
X: Yes.
I: Did you feel responsible for saving the woman in Ambergris?
X: No. How could I? Ambergris isn’t real.
I: And yet, you say in these transcripts that in the trial that resulted from Shriek’s death, you claimed Ambergris was real! Which is it? Is Ambergris real or isn’t it?
X: That was then.
I: You seem inordinately proud that, as you say, the first jury came back hung. That it took two juries to convict. Indecently proud, I’d say.
X: That’s just a writer’s pride at the beautiful trickery of my fabrication.