The Same Green

Scout came into the Dye Yard on Tuesday and stopped, because it smelled like Sunday supper again.

Scout was back from L33T Labs, where the board has a new Proof on it with the chart-keeper’s name in it. Scout had seen it with their own eyes and written it down. In the Grove they had heard a smaller thing: the channel keeper lifted the board at the Weir late on Monday, for the first time anyone could remember, after standing a long while at this yard’s gate.

Piet Ferrabee, the dyer, was sweeping onion skins with their back turned to the oldest vat. Scout sat on the yard wall and asked.

So Piet told them the whole of it. Then Piet fetched the paddle and Monday’s test thread, dry now, and held them side by side.

“That’s the one I’ve been after,” Piet said, touching a faded thread wound round the handle. “That’s the one I’ve got.”

Scout looked for a long time, turning the paddle to the light and back.

Scout carries what they see, never what they guess. It is the one rule in the front of the notebook. And what Scout saw was one green, twice. Scout could feel how much Piet wanted to hear otherwise. It would be easy, and kind, to say there was a difference.

“They’re the same green,” Scout said. “To me they are. I’m sorry.”

Piet’s face went still. Scout hated that, and did not take it back.

“Two Beasts never see one colour alike,” Scout said, more gently. “You know that better than anybody.”

Piet sat down on the wall beside Scout with the paddle in both hands. For a while they sat there, and then something in Piet’s shoulders let go.

Piet began to unwind the old thread from the handle. It came away in a soft coil, all of it, and Piet held it out.

“Keep it in your notebook,” Piet said. “You’ll carry it better than a paddle does.”

Scout laid the thread between two clean pages, shut the notebook on it, gently, and wrote the day beside it.