The Tenderness of Executioners

Step Inside the Story

Garance recognized Madeleine by her feet. Beneath the chair beside the drinks machine, closed shoes had replaced the white sandals, but the blue thread holding a buckle still stuck out. She wondered whether the old woman had moved it from one pair to the other, or repaired all her shoes with the same spool. The thought occupied her a second too long. Madeleine had already looked up.

“You look as though you’re trying to find someone else.”

“I thought you were at your daughter’s.”

“I was. She brought me back yesterday. We spent half the visit making phone calls about today. It gave us something to do.”

The reception robot came to offer them a booth. Madeleine declined without impatience; she was waiting for a person, she said, not a better place to wait. Garance sat down. In the lobby, the screen displayed February 4, 2047, above a photograph of the clinic taken in June. The trees in the picture had leaves. Those in the courtyard wore pigeon netting.

Near them, a man was dictating his request again. The robot had understood him the first time; it kept repeating the same two appointment times, neither compatible with the shifts he had just obtained. His voice stayed low. He spoke to the machine as though it were an employee who might take offense. When he took out his phone to cancel the work, Madeleine looked away.

From Chapter One, “The Renewal,” in The Tenderness of Executioners.