Caleb sat at the rough wooden table, his fingers gently stroking the small bottle of ink. It was almost entirely empty, except for several small droplets of black in the very bottom. He had used it sparingly, up to the very end. He had planned all the words in his mind, carefully, holding them there, stacking them up in long rows of sentences until he could not remember another word, or add another letter. Then he carefully grasped the pen and lightly, ever so lightly, put the words down on the piece of scrap paper, its tip tracing the scrolls and loops and crosses that Caleb commanded until his mind was empty. Then he would write the next section, within his own mind.

As Caleb examined the ink bottle, he imagined that it was full again. He saw hours of words, trying them in new combinations, arranging and rearranging until every word was in just the right place, until the words could make his heart sing or weep. He had not been so careful with the ink in the past. He had never dreamt of the day when he would hold his very last bottle of ink. But now he sat, alone, with no money, far from the town.

So, he stretched his mind and memory to hold a hundred words, no, two hundred or three hundred at a time. He arranged them perfectly there until they held just the right meaning. He could not afford to throw them down onto paper, he could not afford the extra use of ink even to scratch a word out or draw an arrow to move a word to another spot. He could not afford to make a mistake.

Caleb’s memory had grown, but he could not hold all the words forever. He could hold them temporarily, while they were new, and some phrases he was particularly fond of would stay in his mind forever. The plots, the characters, the settings, all were there, deep in his mind, but there was something about the pleasure of reading them, completely, once they were written down. He would go back sometimes, in the cold of night, and select a story he had written years before. He would clear his mind, and pretend it was the first time he had ever read it. He pretended that he was a stranger, someone who was looking for something to take him away, take him away from the troubles of the world. And he would read. And the story, if he had done his job, would take him far away. The four walls of the cabin would dissolve, and the howling wind would silence, and even the coldness of the room or the heat of the fire would disappear. And Caleb would find himself instead, in a dripping green jungle or a deep red canyon, alone. Then he would feel the prick of the tropical mosquito piercing the skin of his forearm, the noontime heat radiating off the red canyon wall. And he’d feel joy. This is why Caleb read. This is why Caleb wrote.

But the joy of writing was tempered, now. There was a pall of sadness, of depression, as he looked at the nearly empty ink bottle. Now he would have to hold all the words within his head forever with nowhere to put them. No way to write them down. No way to empty his head, to clear it, to make way for new stories. Then what would he do? He tried not to think about it. He told himself that he should be thankful that he had had the chance to write these many years. That he shouldn’t complain, but instead be happy for the stories he had been able to write down. But at the core of his being, squatted a sullen child, who was unhappy as he had been so good for so many years, only now to be punished. If he couldn’t write, if he couldn’t get the words out, Caleb, most certainly, would go mad.

It was a matter of survival. He had tried experiments with ash and stone and branch but none of them had been satisfactory. Carving words into wood, drawing them into soil or dust or snow to no avail. Caleb needed ink.

There was a knock on the cabin door. A firm knock. A deliberate knock, one of authority. Caleb paused. Who would be coming out here, this far out in the country? No one came into these hills on purpose. It was the knock of a stranger. Caleb tried to look out the cabin window to see what kind of stranger was out there. What kind of stranger wanted in.

He saw a short man, in red, not a poor man. Not a country man. His woolen hat was red, and his woolen coat was red, and his pants were black, and his boots were of brown leather. The man held a thick pad of paper in one hand, but the paper did not get Caleb’s attention. In the same hand, was a pen and a bottle of ink. A black bottle of ink. He could see the ink’s fullness, tilting at a slivered angle through the opaque glass. [JB1] The stranger was coming in.

Caleb opened the door.

“Good afternoon,” the stranger greeted him. “I’m with the United States Census. We are doing our census count, every 10 years you know?” he stated. “Do you mind if I ask you just a few questions?”

“No,” Caleb answered, finally tearing his eyes off the ink bottle.

“Would you mind if I came in?” asked the census man. “Much easier to write sitting down, you know.”

Caleb didn’t reply, instead swinging open the rough-hewn door for the man. Caleb awkwardly gestured toward the wooden table nearby and one of two chairs.

The man in red smiled gratefully and took a seat at the table. He laid out his thick pad of paper and began to arrange the ink and pen to begin to write. His pad of paper hit Caleb’s bottle of ink, tipping it onto its side. The man started to right it, but Caleb moved quickly, and lovingly, carefully, picked up the ink bottle, gently placing it on the wooden shelf on the wall with the others, as if treating it so carefully and respectfully would refill and renew its contents.

“Well, this won’t take long,” the census man said. Let’s start with your name, first and last if you don’t mind.”

“Caleb,” stated Caleb, sitting down, letting his eyes focus once again on the census man’s black bottle of ink. “Caleb Thurman.”

“And your age at your last birthday, Mr. Thurman?”

“60. April.”

“And do you own your home or rent?”

“Own. It was my Pap’s.”

“And you live here alone? Any wife or children?”

“No, just me.” Caleb’s arm now rested on the table, his fingers just inches away from the bottle. But they may have just as well been in the next county. The ink didn’t belong to him.

He watched as the census man marked the paper and blotted each entry dry. He watched as the sharp metal tip of the pen dipped deeply into the bottle and emerged, dripping, ready to write. Ready to write anything that the holder requested. With that ink, Caleb could write again. He could once again empty his mind. But it wasn’t his.

Caleb moistened his lips, his eyes straying to the heavy poker leaning against the rough stones of the hearth. He was strong. The poker was made of iron. He could lift it and swing it easily, accurately, if required. He watched the census man fill the tiny squares on the paper form with ink. The census man wrote briefly and expertly.

“Occupation?” he asked. Looking around he guessed, “farmer?”

Caleb looked around the cabin as well. Farmer. Yes, a farmer of the rough, rocky soil around the cabin. He farmed so he could eat and live another day. But that wasn’t who he was. He sat straight in his chair and locked eyes with the census man for the first time.

“Writer,” he stated, “I’m a writer.”

The census man’s face brightened. “A writer,” he exclaimed. “How fascinating! What do you write, if I may ask?” he said, genuinely interested.

“Stories,” stated Caleb. “I write stories.”

“Author,” the census man wrote neatly in the occupation square of the form. “You are the first author I have ever met for the census. Fascinating.”

The afternoon sun slanted in through the bubbled glass of the cabin windows. It entered first through the windowpanes, then passed through and around the rows of empty ink bottles on the shelves of the cabin. It briefly illuminated the paper labels of Waterman and Skrip. It passed through the thick glass, then what light remained, filtered its way deep into the room, reminding both men of the awkward passing of time.

Caleb couldn’t take his eyes off the pad. Author. It said so right there, on that line. For the world to see. For the government to read. Forever. He had finally said it. That was what he was, who he was. But an author without the tools to write. Without the tools to live.

The census man stood up to prepare to leave. He noted the neatness of the rough cabin. The swept floor, the kept fire. He noticed the rows of empty ink bottles standing at attention on the thick wooden shelves across the cabin wall. There were dozens of them. It must have taken a man years to use that much ink. He noted for the last time the bottle from the table, nearly empty. [JB2]

Caleb watched as the census man gathered his things. The census man placed the cork firmly into the ink bottle. Caleb wanted to weep. This was his only chance. He didn’t know when he would be this close to a bottle of ink again. His despair grew as the census man grew more cheerful about leaving, leaving Caleb’s home, his cabin, and taking the ink with him. Caleb watched, hungrily, as the man stood up to leave. He noted the small pile of stout logs stacked near the hearth. They were oak, about 18” long, although seasoned they still carried the density and heft of hardwood. Caleb could easily pick one up and swing it through the air.

“Well, thank you very much for your time,” the census man said. “I’ve got to be moving on, many more people to see. You have yourself a fine afternoon.”

Caleb silently opened the door for the man and closed it behind him. He wasn’t a violent man. He didn’t watch the census man leave. He didn’t watch the man cross the porch, pause, go down the three steps into the yard. He didn’t watch to see if the man was on foot or on horseback. He returned to the chair at the table and sat in the darkening room with the stories churning, tumbling inside of his head. He didn’t go to bed. He simply lowered his head to the rough wood facing away from the shelves holding the empty bottles. He faced away from the nearly empty ink bottle, the last bottle of his life. He was no longer a writer. Not without ink.

He slept fitfully, head cushioned by the woolen plaid on his arms on the table. He heard the screech owl’s cry and mountain lion’s whistle, but he did not care. He no longer had room for them in his mind. He no longer had room for the thick hoarfrost coating the cabin window, or the squeak of the iron hinge on the door. No room to describe how the softly padding rain sounded at night on the thick mossy shakes of the cabin roof. His mind had no room for anything. Not for a single word.

When morning came, he finally rose and went outside, and stood on the porch. The sun was just up, its warmth shone and warmed Caleb’s bearded face, taunting him with pleasure, with comfort. Caleb looked down to step away to the yard, and into the morning. And looking down he saw a squat bottle of black ink, firmly corked. It rested on a bundle of tan paper. It sat there expectantly, waiting to be discovered. He sank to his knees there on the porch and picked up the bottle, carefully. He tipped it to one side, gently, and the other, and watched the ink’s level see-saw to the left, and back again. He fingered the thin pad of paper. He thought of the man in red. What words he could write with this bottle! If he was careful, as he always was, it would last him a very long time.

He stood up, carefully grasping the bottle and the thick pad of paper. Then Caleb went back inside his cabin and sat at the rough wooden table to write. He quickly wrote a fine story, the words tumbling out of his mind and onto the paper. He called it, “The Census Man.”