Secrets

Some secrets are just things nobody knows. Like the “secrets of the quantum world” or the “secrets of the Marianas Trench,” nobody is hoarding the information and denying everybody else access to it. Some secrets are just that, though. People who believe they know something that could harm either themselves or others do hoard the information. It can be anything from a “skeleton in the family closet” (we don’t want anybody else to know that Uncle Millrose spent time in prison) to an interpersonal secret (Alice has a crush on Harry, but don’t tell anybody) to something an organization wants hushed up. When a perfume company comes up with a unique scent, they don’t want their competitors to know the ingredients, because they don’t want a direct competitor to their new product. Political organizations like governments keep secrets because of competition too, but the scale of the competition is different. At least they believe it is.

The best, most romantic kind of secrets, though, are lost knowledge. Secrets about the pyramids, or about UFOs, or lost civilizations, or Leonardo da Vinci’s art — wow! Find out something about one of those topics and you can probably sell a ton of books and probably the movie rights too. Of course, if there’s a best-selling book or a popular movie involved, you might reasonably ask whether the “secret” even exists any more — but that’s the strangest thing about this class of secret. It can be publicized, maybe without limit, and still stay a “secret.”

I think that’s because secrecy doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with how many people know or know about a given secret. I think there are some kinds of information that are inherently secret all by themselves. Even if everybody knows about it, it’s still a secret. At least it can feel that way.

Some of the best of those secrets are fictional. It’s still a secret from characters, but you, as the reader or viewer, either know it (and watch the characters work it out for themselves) or eventually learn it either as or slightly before the characters. A secret can be one of the most important fictional devices of all. It’s a way to engage and entertain your readers. Think how many stories are about heroes that discover secrets as we watch. From Indiana Jones to Hercule Poirot to Charles Haden Savage (Steve Martin’s character in Only Murders in the Building), some of the most entertaining heroes spend their stories slowly revealing secrets. We watch the characters learn the secrets and so we learn them too.

As summer comes to an end and cooler weather blows in from the north, settle in with a good mystery story. They’re fun.

Triangle Lake

“Hey Coriolus,” called Lucky, “look down there. Doesn’t that lake look like a good stopping place?”

“That lake is not shaped like a triangle,” said Coriolus. “So we can’t stop there.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Lucky. “You never said we had to find a triangular lake.”

“What day is today?” asked Coriolus.

“Uh...what? Did you just ask what day it is?”

“Correct,” said Coriolus, “what day is it.”

“Tuesday,” called Spruce.

“Thursday,” said Bruce.

“How should I know, I’m a goose,” said Lucky.

“Not what day of the week; the date,” said Coriolus. “Just to cut down on arguments, it’s the third. The third of March, and March is which month?”

“It’s the month we keep flying until we drop out of the sky from starvation,” said Lucky.

“It’s the third month,” said Coriolus sternly. “That means it’s the third day of the third month. And what year is it?”

“What year?” sputtered Lucky. “Why on earth should we be keeping track of years? We’re geese for goodness sake.”

“I’ll tell you that too,” said Coriolus, “it’s the year thirty-three thirty-three.”

“It is not,” said Bruce, “it’s only twenty-something or other. I saw a calendar on the wall of that shack. Remember, it was on the dock in that last lake we stopped at?”

“I remember,” said Lucky, “that lake had the most delicious cress growing right along the shore...”

“In the goose calendar, it’s 3333,” said Coriolus.

“The goose calendar?!? yelled Lucky. “What goose calendar? There’s no goose calendar!”

“Indeed there is, my young gosling,” said Coriolus.

“I am not a gosling, and I am not yours,” said Lucky grumpily.

“In any case, it’s time you learned something about the inner workings of the goose world,” said Coriolus. “You three are lucky I’m leading this flock.”

“Oh really,” said Lucky. “And where exactly are we going, O great leader?”

“To a triangular lake, of course,” said Coriolus.

“Because triangles have three sides, I suppose?”

“Precisely,” said Coriolus; “the number three is quite auspicious on a day such as this.”

Lucky was just thinking up his best scoffing replies when Spruce and Bruce said, at the same time, “look down there!” It was another lake, and this one was triangular. Sort of. If you squinted. 

“That,” said Coriolus, “will do nicely.” He started to glide downward toward the lake. 

Later, when Lucky was feeling nicely fed by the quite spectacular watercress growing in the shallows, he asked Coriolus about the goose calendar.

“How can geese have a calendar that most of us have never even heard of?”

“The secrets of geese are not shared with every goose. That’s why they’re secrets.”

“Yes but this is a calendar. Calendars aren’t secrets; they’re for everybody, so everybody shows up on the right day.”

“Perhaps,” said Coriolus in his most annoying tone, “those who know the secrets don’t want everybody to show up.”

“Show up for what?” asked Bruce. 

“And I have a question,” said Spruce, raising his wing.

“What?” asked Lucky.

“It’s not a question for you,” said Spruce. “It’s a question for Coriolus. And here it is. Aren’t we supposed to be migrating?”

“Of course we’re migrating,” said Coriolus.

“Well then why isn’t it getting any warmer? Or colder? And where are all the other geese?”

“As I said just now,” said Coriolus, “the secrets of geese are not shared with every goose.”

“Oh come on,” said Bruce. “We’re talking about migrating; every goose already knows about that. When you’re migrating it’s supposed to get a little warmer or cooler every day until you arrive and see all the other geese. So what’s going on?”

“Hey, that’s right,” said Lucky, “how long have we been traveling now?”

“I think it’s about two years,” said Bruce.

“It has not been two years,” said Coriolus. “It has been seventeen days.”

“Yeah, well, that should be enough to see some differences,” said Bruce.

“And meet some other geese,” said Spruce.

“All right, all right,” sighed Coriolus. “I suppose it’s time you knew. You would have started asking these questions eventually anyway.”

“Knew what?” asked Lucky.

“We are not really migrating,” said Coriolus.

“Yeah no kidding,” said Spruce. 

“I knew it,” said Bruce.

“So what are we doing then?” asked Lucky.

“You geese should consider yourselves very lucky,” said Coriolus.

“I always consider myself Lucky,” said Lucky.

“I meant ‘fortunate’,” said Coriolus.

“Oh,” said Lucky. “That too.”

“You should consider yourselves fortunate,” said Coriolus, starting over, “because you have been given an opportunity seldom offered to non-secret geese such as yourselves.”

“We’re ‘non-secret geese’?”

“Indeed you are,” nodded Coriolus. “You have not been initiated into the great goose secrets. You only learned about our calendar today.”

“Yeah, about that,” said Spruce, “I’m not so sure...”

“And on this most auspicious of days,” continued Coriolus, paying no attention, “it falls to me, a Secret Goose...”

“Wait, how can you be a secret goose?” asked Lucky. “Anybody can see you’re a goose just by looking at you. It’s plain as day.”

“A goose initiated into the Goose Secrets,” sighed Coriolus, “is known as a Secret Goose.”

“Initiated by who?” 

“That’s a secret.”

“Guys,” said Lucky, turning to Bruce and Spruce, “are you listening to this? It sounds pretty fishy to me.”

“Fishy as in ones and zeroes?” asked Bruce.

“Because that’s all there is with fish,” said Spruce.

“No, fishy as in ‘I don’t think I believe a word of it,’” said Lucky. “We’ve been following this guy for seventeen days, thinking we’re migrating, but we haven’t seen any other geese, and it’s not getting any warmer. Or cooler. Which is it supposed to be, again?”

“Not sure,” said Bruce, “but I know it’s supposed to change.”

“That’s just it,” said Lucky. “I don’t think we’re even going in the right direction!”

Coriolus, who had been listening with unusual patience, finally spoke up. “As I just explained, we are not migrating,” he said. “So the lack of a temperature gradient should not come as an unexpected revelation.”

“A temperature what?” said Spruce.

“A grade,” said Bruce. “I guess the temperature flunked.”

“Okay, okay,” said Lucky, “so if we’re not migrating, what ARE we doing?”

“We,” said Coriolus, “are on a Secret Goose Mission.”

“And the mission would be....?” said Lucky.

“The mission would be a secret.”

“How can we be on a mission when we don’t even know what it is?” snorted Lucky.

“It should be enough that I, your leader, know what it is,” said Coriolus.

“Our leader? When did that happen?”

“Do you or do you not fly behind me every day?”

“That’s got nothing to do with you being any kind of leader,” said Lucky, “that’s just how geese fly. Any of us could fly at the point of the vee.”

“But do you?”

“We could if we wanted to.”

“But you don’t, do you?”

“Look,” said Bruce, “it takes more work to fly at the point. If you’re gonna volunteer to do it all the time, it’s no feathers off my tail.”

“Tell us the mission, tell us the mission,” said Spruce. 

“Soon,” said Coriolus. “You just have to be patient for a few more days.”

“A few more days?” said Lucky. “You tell us this stuff and then say we’re not going to hear any more for days? This is nuts!”

“Nuts or not,” said Coriolus, “you’re just going to have to wait, and that’s all there is to it.”

“Well I quit,” said Lucky. “I’m staying here. It’s a nice lake, even if it is a triangle, and there’s plenty to eat. I don’t see any reason to leave.”

“Hey about that triangle thing,” said Bruce, “I just remembered we had to fly longer because of some magic thing about the number three. When are you going to explain that, Coriolus?”

“I’m not,” said Coriolus, “on the third day of the third month of the year three thousand three hundred and thirty three — according to the secret goose calendar, of course — it should be perfectly obvious that anything having to do with three would be good.”

“I know,” said Lucky sarcastically, “if I stay here, then the three of you can keep going on your little adventure. Going on without Lucky should be lucky, right?”

“We can discuss this in the morning,” said Coriolus. “It’s getting late and I’m going to get some sleep.” He waddled off into the reeds.

“Secret mission, my tailfeathers,” muttered Lucky. “I’ll see you guys in the morning.” He waddled off into the reeds, heading in a different direction than Coriolus.

“Do you think it’s true about the calendar?” asked Bruce.

“How should I know?” said Spruce. “I just don’t see how we keep getting tangled up in weird nonsense like this. Remember what it was last year?”

“Oh yeah,” said Bruce, “that was the time that goose Honker tried to start a fight with some swans.”

“Right,” said Spruce, “I had to go through a whole molting before my feathers were back to normal afterward. I barely got away. Those swans can be nasty. And they’re enormous.”

“I think this year is even weirder,” sighed Bruce. “Come on, let’s find a good place to sleep.” 

The twins waddled into the reeds, taking a direction different from Coriolus and from Lucky. 

Dusk began to fall on the lake that was triangular. Sort of. If you squinted.

The next morning, Lucky was up early, getting ready to fire all the questions he could think of at Coriolus. Bruce and Spruce, the twins, were up next. 

“We’re gonna get some answers out of Coriolus today,” Lucky assured them.

“I don’t think it’ll be that easy,” said Bruce.

“Coriolus doesn’t like answering questions,” said Spruce.

“I’ve got a plan to get him to answer,” said Lucky. “After I ask him a question I’m going to stare at him until he has to answer.”

“That’s your plan? To look at him?”

“Not just look. Stare. It’ll make him so uncomfortable he’ll have to answer.”

“That’s ridiculous,” said Spruce. “Watch, I’ll try it on you.” Spruce stared as hard as he could at Lucky. “Feeling uncomfortable yet?” he asked.

“Not really,” said Lucky. “Maybe I need a new plan.”

“A new plan for what?” asked Coriolus.

“Oh, you’re up,” said Lucky. “I thought you’d still be asleep.”

“Nonsense,” said Coriolus. “There’s a great deal to get done today.”

“To get done?” asked Bruce. “What do you mean? We never do anything but fly to the next place.

“Not any more,” said Coriolus. “Now that we’ve reached Triangle Lake...”

“I didn’t know it had a name,” said Lucky.

“It didn’t,” said Coriolus. “I just called it that. But as I was saying, we have a great deal to do. It’s time you young geese knew some of the Goose Secrets.”

“You’re just going to tell us?” asked Lucky. “Without anybody staring...er, I mean, just like that?”

“Of course I am,” said Coriolus. “What did you think?”

“Uh...never mind that,” said Lucky, “tell us about the Goose Secrets.”

“Okay,” said Coriolus. “The first Goose Secret is our Mission.”

“Our mission, like, just the four of us?” asked Spruce. “Or do you mean all the geese?”

“Just us,” said Coriolus. “We’re a special team on a Secret Mission. It all has to do with Emperor Zurg.”

“Who’s that?” asked Bruce.

“Emperor Zurg is an evil space villain,” said Coriolus. “He has red eyes, and silver horns on his head. You have to be very careful if you ever meet him; he’s extremely dangerous. He has a ray gun.”

“What’s a ray gun?” asked Spruce.

“It’s a...well it’s bad,” said Coriolus. 

“Wait,” said Lucky, “we’re geese. How can we be on a secret mission that’s all about an evil space villain? Let alone an emperor? It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Being a goose is a very important job,” said Coriolus. “We protect the universe, you know.”

“We what?” said Lucky.

“What’s a universe?” asked Bruce. 

“Can we get back to this after breakfast?” asked Spruce, who was munching on some leaves.

“I have a question,” said Lucky.

“I hate answering questions,” said Coriolus, “but I’ll make an exception this one time.”

“How many Secret Geese are there, really?” asked Lucky. “I mean, there’s you, and I guess after you tell us the secrets we’ll be Secret Geese too, but how many others are there?”

“That’s a secret,” said Coriolus.

“But you said you were going to tell us the goose secrets,” said Spruce.

“Some of the secrets are even secret from me,” said Coriolus.

“How do you know that?” asked Lucky. 

“I should think that if I don’t know the answer, I would know I don’t know the answer,” replied Coriolus. “Isn’t that obvious?”

“Yes but if you don’t know the answer, why do you say it’s a secret?” asked Bruce. “Maybe it’s not a secret, but you just don’t know.”

Coriolus humphed.

“Anyway, who told you the goose secrets?” asked Spruce.

“I found them out for myself,” said Coriolus. “On a special communicator.”

Spruce, Bruce, and Lucky looked at each other. This was getting even more ridiculous.

“A special communicator? What’s a special communicator?” asked Lucky.

“It was when I was a young goose,” said Coriolus. “We were nesting on the edge of a marsh, and I couldn’t sleep one night. There was a big light not far away, so I went to see what it was. And when I saw it, it was a special communicator. So I went closer so I could hear it too. It told me everything I needed to know.”

“About Emperor Zurg?” 

“Yes. And about Space Rangers too.”

“Okay, okay, now that’s too much,” said Bruce. “Now there are space rangers?”

“Space Rangers,” corrected Coriolus. “You have to say it so it’s capitalized.”

“Oh, Thank You Very Much,” said Bruce. “Do Tell More.”

“It’s like this,” said Coriolus, “Emperor Zurg is trying to take over the galaxy. The Space Rangers — and the Secret Geese, of course — are all that stands in his way. Along with the occasional motley crew of cowboys and whatnot. I had to get back to my nest, though, so I missed the end of the Special Communicator’s message.”

Lucky, Bruce, and Spruce looked at Coriolus. Coriolus looked at them. Nobody blinked.

“I think I once saw one of those special communicators,” said Lucky. “Do you remember, Coriolus, if there were cars parked in front of it?”

“Yes, there was a parking lot there too,” said Coriolus. “There weren’t any geese in the cars though, so it didn’t matter.”

“And when you heard the, um, messages from the special communicator — excuse me, the Special Communicator — was the sound coming from the cars?”

“That’s the way it sounded,” said Coriolus, “but it was probably just a trick of the night air. The sound was bouncing off the cars or something. It didn’t matter.”

“I think,” said Lucky, “that what you saw, Coriolus, is called a ‘movie’.”

“Nonsense,” said Coriolus, “it was a Special Communicator. I’m absolutely sure of it.”

“Hey Coriolus,” said Bruce, “just out of curiosity, how old were you when you got let in on these secrets?”

“I told you,” said Coriolus, “I was a young goose.”

“How young?”

“Oh I don’t know,” said Coriolus, “couple of months, I guess.’

Bruce rolled his eyes (which is quite a trick when you’re a goose). Bruce, and Spruce went into a quick huddle. Coriolus started on his breakfast. Before he got too far, the other geese came over. “Coriolus,” said Spruce, “we want to get on with migrating. Really migrating. Like, heading south, y’know? With the other geese?”

“But the other geese don’t know the Goose Secrets!” said Coriolus. 

“Well maybe,” said Lucky, “you should be telling them too, not just us.”

Coriolus thought about it. 

“Okay,” he said, “that makes sense, The more Secret Geese there are, the better chance we’ll have against Emperor Zurg. Now, up in the air, everybody. There’s no time to lose!”

“After breakfast,” said Lucky, Spruce, and Bruce together. 

After breakfast, Coriolus led them into the air. This time, heading north.

And suddenly it changes

It seemed pretty abrupt, but in the past three days it felt like the seasons changed here in New England. It was newly chilly taking Hayley the Dog out in the morning. She seems to enjoy it more than the heat, even though she’s tiny. I’m far from tiny, and I enjoy it too. It’s a sign that the days of going barefoot outside are going to end for this year, and a reminder to look for my autumn jacket. I usually put it away for the summer carefully, thinking while I do that this year, for a change, I’ll know exactly where it is when I need it again. Now that it’s September, of course, I have no clue what I did with it. But it won’t be as bad as a few years ago when I failed so thoroughly at locating it that I decided I must have donated it. Naturally it turned up just a few days after I bought a new coat for the season.

Another surprise will come when I first put the jacket on. There’s usually something unexpected in at least one pocket. I wish it were something that would let me say “oh that’s where it’s been; I’ve been looking.” But generally it’s just something innocuous that I haven’t missed. There may be mysteries in the pockets of a coat you haven’t worn for months, but it’s seldom a really good mystery. And the solution — just sticking your hand in your pocket — would be hard to turn into a satisfying part of a story.

Late October

by Maya Angelou (1971)

Only lovers
see the fall
a signal end to endings
a gruffish gesture alerting
those who will not be alarmed
that we begin to stop
in order to begin
again.

Share

Leave a comment