At dawn, the keeper and the stranger reached the far edge of the Country of Traces.
Behind them lay the valley of footprints, clouds and broken branches.
Ahead stood a gate.
It was unlike any gate the stranger had seen before.
It had no hinges.
No wall surrounded it.
It did not keep anyone in or out.
Across its surface was painted a single red circle.
The stranger looked at it.
"What does it indicate?"
The keeper smiled.
"That is the wrong question."
The stranger waited.
"It does not indicate," said the keeper.
"It stands for."
They passed through the gate.
Almost immediately they came upon a road.
At its crossing stood a red light.
No fire burned behind it.
No blood had been spilled.
Nothing was burning.
Yet every traveller who approached the light stopped.
The stranger watched in fascination.
"Why do they stop?"
"Because the light tells them to."
"But how?"
"It does not tell them."
The keeper paused.
"They have learned what it stands for."
The stranger looked at the red light again.
"But why red?"
"It could have been another colour."
"Then red has no natural connection with stopping?"
"Not the connection that matters here."
The keeper pointed towards the road.
"Red has become part of a practice."
The light changed.
The travellers moved.
Then it changed again.
They stopped.
Nothing in the light itself had changed except its colour.
But something in the world of action had changed completely.
The stranger walked closer.
He touched the lamp.
It was made of glass and metal.
"It is only a thing," he said.
"Of course."
"And yet it can command an entire road."
"It cannot command anything."
"But everyone obeys it."
"They participate in the relation that gives it that power."
The keeper looked at the traffic flowing past them.
"The light is one difference. The stopping is another. Between them lies a system."
"A system of signs?"
"Yes."
"And who created it?"
"Many people."
"When?"
"Long ago."
"Could they change it?"
"Certainly."
"Could they decide that green should mean stop and red should mean go?"
"They could."
The stranger laughed.
"Then the colours themselves have not acquired some mysterious property."
"No."
"The relation has changed."
"Exactly."
They walked on.
Soon they came upon a stone beside the road.
A footprint was impressed upon its surface.
The stranger recognised it immediately.
"That indicates that an animal passed here."
"Yes."
"And the red light?"
"That does not indicate stopping in the same way."
"Because the light was not caused by the stopping."
"Precisely."
The keeper pointed towards the footprint.
"The animal made this mark by passing."
Then towards the light.
"These people made that relation by organising a practice."
The stranger considered this.
"The footprint leads from the present to something that happened."
"Yes."
"But the red light can lead from the present to something that need not yet have happened."
"Yes."
"Then a sign has a kind of freedom that a trace does not."
The keeper nodded.
"That is one way of putting it."
They entered a town.
Above the houses flew coloured pieces of cloth.
The stranger stopped beneath one.
"What does that stand for?"
"A country."
"Where is the country?"
"Far away."
"Then why does this cloth stand for it?"
"Because people have made it so."
"Could another cloth stand for the same country?"
"Certainly."
"Could this cloth stand for something else?"
"In another practice, yes."
The stranger looked upward.
The flag moved in the wind.
Nothing about the movement seemed particularly national.
The cloth remained cloth.
The wind remained wind.
But the relation between the two had acquired a history.
People had fought beneath it.
Marched beneath it.
Saluted it.
Burned it.
Loved it.
Hated it.
The stranger realised that the sign had become capable of travelling far beyond the thing it stood for.
In the centre of the town stood a woman making gestures to a crowd.
She raised one hand.
The crowd stopped.
She lowered it.
They moved.
She pointed towards the left.
People turned left.
She pointed towards the right.
They turned right.
The stranger watched.
"Her hand does not cause them to turn."
"No."
"It does not indicate where they should go in the way that smoke indicates fire."
"No."
"Yet they understand it."
"They participate in the practice."
"Then the movement of her hand has acquired another possibility."
"Yes."
"What possibility?"
"To stand for something."
They came at last to a small room filled with marks.
Words were written on walls.
Figures covered the tables.
Maps hung from the ceiling.
There were diagrams of rivers, machines and stars.
The stranger looked around.
"What is this place?"
"A house of signs."
He picked up a piece of paper.
There was a small drawing of a bridge.
"Where is the bridge?"
"Nowhere here."
"But I can see it."
"You can see a sign for it."
The stranger stared at the drawing.
"Then I can encounter something that is not present."
"Yes."
"I can think about something that is elsewhere."
"Yes."
"Something that has not yet happened?"
"Yes."
"Something that has never happened?"
The keeper nodded.
"Yes."
The stranger slowly put the paper down.
"The sign has opened the world."
The keeper smiled.
"It has opened another kind of world."
That evening, they sat beside the town square.
The stranger had become thoughtful.
"I think I understand the distinction now."
"Tell me."
"A footprint is a difference that can indicate."
"Yes."
"A red light is a difference that can stand for another possibility."
"Yes."
"The footprint depends upon what caused it."
"Usually."
"The sign does not have to."
"Correct."
"The footprint cannot simply be copied and detached from its history without changing what it is."
"Not in the same way."
"But a sign can be copied."
"Again and again."
"Moved?"
"Across the world."
"Stored?"
"For centuries."
"Combined with other signs?"
"That is where things become interesting."
The stranger looked towards the town.
"Then a sign is not merely a difference that carries information."
"No."
"It is a difference that has acquired a place within a system of relations."
"Yes."
"And that system allows it to stand for something that need not be present."
"Yes."
The keeper leaned back.
"Now you are beginning to see why this country is larger than the one behind us."
The next morning, the stranger returned to the house of signs.
He took the word tree from a page.
"Tree," he said.
The keeper waited.
The stranger pointed towards an actual tree outside.
"The word does not cause the tree."
"No."
"It does not indicate the tree because the tree caused the word."
"No."
"It stands for it."
"Yes."
The stranger looked at the word.
"And because it stands for the tree, I can now do things I could not do with the tree alone."
"Such as?"
"I can ask what kind of tree it is."
"Yes."
"I can compare it with another tree."
"Yes."
"I can talk about trees that are not here."
"Yes."
"I can talk about trees that existed before I was born."
"Yes."
"I can talk about trees that might exist in the future."
"Yes."
"I can talk about what a tree ought to be."
The keeper nodded.
"And I can even talk about something that is not a tree at all."
The keeper smiled.
"You have found the door."
"What door?"
"The one the sign opens."
The stranger looked again at the word.
He suddenly understood that the great transformation had not occurred in the ink.
The marks had not become magical.
The sound had not acquired a hidden power.
The material world remained exactly as stubborn as before.
A wall remained a wall.
A river remained a river.
A tree remained a tree.
But differences had entered into new relations.
And those relations allowed the absent to become available.
The distant could be brought near.
The future could be discussed.
The imaginary could be explored.
The possible could be compared with the actual.
The sign had not escaped the world.
It had created another way of moving within it.
Before leaving the town, the stranger returned to the gate.
The red circle was still there.
He stood before it for a moment.
"What happens now?" he asked.
The keeper looked towards the road.
"Now we learn what signs can do when they are no longer alone."
The stranger looked puzzled.
"Signs can have companions?"
"More than companions."
The keeper pointed towards the town.
"They can distinguish one another."
"How?"
"They can be combined."
"And then?"
"They can qualify one another."
"And then?"
"They can contradict one another."
The keeper smiled.
"They can ask questions."
The stranger looked back at the red circle.
"And that is where language begins?"
"Perhaps not begins."
The keeper opened the gate.
"But it is where the landscape becomes much larger."
They stepped through.
Behind them remained the Country of Traces.
Ahead lay a country in which differences could be combined, contrasted, classified and transformed.
The stranger turned for one last look.
The footprint was still a footprint.
The cloud was still a cloud.
The red light was still only glass, metal and colour.
Nothing magical had entered the world.
Only a new relation had become possible.
A difference could now stand for another.
And once that became possible, the world acquired something it had never possessed before:
a way for the absent to enter the present.
The road ahead disappeared into the hills.
The keeper began walking.
"Come," he said.
"We have signs enough."
"And where are we going?"
"To find out what happens when they begin to speak to one another."
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