News clipping. “A Hole in the Map: Spokane, and What They Aren’t Telling Us,” the Seattle Times, November 7, pages 7A and 12A:
The article has been clipped from a daily newspaper—aged, yellowing newsprint with sharp, scissor-cut edges. It is in two pieces: a narrow lead column stapled to a wider three-column continuation. It has been well handled. The ink is smeared, and words have been lost beneath smudged fingerprints. The paper is a webwork of creases; it looks like it has been crumpled into a ball and then smoothed back out.
The article describes the quarantine, several months in, and revisits official press releases. It quotes government officials, and there are several “No comments” scattered throughout the text.
There are two pictures incorporated into the final column of type, stacked one on top of the other—large blocks of ink reduced to abstract blurs by excessive handling. The topmost picture is nothing but a dark morass of ink, with the barest hint of a face lurking in the bottom corner. The bottom picture is easier to parse but still difficult to understand. Underneath the maze of creases and beneath the smudged ink, where a sweaty fingertip has traced body and limb, it looks like a spider. A giant spider, perched atop seven spindly legs and one outstretched human finger.