Orbitsville Departure

Chapter 6

In five weeks, with some medical assistance, Cona Dallen had learned to walk and to feed herself, and had almost completed her toilet training. According to Roy Picciano, senior physician for the community, her progress had been excellent — at least as good as would have been achieved had she been in full-time care at the Madison clinic. But as the sheer physical burden of looking after an adult-sized baby had gradually eased, the mental wear and tear on Carry Dallen had increased.

At first he had been too numbed by exhaustion and delayed shock even to consider Picciano's prognostication and advice. There had, for example, been no room in his mind for the monstrous suggestion that Cona might never again be able to speak. Her brain and nerve connections and muscles were all there, intact, and he — Carry Dallen, the man who never made a mistake — knew that by sheer perseverance and the force of his own will he would induce that delicate apparatus to function properly again.

The simple mind-filling truth which seemed to elude all doctors was that their science was based on studies of generalised humanity, on what had happened to anonymous masses of commonplace people, whereas in this case the subject was a unique and special entity who was central to Dallen's unique and special existence. Ordinary rules could not apply. Not this time.

The first unmanning blow had been the discovery that it was necessary for Cona and Mikel to live separately, because she was a real threat to the boy's safety. Cona is a baby again, had been the gist of Picciano's comments. She's locked in the true psychosis of the first weeks of infancy, unable to distinguish between herself and the outside world, with a feeling range which is limited to anger, pleasure, pain and fear. All babies react with violent anger when frustrated, especially where food is concerned. Given the necessary size and strength any infant would kill the mother who withdrew the teat too soon or who thwarted any other infantile desire. Cona is big and strong, particularly in comparison to Mikel, and one moment of rage is all it would take.

Dallen never failed to be dismayed each time that sudden fury asserted itself, usually over matters of thet. Cona had always had a strong appetite, and as a thinking adult had barely managed to control her weight by avoiding sweet and starchy foods. The new Cona, even after she had learned to chew, would have been content to subsist on nothing but chocolate and ice cream, and there were clashes when he tried to persuade her otherwise. Initially she had shown her anger by rolling on the floor and screaming, a sound which daunted him both with its volume and incoherence. At a later stage, when co-ordination and spatial awareness had developed, she had once succeeded in striking him on the face. The blow had stung, but the real pain had come in the swiftness of her transition from rage to crowing happiness as he had relaxed his grip on a disputed candy bar.

The message had been clear — Cona Dallen doesn't live here anymore — and it had caused him to back away, timorously, shaking his head in denial…

When Dallen answered the door chimes he was surprised to see Roy Picciano in place of the voluntary worker he had been expecting. It was mid-morning on a Tuesday and he had been planning some necessary shopping before going to the clinic to visit Mikel.

"Bern has been delayed for a while, so I offered to fill in for her," Picciano said, his smile showing the gold fillings which had again become fashionable. He was a bushy-haired, tanned man of about fifty whose preference for lightweight sports clothes created the impression that all his professional appointments were sandwiched between rounds of golf.

"Thanks, Roy." Dallen stepped back to let the doctor come in. "I could have walked, you know."

"It's no trouble. Besides, I wanted to have a look at my patients ‘’

Dallen noticed the use of the plural. "I'm all right."

"You look tired, Carry." Picciano appraised him candidly. "How long are you going to go on like this?"

"As long as it takes. We've been through this before, haven't we?"

"No! I have been through it — you won't even begin to think about the problem."

"It's my problem. I'm responsible for Cona being the way she is."

'That's a perfect example of what I'm talking about," Picciano said, not hiding his exasperation. "You have no responsibilities to Cona, because Cona no longer exists. Your wife is dead, Carry. Your only responsibility now is to yourself. There is always some uncertainty about the progress of erasure cases, but there's one thing I can tell you for sure — the stunted, half-personality which is going to develop in that human shell in the next room will have nothing, nothing to do with your former wife. You've got to accept that, for your own good."

"For my own good." Dallen made the words sound like a phrase from a foreign language. "How long are we going to stand around here in the hall?"

Til look at her now." Picciano opened the nearest door and went into the long living room, bis heels clacking on the polished composition floor. In his early attempts to deal with Cona's incontinence Dallen had tried putting her in diapers, but she had disliked them intensely, and he had found their appearance grotesque and degrading. He had then settled for removing all carpets and cleaning up after her, a chore which had almost ceased to exist now that she was using the bathroom. She was lying on a blue pneumat, chin propped on her hands, engrossed in watching the swirl of colours and shapes above a nursery imager. Her legs were bent, bare feet circling aimlessly and sometimes colliding. In spite of the loose smock in which Dallen had dressed her she was noticeably plumper than she had been a month earlier. "Look who's come to see you," Dallen said, kneeling beside Cona and putting an arm around her shoulder. She glanced up at him, eyes bright with window reflections, and returned her attention to the glowing airborne patterns. Dallen took a tissue from his pocket and tried to dab a smear of chocolate from her chin, but she whimpered in irritation and twisted away from him.

"We only got the imager yesterday," Dallen explained. "It's still a novelty."

Picciano shook his head. "Do you know what you're doing, Carry? You're apologizing because the subject — I refuse to call her Cona, and so should you — didn't greet me with polite chitchat and a choice of coffee or sherry. This is what I've been…"

"For God's sake."

T'm only…" Picciano sighed and stared out of the window for a moment. "Did you get her to take all the fifth week medication and tracers?"

"Yes. No problem."

"In that case I'm going to carry out some tests and make notes." Picciano opened his flat plastic case and began to activate an instrument panel incorporated in the lid. "This is all routine stuff and I don't need any help," he added significantly.

"Thanks." Dallen pressed his face against Cona's for a moment without getting any response, then stood up and left the room. A minute later he was out on the street, breathing deeply to cleanse his lungs of the smell of chocolate and urine which in his fancy pervaded the house at all times. He lived near the outer edge of the inhabited strip of Madison, an area which straggled northwards for about five kilometres from the city centre to accommodate a population of several thousand Metagov and local administration workers. For the most part the dwellings were large, stone-built and well screened by trees — evidence of the district's former affluence. The far-off drone of a lawnmower served only to emphasise the mid-week, mid-morning stillness, creating the impression he had strayed into one of the thousands upon thousands of deserted suburbs which migrating families had left to dreams and decay.

Windows and doorways, never aglow, Dallen thought, recalling one of the most popular songs of the last two centuries. Everyone's gone to Big O…

Dismissing the mawkish lyric, he decided to walk into town and use the time to work on the problem of Derek Beaumont. The tragedy that had befallen Cona overshadowed everything else in his life, but he appreciated a certain irony in the fact that the one man he knew to bear responsibility also provided his only distraction. When not grieving over his wife or coping with the despairing drudgery she now represented, Dallen fantasised about being alone with the young terrorist, about making him name all the relevant names, about hunting and capturing and killing. Part of him, even in lurid visions, drew the line at coldblooded execution, but another understood only too well that confrontations could be manipulated. It was a technique boys learned at school. Give the enemy a gentle push, encourage him to push back, respond with a harder shove, escalate the violence and keep doing it until suddenly all thoughts of guilt can be discarded and it's time to cut loose and go in hard. When it's merely a matter of temperature, Dallen knew, the blood can be very obliging. And the man or woman who pulled the trigger on Cona and Mike! was going to know the same thing… in the final passionate, exultant moment that person was going to know… and that person was going to be sorry… in the end…

Walking south through slanting prisms of sunlight and green shade, Dallen heard his own footfalls change note as frustration hardened his muscles. Although his job occasioned him to think and act like a policeman, he held no official responsibility for local law enforcement. He was a Grade IV officer in the Deregistration Bureau, and as such his prime concern was with surveying tracts of land that had been declared empty and making sure they remained unoccupied for one full year, after which time Metagov was longer legally accountable. Madison City itself, thanks to the artificial mix of its population, had virtually no crime, and the police department consisted of an executive and a handful of officers who were mainly concerned with regulating tourist accommodation. In spite of the overlap in their jobs, Dallen had always maintained an easy working relationship with Police Chief Lashbrook. Consequently he had been surprised to find himself not only denied access to the terrorist, but made distinctly unwelcome in the downtown police building.

"It was a sickening thing, what happened to your wife and boy," Cole Lashbrook had said, eyeing him severely over pedant's spectacles. "I'm deeply sorry about it, but I've made every allowance I can. If you persist with your attempts to see Beaumont I'll be forced to take appropriate action against you."

Dallen's fists clenched as his sense of outrage returned, "Against me" he had almost shouted. "Are you crazy?"

"No, but sometimes I think you are. Beaumont has made a formal complaint about what you did to him in back of that store, Carry. The dust hasn't settled over that business of the pursuit fatalities a couple of months back, and now there's this… And on top of it all you come round here and expect to be let loose on my prisoner!"

"Your prisoner?" Dallen had refrained with difficulty from pointing out the police department's past willingness to allow onerous duties to be performed by his own force.

"That's right. He was in possession of an explosive device and that makes it a criminal matter, and I intend to deliver Beaumont for trial in good health — a condition he may not be in if you get near him."

"Exactly what does that make me?"

"Carry, you're a man who has been known to go too far — even when you weren't personally involved in a case — and I’m not going to help you land yourself behind bars."

Thanks a lot, Dallen repeated to himself, immune to the blandishments of the placid sunlit warmth through which he was walking. In the two centuries since the discovery of Optima Thule, to give Orbitsville its constitutional name, there had been a general and steady decrease in traditional crime. Most crimes had involved property in one way or another, and as the race had been absorbed by a land area equivalent to five billion Earths — enough to support every intelligent creature in the galaxy — the basic motivations had faded away. Keeping pace with that change, many vast and complicated legal structures had become as obsolete as barbed wire, and progressively fallen into disuse.

Even on Earth, where there were historical complications, a community the size of Madison operated on a fairly informal basis as far as the law and its enforcement were concerned. In the days immediately following the blanking of his family Dallen had been certain that somehow he would obtain private interview with Beaumont. He had never allowed himself to consider the possibility of his being unable to force the prisoner to talk. He had fuelled himself night and day on the conviction that Beaumont would give him a name, the name, and that events thereafter would take a divinely ordained course. Now he was haunted by a suspicion that the young terrorist would be arraigned at the next session of the regional court and receive the routine sentence of — irony of ironies — deportation to Orbitsville. And once Beaumont reached Botany Bay, the popular name for the area surrounding the N5 portal, he would be beyond the reach of Dallen or any other private citizen. Economics and celestial mechanics had conspired to bring about that particular circumstance. A starship docking at an equatorial port simply went into orbit around Optima Thule's central sun, but only a few vessels — all owned by Metagov — were fitted with the complex grappling equipment which enabled them to ding like leeches to entrances in the northern and southern bands… "What's wrong with your car, old son?" The voice from only a few paces away startled Dallen. He turned his head and found that a gold Rollac convertible had slowed to a craw! beside him without his noticing. The top was down and at the wheel was the buoyantly plump figure of Rick Renard, a man who had started showing up recently at the city gymnasium used by Dallen. Renard had red curly hair and milky skin which was uniformly dusted with freckles. He also had an uncanny ability to needle Dallen and put him on the defensive with just about every remark he made.

"Why should anything be wrong with my car?" Dallen said, deliberately giving the kind of response Renard was seeking, as if to be wary of his snares would be to pay the other man a compliment.

Renard's slightly prominent teeth gleamed briefly. "Nobody walks in heat like this."

"I do."

"Trying to lose weight?"

"Yeah — right now I'm trying to get rid of about a hundred kilos."

"I'm not that heavy, old son," Renard said, eyes beaconing his satisfaction at having provoked an outright insult. "Look, Dallen, why don't you get in the car with me and ride downtown in comfort with me and use the time you save to enjoy a cold beer?"

"Well, if you put it like that…" Suddenly disenchanted with the prospect of walking, Dallen pointed at the curb a short distance ahead, making the gesture an instruction as to where to halt the car. Renard overshot the mark by a calculated margin and scored back against Dallen by allowing the vehicle to roll forward before he was properly in, causing him to do some quick footwork as the door dosed.

"Aren't we having fun?" Renard's shoulders shook as he enjoyed a private triumph. "What do you think of the car?"

"Nice," Dallen said carelessly, slumping into the receptive upholstery.

"This lady is sixty years old, you know. Indestructible. Brought her all the way fom the Big O. None of your modem Unimot crap for me."

"You're a lucky man, Rick." Feeling the passenger seat adapt itself to his body, coaxing him into relaxation, Dallen was impressed by the car's sheer silent-gliding luxury. It came to him that its owner had to be wealthy. He vaguely recalled having heard that Renard was a botanist who had come to Earth on some kind of a field trip, which had suggested he was a Metagov employee, but salaried workers did not import their own cars across hundreds of light years. "Lucky?" Renard's narrow dental arch shone again. "The way I see it, the universe only gives me what I deserve."

"Really? Do you accept donations from any other source?"

Renard laughed delightedly. "As a matter of fact, my mother was a Lindstrom."

"In that case, shouldn't the universe be getting hand-cuts from you?" Dallen closed his eyes for a moment, glad to be distracted from his own affairs, and considered Renard's claim to be related to the legendary family which had once monopolised the space travel industry. For a brief period after the Big O's discovery its official designation had been Lindstromland, and the Scandinavian connotations of its present name hinted at the clan's continuing if muted influence. In their heyday the Lindstroms had amassed a fortune which, apparently, was beyond human capability to diminish; and if Renard was connected with them, no matter how tenuously, he was no ordinary botanist.

The universe only gives me what! deserve. Dallen got a mental image of his wife — wandering aimlessly through shaded rooms, smock gathered to the waist, crooning to herself as she masturbated on the move — and the pressures within him grew intolerable. Cona deserved better…

"I heard you're a botanist," he said quickly. "You collect flowers?"

Renard shook his head. "Grass."

"Ordinary grass?"

"What's ordinary about grass?" Renard said, smiling in a way intended to let Dallen know that his education was incomplete. "So far we've found only thirty or so species on Orbitsville — an incredibly low number considering the areas involved and the fact that we have more than ten thousand species on Earth. The Department of Agriculture did some work on determining mixes of Earth seeds which are compatible with Orbitsville soil and the native species, but that was in the last century and it was a half-assed effort anyway. I'm doing the job properly. Soon I'll be going back with over a thousand seed varieties and maybe two thousand square metres of sample trays."

"So you work for Metagov."

"Don't be so naive, old son — all Metagov wants from Earth is a decree nisi." Renard turned the steering wheel with a languid hand, swinging the car into an avenue which ran due west. "I work for nobody but myself.'"

"But…" Dallen grappled with unfamiliar concepts. "The transport costs must be…"

"Astronomical? Yes, but it's not so bad when you have your own ship. For a while I considered chartering, then I realised it made more sense to recuse an old flickerwing from the graveyard and amortise the cost over three or four trips."

"That's what I would have done," Dallen said, concealing his grudging awe for an individual who could so casually speak of owning the artificial microcosm that was a starship. "What have you got?"

"A Type 96B. It was designed for bulk cargo work, so there aren't any diaphragm decks, which means it isn't all that suitable for my work. But I got round that by building really tall racks to hold the grass trays. Do you want a free trip to Orbitsville?"

"No, not at… Why?"

"I need people to tend the samples by hand — not worth installing automatic systems — and I'm paying with free transportation. That way everybody benefits."

"Perhaps I'll become an entrepreneur."

"You're not cut out for it, old son — you've conditioned yourself to think small." Renard's smile conveyed affectionate contempt. "Otherwise you wouldn't be in the police."

"I'm not a policeman. I work for…" Dallen widened his eyes, belatedly aware of the car's change of direction. "Where the hell are we supposed to be going?"

Renard chuckled, again pleasurably triumphant in what appeared to be a never-ending personal game. "This will only take a couple of minutes. I promised Silvia I'd drop by with a carton of glass she's been waiting for."

"Silvia who?"

"Silvia London. Oh, I don't suppose you've ever been to the Londons' place?"

"Not since my polo stock got woodworm."

"I like you, Dallen," Renard said appreciatively "You are a refreshingly genuine person."

And you are a refreshingly genuine bag of puke, Dallen thought, wondering how he could have been stupid enough to give up part of his day to such criminal waste. His previous encounters with Renard in the gymnasium had been brief, but they should have been enough to let him recognise and beware of a stunted personality. Renard's life appeared to be a continuous power game, one in which he never tired of contriving all the advantages, one in which no opponent was too small and no battlefield too insignificant.

The present situation, with Renard at the wheel of a car and therefore temporarily in control of his passenger's movements, was a microscopic annoyance, and yet the other man's obvious relish for what he was doing was turning it into something else. Furious with himself for being drawn in, Dallen nevertheless sat up straighter and began watching for an opportunity to quit the car. It would have to be done in a single effortless movement — otherwise Renard would score even more points — and for that the car would have to be practically at a standstill. Renard glanced sideways at Dallen and promptly accelerated, hastening the alternation of tree-shadow and sunlight over the curving gold hood.

"You'll enjoy meeting Silvia," he said. "You've got to see her jugs."

"Maybe I'm not interested in pottery."

"Maybe that's not what I mean, old son." Dallen kept his gaze fixed on the pavement ahead. "I know what you meant, old son."

"1 do believe he's angry!" Renard craned his neck to look into Dalten's face. "I do believe I've succeeded in provoking the puritanical Mr. Dallen. Well, well!" Shaking his head in amusement, Renard turned the car into a wide driveway with scarcely any slackening of speed. The level of illumination dropped abruptly as walls of foliage closed in on each side.

"These reactionary times we're living in must suit you very well." Renard spoke with quietly ruminative tones, surprising Dallen with the change of tack. "Personally, I'd have been happier thirty years ago, back in the Sixties. I suppose you've noticed the pattern in the last few centuries? The steady build-up of liberalism… peaking two-thirds of the way through… then the violent swing the other way to close out the century and start the next. Why do you think it happens? Why is it that Mary Poppins concepts like mortality and monogamy and family refuse to lie down and the?"

Vm going to presume be doesn't know what happened to Cona and Mikel, Dallen told himself. When the car stops Fm going to walk way, and if be has enough sense to let me go that will be the end of it…

The house which was coming into view on a low hill was not what Dallen had expected. All he knew about the Londons was that they were supposed to be wealthy and that they were a focal point for an unorthodox philosophical society — the sort of people whose chosen setting would abound in gabled roofs, leaded glass and all the overt signs of respectability and tradition. Instead, the London residence turned out to be a three-storey redbrick house — rather too small for its imposing location — around which had been tacked an untidy skirt of timber-framed extensions. Additions had been made to additions in an undisciplined manner which would not have been tolerated in the days when zoning regulations were taken seriously. A stack of greying lumber had been left near the entrance to the main building.

"Rebecca's replacement wouldn't have lost much sleep over this place," Renard said, bringing the car to a crunching halt on a square of brown gravel in front of the house.

Dallen nodded and remained silent, guessing that the allusion had been literary. He got out of the car and was turning to leave when a tall brunette in her late twenties came out to the front steps of the house to greet Renard. She was wearing a close-fitting white shirt and white pants which showed off a full-bosomed but lean-hipped figure. A hint of muscularity about her forearms suggested to Dallen that here was a woman who kept in trim by sheer expenditure of energy. Her face was small and quite square, with neat features and a slight prominence of chin which gave a near-truculent fullness to her lower lip. It was a face which in spite of its liveliness and intelligence, many would have considered disappointing, but Dallen found himself alerted and oddly disturbed, like one who is on the verge of recalling a vital missed appointment.

"…and his name is Carry," Renard was saying to the woman. "I've never seen him go into a trance like this before — perhaps if you pointed your chest somewhere else…"

"Shut up. Rick. Hello, Carry." She gave Dallen a brief smile, her attention already focused on two transit cartons which rested on the rear seat of the car. "Is this my glass?"

"It certainly is, courtesy of Renard's doorstep delivery service. I'll carry it in for you."

"Thanks, but I'm quite capable of moving a box or two." The woman reached into the car, picked up a carton and bore it away into the house.

"I'll say you are," Renard said admiringly, his gaze lingering on the white-clad figure before he turned to Dallen. "What did I tell you?"

Dallen felt a pang of annoyance then realised that what he disliked about the question was not so much the sexism as the proprietary pride. This is crazy, he thought, alarmed at the speed and uncontrollability of what was happening inside of him. If a woman like that is mixed up with Renard she can't be a wanton like that. Unwilling to consider what his motives might be, he picked up the second carton and carried it into the house. Its weightiness confirmed his guess about Silvia London being physically strong. She met him at a doorway on the left of the hall, smiled again and gestured for him to go on through. "Thanks," she said. "Straight ahead to the studio, please."

"Okey-dokey." Brilliant conversational opening, he thought, appalled. Where did I dredge that one from? He went through a high-ceil inged, conventionally furnished room and into another whose airiness and overhead windows proclaimed it to be part of the house extension. He came to a halt, transfixed, as he saw that the fierce light in the outer room was transformed into a multi-hued blaze by a screen of stained glass which reached almost to the ceiling.

Da Hen's first impression was of a huge trefoil flower. All edges of the three enormous petals were in the same plane, which would have made it possible for the construction to serve as an incredibly ornate window, but the central surfaces were a bewildering series of complex three-dimensional curves, sculptures in glass. Geometric patterns based on circles and ellipses radiated from a sunburst centre, swirling and interacting, generating areas of incense complication in some places and smoothing into calm simplicity in others. The technique was almost point-ille, deriving its effect from myriad thousands of colour fragments, most of which were no bigger than coins. Dallen's sense of awe increased, rippling coolness down his spine, as he realised that the glowing tesserae — which he had taken to be brush-dabs of transparent paint — were actually individual chips of stained glass bonded with metal.

"My God," he said, with genuine reverence. "It's… I've never…"

Silvia London laughed as she took the carton from him and placed it on a nearby workbench. "You like it?"

"That has to be the most beautiful thing I've ever seen." Dallen filled his eyes with mingling rays, mesmerising himself. "But…"

"A third of a million."

"I'm sorry?"

"The first thing everybody asks is how many separate pieces of glass," Silvia said. "The answer is a third of a million, almost. I've been working on it continuously for four years."

"Why? For God's sake, why?" Renard spoke from behind Dallen, having entered the studio unnoticed. "With an imager you could have built up the same effect in a few days. Throw continuous computer variation and it would be even better. What do you say, Garry?"

"I'm not an artist."

"You could still venture an opinion." Silvia spoke lightly, but her brown eyes were holding steady on Dallen's. "Why should I give up four years of my life to one unnecessary project?"

His answer was instinctive. "Something which sets itself up as a mosaic really has to be a mosaic — otherwise it's no use."

"Near enough," she said. "You can come back anytime."

"Crawler," Renard sneered. "Silvia, when are you going to drop this phoney reverence for old… what's his name… Tiffany and his methods? You know perfectly well that you cheat."

She shook her head, glancing at Dallen to include him in what she was saying. "I cut the glass with a valency knife because it's so fast and accurate. And instead of edging each piece with copper foil so that it can be soldered 1 transmute a couple of millimetres of it into copper, for reasons of speed and strength. But Tiffany himself would have used those methods if they'd been available to him — therefore in my book it isn't cheating."

"And how about the cold solder?"

"Same criterion applies."

"I should know better than to argue with a woman," Renard said, cheerfully unconvinced. "When are you and I going to have dinner?"

"We've been over all that."

Renard picked up a fish-shaped piece of streaky blue glass from the bench and peered through it, "How is Karal these days?"

"His condition is stable, thank you."

Renard held the strip of glass closer to his eyes, converting it into a mask. "I'm glad about that."

"Yes, Rick." Silvia turned to Dallen with an apologetic smile. "I'm sorry about the conversation becoming so cryptic. I'm not interested in adultery, you see — even though my husband is old and very ill. When I refused to date Rick a moment ago he, quite naturally — being the sort of person he is — asked me if Karal would the soon, and when I told him there was no immediate prospect of it he couldn't even make a convincing attempt to appear pleased."

"Silvia!" Renard looked scandalised. "You make me sound so crass!"

"I'm tempted to make the obvious reply to that one, but…"

"Don't mind me," Dallen put in. "I quite enjoy the sound of knuckles on flesh." He had slipped into his social armour by reflex, buying time in which to gain some control over what was happening behind his eyes. Information had been coming in too fast The fantastic glass edifice filling the studio had an overpowering presence of its own, but something about Silvia London was even more disturbing. He had just learned that Renard had no claim on her, that she was a person upon whom Renard could not make a claim, and the result had been an immediate explosion of images and sense impressions — Silvia seen across a supper table; Silvia broodily examining a damaged fingernail; Silvia at the controls of a high-G zoom car, Silvia floating lazily in a sun-gilded pool; Cona raising her gaze in momentary bafflement from on historical text, Silvia lying with her head in the crook of his left arm; Cona trotting footprints of her own urine from room to shaded room…

Silvia looked thoughtfully at Dallen. "I can't help wondering… Have we met before?"

"It isn't likely," Renard said, grinning. "His polo stick got woodworm."

Dallen moved away from Silvia, closer to the stunning glass mosaic. "I thought this was a flower at first, but it's astronomical, isn't it?"

"Yes. It's a representation of a Gott-McPherson cosmos."

Dallen frowned, still expunging visions. "I thought McPherson was a spherologist. Isn't he on the Optima Thule Science Commission?"

"Yes, but it's his work on cosmogony that inspires me as an artist," Silvia said, caressing the glass with the tip of a finger. "Actually, as it stands the screen shows a pure Gott cosmos. The scenario he devised in the 20th Century called for the creation of three separate universes at the moment of the Big Bang. He labelled the universe we live in Region I. It's composed of normal matter and of course in our universe time goes forward. This is it in the left-hand zone, with all the colours and forms naturalistic by our terms of reference." Silvia crossed to the other side of the screen, stepping with care over a wooden support, choosing the constricted route between Dallen and the glass. Her hair touched his lips.

"In the opposite panel is the Region II universe, created in the same instant as ours, but rushing backwards into our past and composed of anti-matter. I've suggested its nature by using inverted forms and colours which are complements of those in Region I. Gott also postulated a Region III universe — a tachyon universe — which has sped far ahead of us in time and will remain in our future until all the universes meet each other again in the next Big Bang. This is the tachyon universe in the centre section — elongated abstract patterns, leached-out opalescent colours."

"Aren't you glad you asked?" Renard's bow of teeth gleamed. "If you want to appear intelligent and interested ask where McPherson comes into the picture."

"I'm sorry," Silvia said, her eyes again locking with Dallen "I do tend to presume that my private manias are universal."

"It's all right," Dallen replied quickly. "It's really… well, fascinating… and as a matter of feet I was going to ask about McPherson's contribution."

Renard burst into full-throated laughter, hamming up his scorn by slapping his thigh, and walked away into the old part of the house, shaking his head.

"Perhaps he's kind to animals," Silvia said, pausing until Renard was out of earshot. "McPherson refined Gott's ideas and also added a Region IV universe — an anti-tachyon universe which is fleeing ahead of Region II into its past. It's being incorporated into the design as a fourth panel complementing Region III, but there isn't enough ceiling height here to let me assemble the whole screen. That will have to wait."

"For what?"

"Completion of Karal's memorial college, of course."

"I see," Dallen floundered. Tm afraid I don't know much about your husband's work."

"There's no real reason why you should — he isn't a publicity-seeker."

"I didn't mean…"

Silvia laughed, showing predictably healthy teeth. "You're far too normal to be keeping company with Red Rick, you know. Why do you do it?"

"He promised he could get me into movies," Dallen said, trying to decide why he was unhappy about being described as normal. What's going on here? he thought. Pm supposed to be the one who always holds the conversational high ground.

"I'm sure you'd be interested in what Karal has to say." Silvia's gaze had a disconcerting softness. "We're having some people around tomorrow night — would you like to join us?"

"I…" Dallen looked down at the woman and felt a surge of genuine panic as he realised how close he had come to opening his arms to her. There had been no reason to it, no sense of having been given an invitation, not even any special pressure of desire — it was just that his arms had almost moved by themselves. And Com is still a prisoner, still where I put her.

Tm busy tomorrow," he said, his voice unexpectedly loud.

"Perhaps some other evening would…"

"My wife and I never go out." Dallen strode out of the studio and into the adjoining room, where he found Renard studying some botanical prints clustered on a wall. The high-ceilinged room seemed mellow and cool, part of another age.

"Ready to go?" Renard looked quizzical. "I thought an art lover like you would have been in there for ages. What have you been doing to this young man, Silvia?"

"Thanks for your help with the glass," she said to Dallen, entering the room behind him, and it seemed to him that her manner was now overly correct. "The cartons are quite heavy."

"No trouble. If you’ll excuse me — I have an appointment in town." Dallen went out to the front of the house, prepared to leave the premises on foot, but Renard caught up with him and within a minute — after an exchange of formalities with Silvia — they were in the car and rolling silently between banks of foliage. Warm air currents touched Dallen's forehead. The world looked subtly different to him, as in the first moment after stepping out of a bar in daytime. He felt that something momentous had happened, but what made it unsettling was the lack of evidence that anything at all had taken place. It was a matter of interpretation. He had never met a woman quite like Silvia London before, and could have been misreading the signals because of unfamiliarity or male egotism. Or perhaps sheer sexual deprivation. When he had mentioned Cona's frequent masturbation to Roy Picciano the doctor had suggested that it could cease if they resumed a physical relationship, but Dallen had found the idea repugnant beyond words…

"That was a nice little divertimento for all concerned." Renard said. "What went on in there?"

"Meaning?"

"The two of you came out of the studio like robots." Renard looked amused. "Did you try to touch her?" Dallen sighed in exasperation. "Stop the car and let me out."

"No need to get huffy, old son," Renard said, accelerating out into the street. "It's two years since her old man went off to the Big O to the, and nobody has got near our Silvia in all that time. It's a criminal waste, really, but she has compensated by inventing this game called New Morality Musical Beds. Cumbersome title, but I've just made it up. When the music stops — by music I mean Kara T’s emphysematic rattling — there's going to be one hell of a scramble, and Silvia wants the field to be as large as possible. I’m going to win, of course. It's a foregone conclusion, but she doesn't want to admit that Co herself. I guess the illusion of choice gives her a bit of a lift."

The tone and content of what he had just heard outraged Dallen on behalf of Silvia, but he was distracted by new information. "I didn't realise Karal London lives on Orbitsville."

Renard nodded. "A place near Port Napier. He only appears in holomorph form at Silvia's little soirees, you know. Personally, I find it somewhat distasteful."

"A sensitive person like you would."

"Unkind, Carry, unkind."

"What's this about emphysema?"

"That's what is kilting him. I'm told he can barely cross a room."

"But…" Dallen began to feel overwhelmed. "Why?"

"Why is he allowing himself to the of a disease which can be cured? Why didn't he either stay here or take Silvia to Big O with him?" Renard glanced at Dallen, arched teeth gleaming. "Obviously she didn't have enough time to get on to hobbyhorse number two otherwise you'd know all about it. That would have been something else for you to find… urn… fascinating."

"Forget I asked," Dallen said, his patience fading.

"It's all part of the Great Experiment, man!" Renard laughed aloud, alerting the part of Dallen's mind that remained permanently on guard against being ribbed. "Haven't you heard you're going to live for ever?"

"I think somebody from Nazareth may have mentioned the idea."

"This is nothing to do with religion, old son," Renard said, apparently for once deciding to impart straight information. "Old Karal is anti-religious and anti-mystical. He set up his Anima Mundi Foundation a few years back with the express purpose of…

"Garry? Have you got your ears on?" The voice came from Dallen's implanted transceiver. "This is Jim Mellor."

"I’m listening," Dallen sub-vocalised, shocked by the unexpected communication from his deputy after weeks of radio silence. "Is something wrong?"

"I've got some bad news for you," Mellor said. "Beaumont has escaped."

"Escaped!" Dallen felt old preoccupations take over his mind. "Pick him up again."

"It's too late for that," Mellor replied, sounding both angry and embarrassed. "It happened three days back, but Lashbrook only told me a few minutes ago. Beaumont will be back in Cordele by this time."

Dallen closed his eyes. "So I go to Cordele."

"What's the matter with you?" Renard said loudly from beside Dallen, an intruder from another dimension. "Are you talking to yourself?"

Dallen shut him out, concentrating on the exchange with his deputy. "Get a ship ready for me, Jim — I'll be with you in a few minutes."

"But…"

"In a few minutes, Jim." Dallen made the practised sideways movement of his jaw which switched off his transceiver, then tried to relax into the deep cushions of the seat. He felt a cold, pleasurable anticipation which — even though he could recognise it as a sickness — restored lost illusions of purpose.