Phoenix Café
Page 33
But if the mask slips…. She stared at the bracelet. Is this a new world that came into being that night, when we defeated the doomsday conspiracy? Did I ever leave the game? What is real?
i don’t exist, I’m nothing, there is no catherine, no place, no time.
The glitter of the stones released her.
The sky was a blue void in which stately white mountains of cloud hung suspended; the navy blue rollers drove in from the ocsean and fell in spume onto the sands. She noticed how her wrist had grown more muscular but thinner, over the years. One could see bone as well as blood through the fragile skin now; jutting bone and unexpected hollows. How much time did she have left? Not enough, of course. She felt such a passion of love for this blue air, for this green world. To which Johnny still might return; might have returned even now from the mazes of rebirth. Any day he might come to visit her, or send a message. I’m back, I remember everything, I love you…. Some part of Catherine would always believe the sweet impossibility was possible, as long as she lived. And yet, she thought, she would be glad enough to leave when the time came. All debts paid (for a while); the long strain over. She passed through the gate, shouldering her board, and shut it behind her. The jeep was waiting, half asleep, in the silence of the forest margin.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A short bibliography
How the Leopard Changed Its Spots, Brian Goodwin, Weidenfield and Nicolson, London, UK 1994; Hiding in the Light, Dick Hebdige, Routledge, London, UK 1994; Leonardo da Vinci, Martin Kemp, J.M. Dent and Sons, London; 1981; The House of Souls, Arthur Machen, Grant Richards, London 1906; Greenmantle, John Buchan, Pan Books 1950; The Life of St Catherine of Siena, Blessed Raymond of Capua, tr George Lamb, Harvill Press, London UK 1960; The Story of A Soul, St Thérèse of Lisieux, Wheathampstead, Anthony Clarke 1990; Histoire De Ma Vie, George Sand, Academy Press 1977; Flaubert-Sand: the correspondence, tr Francis Steegmuller and Barbara Bray, based on the edition of Alphonse Jacobs, Harvill, 1993; L’Education Sentimentale, Gustave Flaubert, Penguin 1946; Les Blanches Annees, Jacqueline Bruller; Stock, 1980; Thérèse Desqueyroux, Francois Mauriac, Bernard Grasset; Paris 1927. The John Singer Sargent portrait is of Graham Robertson; it’s in the Tate Britain Gallery, London. “Yo Soy La Desintegración,” Frida Kahlo, a sketch in a diary entry: from The Diary of Frida Kahlo, intro. Carlos Fuentes, Bloomsbury, London UK 1995. The virtual laboratory (Vlab) was inspired by the work of Hungarian biologist Aristid Lindenmayer, 1968, reported by Tim Thwaites, in New Scientist, IPC magazines, May 1995. Special acknowledgment: Jeremy Millar (c/o The Photographers Gallery, London) for the influence of his exhibition “The Institute of Cultural Anxiety” (ICA December 1994 to 12 February 1995). Special acknowledgment also to Vincent Shine (c/o laure genillard gallery, London), for his version of (plant) life exactly recreated in artifice. Agathe Uwilingiyimana was the Prime Minister of Rwanda, July 1993–April 7, 1994.
Quotations
An explanation for group suicide, from Jude the Obscure, Thomas Hardy; Catherine on her need to believe in God, from Jacques le Fataliste, Denis Diderot. Maitri’s appreciation of Misha’s style, from Two Gentlemen of Verona, Wm Shakespeare Act I scene.3; Misha’s defiance song, “The Wearing of the Green,” traditional. A branch of cold flame (in the heart of a man)…. Patti Smith, “Land/Land of a Thousand Dances”; the Car Park hymn (don’t be afraid to live), music Jo Akepsimas, lyric Jean Serval. Alicia Khan’s question of ownership, Alexander Pope, from an epigram engraved on the collar of a dog given to Frederick, Prince of Wales; Agathe’s complaint about the difficulty of doing good, from Paul et Virginie, Bernadin de Saint Pierre. Misha applying the eyedrops on Catherine’s first entry to the games-room, from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Wm Shakespeare, Act II scene 1; Dr. Bright’s comment on proliferating weapons production, “I am become death,” a quote from the Bhagavad Gita attributed to J. Robert Oppenheimer; on seeing the first atomic device detonated. Agathe on human smiles, from Hamlet, Wm Shakespeare, Act I scene 5; Triumph chant in the Blue Forest, “When the Saints Go Marching In,” traditional as far as I know. Maitri on the spirit of adventure, from Hassan, James Elroy Flecker; Helen’s description of her art from La Boheme, Puccini (librettists Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica); Maitri’s household’s farewell to Earth, “Spanish Ladies,” traditional. Catherine’s ever present company, Hebrews chapter XII verse 1.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Gwyneth Jones, writer and critic of science fiction and fantasy, is the author of many novels for teenagers, mostly using the name Ann Halam, and several genre novels for adults, often addressing feminist, popular culture and gender issues. Her critical essays and reviews are collected in Deconstructing the Starships, 1999, and Imagination/Space, 2009. Recent honors include the P. K. Dick award for Life, published by Aqueduct Press, and the Pilgrim award for science fiction criticism. She’s done some extreme tourism in her time, and enjoys mountain walking, playing with her websites, and watching old movies. Her latest novel is Spirit, or The Princess of Bois Dormant (Gollancz UK). She lives in Brighton UK.
Table of Contents
I Blood and Fire
1 A Prisoner of Conscience
2 Political Meeting
3 The Phoenix Café
4 Les Parapluies
5 The Stardate Diaries
6 Blocks and Docks
II Name of the Father
7 L’Airial
8 Paper Flowers
9 The Secret Author
III Yo Soy la Desintegración
10 Intermundia
11 The Earlier Crossing
12 In the Field Hospital
Envoi: Un Bel Di Vedremo
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS