The Year's Best SF 08 # 1990

by Gardner Dozois (ed)

  “My name’s Paul Pappenheim. I’m Beatrice’s brother.”

  “The engineer!” She was full of welcome. “My goodness, you know, I think Bea could foretell the future. She said you’d be turning up here about now.”

  “I wrote and told her!” I was laughing as the woman unlocked the gate and let me in. “I knew about this job months ago.”

  “You’re here on business.”

  “I’m going through the rituals of sorting out a better dam and trying to do something about the climactic changes. I got sent because I know a couple of people here—and because I asked to come. But there’s little real point to my being here.”

  “You don’t sound very hopeful, Mr Pappenheim.” She led me towards the back of the house, to a white wrought-iron conservatory which was a relatively recent addition to the place and must have been erected by some forgotten imperial dignitary of the last century.

  “I’m always hopeful that people will see reason, Lady Roper.”

  We went into the sweet-smelling ante-room, whose glass had been treated so that it could admit only a certain amount of light, or indeed reflect all the light to perform some needed function elsewhere. Despite its ancient appearance, I guessed the house to be using up-to-date EE technologies and to be completely self-sufficient. “What an extraordinary garden,” I said.

  “Imported Kent clay.” She offered me a white basket chair. “With a fair bit of Kenyan topsoil, I understand. We didn’t have it done. We got it all dirt cheap. It takes such a long time to travel anywhere these days most people don’t want the place. It belonged to one of the Fayeds, before they all went off to Malaysia. But have you looked carefully at our roses, Mr Pappenheim? They have a sad air to them, a sense of someone departed, someone mourned. Each bush was planted for a dead relative, they say.” Her voice grew distant. “Of course, the new rain has helped enormously. I’ve survived because I know the rules. Women frequently find their intuition very useful in times of social unrest. But things are better now, aren’t they? We simply refuse to learn. We refuse to learn.”

  Grinning as if enjoying a game, a Nubian girl of about sixteen brought us a tray of English cakes and a pot of Assam tea. I wondered how I had lost the thread of Lady Roper’s conversation.

  “We do our best,” I said, letting the girl take tongs to an éclair and with a flourish pop it on my plate. “I believe Bea lived here for a while.”

  “My husband took quite a fancy to her. As did I. She was a sweetie. And so bright. Is that a family trait? Yes, we shared a great deal. It was a luxury for me, you know, to have such company. Not many people have been privileged as she and I were privileged.” She nodded with gentle mystery, her eyes in the past. “We were friends of your uncle. That was the funny thing we found out. All at Cambridge together in the late sixties. We thought conservation an important subject then. What? Fifty years ago, almost? Such a jolly boy. He joined up for extremely complicated reasons, we felt. Did you know why?”

  I had never really wondered. My picture of my mother’s brother was of the kind of person who would decide on a military career, but evidently they had not known that man at all. Finding this disturbing, I attempted to return to my subject. “I was too young to know him. My sister was more curious than I. Did she seem neurotic to you, while she was here?”

  “On the contrary. She was the sanest of all of us. Sound as a bell upstairs, as Bernie always said. Sharp intelligence. But, of course, she had been there, you see. And could confirm everything we had been able to piece together at this end.”

  “You’re referring to the site they discovered?”

  “That, of course, was crucial. Especially at the early stages. Yes, the site was extraordinary. We went out to see it with her, Bernie and I. What a mind-blower, Paul! Amazing experience. Even the small portion they had excavated. Four mechanical sifters just sucking the sand gradually away. It would have taken years in the old days. Unfortunately three of the operators left after the earthquake and the sifters were recalled for some crucial rescue work over in Sinai. And then, of course, everything changed.”

  “I’m not sure I’m…”

  “After the ship came and took Bea.”

  “A ship? On the Nile?”

  She frowned at me for a moment and then her tone changed to one of distant friendliness. “You’ll probably want a word with Bernie. You’ll find him in his playroom. Nadja will take you. And I’m here if you need to know anything.”

  She glanced away, through the glass walls of the conservatory and was at once lost in melancholy reflection of the roses and their guardian trees.

  6 The Smoke Along The Track

  A tape of some antique radio programme was playing as I knocked on the oak door and was admitted by a white-haired old man wearing a pair of overalls and a check shirt, with carpet slippers on his feet. His skin had the healthy sheen of a sun-baked reptile and his blue eyes were brilliant with trust. I was shocked enough to remain where I was, even as he beckoned me in. He turned down his stereo, a replica of some even older audio contraption, and stood proudly to display a room full of books and toys. One wall was lined with glass shelves on which miniature armies battled amidst a wealth of tiny trees and buildings. “You don’t look much like a potential playmate!” His eyes strayed towards the brilliant jackets of his books.

  “And you’re not entirely convincing as Mr Dick, sir.” I stood near the books, which were all well-ordered, and admired his illustrated Dickens. The temperature in the room was, I guessed, thoroughly controlled. Should the power fail for just a few hours the desert would fade and modify this room as if it had been a photograph left for an hour in the sun.

  My retort seemed to please him. He grinned and came forward. “I’m Bernie Roper. While I have no immediate enemies, I enjoy in this room the bliss of endless childhood. I have my lead soldiers, my bears and rabbits, my model farm, and I read widely. Treasure Island is very good, as are the ‘William’ books, and Edgar Rice Burroughs and, as you say, Charles Dickens, though he’s a bit on the scarey side sometimes. E. Nesbit and H. G. Wells and Shaw. I enjoy so much. For music I have the very best of Children’s Favourites from the BBC—a mixture of comic songs, Gilbert and Sullivan, Puff the Magic Dragon, The Laughing Policeman, popular classics and light opera. Flanders and Swann, Danny Kaye, Sparky’s Magic Piano, Peter and the Wolf and Song of the South. Do you know any of those? But I’m a silly chap! You’re far too young. They’d even scrapped Children’s Hour before you were born. Oh, dear. Never to enjoy Larry the Lamb or Norman and Henry Bones, the Boy Detectives! Oh!” he exclaimed with a knowing grin, “Calamity!” Then he returned his attention to his toys for a moment. “You think I should carry more responsibility?”

  “No.” I had always admired him as a diplomat. He deserved the kind of retirement that suited him.

  “I feel sorry for the children,” he said. “The pleasures of childhood are denied to more and more of them as their numbers increase. Rajhid and Abu Halil are no real solution, are they? We who remember the Revolution had hoped to have turned the desert green by now. I plan to die here, Mr—?”

  “My name’s Pappenheim. I’m Bea’s brother.”

  “My boy! Thank goodness I offered an explanation. I’m not nearly as eccentric as I look! ‘Because I could not stop for Death, He kindly stopped for me. We shared a carriage, just we two, and Immortality.’ Emily Dickinson, I believe. But I could also be misremembering. ‘The child is Father to the Man’, you know. And the lost childhood of Judas. Did you read all those poems at school?”

  “I was probably too young again,” I said. “We didn’t do poetry as such.”

  “I’m so sorry. All computer studies nowadays, I suppose.”

  “Not all, sir.” The old-fashioned courtesy surprised us both. Sir Bernard acted as one cheated and I almost apologised. Yet it was probably the first time I had used the form of address without irony. I had, I realised, wanted to show respect. Sir Bernard had come to the same understanding. “Oh,
well. You’re a kind boy. But you’ll forgive me, I hope, if I return to my preferred world.”

  “I’m looking for my sister, Sir Bernard. Actually, I’m pretty worried about her.”

  Without irritation, he sighed. “She was a sweet woman. It was terrible. And nobody believing her.”

  “Believing what, Sir Bernard?”

  “About the spaceship, you know. But that’s Di’s field, really. Not my area of enthusiasm at all. I like to make time stand still. We each have a different way of dealing with the fact of our own mortality, don’t we?” He strolled to one of his displays and picked up a charging 17th Lancer. “Into the Valley of Death rode the six hundred.”

  “Thank you for seeing me, Sir Bernard.”

  “Not at all, Paul. She talked about you. I liked her. I think you’ll find her either attending Abu Halil’s peculiar gymnasium or at the holiday homes. Where those Kenyan girls and boys are now living.”

  “Thank you. Goodbye, sir.”

  “Bye, bye!” Humming some stirring air, the former Director General of the United Nations hovered, contented, over his miniature Death or Glory Boys.

  7 Another Relay In The Chain Of Fire

  Lady Roper had remained in her conservatory. She rose as I entered. “Was Bernie able to help?”

  “I could be narrowing things down.” I was anxious to get back to the East Bank before dark. “Thank you for your kindness. I tried to find a phone number for you.”

  “We’re not on the phone, lovie. We don’t need one.”

  “Sir Bernard mentioned a spaceship.” I was not looking forward to her reply.

  “Oh, dear, yes,” she said “The flying saucer people. I think one day they will bring us peace, don’t you? I mean one way or another. This is better than death for me, at any rate, Paul. But perhaps they have a purpose for us. Perhaps an unpleasant one. I don’t think anybody would rule that out. What could we do if that were the case? Introduce a spy? That has not proved a successful strategy. We know that much, sadly. It’s as if all that’s left of Time is here. A few shreds from a few ages.”

  Again I was completely nonplussed and said nothing.

  “I think you share Sir B’s streak of pessimism. Or realism is it?”

  “Well, we’re rather different, actually…” I began to feel foolish.

  “He was happier as Ambassador, you know. Before the UN. And then we were both content to retire here. We’d always loved it. The Fayeds had us out here lots of times, for those odd parties. We were much younger. You probably think we’re both barking mad.” When I produced an awkward reply she was sympathetic. “There is something happening here. It’s a centre. You can feel it everywhere. It’s an ideal place. Possibly we shall be the ones left to witness the birth of the New Age.”

  At that moment all I wished to do was save my sister from that atmosphere of half-baked mysticism and desperate faith, to get her back to the relative reality of London and a doctor who would know what was wrong with her and be able to treat it.

  “Bea was never happier than when she was in Aswan, you know,” said Lady Roper.

  “She wrote and told me as much.”

  “Perhaps she risked a bit more than was wise. We all admire her for it. What I don’t understand is why she was so thick with Lallah Zenobia. The woman’s psychic, of course, but very unsophisticated.”

  “You heard about the witness? About the purse?”

  “Naturally.”

  “And you, too, are sure it was a purse?”

  “I suppose so. It’s Cairo slang, isn’t it, for a lot of money? The way the Greeks always say ‘seven years’ when they mean a long time has passed. Bernie’s actually ill, you realise? He’s coherent much of the time. A form of P.D. we were told. From the water when we were in Washington. He’s determined to make the best of it. He’s sweet, isn’t he?”

  “He’s an impressive man. You don’t miss England?”

  She offered me her hand. “Not a bit. You’re always welcome to stay if you are bored over there. Or the carping materialism of the Old Country gets to you. Simplicity’s the keynote at the Rose House. Bernie says the British have been sulking for years, like the Lost Boys deprived of their right to go a-hunting and a-pirating at will. I’m afraid, Paul, that we don’t think very much of home any more.”

  8 And All These In Their Helpless Days …

  The great Egyptian sun was dropping away to the horizon as in the company of some forty blue-cowled Islamic schoolgirls and a bird-catcher, I sailed back to the East. Reflected in the Nile the sky was the colour of blood and saffron against every tone of dusty blue; the rocks, houses and palms dark violet silhouettes, sparkling here and there as lamps were lit, signalling the start of Aswan’s somewhat orderly nightlife. Near the landing stage I ate some mulakhiya, rice and an antique salad at Mahommeds’ Cafeteria, drank some mint tea and went back to the Osiris, half expecting to find that my sister had left word, but the Hindu woman had no messages and handed me my key with a quick smile of encouragement.

  I slept poorly, kept awake by the constant cracking of a chemical “equaliser” in the basement and the creak of the all-but-useless wind-generator on the roof. It was ironic that Aswan, so close to the source of enormous quantities of electricity, was as cruelly rationed as everyone.

  I refused to believe that my sister, who was as sane as I was and twice as intelligent, had become entangled with a black magic flying saucer cult. Her only purpose for associating with such people would be curiosity, perhaps in pursuit of some anthropological research connected with her work. I was, however, puzzled by her secrecy. Clearly, she was deliberately hiding her whereabouts. I hoped that, when I returned the next day, I would know where she was.

  My meetings were predictably amiable and inconsequential. I had arrived a little late, having failed to anticipate the levels of security at the dam. There were police, militia and security people everywhere, both on the dam itself and in all the offices and operations areas. I had to show my pass to eleven different people. The dam was under increased threat from at least three different organisations, the chief being Green Jihad. Our main meetings were held in a large, glass-walled room overlooking the lake. I was glad to meet so many staff, though we all knew that any decisions about the dam would not be made by us but by whomever triumphed in the Geneva negotiations. It was also good to discover that earlier attitudes towards the dam were changing slightly and new thinking was being done. Breakfasted and lunched, I next found myself guest of honour at a full-scale Egyptian dinner which must have taken everyone’s rations for a month, involved several entertainments and lastly a good deal of noisy toasting, in cokes and grape juice, our various unadmired leaders.

  At the Hotel Osiris, when I got back that night, there was no note for me so I decided next day to visit the old vacation villas before lunching as arranged at the Cataract with Georges Abidos, who had told me that he was retiring as Public Relations officer for the dam. I had a hunch that my sister was probably living with the neo-hippies. The following morning I ordered a calash to pick me up and sat on the board beside the skinny, cheerful driver as his equally thin horse picked her way slowly through busy Saturday streets until we were on the long, cracked concrete road with the railway yards on one side and the river on the other, flanked by dusty palms, which led past the five-storey Moorish-style vacation complex, a tumble of typical tourist architecture of the kind once found all around the Mediterranean, Adriatic and parts of the Black and Red Seas. The white stucco was patchy and the turquoise trim on window-frames and doors was peeling, but the new inhabitants, who had occupied it when the Swedish owners finally abandoned it, had put their stamp on it. Originally the place had been designed for Club Med, but had never sustained the required turnover, even with its special energy dispensations, and had been sold several times over the past ten years. Now garishly-dressed young squatters from the wealthy African countries, from the Australias, North and South America, as well as Europe and the Far East, had covered th
e old complex with their sometimes impressive murals and decorative, computer-sprayed graffiti. I read a variety of slogans. LET THE BLOOD CONSUME THE FIRE, said one. THE TYGERS OF THE MIND RULE THE JUNGLE OF THE HEART, said another. I had no relish for such undisciplined nonsense and did not look forward to meeting the occupants of this bizarre New New Age fortress. Psychedelia, even in its historical context, had never attracted me.

  As I dismounted from the calash I was greeted by a young woman energetically cleaning the old Club Med brass plate at the gate. She had those startling green eyes in a dark olive skin which one frequently comes across everywhere in Egypt and are commonly believed to be another inheritance from the Pharoanic past. Her reddish hair was braided with multi-coloured ribbons and she wore a long green silk smock which complemented her eyes.

  “Hi!” Her manner was promiscuously friendly. “I’m Lips. Which is short for Eclipse, to answer your question. Don’t get the wrong idea. You’re here to find a relative, right?” Her accent was Canadian with a trace of something else, possibly Ukrainian. “What’s your name?”

  “Paul,” I said, “My sister’s called Bea. Are the only people who visit you trying to find relatives?”

  “I just made an assumption from the way you look. I’m pretty good at sussing people out.” Then she made a noise of approving excitement. “Bea Palestine, is it? She’s famous here. She’s a healer and an oracle. She’s special.”

  “Could you take me to her apartment?” I did my best not to show impatience with the girl’s nonsense.

  “Lips” answered me with a baffled smile. “No. I mean, sure I could take you to one of her rooms. But she’s not here now.”

  “Do you know where she went?”

  The girl was vaguely apologetic. “Mercury? Wherever the ship goes.”

  My irritation grew more intense. But I controlled myself. “You’ve no idea when the ship gets back?”

  “Now? Yesterday? There’s so much time-bending involved. No. You just have to hope.”