Greenhouse

by Thomas A Easton

  ENDANGERED SPECIES REPLACEMENT PROGRAM

  CENTER #251

  POSITIONS OPEN:

  Siberian Tiger

  Cheetah

  White Rhinoceros

  Golden Tamarind

  Adelie Penguin

  Minke Whale

  Manatee

  As they paused to read it, a short, grey-haired woman appeared in the open doorway a few feet away. “Interested?” she said. “The Minke’s a pretty good deal. No hands, but it has a nice big brain. And the ocean’s always cool.”

  Freddy twitched. “Can you…?”

  She shook her head, apparently unsurprised that a garbage disposal could speak. “Sorry. People only. The humane society insists.”

  Behind them, there was a rush of feet. The ESRP woman’s eyebrows rose and her mouth opened. Hands seized Muffy, and she watched Tom spin even as someone hurled him to the ground. She jerked her head to either side and saw that she was held by two men. There were five more of their attackers, all men, all burly, all wearing grimly determined expressions and light tan coveralls. None of them were familiar from the night before. Two were now bending over Tom. Two more had Julia by the arms. Jim, like Tom, was on the ground. The only sounds had been the thugs’ grunts of effort. No one had spoken or cried out in alarm.

  The attackers were ignoring Freddy, who had flown out of the handcart and now lay half under a low shrub. Randy was scuttling up a tree trunk, her missing leg no handicap at all.

  Rough hands wrenched Tom into a sitting position and bound his arms behind him. Muffy felt her arms being yanked into the same position and rough cord grinding into her skin. The two thugs who held Julia seemed to be waiting their turn with the rope. When Jim tried to get up, the seventh thug, standing to one side of the path where he could see both them and the ESRP woman, aimed a pistol at him. He did not need to say a word to make the trucker lie down again. Nor did he need to speak to make the ESRP woman halt her movement back into her building. It was enough to point the gun in her direction.

  The thugs’ coveralls, Muffy noticed, were none too clean, and the thugs themselves smelled as if they could have benefited from a closer acquaintance with soap and water. But they knew their business. They moved without confusion or wasted motion, and they spoke not a word, neither to each other nor to their victims.

  The silence was eerie. These men were trying to take Muffy captive once more, for whatever reason. With her, this time, they would take both Tom and Julia. Why hadn’t she yelled? Or Tom? Jim? Julia? Were they all so shy of attention that they would rather be kidnapped?

  She glanced upward. Only inches from her face hovered a slender honeysuckle branch with two blossoms. She swallowed, said a silent No!, and looked away as quickly as she could. And there, there was something she could focus on. Randy had moved out onto a branch above them and was fastening to the bark a strand of her silk. In a moment…

  The spider leaped, landing on the neck of the thug with the gun. He screamed as she bit, his gun jerked up, pointing at the sky, and went off. He fell to the ground. The ESRP woman backed up and closed the door. The other thugs turned to see what was happening. Jim scrambled to his feet and begun to run toward the parking lot, yelling, “Tige!”

  Two of the thugs began to chase him. Randy leaped toward the others, they backed up, and she climbed back onto Muffy’s shoulder, where she faced the would-be kidnappers with her forelegs raised threateningly in the air and her fangs gaping. Each of those venom-filled hypodermics was over an inch long.

  Tom got to his feet. Julia, the only one other than Jim whose hands were still free, picked up Freddy.

  There was a distant roar and a crash as Jim’s Mack came through the fence nearest the parking lot. In a moment, Tige was in view, with Jim sitting atop his head, holding to the tips of the ears.

  Those of their attackers who still could turned and fled.

  * * *

  CHAPTER 8

  The city, like all cities, was a mosaic of neighborhoods. Some were new, extensions of the basic urban structure into its peripheral suburbs and even open land, places for the prosperous to build or grow expensive homes, places for industry to stretch free of the constraints of ancient infrastructure. Some neighborhoods were old and unfashionable, falling into decay like that warehouse district where Jim Brane had lost his Tige. Some were old but had somehow retained their exclusive, moneyed respectability and added to it a patina of time. Here were well-kept, classic residences, built of red brick and stone, roofed with slate or tile, solid, anchored in the soil of history both by the achievements that had earned their builders their wealth and by their architects’ respect for ancient building styles. None of the residences were bioforms, for that technology was not yet mature enough to carry the necessary weight of tradition. The city’s aristocrats looked down on those who dwelled in bioforms with something of the disdain prior generations had reserved for those who lived in mobile homes.

  Some of the city’s mansions held the descendants of those who had had them built. Others held later purchasers and renters. Most held private households. A few held businesses—a brothel, a casino, a dealer in biological contraband—that required the sort of room and the invisibility that only an address in such a neighborhood could provide. There were as well a few private foundations and foreign consulates.

  No one could tell who or what occupied any specific house, for there were no signs, not even the most discreet of brass plaques, and the houses’ exteriors and grounds offered no clues. With few exceptions, they all looked much the same, surrounded by broad lawns and thick trees, their walls draped with ivy, the brickwork showing through like the scalp beneath an old woman’s hair. Very few homeowners allowed honeysuckle to replace the ivy, although many did, for the sake of an occasional sip (or more) of wine, let the vines have a planter by the pool.

  The most obvious exception to the general pattern was a three-story house whose brick had been painted blue. The four white columns that dominated its facade had been given spiral bands of red so that now they resembled peppermint sticks. But as startling as the paint-job seemed among the more staid treatments of the neighboring houses, very little of it struck the eye. The house was swathed not in ivy, but in a thick layer of brilliant green, a vigorous growth of curling vine that spilled onto the lawn and buried it in verdure, that climbed and cloaked the trees, that threatened the neighbors so greatly that they had set the miniature sheep that normally served them as lawn mowers on permanent boundary patrol. Their lawns were shaggy, but the strange vines did not invade.

  “It’s not honeysuckle,” said Julia Templeton. “But what is it?”

  “That’s the address,” said Freddy. Tom Cross was holding him so he could see over Jim’s shoulder. Jim Brane was driving Tige, with Julia in the seat beside him. The rest were crowded into the space behind the seats.

  “Are you sure?” asked Muffy Bowen.

  “It has to be. I told you he was strange.”

  They had been stuck at the zoo until the police had come and gone, satisfied that Jim had, as he claimed, run to the parking lot and driven Tige through the fence to rescue his friends. The cops had taken with them the body of the thug Randy had bitten. Then they had had to wait until the zoo’s own officials had decided that the blame for the damage lay with the terrorists who had waylaid them. Once they were free, they had gone directly to the Farm. On the way and over dinner and afterwards, in the small apartment that Jim and Julia shared, they had discussed events.

  The discussion had told them nothing, of course, but it had solidified their sense of mystery and made them wish out loud that they could find out why they were being attacked and kidnapped and robbed, and who was behind it. Was Tom’s mother, Petra, right despite her honey-drunken befuddlement? Or was it merely fantasy that Tom’s father, Jack, wanted to turn Muffy into a plant? If so, then what had those giant flower-pots been doing in the trailer in which they had found Muffy? Was the villain someone else? Then what was the motive?
The goal?

  “Maybe,” Freddy had said. “I know a fellow. He comes to the museum occasionally, and we’re pretty friendly.”

  “So what?” said Jim impatiently.

  “Hold your water.” The pig’s voice dropped a note in scorn. “So he’s a computer expert, he makes his living as a free-lance researcher, and he might be able to help.”

  “What’s his name?” asked Julia.

  “Joe-Dee Alvidrez.”

  No one had recognized it, but none of them was surprised at that. The city was full of people of whom they had never heard, and never would. But the address—that they recognized, and it made Tom whistle. “He must be a pretty hot researcher. Maybe he can help us.”

  Now Jim talked Tige into the long drive that curved past the front of the house and said, “But how strange is he?”

  “Wait and see,” said Freddy.

  But when the door opened behind the peppermint pillars, they did not see a man. The figure peering out at the Mack truck that had stopped before the house was that of a young woman, blonde and slight and wrapped in a robe, patterned in geometric designs on a white ground and clasped at breast and waist by gaudy brooches that shone brilliantly in the sun. Tom leaned over Julia’s shoulder, pointing toward the cab’s window in surprise. “Isn’t that…?”

  “It’s Kimmer!” cried Muffy. Where before the other had been as disheveled and muzzy as Muffy, now her hair gleamed and her eyes shone alertly. “I never thought I’d see her again!” Randy, riding as usual on her shoulder, shifted her weight and meeped in reflection of Muffy’s excitement. “But she said she had an apartment.”

  Julia Templeton opened the door to Tige’s cab and the two women jumped to the ground. Now it was Kimmer’s turn for a double-take and a rush of words: “How did you find me here? But oh! You don’t want me. I’ll bet you’re looking for Daddy.”

  As the men descended from the Mack, she and Muffy Bowen embraced. Freddy interrupted from his perch in Tom’s arms: “Right. We’re old friends. And if I’d known he had someone like you around the house, I’d have visited before.”

  “You’ll fit right in,” she answered him. “He’s a pig too.”

  Muffy laughed, Julia said, “Do we want the cart?” and Tom said, “Leave it.” Then he gestured at the greenery covering the house and grounds. “What’s…?”

  “Kudzu.” Kimmer’s grin said she thought her father was a nut as well as a pig. “He prefers more traditional vines, but he doesn’t want to be as old-fashioned as…” To finish the sentence, she simply pointed at the ivy on the house next door.

  “Who’s there?” The voice that echoed from within the house was a deep bass.

  “Go on in,” said Kimmer. They let her lead the way through a living room whose identity showed only in odd scraps of carpet, the arm of a chair or couch, a corner of a once-shiny table, that peeped out from under mounds of cardboard boxes, piles of technical manuals, hanks of wire, and dusty pieces of electronic equipment identifiable by their keyboards and screens. Kimmer waved a hand at the disorder: “Most of this is so obsolete it belongs in an antique store. He never throws anything out. Says he might need a box, or parts, or a spare. And he never does.”

  The next room was high-ceilinged, long, and broad enough to have served as a banquet hall for the mansion’s previous owners. Perhaps it had. But now the parquet floor was scarred, the French windows void of draperies but fringed by encroaching kudzu, the paneled walls smudged and stained. The hall was presently the throne room for the master of an electronic kingdom. The throne was a padded seat that rode a metal rail down the center of the room. On the seat sat the king; he must have weighed 200 kilograms, and the long, greasy hair that rimmed his broad bald spot, the unshaven cheeks, the stains and tears that marked his old-fashioned pants and shirt, said immediately that he cared less for his appearance than for the gadgets that surrounded him. To either side of the room’s central throne-rail were two long rows of workbenches covered with computers, their screens glowing with rapidly changing text and diagrams. The room held at least two dozen of the machines, along with photonic printers and plotters, external memory banks, and communications gear.

  At the moment, the king was staring expectantly toward the entrance to his throne room. When his daughter appeared there, he repeated, “Who is it?” But then Freddy was in view, carried in Tom’s arms, saying, “Hey, Joe-Dee! Your daughter’s got nice…”

  Joe-Dee Alvidrez laughed so loudly that Tom thought something might fall from the metal shelves that covered the room’s walls and groaned beneath burdens of more manuals, electronic parts, unused computer apparatus, and unlabeled boxes, all seeming much newer than the technological debris in the living room. From the ceiling hung robotic arms on tracks like those for theater lights. The aisles between the tiered shelving and the workbenches were choked with cables and debris. Empty food containers, wadded paper, and an abandoned shirt caught Tom’s eye, and he thought that the mechanical gofers really were the only way to reach the shelves.

  “She does, doesn’t she!” Kimmer Alvidrez blushed, but her father ignored her. “What do you want, Freddy? I thought you never left the museum. Want some coffee? A snack?” He wore a mouse, a glove inlaid with electronic circuitry. Now he pointed at a computer screen, clicked a button set on the side of his index finger, and wiggled his fingers. One of the robotic arms whizzed along its track to grab a coffee pot that had been positioned out of all human reach. Meanwhile, a second arm was arranging mugs, sugar, and cream upon a tray. The first arm poured and then, while the second lowered the tray to within reach of the visitors, sought a paper bag on another shelf. It dropped the bag on a workbench near Freddy, opened it, drew out a jelly-filled doughnut, and dropped it into Freddy’s mouth.

  While all this was happening, Alvidrez was sliding toward them on his rail. He arrived only slightly behind the refreshments and when he saw how Tom and the rest were staring, he laughed again. “Go ahead,” he said at last. “Grab a mug. And there’s enough doughnuts for everybody.”

  He showed them what he meant, and for a moment there was no noise in the room except for the hums and ticks of active electronic devices. Finally, he wiped his fingers and said, “Hey, Freddy. I’ve been to hear you sing, right? Now you’re here, and I’m going to show you something. C’mere.” He touched the controls on the arm of his seat and slid away from them, coming to a halt by a computer screen covered with rapidly scrolling text.

  Tom Cross followed him, Freddy still in his arms; the others tailed behind. Alvidrez touched the keyboard, pointed his mouse-covered hand, and wiggled his fingers. The screen before him steadied, blanked, and refilled with an arrow column of words. “I’ll bet you didn’t know I was a poet, did you, Freddy?”

  “I still don’t,” said the pig. “You’re an electron freak.”

  “The things those electrons can do!” Alvidrez laughed again. “Look—I gave the program a word list, all about elephants. Then I added a few words about Australia. It gave me a bunch of random sentences mixing up elephants and dingoes. And then I cleaned’em up. Threw out the nonsense, edited, revised, and—” He held a hand toward the screen, inviting them to read the words:

  DINGO FANTASY I

  Wallabies always were unpopular

  Substitutes for kangaroos,

  But then the rains came.

  Laughing swagmen rolled in lusher grass

  And farmers prospered in the mire,

  But joeys melted in sudden swamps.

  Dingo said, I wanna beee mahout!

  Said widow Roo, Spread mud!

  Make the howdah shiny.

  Import a Dumbo flapping high.

  Let it alll hang out!

  Pachyderms

  like it hot and wet.

  Too much sand makes them itch.

  They fly to spreading billabongs

  And trunkish spout!

  Maiden Dingo crossed the water,

  Lay royal soul before huge fictions,

  Let
sexist tusks enjoy her kindness,

  Thought her pup would be mahout.

  She made a sparkling bride

  But she forgot that wallabies,

  Psychotic beasts, use ankhs on tulips,

  And soaring elephants pout.

  Freddy grunted. “That’s…That’s number one. There’s a number two?”

  “Right! Let me…” Alvidrez reached for the keyboard.

  “No! I don’t wanna see it. That is…It’s…”

  “It’s published.”

  “You’re kidding,” said Julia Templeton.

  Alvidrez shook his head, while Freddy said, “It’s still tripe. Bull-litter.”

  The man threw his head back and laughed louder than he had when they first entered the room. “I know! But the poets don’t!” Then he spun to face them fully. “So. What brings you here? What do you want?”

  “Wait a minute,” said his daughter. She turned toward the others, her mouth set in a disgusted moue. “You should know. He uses that poet schtick on everybody. He’s not serious about it.”

  “I guessed…” said Jim Brane.

  “Sure I am,” bellowed Alvidrez, laughing again. He pointed a fleshy finger at Tom. “I seriously want to know if your bullshit detector is any good! “He sobered instantly. “I mean it. You’re all wearing these things. Even you, Freddy.” He pulled a rose-pink worrystone out of the front of his own shirt. Reflectively, rubbing his stone with a thumb, he went on. “They’re pretty. And they feel nice. But they’re a mystic crock.”

  “Frankie gave them to us,” said Freddy. “For luck.”

  Alvidrez grinned. “That’s what Kimmer said when she gave me this one. She doesn’t wear one herself.” He paused for a moment before continuing. “But I asked a question. Freddy’s a friend, and needs no excuse to visit. The rest of you—what do you want? Why are you here?”

  “It was my idea,” said Freddy. “They need information, and I told them…”

  “That I was the best man in the city for finding it. I am. But what sort of info do you want?”