Читать книгу The Monster Trilogy - Brian Aldiss - Страница 15

State Route 18 runs north from St George, through the Iron Mountains, to the Escalante Desert. One day in 1999, it also ran into a past so distant nobody had ever dared visualize it.

Bernard Clift had worked in this part of Utah before, often assisted by students from Dixie College with a leaning towards palaeontology. This summer, Clift’s instincts had led him to dig on the faulty stretch of rock the students called Old John, after the lumber-built jakes near the site, set up by a forgotten nineteenth-century prospector.

Clift was a thin, spare man, deeply tanned, medium height, his sharp features and penetrating grey eyes famous well beyond the limits of his own profession. There was a tenseness about him today, as if he knew that under his hand lay a discovery that was to bring him even greater fame, and to release on the world new perspectives and new terror.

Over the dig, a spread of blue canvas, of a deeper blue than the Utah sky, had been erected, to shade Clift and his fellow-workers from the sun. Clustered below the brow of rock where they worked were a dozen miscellaneous vehicles – Clift’s trailer, a trailer from Enterprise which served food and drink all day, and the automobiles and campers belonging to students and helpers.

A dirt road led from this encampment into the desert. All was solitude and stillness, apart from the activity centred on Old John. There Clift knelt in his dusty jeans, brushing soil and crumbs of rock from the fossilized wooden lid they had uncovered.

Scattered bones of a dinosaur of the aurischian order had been extracted from the rock, labelled, temporarily identified as belonging to a large theropod, and packed into crates. Now, in a stratum below the dinosaur grave, the new find was revealed.

Several people crowded round the freshly excavated hole in which Clift worked with one assistant. Cautious digging had revealed fossil wood, which slowly emerged in the shape of a coffin. On the lid of the coffin, a sign had been carved:

Overhead, a vulture wheeled, settling on a pinnacle of rock near the dig. It waited.

Clift levered at the ancient lid. Suddenly, it split along the middle and broke. The palaeontologist lifted the shard away. A smell, too ancient to be called the scent of death, drifted out into the hot dry air.

A girl student with the Dixie College insignia on her T-shirt yelped and ran from the group as she saw what lay in the coffin.

Using his brush, Clift swept away a layer of red ochre. His assistant collected fragile remains of dead blossom, placing them reverently in a plastic bag. A skeleton in human form was revealed, lying on its side. Tenderly, Clift uncovered the upper plates of the skull. It was twisted round so that it appeared to stare upwards at the world of light with round ochred eyes.

The head offices and laboratories of the thriving Bodenland Corporation were encompassed in bronzed-glass curtain walls, shaped in neo-cubist form and disposed so that they dominated one road approach into Dallas, Texas.

At this hour of the morning the facade reflected the sun into the eyes of anyone approaching the corporation from the airport – as was the case with the imposing lady now disembarking from a government craft in which she had flown from Washington. She was sheathed in a fabric which reflected back something of the lustre from the corporation.

Her name was Elsa Schatzman, three times divorced daughter of Eliah Schatzman. She was First Secretary at the Washington Department of the Environment. She looked as if she wielded power, and did.

Joe Bodenland knew that Elsa Schatzman was in the offing. At present, however, he had little thought for her, being involved in an argument with his life’s companion, Mina Legrand. While they talked, Bodenland’s secretary continued discreetly to work at her desk.

‘First things first, Birdie,’ said Bodenland, with a patience that was calculated to vex Mina.

Mina Legrand was another powerful lady, although the genial lines of her face did not proclaim that fact. She was tall and still graceful, and currently having weight problems, despite an active life. Friends said of her, affectionately, that she put up with a lot of hassle from Joe; still closer friends observed that of late he was putting up with plenty from Mina.

‘Joe, your priorities are all screwed up. You must make time for your family,’ she said.

‘I’ll make time, but first things first,’ he repeated.

‘The first thing is it’s your son’s wedding day,’ Mina said. ‘I warn you, Joe, I’m going to fly down to Gondwana without you. One of these days, I’ll leave you for good, I swear I will.’

Joe played a tune on his desk top with the fingers of his left hand. They were long blunt fingers with wide spade-like nails, ridged and hard. Bodenland himself resembled his fingers. He too was long and blunt, with an element of hardness in him that had enabled him to lead an adventurous life as well as succeeding in the competitive international world of selling scientific research. He set his head towards his right shoulder with a characteristic gesture, as he asked: ‘How long has Larry been engaged to Kylie? Under a year. How long have we been pursuing the idea of inertial disposal? Over five years. Millions of dollars hang on today’s favourable reception of our demonstration by Washington. I just have to be here, Birdie, and that’s that.’

‘Larry will never forgive you. Nor will I.’

‘You will, Mina. So will Larry. Because you two are human. Washington ain’t.’

‘All right, Joe – you have the last word as usual. But you’re in deep trouble as of now.’ With that, Mina turned and marched from the office. The door closed silently behind her; its suction arm prevented it from slamming.

‘I’ll be down there just as soon as I can,’ Bodenland called, having a last-minute twinge of anxiety.

He turned to his secretary, Rose Gladwin, who had sat silently at her desk, eyes down, while this heated conversation was going on.

‘Birth, death, the great spirit of scientific enquiry – which of those is most important to a human being, Rose?’

She looked up with a slight smile.

‘The great spirit of scientific enquiry, Joe,’ she said.

‘You always have the right answer.’

‘I’m just informed that Miss Schatzman is en route from the airport right now.’

‘Let me know as soon as she arrives. I’ll be with Waldgrave.’

He glanced at his watch as he went out, and walked briskly down the corridor, cursing Washington and himself. It annoyed him to think that Larry was getting married at all. Marriage was so old-fashioned, yet now, on the turn of the century, it was coming back into fashion.

Bodenland and his senior research scientist, Waldgrave, were in reception to welcome Miss Schatzman when she arrived with her entourage. She was paraded through the technical floor, where everyone had been instructed to continue working as usual, to the laboratory with the notice in gilt on its glass door, INERTIAL RESEARCH.

Bodenland’s judicious answers in response to her questions indicated that Schatzman had been properly briefed. He liked that, and her slightly plump forties-ish figure in a tailored suit which signalled to him that human nature survived under the official exterior.

Various important figures were gathered in the lab for the demonstration, including a backer from the Bull-Brunswick Bank. Bodenland introduced Schatzman to some of them while technicians made everything finally ready. As she was shaking hands with the Bank, one of Bodenland’s aides came up and spoke softly in Bodenland’s ear.

‘There’s an urgent call for you from Utah, Joe. Bernard Clift, the archaeologist. Says he has an important discovery.’

‘Okay, Mike. Tell Bernard I’ll call him back when possible.’

In the centre of the lab stood a glass cabinet much resembling a shower enclosure. Cables ran into it from computers and other machines, where two assistants stood by a switchboard. The hum of power filled the air, lending extra tension to the meeting.

‘You have all the technical specifications of the inertial disposal principle in our press and video pack, Miss Schatzman,’ Bodenland said. ‘If you have no questions there, we’ll move straight into the demonstration.’

As he spoke, he gave a sign and an assistant in a lab coat dragged forward a black plastic bag large enough to contain a man.

Waldgrave explained, ‘The bag is full of sand, nothing more. It represents a consignment of nuclear or toxic waste.’

The bag was shut in the cabinet, remaining in full view through the glass as computers briefly chattered their calculations.

‘Energy-consumption rates are high at present. This is just a prototype, you appreciate. We hope to lower tolerances in the next part of the programme, when we have the okay from your department,’ Bodenland said. ‘Obviously energy-input is related to mass of substance being disposed of.’

‘And I see you’re using solar energy in part,’ Schatzman said.

‘The corporation has its own satellite, which beams down the energy to our dishes here in Dallas.’

Waldgrave got the nod from his boss. He signalled to the controls technician, who pressed the Transmit pad.

The interior of the cabinet began to glow with a blue-mauve light.

Two large analogue-type clocks with sweep-hands were visible, one inside the cabinet, one on a jury-rig outside, facing the first one. The sweep hand of the clock in the cabinet stopped at 10.16. At the same time, the clock itself began to disappear. So did the black plastic bag. In a moment it was gone. The cabinet appeared to be empty.

A brief burst of applause filled the room. Bodenland appeared noticeably less grim.

The party went to have drinks in a nearby boardroom, all tan leather upholstery and dracaena plants in bronze pots. There was a jubilation in the air which even the formality of the occasion did not kill.

As she sipped a glass of Perrier, Schatzman said, ‘Well, Mr Bodenland, you appear to have invented the long-awaited time machine, no less.’

He looked down into his vodka. So the woman was a fool after all. He had hoped for better. This woman was going to have to present his case before her committee in Washington; if she could reach such a basic misunderstanding after studying all the documentation already sent to her over the computer line, the chances for government approval of his invention were poor.

‘Not a time machine, Ms Schatzman. As we’ve made clear, our new process merely halts time-decay – much as refrigeration, let’s say, slows or halts bacterial action. We found a sink in real time. The bag in the cabinet disappeared because it became suddenly stationary with regard to universal time-decay. It remained – it remains at 10.16 this morning. We are the ones who are travelling forward in time, at the rate of twenty-four hours a day. The bag remains forever where we put it, at 10.16. We can reach back and retrieve it if necessary, though the expenditure of energy increases geometrically as we progress further from entry point.

‘The inertial disposal process is far from being a time-machine. It is almost the reverse.’

Ms Schatzman did not greatly enjoy being talked down to. Perhaps her remark had been intended humorously. ‘The department will need to enquire into what happens to substances isolated in 10.16, or any other time. It would be irresponsible simply to isolate considerable amounts of toxic waste in time with no clear picture of possible consequences.’

‘How long do you estimate such an enquiry might take?’

‘We’re talking about something unprecedented, a disturbance in the natural order.’

‘Er – not if you have an understanding of the science of Chaos.’

She understood she had been snubbed. ‘An enquiry will of course occupy some weeks.’

Bodenland took a generous swig of his vodka and inclined his head in her direction.

‘The disposal of toxic waste represents one of the world’s most pressing problems, Ms Schatzman. No one wants the stuff. Only a decade ago the cost of disposal of nuclear waste as prescribed by US law was $2,500 per tonne. It’s twenty times higher now, and rising. Only last week the death of a whole village through the dumping of an illegally manufactured pesticide, Lindane, was reported in Bulgaria.

‘That’s where we come in. Bodenland Industries have developed a foolproof way of ridding the world of such evils. All we need is your department’s clearance. You must persuade your committee not to stand in the way of progress.’

She pronounced the last word at the same moment as he did. ‘Progress,’ echoing it ironically. ‘“Progress” cannot be achieved at the expense of safety. You’re familiar with that concept. It’s what we call the Frankenstein Syndrome.’ She attempted lightness of tone. ‘You know the Department will do what it can, Mr Bodenland. You also know how thoroughly this new advance will have to be investigated. We have our responsibilities – there are security aspects, too. May I suggest that meanwhile you turn your inventive mind to other matters?’

‘Sure,’ he said, setting his glass down and rising. ‘I’m going to turn my inventive mind to being a late guest at my son’s wedding.’

A jazz band was playing an arrangement of ‘Who’s Sorry Now?’ when Joe Bodenland entered the main reception rooms of the Gondwana Ranch, the home in which he and Mina had lived for a decade. At present it was full of flowers and guests.

Some of the wedding guests were dancing, some drinking, and some no doubt otherwise engaged. The caterers hired for the occasion were bearing savoury and sweet dishes to and fro, while the popping of champagne corks could be heard above the noise of the band.

Bodenland exchanged compliments and good wishes with a number of family friends as he made his way to where Larry Bodenland stood with his bride, receiving congratulations.

Kylie greeting Joe warmly enough, flinging her arms round his neck and kissing him on the mouth. Kylie was a beautiful girl with a round face on which good features were set wide apart, giving her a singularly open appearance. Joe had already discovered that Kylie was no mere innocent. She had – beside the considerable fortune accruing from her father’s transport business – a sharp and enquiring mind. But for the moment it was enough to feel her slender body against his as he revelled in her sunny good looks and wished her all future happiness.

‘Just see that Larry behaves himself,’ he said, giving her an extra hug.

Larry overheard the remark. As he shook his father’s hand, he said, ‘How about behaving yourself, Joe? How come you were late for my wedding? Was that deliberate? We know how irrational you are on the subject of matrimony.’

‘Now don’t you two start in,’ Kylie said. ‘Not today of all days.’ She raised a hand half-way to her throat, as if to indicate the crucifix hanging there. ‘You know my funny religious principles, Joe, and you must honour Larry for respecting them.’

‘Well, bless you both, and I hate myself for missing the ceremony. Don’t blame me – blame the Department of the Environment in Washington, who nailed me to this morning’s appointment.’

‘Family certainly can’t compete with a whole Department of the Environment,’ Larry said, huffily.

‘Joe has to follow his daemon,’ Kylie said, winking at her new father-in-law.

‘What demon’s that?’ asked Larry.

‘Now, Larry – your pop is a technophile of the old school. He’s crazy about machines and you must allow him that.’

‘Just as you’re crazy about religion, if I can put it that way.’

‘Religion still has a place, even in an age of science, and —’

‘Spare us!’ cried Larry. ‘I need another drink. It’s my wedding day.’ As he turned away, his mother came up, smiling in a brittle way at Joe.

‘You missed the ceremony and hit the champagne,’ she said angrily. ‘Larry and Kylie will never forgive you for this.’

‘I’m sorry, Mina.’ He took her hand, looking compassionately into her green eyes. For all his kind of hasty blindness, one of his characteristics, he knew very well what was in her mind at that moment. They had had another son, Larry’s older brother Dick, killed in an automobile crash together with his young wife Molly. Dick had always been his father’s favourite, a brilliant youngster, athletic, and with a deep interest in science, particularly particle physics. Molly too had been clever and high-spirited, a redhead whose body, at the age of twenty-two, had been inextricably merged with her husband’s in the fatal crash. It was Molly, not Dick, who returned to Joe in dreams. Dick had gone beyond recall, leaving no space for his younger brother in his father’s affections.

With the long habit of a couple who have spent years together, Mina understood something of what passed through Joe’s mind. Her mood softened.

She said, ‘Odd how Kylie has the religious impulse, just like Molly.’ It was the first time Molly’s name had passed between them in years. ‘I hope that doesn’t mean …’

‘Molly wasn’t religious. She just had an intense interest in the supernatural.’

‘You’ve forgotten, Joe. Maybe just as well.’ She took his arm. ‘Let’s take a turn outside. It’s not too hot. I’m sorry I flew off the handle earlier. But Larry and Kylie are our only kids now. Let the dead bury the dead.’

As they reached the terrace, he half-turned to her, smiling.

‘That’s kind of a dumb expression, when you think, isn’t it? “Let the dead bury the dead …” What a macabre scene that conjures up! They’d have a problem with the shovels, eh?’

She laughed. The terrace, which overlooked the swimming pool, was roofed over with reinforced glass, the supporting pillars of which were entwined with different colours of bougainvillea. He took Mina’s hand and they began to stroll, happy to get away from the noise indoors.

A phone on the wall rang as Joe and Mina were passing it. She answered by reflex, then passed the receiver to her husband with a wry look. ‘You’re wanted, Joe. The world needs you.’

He stood in the partial shade, gazing at her face, listening to his old friend Bernard Clift speaking slowly to conceal his excitement.

‘Bernie, that can’t be,’ Bodenland said. ‘It’s impossible. You must have got it wrong. You know you’ve got it wrong. Your reputation —’

He listened again, shaking his head, then nodding. Mina watched him with amusement, as his eyes lit up.

‘I’ll be right over,’ he said, finally, ‘and I may bring some of the family along.’

As he hung up, Mina said, ‘Some fresh madness brewing! Whatever it is, Joe, count me out. I want to take part in an air display over Austin tomorrow.’

‘You can freefall any time, Mina. This is terrific. Would you have wanted to have been fishing in Bermuda while the Revolution was going on on the mainland?’

‘It was Bernie Clift?’

‘Clift doesn’t fool around. He’s made a find in Utah.’

He explained that Clift had rung to tell him about the discovery of a human-like skeleton. Clift had subjected fragments of bone to carbon-dating analysis. The remains dated out as 65.5 million years BP, before the present. This checked out with their discovery in late Cretaceous rock. They came from a time over sixty million years before mankind in its most primitive form walked the earth.

‘That doesn’t make any kind of sense,’ Mina said.

‘It’s a revolution in thought. Don’t ask me what it means but this we really have to see. It’s – well, incredible.’ He whistled. ‘Just to prove that Larry and Kylie do mean something to me, we’re going to take them along too.’

He was already moving back into the house. She caught his sleeve impatiently.

‘Joe, easy now. You’re so impetuous. Larry’s off in a couple of hours to honeymoon in Hawaii. They’re not going to want to stop off in Utah, to help us.’

He was looking at his watch.

‘They’ll love it, and so will you. That’s wonderful desert country where Bernie is. Utah’s Dixie, they used to call it. If we move, we can be there by nightfall. And remember, tell no one why we are going. Bernie’s discovery stays under wraps for now. Otherwise the world’s media will be on his back. Okay?’

She laughed, not without a hint of bitterness. ‘Oh, Joe – are you allowing me time to pack?’

He kissed her. ‘Grab your toothbrush. Tell Kylie to shake the confetti out of her hair.’