Turquoiselle, Tanith Lee [100 best novels of all time .TXT] 📗

corridor and look out towards the shed. See if ithad begun to glow blue-green. That would not occur, he was fairly sure. Butthen. Who could say?

Ashe returned, tramping in along the gravel drive for a last scan of the sea fromthe promenade-terrace, he heard a furiously whirring mechanical sound. Carverstepped back against the wall of the building as a bicycling Charlie camebuffeting past, turgid and erratic, his legs, in their too-tight-but-floppyjeans, labouring like a pair of whipped epic-film slaves hauling rocks. Thegravel sprayed up, the split wave of a shallow pool. Some hit the outer glassof the blinded ground floor windows.

Carverdid not believe that Charlie saw him. Maybe Charlie could see nothing beyondthe weird and possibly ill-advised goal of driving the bicycle on and on atthe topmost speed he could conjure, which was about three miles an hour.Charlie’s face was dense red again, and angrily fixed. He rained sweat.

Hiseyes were filmed and blind as the windows.

Midnight. Carverknew, since the small screen he could access behind a panel in the wall, (thehelpful food-bringing girl had shown him) gave him the hour, along with aselection of concurrent hours in other time-zones. It was 7 p.m. in New York,around 4 p.m. in San Francisco. No clues there to anything much. He would knowwithout looking. As for it’s being 5.20 of the following morning in Cesczeghan,he had never heard of it, though it must lie considerably farther east thanBritain.

Carveropened the door of his room and went into the corridor. The blurred amberlight that automatically came on there after sunset, reminded him of the sortof stormy gloaming paraphrased in some old paintings. It gave sufficientillumination to find the walls and doors, and just too much to let the unblindedwindows keep their views all clear. Carver pressed close to a pane, (a childlooking out at the wide world), shading his eyes in against the glass. Now hecould see a sable landscape beyond. Black blocked on black, taking a mutedglint from the building’s lights.

Onits hill, the shed was glowing like a torch.

Thecolour was vivid, not needing any enhancement. (He must have been aware of it before shading out thecorridor light. And, as before, his imagination had mitigated, dismissed theglow. Now nothing but sightlessness could.)

Turquoise.Alert Level low, between Blue and Green.

Evenso, a Level of Alert.

Therewere just seven objects in there, of five categories, unimportant, mundane,adrift in the middle of a wooden table. On a rise in a group of trees, aquarter mile off.

Burningbright.

Aloud noise, and Carver stepped back from the window. (It was true, like this,the glow faded, was minimised, might even pass as some security lamp, if yourmind was on other matters.)

Intothe corridor, from the direction of the stairs, rolled Ball and boiler-suitedFiddy, and then Van Sedden. Then Charlie, even from the stairs pink, if notscarlet, and in a plain black T-shirt over another pair of equally unequaljeans. Anjeela did not appear. Why would she?

“Car,Car,” cried Ball, with a drunken happy musicality. “Come join our revel!”

Hetheatrically bore an uncorked bottle of red wine, one third full. Van Seddenhad a bottle of greenishwhite, two thirds full. Fiddy carried a bottle ofscotch. This was three thirds full, but open. Charlie had a tall glass of whatlooked like Coke, fizzing. He and Fiddy did not seem pissed, as the other twodid, but even so, ‘merry’, as Sara had been used to say. Car, at bay, stared atthem. But there would be surveillance out here too. “Sure,” said Car, and letFiddy hand him the whisky.

 

Fifteen

“Passthe port.”

“Thereis no port, you arsehole. ‘Swhisky.”

“Whiskyand wine–”

“Richand fine–”

“Fuckingthe fuck shut up and pass the fucking booze, you arrant bloody cunt.”

“Pourit out,” expanded Fiddy, (this piece of conversation was between him and Ball),“and stick it in.”

“Stickit somewhere,” grumbled Van Sedden resentfully.

Hisown white wine was consumed. He had said he did not like whisky. And the red wine – Ball’s –had gone down Ball’s throat to the last drop, Ball balancing the bottle-neck inhis mouth, his head tipped right back, a kind of divertissement, (as Sedden hadremarked), based on a performing seal.

“Shouldagot more,” observed Ball. He could drink, he claimed, “anything”. He and Fiddytherefore were by now two thirds down the whisky bottle. Carver –considerately? – had only taken a couple of mouthfuls from it. (The exchange ofprobable germs did not especially concern Carver. Immunisation was a matter ofcourse at Mantik. And, you assumed, here at this place, too.)

“Fuckingbollock they don’t keep the bar fucking open after twelve,” said Sedden to theterrace pavement.

“True,fucking true, dear swine,” (Ball), “though maybe they rightly think guys likeyou, my prince, need to stop after two bottles of Pinot Grigio and one ofSauvignon Blanc. Eh? D’you suppose?”

Charliegiggled. It transpired his Coke had also contained a double vodka, his fourthdouble. But he had eked it out.

“Shutthe fuck up,” suggested Sedden.

Andfor a while silence dropped.

Thefive men sat on three of the griffin-armed benches, on the terrace above thecliff-end and the stretching, glinting, now moonless ink of the sea. Stars inthe sky were pale as grains of rice, since some dim light still leaked from thebuilding to dilute them. Though none from the shut main doors.

Carverwas bored and restless, both these states under firm control. There had beensessions like this at the teenage college. He had swiftly managed to avoidthem. Two hours, he estimated, had tonight dragged themselves through and awayfrom the drinking party. In a short while, Carver could take himself also awayto his room.

“You don’t say much,”said Ball, waving from the adjacent bench. About a metre separated them.

Carversmiled, noncommittal.

“Why’sthat?” said Fiddy, “why’s he so quiet?”

“What,”said Carver mildly, “do you want me to say?”

“Oh,tell us a bit about yourself,” said Ball.

“Youfirst,” said Carver, amiable.

“Oh,me,” said Ball. “Don’t get me started.”

“No,for fuck’s fucking fuck’s sake don’t get him started,” muttered Sedden.

Fiddysaid, “Go on, Car. We all wanna know about you. You’re the big star, here.”

“Where?”said Carver, gentle. “Wheream I the star?”

“Upthere!” roared Ball abruptly. “Dazzling!” He waved the whisky at the sky overthe sea, and Charlie sprang up with curious agility from the third bench andgrabbed the bottle from him. “You’ll spill it all!”

ThenCharlie, standing