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

from his father’s side. The father was half and half, with afully English mother. Apparently there was something wrong with the boy –defective genes, learning difficulties. Physically he was, well, odd. But sheloved him, the woman, and the father came to love him. He was a very loveableinfant for them, it seems. Phenomenally so. And his mother called him thisunreasonable name – I was told it was something extremely religious, something like– was it Paradise? No,it wasn’t. But thatextravagant and unsuitable. A curse of aname for a kid. For anybody. And then there was bad trouble out there, wherethe father was posted – he worked for the British government – and both parentswere killed. But the boy survived. And it became obvious he had somethingspecial, exclusively astonishing. So Mantik took him on. He grew up in Britain,somewhere. He’s far younger, by the way, than Avondale. Of the three of us,apparently, I’m the oldest, if not by much. He’s about your age. Car. Thirty-one-two-three– whatever. I can’t recall his name.”

“Paradise.”

“I’m sorry. It wasn’t that. Kingdom of God–? Wasit that? No. You see, I can grow my hair at will or turn it blonde–”

“Or be a corpse.”

“–Or be a corpse, yes. But I can’t remember the name of thefirst member of our trio. Perhaps you should ask Latham.”

“Ask Latham.” Carver smiled. His facial muscles simply did this.He did not know why, or why he spoke to her at all, this reasonable and couthyoung woman.

“There’s no restriction on him telling you, Car. Not now. Or I’llask, if you like.”

Like...

The pool of henna reached down and down. You could effortlessly drownin it. That was why they drank it, after all. To drown. It in you, you in it.Either/or.

A movement. Her chair shifting back.

“Let’s go outside, shall we?” she asked.

Why? Why not? Go outside.

Carver rose. He picked up the beaker and poured the last of thewine out on the cleansed floor. Only a trickle now, about deep enough to drowna fly.

Theroom opened on another lift. They descended two floors. The lift door drew wideon a sunny courtyard, shut in by the building on one side, and by walls nineor ten feet high on the other three sides. Tree tops visible, sky. Hint of sea-scentand faint putrid linger of smoke, with – here – the mildest tinge of humandeath in it.

The yard was paved, plain concrete squares. Tubs around, theplants undamaged, some with flowers. Two sets of garden tables, four chairsapiece. No one there.

Another door, metal, with a button to push, confronted them in thethird wall. Presumably it led out to the grounds.

But Silvia had sat down on one of the two tables. She shook backher malleable hair and raised her face to the sky, eyes part-closed.

No noises anywhere. But neither did the birds call. Still no gullsflying over.

On either side, blank windowless angles of the building restrictedfurther view.

In a corner, beside one of the tubs, a smashed bottle (overlooked?)sparkled happily.

The woman spoke.

“Try to relax, Car. We’ll be leaving fairly soon. Around two inthe afternoon at the latest.”

Avondale: You’ll see the lights of London long before the the dark moves in.

London. What was London?

Carver pulled out a chair from the second table and sat on it. He would not, he supposed, be able to get rid of the girl. Shewas his (un)official minder. And she was strong enough probably to manage him,was she? He would not want to try, would not want to harm her. Even if, in theshed –

Too late, Croft. I should have said Yes. Yours was the only wayout.

Beyond the wall with the door there was a sound. Nothing to it, infact. An ordinarysound. A couple of voices were talking without urgency or raised volume. Andthen, instead, a girl’s crying, but not that loud either. And then a malevoice, but so very low, no meaning could be made of it except a sort of – kindness.The crying faltered and stopped. “Thanks, mate,” said another male voice,audibly.

Following which the silence returned. They, whoever they had been,had gone away.

And yet –

Something had not gone away.

Something stayed there outside the shut metal door. Something.

Not meaning to, not knowing what it meant, Carver had got upagain. Silvia also had swung herself about on the table, her back to Carver,staring it seemed towards the shut door. Which sighed. And slid open.

Twenty-Five

Mainly sunshine filled the space, a starburst of white-gold. But against and out of the sun –

A silhouette evolved. Forming up and filling in, untilsubstantial. Though advancing, it was at once reminiscent of a man seatedagainst a blank lit window. An old trick. Filmic. Effective. A big shape, a bigman, tall and excessively broad-bodied, thickly built of flesh. Croft? Itwas Peter Croft, animate and alive, and without the rear of his skull blownoff.

He came rambling forward unhurriedly out of the light. Not onlybig, then, thisCroft had ballooned into fat. And the suit was a tent, yet tailored and notgraceless. The fashion in which he moved, too, had an almost absurd – elegance.The body did not seem either to mind or to be hampered by its potentialobesity. Its lack of coordination was coordinated. Another species,and automated in its own unique way. Valid in its own unique right.

Shaggy hair, not grey, well-cut yet tufted, framed the profoundcountenance of a huge toad. The enormous eyes, river-brown rather than dark,were definitely not Croft’s, but bulbous. They glowed, having consumed some rayof the sun.

“Loandy,” the toad-being said. “You’ve all grawn up.” And stopped,positioned on the paving. Where instantly it was a fixture, cast from iron andset there to last forever.

As Carver’s vision adjusted, he saw over one of the bulbousshoulders. Two paramedics were leading a woman away along a line of trees. Sheappeared tranquil, going along brightly, without regret. She was not cryinganymore.

Silvia spoke.

“I remember,” she murmured, “the name.”

“Yes,” said Carver. He too had realised what it must be, the namethat implied Paradise, and had been altered by morons to fit apparent earthlycircumstance. “Heaven. That’s his name.”

Onthe wide-screen of Carver’s mind the truth unrolled, some extravaganza offiction that was fact. Suddenly he