In the Blood Read online

  Then, as the last of the Nevada desert sunset flashed away from us, the tunnel flicked by and the first of the ‘burbs came into view, he pressed the panelling and collected two cups of tea, added soycream, sugar, passed me an orange cream biscuit, then took the data sheets from my lap and began to examine them.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Working out where we’re going next.’

  I blinked at him. For the first time Neil seemed neither calm nor unflappable. He gazed at me fiercely. ‘You don’t think I’m going to leave it there?’ he demanded. ‘For Christ’s sake, you saw her too.’

  Yes, I had seen her too. And no, I had no intention of leaving it there. Or I’m sure I wouldn’t have, once I’d had time to think it through.

  There was a Terminal on the floater wall. Neil pulsed it on, without, it appeared, even considering switching it to manual to save my sensibilities. I found, on reflection, I preferred this.

  A map lit up the screen. Neil pointed to it. ‘Okay, the City’s here. And this is Nearer To Heaven. Up the coast, not inland. I’ll reset the floater’s coordinates then, unless you’d rather go home first.’

  ‘Go home?’

  ‘Change your clothes, stuff like that.’

  ‘But…’

  ‘It’s only, what?’ He checked the monitor again. ‘An hour and a half up to Nearer To Heaven. We can at least get started on this and be back tonight. All right?’

  ‘Yes. All right.’

  He shut his eyes while he Linked in to the coordinates, then opened them again. ‘I left a message at home too. They should probably know where we’re heading, just in case. You’d better have something to eat,’ he added kindly. ‘It’ll be well past lunchtime when we get there, and they mightn’t be particularly hospitable.’

  It was as though the pet puppy had suddenly decided to take charge of household management.

  ‘All right,’ I said again. I was trying to decipher the expression in his eyes. Knight errant? Righteousness? A sincere desire to make sure the horror didn’t happen again?

  But also, perhaps, just a touch of innocent excitement. Walkies, boy, I thought.

  Chapter 20

  All in all, Michael hadn’t given us very much. There were six pages on Doris Prothero, but little of it was useful, unless for some reason we needed data on her genetic susceptibility to tuberculosis 4, NewCholera, any of the forms of HIV or pneumonic Ebola.

  There was also information on her probable appearance, given her genes. But we knew what she looked like already, and the correlation between the girl on my sofa and the projected woman in the charts was close enough to prove that the identification was correct.

  And she hadn’t died from heart disease, which had been posited at her birth as the most likely cause of death. Except, of course, that in the end all deaths are from the failure of our hearts, diseased or not, to keep on pumping.

  She’d been routinely engineered, shorn of harmful recessives, but given no enhancements. Nothing weird, new or experimental that might have gone wrong.

  Her parents were another matter. Neither had been engineered at all—in their generation about 25% were still norms (24.37778893% variable by 1.67% if you want to be accurate). Both parents were CompuTechs. Both had applied for permanent City passports when Doris was five years old. The reason given was ‘spiritual discovery and human enlightenment’.

  A City passport would let them return to the City if they didn’t find life in the Outlands to their taste. They’d been granted limited passports only—they could return temporarily at any time, but would have to undergo evaluation before they could regain residency. Evidently they had thought the risk worthwhile.

  Like mine—and for all I knew, the same as Neil’s community—their credit line stayed in the City. There are no Outlands banks, except small ones that run purely on local credit. Theirs was a modest account. Although it was never formally closed all available funds had been withdrawn within a couple of years.

  I glanced up at Neil. He was absorbed in the other pages. I bent my head again. It was all so slow, so appallingly slow…

  I turned to the forensic results.

  Not much there either. There had been foreign hairs and skin cells on her clothes—mine, and three others, two of which were probably Elaine’s and Neil’s; the other one might have been quite innocent too. DNA traces are accurate, but there is rarely any way of telling how long they have been there. A stray hair may linger on your clothing for months.

  The vaginal swab results were negative. No traces of any other person’s blood, except for mine, presumably from when I scratched my hand carrying her back to the house.

  ‘Danielle?’

  ‘Mmmm?’

  ‘Michael called you Danny,’ he said. ‘Would you rather I called you that?’

  I shrugged. ‘Most of the Forest called me Danny. My parents called me Danielle. Everyone else too.’

  He didn’t miss the implication. ‘All right, Danielle then. I was just wondering, do you know anything about Nearer To Heaven?’

  Someone familiar with the Forest would have said, ‘Can you call up any data? Are there any correlations?’ I should have stuck to digging my garden, where there were no memories to disturb me…I pulled myself together. ‘Nothing that immediately comes to mind. Let me think for a minute.’

  I shut my eyes. It’s hard to call up data cold. Usually a mental trigger is more effective. If I were gardening, then gardening data was easy to call up. Ten bytes on one Utopia will trigger data on another.

  Nearer To Heaven…Nearer To Heaven…I was sure I’d come across it in some context, possibly two or three…

  I shook my head. ‘Just a vague memory that it’s one of the religious Utopias. Isn’t there anything about it in Michael’s notes?’

  ‘No. Only what he mentioned in his office.’

  ‘That tells us a lot by itself then.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘It means that Nearer To Heaven has never combined records with the City’s. That they don’t have a reciprocal arrangement with the City databanks. It implies that they don’t share medical data with the City either, as your Utopia does. They probably don’t share the education web either. And that, in turn, implies that their standard of living is lower than your community’s, for example, where you have the benefits of greater expertise.’

  He nodded, clearly impressed.

  ‘It was my job,’ I added, almost apologetically. ‘Making correlations. One thing leads to another and another and finally you have a Reality.’

  He nodded again. It was hard to read his expression. ‘Does the information suggest anything else to you then?’

  ‘Lower education standards, more isolated education—they’re probably bigots. Their Utopia is set on a headland: probably a bit of ‘Let us praise the glories of God’ nature worship too. Maybe nude dancing under the full moon, stuff like that. Oh, and no trading credits with the City either. Of course they may trade with another Utopia nearby who does trade with the City, but there are no other large Utopias nearby, so it’s unlikely. Which again means a lower standard of living.’

  ‘Any more?’

  I sighed. ‘They’ll probably be dressed pretty much alike. And they are unlikely to offer us lunch.’

  ‘The “dressed alike” I understand. That would come from making their own clothes, not being able to buy City-made fabrics. But why don’t you think they’ll offer us lunch?’

  ‘Because they’re probably bigots. And, like you said: it’ll be way past lunchtime.’

  Chapter 21

  Iwas wrong.

  Nearer To Heaven was set on a headland, a sheer cliff on one side, a gentle grassy slope down to a long white beach on the other: a perfect place to rejoice in the beauty of nature. I’d got that right anyway. But the inhabitants were anything but drab and their hospitality was relentless.

  There was no obvious floater dock. Neil switched the floater to manual and parked us next to what appeared to be
the main building, a long low structure made from stone and embellished concrete—a myriad of shells and small coral branches and what looked like shreds of broken crockery arranged in patterns—totally hideous, like a creche craft project multiplied a hundred times.

  Two further buildings stretched on either side of it, making a wide U that faced the sea. There were no other buildings at all nor any sign of life, either human or animal. A path of crushed white shell bordered with white painted rocks led through a grove of tea-trees. I presumed the path also led to the community orchards and gardens. Beautiful as the site was, it was too exposed to wind and salt air for fruit and vegetables to thrive.

  Floaters are quiet, but someone must have heard us arrive. A face peered out of a window, then vanished. Almost at once the door opened and a woman emerged.

  At first glance I thought she was my age. The long boned face was free of wrinkles, the skin tight and fresh. Her body was plumpish, but without the softer sprawl of older bodies. It was only as she came closer and I saw her poise and met her eyes that I realised that she was many decades older than I’d first thought. Nearer To Heaven might not have reciprocal medical with the City, but this woman had bought rejuvenation somewhere, with cosmetic added too. Or perhaps she was a recent convert, rejuved in the City before she joined.

  She smiled at me, showing long, even, white teeth, then even more widely at Neil and held out both hands. ‘Welcome!’ she cried joyously. Her wide multi-coloured sleeves fell away from her arms, showing bracelets of shells and seeds. The rest of her dress was of the same order—a patchwork of colours and fabrics, the hem encrusted with shells and embroidery.

  I glanced at Neil. It was as though she was reading from a script: ‘Emerge through front door. Lift hands. Exclaim joyously.’

  Neil shrugged. ‘Drab clothes?’ he whispered.

  ‘There’s always an error factor,’ I informed him.

  The welcomer was still holding up her hands, but she looked a bit lost now, as though we had failed to keep to the script. ‘Welcome to Heaven,’ she cried again, to give us our cue.

  I stepped out of the floater. Neil followed me, bumping his head this time as he came. ‘Thank you,’ I said.

  The wattage of welcome reduced slightly to a wide smile. ‘You have come to join us. I feel it in my heart.’ She pressed her bosom expressively. The shell bracelets rattled.

  ‘Well, no,’ I said apologetically. ‘We’re looking for the parents of Doris Prothero. Can you tell me if they’re still here?’

  The woman’s face fell, either with sorrow because we weren’t followers of the creed or because of what she had to tell us. She shook her head.

  ‘I am afraid Brother Harry and Sister Emma left us about ten years ago.’

  ‘Where did they go?’ asked Neil.

  The woman beamed at him. Her lips were plump and coated with what looked like perma-cosmetic red. ‘They went to the clear light,’ she announced.

  It took a moment to realise what she meant.

  ‘You mean they died? An accident?’ For a heartbeat I wondered if by some wild chance their deaths might have been similar to their daughter’s.

  ‘They were drowned. Our little community swims every day.’ She gestured to the beach below. ‘The sea cleans the body and refreshes the soul, and sometimes when you listen to the waves you hear the Creator in your heart. It was a cold day and the waves were rough. Sister Emma was taken first and then Brother Harry when he tried to rescue her. It was tragic,’ she said contentedly. ‘But, of course, they have found the true light now.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said. ‘Look, I’m sorry, I’m afraid I have to be the bearer of even more bad news. It’s about Doris. I’m afraid she’s dead too.’

  I had expected at least some sign of regret. But the woman just shook her head. ‘Poor Sister Doris,’ she said. ‘Thank you for sharing that with us, in spite of the pain it must cause you. I felt it would come to this.’ She pressed her bosom again.

  ‘Well, everyone dies some time,’ said Neil practically. ‘So I suppose you were going to be right eventually.’

  The woman looked at him uncomprehendingly. ‘Sister Doris left us…’ She paused. ‘It must have been about four years ago. But what am I doing? Keeping you out here! You must come in and meet our community! Let us welcome you properly. I am Sister Tracey.’

  ‘Danielle,’ I said.

  ‘And I’m Neil,’ said Neil. Sister Tracey smiled at him as though he was a plump lamb chop.

  We followed her inside. Four years, I thought. That would make Doris about fifteen at the time…and her parents had died, so she hadn’t left with them. Had she left by herself?

  The door opened on an anteroom—an arched ceiling with skylights, pale parquet floor, no furniture apart from a dozen driftwood sculptures.

  ‘They’re very…striking,’ I said, nodding at them.

  Sister Tracey beamed. ‘We take pride in our work of the heart here at Nearer To Heaven,’ she said. ‘Now let me introduce you to Brother Perry and Brother Cydore.’ She smiled at them too.

  Brother Perry was short and pudgy and wore a black slimline suit, possibly to hide the pudge. Brother Cydore was tall and wore the long white drapes that had been fashionable in the City about thirty years ago. Both looked to be in their late thirties but I suspected both were older.

  ‘Welcome!’ cried Brother Cydore, holding out hairy hands. I felt like telling him that that part of the script had already been covered. He turned his smile on Sister Tracey. ‘I’m sure our good sister has already offered you a little snack.’

  ‘I was about to,’ said Sister Tracey gently.

  ‘Good. Good.’

  ‘They have brought sad news about our little lost lamb,’ added Sister Tracey, leading the way into yet another long, arched room. This one was mostly windows, and looked out onto the horizon where blue sky met bluer water.

  I couldn’t resist stepping closer to the window. The air smelt of salt, and something tangier, with just the faintest taint of rot. The colours were deeper than anything I’d ever seen.

  ‘The first time you’ve seen the sea?’ asked Neil quietly behind me.

  I nodded without turning round. ‘Yes. Well, no, I mean I thought I knew what it was like. I’ve seen it in Virtuals, of course. Created them even. But it’s not the same.’

  ‘Theo and Elaine used to take me and a couple of the other kids camping at the beach every year,’ said Neil. ‘It’s been years since I’ve been though.’

  I could just imagine him at the beach, bounding down sandhills and jumping at the waves…I brought myself back to the matter in hand with an effort.

  Sister Tracey had evidently been filling in the brothers on our arrival. She now slid out of the room with Brother Cydore and yet another smile. Her eyes rested on Neil for just a little too long. So did Brother Cydore’s. Brother Perry gestured to the seats around a long table heavily inlaid with small bright tiles in the colours of sand and sea and sky.

  ‘Please do sit down my friends,’ he said.

  ‘Thank you.’ I nodded towards the table. ‘It’s very…striking.’

  Brother Perry beamed at me. ‘Do you think so? It took me five years. The effort to get the colours just exactly right…it’s our beach, of course, at exactly two in the afternoon on midsummer’s day. I wanted the freedom of colour without constricting the form in any way.’

  ‘It’s, yes, I’m sure it is. I mean you’ve achieved exactly that.’ I tried not to catch Neil’s eye.

  ‘I seek my path in art,’ said Brother Perry. ‘Do you love music, Neil? It is Neil isn’t it?’

  ‘Me? Yes, I like music,’ said Neil.

  ‘I knew it,’ beamed Brother Perry. ‘I sensed your face was sympathetic the moment I saw it. As soon as you’ve had your little chat with Sister Karen I must show you my studio.’

  ‘Is Sister Karen the head of your order?’ I asked.

  Brother Perry shook his head. ‘Mother Cheryl went to the clear light many y
ears ago. We are all just sisters and brothers now.’ He patted my hand. ‘All of us, even those who don’t live in our community, are sisters and brothers in our hearts.’

  I moved my hand away.

  ‘Yes, indeed,’ said Neil too innocently. I glared at him, but he just smiled back.

  ‘How many of you are there here?’ I asked, to make conversation.

  Brother Perry smiled gently at me. ‘Seven initiates and two devotees. Ah, here is Sister Karen.’

  Sister Karen appeared to be in her forties. She was as skinny as the lyrebird who camped outside my kitchen, and as sharp-beaked too.

  ‘Welcome!’ she cried joyously as she entered.

  Neil and I got to our feet. ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘This…’

  ‘I know, I know,’ Sister Karen beamed at us. ‘You have come to tell us about poor Sister Doris. Such a tragic loss.’

  About as tragic as a visit to the circus, I thought sourly, watching as she patted Neil’s cheek with her skinny hand.

  Sister Tracey crashed through the doors, bearing a tray. Brother Cydore followed with a teapot. ‘A little snack,’ panted Sister Tracey. ‘Now, let’s all get to know each other, shall we?’

  The little snack consisted of four sorts of cake in varying shades of brown, scones with flecks of what I supposed were currants, a bowl of whipped cream and a pot of seedy jam. The jam was brown as well.

  Brother Perry’s hand was now resting on my knee and I moved my chair slightly. Brother Cydore passed me a cup of tea and then handed one to Neil. ‘Milk and sugar?’ he beamed flirtatiously. ‘Now tell us all about yourself.’

  ‘Just milk,’ said Neil. ‘Look, we really just came to tell you about Sister Doris. We wondered if perhaps you might know anything that would help the authorities investigate her death.’

  ‘Anything we can do to help, dear boy,’ said Brother Cydore.

  ‘Naturally,’ said Sister Tracey, fluttering her eyelashes. ‘How did she die?’