Part 46 (1/2)

'It's a voice patch, Jacques, that's all, a new gizmo,' he said. 'Soon every shop in the Kakdorp will have one in its window. But I loved,' he said, speaking loudly, as one of the performers walked past in a white bathrobe, his cheeks red, his eyes bulging a little with fatigue, 'I absolutely loved that bit of business with old Spookganger.'

The performer opened a door and closed it behind him.

'That was Dirk Labelaster,'* he whispered to Tristan Smith. 'Would you like to meet him? We could visit him at home. He lives just near us. Are you still interested in posturing? Tell me who you want to meet.' he whispered to Tristan Smith. 'Would you like to meet him? We could visit him at home. He lives just near us. Are you still interested in posturing? Tell me who you want to meet.'

For answer, Bruder Mouse presented his immobile cheeky grin.

We descended a steel staircase. At the bottom we arrived at a closed roller door, not unlike the one at the entrance of the Feu Follet. Bill pressed a b.u.t.ton. The door rose noisily and we found ourselves outside the Sirkus, in the dank night air, by a small ka.n.a.l.

The air was fetid. There was broken gla.s.s, a burned-out truck. A man in a leather jacket came out from behind the truck and pointed his finger at us.

'It's OK,' Bill said. 'Relax. He's not a Misdaad Boy.'

This man was the wheelmajoor, the pilot of a boat, a gondel, which was sitting in the iridescent water with its motor purring. And now, as our party walked towards him, he held out his hand to help us aboard.

'It's a nice night to go to Saarlim?' Jacqui said.

'Yes, Meneer,' he said, but she could see he was not VIA, and as the gondel nosed out of the back ka.n.a.l, and into Bleskran Ka.n.a.l, as the great spires and domes, the luminous filtreeders, rose high above her, Jacqui left the cabin and went to stand alone in the prow. Then Saarlim appeared above her, around her, like the fairy city of the vids. It was one of those rare moments when a city can suddenly, unexpectedly, appear to open its doors to a stranger, and take them from the dirt and heat of the streets into that other secret world it shows only its creators and intimates.

Yet this experience, far from bringing our nurse a little peace, produced in her pa.s.sionate heart a fierce agitation.

You see, she told her mother, who could not see, was not here, could never know, even if she were told. You see You see you do not need to live your life like a pinched-up piece of leftover in a saucer in the fridge. you do not need to live your life like a pinched-up piece of leftover in a saucer in the fridge.

She sat in the prow, looking at the skyline, accepting the gla.s.s of champagne champagne from from Bill Millefleur Bill Millefleur, who came out on to the deck to give it to her personally.

She sipped champagne, and thought contradictory and agitated thoughts about that cautious street her mother still lived on, the genteel poverty, the suspicion, the habitual meanness which was thought of as caution, the d.a.m.n leftovers, the frozen sc.r.a.ps with date labels three years old.

I am going to wait in Saarlim for the snow. am going to wait in Saarlim for the snow.

Through the gla.s.s she could see Bill and me and Wally in intimate conversation. And she was somehow persuaded about me in a way she had not been before.

She sat out in the fog looking in at me.

She sat in the prow as the gondel glided along the black silky waters of the ka.n.a.l, beneath the golden gates of the Bleskran, under the great illuminated wharf of the Baan, where uniformed doormen waited to help us disembark.

She arrived on the private wharf with the champagne gla.s.s still in her hand, and walked in through the foyer in her now slightly soiled male costume as if she too were already someone special.

When she entered the carpeted elevator it was as if she did it every day. The elevator was, as appeared to be the Saarlim habit, gla.s.s-walled. As our little party rose into the night we were presented with this jewel-box view of the city, its water, its boats, the rippling gla.s.s towers of water filters, the glow of the Sirkus Domes, like so many Florentine cathedrals cl.u.s.tered densely around the Grand Concourse but then spreading away into the great dark night of Voorstand.

*The Dome Projection is naturally little known in Voorstand, where no one would waste their time viewing a vid reproduction of a Sirkus. In the rest of the world, Meneer, Madam, this is often how we know you. Chemin Rouge, for instance, now supports two live Sirkuses, which change their show every three months or so. In contrast we have sixteen different Dome Projection theatres whose entertainment changes weekly. [TS] [TS]*You may be surprised to see that Bill Millefleur did not have to explain who Dirk Labelaster was. Labelaster is hardly a star, but he has a following among the Eficans. Dirk Labelaster? you ask. In Chemin Rouge? In Chemin Rouge? And I, in my turn, say to you: you have no idea of your effect on those of us who live outside the penumbra of your lives And I, in my turn, say to you: you have no idea of your effect on those of us who live outside the penumbra of your lives. [TS] [TS]

37.

I had been pleased to see my father. I loved him, although I had spent many years insisting I did not. But each time he did not understand my speech, he emphasized our eleven years of separation. This was the father who could not do the time. He could do what was 'brave' and 'dramatic', go to the Mall and say, 'This is my son, Tristan Smith,' 'This is my son, Tristan Smith,' or paint his face with Zinc 3001, but he did not have the spine to be a father. or paint his face with Zinc 3001, but he did not have the spine to be a father.

When I saw the flashy gondel bobbing at the wharf, I saw one more of his dramatic gestures.

Of course I now know that this was unfair, that a gondel is not 'flashy', that it is, in fact, a perfectly ordinary conveyance for a Saarlim bhurger. But when I was carried inside the cabin, I did not understand that gondels are hired by the hour by bank clerks and fishmongers, or that the liquors displayed so proudly in spotlit niches cost a very reasonable 3 Guilders a nip. Laugh if you like, but when I saw the black leather banquettes and small bra.s.s lamps, I thought he was trying to seduce me with his money, and by the time I sat on the banquette I was as depressed as Wally was, although for different reasons.

Bill, meanwhile, plunged anxiously onwards. He was in full gallop, round and round, smiling, laughing, juggling tall-stemmed gla.s.ses in one hand while with the other he eased the cork from a dripping wet bottle of Veuve Clicquot.

I declined the gla.s.s in sign language, holding my Mouse head to show him why I could not drink.

Then the d.a.m.n fool began to fiddle with my suit.

If he had only thought a moment more he would have realized I might not wish to undress myself in public, to show myself to him like this. I pulled away from him and turned, not towards Wally who was staring mournfully out into the night, but towards Jacqui who was seated on my left. In our days of tin-rattling my nurse and I had finally become allies. In the Water Sirkus she had been my friend and companion. Twice she had touched my knee, once my arm.

'Stop ... him,' I said. 'Please ... get ... him ... off ... me.'

But when I touched her arm she gave a small, apologetic shrug and slipped off the banquette away from me.

'Just ... tell ... him ...' I said, but I saw she had become my father's friend. She walked out of the cabin and up towards the prow, and let me tell you it was obvious to me then as she walked up and down that little deck, she walked not like a man, but like a woman, and a d.a.m.n frisky one at that.

You may be thinking, Madam, Meneer, that Jacqui left the cabin from a sense of delicacy, a wish to leave me alone for my difficult reunion with my father. Equally you may imagine that Bill Millefleur, in carrying champagne to her on the deck, might have been performing his role as a gracious Saarlim host.

I was in no state to imagine any such thing. I watched Bill and Jacqui, a man and a woman silhouetted against the lights of the filtreeders and wolkekrabbers.

It made me half mad with jealousy this whole world that I could never enter.

I turned to Wally. 'Let's ... go ... back ... to ... the ... hotel.'

But Wally had found a bottle of whisky and was pouring himself a generous drink.

'Take your suit off,' he said. 'Have a little drink. Enjoy yourself.'

'He's ... a ... creep.'

'Give him a chance.'

'He's ... such ... a ... phoney.'

'Don't be such a rucking Bruder. Take your d.a.m.n suit off. Can't you see he's pleased to see you?'

'Mr ... Walk ... Away.'

'Relax, he'll be back in a moment.'

'f.u.c.k ... him.'

But then Bill did come back, stooping under the low roof and seating himself beside me.

'Now, Tristan, speak to me.'

But he seemed so far from me, so far, far away.