mushroom squirt of white liquid scudding around his brain, neurohormones soaking into synaptic clefts. Actually, the physiological function was nothing like that; picturing it at all was a psychological quirk that most Mind-star Brigade veterans employed. There’s no natural internal part of the human body which can be consciously activated; only muscles, and you can see that happen. So the mind copes by giving itself a picture of animation to explain the onrush of ethereal sensation. The result left him sensing an agitated haze of thoughts, entwined by grief. The man had forced himself to the Mandel farm against all kinds of deep-rooted doubts.
“I’m Andy,” he said it as though puzzled that Greg didn’t already know…as though his name explained away everything. “Andy Broady. Eleanor’s brother.”
Andy sat in a chair at the kitchen table, uncomfortable despite the cushion. He’d glanced around with a type of jealous surprise at the oak cupboards and tiled work surfaces. Greg followed his gaze with a mild embarrassment. The fittings were only a few years old, and Mrs. Owen came in to clean and help with Christine three times a week; but the room was still a mess. Baby bottles, washed and unwashed were all over the worktops, two linen baskets overflowing with clothes, packets of rusks, jars of pureed apple and other mushy, disgusting-tasting food were stacked in shop bags ready to be put away. Last night’s plates and dishes were waiting on top of the dishwasher. Big, rainbow-colored fabric toys underfoot.
Half the broad ash table was littered with the financial printouts which Eleanor had generated as she worked through summaries of the citrus grove crop and market sales.
Christine gurgled quietly in Andy’s lap, and he looked down at his new niece with guilty surprise. His lips twitched with a tentative smile. He held her with the stiff terror of every bachelor, frightened that he’d drop her, or she’d start crying, or burp, or choke or…
“How old is she?”
“Coming up six months.” Eleanor opened the dishwasher and retrieved three cups.
“She’s lovely.”
“Make me an offer, you can take her home with you today.”
Andy’s head came up in shock. Greg gave him a reassuring wink. Eleanor filled the cups from the Twinings carton and put them in the microwave. Greg never used to like instant tea, quietly fancying himself as a reasonable cook. These days everything was in convenience units.
Eleanor sat opposite her brother, and gave him a sympathetic look. “All right, what’s happened, Andy?”
“Happened?”
“You wouldn’t have come here otherwise.”
He nodded reluctantly. “It’s dad. There was an accident.”
“Oh, shit.” Eleanor let out a sigh, rubbing at her eyes. “How bad?”
“He was hit by a car. We took him back home, but he can’t move. He hurts a lot, and he’s hot…like with fever. Coughs blood. Other end, too.”
“And of course he won’t go to hospital.”
Andy shook his head, too glum to speak.
She put her hand on his arm, squeezing reassuringly. “Who’s looking after him?”
“Paddy, but he’s not as good as you were at medicine and such. Don’t have real training. Dad didn’t want any of us to go to college for courses, not after you left. Said that all outside the kibbutz was an evil place, that it corrupts us.” He gave Greg a nervous glance. “Said that the devil stole you away.”
“I wasn’t stolen, Andy; I was driven away. I saw what life can be like if you just have the courage to live it.” Her hand moved to Greg. “And have a little help.”
He kissed the top of her head. Andy’s expression hardened.
“I’m not arguing with you Andy,” she said. “But we’re all free to make choices. Even you, because I know he didn’t ask you to come up here today.”
“So? Will you come and see him?”
“Yes, Andy, I’ll come.”
It was a funny kind of day to find the perfect definition of mixed feelings, Greg thought, but now here he was torn between complete disapproval and devotion. Didn’t want Eleanor to go anywhere near the kibbutz, let alone back inside, and couldn’t leave her to do it alone.
It didn’t take long to drive to Egleton. The kibbutz was on the other side of the tiny village, on a flat expanse of land that bordered the road. One side of it was Rutland Water, a shoreline which ironically put only a short stretch of water between them and the Mandel farm’s citrus groves on the peninsula.
Close in miles, but not in time.
Eleanor had described the kibbutz to him often enough, there were even a few places on the farm where he could just make out their roofs over the top of the coconut palms they’d planted along their section of shore. Even so it came as a surprise. The buildings were all single-story, clumped together in three concentric rings with the church in the center. Long huts that were half house, half barn or stable. Unlike anything else built since the Warming, they didn’t have glossy black solar-panel roofs, just flat wooden slates. Brick chimney stacks fumed wisps of gray wood smoke into the clear sky. Beyond the outermost ring, a pair of donkeys were harnessed to a wooden pole, circling a brick well-shaft, turning some incredibly primitive pump.
The fields surrounding the buildings were planted with corn, barley, maize and potatoes; dense clumps of kitchen vegetables in each one made them resemble oversized allotments. Some had fruit trees, small and wizened, with zigzag branches and dark-green glossy leaves. Greg drove the Ranger down a rough dirt track that indicated a boundary. They stopped at a gate in the maze of tall sturdy wooden fences which surrounded the buildings; paddocks and corrals containing goats, donkeys, cows, some elderly horses, llamas. Neither the crops nor the livestock were genetically modified varieties, Greg noticed.
He busied himself unstrapping a sleeping Christine from her baby seat while Eleanor looked around her old home with pursed lips. She grunted abruptly, and pulled the first-aid case from the Ranger’s boot, slamming it down. They made quite a spectacle walking to the Broady home through the dried mud which filled the space between the buildings, while dogs barked and giant black turkeys waddled away squawking loudly. Several children ran alongside, giggling and calling to Andy. They seemed well fed, Greg thought, though their clothes were all homemade and patched. The adults still milling among the buildings eyed them suspiciously. Several must have recognized Eleanor; because they nudged each other and traded meaningful looks.
Eleanor didn’t even hesitate when she reached the front door. Shoved it open and walked in. Greg and Andy followed. It was a single long room, brick oven with iron doors at one end, bed at the other, with a few simple pieces of furniture between. The walls were hung with pictures of Jesus and Mary. Windows had shutters rather than glass.
A pale figure lay on the bed, covered by a single thin blanket. Greg probably wouldn’t have recognized Noel Broady. He’d only seen the old man once before, years ago, the night he met Eleanor. If any two people in the world were destined never to be friends, it was him and Noel.
Now though, that stubborn face was sunken and sweating. Grey hair had thinned out, several days’ stubble furred his cheeks and chin, flecked with dry saliva.
His eyes flickered open and he turned his head at the commotion. A dismissive grunt. “I told that boy not to go bother you.”
“Andy’s not a boy anymore, father, he’s a man who makes his own decisions. If he wants to tell me about you, he can do.”
“Stubborn. Stubborn.” He coughed, his shoulders quaking, and dropped his head back on the thin pillow. “Have you not yet learned God’s humility, girl?”
“I respect God in my own way, father.”
“By leaving us. By turning your back on Jesus and your family.” His finger rose to point at Greg. “By lying with that abomination. You live in sin, you will drown in sin.”
“Greg is my husband now, father. You were invited to the wedding.”
“I would not despoil all I have taught my flock by giving you my blessing.”
“Really?” Eleanor put the first-aid case on the floor, and opened it. She took out the diagnostic patch, and applied it to the side of her father’s neck. He frowned his disapproval, but didn’t resist.
“You have a granddaughter,” she said in a milder tone. She began running a handheld deep-scan sensor along his arms, switching to his ribcage. A picture of his skeleton built up in the cube of her Event Horizon laptop terminal.
