stored fat, their metabolisms slowed to a crawl. In the spring they would emerge to another summer of eating.

Then a clutch of larger animals appeared over a low ridge. Ah ha! Chamois!

Probably these weren’t the animals Frank had seen online, as none wore a radio collar. If that was in fact how GPS got attached to animals these days; she didn’t know. Frank was watching them closely.

They were odd-looking beasts. Round-bodied, short-necked, short-legged, snub-faced. Short curving horns. They had the rectangularly pupilled eyes of a goat. Devil’s eyes. After Frank had proposed this trip, she had read they were “goat-antelopes,” whatever that meant. Obviously they were their own beast, neither goat nor antelope, and not even much like the other species in their same family. The youngsters were slender and hornless, and stayed near their moms. They nibbled, looked around, walked calmly over rocks from one patch of grass to the next. They regarded Frank and Mary curiously. She was surprised that they seemed so unconcerned to see people; there were Swiss hunters, or so she had heard, and these beasts were among the most commonly hunted. Why were they so unafraid?

She muttered this question to Frank.

“Why should they be afraid?” he replied.

“We might shoot them.”

“We don’t have any guns.”

“Do they know that?”

“They’ve got eyes.”

“But have they seen guns before? Wouldn’t that put them off people entirely?”

“Probably. So maybe they haven’t seen any guns.”

“I find that surprising.”

“The Alps are wild.”

“I thought you said they weren’t.”

He thought about it. “They are and they aren’t. Lots of people up here, yes. But the Alps can kill you quick. They’re savage, really. Didn’t you say you went over one of the high passes?”

“I did.”

“That should have taught you.”

She nodded, thinking it over. “That was definitely wild. Even savage, yeah— if the weather had turned, sure. Nothing but rock up there.”

“And that was a pass. There are lots of places up here where people don’t ever go. They’re really hard to get to, and they don’t lead anywhere. If you look on the maps you see them all over.”

“Not like this, then,” Mary said, gesturing around. On the grass under their boulder lay scattered about twenty varieties of alpine flower, either tucked into the grass or waving over it, flowers at different heights for different plants, so that the air was layered by color: at the top yellow, waving over a white layer; lower still a blue layer; then the grass, spangled with a variety of ground flowers.

“Not like this.” Frank smiled.

Mary saw that with a start; it seemed to her that she had never before seen him smile. Flower-filled meadow, wild beasts grazing all careless of them, the young ones literally gamboling, defining the word as they popped into the air and staggered around on landing, then did it again. Gray wall above, with a window in it to make it Alpine-strange. Blue sky. It was definitely a cheerful sight. Even a little hallucinogenic. Breeze flowing over the flowers like a tide, so that they bobbed in place. The young marmot still there near them continued to draw grass stalks to its mouth. The oily sheen of the bunched seeds it had caught in its paw gleamed in the sun. Quick little fans of food. The demon eyes of the chamois just a bit farther away, placidly chewing their cuds, unafraid of anything.

“I like this,” she said.

“Seeing the animals?”

“Yes.”

The slight smile returned. “Me too.”

They watched for a while.

“Have you seen many?” she asked him. “Animals in the wild, I mean?”

“Not many. I’d like to see more. So far almost all the ones I’ve seen have been up here in this basin, or basins like it. These guys, mainly. Marmots and chamois. Once an ibex, I think it was. Another time something like a marten. I looked it up later and it seemed like it must have been a marten. It was by a creek up here, with some trees on the other bank. It was running around like a crazy person, back and forth. I couldn’t understand what it was doing. Really fast, but erratic. Didn’t seem to be hunting or building a den, or whatever. Just dashing. Slinky thing with dark fur. Very intent on its own business. I wanted to pull my phone out of my pocket and take a picture, but I didn’t want to spook it. I didn’t want it to notice me. So I stayed still.”

“How did that end?”

“I had to leave to make the last chairlift.”

She laughed. “That’s the Swiss for you.”

“So true.” He plucked a grass stem from under him and began using it as a toothpick. “What about you?”

She shook her head. “Galway and Dublin aren’t really places for wildlife. I liked going to the zoo when I was a girl. That wasn’t quite the same.”

“Yes. What you would want is animals around you where you live.”

“Probably so. That’s what they’re working on in California. They’ve got so much land there, and they’ve been rewilding for a long time. My contacts there called it the Serengeti of North America, but they were referring to before Europeans arrived. It’s something they’re trying to get back.”

“Nice for them. But we live in Zurich.”

“Right. I don’t know. I walk the paths on the Zuriberg pretty often, but I’ve not seen any animals up there. I’m a bit surprised, now that I think of it. It’s quite a big forest.”

He shook his head. “Surrounded by city. That doesn’t work.”

“So they need habitat corridors, you mean. Do those work?”

“I think so. If they’re wide enough, and connect up big enough areas.”

“That’s what they’re doing in California.”

“In lots of places, I gather. I think it might work in Switzerland too. Although these beasties might not like it if wolves come back.”

“Is that who used to eat them?”

“Yes.”

“I can’t imagine the Swiss getting on with wolves either.”

“You never know. I read that with their glaciers going away, they’re thinking of reforesting some lower alps, and helping start plants on the exposed glacial

Вы читаете The Ministry for the Future
Добавить отзыв
ВСЕ ОТЗЫВЫ О КНИГЕ В ИЗБРАННОЕ

0

Вы можете отметить интересные вам фрагменты текста, которые будут доступны по уникальной ссылке в адресной строке браузера.

Отметить Добавить цитату