'Yes, Rick.' Silvia turned to Dallen with an apologetic smile. 'I'm sorry about the conversation becoming so cryptic. I'm not interested in adultery, you see — even though my husband is old and very ill. When I refused to date Rick a moment ago he, quite naturally — being the sort of person he is — asked me if Karal would the soon, and when I told him there was no immediate prospect of it he couldn't even make a convincing attempt to appear pleased.'
'Silvia!' Renard looked scandalised. 'You make me sound so crass!'
'I'm tempted to make the obvious reply to that one, but…'
'Don't mind me,' Dallen put in. 'I quite enjoy the sound of knuckles on flesh.' He had slipped into his social armour by reflex, buying time in which to gain some control over what was happening behind his eyes. Information had been coming in too fast The fantastic glass edifice filling the studio had an overpowering presence of its own, but something about Silvia London was even more disturbing. He had just learned that Renard had no claim on her, that she was a person upon whom Renard could not make a claim, and the result had been an immediate explosion of images and sense impressions — Silvia seen across a supper table; Silvia broodily examining a damaged fingernail; Silvia at the controls of a high-G zoom car, Silvia floating lazily in a sun-gilded pool; Cona raising her gaze in momentary bafflement from on historical text, Silvia lying with her head in the crook of his left arm; Cona trotting footprints of her own urine from room to shaded room…
Silvia looked thoughtfully at Dallen. 'I can't help wondering… Have we met before?'
'It isn't likely,' Renard said, grinning. 'His polo stick got woodworm.'
Dallen moved away from Silvia, closer to the stunning glass mosaic. 'I thought this was a flower at first, but it's astronomical, isn't it?'
'Yes. It's a representation of a Gott-McPherson cosmos.'
Dallen frowned, still expunging visions. 'I thought McPherson was a spherologist. Isn't he on the Optima Thule Science Commission?'
'Yes, but it's his work on cosmogony that inspires me as an artist,' Silvia said, caressing the glass with the tip of a finger. 'Actually, as it stands the screen shows a pure Gott cosmos. The scenario he devised in the 20th Century called for the creation of three separate universes at the moment of the Big Bang. He labelled the universe we live in Region I. It's composed of normal matter and of course in our universe time goes forward. This is it in the left-hand zone, with all the colours and forms naturalistic by our terms of reference.' Silvia crossed to the other side of the screen, stepping with care over a wooden support, choosing the constricted route between Dallen and the glass. Her hair touched his lips.
'In the opposite panel is the Region II universe, created in the same instant as ours, but rushing backwards into our past and composed of anti-matter. I've suggested its nature by using inverted forms and colours which are complements of those in Region I. Gott also postulated a Region III universe — a tachyon universe — which has sped far ahead of us in time and will remain in our future until all the universes meet each other again in the next Big Bang. This is the tachyon universe in the centre section — elongated abstract patterns, leached-out opalescent colours.'
'Aren't you glad you asked?' Renard's bow of teeth gleamed. 'If you want to appear intelligent and interested ask where McPherson comes into the picture.'
'I'm sorry,' Silvia said, her eyes again locking with Dallen 'I do tend to presume that my private manias are universal.'
'It's all right,' Dallen replied quickly. 'It's really… well, fascinating… and as a matter of feet I was going to ask about McPherson's contribution.'
Renard burst into full-throated laughter, hamming up his scorn by slapping his thigh, and walked away into the old part of the house, shaking his head.
'Perhaps he's kind to animals,' Silvia said, pausing until Renard was out of earshot. 'McPherson refined Gott's ideas and also added a Region IV universe — an anti-tachyon universe which is fleeing ahead of Region II into its past. It's being incorporated into the design as a fourth panel complementing Region III, but there isn't enough ceiling height here to let me assemble the whole screen. That will have to wait.'
'For what?'
'Completion of Karal's memorial college, of course.'
'I see,' Dallen floundered. Tm afraid I don't know much about your husband's work.'
'There's no real reason why you should — he isn't a publicity-seeker.'
'I didn't mean…'
Silvia laughed, showing predictably healthy teeth. 'You're far too normal to be keeping company with Red Rick, you know. Why do you do it?'
'He promised he could get me into movies,' Dallen said, trying to decide why he was unhappy about being described as normal. What's going on here? he thought. Pm supposed to be the one who always holds the conversational high ground.
'I'm sure you'd be interested in what Karal has to say.' Silvia's gaze had a disconcerting softness. 'We're having some people around tomorrow night — would you like to join us?'
'I…' Dallen looked down at the woman and felt a surge of genuine panic as he realised how close he had come to opening his arms to her. There had been no reason to it, no sense of having been given an invitation, not even any special pressure of desire — it was just that his arms had almost moved by themselves. And Com is still a prisoner, still where I put her.
Tm busy tomorrow,' he said, his voice unexpectedly loud.
'Perhaps some other evening would…'
'My wife and I never go out.' Dallen strode out of the studio and into the adjoining room, where he found Renard studying some botanical prints clustered on a wall. The high-ceilinged room seemed mellow and cool, part of another age.
'Ready to go?' Renard looked quizzical. 'I thought an art lover like you would have been in there for ages. What have you been doing to this young man, Silvia?'
'Thanks for your help with the glass,' she said to Dallen, entering the room behind him, and it seemed to him that her manner was now overly correct. 'The cartons are quite heavy.'
'No trouble. If you’ll excuse me — I have an appointment in town.' Dallen went out to the front of the house, prepared to leave the premises on foot, but Renard caught up with him and within a minute — after an exchange of formalities with Silvia — they were in the car and rolling silently between banks of foliage. Warm air currents touched Dallen's forehead. The world looked subtly different to him, as in the first moment after stepping out of a bar in daytime. He felt that something momentous had happened, but what made it unsettling was the lack of evidence that anything at all had taken place. It was a matter of interpretation. He had never met a woman quite like Silvia London before, and could have been misreading the signals because of unfamiliarity or male egotism. Or perhaps sheer sexual deprivation. When he had mentioned Cona's frequent masturbation to Roy Picciano the doctor had suggested that it could cease if they resumed a physical relationship, but Dallen had found the idea repugnant beyond words…
'That was a nice little divertimento for all concerned.' Renard said. 'What went on in there?'
'Meaning?'
'The two of you came out of the studio like robots.' Renard looked amused. 'Did you try to touch her?' Dallen sighed in exasperation. 'Stop the car and let me out.'
'No need to get huffy, old son,' Renard said, accelerating out into the street. 'It's two years since her old man went off to the Big O to the, and nobody has got near our Silvia in all that time. It's a criminal waste, really, but she has compensated by inventing this game called New Morality Musical Beds. Cumbersome title, but I've just made it up. When the music stops — by music I mean Kara T’s emphysematic rattling — there's going to be one hell of a scramble, and Silvia wants the field to be as large as possible. I’m going to win, of course. It's a foregone conclusion, but she doesn't want to admit that Co herself. I guess the illusion of choice gives her a bit of a lift.'
The tone and content of what he had just heard outraged Dallen on behalf of Silvia, but he was distracted by new information. 'I didn't realise Karal London lives on Orbitsville.'
Renard nodded. 'A place near Port Napier. He only appears in holomorph form at Silvia's little soirees, you know. Personally, I find it somewhat distasteful.'
'A sensitive person like you would.'
