The Ambassador (29 page)

‘Princess, you know I work at Porton Down. Among other projects, I’ve been investigating chromosome 21. Damage to it introduces – or possibly reinforces – a vicious streak. That alone should render the embryos non-viable. It always has before. We bred it out long ago. Reasons of policy, sensible policy. But this batch thrived. And if mine did, maybe somebody else has come across the same phenomenon. As for those files, not only did the data vanish into thin air, but the living material did too.’

‘So somebody may have a few dozen healthy little foetuses whose main characteristic is a penchant for violence?’ Marius asked, slowly. ‘I take it you are not joking or exaggerating, Doctor? You are sure of this?’

Lisa did not reply but her anguished look was testament enough. ‘And who,’ Marius continued in the same measured tone, ‘might be interested? Who knows about this?’

‘My Director. He says I’m imagining things. He implied I was imagining what I saw the other night …’ Lisa’s hand flew to her mouth and her eyes widened in misery.

‘Go on, Doctor,’ Strether said gravely. ‘What did you see?’

The title, the reminder of her status, seemed to reinforce in Lisa a deeply ingrained duty. As she heard it for the third time, she nodded to herself. Loyalty to science, to mankind must come before loyalty to an employer. She shook her head and for a few moments could not talk. The pet monkey pulled at Strether’s trouser leg. He gave it a piece of bread which it snatched and carried away, squeaking. Nobody spoke.

Then, after gentle urging from both men, Lisa described as accurately as she could the shadowy tarpaulined lorry and its strange, moving cargo.

Her listeners digested what she had said. ‘I asked you once about rejects, and you did not understand what I meant,’ Strether reminded her gently. ‘But that sounds to me like a barrel-load of rejects. Maybe they were supposed to have been disposed of – gassed, or
whatever – but it was botched. Someone’s doing a bit of breeding on the side, Lisa. Perhaps the experiment went wrong. You weren’t supposed to see. None of it.’

‘You are a very brave woman.’ The Prince nudged his chair next to hers and held her trembling hand in both of his. Her face, full of misery, was turned to him, but she did not cry; that would have drawn attention. Her shoulders shuddered with the effort.

The Prince looked closer. ‘You’ve never been asked to experiment on anything like that, have you, Lisa?’

‘No. Never.’

‘That’s because you are a principled woman,’ Strether intervened robustly. He put himself firmly on her side. ‘If anyone had, you’d have told them firmly where to stuff such a proposition.’

Lisa found strength from somewhere. ‘I’d have reported them. To the Chartered Institute. To anybody. It’s dreadful. The whole ethos is being ignored, mocked – everything I care about most. And I don’t know what to do. By contrast, Bill, your – your toys are quite benign.’

‘Well, now. Enough,’ came Marius’s voice. He had resumed a patrician, insouciant air. ‘So, we have more than a supine Parliament to flagellate ourselves over. How very intriguing. Let me ponder on this, Bill. Meanwhile, this poor girl’s had sufficient interrogation and my dear mother’s nodding off. Can we please change the subject?’

The monkey had leaped chattering on to the parapet a few metres away. It tore at the bread, ate, and scratched itself. Strether caught himself wondering whether it had been subjected to gene therapy or enhanced in some outlandish fashion. Maybe it could perform tricks such as screeching ‘Rule Britannia’ with perfect pitch. Given what he had just heard, he was beginning to believe that anything was possible. 

Marty greeted him in a dressing-gown of white satin edged with fur, identical to the one Marilyn had worn on leaving hospital after her first miscarriage. It had marked, Marty told him, her maturation from her empty-headed starlet period. Or, looking at it another way, had been the first step from hope to despair. Underneath it was obvious that she wore nothing at all.

Strether mopped his brow. He had caught the sun that afternoon, probably through its reflection off the MPs’ folly, their darned poxy lake. Marty was a little tired, she told him; her previous job had been a mite over-enthusiastic. She lounged on the
chaise-longue,
the lovely limbs stretched like a cat’s, and rubbed her knees.

‘He had a Clinton tendency, that one,’ she observed. ‘Gawd, makes you wonder why they pay real money for it when gadgets can do it just as well.’

Strether removed his tunic and hung it over a chair. In Marty’s company, for the first time in weeks, he felt comfortable, though not entirely relaxed – that would have been impossible. Yet her perfume filled the air, and the hint of a sexual smell was stronger than on his earlier visit. ‘You have a remarkable attitude to your clients, Marty. I thought it might upset me to hear you discuss them that way, but it doesn’t. It’s as if the body who – performs those acts, is someone else.’

‘Yeah, I feel the same. Most are cute, y’know? Especially the young boys sent here by their fathers. I always feel I’m doing some nice girl a favour; when she meets the right guy,
he’ll know exactly how to please her. Makes for a far better marriage.’

‘Doing your public duty, maybe,’ Strether commented, but the import of the remark was lost on Marty. She passed him a platter of fruit. He took a handful of fat ripe strawberries and bit one, his teeth sinking into the sweet flesh.

‘Your two staffers were here earlier this evening,’ she said, by way of conversation. ‘Did you see them on your way in? Matt and Dirk, the ginger-haired guy. You should warn them, though. Their toys are a bit peculiar.’

Strether accepted the obligatory champagne but waved away dishes of gravadlax and caviar. ‘How do you mean – peculiar?’

Her manner became vague. ‘Unreliable, then. They shouldn’t attempt to meet them outside.’ She sat back and crossed her ankles, a gesture that quickened Strether’s pulse alarmingly. The rosy light made her skin luminous, the same magical glow that had enchanted him before. He started to eat another strawberry, but the taste on his lips made him aware of the great scarlet bow of Marty’s mouth.

‘That’s all. Now, darling Bill, what can I do for you?

Strether held his breath. His skin had begun to tingle. He forced himself to pause and reflect. What was he about to do? What duplicity was he capable of? He was so very fond of Lisa. That was a friendship founded on respect as much as anything else. Plus the fact that the doctor had been the first attractive woman he had come across, the first who had reawakened his dormant interest. It was a romance, but had a formal element. She would not have taken kindly to the idea of any repeat visit to the Toy Shop. He should have been utterly incapable of deceiving her, yet without hesitation he had come again, and hidden the arrangement from her.

But Marty was another world entirely: a kind, open personality, without pretensions, but wrapped up in the most luscious frame ever endowed on womankind. And her generous nature would extend to welcoming whatever advances he might make, without expecting anything in return. Nor need Lisa ever find out.

He would let the idea ferment for a little. Meanwhile he wanted information.

‘Marty, I just need some wise company for a bit. Let me ramble on, will you? Then tell me what you think.’ He sat nibbling fruit and talking for more than ten minutes, outlining his dismay at his visit to the Commons and his stupefaction that nobody seemed bothered by its weakness. He omitted mention of Lisa’s work, since she could be compromised by gossip; and her name would feel like an intrusion. It seemed instinctively best, too, not to venture into the murky world of the prison camps or his sojourn in the desert. But when he reached Marius’s hints that protest groups might well exist, Marty kicked up her heels and hooted with laughter.

‘1848? Solidarity? What kinda names are those? Sounds like a slimming club to me!’

‘You never heard of them?’

‘Naw. We do get to hear all sorts of rumours here, when clients are in their cups, but I never heard tell of no protest groups. You’re having me on.’

Strether sucked his teeth in frustration. ‘I was hoping you might be able to add something, Marty.’

Her alabaster brow puckered, the lips pushed in a round pout. Her shoulders came forward artlessly and the nipples showed clearly beneath the white silk. ‘Oh, gee, I’d love to
help. I’d love to know more about it myself. Do they spirit people away? Do they have escape routes – tunnel under walls, secret messages ’n’ that sort of thing?’

‘I’ve no idea.’
The boat people
. ‘My God. Maybe they do. Tell, me, Marty. If you wanted to escape, where would you head for?’

‘Escape? West, of course. Where you come from. It’s the closest, and big enough to disappear in. Isn’t it?’

‘America?’

‘Sure. That’d be where I’d escape to, Bill.’ Her face became wistful. She slid closer to him. The silk slipped from her thigh. ‘Maybe that’s not so fanciful. P’raps if you get to know more about these Solidarity people, and they’re short of candidates, I could volunteer. I still haven’t heard a word from my best pal, Betty. I’m not sure I wanna stay around to find out what happens to fifty-year-old Marilyns, y’know?’

Strether caved in: the tensions of the day had been too great not to. He took the warm, sweet face in both hands and let himself melt into the candid blue eyes. He could no longer tell himself that this person, Marty, was an artificial creation. This was flesh and blood, and wholesome, living woman. He kissed her full on the scarlet lips and rested her dazzling platinum head on his shoulder.

Then he pulled awkwardly at the dressing-gown cord and let the slippery fabric slide away, revealing what he had. never seen, but now realised he had dreamed about. Marilyn’s breasts, full, creamy, firm, their nipples bold and aroused. Marilyn’s hips, broad and almost heavy, the belly a slight curve, not flat, the high navel, the curly pubic triangle revealing that she had not always been blonde. Marty sighed and lay back, her arms up, hands crossed over her shimmering head as if she were a child. She ran her moist tongue over her parted lips, then laughed throatily. Her lovely legs bent up at the knees, slightly splayed, were an invitation to part them.

Strether stood up and unfastened his trousers. ‘Yeah, Marty. I’ll find out more, if I can. And don’t worry. I’ll make sure you’re OK. Don’t know how, but that’s an absolute promise.’

It was more than two hours before he returned to the Residence, his head and whole being suffused with Chanel No. 5 and Marty’s own musky odour, which had so entranced him. He felt weak, dazed, almost delirious. And quite extraordinarily happy.

The vidphone was blinking. Strether switched it on, half expecting another garbled message from some subversive group. The callers’ numbers were never traceable; he wondered in annoyance quite what the urban terrorists, if that’s what they were, expected him to do with such fragments of information.

But it was Marius.

‘Hello, old chap. Hope you enjoyed the Toy Shop again – yes, my spies saw you. Are you genuinely interested in finding out more about what we discussed on the terrace? If so, I’m afraid it’s back to Milton Keynes. Call me.’

The delivery boy stood on the footpath and whistled lazily. With his free hand he unwrapped a piece of testosterone chewing-gum and stuffed it into his mouth. He did not believe the claims made about it on TV but you never knew. It certainly made him feel perkier.

His was an unusual job, which his friends envied; these days, most household goods arrived overnight in anonymous packs from automated vehicles and were left ready for breakfast in the cooled acceptance cupboards built into most homes. He’d heard that communications such as post and newspapers used to be sent the same way, though letter-boxes, as they were called, did not require refrigeration. Electronic mail had put paid to that, plus the vidphone and wall screen. Nobody sent reams of paper any more.

He pushed the maroon cap to the back of his head and hefted his load from one arm to another. The electric van purred softly at the kerbside; he had taken care to park it in the shade, but if this dolly didn’t hurry up the sun would have moved and made the metal too hot to touch. He pressed the doorbell again and shouted into the entryphone. The sound of crockery being dropped and a muttered curse greeted him. He grinned and switched the gum from one cheek to the other.

The door opened. A brown-haired woman stood on the doorstep, looking completely bewildered. Her tunic was half fastened and she had on only one earring. ‘What on earth…?’ she asked.

‘Flowers, miss. Somebody loves ya. Thumbprint on the powerbook ’ere,’ said the boy. This would be a tale to tell his pals.

‘Flowers? Good Lord, I’ve never had flowers. What kind are they?’

‘Dunno, I’m no expert. But, from the fuss made at the shop, summat special. Roses, maybe?’ The boy grew a trifle restless. ‘Will that be all, miss?’

‘Er, yes, indeed. Thank you.’ The woman had missed his hint entirely. Clutching the bouquet in her arms, she shut the door. With a disconsolate sigh, for tips were a substantial part of his income, he slouched back to the van. 

Later she shared the problem, still quite puzzled, with her records clerk Winston Kerry. A visit to the Bunker had become an urgent necessity. While there was no clear evidence that her e-mail and vidphone calls were being monitored she had started to act with circumspection. If she were in the Director’s shoes, it would be prudent to check what Dr Pasteur, that prickly rebel, was up to. On the issues she had asked Winston to pursue,
face-to-face
discussions would be safest.

Winston had put his feet up cheekily on the computer console. Above him the camera was motionless and unblinking: put to sleep temporarily, Lisa suspected. He offered her a chocolate from a little box, as if sharing secret vices with her. ‘Man, that’s not a problem,’ he chuckled. ‘A guy sends you a prezzie like that, you say thank you kindly and wait to see what he sends you next.’

‘But I’ve hardly met Prince Marius,’ Lisa protested. She unwrapped the sweet and popped it into her mouth. The next words emerged indistinctly. ‘I caught a glimpse of him when he brought Bill Strether to the lab – just a moment in the corridor. He was in cahoots with the Director then. They went, off and left me and Bill together. And he was at the embassy party – we had a few words, nothing dramatic. Last week was the first time he’s ever had a conversation with me.’

‘Bill? Pretty familiar, huh? You got a whole harem there, ma’am.’ Winston pronounced it
hareem
, lolling his tongue against the thick lips and rolling his eyes.

‘Oh, don’t, Winston. I’m in a muddle. Cracks like that are not helpful.’

‘I’m not the best person to come to for agony aunt advice, dear Doctor,’ Winston relented. ‘But what’s going on? You like this geezer the American?’

‘I do. He’s a darling. An absolute gentleman.’ As she spoke she remembered his dalliance at the Toy Shop, but forced it firmly out of her mind.

‘You trust him?’

‘Yes. Increasingly so. When he criticised my research I was mortally offended, but he was right. He’s a man of limited education and background compared with a typical European diplomat, but has sound judgement, I’d say.’

‘Big romance?’

Lisa shrugged but her face was downcast. ‘I sleep with him, if that’s what you mean. And I’m immensely fond of him. I think he’s a bit old for me; or maybe it’s the fact that he’s not from here, and finds much of our world not to his taste. At times it’s like chatting to somebody from another century.’

‘Bit of a hick, then.’

She laughed at that, and relaxed a little. ‘He asked if I’d like to go back to the States, but it doesn’t appeal, to be frank. So much of our lives here we take for granted. I like the way our government and the Commission are expected to take care of us – that’s very European. I don’t think I’d be comfortable in that fundamentalist paradise. And how would I earn a living?’

‘That I can see. But you didn’t quite answer me. When I asked if you trusted this Bill feller, you talked about his wonderful judgement. But would you trust him to keep his mouth shut?’

Lisa considered. ‘I suppose he must report back. But I doubt if he would put anyone at risk. Why do you ask?’

‘Because he’s coming to Milton Keynes later today. I wondered if that was why you were here too.’

She was silent. After her ringing endorsement of his trustworthiness this was a surprise. Then: ‘I was not aware of that. Coming to see you?’

Winston recrossed his legs. ‘Not exactly. But there aren’t many secrets underground. If you hang about, maybe you could tag along.’

She was dubious. ‘I probably wouldn’t be welcome. I’m beginning to feel something of a liability wherever I go.’ Winston pursed his lips in a kiss and made smacking noises. ‘They all adore you. Prince Marius is coming too. A double reason. Go have yourself a soya milk-shake and I’ll gather a few printouts. I’ll see you at the caff in twenty minutes.’ 

Strether and Marius had chosen to drive by electric car to Milton Keynes. It was not far; the journey up Watling Street was hardly arduous, as, though the motorway had long since been ploughed up for vineyards, by historical standards there was little traffic during daylight hours. The speedy Maglev was too public for the confidential conversation, and Strether, being an American, was an accomplished driver.

‘I tried an antique motorbike once,’ Marius confessed, as he fastened his seat-belt. ‘A Norton 732 with twin carbs from the Midlands museum. It completely petrified me. And the stink of unburnt hydrocarbons! Nothing whatever would induce me to learn to drive after that. Too bloody murderous, even if the road was empty. Anyway, in my profession it’s best to use public transport. The voters prefer it.’

Strether eased the car into sixth gear. He had learned not to wrestle with the controls of the small but powerful English-made Toyota, chosen in preference to the Dodge. The night before, he had made the effort to sit down in the garage with a doubtful Peter, the chauffeur, and the manual. It had taken over an hour to master the systems and on-board computer with its instructions in an addled version of Microsoft English. He would return from the trip content to let Peter take over in future.

The car moved out north beyond the city towards Harpenden and Dunstable. Above their heads, and in an almost straight line into the distance, tall cypresses reached to a cloudless blue sky. Strether switched on the shader and adjusted the air-conditioning. It might be autumn, with the older deciduous trees losing their leaves – more modern species did not – but noon temperatures were still forecast to reach over 30°C. Fortunately Bedfordshire was not humid. In the semi-tropical jungles of Sicily, today would be stifling.

‘What exactly am I going to see, Marius? You’ve been nothing if not mysterious. “Wear stout shoes and clothes which you don’t mind getting dirty.” These are my sole instructions.’

The Prince pretended to look out of the window. ‘I can’t tell you much. Or, rather, it’s not for me to tell. I’m not a fount of knowledge on this. It may be a learning opportunity for me too.’

Strether grunted. ‘Damn you.’ They drove in silence for several kilometres. Leighton Buzzard with its conservation areas of 1960s ‘little boxes’ housing slipped away to the west. Then he tried again. ‘I can’t figure you out, Marius. Am I wrong? You seem to know everybody, and you move in the most elevated circles. You’re an NT, and an Énarque. Presumably you could, if you wanted, be a front-bencher. Or a top official – leastways, a person with considerable influence. Yet you play the dilettante. I don’t get it.’

‘Go on, I’m enjoying this.’ A half smile curled on Marius’s face. ‘A little bit of character assassination does a man good. I’ve never had a proper job, that’s true. Never felt any need of one. Maybe when they put my genes together, they forgot the most important ingredient.’

‘What’s that?’

‘Taking oneself seriously.’

The two men laughed quietly. Marius continued, ‘You sound like my mother. Except she wants me to get married and start producing embryos of my own.’

‘And why don’t you?’

‘Oh, something lacking in my personality, I suppose. Put it down to prolonged immaturity – mine. And I’ve never found the right woman. But I will admit, I have started looking. I have begun to take steps – definitely.’

A road sign indicated access to the Woburn Abbey theme park, which stretched from Luton to the edge of their destination. In the distance elephant-giraffe crosses could be glimpsed, and a pride of tame white leopards asleep on the roof of the Moat House Hotel. Strether slowed slightly. ‘I did want to ask you. You’re familiar with the ethics of the genetic programme, aren’t you? What Lisa was saying at the Commons has been addling my brain ever since. What actually happens to rejects?’

Marius folded his arms. ‘I knew you’d ask me that, sooner or later. It was discussed ferociously in the beginning, but, my dear Bill, that was over seventy years ago. And when something’s successful, and as widely accepted as the programme is, then it ceases to be the subject of debate. Criticism seems like carping. Some questions are no longer asked. Who wants to know what happens to sewage?’

‘I worked that out for myself,’ the Ambassador responded grimly. ‘I’m listening.’

‘What was supposed to happen with failed experiments – rejects, damaged material and the like – was covered by two separate considerations. First, its human origin required respect. That meant, if it were viable, and the parents wished it, it could be blessed or given the last rites or whatever, and disposed of like a stillborn. It couldn’t be used for further research without express permission. The second element was really a contradiction of the first. It stemmed from the need to understand errors. Details had to be recorded, biopsies stored, medical audit would establish what went wrong and why. In either case, a test-tube full of defective live cells would be handled with the utmost care. Unfortunately, my meagre inquiries have shown that both systems have fallen into disuse.’

‘But what you’ve just described are excellent protocols – if there has to be a programme, that is.’

‘Sure. And that’s how it was written – in 2032, anyway. But in practical terms it must have been a nightmare. Getting signatures on all those documents – what if the ova and sperm are donated? Who has paramount rights? Who were the “parents”? That sort of thing.
With manipulated chromosomes a baby could have fifty “parents” or more. So other legislation came to predominate. Family law, for a start. For the last fifty-odd years, the official parents of an assisted-conception child have been whoever applies for the licence and accepts responsibility for the outcome. They expect success: they’re not interested in disasters. In other words, there had better not be any failures.’

‘So the mistakes are not admitted. That must mean they go down the pan.’

‘In all likelihood. Ask your friend Lisa. Legislation covering medico-ethics is biased towards her side, as a scientist. The positive assumption in law these days is that the needs of research override other considerations. The material becomes useful if a researcher wants it; if not, then it’s quicker and easier to discard it. And a lot cheaper.’

‘Money counts that much?’

‘As ever. Start loading administrative and clerical costs on to the programme and the estimates would soar.’

‘But it’s not “material”. It’s human. Never mind the parents, does
it
have any rights?’

Marius laughed unpleasantly. ‘Rights? Eggs and sperm? Embryos, foetuses, mashed up bits of RNA and DNA? That really would be impracticable. You must be joking.’

To their left the great lakes of Little Brickhill lay flat and hot in the sun. Flocks of white herons wheeled and cried. To lighten the atmosphere, Marius remarked how wise it had been of the environmentalists to insist, once the clay quarries had been exhausted, that they should be left untouched to fill with water naturally. In his view they made a splendid contrast to the tinny artificiality of Woburn.