The Grasshopper's Child (8 page)

‘Please. I'll make fresh tea.'

Heidi wiped up Tallis's tea, collected the mug-fragments and filled two more mugs.

‘What weather,' said Mrs Healey, looking around. ‘You've been working hard, I can see. And just when we thought that awful winter was over. When are we ever going to have a normal Spring again, do you think? You must want to know lots of things. Fire away.'

‘How do I pay for stuff, the vegetables and everything?' said Heidi at once. ‘I'm new to this. Am I supposed to ask them for housekeeping?'

Mrs Healey looked shocked. ‘Goodness, no! You don't
pay
. We do things differently in Mehilhoc, we don't use money. The Carron-Knowells are splendid, and we just share and share alike, everyone mucks in.
Oh,
but I don't mean
you
. I mean, I hope you'll consider coming along to the vegetable sorting at Knowells Farm, to meet everyone, but you're not expected to
do
anything.
Whatever
you need, add it to the Garden House List. Oh, what am I thinking? Is there anything right now? Personal things, toiletries, er, tampons?'

Heidi needed clothes. The purple suitcase had not yet turned up. She needed socks, underwear, jumpers. But she was too ashamed: she couldn't make herself say it.

‘Not really, thanks. I won't need tampons. They give you a long-term contraceptive injection at the Indentured Teens Facility. It stops your periods too. '

‘Oh!' Brooklyn's mum swallowed tea as if it hurt her throat. ‘Heidi, I'm
so
sorry. I just don't know what to say. The way you've ended up here, it's so awful.'

‘I'm fine. What's the Garden House List? I don't know what you mean.'

Mrs Healey frowned. ‘You're registered on the WiMax now, aren't you?'

‘I think so. I can't really tell, as I haven't had any calls or messages.'

‘No messages? Well, that isn't right! Let me see your phone.'

Heidi handed it over. Mrs Healey put on her reading glasses, flicked and tweaked like a pro, and finally sighed in relief. ‘Ah, just a step missed in the activation. Here you are. You have mail! Your access to the Garden House domain, my invitation to the vegetable sorting, and I don't know what else—'

The kitchen was warmer and brighter, when Heidi looked up from the little screen. The roots and greens in the vegetable box actually glowed.

‘Thanks. That's
great
Mrs Healey. I'll be happy to come to the veg sorting; I'd like to pull my weight. As long as it's okay with Tallis. Who looked after them before?'

‘Please call me Rose. I suppose it was me. I wouldn't say Tallis and I were friends, but I did what I could, and, well, I noticed things were getting beyond a joke. Poor woman, she's only seventy or so. She was always eccentric. Had some kind of arty career in London, before she came back here, but I don't know about that. Anyway, her mind had started to go. Something had to be done.'

So it was you, thought Heidi. You grassed on her,
that's
why she hates you. You told someone she needed help, and Angel Care sent me.
You
are the actual reason I'm here.

Mrs Healey was welling up, brown eyes swimming. ‘I'm so sorry, Heidi. How could I have known? Truly, I
never
thought they'd send a fifteen year old girl!'

‘It's all right, honestly. What about the brother, Roger?'

‘Oh, Roger. He used to be an artist, long ago. I'd stay out of his way, if I were you.'

‘I do,' said Heidi. ‘Is it true their father burned their house down?'

‘I'm afraid so! Florian, that's Mr Maylock senior, was a real “wild child” of the Sixties. A hopeless alcoholic by the end. Or so they say: it was before we came here.' Mrs Healey hesitated. ‘You've noticed the steel door in the basement stairwell? Well, there used to be an underground passage. For smuggling, or something to do with the French Revolution; I don't really know. It had to be blocked up after the fire, it's very dangerous. Don't try to explore anything like that, will you?'

‘I won't.'

‘Heidi, I have to get on. This snow! I'll pick you up in the van on sorting day, but I'm sure we'll be in touch before that. And if there's
anything
, give me a call, day or night—'

After lunch she ran to the village, her phone glowing in her pocket. The Inspector had come through. He needed a biometric signature for the travel warrant, and to hell with wet feet, Heidi
could not
wait. The Learning Centre hummed with activity. Primary kids buzzed in a classroom; a chorus of nursery voices could be heard, belting out ‘The Three Gos'. But Heidi's nerves had vanished. She didn't bat an eye when the man behind the Reception desk looked at her curiously. She just said
Hi,
and walked right into the Access Booth.

This time a woman's avatar came into the virtual room, and sat beside the Inspector at the blue table. She explained who she was; what a transient biometric scan was; that it was completely harmless and would be destroyed after use. Heidi pretended to look at the terms and conditions: gave her consent and the scan was taken. Nobody waved a wand around, she didn't walk through a gate: she didn't have to move from where she was. Weird to think that this was such a big deal at home, and people were outraged and terrified—

It depends what you need, she thought. If you
need
it, you'll put up with anything.

‘Funny you ended up in Mehilhoc,' remarked the Inspector, as they waited for the confirmation. ‘It's a special sort of place, I hear. What d'you make of the set-up?'

‘It seems like a bit of a rich hippies' private manor,' said Heidi, shrugging. ‘They rule the roost, but they share the wealth and all that, so I suppose it's fine.'

‘Mm, I see. How does this “sharing the wealth” work?'

“Oh, I dunno. Just, they organise stuff, and look after their own, I suppose.'

‘Interesting.'

In the crisp afternoon she ran joyfully uphill, and made another attempt to reach the towering Sequoia.
Again
it managed to vanish, so she ran to the knoll at the end of the ridge instead, to visit
The Magic Vistas Panorama
. The views of the Gardens weren't much: too many wind-sown young trees had sprung up. She could barely make out the roof and chimneys of the Garden House; gingerbread gables like surprised eyebrows. One of the high windows must be her own. She felt like waving to the Bad Dream Cat: but she couldn't quite figure out which. And there was the Sequoia, of course. She liked the sound of that word, the way it flowed:
se-quoi-a
. But you couldn't put it in a poem, unless you had a good reason. It was too different. I won't chase you anymore, she thought. One day I'll just
find
you, and something marvellous will happen—

The best vistas were far off in the distance: the dark river winding through snow; the village of Mehilhoc all tiny, and the white-iced spurs of cliff-tops that must hide the sea. A spiky blot on one of the spurs puzzled her. It looked as if the villagers had been building a monster bonfire. Maybe they have human sacrifices, she thought. Maybe Gorgeous George has to slice up a maiden with a golden knife every Beltane, to make the crops grow.

If Brooklyn's mum is going be nearly crying, and telling me she's
so sorry
, a hundred times a minute, whenever she sees me, I just hope I don't have meet her very often.

I am a stranger in a place

Of horror and secrets

Sequoia is my guardian

From the grey-eyed prince's knife. . .

Rubbish.
Grey-eyed prince
, bleggh. Get out of my head, Gorgeous George! She was going to see Mum, and that made everything okay. Common sense whispered in her ear:
the police
never do you a favour for nothing, what does he want?
But she didn't care.

The sun had gone in. She ran again, until she spotted the Painted Dragon: first time since the day she found the Door in the Wall. Her feet couldn't get more cold or wet, and she had time to spare, so she decided to check it out. She scrambled through undergrowth, down to the wall under that roof, and followed it through snowy thickets to the front of an enclosure. It genuinely was a dragon, not a weird-shaped branch. It pranced along a tiled roof, glaring at her. The tiles were green; except where they'd vanished. She'd found another Temple, like the Temple of the Dead Cats, but Chinese-style. A shallow flight of steps, white and spotless, led up to a gateless gate.

The snow had melted, or been blown away, from the courtyard inside. She crossed it, looked into a dark doorway, and immediately saw the boy called Clancy sitting on a stone platform: watching her from under his hood.

‘Hallo, Hooded Boy,' said Heidi. ‘You must have heard me crashing about.'

‘I did. I've seen you passing before, on your flying way. Is that what you do, in the real world? You're a teen athletics star?'

‘Nothing like. I never ran except for a bus, until I came here. I don't know why I started, but it's good exercise Are you living in here?'

She could see a drab-coloured one-man tent behind him; the kind you inflate.

‘Should I have asked your permission?'

‘Not me, my owners. I wouldn't bother. Isn't it too cold to sleep out?'

‘Nah. My bivvy's a Five Season, and I can have a fire in here if I'm careful.'

‘You swept away the snow in the courtyard so you wouldn't leave footprints, I get it. How do you manage the steps?'

The hooded boy shrugged. ‘Does it matter? I like being left alone. Got some issues.'

Heidi nodded politely. She thought she knew what was on the form he'd shown to Tanya, and she was not impressed. Mental Health Issues: it had to be, from that
special
look Tanya gave him. The Hooded Boy had a toff's accent. His family must have fixed it, which Heidi thought was completely stupid. How could a few years of farm work be worse than having MHI on your file for life? But it wasn't her business.

‘Okay then. I'll be off.'

‘No, stay: you're all right. What's it like, being Indentured?'

Heidi sat cross-legged on the pavement. ‘Not bad. I have a roof over my head. Flush toilet, hot water a few flights of stairs away; three meals a day. It's a weird deal though. The Gardens all gone to ruin, when you'd think they'd be in Food Production. And Tallis and Roger, my owners, are pretty strange. They're not
really
old, or helpless, but they dress like beggars, never go out, never get calls. Except Brooklyn's mum turned up today—'

‘Brooklyn is the very thin girl with the hat?'

‘Yeah. I thought she was anorexic but it's heart. Her mum delivers supplies. She said she was going to explain everything. She didn't, but I think I'm getting the idea. It's Roger, the brother. I've a feeling he's been in trouble. I think he might be on a long-term tag.'

‘You're living with a dangerous criminal. Terrific.'

Heidi was trying not to worry about the face that had looked into her room. What was the point? There was nothing she could do. Verruca had given her fair warning: she'd get no protection from Angel Care.

She shrugged. ‘I'm not bothered. Tallis keeps him out of my way.
She's
supposed to have moderate vascular dementia, but I don't know. She's not like a normal confused person. She doesn't repeat herself, she's sharp as often as she's crazy and she doesn't move or act the way people with dementia do. You know: that
where am I
look—'

‘What do you mean
, normal
? Dementia isn't normal.'

‘Well, not now. But the Elders we're assigned are likely to be too old to have benefited from the treatments, so if they do have dementia, they're stuck with it. That's why everyone gets taught about it, in
Sharing the Care One
. You must have done
Sharing the Care One?
'

‘Nah, I'm faking it. What's it to you? My old dear's definitely demented. She doesn't even know her own name.'

‘Does she have family?'

‘A daughter who disappeared in the Occupation, with her husband and kids. And a son who's not interested.
No contact
, it says on the form.'

‘Try talking about the past. Get her to look at old photos. Normal dementia can't attack old memories, only stops you forming new ones. She probably remembers lots of things.'

‘I'll make a point of asking her. The first mobile phones, the kind you had to pull after you on a cart. The Cuban Missiles.'

‘The Vietnam War. The Birth of the Internet.'

Clancy smiled under the hood, and shook his head. ‘Wild. What about that time in the Crisis, when there was no internet and no phones for years?'

‘I don't remember, I was too young . . . I think my mum and dad kind of liked it.'

‘What about the Occupation. D'you remember that at all?'