Not, of course, that one could make it quite exact. But it was a most intriguing prospect. Weyharrow might set a useful trend.
A tap at the door: no doubt Jenny. He went to answer.
And it was, arms full of newspapers, but face downcast.
‘What’s wrong?’ he demanded. ‘Didn’t they run the story?’
‘Oh, it’s all over the front page,’ she muttered, pushing past him. ‘Questions are likely to be asked in the House – people from the Ministry of Defence are going to be hauled over the coals for wasting public money – everything I dreamed of is happening.’
‘Then what’s wrong?’ he repeated, following her into the kitchen where she dumped the papers on the table.
‘Marmaduke died in the night. Marmaduke Goodsir. I don’t suppose you met him. I did, two or three times. He was the only one of that ghastly family worth a spit in the bloody ocean. Apparently Basil and Helen got back last night and found him dead in his chair. Know what that means?’ She fixed him with a blue glare. ‘Now Basil can do what he likes – break up the library and sell it to America – turn the Court into a hotel – anything could happen! Everyone in the village who leases a house or land from the Goodsirs is scared stiff! This is awful!
Mechanically he handed her the promised cup of coffee; mechanically she accepted it and made to sip, but it was still too hot.
He said at length, ‘You know something?’
‘What?’
‘I suspect you care for Weyharrow.’
Hand on cup, she checked. After a moment’s thought she said, ‘I think you’re right. And I think you must, too.’
‘I just discovered that I do. Sit down. I’ll tell you what I’ve been thinking while you were out … Eggs and bacon? You didn’t eat anything last night.’
‘Please don’t tempt me. I’m on a diet, as usual … Oh, all right: an egg. Poached, though, not fried. Dry bread.’
‘Speaking medically, I approve.’ He hunted among the kitchen cupboards for a poacher, found one, and poured in water. Over his shoulder he said, ‘Old Mr Goodsir’s death is another part of the way the pattern’s breaking up, isn’t it? Life in a village like this must once have been very certain, very predictable, very secure. I mean there’ve been no civil wars, let alone invasions, for centuries –’
‘Invasions, yes,’ she said absently, perusing the Globe. ‘Chris the Pilgrim and his bunch.’
‘Hmm! You’re right. I hadn’t thought of it that way. But that only adds to the force of my argument.’
‘You haven’t told me what it is yet … Oh, see what Don said about you!’
He bent over her shoulder, one hand tousling her hair, and followed her pointing finger. She read aloud: ‘Dr Stephen Gloze, 28, the young GP deputizing while Weyharrow’s resident doctor is abroad, summed the matter up by saying, “I would have preferred devils because they can be exorcised, while we know of nothing that will drive this poison from our blood and bone.” Steve, that’s marvellous!’
‘He spelt my name wrong,’ Steven grunted, turning back to the stove. ‘It’s with a “v”.’
‘That’s probably the sub’s fault … Oh, you’re pulling my leg!’ She jumped up to embrace him. ‘But aren’t you proud?’
The phone rang.
‘I’ll go!’ Jenny exclaimed, and was in the hallway before he could stop her.
Let it not be a medical emergency …
It wasn’t. She was back, flushed with excitement.
‘It’s Nigel Mender! He says the rest of the council have been on the phone to him all morning, and he wants a word with you, so would you drop by the hotel at lunch-time? He says everybody he’s been talking to thinks you were wonderful last night. And – and he said …’
‘Something about you?’
She nodded, eyes bright. ‘He said that if I hadn’t thought of calling in the nationals it could have been ages before we found out about the leak from Helvambrit.’
‘Did what’s-his-name – Wallace – get his story in, too?’
‘I haven’t looked yet … What shall I say?’
Steven glanced at the kitchen clock. ‘Say one o’clock.’
‘They open at twelve –’
‘It’ll give us time to make love again and have a bath together.’
She stared at him for a long moment as though unable to believe her ears. Then she grinned enormously and dashed back into the hall.
As he set her breakfast before her a minute later, he said in a musing tone, ‘Squire and parson … Doctor and reporter could make a bloody sensible replacement.’
‘What?’ She glanced up, uncomprehending.
‘Just something that’s been going through my mind. I’ll explain later. Eat up.’
‘Okay.’
When he did get around to explaining, on the way to the hotel, she listened intently and at last gave a firm nod.
‘You’re right, of course. There’s only one thing I don’t like about it.’
‘What?’
‘I’ve never been the sort of person who wanted to take charge.’
‘Nor have I. I never wanted to be a consultant, or head of a teaching department. I want to be a country GP, that’s all … But you want to be a Fleet Street reporter.’
‘Not any more. Like I said, I don’t have the right antennae. I found that out last night. What I want to be is what’s most badly needed.’
‘Say it.’ He squeezed her hand.
‘A communicator. A link between a place like this and everywhere else. So that what happens there won’t be so awful in the future, and what happens here won’t ever again become a national scandal.’
‘Let’s say that to Nigel and the other councillors. If they understand what we’re driving at, we’re in.’
‘Agreed.’
Contentedly, she linked one arm with his. With her other hand she waved at Stick and Sheila, emerging from the Marriage after a Sunday noontide drink. Stick excused himself and came rushing over.
‘You heard about Marmaduke?’
‘Yes!’ Jenny’s sunny mood clouded again. ‘Isn’t it awful? When one thinks of what Basil may do now –’
‘That’s it! He can’t! Cedric was here a while ago and told us!’
Both Steven and Jenny blinked at him; Steven said, ‘What do you mean?’
‘The estate’s been left in trust to him! Basil and Helen can go on living at the Court, but they can’t sell anything – the library, the house, the land – without squandering a fortune in lawyers’ fees to challenge Marmaduke’s will! That’s what he’s claiming, anyhow.’
‘Oh, wow,’ Steven whispered. ‘I hope that’s true!’
‘So do I!’ said Jenny fervently.
‘It isn’t going to be much fun for Ced,’ Stick observed. ‘I mean, living with those bastards that he has for parents and all the time bombarded with demands to gimme, gimme – as though they were the kids and he the daddy! But you know something?’
He fixed them with a serious gaze under his bushy eyebrows.
‘If anything can make that guy grow up, this’ll be it. And there are more people on his side than he imagines … Well, I best get home. I promised Sheila and the kids a special lunch and left it in the oven. Au revoir!’
All of a sudden Weyharrow felt like not too bad a place to be.
Though something would have to be done, eventually, about the distinction between the patrons of the pub and those of the hotel …
Time enough for that, though. Time enough, if in the world of the information explosion enough people could be told often enough about the horrors being conceived beyond their personal horizon, and learn to stand up and shout aloud, ‘You stop that! Stop it now! And that means NOW!’
Postlude
Later, the weather at Weyharrow turned cold again. In Wearystale Flat Sheila complained to Stick about the way he left wide open the windows that overlooked the Chap. She was shivering, she said; so were the kids.
Sighing, resigned, he closed
out the dense autumn mist that was gathering along the valley.
‘Shame …’ he murmured into his beard.
‘What do you mean?’ Sheila demanded.
‘They say there aren’t going to be any more leaks.’
‘You think that’s a shame?’
‘Well, it was cheaper than pot, wasn’t it? No trouble about growing it. No hassles with the fuzz, either!’
Sheila erupted into a noise between a giggle and a gurgle; she was in bed, sipping a mug of Ovaltine.
‘Stick, how often do I have to tell you? Don’t make me laugh while I’m eating – I mean drinking!’
‘Ah, it’s because I plan to do away with you and wreak my wicked will on your two lovely albeit not-yet-nubile daughters!’
His boots he had already kicked aside; now he peeled off his sweater. He was pushing down his jeans when he realized Sheila was staring at him strangely.
‘Did you say “daughters”?’
‘Sam and Hilary, who else?’
‘Daughters?’ She set her empty mug aside.
‘Yes, of course!’
‘But Hilary and Sam are boys … Stick, how much have you been smoking lately?’
He only grinned at her, and scrambled into bed. As she turned her mouth up to greet his, he thought: No more leaks, hmm? You could have fooled me!
I wonder what tomorrow has in store!
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Also by John Brunner
A Maze of Stars
A Planet of Your Own
Age of Miracles
Bedlam Planet
Born Under Mars
Castaways’ World
Catch a Falling Star
Children of the Thunder
Double, Double
Enigma from Tantalus
Galactic Storm
Give Warning to the World
I Speak for Earth
Into the Slave Nebula
Manshape
Meeting at Infinity
More Things in Heaven
Muddle Earth
Players at the Game of People
Polymath
Quicksand
Sanctuary in the Sky
Stand on Zanzibar
Telepathist
The Atlantic Abomination
The (Compleat) Traveler in Black
The Altar on Asconel
The Avengers of Carrig
The Brink
The Crucible of Time
The Dramaturges of Yan
The Dreaming Earth
The Gaudy Shadows
The Infinitive of Go
The Jagged Orbit
The Ladder in the Sky
The Long Result
The Martian Sphinx
The Productions of Time
The Psionic Menace
The Repairmen of Cyclops
The Rites of Ohe
The Sheep Look Up
The Shift key
The Shockwave Riders
The Skynappers
The Space–Time Juggler
The Squares of the City
The Stardroppers
The Stone That Never Came Down
The Super Barbarians
The Tides of Time
The World Swappers
The Wrong End of Time
Threshold of Eternity
Times Without Number
Timescoop
To Conquer Chaos
Total Eclipse
Web of Everywhere
John Brunner (1934–1995) was a prolific British SF writer. In 1951, he published his first novel, Galactic Storm, at the age of just 17, and went on to write dozens of novels under his own and various house names until his death in 1995 at the Glasgow Worldcon. He won the Hugo Award and the British Science Fiction Award for Stand on Zanzibar (a regular contender for the ‘best SF novel of all time’) and the British Science Fiction Award for The Jagged Orbit.
Copyright
A Gollancz eBook
Copyright © John Brunner 1987
All rights reserved.
The right of John Brunner to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in Great Britain in 1987
This eBook first published in 2011 by Gollancz
The Orion Publishing Group Ltd
Orion House
5 Upper Saint Martin’s Lane
London, WC2H 9EA
An Hachette UK Company.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978 0 575 10172 2
All characters and events in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor to be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
www.orionbooks.co.uk
John Brunner, The Shift Key
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