The Death of Sleep (22 page)

"Good!" Dougal wrapped her up in an embrace that made her squeak. "I've been looking forward to exchanging stories with you."

Lars started to reproach his brother, when Melanie stepped between them.

"Dinner, boys." She gave them a look which Lunzie could only describe as significant, and led the way to the dining room.

"Melanie, I must say, you've inherited my mother's cooking arm. That was absolutely delicious," Lunzie said. She and Tee sat across from each other on either side of Dalton at one end of the long table. Lars sat at the other end and nodded paternally over the wine. "What spice was that in the carrot mousse? And the celeriac and herb soup was just delightful."

Melanie glowed at Lunzie's praise. "I usually say the recipes are a family secret but I couldn't keep them from you, could I?"

"I hope not. Truly, I'd love to take a look at your recipe file. I can offer some of my inventions in return."

"Take her up on the offer," Tee put in, gesturing with his spoon. "Do not let her change her mind, Melanie. Lunzie is a superb cook. As for me, I have been eating synthetic Fleet food for many years now, and this is like a divine blessing."

"I know what you mean, brother," Dougal said, noisily scraping the last of the spiced cheese and bean dish out onto his plate. "Depending on how long a ship is in space, the crew forget first the love they left behind them, then fresh air, then food. Between crises, I dream about good meals, especially my sister's cooking."

"Thank you, Dougal," Melanie acknowledged prettily. "It's always nice to have you home."

"I made dessert," Lona answered, getting up to clear the plates. "Is anyone ready for it yet?"

Pedder and his brothers chorused, "Yes," and sat up straight hopefully, but their mother shook her head at them. They sighed deeply, and relaxed back into their seats.

"We'll have dessert in the common room, shall we, Lona?" Melanie suggested, getting up to clear away the dishes.

"All right. Good idea," Lona agreed. "That way I can display everything artistically."

"Aw, who cares?" Corrin said rudely, pushing back. "It all gets chewed up and swallowed anyway."

"Fall into a black hole!" Lona swung at him with an empty casserole dish, but he evaded her, and fled into the common room. Lona threw a sneer after him and continued stacking plates. Lunzie automatically got up and began helping to clear away.

"Oh, no, Lunzie," Lars reproved her. "Please. You're a guest. Come with me and sit down. Let the hosts clean up. I've been waiting to hear about your adventures." He tucked Lunzie's arm under his own and propelled her into the common room.

"Dessert!" Lona called, pushing a hover-tray into the middle of the room.

The supports of the cart hung six inches above the carpet until Lona hit a control, when it lowered itself gently to the ground.

"There," Melanie hurried around the tray, setting serving utensils and stacks of napkins along the sides. "It's beautiful, darling."

Rescued from Lars's relentless interrogation, Lunzie immediately stood up to inspect the contents of the tray. Lona had prepared tiny fruit tarts in a rainbow of colors. They were arranged in a spray which was half-curled around three dishes of rich creams. "Good heavens, what gracious bounty. It looks like Carmen Miranda's hat!"

"Who?" Melanie asked blankly.

"Why, uh . . ." Lunzie had to stop herself from saying
someone your age would surely remember Carmen Miranda.
"Oh, ancient history, A woman who became famous for wearing fruit on her head. She was in the old two-D pictures that Fiona and I used to watch together."

"That's dumb," opined Pedder. "Wearing fruit on your head."

"Oh, we don't watch two-D. Flatscreen pictures don't have enough life in them," Melanie explained. "I prefer holovision every time."

"There are some great classics in two-D. I always felt it was like reading a book with pictures substituted for words," Lunzie said. "Especially the very ancient monochrome two-Ds. Easy once you get used to it."

"Oh, I see. Well, I don't read much, either. I don't have time for it," Melanie laughed lightly. "I have such a busy schedule. Here, everyone gather around, and I'll serve. Lunzie, you must try this green fruit. The toppings are sweet apricot, sour cherry, and chocolate. Lona made the pastry cream herself. It is marvelous."

The dessert was indeed delicious, and the boys made sure that leftovers wouldn't be a problem. They were looking for more when the empty cart was driven back to the food preparation room. Lona was given a round of applause by her happily sated cousins.

"Truly artistic, in every sense of the word," Dougal praised her. "That will fuel food dreams for me for the entire next tour. You're getting to be as good a cook as your grandmother."

Lona preened, looking pleased. "Thanks, Uncle Dougal."

"Oh, don't call me a grandmother," Meianie pleaded, brushing at invisible crumbs on her skirt. "It makes me feel so old."

"And think of how it would make Lunzie feel," Lars said, with more truth than tact. Lunzie shot him a sharp look, but he seemed oblivious.

"How are things at the factory?" Drew asked Lars, settling back with a glass of wine.

"Oh, the same, the same. We've got a contingent from Alien Council for Liberty and Unity protesting before the gates right now."

"The ACLU?" Drew echoed, shocked, "Can they close you down?"

"They can try. But we'll demonstrate substantial losses far beyond accounts receivable for the products, and all they can do is accept what we offer."

"What are they protesting?" Lunzie asked, alarmed.

Lars waved it away as unimportant. "They're representing the Ssli we fired last month from the underwater hydraulics assembly line. Unsuitable for the job."

"But the Ssli are a marine race. Why, what makes them unsuitable?"

"You wouldn't understand. They're too different. They don't mix well with the other employees. And there's problems in providing them with insurance. We have to buy a rider for every mobile tank they bring onto the premises to live in. And that's another thing: they live right on the factory grounds. We almost lost our insurance because of them."

"Well, they can not commute from the sea every day," Tee quipped.

"So they say." Lars dismissed the Ssli with a frown, entirely missing Tee's sarcasm. "We'll settle the matter within a few days. If they don't leave, we'll have to shut the line down entirely anyway. There's other work they can do. We've offered to extend our placement service to them."

"Oh, I see," Lunzie said, heavily. "Very generous of you." It was not so much that she thought the company should drive itself into bankruptcy for the sake of equity as that Lars seemed quite oblivious to the moral dimension of the situation.

Lars leveled a benevolent eye at her. "Why, ancestress, how good of you to say so."

Melanie and Lars's wife beamed at her approval, also entirely missing her cynical emphasis.

"Is it considered backwards to read books nowadays?" Lunzie asked Tee later when they were alone in the guest room. "I've only been on the Platform and Astris since I came out of cold sleep the first time. I haven't any idea what society at large has been doing."

"Has that been bothering you?" Tee asked, as he pulled his tunic over his head. "No. Reading has not gone out of fashion in the last number of years, nor in the years you were awake before, nor in the ones while you slept in the asteroid belt. Your relatives do not wish to expose themselves to deep thought, lest they be affected by it."

Lunzie pulled off her boots and dropped them on the floor. "What do you think of them?"

"Your relatives? Very nice. A trifle pretentious, very conservative, I would say. Conservative in every way except that they seem to have put us together in this guest room, instead of at opposite ends of the house. I'm glad they did, though. I would find it cold and lonely with only those dreary moralizers."

"Me, too. I don't know whether to say I'm delighted with them or disappointed. They show so little spirit. Everything they do has such petty motives. Shallow. Born dirtsiders, all of them."

"Except the girl, I think," Tee said, meditatively, sitting down on a fluffy seat next to the bed.

"Oh, yes, Lona. I apologize to her from afar for lumping her with the rest of these . . . these closed-minded warts on a log. She's the only one with any gumption. And I hope she shows sense and gets out of here as soon as she can."

"So should we." Tee moved over behind Lunzie and began to rub her neck.

Lunzie sighed and relaxed her spine, leaning back against his crossed legs. He circled an arm around her shoulders and kissed her hair while his other hand kneaded the muscles in her back. "I don't think I can be polite for very long. We should stay a couple of days, and then let's find an excuse to go." "As you wish," Tee offered quietly, feeling the tense cords in her back relax. "I would not mind escaping from here, either."

Lunzie tiptoed down the ramp from the sleeping rooms into the common room and the dining room. There was no sound except the far-off humming of the air-recirculation system. "Hello?" she called softly. "Melanie?"

Lona popped up the ramp from the lower level of the house. "Nope, just me. Good morning!"

"Good morning. Shouldn't you be in school?" Lunzie asked, smiling at the girl's eagerness. Lona was both pretty and lively, she looked like a throwback to Lunzie's own family, instead of a member of Melanie's conservative Alphan brood.

"No classes today," Lona explained, plumping down beside her on the couch. "I'm in a communications technology discipline, remember? Our courses are every other day, alternating with work experience either at a factory or a broadcast facility. I've got the day off."

"Good," Lunzie said, looking around. "I was wondering where everyone was."

"I'm your reception committee. Melanie's just gone shopping, and Dalton normally works at home, but he's got a meeting this morning. Where's Tee?"

"Still asleep. His circadian rhythm is set for a duty shift that begins later on."

Lona shook her head. "Please. Don't bother giving me the details. I flunked biology. I'm majoring in communications engineering. Oh, Melanie left you something to look at." Lona produced a package sealed in a black plastic pouch. Curious, Lunzie pulled open the wrapping, and discovered a plastic case with her name printed on the lid.

"They're Fiona's. She left them behind when she went away," Lona explained, peering over Lunzie's shoulder as Lunzie opened the box. It was full of two-D and three-D images on wafers.

"It's all of her baby pictures," Lunzie breathed, "and mine, too. Oh, I thought these were lost!" She picked up one, and then another, exclaiming over them happily.

"Not lost. Melanie said that Fiona brought all of that stuff to MarsBase with her. We don't know who most of these people are. Would you mind identifying them?"

"They're your ancestors, and some friends of ours from long ago. Sit down and I'll show you. Oh, Muhlah, look at that! That's me at four years of age." Lunzie peered at a small two-D image, as they sat down on the couch with the box on their knees.

"Your hair stuck out just like Gordon's does," Lona pointed out, snickering.

"His looks better," Lunzie put that picture back in the box and took out the next one. "This is my mother. She was a doctor, too. She was born in England on Old Earth, as true a
sassenach
as ever wandered the Yorkshire Dales."

"What's a
sassenach
?" Lona asked, peering at the image of the petite fair-haired woman.

"An old dialect word for a contentious Englishman. Mother was what you'd call strong-minded. She introduced me to the works of Rudyard Kipling, who has always been my favorite author."

"Did you ever get to meet him?"

Lunzie laughed. "Oh, no, child. Let's see, what is this year?"

"Sixty-four."

"Well, then, next year will be the thousandth anniversary of his birth."

Lona was impressed. "Oh. Very ancient."

"Don't let that put you off reading him," Lunzie cautioned her. "He's too good to miss out on all your life. Kipling was a wise man, and a fine writer. He wrote adventures and children's stories and poetry, but what I loved most of all was his keen way of looking at a situation and seeing the truth of it."

"I'll look for some of Kipling in the library," Lona promised. "Who's this man?" she asked, pointing.

"This is my father. He was a teacher."

"They look nice. I wish I could have known them, like I'm getting to know you."

Lunzie put an arm around Lona. "You'd have liked them. And they would have been crazy about you."

They went through the box of pictures. Lunzie lingered over pictures of Fiona as a small child, and studied the images of the girl as she grew to womanhood. There were pictures of Fiona's late mate and all the babies. Even as an infant, Lars had a solemn, self-important expression, which made them both giggle. Lona turned out the bottom compartment of the box and held out Lunzie's university diploma.

"Why is your name Lunzie Mespil, instead of just Lunzie?" Lona asked, reading the ornate characters on the plastic-coated parchment.

"What's wrong with Mespil?" Lunzie wanted to know.

Lona turned up her lips scornfully. "Surnames are barbaric. They let people judge you by your ancestry or your profession, instead of by your behavior."

"Do you want the true answer, or the one your uncle Lars would prefer?"

Lona grinned wickedly. She obviously shared Lunzie's opinion of Lars as a pompous old fogy. "What's the truth?"

"The truth is that when I was a student, I contracted to a term marriage with Sion Mespil. He was an angelically handsome charmer attending medical school at the same time I was. I loved him dearly, and I think he felt the same about me. We didn't want a permanent marriage at that time because neither of us knew where we would end up after school. I was in the mental sciences, and he was in genetics and reproductive sciences. We might go to opposite ends of the galaxy—and in fact, we did. If we had stayed together, of course, we might have made it permanent. I kept his last name and gave it to our baby, Fiona, to help her avoid marrying one of her half-brothers at some time in the future." Lunzie chuckled. "I swear Sion was majoring in gynecology just so he could deliver his own offspring. With the exception of the time we were married, I've never see a man with such an active love life in all my days."