The Machine's Child (Company) (33 page)

This is it, lads,
the Captain said.
BTM 417, same as afore. Quick now.

“Wait here with the horses, love,” said Nicholas, dismounting and handing Mendoza the reins. “I’ll not be long.”

“All right,” she said, looking uneasily out through the black trunks to the sunlit world beyond that wood.

He kissed her hand and went to the door, which opened easily at his touch.

Nicholas found himself looking down a stone corridor much like the one on Santa Catalina Island, clean and dry, lined with drawers. Not far in was one drawer with his file designation on it. Holding his breath, he opened it.

Whew.
Alec relaxed.
No skeleton, anyway. What are those things?

Don’t touch ’em, lads!
The Captain was referring to a pair of containers of roughly four-liter size, of ceramic or opaque glass.
They’re tissue specimen jars. They’ll go transparent for viewing, if they’re handled.

Ugh!
Alec yelled silently, as comprehension hit him.
One of those must have Edward’s—

Shut your damned mouth,
Edward said.

But, then, what’s in the other—

You don’t need to see it. Let’s just say that things don’t burn down to a nice anonymous pile of ashes in a country where the wood’s always wet.

Nicholas shuddered.

Not so easy to be objective about your own mortal remains, is it?
said Edward tightly.
No psalm for the occasion, brother Nicholas? No heartening words about the sea giving up her dead on the Last Day? Do you suppose what’s in those jars will be made incorruptible? But I daresay the Company’s already made certain it’s well preserved.

That’ll do, Edward.

I merely point out—hello, what’s this?
said Edward, taking control to reach deeper into the drawer. He pulled out a third and smaller jar.

A little chime sounded and a quiet unhuman voice announced: “PROJECT
ADONAI,
THIRD SEQUENCE ORGANIC RESIDUE.” The opaque sides of the jar cleared, to reveal several small objects floating in transparent preservative.

They appeared to be a clump of dun-colored hair, one whole tooth and broken pieces of at least three others, and an ear.

Alec gasped.

Here now! Don’t go all green, laddie, it’s only cloned stuff. When you was in the infirmary after yer accident, I made some bits and pieces to scatter about in the shuttle afore I sunk it in forty fathoms. These scraps fooled ’em into thinking you was killed in the crash, until we could raid them lubbers in Albany Crescent.

But what’s it doing back here in 1600?
Alec asked.

Standard Company procedure, son. The more secret Secret Material is, the further back in the past they hides it.

You . . . cloned this? Cloned, is that the word?
Edward peered into the jar.
You made an ear? Might you make a whole body as easily?

No, and we ain’t got time to go into why now. Look. Be there more of them plaquettes?

Just a couple,
Alec said doubtfully.
Do we take ’em?

If that’s all there is, aye. Maybe there’ll be clues in them like there was in the others.

They stashed the plaquettes, which framed rather nasty-looking bits of things nobody wanted to examine particularly, in Nicholas’s belt pouch, and hurried out to where Mendoza waited with the horses.

“Any luck?” she said, waiting to hear whether he’d slip back over to Victorian or Transatlantic idiom again.

“Small luck, but belike we’ll have better,” Nicholas told her, swinging up into the saddle. He leaned over to kiss her. “Let’s to sea again, love.”

They rode back the way they’d come, into Stratford. Edward craned his neck longingly, peering into Chapel Lane.

There’s New Place!
he said.
Good God, that’s the Bard of Avon’s own house. Mightn’t we at least ride close to see it?

Can’t we, Captain sir?
Alec asked.
It means a lot to him.

Edward glared at Alec in embarrassment. Nicholas shrugged and urged his horse into the lane.

“This house would be his that wrote the fairy play?” Nicholas asked, pointing. “Shakespeare, was it not?”

“Is it?” Mendoza looked up, interested. “Nice garden.”

The property in question took up most of a long deep lot, with the splendid brick-and-timber house away at the end of it, fronting Chapel Street. Over the wall that enclosed the yard, they could see orchards and a couple of barns. Roses climbed the walls of the distant house, waving toward its plentiful chimneys. Espaliered fruit trees could be glimpsed against the far walls. Vines arched over a long pergola, shading the central walk. There was a strong fragrance of honeysuckle, and sweet herbs, and flowering privet.

Here’s flowers for you,
quoted Edward reverently,
hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram, The marigold, that goes to bed wi’ th’ sun, And with him rises, weeping—

Alec and Nicholas looked at him in disbelief.

“Look at that formal knotwork,” said Mendoza in awe, urging her horse closer. “Look at the
Lavandula spica
!”

Mightn’t we ask to see the garden?
Edward implored.
There might be a servant home, and if we paid—

“Beautiful box hedges, too,” Mendoza added, leaning on the top of the wall to see better.

“I thank you kindly, madam,” said someone, standing up more or less under her nose. He had apparently been kneeling on the walk just the other side of the wall, weeding.

“Oh,” said Mendoza, abashed.

Hey!
Alec exclaimed in delight. Edward gasped, peering over the wall.

Nicholas, seeing Mendoza’s discomfiture, rode close and looked down at the man who stood there, regarding Mendoza with an expression of mild annoyance as he rubbed dirt from his hands. He was a neatly made fellow of average height, with a receding hairline and a trim beard, and handsome regular features. The only thing remarkable about him was his eyes, which had an unnervingly piercing stare. Altogether he looked like nothing so much as the lead singer for Jethro Tull.

“I cry thee mercy, goodman,” said Nicholas politely. “Art thou the gardener here?”

No, you idiot!
groaned Edward.

That’s, er,
him
actually—
Alec said.

“—Or are you the master of the house and a gentleman, as clearly your bearing and countenance do proclaim?” Nicholas revised in haste.

“This is my house, sir, and my garden,” Shakespeare said with some asperity.

“It is a marvelous garden, sir, truly,” Mendoza said. “The lavender knots, particularly. And the, er, roses.”

“Mm,” said Shakespeare.

“I, myself, have had but ill luck with my lavender in all this English rain,” Mendoza temporized, blushing. “I do protest, sir, I have never seen any so fine as this of yours. I pray you excuse the rudeness of our too-open regard! We meant no unmannerly behavior.”

“Well,” said Shakespeare, looking a little mollified.

“But as for the lavender, kind sir, I must ask! How have you such abundance to make knots wherewith, and in this shrewd air?” Mendoza babbled. “You never grew them from seed? Hell itself may freeze over before the knavish things will sprout, and yet I can get no cuttings of mine to live.”

Wow, she’s good at lying,
Alec said in awe.
Company training, huh?

Shakespeare, meanwhile, was looking smug.

“I pray you, lady, did you root them in sand?”

“Certes, as who would not?” Mendoza said. “Grow cuttings in clay or loam? It is impossible.”

“Ay, ay, so it is, lady,” said Shakespeare, stroking his beard craftily. “Pray, took you cuts from the wood of the said lavender?”

Mendoza hesitated a moment. “Well—” she said, wondering why she’d blurted out spontaneous prevarication.

Good God,
Edward said in anguish,
this is the foremost poet of the English tongue, and is she going to spend the whole damned time talking about lavender?

“Ah!” said Shakespeare. “There your error lies. They must be little and new shoots, lady, not old wood that hath lost the vigor of youth.”

“Is it even so?” said Mendoza, smiting her forehead with the palm of her hand. “And I have been cutting the old wood all this weary time! Truly, sir, you are master over me.”

Shakespeare arched one eyebrow at that, as Nicholas put out a hand.

“Peace, wife,” he said, trying not to giggle. “I would inquire, patient sir, whether you are not Shakespeare the poet?”

Shakespeare threw him an oddly furtive look. “I am that he, sir,” he admitted.

“Oh, sir, your
Rape of Lucrece
!” Mendoza said, attempting to make a good impression. “We bought us two copies i’Paul’s churchyard and read them to tatters, did we not, husband? And your
Venus and Adonis,
too.”

“So we did,” Nicholas agreed cautiously. Shakespeare looked rather gratified at that.

“Why, I am glad they pleased,” he said. “I have another in hand, to speak truth. More matter of Ovid: Actaeon his outrage ’gainst the goddess Diana, lewdly observed in her bath, and his transformation thereafter to a hart.”

Edward muttered an oath of surprise. Nicholas looked intrigued.

“Diana in her bath?” he said. “Naked-pale as the watery moon? Now, there’s matter that will speed, surely.”

“Ay, with the gallants at Court,” Shakespeare said, grinning. “You see how it will be, sir, much Rhyme Royal treating of fair wet bub—well!” He broke off, looking sidelong at Mendoza. “But peradventure you shall read, sir, an you apply to Master Field again, a year hence.”

“H’m! Peradventure I shall,” said Nicholas. “Well, then, Master Shakespeare, for your forbearance I do thank you humbly. Truly the garden is a poem, and each poem severally a garden of divers delights. Let us on, wife, and use no more of this fair gentleman’s time.”

NOOO,
screamed Edward in silence.
For God’s sake, can’t we even get a photograph?

Captain, can you take an image with the remote cam?
Alec said, watching Edward in uneasy concern.

Oh, bloody Hell. Nicholas, turn and point out the hawk.

And the hawk-remote swept in low, as Nicholas pointed to it and said:

“Marry, she stoops! I hope you have no chickens at hazard, sir.”

“Oh, fie,” said Shakespeare, frowning up at the camera, and so his image was captured: prosperous gentleman with slightly muddy knees, staring up indignantly from his side of the garden wall, with the Elizabethan gallant and his lady staring up, too, posing for the camera on their side of the wall.

“Whose should that be but one of Greville’s again?” Shakespeare muttered. “I’ll get me a fowling-piece, and see how he liketh hawk pie.”

“Truly it is a shame, the way folk will let their birds range unmewed,” said Nicholas sympathetically. “Well, we must away. Bid Master Shakespeare good-day, wife.”

“Good-day, Master Shakespeare,” said Mendoza.

“And to you, little madam,” Shakespeare said, smiling at her. His remarkable eyes widened as an idea occurred to him, and he held up a hand. “But stay you, now. Here’s an herb for you, lady, this same sweet lavender.” He scooped up one of several small clay pots containing live cuttings and handed it over the wall. “An it live it’ll be a goodly bush in a year’s time; and, remember you, it is the young wood that hath the life in it.”

Mendoza accepted it, wide-eyed. “I do thank you, gentle sir.”

“Y’are most welcome, lady,” he said, and returned to his weeding as they rode away.

“God, that was embarrassing,” said Mendoza. “What possessed me to come up with all that plausible incidental detail? Was that something we used to do for the Company?”

“Ay,” said Nicholas, with just a trace of smugness. “Thou wert a most complete, excellent, and perfect liar.”

You damned fool,
said Edward as he ran along at Nicholas’s stirrup.
Do you know how many generations yet unborn would pay fortunes even to have a glimpse of that man, let alone five minutes’ conversation, and you wasted my chance to ask even one question about his plays?

Tush! We’d vexed him enough, spying into his garden without his leave,
Nicholas told him.
Should I have insulted the fellow further by reminding him he’d been a common player?

THAT EVENING, OFF SKEGNESS, 1600
AD

At least we’ve the damned lavender bush for a souvenir, even if the rest of the job was an utter failure,
Edward said dully, watching from across the saloon as Mendoza fastened the repotted slip into a newly installed solarium window. Nicholas, who had control and was using it to read
Venus and Adonis,
ignored him.

Now, that ain’t rightly true, begging yer pardon. It looks like there’s a power of data in them new plaquettes.

Well, bravo,
said Edward.
Perhaps they’ll send us racing off on yet another chase across Time, for a few more pathetic fragments. What a prize.

Belay the sarcasm, swabbie.

We could go on another supermarket expedition,
said Alec.
More beef chops and brandy? That’d be fun, wouldn’t it?

Endless jollity,
drawled Edward. He cocked an eye at the nearest of the Captain’s cameras.
And yet, I must admit I was intrigued by something. Those scraps of Alec you made, Captain; explain to me, if you please, why it was within your power to make an ear but not a whole body.

Why, lad, a tooth or an ear ain’t got to think, do they? And those bits didn’t even have to live. All they had to do was look real. It didn’t matter that they was cloned from Alec’s thirty-year-old DNA with its chain errors. But if I tried to clone a whole body from Alec now, hell! Even if it could be managed, and I ain’t saying it could, all you’d get would be a baby. A sick one, at that, as wouldn’t live more’n ten years or so.