Kethani

The Station seemed even more alien today, rearing like an inverted icicle from the moorland. I left my car in the snow and hurried inside. Director Masters ushered me into the private reception room, where I paced like something caged and contemplated the future.

It all depended, really, on Sam, on her reaction to what she had undergone on the home planet of the Kethani.

Long minutes later the sliding door sighed open and she stepped through, smiling tentatively at me.

My heart gave a kick.

She came into my arms, crying.

"Sam?" I said, and I had never feared her words so much as now.

"We have a lot to talk about," she said. "I learned so much out there."

I nodded, at a loss for words. At last I said, "Have you decided...?"

She stared into my eyes, shook her head. "Let"s get this over with," she said and, taking my arm, led me into the reception lounge before I could protest.

I endured the following hour with Sam"s family and mutual friends, and then we made our excuses and left the Onward Station. It was a short drive home across the moors, fraught with silence. More than once I almost asked whether she would remain with me on Earth.

But it was Sam who broke the silence. "Do you understand why I did it, Stuart? Why I..."

I glanced at her as I turned into the driveway. "You feared losing me?"

She nodded. "I was desperate. I... I thought that perhaps if I experienced what you were going through, then it might bring us closer together when we got back."

I braked. "And has it?"

She stared at me without replying, and said, "What about you, Stuart? Do you still love me?"

"More than ever."

Quickly she opened the door and hurried from the car.

The house was warm. I fixed coffee and we sat" in the lounge, staring out through the picture window at the vast spread of the snow-covered moorland. The sun was going down, laying gorgeous tangerine strata across the horizon. In the distance, the Onward Station scintillated in the dying light.

Sam said, "I became a different person on Kethan."

I nodded. "So did I."

"The small concerns of being human, of life on Earth, seem less important now."

I wanted to ask her if her love for me was a small concern, but was too afraid to pose the question.

"Could you remain here on Earth?" I asked.

She stood and paced to the window, hugging herself, staring out. "I don"t know. I don"t think so. Not after what I"ve learned about what"s out there. What about you?"

I was silent for a time. "Do you remember what you said all those months ago, about the Kethani taking away our ability to feel love?"

She looked at me, nodded minimally.

"Well, do you think it"s true for you?" I asked.

"I... I don"t know. What I feel for you has changed."

I wanted to ask her if I could compete with the allure of the stars. Instead I said, "I have an idea, Sam. There are plenty of vacancies for couples out there. We could explore the stars together."

Without warning she hurried from the room, alarming me.

"Sam?"

"I need time to think!" she cried from the hall. I heard the front door slam.

A minute later I saw her, bundled up in her parka and moon boots, tramping across the snow before the house, a tiny figure lost in the daunting winter wilderness.

She stopped and gazed up into the night sky.

I looked up, too, and stared in wonder.

Then, slowly, I dropped my gaze to the woman I loved. She was struggling through the deep snow, running back towards the house and waving at me.

My heart hammering, I rushed from the house to meet her.

Overhead the night was clear, and the stars were appearing in their teeming millions, a vast spread of brilliant luminosity promising the universe.

Interlude "In the first five years after the coming of the Kethani," Stuart Kingsley was saying, "the population of Earth did inevitably increase."

We were sitting in the beer garden of the Fleece and watching the sun going down over the moors in great orange and red banners; it was high summer, and the day had been blistering.

Andy Souter, the latest member of the Tuesday night group, had initiated this line of conversation by asking what the present population of the world might be. He wanted to know if any more resurrectees were staying out there to do the work of the Kethani.

Stuart went on, "Now, thirteen years later, I"d say things have reached an equilibrium. The same number come back as stay out there."

Richard Lincoln laughed. "What Stuart"s getting round to saying is that the world"s population stands at around five billion, give or take a few."

Andy said, "But that wasn"t always the case, was it?" He shrugged and mopped a strand of ginger curls from his perspiring forehead. "I mean, in the early days how did we cope with the population explosion?"

Dan Chester pointed at him. "We had help."

"Help?"

"Think about it. How could we have coped with a population growing by ten per cent every few months? How could we house these people, let alone feed them? We had help."

Andy said, "The Kethani?"

Richard nodded. "Didn"t you notice the fleet of white juggernauts coming to and going from the Onward Station all night long for years? The Kethani beamed down all the provisions we"d ever need to supply a burgeoning population."

"And now?"

"No longer necessary," Richard said.

"In fact," Stuart said, "the world"s population is undergoing a gradual decline. In a few years the place will be depopulated as citizens take to the stars..."

We sat and thought about this for a while, and then Sam asked if anyone had seen the latest computer-animated Bogart movie.

I turned to Stuart and asked if he"d thought any more about leaving Earth. After his and Sam"s resurrection, they had seriously considered the option.

He stared into his pint, then said, "It"s strange, but we had more or less decided that that"s what we were going to do. We still contemplate it, from time to time... Then," he smiled sheepishly, "then we slip back into the old routine: work, the village, friends. I don"t know, maybe one day..."

Later, I chatted to Andy Souter about his music. He was a professional cornet player with various bra.s.s bands in the area, and in demand as a session musician. He was a shy, hesitant man in his mid-thirties and had recently moved to the village to look after his ailing mother.

He was implanted, but I received the impression that, even so, he held a deep distrust of the Kethani.

That night, I remember, we chatted about how the aliens" presence on Earth-or rather how what they had done to transform the planet-had come little by little to be accepted.

We noted how even religious opposition to the gift of the Kethani mellowed over the years, as theocratic doctrine-as is the way-sought to accommodate itself to the exigencies of the modern world... or to compromise its principles.

I was to recall this conversation when, a few months later, as the scorching summer gave way to a compensatory winter of gales and snowstorms, we gained another-albeit temporary-member of the Tuesday night group. He was Father Matthew Renbourn, a Catholic priest convinced that his G.o.d still occupied His throne on high, and that the Kethani were but part of His overall grand plan...

Andy Souter came to know Matthew very well, and is the best person to relate the priest"s remarkable-some might even say unbelievable-story.

EIGHT.

MATTHEW"S Pa.s.sION I first met Matthew Renbourn in the public bar of the Fleece. He was sitting at the table beside the open fire with the rest of the Tuesday night crowd, a pint of Landlord in his hand. He was laughing at a joke that Elisabeth had just told. Okay, it wasn"t that funny a joke, but he had such a deep, appreciative laugh that everyone else was laughing too. I didn"t catch on to his true ident.i.ty at first. This wasn"t surprising: he was, in his own words, undercover. Besides, he was implanted.

It was my first Tuesday night at the Fleece for a while, and in my absence Matt had made himself a regular in the group. Now Khalid formally introduced us.

"Andy Souter. Andy plays the cornet," Khalid said. "Front row for Brighouse and Rastrick, among others. Been round the world as a session man, too. Maybe you should ask him if he"ll help you out with the orchestra."

I shrivelled inside at this introduction; but I shouldn"t have worried. Matthew was a likeable man. Maybe I should say an exceptional man.

People have a funny way of acting when they meet someone who has made a success of one of their own particular interests. Matthew was a keen amateur musician; nonetheless, he didn"t turn to me in a show of bravado or excess bonhomie as many do when they approach me in my professional capacity. Nor did he make a pretence of false modesty and engage me in sycophantic conversation. He smiled his wide, genuine smile, leaned across the table and shook my hand. "Delighted to meet you," he said.

Khalid went on, "Matthew is the priest at St. Luke"s."

Matt laughed. "I"m here undercover," and he slipped two fingers into his shirt pocket and pulled out a strip of white plastic. It took me a moment to realise what I was looking at. A dog collar.

I stared at the implant at his temple.

He smiled. "No," he said. "It"s real. Not one of those fakes you hear about."

He could see I was surprised; he was expecting it, almost looking forward to my reaction.

I don"t believe in first impressions: I think the time to make your mind up about someone is never, and although Matt Renbourn thought the same, he knew other people would disagree. He realised that he was always on show, and so he lived up to it. He liked to make an impression.

Later he told me about his "orchestra".

"Well," he smiled. "We used to have a band to accompany the Sunday service. You know, couple of guitars, violinist, kids playing flutes and clarinets. But then we found ourselves an organist, and suddenly the band felt themselves a bit surplus to requirements. My fault, I suppose, but I think you need an organ for the Gloria and so on."

I said nothing. Call me a sn.o.b, but I"ve often thought that if there is a h.e.l.l for musicians, their punishment will be to spend eternity sitting in a band such as the one Matthew just described playing, "Shine, Jesus Shine".

"Anyway," he said, sipping from his pint, "the band didn"t want to just drift along doing nothing, so we continued to meet and practice. Once you removed the "church" a.s.sociation, others wanted to join in. Things have grown from there."

"Novel," I said. "Oxenworth has never had an orchestra before."

"It"s not really an orchestra," he said, but you could hear the pride in his voice. "More a show tunes sort of band. I"m trying to arrange a series of concerts to help with the restoration fund. I"m going to schedule one for next month. Give the band something to work towards."

"Still no luck with the pianist?" Khalid asked him. He can be such a stirrer.

"Good pianists are thin on the ground," Matt said, equably.

I was tempted to volunteer. Earlier, I"d heard Khalid whisper to Matt that I was pretty handy on the piano as well as the cornet, but he didn"t presume upon me. That was one of the many nice things about Matt, I came to discover. The truly truly religious are hardly ever pushy. religious are hardly ever pushy.

The evening wore on. I had a couple more than my usual two pints, and the more I talked to Matt, the more I warmed to him. He came over as humane and genuine, and more than willing to listen to the other person"s argument.

Towards the end of the evening I asked him, "This orchestra. When are the rehearsals?"

"Every Wednesday evening." He looked at me.

"And what nights are you planning the concerts for?"

"Sundays," Matt said, face still impa.s.sive.

I nodded. "Well, I have nothing much on those days. Okay if I come along and help out?"

He gave a wide grin. "More than okay, Andrew! Welcome aboard."

If the truth be told, the orchestra was not very good, but what they lacked in talent, they made up for in Matthew Renbourn. It turned out that he was actually a fairly competent pianist himself, but that wasn"t his real strength.

There are some bandleaders who can take a group of musicians and make them play better than they have ever done before. They have a feeling for the music and a way of communicating their enthusiasm that lifts the band to a higher level.