Box no . . .
He had swept into her laboratory in the middle of the afternoon waving it delightedly above his head, ruining an experiment, unrepentant even when she snapped at him.
“Hang the experiment, Kate. Look at this.” He stood about the same height as she did, and his hair was still dark. He looked like a schoolboy on a lark, brown eyes twinkling, broad fingers drumming excitedly on the august page.
“What is it, Jon?”
“This ad. Just the job for you!” The grin was just too broad, the argument just too convincing. “I mean it’s your speciality, isn’t it? The experiment I’ve just ruined is to test the effect of extreme cold on Protococcales isn’t it?”
“Of course it is. You know . . .”
“Well then. This chap’s doing it in the field. Much better than all this.” He gestured, knocking over a stack of computer programme cards.
“Jon! Be careful!”
“Hang it all Kate, you’ve got to apply!”
“But why?”
Again, smiling evasion. “Well, it’ll be such good experience for you . . .”
“Jon. I smell a rat somewhere here. What are you up to?”
“Well . . .”
“Jon . . .”
And he had told her. The botanist in question was her father.
At first it had completely taken her breath away, and numbed her in the strangest way. Then, suddenly, there was an excitement in her which would not be controlled. Adventure. She had felt her face flushing, her scalp and spine prickling with it. And Jon outlined his plan.
She would apply for the job under the pseudonym of Elizabeth Edwards. Only the name would be false: the facts of her life and education, the recommendations by himself and Professor Brownlow would be real. She would get the job. She could not fail to get the job. And she would see her father, would work – actually work! – with that shadowy figure she had worshipped from afar and sought to impress for so long.
In a haze of excitement she had written a plain letter and appended to it recommendations from Jon and the professor which had brought a blush to her cheeks. With only a little trepidation she had sailed through an interview, charming three crusty old company scientists out of the full realisation that she knew far more than they did about the answers to the questions they asked.
And finally, beginning to be really frightened at last, she had packed her practical suitcase full of sensible clothes while Jon sat on the end of her bed and tried to calm her fears. The questions then were the same as those now. What if he doesn’t want me? What if he’s angry? What if there’s no one to meet me? What if there is?
Her mouth was dry. She shifted uneasily. The book slid unnoticed to the floor. A wing of hair slipped free of her severe style and shyly revealed a wave.
What I shall do, she decided, as sleep finally claimed her, will be to run across the disembarkation hall to him as though it were the graveyard and I were still fourteen. And hope he recognises me this time.
ii
At first she thought they were part of a dream, the giant and the dwarf. They loomed beside her in the gloom of her semiconsciousness and spoke with familiar accents.
“OK Job?” asked the giant. He pronounced it to rhyme with robe.
And Job the dwarf said, “OK.”
Kate stirred a little and sighed. The giant said, “Shhh. You’ll wake her.” He crouched at her side for a moment, and she felt something moving on her lap.
“Hey . . .” she said, and sat up straight. Even though he was kneeling beside her, the giant’s eyes were a little above her own. They were green, she noticed. Her hands flew to her lap, and struck against her book.
“It had fallen on to the floor,” said the giant. His voice was very deep. He spoke with an English accent.
“Oh,” she said, confused, still not properly awake. “Thank you.”
Then the stewardess bustled up, all blue uniform, lacquered hair and brisk efficiency. “Would you take your seat please, sir? We’re about to take off.”
The giant stood up, stooping slightly as though his head were near the roof, and went just behind her. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the dwarf Job put down the three bags he had been carrying, and reach up to help the English giant out of his overcoat. Her lip curled. A man that size needing to be helped out of his overcoat. Too important to carry his own bag. Probably worried about spoiling his expensive black kid gloves.
The plane gave a slight lurch, and Kate realised it had been stationary. This must have been Washington. The plane went from New York to Washington to Chicago, and to Anchorage. The engines whined, the plane picked up speed, began to lift.
Behind her, the dwarf Job’s voice began to whisper. She strained to hear. “I heard a voice from Heaven, saying unto me, ‘From henceforth write blessed are the dead which die in the Lord: even so saith the Spirit; for they rest from their labours!’ ” There were elements in his accent she could not place. He spoke with fervour and absolute belief. The words sounded like a piece out of the Bible, but not like a prayer. She wondered why he had said them, and a tickle of fear ran in her as the big 747 banked away over Washington.
Kate opened the well-thumbed book and began to re-read her father’s lucid descriptions of what happens to single-cell plants under Arctic ice. As always, she become engrossed in it quickly, and time ceased to exist until suddenly some corner of her mind alerted her to the quiet conversation behind her.
“Are you sure you’re ready for this? You’re not too rusty?”
“Job, Job. If I didn’t think I was ready I wouldn’t have taken it.”
“Yes, but to be out there again . . .”
“It won’t be that bad. It’s only for a while. A few weeks. I’m letting myself in easy. There’ll be no mistakes this time. And even if there are, no one will . . .”
“Die,” said Job. “This time no one will die.”
“Not so loud for heaven’s sake,” hissed the giant. “No need for the whole world to know.”
“Need for one or two to know,” said Job. “Does Warren know?”
Kate’s heart gave a terrible lurch at the sound of her father’s name. She felt sick.
Job repeated, “Does Warren know?”
“Warren knows,” said the giant.
“About all of them?”
“He’ll have been given a full report.”
“Perhaps,” said Job. “And what if he’s passed it around?”
“I can take care of it. I can take care of Warren, and whoever else knows.”
They lapsed into silence. The stewardess came by and they ordered drinks. Kate listened avidly, but they didn’t mention her father’s name again.
After a while she wiped her palms on her skirt and they stayed dry. Her heart stopped thumping. Her breathing returned to normal.
Nobody got on at Chicago, and as they rose above the Windy City, everyone seemed to settle back at once for the long night flight to Anchorage. There was a movie, but Kate didn’t watch it. Her mind was a confusion of thoughts, emotions and fears. What would her father say? Would he send her back? Where was his camp? Who else would be there? What were the two men behind her talking about? Who had died? What did the giant want with her father? Her hopes and fears went round and round until they became soporific. Just before she fell asleep, she heard the voice of the dwarf Job as he composed himself for sleep. He said:
“God be in my head And in my understanding;
God be in my eyes And in my looking;
God be in my mouth And in my speaking;
God be in my heart And in my thinking;
God be at mine end And at my departing.”
And the cabin lights went dim, as though God had heard that the strange little man was ready for sleep, and had acted accordingly. The dusk quietened voices; the other passengers set their seats far back, took blankets from the stewardesses, and allowed the blue gloom to wash over them like a drug. The whine of the engines grew a little louder, reassuring, battling gravity on their behalf.
Over in one corner, lights burned over a table where four figures sat hunched over the sounds of plastic-coated playing cards, the rustle of paper money, the tinkle of glasses and ice; while above them rose the blue-grey haze of cigarette smoke, and a fund of dirty stories which had all of the neighbouring passengers turning their heads, half of them forward to hear more, the rest away, in case they heard too much . . .