There were big hints that this wasn’t just caused by lack of eating. The folds of flesh were strangely stiff, arranged in patterns that mocked the muscle pattern belonging to an exceptionally toned twenty-five-year-old. Some of the ridges were pink, as if rubbed sore; in several places they were so red she suspected they were long blood blisters.
Shame welled up in Johan’s mind, responding to the dismay and tinges of disgust in the three people surrounding him. The emotional oscillation was so powerful Carmitha had to sit on the edge of the bench beside him. What she wanted to do was turn and leave.
“You wanted to be young again,” she said quietly. “Didn’t you?”
“We’re building paradise,” he told her in desperation. “We can be whatever we want to be. It only takes a thought.”
“No,” Carmitha said. “It takes a lot more than that. You haven’t even got a society that functions as well as Norfolk’s old one.”
“This is different,” Johan insisted. “We’re changing our lives and this world together.”
Carmitha bent over the trembling man until her face was a couple of inches from his. “You’re changing nothing. You are killing yourself.”
“There’s no death here,” Susannah said sharply.
“Really?” Carmitha asked. “How do you know?”
“We don’t want death here, so there is none.”
“We’re in a different place. Not a different existence. This is a giant step back from reality. It won’t last; it’s built on a wish, not a fact.”
“We’re here for eternity,” Susannah said gruffly. “Get used to it.”
“You think Johan is going to survive eternity? I’m not even sure I can get him through another week. Look at him, take a bloody good look. This is what your ridiculous powers have reduced him to; this . . . wreck. You haven’t been granted the power to work miracles, all you can do is corrupt nature.”
“I’m not going to die,” Johan wheezed. “Please.” His hand gripped Carmitha’s arm, a hot, damp pressure. “You have to stop this. Make me better.”
Carmitha gently pulled herself free. She started to study his self-inflicted impairments properly, trying to work out what the hell she could realistically achieve. “Most of the healing will be up to you. Even so, this convalescence will stretch the concept of holistic medicine to its limit.”
“I’ll do anything. Anything!”
“Humm.” She ran her hand over his chest, tracing the creases in the flesh, testing them for firmness as she would ripe fruit. “Okay. How old are you?”
“What?” he asked, bewildered.
“Tell me how old you are. You see, I know already. I’ve been coming to this estate for the rose season for over fifteen years now. My earliest recollection is of Mr Butterworth supervising the grove teams. He was the estate manager even back then. He was a good one, too; never shouted, always knew what to say to get people going, never treated the Romanies different to anyone else. I always remember him dressed in his tweeds and yellow waistcoat; when I was five I thought he was king of the world he looked so fine and jolly. And he knew the way Cricklade worked better than anyone other than the Kavanaghs. None of that happens overnight. So now you tell me, Johan, I want to hear it from your own mouth; how old are you?”
“Sixty-eight,” he whispered. “I’m sixty-eight Earth years old.”
“And how much do you weigh when you’re healthy?”
“Fifteen and a half stone.” He was silent for a moment. “My hair’s grey, too, not blond. I don’t have much of it anyway.” The confession relaxed him slightly.
“That’s good. You’re beginning to understand. You must accept what you are, and rejoice in it. You were a soul tormented by emptiness, now you have a body again. One that can provide you with every sensation that was taken from you in the beyond. What it looks like is a supreme irrelevance. Allow the flesh to be what it is. Hide from nothing. I know, it’s tough. You thought this place was the solution to everything. Admitting it isn’t to yourself will be difficult, coming to believe it even more so. But you must learn to accept your new self, and the limitations Butterworth’s body imposes. He had a good life before, there’s no reason why that can’t continue.”
Johan was trying to appear reasonable. “But how long for?” he asked.
“His ancestors were geneered, I expect. Most colonists were. So he’ll last decades more at least, providing you don’t pull a stunt like this again.”
“Decades.” His voice was bitter with defeat.
“Or days if you don’t start to believe in yourself again. You have to help me help you, Johan. I’m not joking. I won’t even waste my time with you if you don’t stop dreaming that you’re destined for immortality.”
“I’ll do it,” he said. “I really will.”
She patted him comfortingly, and drew the blanket back up. “Very well, you lie here for now. Luca will arrange for some of the lads to carry you back to your room. I’m going to go over to the kitchen and have a word with cook about what sort of foods she’s got available. We’ll start off giving you plenty of small meals each day. I want to avoid putting any sudden stress on your digestive system. But it’s important we get some decent nutrition back into you.”
“Thank you.”
“There are some treatments I can use which will make this easier for you. They’ll need preparing. We’ll make a start this afternoon.”
She left the carpentry shop, and walked back to the manor’s rear courtyard. Cricklade’s kitchen was a long rectangular room, bridging the gap between the west wing’s storerooms and the main hall. Tiled with plain black and white marble, one wall was lined with a ten-oven Aga radiating a fierce heat that the open windows couldn’t eradicate. Two of Cook’s assistants were taking loaves from the baking ovens and knocking them out of their tins onto wire racks below a window. Three more assistants were busy by the row of Belfast sinks, chopping vegetables ready for the evening meal. Cook herself was supervising a butcher who was cutting up a sheep carcass on the central island. Copper-bottomed pots and pans of every size and shape dangled from a large suspended rack overhead like segments of a polished halo. Carmitha had hung bunches of her herbs between the pots along the side facing the Aga, helping them to dry faster.
She waved at Cook and went over to Véronique who was sitting at the last Belfast sink, scraping carrots on the wooden chopping board. “How’s it going?” Carmitha asked.
Véronique smiled, and put a hand worshipfully on her heavily pregnant stomach. “I can’t believe he hasn’t started yet. I need to take a pee every ten minutes. Are you sure it wasn’t twins?”
“You can sense him for yourself now.” Carmitha slid her hand over the baby, experiencing only warm contentment. Véronique was possessing the body of Olive Fenchurch, a nineteen-year-old maid who had married her estate worker love about two hundred days ago. A short engagement, followed by an equally short, if biologically improbable, pregnancy. For here she was about to give birth with nearly seventy days’ gestation misplaced. A common occurrence on Norfolk.
“I don’t like to,” Véronique said shyly. “It’s like bad luck, or something.”
“Well take it from me, he’s just fine. When he wants to make a move, he’ll let us all know.”
“I hope it’s soon.” The girl shifted uncomfortably on the wooden chair. “My back’s killing me, and my legs ache.”
Carmitha smiled in sympathy. “I’ll come and rub some peppermint oil into your feet this evening. That should perk you up.”
“Ohooo thank you. You have the most cleverest hands.” It was almost as if the possession hadn’t taken. Véronique had such a quiet, gentle nature, nervously trying to please, so very similar to Olive. She’d once confessed to Carmitha that she’d died in some kind of accident. She wouldn’t say how old she’d been, but Carmitha suspected early to mid teens; there had been occasional mention of bullies at her day-club.