F&SF July/August 2011

by Fantasy; Science Fiction

  Blank-faced, Poonai laid out Plaintiff's case: Jacob Mannheim was old and inflexible. He went on farming his land, ignoring the fact that the Government would buy it at several times its book value. And there were numerous other instances of his bullheaded stubbornness, failing memory—he couldn't tell one grandnephew from another (some truth there), he avoided his family, refused their counsel and advice, and so on.

  Poonai spent quite twenty minutes laying out his case, using legal and medical phrasing that Jacob had to translate mentally with the aid of his own extra-brain. He had to admire the man; he'd done his best, had put some work into it.

  Of course it's all wasted; I hope he's getting paid well. Up front.

  Judge Malmstrom took it in, then turned to Sam Nganya. "Defendant?"

  "Thank you, Your Honor. I would first draw your attention to one of Plaintiff's offerings, that Mr. Mannheim has refused to sell his farm at a great profit, a chance that will never recur. Here we have the heart of their complaint: his heirs wish to increase the size of their inheritance. They have failed to persuade him; they have not been able to bully him. Now they seek to seize his property, and with it his way of life, out of simple greed."

  Sam produced papers and an e-card for the record. "In response, I offer proof, not gossip, that Mr. Mannheim's competence has not faltered. With Defendant's permission, I offer Jacob Mannheim's medical record—accidents and injuries only. I draw the Court's attention to the point that in the last twenty years, Defendant's rate of injury accidents has been lower than during any other twenty-year period in his life."

  "Entered as Exhibit C," the judge said, and scanned it carefully. She closed her eyes the better to access her extra-brain, perhaps calculating accident rates for hundreds of years. c" meetingb b, and nodded. "Proceed, Counselor."

  "I next offer Defendant's tax records for the past forty-five years. It will be seen that though each year the public buys less natural food, still his profits have scarcely altered."

  That was tricky; he'd sold off-world, taking advantage of the tax breaks. But he supposed that would show competence.

  "Entered as Exhibit D," said the judge, and studied the record carefully.

  "That concludes our defense," Sam said. "We contend that Plaintiffs have shown no instances of mental incompetence, merely a lack of interest, on Jacob's part, in his family. Certainly Mr. Mannheim's life exhibits no signs of mental failings. He refuses to sell his land because he wishes to continue farming it. For however long a time he has."

  Judge Malmstrom nodded thoughtfully, glanced at Jacob, and turned to Jamal Poonai. "Rebuttal?"

  "No, Your—Honor—" He had seized the arm of Albrecht on one side of him and Tomoko on the other. They subsided. Delighted, Jacob thought, Sitting between them shows what a good lawyer he is.

  The judge ignored the byplay. "Five-minute recess for deliberation."

  Instead of leaving the room, she went to the coffeemex and brought back a tray. More crullers and dim sum; she graciously poured coffee for any who wanted. Jacob was ready for more, but was uneasily aware that at this rate he'd soon be excusing himself.

  In less than five minutes Judge Malmstrom cleared her throat and folded her hands. They all stilled their motions; the judge looked up directly at the hidden ring of cameras overhead. Full-face for the record, Jacob thought, and it's impersonal. She met no eye.

  "Request of Plaintiffs Albrecht Mannheim et al that Defendant Jacob Mannheim be found of unsound mind and mentally incompetent and that he be placed in conservatorship is hereby denied. No cause has been shown."

  She glanced at Albrecht, at Tomoko, and looked back at the cameras.

  "The unstated but deeply felt argument of Plaintiffs appears to be that anyone who turns down so good a bargain as that offered by House of Earth 1,717 Section C-5e is of unsound mind. But no credible evidence of unsoundness has been offered. This Court is not empowered to rule on the Defendant's judgment—certainly it is not within this Court's purview to force a bargain on him which he does not wish. This Court may privately agree with Plaintiffs that Defendant is making a mistake. But to abrogate a person's freedom merely to prevent a mistake would be to nullify all our freedoms, the more particularly when the motive is apparently to enrich his relatives at his emotional, if not his financial, expense...."

  The judge tongue-lashed them for a few more minutes in her precise cold legal manner. She finished by warning them that though they could appeal, the judicial system took nuisance suits very ill indeed. Absent proof of incompetence, they could wind up facing felony prosecution, Jacob knew.

  The judge tapped three times with her ridiculous little gavel—it didn't seem so tiny now—nodded at them all, with a small smile for Jacob, and withdrew.

  Jacob stood stiffly, needing that bathroom, and glanced at his kinfolk.

  They looked as if they were braced for a grandparental tongue-lashing. Jacob's emotions were remote, his tone mild. He said, "Well, that didn't work. What next?"

  They exchanged uncomfortable glances, said nothing with much clearing of throats. Linda's eyes were teary.

  Finally Albrecht muttered a "sorry."

  "You know you're all welcome at the farm, any time. As usual."

  Jacob felt no triumph. It was over, he was glad of that, but now he was very tired. Tired especially of his family.

  So: home again well before dark, and Oscar and Wolf and Forst and the other agrirobots were working "manfully" away at Mercer 27. They finished harvesting it not long before midnight.

  Jacob had sat up, drinking coffee, not to supervise, but because he couldn't an unusual number of shouldre the ruins—sleep.

  The family had always been there, all those grandnephews and grandnieces whose names and faces he needed an extra-brain to remember. Now they'd tried to mug him, and none of them had warned him. The month of arguments that led up to the hearing, the hints meant as threats, those had been his warning. So he had consulted Sam Nganya, who'd laughed and prepared his defense in advance.

  They'd all been in it together. He had lost his family.

  It wasn't the first time he'd felt this pain. The death of Amelita, but she had been ill for a long time, he was prepared. Then the defection of both their sons, who emigrated to the colonies, with all their grandchildren. He was glad Amelita hadn't lived to see that. That, he'd thought, had been the severest blow he would have to withstand. At least, he'd thought, he still had the rest of the family.

  No longer. The family's lost to me, he thought. I am orphaned.

  After his sons left, he'd tried to interest the nephews in farming, then he'd vaguely hoped for one of the grandnephews. Most of his hopes had ridden on Ricardo. Albrecht had always been hopeless.

  Now he had no hope at all. He had no future. But he was a farmer, and there was the farm to occupy his mind.

  AFTER A COUPLE OF WEEKS, in a casual con-versation with the factor for Wholesale Foods, the subject turned to emigration.

  "It's this buyout," the other said. "They're getting close to the time limit, so there's a big rush on to sell out and emigrate."

  "News said a million emigrants leave every year," Jacob said. "They can't keep that up."

  "No, it'll taper off in a few months. More room for the rest of us!"

  It was the reminder of the time limit on the Government buyout that got Jacob's hopes up again. Once safely past the deadline, the family would no doubt get over its current ire. They'd come around, he thought. Surely they'd come around. They all had fond memories of vacations on the farm, he remembered so many happy hours.

  It was only a few days later that Linda called to say that she was on the way.

  Jacob was out in the fields and was at first all of a dither. Rush home, prep food, whatever. But she told him not to bother. "I'll just home on you. You're in the fields?"

  "Yes, I'm in Linn Thirty-One."

  That, he thought, didn't sound so good. Not a friendly visit, then.

  Well. What will be, will be. So he wa
s still at it an hour later, when her car came in.

  Jacob stood on a long green dune of soil, now in clover. Rain was predicted, and the fields couldn't absorb every drop. Each terrace berm had its narrow drainpipe with valves, to let water trickle down to the next catch basin lest the standing water sour the soil. He'd put the robots on to opening the valves, as a good bit of rain was expected. An ancient farmer had proclaimed, "The best fertilizer is the footsteps of the farmer," and he was double-checking the robots, looking at the pipes, the soil, the clover, the farm itself.

  Linda's car came to hover just above the clover, too cautious to land on this uncertain surface. She stepped out and it swept discreetly away, disturbing a flock of crows. These big autumnal birds flew about, squawking and deriding them, a backdrop to the conversation.

  Linda was pretty, as usual in the modern era whether born that way or not. She was blonde, and he wondered for the first time if that was genie or bottle; it didn't run in the family.

  Jacob fought down an impulse to run to her, to hug her; family is family, even those you don't like, and to be cut off from them had left an ache. He greeted her awkwardly.

  "H-hi, Uncle Jake," she said.

  He took her hand and for the first time saw her as Linda Minetti, not simply as his grandniece, a representative of the family. She was upset. Her lip trembled, there was a suspicion of tears on her lashes, and a definite quaver in her voice.

  "You've come on business, of course," he said, for hundreds of years. c" meetingb b feeling numb. "Still trying to persuade me to sell?"

  She shook her head and the tears became more evident.

  "N-no. The family has given up on that. W-we're going without you. Or all that money."

  "Going?"

  "We're emigrating. Th-the whole family." Gulp. "Th-they w-wanted to just send you a-a letter, b-but I said I would come and tell you."

  "You're all emigrating? To the colonies? Together?"

  Gulp and nod. "S-sorry, Uncle Jake."

  Jacob Mannheim turned from his grandniece and stumbled a few steps away, his gaze seeking the horizon. The crows mocked his pain. He knew there were tears in his own eyes. She'd tell the others if she saw, and he wouldn't have Tomoko and Albrecht gloating over him.

  "Oh, Uncle Jake!"

  Linda came running and almost tackled him, weeping, blind.

  They hugged, and Jacob found that tears and gloating didn't matter. A long time later they were seated in the clover, watching the busy robots move up and down the fields, watched by the wary crows.

  "I'm not trying to p-persuade you, Uncle Jake. But why won't you come? You know they need f-farmers, and you're the best. It's hothouse farming, of course, but you do a lot of that, and you're good at it."

  His hothouses were small beside the vast hectarage of the Farm, but they took half his time and provided a fifth of his income. But how to explain to her? She wasn't a farmer, none of them were, and so they didn't understand. That's why they had tempted him with money and status.

  "I never wanted to be rich or important," he said, trying to keep the old impatience out of his tone—none of them had ever understood this simple point. "It was always the land. If you didn't feel it, you weren't a Mannheim."

  He paused, groping for words. "Look, you know about the settlement of NorthAm by the Euros?"

  "Y-yes," she said, sounding doubtful.

  "I don't mean the wars and politics. The first wave was the Asian settlers, the Asiams."

  "The Red Men, yes," she said, nodding.

  "Then the Euros. Well, on the East Coast, a bunch of these Euros went back into the woods. They only had hand tools, axes, saws—you've seen me use the axe. Well, these settlers cut down trees, fought off wild animals and Asiams, and fought all the other enemies of farming: drought, crop pests, banks. You'd think that such a horrible struggle would never pay off, that the price in money, time, sweat, and blood, could never be repaid. But that land is being farmed today, much of it, and the rest is tended parkland that also gives value back. You see, a farmer has a very long time horizon. That was a good investment."

  Linda looked at him timidly. "But the glaciers are coming, Uncle Jake. Already they're forming, and in a few hundred years the climate will make farming impossible. Long before the ice comes."

  Jacob glanced up at the Sun. To the unaided eye it was as bright as ever, but that eye is blind. He nodded. "This is true, all agree on that. So my time horizon is shorter than I thought. But it is still the land, still Mannheim Farms for however long. I am Jacob Mannheim. I do not sell my land."

  He snorted. "On the colonies, who owns land? They don't even have land, it's just a thin layer of dirt over a deck. So they'd put me in charge of a hothouse and call me an agtech? Let them buy robots."

  Linda sat silent for a long time, then she hugged him hard and whispered, "Oh, Uncle Jake, I'm so sorry! I'll come and visit before we go! It'll take months for all the arrangements. Don't listen to the others, you just go on being my Uncle Jake!"

  She jumped up and ran along the terrace, and her car swooped down, swallowed her. Linda turned in the doorway to wave once, and the bright egg shrank to a gleaming dot low above the horizon. The crows yelled in sarcastic delight.

  THE BIG HOUSE was silent that night, emptier than usual. Often since Amelita's death it had been empty, but as often as not there were relatives visitin how things are goingooom encounterorg. And even when it had been empty, there'd been the knowledge that he would not be alone forever. Since the hearing, he had been alone.

  Now, soon now, he would be alone forever. They were all going away.

  Well, the future is another country. It's no place for old men, but what could he do? Marry again? He felt no inclination, and besides, supposing a woman was willing to bear another son for him, did he have the time, did he have the skill, to instill in that young one his own love for the land? He'd failed with both of his boys, the grandsons, too.

  Why had he prepared all this food? He wasn't a bit hungry. Pure habit. Jacob pushed the plate aside and sat staring at the black nothing beyond the nighted windows.

  Adopt someone, maybe. Will the Farms to a likely youngster, if he could find one. One of his neighbors, perhaps. But around him was mainly parkland, owned by MidAm Regional Parks & Recreation.

  Well, he'd have many lonely evenings in which to ponder his options.

  He found he was yearning already for Linda's next visit. She was right, it'd take months for them all to disentangle themselves from their affairs and choose a colony, if there was one that'd have them all. No doubt many of the nieces and nephews would drop by. She was right, many would try to persuade him to go along. Not necessarily out of greed, out of simple inability to understand him.

  He supposed he'd been a remote figure all their lives. He was an old man, and his talk was of the farm. He hadn't spoken their language.

  So, months before they went. Less than a year, though, he guessed. Just a few months, and they go by fast when you're old and busy.

  He wondered what time of the month it was now. He could have consulted his extra-brain, but he was a farmer; he went outside. The house and barns and harvest bins were low and sprawling, amid the forest of trees, planted centuries ago for windbreak and coolness and a break in the monotony of the vast rolling prairie. He had to get out from under them.

  Jacob Mannheim looked up at his sky. From horizon to horizon it was a glowing dome, brighter than a hundred moons. At first the glow seemed soft, ethereal; then the eye caught the tiny sparkles, here, there, everywhere across that gigantic luminous crystalline sphere.

  It was not known how many space colonies there were. Even estimates could only be approximate, based on the amount of matter that had gone to make them, and the average mass. They'd devoured the asteroids, then the minor planets and satellites, then they had eaten the major planets. Mars, Mercury, Venus were gone long before he was born, and Pluto, then Uranus and Neptune. Now they were sucking at Saturn and Jupiter, a million grav
itronic straws dipped into two sundaes.

  The colonies had gone forth, prospered, and multiplied. Their solar sails now filled the sky, overlapping, sparkling as their motions caused the mirror-beams of their sails to sweep across his eyes, drowning the stars in light.

  Thus it had been as long as Jacob could remember; for generations the night sky had been a sparkly glowing mist. The glow had brightened generation by generation till now the Sun was englobed in uncounted motes that glanced its paled light back toward it, and Earth.

  Generation by generation that glowing night sky had warmed the Earth, forcing increasingly desperate countermeasures, till ironically the colonies themselves had solved the problem by orbiting between Earth and Sun, greedy for the heat and the light. Stealing it for their own lives.

  Jacob found the Moon, a dull splotch against that ethereal glow, itself brighter than it had been in olden days. It had been given water and an atmosphere that reflected twice the light the stony old Moon had ever done, yet still it was a dull, misshapen blotch against the shining serenity beyond.

  It was past the half, waning. It looked gnawed.

  Note: the patent on HILE was issued to Krekel Karch in May 1956, PatenI pick up the corner of the net... I pick up the corner of the netacc encounterort # 2745768. It can be found at Google Patent Search. An excellent article appeared in Popular Mechanics, June 1966, which can be found at Google Books; search either under Krekel Karch or Hydrosol Intransitive Land Engineering. (Hilescape is my own usage.) R.C.

  * * *

  Hair

  By Joan Aiken | 2399 words

  In the United States, Joan Aiken is probably best-known nowadays as the author of many children's books, particularly The Wolves of Willoughby Chase and its prequel and sequels. But the late Ms. Aiken (1924-2004) was a prolific writer of short fiction and her new posthumous collection, The Monkey's Wedding and Other Stories, includes half a dozen tales that have never before been published. We thought you'd enjoy this short Gothic story.