by Jule Owen
And there she is, Ju Shen, his grandmother, smaller than he remembers, greyer, bowed somehow by the weight of life. His last remaining blood relative.
When the car stops, without knowing how he got to her, he is holding this tiny woman in his arms, her face and his face wet with tears, not knowing whether to be sad or joyful, grateful or full of grief. They cling to one another, until she says loudly, via the translation software she always uses, “You are too bloody tall now to hug,” and she pushes him away affectionately, but firmly. “You are tall like a Westerner now.”
He unfurls himself to his full height and looks down at her, smiling, wiping the tears from his eyes with the backs of his hands, “Hello grandma,” he says.
“Hello Mat,” she replies.
For the first time he notices the people around them: Littlemore and Ludewig out of the car, Isaac hanging back uncertainly and two other men and a woman. The woman he recognises, though he’s never met her before. She is Isla Kier, Cadmus Silverwood’s wife, and the owner of Elgol. She is tall, much taller than Ju Shen, thin and fragile-looking, although Mathew knows by reputation, she is anything but. Mathew has been to Elgol hundreds of times but he has never met Isla and he is puzzled as to why he should now.
Of the two men with her, one is a middle-aged man with grey hair, a grizzled beard and tanned lined skin, someone used to being outside. He looks every bit as tough as Littlemore and Ludewig, but has a sparkle in his eye and a kind smile as he nods at Mathew.
“I’m Craig Buchanan,” he says. “This is Oli, my nephew.” He puts his hands on the back of a young blond man, nearly as fair as Isaac, who smiles and nods to the boys.
Buchanan turns to the two Panacea men and says, “We have lodgings for you, and food and refreshments if you want any at this hour. We’ll do the formalities in the morning. There’s some paperwork regarding the boy, I understand. If you’ll come this way, gentlemen…? The boys will go with Mrs. Shen.”
Buchanan leads the guards off and Oli goes with him.
Isla says, “It’s good to see you safe, Mathew,” she says. “And you, Isaac. You’re welcome here, I hope you know that.” Isaac gapes at the grey-haired woman and she smiles and says, “You must be tired. I’ll walk with you to Ju’s house.”
They pass by the gatehouse, which as Mathew remembers, is always manned, day and night, and walk along a wide pathway, lit by solar lamps and lined with trees, leafless for the winter. The air is cold, their breath steams out of them. There are patches of snow lying on the ground.
“Has it been snowing?” Isaac asks, delighted.
“Only a frosting,” Isla says. “Not like we used to have, like we should have. There’s snow there on the higher ground, though. No doubt, Mathew will take you to see it sometime,” and she looks at Mathew and smiles.
They take another path, and then another, through neat patches of garden and little fields, past round and long houses, some thatched, some with wood shingles, some with grass roofs, like Ju Shen’s house, each one an experiment. Mathew feels the peeling back of tension as he walks these familiar paths, and a sense of coming home. When he sees Ju Shen’s white, lime-washed, grass-roofed A-framed house and follows her through the rustic wooden gate, along the stone path that is planted with herbs in the summer, he is overwhelmed with emotion and grits his teeth to fight back the tears.
“I will leave you here,” Isla says. “I hope you sleep well boys. Ju. Good night.”
They all say their goodnights to Isla Kier and she walks off into the darkness.
As they turn to the house, Mathew and Isaac notice a white cloth hanging over the door and a brass gong on the right. Mathew sees Isaac's questioning expression and answers the unasked question, “To honour the dead.”
Ju Shen brushes the cloth aside and opens the door to her house; they are hit by a blast of comforting warmth. They take off their boots and jackets in a small anteroom where logs are stacked to the roof and open a door with a latch carved from pine. The wood burning stove in the centre of the large open-plan room that serves as living room, dining room and kitchen warms the whole house.
“I’d offer you drinks, but I’m guessing you boys have had your fill from the supplies in the car.”
“We’re fine, grandma, thanks.”
She nods. “It’s late, let’s get to bed.”
They follow her downstairs. Everything is made of wood; the staircase, the floor, the rail, the doors, all scrubbed pine. At the bottom of the stairs there are handmade rag rugs on the floor, three bedrooms and a bathroom. Ju Shen had the house designed to accommodate Mathew and his family as well as herself. She shows Isaac into Mathew’s old room and Mathew into the room next door.
“Is this okay?” she asks, concerned he will be upset to be in the room his mother used to sleep in. “It’s bigger than your old room. I thought you would prefer it.”
“It’s fine,” he says, turning to her. “More than fine. It’s a lovely room.” Ju Shen follows closely behind her grandson and then leans her shoulder against the doorframe as he sits on the bed, pulling off his socks. She notices the rucksack propped against the bed by his feet. Mathew looks at her and then looks down at his bag. He says, “I brought her ashes. She’s in there.”
Ju Shen’s breath catches in her throat. She says, “We’ll hold her funeral the day after tomorrow, okay?”
Mathew nods. Then he notices a pile of boxes in the corner of the room. “My stuff came,” he says.
“Yes, it came yesterday.”
“I thought it would arrive after me.”
“So did I,” Ju Shen says.
“I didn’t expect Isla Kier to be here, either,” he says. “In all the years I’ve come, I’ve never seen her.”
“That’s because she’s mostly not been here, she’s been with her husband in London.”
“But why did she come to meet us tonight?”
“She happened to be in Elgol. She heard your story and wanted to greet you in person, both of you, to make you know you are welcome. She’s also concerned about the Panacea men being here.”
“They’re not interested in Elgol. They’ll leave in the morning.”
“There is tightened security in the camp. Everyone is on tenterhooks.”
“But why?”
“Isla is expecting her husband. Cadmus Silverwood is coming to Elgol.”
Before he falls asleep, Mathew sends a brief message to Clara. All it says is
I am here. I am safe.
16 Elgol
DAY THIRTY: Tuesday 21st December 2055
In the morning, Mathew opens the shutter to his room, and leans out on his elbows across the two-foot-thick wall to peer out at the valley. It is nearly eight o’clock, but dawn is only just breaking. It won’t be fully light for another hour. Mathew remembers the incredibly long days he spent here. In the summer, it starts to get light before three AM and it is still dusk before midnight. He hasn’t stayed in Elgol in the winter since he was young, but he knows from his grandmother’s stories that the daylight hours are short.
His eyes track to the boxes in the corner of the room, and he goes over to them, opening a couple, to find the one that contains clothes. He unpacks them, stacking jeans, sweatshirts and jumpers on his bed. He goes to the large fitted wardrobe on the inner wall of the room and opens the door, looking for hangers and space to hang his stuff. The wardrobe is empty, bar a single coat on a hanger. With a stab, he recognises it as an old jacket that belonged to his father. It’s worn and dirty, one sleeve covered in dried mud. Mathew can’t believe the coat is still here. He takes it out and puts it on. It swamps him. His father was a big man, over six foot four, with a heavy Scandinavian frame. Putting his hands in the pockets, not expecting to find anything, he pulls out a stone, a knife, a piece of string and a flower. He lays these things out on the white bedsheets and sits down, still in the coat, holding the flower in the palm of his hand. It is golden yellow, with a stamen curling out of a long tube, and wing-like petals, an
d it is fresh, like it was picked yesterday. His grandmother must have used the coat, he decides, and he smiles, thinking of her swamped in its enormous mass. He takes the coat off and hangs it in the wardrobe. With the flower still in his hand he goes in search of her, knocking on her bedroom door, and then pushing it open.
Ju Shen’s house is built on the edge of a valley, and the front of the house is on stilts. Through the double doors of his grandmother’s bedroom, there is a balcony which overlooks the forest. She isn’t in her room. The curtains are pulled and the bed is made. He opens the door, walks out onto the wooden platform and leans on the rail. Small white clouds float by serenely, below in the valley. A bird of prey is circling. Thousands of birds sing.
There is a knock at the door. It is Isaac. “I couldn’t find you in your room,” he says.
“S’okay,” Mathew says, smiling. “Come and look.”
Isaac pads across the room and squeezes out through the open patio door onto the balcony. “Wow. I’ve never been anywhere like this. We’re in the middle of nowhere.”
“Yes, this is nowhere,” Mathew says. They stand together listening to the birdsong and watching the busy life of the forest, as blackbirds, blue tits, finches, robins and sparrows flutter from tree to tree, and a nuthatch scuttles up the side of the pine, pecking at insects. After a while, Mathew notices Isaac is shivering and he says, “Fancy some breakfast?”
Ju Shen is already in the kitchen when they go up. She turns when they enter and asks, “Sleep well?”
She is cracking eggs into a big pan on the stove. Isaac goes over. “Are they real eggs?”
Ju Shen looks at him. “Here.” She hands him an egg.
Isaac takes hold of one curiously. “They’re still warm.”
“Fresh from my chickens this morning.”
“You have chickens?”
“And goats and a share in a cow, but she’s out in the big barn with the herd. Have you really never seen an egg before?”
Isaac shakes his head.
Ju Shen says, “Mat, there’s a jar of tomatoes in that cupboard there,” she indicates with her foot. “Could you get it out and put it in one of those pans?”
Mathew does as she says. “Isaac, can you cut some bread?”
When breakfast is cooked, they sit at the table in the dining area and eat. In the centre, there is a vase containing a sprig of yellow broom, like the flower Mathew found in his father’s coat pocket, now in his own.
“Did you grow those in your polytunnel?” he asks.
Ju Shen reaches out and touches the flowers, “No, there’re off the hills, believe it or not.”
“In winter?”
“In winter, yes,” Ju Shen says. “There are patches of flowering broom, where there’s no snow.”
“Did you pick them yourself?”
“They were a gift,” she says.
“They’re nice,” Isaac says, breaking the spell between Mathew and Ju Shen. “Do you have any ketchup?”
“You have real tomatoes on your plate, there,” Ju Shen says.
“I prefer ketchup.”
“I’ll get it,” Mathew says, pushing back his chair and going into the kitchen.
“I bet you miss your robot,” she says.
“Not really.”
“What robot?” Isaac asks.
“Mathew had a HomeAngel in his house in London.”
“The robots that cook and clean for you?”
“And fetch ketchup,” Mathew says, putting the bottle in front of Isaac.
“Thanks,” Isaac says.
“I’m sure Mathew will make time to show you around, Isaac, but your first few days are going to be busy. First thing, we are going to meet with those Panacea men and make sure the paperwork about you being here is to their satisfaction. After that, you have an appointment at Elgol hospital to see about your eye.”
Mathew says, “I have something I need to do. We haven’t told you what happened to us yet.”
“You will get to tell your story many times over the next few days. The whole of Elgol will ask you.”
Mathew smiles. He remembers the avid curiosity of the people of Elgol, hungry for stories of the world outside, fascinated by strangers. Their isolation had never made them insular. “I will prepare myself.”
“You should.”
“But I have an obligation. When Isaac and I were attacked on the road and managed to escape, we went for help to a village near the motorway. The village is called Amach. The people living there aren’t allowed to leave because they are sick.”
“I don’t understand.”
“They have a sickness, a virus the government doctors couldn’t identify.”
Ju Shen looks alarmed. “We should get you both checked out this morning,” she says.
Mathew nods, “Okay. But the village doctor who took care of Isaac says it isn’t contagious. I think it may be a biological weapon that has either been accidentally leaked there or dropped by the Russians or the Chinese.”
She whistles through her teeth.
“Exactly,” Mathew says. “So the government won’t let anyone in or out and the people are running out of food. They took good care of us. In return they asked for our help. Yesterday when I got to the police station and a Nexus signal, I sent messages on my Paper. My Lenz and e-Pin were stolen.”
“We’ll get you both new ones today, if you’d like,” Ju Shen says.
“That would be great,” Mathew says. “But what I’d like is to get word out about what is going on at Amach. I thought about posting something to MUUT, but I don’t want my post to get lost in the noise. There is someone living here, you put me in touch with them, who has helped me a lot over the last few weeks, who knows the Blackweb backwards and forwards. I don’t know their real name. They always insisted we use code names.”
Ju Shen’s face lights up in recognition. “Oh, I know who you mean!”
“Can we visit them today?”
“I don’t see why not.” Her smile is quite mischievous, he thinks. “After we’ve helped Isaac.”
When they have finished their breakfast and dealt with the dishes, Isaac asks, “Can we see the chickens?”
The dark blue sky has a pink-tinged belly, and the air smells of pine outside Ju Shen’s house. The sun rises beyond the trees. Mathew takes a deep gulp of fresh air, the sort of air, he thinks, every human should breathe, but these days is rarer than fine wine.
Ju Shen shows Isaac the chicken coop, next to the wood stack. She passes a fat brown hen to Isaac and pins back the door to their enclosure so they can peck about for grubs and greens during the day. Then she lets the goats out of their barn and they trot off and jump down the almost vertical mountainside with no apparent effort, their bells ringing. The chicken coop is at the top of Ju’s terraced acres, which in the summer are planted full of fruit and vegetables. Further along the road is a flat plot, where she has her polytunnels now bursting full of salad for the winter. She barters salad, eggs, goats’ milk and cheese for things she can’t grow or make herself. Mathew notices there are more tunnels than he remembers. The salad business must be expanding.
“I’ve also starting growing some Chinese vegetables,” his grandmother tells him. “They are popular and I give cookery lessons.”
Ju Shen’s house is on the periphery of the town. The houses of Elgol are spread out like beads on the hem of the skirts of the mountain, on the west side of a fulsome stream that gathers into a river in the valley, where it meets other mountain water sources on the plain below. The river winds its way through the plain between the mountains, where many of the Elgol people have second houses and stay in the summer. The valley is a flat basin leading to the sea. The river bubbles out under a cliff-hugged stony beach, where the community’s boats are overwintered. Further round the coast are the empty golden beaches of Mathew’s childhood. The places of endless, careless summer days.
They set off along a track lined by tall pine trees. The homes of Elgol are spread
out to give each property enough space for growing food and the sense of wildness and freedom the people of Elgol have come for.
The public buildings are all on a plateau in the centre of the settlement. Here there are shops for the trade and barter of products and the purchase of some things bought in from outside. Food is sold here as well as clothes, furniture, electric charge for their vehicles, wood for their stoves, agricultural equipment, solar panels, batteries and communication equipment. The people of Elgol are not Luddites. In this town centre, there are also places to go to give and receive advice and help. If someone wants to raise a new building or dig a well, has a leak in their roof, or needs help with any one of the more complex systems they are trying out in the town, they go to the hut designated for this purpose. Here, they either find someone in, or they leave a request for help. In this huddle of buildings there is a restaurant that is run, like all of the shops, by a cooperative. It is open odd hours, often at request, and has an eccentric and highly seasonal menu. Beyond the restaurant is the town school, which has its own distinctive curriculum based on skills and knowledge relevant to the community. Then there’s the research centre, the building given over to the permanent and temporary scientists and engineers who come to Elgol to work on the hundreds of projects and experiments the town is home to. Across the wide road from all of this is the village hall, and on a square of land beside it a twenty-foot Christmas tree, cut from the forests of Elgol and decorated with lights.
The hall is large enough to accommodate every permanent and temporary resident. It is used for public meetings, weddings. funerals, parties, the frequent amateur entertainments put on by residents, and the steady stream of visitors, friends and family and those strangers who come for holidays, for research, or out of curiosity. They have had numerous celebrity guests, drawn in by Cadmus’s magnetic personality and his public profile.