The Cure jabbed a finger at Maria, making his point in harsh staccato tones. Maria only caught the word Xingu.
The old woman eyed Maria. "What would happen to us at Xingu?"
"We'd teach you how to be part of the world outside," said Maria. "We'd show you what you need to know to be farmers, or to live in the city if that's what you want."
"Are there guns in the world outside?"
It was a patronizing question. Maria felt sweat break out at the small of her back. "You know there are."
"Would we all be able to stay together, the entire tribe?" asked the old woman.
"We do the best we can," said Maria. "Sometimes it isn't possible to keep everyone together, but we try."
The old woman made a wide gesture into the dark. "We didn't lose one single person on the trip. You're saying you can't guarantee that for us at Xingu, though. Is that right?"
"Right," said Maria.
"But we'd be free."
Maria didn't say anything.
The old woman made a sharp gesture. "It's time for the Jamarikuma spirit to leave. If that's what she actually is." She closed her eyes and began to hum, a spirit-dismissing song, Maria supposed, and she glanced at the Cure, who leaped to his feet.
"I am leaving. With the Jamarikuma."
The old woman nodded, still humming, as though she was glad he'd finally made up his mind.
The Cure took a step away from the fire. He walked—no, he sauntered around his silent friends, family, maybe even his wife. No one said anything and no one was shedding any tears. He came over to Maria and stood beside her.
"I will not come back," he said.
The old woman hummed a little louder, like she was covering his noise with hers.
· · · · ·
When they got back to the Toyota, Maria unlocked the passenger side and let him in. He shut the door and she walked slowly around the back to give herself time to breathe. Her heart was pounding and her head felt empty and light, like she was dreaming. She leaned against the driver's side, just close enough to see his dim reflection in the side mirror. He was rubbing his sweaty face, hard, as though he could peel away his skin.
In that moment, she felt as though she could reach into the night, to just the right place and find an invisible door which would open into the next day. It was the results of a night with him that she wanted, she realized. He was like a prize she'd just won. For the first time, she wondered what his name was.
She pulled the driver's side open and got in beside him. She turned the key in the ignition and checked the rearview mirror as the dashboard lit up. All she could see of herself was a ghostly, indistinct shape.
"Is something wrong?" he asked.
"Everything's fine." She said and let the truck blunder forward into the insect-laden night.
Later, when the access road evened out to pavement, he put his hot palm on her thigh. She kept driving, watching how the headlights cut only so far ahead into the darkness. She stopped just before the main road, and without looking at him, reached out to touch his fingers.
"Are we going to Xingu?" he asked, like a child.
"No," she said. "I can't go back."
"Neither can I," he said, and let her kiss him. Here. And there.
PAUL TREMBLING
Paul Trembling was born in England in 1957 and has been making up stories for as long as he can remember. Whilst following a varied career path - seamen, storeman, janitor, missionary, administrator and most recently, Crime Scene Investigator - he continued to dream up plots, characters, and scenes. Some became sketches, some short stories, some novels. Most are still waiting for their chance to get out of his head!
Time, Art & Criticism, by Paul Trembling
There was only one exhibit, but it dominated the room. A discreet brass plaque gave its title: 'Seasons of a Tree'.
The Tree itself was an oak, I think - it's not really my area. Full size, fully grown. It appeared to be just putting out the first leaves of spring. And it was ever so slightly blurred. Not so much as to be obvious, but as you stared at it your eyeballs started to ache, and then you realised that you were constantly trying to focus properly. It was as if the light around the Tree had been slightly greased.
"What do you think?"
I turned round, mildly surprised to be addressed. I don't get invited to many of these functions, and tend to be a bit of a wallflower when I do. I'm a newcomer in this field, a hanger-on and an eavesdropper to the conversations of the Great and the Wise.
But, having said that, there were surprisingly few guests for such a prestigious event - and many of those were there 'in light only'. Nor were there as many famous faces, real or holo-projected, as I would have expected.
"I'm impressed," I replied cautiously. "It's - dramatic. Different. Totally unique, of course." Out of the corner of my eye I saw that the Tree was now fully leaved, radiating that quality of green that nature does so well and artists struggle to imitate.
"Anything else, Mr - Garden, is it?"
"Gardine," I corrected carefully, smiling to show that I wasn't offended. "I edit an Art Netzine - Insights."
He gave a polite smile to show that he'd never heard of it, or of me, which I fully expected. I was trying hard to think of hisname. I was sure that that flat, hard-edged face was familiar, but I couldn't place it.
"Well, the most exiting thing about this exhibition," I continued, "is that it's something totally new in Art. I mean, this is the first completely new medium to be devised in - centuries, at least. It's radical! It's going to break the mould and let in some fresh air and new light!" As I spoke, I could feel the genuine enthusiasm breaking out from inside me. "This is exactly what Art needs just now, now more than ever - something to turn it upside down!"
Enthusiasm can be dangerous in Art circles. It can get you sneered at. But my lapse from good taste had prompted a more positive reaction: the smile became real, and then recognition clicked in.
"You're him, aren't you - Vechery, the Temporal Engineer!" The holo's I'd accessed hadn't communicated the essence of the man. Seen in the flesh, he fairly crackled with drive and intelligence. His rather ordinary features were transformed by the personality within.
"That's pronounced Veychery, Taran Vechery - and I'm here as an artist, not an engineer," he corrected, but he'd kept his smile. "I'm glad you like my first work. Here, come and look at it from over here..."
The Tree was now well into autumn, a blaze of crimson-gold that was already fading to duller shades, as leaves began to drift down.
"I think I like the Autumn best," said Vechery. "Such colours..."
"It's a real tree, then?" I asked.
"Of course. This isn't a holo projection, or some sort of trick!"
All the leaves were gone now, leaving the tree stark and bare in its winter.
"How long does it take to go through a year?"
Vechery gave me a sharp look, as if suspecting a trick question. "A year, of course. A year in its own temporal frame, that is. It interfaces with our standard temporal rate at about 14.43 KK's slip rate, that's with a precessional series boosted to..." he saw the look on my face. "Oh, sorry," he said, not sounding it. "I suppose the answer you want is that the Tree goes through a year in about a minute of our time. When it reaches 100 years old - in its reference - the field reverses, takes it back down to a seed. From our perspective, that is."
"What about the Tree's perspective? Doesn't it get a bit - ah - confused?"
"Do you?" Vechery chuckled. "From the Tree's point of view, we're the ones who keep going backwards and forwards. Temporal fields are self-contained: it's the interfaces between them that generate the apparent paradoxes. But don't try and grasp it. I can barely get a handle on it myself - you have to be a three-brained Isha'hassat to really visualize trans-temporal events. Just settle back and enjoy the show! Look, we're back in springtime... Now, who's this then?"
A small procession that had entered the room. Leading the way, dressed in a blaze of fashion
, was the regal figure of Demidi De Soliel.
"You don't know?" I asked in sudden apprehension. The scent of critical disaster hung heavily in the room.
De Soliel drifted languidly through the sparse crowd with his entourage a discrete distance behind him. Pointedly, he did not approach the Tree, or even look at it. Instead he orbited, acknowledging greetings, bestowing a gracious word here or there, and picking up satellites. When he finally happened to notice the exhibit, he had incorporated most of the room into his train.
"Well, now." He cocked his head on one side, and gazed up and down the length of the trunk. "Well, well now. Isn't this interesting?"
He didn't sound interested. I could feel Vechery tense up beside me. "Who is he, Gardine?" he whispered.
"Demidi De Soliel," I whispered back. "Whatever you do, don't upset him!"
"Why ever not?" asked Vechery in genuine surprise. I had no time to answer. De Soliel had been slowly circling the Tree, and now stood face to face with its creator. I stepped back, so as not to be hit by a stray thunderbolt.
De Soliel had no trouble recognising Vechery - or in pronouncing his name.
"Ah, you must be Taran Vechery. I believe that you are the Engineer responsible for this.. device."
The way De Soliel pronounced 'engineer' produced an instant mental picture of oily spanners and dirty overalls.
To Vechery's credit, he sounded very calm when he replied.
"Yes, I'm Vechery. I'm the artist who has... created ... this temporal sculpture. I understand that your name is De Soliel?"
An eyebrow raised by a mere fraction was all the answer that Vechery received. De Soliel turned to look at the Tree once more.
"A temporal sculpture, you call it? How very quaint!" He turned to his nearest satellite, and spoke in a stage whisper. "I believe that I shall plant a tree and call it a 'non-temporal' sculpture!"
A titter of laughter swept over the gathering, and Vechery went pale. "Is that fatuous remark meant as serious criticism?" he asked tightly.
If the floor hadn't been carpeted, you'd have heard the jawbones bouncing. Demidi De Soliel had not been spoken to like that since he was a foetus. I was watching him closely, and I'm sure that he actually blinked.
"Oh, no, Mr Vechery." De Soliel purred. "Serious criticism is reserved for serious Art."
Dead silence. You could hear the Tree growing.
"Mr De Soliel." Vechery spoke very quietly. "You clearly do not understand what you are seeing. This Temporal Sculpture is a completely unique and original work. Nothing like it has ever been done before - indeed nothing like it could have been done before. Except by the Isha'hassat, but they have no interest in Art. Indeed, even now there are only 14 other human beings alive who could even attempt to reproduce this: and none of them are currently on Earth. You have never seen anything like this before in your life, Mr De Soliel. You should think of that before you make hasty judgments."
De Soliel's reply was loud and clear, and accompanied by a smile. A very gentle, pleasant smile. "But I have seen this before, Mr Vechery. I have a number of them in the grounds of my home - a wood, I believe it's known as." There was another outburst of titters, some of them quite loud, and even some chuckles and guffaws. "Moreover, I do not make hasty judgments, Mr Vechery. I simply know what Art is, and what it is not. And it is not the simple copying of Nature, no matter how clever the technical methods used. That is what I am seeing here, Mr Vechery - and now I have seen enough! Good day to you."
De Soliel turned and swept majestically away. Vechery raised a hand as if to hold him, but on impulse I pulled him back.
"You'll only make it worse," I hissed in his ear. He glared at me, but held back, and De Soliel was gone. With him went his whole entourage, not only those he had brought with him, but also those he'd collected since. The room was empty but for Vechery, myself, and the Tree, now once more in Autumn.
Vechery walked across to a dispenser, collected a drink, and as an afterthought got me one as well. We sipped in silence for a while, watching the Tree.
"So who is Demidi De Soliel?" he eventually asked me.
I shrugged. "De Soliel is the Voice of Art in the Twenty Second Century. De Soliel is the pace setter, the arbiter of taste, the leader of fashion, the Sun of Criticism around which all Art revolves."
"Ah. So his opinion is important, then?"
I nodded. "Absolutely. You can't get serious consideration in the Art world without a nod of approval from him. And as it is... Tell me, how did you invite your guests?"
"Random Net search. Pulled out names with Art connections. How else? I've been away for 65 years, Earth time, piloting a starship. I only got back a few months ago, and I've been working on the Tree ever since. I didn't know anyone in the current Art scene. I take it I should have given De Soliel a special invitation?"
"You should have wined him, dined him, and begged him personally to favour your exhibition with a few moments of his most valuable time."
Vechery snorted. "Would it have made any difference?"
"Well - he might have been kinder."
Vechery gave me a long look. "What he said - was there anything in it?"
I took a deep breath. "Well - De Soliel's an egomaniac, but he's not without talent as a critic..."
"I thought you said you liked it!"
"I said that it's a unique new medium - and so it is. It's got potential: it could be the biggest thing in Art for centuries! Could have been. But De Soliel will trash it - and anyone who is anyone will follow his lead."
"Including you?"
"No. I'll do my best for you. But my readership is barely in the thousands, and it doesn't include anyone who matters. Nobody who does will go against De Soliel. In the Art world, you're dead. Sorry."
"Dead? Oh, I think not, Gardine!" Vechery looked at me with fire in his eyes. "I'm not about to give up just because that arrogant bastard didn't get the right strokes to his ego!" He turned to look at the Tree. "Copying nature, eh?"
De Soliel's review of 'Tree' was witty, caustic and short. It proved as utterly damming as I'd predicted. I wrote a strong editorial in favour of fresh ideas, and saw my readership dip alarmingly.
Taran Vechery dropped out of sight. Rumour had it that he'd left Earth for good, laughed out of the Solar System. I didn't believe it: there was more to Vechery than that.
I was proved right a few months later, when a cryptic note invited me to attend a new "Exhibition of Trans-Temporal Art", to be held in a large open-air sports stadium.
As before, there was only one exhibit, but this time it was considerably larger than even the Tree. I got there early, in time to see Vechery bring his new work to life.
It started with just a flat plain, shimmering slightly within the time-field. Then holes appeared in the ground, slowly lengthening into trenches - foundations, I realised, as stone blocks began to appear out of nowhere, building themselves up into walls. A palace grew before our eyes: soaring spires, flowing buttresses, towers, walls, lakes, gardens.
It reached its magnificent peak, a huge edifice that filled the stadium. Then, as I watched, decay set in. The walls weathered, aged: tiles slipped, brickwork crumbled, stones cracked. The lakes became stagnant, the gardens overgrown. A tower fell, a roof caved in, the interior floors swiftly followed. For a brief moment the walls remained, stark skeletons, before they also crumbled, tottered and slid wearily to the ground. A pile of rubble remained, overgrown by wild vegetation. The water dried up, the plants died. The dry stones crumbled still further, an invisible wind drifting their dust away.
At last there was just a flat plain, fading into darkness.
There was a spontaneous outburst of applause from the sparse audience - not one of whom I recognised as being of any significance in the art world. I clapped as well: it had been a truly impressive performance. Glancing at my wrist tattoo, I saw that it had been a full hour from start to finish, but I'd had no awareness of the time passing. At least, not my time.
Vec
hery made his appearance, greeting people here and there but making his way towards me. Behind him, the plain reappeared, as the sequence began to run again.
"Well?" He asked. "What do you think of 'The Works of Humanity'?"
I held up my hands. "Incredible. Breath taking. Magnificent."
"What - all of that?" He laughed.
"Certainly. Was it difficult to achieve that decay effect?"
"The decay was the easy part. I just increased the relative time flow. The hard part was the building section. I borrowed a technique from right back in the 20th century - cartoon films. 'Animation', they called it. I had to put each building block in separately, in its own time frame, then run the frames together.... But never mind the technical details. Is it Art?"
I shrugged. "It is for me. But what about De Soliel?"
Vechery gave a wry smile. "Not here is he? Well, I tried. I sent personal invitations, with gifts... But I never did get a reply. It seems I've been snubbed."
A mere snub, however, was insufficient for De Soliel.
He did attend the exhibition. He came late, and alone, and 'in light only' - which was an insult in itself, considering the personalised invitation. He didn't talk to Vechery, or to anyone else. He merely appeared, cast a glance over 'The Works of Man', and gave it a smile of condescending amusement. Then he blinked out, without waiting to see the full cycle and without even the courtesy of pretending to use the exits.
He was noticed, of course, and his abrupt departure signified the end of the evening. Once more, Vechery and I were left alone. But this time there was no conversation. He sat and brooded, watching his creation go through its endless cycles of growth and decay, and after a while I said goodnight and went home.
It was a week or two before De Soliel even bothered to comment. When he did, it was brief and dismissive.
"Vechery is not an artist. He has no understanding of Art. He cannot distinguish between clever technological tricks and true creativity. He communicates nothing of himself: he shows nothing of his soul."
Anthology of Speculative Fiction, Volume Two Page 246