The Disestablishment of Paradise

by Phillip Mann

  The final daybook entry was made by Marie Newton, on the morning of the day on which Mayday was fatally injured.

  It was one of the Mayday and Marie’s grandchildren, Proctor Newton, who hurled the chair which injured Hera at the ORBE hearing.

  •

  Third anniversary. Marie is down at the bay. We saw a Dendron swamped in a storm a week ago. There was nothing we could do but watch as it was toppled by the big breaking waves. And now it has been washed up at the bay, all flags and cherries gone.

  Marie wants to do a book with pictures about the life of the Dendron – or Rexes, as some people still call them. I told her to watch her step. It is not too long since someone came upon what they thought was a stranded Dendron and climbed up on it, and it got up and walked out to sea!

  I’ve been down the line having a look at the crop. Very pleased. All the plum trees I put in a year ago are doing well. A good crop, I would say. The plums are maturing, black, blue and the deep red. In fact I somehow seem to have planted a few different varieties, as I see we have some green-veined plums and some that are bright like cherries. But they will all taste good, I’m sure. The first crop I sent sold out the morning it went on auction, so after we’ve paid the taxes and the land loan and the insurance and the equipment levy, we might, if we’re lucky, have a bit left over, and that would be nice. First time in our lives.

  Been talking with John and Gerda Pears – they’ve got twins Peter and Benjy, arrived last month – about supply lines. They are doing quite nicely, thank you, ‘turning seaweed into solas’ as Gerda put it. John thinks we ought to all get together and start a trust fund so we can purchase either a controlling share in the Paradise platform or the nearest fractal – or both! He reckons Paradise is about to take off commercially, and the last thing we want is some middleman from Mars controlling our supply line. He also talked about tourism, so he is thinking far ahead. I’m not sure about that, though. As soon as you get too commercial you lose sight of the mountains and the music.

  I want to talk about the trees. Life is easy so I get time to experiment and think. One thing I don’t understand about them is why they have such a bloody long root. The first time I dug one up I tried to dig the whole thing out, but the root just went on and on, getting deeper and deeper, till finally I had to give up and chop it off. This must be one of the characteristics of the flora on Paradise. Most of the plants I have dug up have a long root. Take the blue waltzer (or the Tattersall weed, as we are now starting to call it). It has a long single root too, but that root has a little knot in it so that it breaks as soon as you put pressure on it, like the elbow on a tomato. Not so the plum or the stink wort or the yellow trancers – they’ve got a root like a main drain. Why do they need a deep root like that if all their sustenance comes from surface roots? I mentioned this to Deacon Syng, and he thought it might be an evolutionary remnant from the time when there was a shortage of water and the plants had to dig deep. He may be right, but I have seen no evidence of drought or desert in this part of Paradise.

  I realized something the other day when I was scorching back some Tattersalls in the meadow bottoms. We are the true pioneers. It came as a shock. And do you know how I know we are the pioneers? Because there are no manuals. We experiment. See what works and apply that. For instance, I tried making compost, but you can’t on Paradise. But you can make wonderful plant tea, which is just as good.

  I am probably the world expert on growing the Paradise plum. I know that Tewfic and Sullia have a few plants up and coming. Now that secondary workers are starting to arrive, things are easier, They intend to plant out a hundred acres or so as soon as they have finished clearing their land. Tania and Sean, who have a massive holding touching two continents in mid-Chain, are also gearing up to plant the plum. God knows why they don’t have any local ones, but I will supply them with rootstock. I think you could say that we, as a planet, are up and running. I love being self-sufficient and I have never seen Marie so happy. I am trying to make a solar hair dryer.

  Gunter and Hirondelle are starting to worry me. I don’t think they’re going to last. Everything they plant seems to fall over. I went over in the cutter to see them last week and Hirondelle had taken to her bed in depression. She says living here is like living in a graveyard! I think she’s a few fingers short of a fist. She is very fey, full of omens, and has designed a tarot card sequence for Paradise. She wanted to cast our future but I told her we were not interested. That kind of thing puts the willies up Marie. Me, I think it’s just ignorant mumbo-jumbo. I suggested that Hirondelle have a smoke of the calypso lily and gave her a pouch. Marie was upset with me as she thinks it’s addictive, but I think of it as a medicine. I like a pipe-full of an evening. It stimulates the mind.

  Been talking to Tattersall and I think we need to start agitating for a research institute here. I am not sure who was responsible for the initial planning, but I suspect they thought this place was like Earth because it looks similar and because we can breathe the air and drink the water. But as the days go by I recognize ever more deeply how totally unlike the Earth it is. Not worse or better. But different, and we need to know how things function here. A bit of scientific nous would not go amiss, and less of Hirondelle’s spooky nonsense. The last thing we want are freaks on Paradise. Gunter is as bad. He has this idea that you should pee on plants – so he does that, methodically, and I told him that might be why he can’t even grow a decent Tattersall weed! But he just snorted.

  Just got word. Literally just now came in: ‘To Bola and Peta Silvio, a girl called Isadora’. I’m so happy for them. No complications. All the right bits and pieces and all in the right place. We are invited over for a party in a couple of weeks’ time. Must think about an appropriate gift.

  Marie has become really interested in publicizing Paradise. She’s started an action group called WAM – Women Against MINADEC. It was after she heard about those drums of chemicals they found up on Palestrina. A lot has not been explored yet on this world. And there’s a lot we don’t know. The group is already having an impact. They went to the Bell Tree Islands and found the grave of the first child born on Paradise. It gave Marie and the rest of the party a real fright. They came to the falls, which were as pretty as anything you can imagine, and the little grave was off to one side. It was in what had once been a clearing, and there was still a signpost up saying Babycry Falls, but the whole place was now completely overgrown, as you might expect.

  Marie has also started a cooking club. When we can, we all share recipes, and Marie wants to publish a little book of them to accompany the produce we send off planet. Those of us who are into native food production think it is a good idea, and there is a distributor on Mars who is interested. Marie experiments with the Paradise plum almost every day, so I am the envy of all the fellas! Here is one of her recipes. I provide the titles. I name this one

  Isadora’s Plum Delight – recipe by Marie Newton

  Take some ripe plums (a plum the size of a duck egg or a fist is usually enough for one person) and lightly wash them, being careful not to bruise the skin. Set them aside on a dry towel and let them dry in the sun or air. Don’t rub them, as the skin detaches very easily after washing.

  When dry, slice with a very sharp knife and hold the plum together as you withdraw the blade. Hold it for a few seconds, then allow the cut plum to open naturally. You will find that the flesh of the fruit holds firm and that there is a ring of small black seeds surrounding a central yellow pith.

  Using a small sharp spoon, scoop out the yellow pith and reserve in an egg cup or small bowl. Then remove the seeds with the spoon, and discard. If some of the seeds have been bruised, they may leak a blue liquid. This is not harmful but has a flavour close to fennel, which is to be avoided in this recipe. A dab with a twist of absorbent kitchen paper is usually all that is needed to soak up the blue liquid.

  Mash the pith with a fork and add a herb of your choice. Hybla berries provide a nice contrast to the flavour o
f the plum. Spoon the mashed pith back into the cavity from which it came. Heat an oven to 200°C and place the plum halves in the centre. Watch as they froth up and change colour. When the liquid pith has firmed and the skin of the plum is reddish brown, they are cooked. It never takes more than five minutes.

  Serve immediately with fresh warm bread. Each part of the plum has its own flavour. This can be an appetizer or a dessert – or a complete lunch. It tastes especially good with one of the range of Tattersall teas.

  Enjoy.

  DOCUMENT 5

  ‘Plum Crazy’, from the private notebook of Professor Israel Shapiro

  According to the date, and Hera’s testimony, the following entry was probably written only a few weeks before Shapiro died. This would explain the sombre and apocalyptic tone. It shows the effects of addiction to the juice of the plum.

  •

  To dinner with my sister and her husband in Cambridge. Tonight we heard the Cantata Romana sung by the full choir of King’s College. Proceeds to go to the relief fund for Rome. Afterwards we walked through the lovely grounds of Clare while a frost made the air dry and pure.

  They will have to move before the year is out, I fear. Their lovely stone house is sinking! Oswald showed me the cracks in the cellar and muttered grimly about the lack of endowments.

  Fortuna came home while we were sampling the fruit of the cellar. She was wearing a peacock-blue outfit and had been out fund-raising. She said to me, conspiratorially taking my arm, ‘I have a special treat for dessert,’ and my heart sank. How hard it is when people mean well but do the very thing that hurts.

  So at dinner there it was. As I feared. After the wine and before the liqueur. Ushered in with trumpets.

  This ‘plum’, as they call her, what am I to make of her? She sits on my plate like a giant damson, inviting my fork and knife, her perfume rising like a vintage port – but I would rather plunge the fork into my arm than eat this innocent creature, which contains more knowledge than I do. Yet I do not.

  Being one for whom politeness is like spelling, a cornerstone of civilization, I reason: my host, Oswald, will have mortgaged his pension to pay for these – retained in the caves of Mars, close to freezing, say 34.5 degrees of the old Fahrenheit, varying by less than point five of a degree, week in, week out. I should feel honoured. And they mean it as a treat for me, for they know I have had a hard time of late.

  Fortuna and I both once had a cache of plums, an inheritance from our spendthrift father. Fortuna gobbled hers with her paramours. I, being the sober conventional one, ate some of mine, sold the rest to get research funds, and I doubt if Papa would ever forgive me for that or would ever understand. A few I kept back. Three remain. One is for H, whom I love. One is for me when I am dying – not to eat or drink, I have my own supply of liquor for that, but to keep by my ear like a shell, and I will whisper to it as I fade. The last is for Fortuna when I am gone, and I hope she guzzles it with the same generous gusto she has guzzled her life.

  For I am an addict and both love and hate my vice. A kind of hypocrisy here. ‘Nous alimentons nos aimables remords. Comme les mendiants nourissent leur vermine.’ This Baudelaire mood confirms my worst fears. I am moving on, away, off, losing the thread somewhere. The hunter may come home from the hills, but this ship will find no haven. I need a sip to ‘shuffle the deck’, as we say.

  That’s better. We were in Cambridge. Eating. Yes.

  Fortuna is deft. Her twin-tined fork vertical in her hand and the sharp knife between the prongs, she slices like a conjurer and, lo and behold, the slit fruit splays as the fork withdraws.

  She says, ‘The seeds are bitter. Such a waste to discard. I am told they are good for lovemaking.’ Oswald pales, poor sod! ‘But better in the compost,’ she adds kindly.

  I think to myself, The small dark distillation of matter we call seeds are its wisdom. They are its salt. Hold them on your tongue for as long as you can, until the blue honey fills your mouth and turns bitter. Then swallow swiftly.

  But I don’t say this. Fortuna would try it. She would go out in a blaze of glory, knowing her. You have to build up slowly to achieve my stamina. I would have a bad conscience, and besides, I wish to die first. So, I obey convention and put the seeds to one side. They are not dead yet, I observe. That fine blue secretion tells me they are still viable, not as seeds but as centres of sense. Fortuna has been coy in her cooking, perhaps believing that a plum done rare becomes a rarer plum. They are not dead, that is what I want to say, for if they were, they would not bleed their blue knowledge. They would congeal like vile jelly.

  But revulsion and addiction are at war. On the tip of my knife I lift a pale morsel. I apply it to a sliver of toast, and, like the addict I am, like all lovers, delight at the rush: salt and honey, guilt and pleasure.

  Despite my knowledge I am no better than the rest, my nose in the trough, gobbling.

  But a few days later I am back in my laboratory on Paradise. Tonight I will not sleep but I will dream. Before me is Prunella, the entity that has been my companion for fifteen years. Her roots pass through my floor and down, through the caverns of Paradise. With instruments I have traced that pale cable through sixty feet and it gets thicker and stronger the more it descends. It ‘raps’ with all the other roots of Paradise.

  There is a prunella fruit – a ‘plum’ – which hangs before me, over my desk. It is large (say the size of one of H’s breasts). There is a cut in this fruit I have kept open since first I had it brought here as a straggly vine. All I need to do is insert my scalpel and move it slightly. Moments later I am rewarded with a few drips of blue nectar, which I catch in a spoon and drink. Nine times a day – as often as I cast offending Adam out.

  Does this operation hurt the vine? I think not. In fact I am sure not, as I would be aware if it did and it would by now have contrived some means to stop me. Perhaps poison me, and the truth is I have sipped enough juice to kill a regiment. No, it does not hurt any more than I hurt when I produce acid in my stomach or semen in my balls.

  There is a parallel here, of course, and we will come to that. But for the moment I am still an ace of spades short of drunk, and want to lay some falsehoods while I can. How dangerous is popular wisdom! Estelle it was who first called this a plum, and anyone can see why. But if we called it the Paradise testicle, or the Paradise ovum, or the Paradise cerebellum or thyroid, people might not be so keen to eat it. If we likened it to a fleshy chakra – a node of energy made solid, a halo that rings like silver crystal when you tap it with a fingernail – we would be closer, though still far from the truth. These beautiful red pendulous shapes, sometimes perceptibly warm to the touch on a cool morning, are of course its main organ of sense and feeling – but again language is betraying me, for what they sense or what they feel is beyond me, though maybe bright H will untie the mystery.

  How I wish I could have been on the Scorpion! Would that there were more like Sasha or lovely, daft Estelle Richter, whose naked body splashing in the sea was the first knowledge this world had that there was a world beyond Paradise. Is there wisdom in innocence? I think there is, but there is a cult now of drab men and women for whom the world, and even life itself, is a kind of commodity. These critics, having eaten, now study their excrement to see what they consumed. On this they base certain conclusions. Their ignorance is uncompromising. Let us rather stand before the unknown in very humble, quiet observance and wait while it reveals itself.

  Sadly, we have tended to export the fears of Earth to space. My dying hope is that the exportation will not be accepted, and just as the corpses of Earth are slowly delivered back to the surface of this world, there to lie and dry and never fester, so the madness of Earth will be exhumed before it can take root.

  I am sorry for lovely H and the rest. It is not their fault – but it is our fault, the whole damn lot of us. Once I was a scientist, and a good one, but I never quite believed in science. In my prime I could see alpha and omega as glorious echoes of one another. Great
resonating gongs beneath a sea whose waves brought rapture. But now I am a happy mystic, happy to be cryptic and in love with my Prunella, which I tease with my knife and which teases me with her knowledge. He who knows will understand what I say. He who does not know will not be enlightened.

  I do not mean to be difficult, but if you men of the future wish to understand, you must make as a big an effort as I have, and pay as big a price as I have, and taste failure as I have. The sad truth is, everything you need to know is there before you, and always has been, on the lovely Earth we once called home. It is all in the asking. It is all in the seeking. Perhaps if I had read more poetry I would have known this sooner.

  Now I drink my blue nectar and lie down in the soil and seek the peace of God which passeth all understanding. Good night. Oh my sweet love . . .

  DOCUMENT 6

  ‘Shunting a Rex’, from Tales of Paradise by Sasha Malik

  To begin let us recall that, as a girl, Sasha Malik ran wild on the hills of Kithaeron while her father chopped trees. She danced, swam, dreamed and invented games as the mood took her. She was a clever girl with a quick eye, and soon it was Sasha who kept a tally of the logs sent down the Mother Nylo – both their length and their volume. And it was Sasha who kept the receipt books. By the age of twelve she was more or less running the household, and that included brewing batches of beer, cooking meals, mending wounds and cutting hair and beards – all for a price.