The Zeno Effect Read online

  “I’ve just realised I’ve left something in the café.”

  “We’re about to go,” the supervisor replied with some irritation. “You won’t have time to get there and come back and I can’t refund your fare.”

  “Never mind,” said Charles, “it’s my fault. I’ll catch the next shuttle.”

  As he turned towards the main entrance he caught a final glimpse of the boy and his mother. They were looking at him curiously, their faces pale discs receding as the shuttle swung out onto the main road. Charles turned and walked slowly down the aisle of shops, made a show of looking around the area where he had been sitting in the café, then returned the way he had come to occupy a bench outside the main entrance. Perhaps this wasn’t so bad, he thought; now he had a chance to work on a second shuttle. He would wait for the next one and ensure that he was the first person to board.

  Once the newly arrived vehicle had disgorged its occupants, Charles followed the same procedure as he had on the previous occasion, finally seating himself midway down the bus and closing his eyes. This time, although the passengers proved just as noisy as before, he kept his eyes firmly closed for the entire trip, opening them only when it was clear that they were arriving at the Salisbury terminal. It was now mid afternoon of a hot August day and the narrow streets around the cathedral were busy with Saturday shoppers as well as with tourists. After discarding his now empty bottle in a bin, Charles slowly worked his way towards the Cathedral Close, a route which he had followed so often over the years. He stopped briefly outside the restaurant which now occupied the site of Beaches Bookshop, recalling how he and his father would poke about in search of bargains among its extraordinary collection of second-hand books. One of those volumes was in his rucksack right now, part of a 1920s Macmillan Pocket Edition set of Thomas Hardy novels which had taken years of assiduous searching to assemble and of which his father had been very proud. Given that personal history he felt doubly sad that Beaches had closed, although hardly surprised. It was, Charles reflected, just another small example of where the world had gone wrong.

  Turning away from these troubling memories, Charles made for his final destination of the day. Salisbury Cathedral remained his favourite of such buildings. Not, perhaps, as historically evocative as Winchester or as monumental as Durham or York, but so elegant, its magnificent spire reaching for the heavens. Constable had caught its splendour well in his famous painting of the view from the meadows, a print of which was hanging on Charles’s bedroom wall. He stood for a while and allowed his gaze to travel along the building and, finally, up and up that spire. His father had always borrowed Orson Welles’s description of Chartres Cathedral when confronted with Salisbury – ‘a grand, choiring shout of affirmation’ – and the phrase had stayed with Charles. Affirmation indeed, he thought. When they built this it was still possible to affirm, to celebrate humanity’s relationship with its god. But now god was dead and humanity was busy destroying the world and leaving little worthy of celebration.

  With that melancholy thought Charles gave the spire one last appraising look and then walked swiftly towards the main entrance. Coming in from the bright sunshine made the interior seem all the more cool and dark, the narrow nave with its high-vaulted roof appearing to stretch away into time itself. Although he had no religious beliefs, a kind of peace came over Charles as he wandered through the ancient building. The creators of the cathedral had wanted to celebrate the glory of their god and, less altruistically if more pragmatically, ensure their ultimate entry into heaven. He felt it entirely appropriate that this was where the day of judgment would arrive, both for him personally and, more important, in bringing to fruition the judgment that he was making on the world. Was that hubris? Perhaps it was, he thought, but necessarily so if humanity was ever to recover anything like the noble aspirations that had motivated this building. Had he done a terrible wrong? The cathedral’s builders would certainly have thought so, but unlike them he was not a believer except perhaps in Nature and now, with his help, in the capacity of the Earth to survive humanity’s worst depredations.

  In this newly recovered state of quietude Charles took out the third bottle and, as a tourist might, wandered among the tombs, chapels and hidden corners of the cathedral, spraying as he went. At last the bottle was empty, and after dropping it in a rubbish bin near the main entrance, he found a deeply shadowed seat tight up against one of the pillars. His mission was accomplished. Events would take their own course now with no need for further intervention from him. He sat for a while listening to the organ music which seemed to float in the huge spaces around him. Was it recorded? Was it the real organist at rehearsal? He couldn’t tell, but whichever it was it sounded beautiful. Now it was time. From his bag he removed the travellers’ medical kit from which he extracted a hypodermic. First checking that no one was in his immediate vicinity, he filled the hypodermic from a small vial and injected himself in the muscle of his left arm. Then, returning the hypodermic and vial to the bag, he drew out his book, searched for a particular page and sat quietly reading.

  To any of the tourists who passed by that corner of the cathedral as the late afternoon transformed into evening, there was nothing unusual to attract their attention. A man asleep in the deepening darkness, his head leaning to one side against the pillar by which he sat, open on his lap the book that he had been reading before sleep overtook him. Had they approached nearer, they might have wondered how he could remain asleep with his head at that uncomfortable angle, and nearer still they could have seen that his mouth was open in an oddly disturbing way and that he did not appear to be breathing. But no one came that close. If they had done so, they might have seen also that the book was an old-fashioned looking edition of Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure, and that it was open at the passage describing the deaths of Jude’s two younger children at the hands of their elder brother, who then hangs himself. In the midst of the page, in italic and separated from the text around it, was the message left in a note by the older child.

  ‘Done because we are too menny.’

  Part 1

  INCUBATION

  1

  The city smelled hot to Alison MacGregor as she picked her way along a busy pavement on her way to work. It was an oddly compelling mixture of scorched rubber, grilled food and dust, which she only ever encountered here in central London. Her home town of Edinburgh smelled quite different, washed, as it was, with sea-flavoured winds that blew in from the Firth of Forth. Even in these days of temperature extremes, Edinburgh never seemed to turn into this kind of cooking pot where the simple act of walking along was like pushing your way through an invisible wall of heat. It was a relief to see ahead the pillared portico of Dover House, once the home of the Scotland Office and now given over to the Scottish Liaison Executive, albeit reluctantly on the part of the residual UK government.

  Once into the building and past security, air conditioning ensured that the temperature dropped considerably, though how long such energy use could be sustained was an increasingly divisive topic in the monthly staff meetings. The SLE retained the same attachment to democratic debate as the Scottish government itself, making meetings lively affairs if not always with conclusive outcomes. In marked contrast, Alison’s encounters with the UK science administrators, with whom it was her job to liaise, were usually tame occasions in which deference to the established hierarchy was the main distinguishing feature. Happily, she had no such meetings today, and since she was due to return to Edinburgh to report at the end of the week, would have none for some time to come.

  She settled into the lengthy and rather dull process of dealing with routine emails and circulated notifications. This was the price to be paid for what was otherwise engaging and often challenging work. As a Scientific Liaison Officer she was responsible for ensuring the flow of information between English and Scottish scientific communities – not always easy when there were layers of bureaucracy to negotiate, even w
here the scientists themselves were more than willing to talk to, or at least at, each other. After graduating in physics, her PhD specialism had been in philosophy of science, but it had soon become clear to her that her real talent lay in organising other scientists – herding cats, as her colleagues were fond of describing it – and mediating between constitutionally incommunicative experts in obscure fields of study.

  It was a job that she enjoyed and one at which she had proved exceptionally good, aided by scrupulous attention to detail and a remarkable ability to remember verbatim whole pages of information with little or no effort. At twenty-nine she was the youngest full Liaison Officer in the Executive. With some of the male scientists she knew that it also helped that she was an attractive woman. Long dark hair, a clear complexion, and vivid green eyes had earned her the soubriquet ‘The Selkie’ among her student contemporaries, and she wasn’t averse to turning on some of that magical charm when it would push things along.

  She was well through the accumulation of emails when her CommsTab audibly demanded her attention. ‘V-call from Irene Johnson,’ the machine murmured. Calls from Irene were definitely to be taken, partly because she was a very senior scientific adviser to the UK government, but also because Alison had known her since childhood. Irene’s daughter, Sarah, remained Alison’s best friend.

  “Hello Irene, how are you?”

  “Fine Ali, fine. Could you meet me for lunch today? I know you’re off north tomorrow and I’ve got a present for little Charlotte I’d like you to drop off when you visit Sarah.”

  “Yes, of course, but…”

  Ali was about to add that she wasn’t actually going until the end of the week and that she hadn’t expected to stop off in York to visit Sarah and Hugh, but Irene gave her no chance.

  “Great. Great. Let’s meet in the National Gallery café at one o’clock. See you then.”

  And she was gone, leaving Ali open-mouthed, intending also to point out that she had told Irene of her travel plans only a couple of days ago. What was going on? Although Irene was in her sixties, she was as sharp as ever and had hitherto shown no signs of failing memory. She had been so quick to cut Ali off in mid sentence, almost as if she knew what Ali was about to say and didn’t want it said. Oh well, Ali thought, maybe she’s just having a bad morning at work. Too many people demanding too much of her time. That wouldn’t be unusual.

  By a quarter to one, Ali was walking into a crowded Trafalgar Square, the sunshine drawing a mixture of tourists, office workers on lunch break, and the scavenging pigeons that had been restored to their former location in the square as tourist attractions. She struggled to find somewhere to sit, finally settling on the steps of the National Gallery from where she would be able to see Irene approaching. The heat was soporific, and it was through half-closed eyes that she at last spotted her friend coming across the square, carrying a gift-shop bag and looking to left and right as she approached. Ali stood up so that Irene could better see her, and, when they made eye contact, walked forward to meet her. To her surprise, Irene enfolded her in a hug of greeting and, her mouth close to Ali’s ear, whispered:

  “Go along with whatever I say. We could be overheard.”

  Irene then linked her arm through Ali’s and walked her into the building’s Sainsbury Wing, chattering about the weather and the crowds as they went. Ali listened mutely, taken aback both by the uncharacteristically effusive greeting and, even more, by the unexpected instruction. Now she was really worried about Irene’s state of mind.

  They found their way to the café and, after queuing for a while, carried their food to a table which was fortuitously vacated by a man and a woman just as they turned to look for somewhere to sit. Irene fixed the departing couple with a suspicious stare until they had left the café, and then, after handing over the bag containing Charlotte’s present, embarked on a torrent of talk which she kept up throughout the meal. About Sarah, about granddaughter Charlotte’s upcoming sixth birthday, about Ali’s work, about anything other than the reason for that whispered demand. Ali nodded her way through it all, speaking when Irene eyed her expecting a response, and becoming more puzzled by the minute.

  At last the meal was over, and it was with some relief that she followed the still voluble Irene back out into Trafalgar Square. Taking her arm once more, Irene drew Ali towards an area particularly crowded with tourists where she stopped and announced that she had a little shopping to do so Ali should continue down Whitehall on her own. Then, just as she had earlier, she drew Ali into an embrace and murmured into her ear.

  “When you have Sarah on her own tomorrow, give her this message. Zeno is in the wild. Just that. Zeno is in the wild. She’ll understand. On her own, remember. It’s urgent and very important.”

  And with that she disappeared into the crowd.

  Ali returned to work but, unsurprisingly, found it impossible to concentrate. She could make no sense of Irene’s behaviour except that it was clearly vital to her that Ali did as she asked. Well, Ali thought, there was no real reason why she shouldn’t leave tomorrow and stay overnight in York before continuing on to Edinburgh. Having convinced herself of that, she called the Office Manager to make the arrangements.

  “Moira, something’s come up and I’ll need to go north tomorrow instead of Friday, but stopping off in York on the way. I have to talk to a researcher in their Medical School. Could you rebook me on the eleven o’clock train but with a stopover. I’m really sorry about the last-minute change.”

  Moira, too, sounded sorry at being thus inconvenienced, but Ali comforted herself with the thought that at least her excuse was partly true. Sarah was an immunotherapy systems researcher in the Centre for Immunology and Infection, and it was part of Ali’s job to keep in touch with researchers in different regions of the country.

  Having taken the decision, Ali felt a little less ill at ease. She was still worried about Irene and puzzled by the strange message, but she and Sarah could sort that out together. Pushing such concerns to the back of her mind, she emailed Sarah to say that she was coming and then returned to the work remaining from the morning. It would have to be dealt with before she left, a task which would certainly occupy the rest of the afternoon.

  Just as she was nearing the last few bits and pieces her CommsTab sprang to life with the information that Richard Osborne was calling. This was not entirely welcome. Ali had an on–off relationship with Richard, one which she did not fully understand and which she was not certain that she wanted. They had met a few months previously at an official reception – Richard was a civil servant in some unspecified financial area of government – and he had proposed that they go out to dinner after the event had ended. He was pleasant company, and Ali found herself falling into a pattern of periodic social outings followed by sleeping together, usually at his flat since her SLE accommodation was altogether more spartan. She quite enjoyed the companionship, and the sex was welcome, but there was nothing there that spoke to her of a longer-term relationship. Still, she didn’t feel able to simply ignore his call.

  “Hello Richard.”

  “Ali. Glad to catch you. How about dinner tonight?”

  “I’ve got a lot of work to get through, Richard. I’m still at the office now. I really ought to finish it off and then I’ve things to do at home.”

  “Oh come on. We can eat quite late and I’d love to see you. It seems like a long time since we went out and with you going away it’s the last chance we’ll get for a while.”

  The exchange continued for a minute or two with Richard in this rather wheedling vein until, as much as anything as the easiest way of ending the conversation, Ali agreed to meet him in a favourite Thai restaurant quite near to where he lived. Perhaps it would take her mind off the day’s odd events, she thought, and she had to eat anyway. Cooking herself a solitary meal was even less appealing than usual today.

  Another half-hour saw the remnants of office
work finished and Ali on her way home. The impersonal official apartment was hardly welcoming and she began to feel a little more enthusiastic about meeting Richard. Enough, anyway, to take some care about getting ready, having first packed her suitcase and left it along with Charlotte’s present ready for the next day’s journey.

  Dinner turned out to be more entertaining than Ali had expected, mostly since Richard was going out of his way to be charming, keeping her amused with stories of the bureaucratic inaction and obfuscation which seemed to characterise the government circles in which he moved. As he talked, she found herself reflecting on the increasingly marked differences between the tone of politics and governance in her own country and that which prevailed in England.

  “OK Richard,” she said, interrupting his flow of humorous anecdotes. “It’s all very well for us to laugh at this kind of behaviour, but why is it like that? I go to meetings with officials down here and there’s no real discussion. A policy is announced and people go along with it. Sometimes I think they’re just sitting there looking for ways to agree.”

  “Maybe it’s because they do agree.”

  “No, you’re missing the point. Yes, perhaps they do agree – though surely all of them can’t all of the time – but it’s more like they’re unwilling to actually discuss anything.”