Holy Fire (19 page)

Klaudia sipped nervously at her demitasse. “[You know what the problem is, Maya? This is a party for intellectuals. It’s really stupid to be an intellectual when you’re young. You should be an intellectual when you’re a hundred years old and can’t feel anything anymore. Intellectuals are so pretentious! They don’t know how to live!]”

“Klaudia, relax, okay? It’s still early.”

The wall mural was the most warm and inviting object in the Tête du Noyé. It was not glassy or screenlike at all, it was very painterly, very like a canvas. The screen had been broken up into hundreds of fragments, honeycombed cells, slowly wobbling and jostling. The moving cells swam among one another, and pulsed, and rotated, and mutated. A digital dance of the flowers.

Maya lifted her demitasse cup, formally touched it to her lower lip, and put it back on the table. She watched Klaudia fidget for a while, and then glanced at the mural
again. The amber floral shapes were mostly gone, replaced by a growing majority of cool geometrical crystals.

She wasn’t quite sure how she knew it, but she realized somehow that the mural was watching her. The mural had some way to monitor people—probably cameras, hidden behind the screen. Whenever anyone looked at the mural directly, its movement slowed drastically. It only really got going when no one was looking at it.

Maya opened her backpack, and slyly watched the mural in the mirror of her makeup case. The mural knew no better, and thought it had escaped her attention. The little cells became quite lively, flinging sparks of information at one another, blossoming, conjugating, spinning, kaleidoscoping. Maya snapped her case shut, and turned to face the screen directly. The cells froze guiltily in place and crept along on their best behavior.

Eugene ambled over. “Ciao Maya!”

“Ciao Eugene.” She was glad to see him. Eugene had bathed. He’d combed his hair. He was looking very natty in a long brocade coat and stovepipe slacks.

Eugene smiled winningly. “
Was ist los
, Camilla?”

“Klaudia,” Klaudia said, frowning and tucking in her legs on the couch.

Eugene sat down cheerfully. “You should have logged on at the bar! That’s the custom here at the Tête. I didn’t even know you’d arrived.”

“There’s a first time for everything, Eugene.”

“Most people log on from home to say they’re coming. This scene is very netted. The Tête is our meat rendezvous. I’m pleased that you’ve come. How do you like our host?”

“I don’t much like him,” Klaudia said primly in English.

“Amazing character, isn’t he? He’s a fascinating conversationalist. Got a million stories. He was a cosmonaut.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, the only Czech in the lunar colony. Stayed up on the moon all during the plague years. That’s why he wears the suit. They had those immune system problems with the long-term radiation. He tried to make it on Earth without his suit at first, but he caught the staph and it scarred him pretty bad. That’s why he went for the heavy fur.”

“I’ve never met a cosmonaut.”

“Well, you’ve met one now. Klaus owns the Tête. I gotta warn you, Klaus doesn’t much like to talk about his moon years. Most of his friends died during the blowouts and the coup and the purges. But he’s really good to the local scene. He was the only Czech lunarian, a national hero. So the Praha city council lets him do anything he wants. Klaus is no stuffy gerontocrat, he’s really been to the edge.
Mit ihm konnte man Pferde stehlen.
”

“You don’t have to speak Deutsch just for me,” Klaudia pouted.

“Deutsch is no problem! We got a Shqiperisan guy right over there trying to find someone here who can speak Geg. Geg, or maybe Tosk.”

“Where’s he from?”

“Tirana.”

Reluctantly, Klaudia brightened. “[I love men from Shqiperise,]” she said in Deutsch. “[They’re so industrial and romantic. What does he do?]”

“
Virtualitat,
” Eugene said.

“
Prima.
” Klaudia stood up and left.

Maya patted the couch seat next to her. “Come sit closer.”

Eugene edged over cautiously.

“Tell me something about the woman who did that wall mural.”

“How do you know a woman did it?”

“I can just tell, that’s all.”

Eugene watched the mural, which noticed his attention and slowed instantly. “It’s a cellular automata display.
From the fifties, to judge by the technique. I hope she built it solid, because you’d have a pretty hard time replacing the works-and-wares from a dead platform like that.”

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it? That gimmick almost made me angry, before I realized what she meant to say.”

Eugene scratched his head. “You got me. Not my variety of gimmick at all. Paul would know, Paul’s a scholar.”

“Who’s Paul?”

Eugene smiled guardedly. “Paul pretty much lays down the law in our little scene. Y’know, I don’t like being told what to think. Because I’m not much for ideology. But I trust Paul. And I think that Paul trusts me.”

“Is Paul here tonight? Introduce me, all right?”

“Sure.”

Eugene led her across the bar. Haifa dozen people were eagerly clustered around a muscular red-haired young man in a vivid display suit. His suit jacket showed a splendid satellite view of night-lit Praha, patterned streetlights sprawled across his black lapels and down both his glossy sleeves. He was telling some lively and elaborate anecdote in Français. His enthralled listeners laughed aloud, with the clubby sounds of friends absorbing in-jokes.

Maya waited patiently until the story was wound up in a torrent of alien wisecracks. Then she spoke quickly. “Ciao Paul! Do you mind English?”

The red-haired man scratched his beard. “I have great respect for the English language, but that’s Paul there at the end of the table, darling.”

“Oh.”

“Don’t do that, okay?” Eugene muttered. He led her past a clutter of legs and drinks.

Paul was dark and stocky and clean-shaven, wrapped in quiet conversation with a sharp-nosed woman with black bangs and no lipstick. Paul was groping with an oversized table napkin. The square decorative cloth had a life of its own. It flapped and wriggled and seemed determined to crawl up Paul’s forearms.

Eugene whispered. “Let me get you something.”

“A mineral water? Thanks.” Maya perched on the edge of the couch and watched as Paul and the dark-haired woman discussed the glimmering, flopping cloth in rapid and fluent Italiano.

Paul wore gray fabric trousers and a buttoned fabric shirt in faded khaki; he’d thrown his coat over the back of the couch. The woman wore dark tights and boots and elbow-length white smartgloves. The woman was putting a lot of effort into ignoring her.

Paul deftly pinched a corner of the kerchief. The wriggling cloth went limp. He attached the kerchief to a slender cable, pulled a notebook from beneath the couch, and, still speaking nonstop Italiano, began pounding the keys and observing a readout in some grisly technical dialect of English.

Paul touched a final key and a process began execution. Then he turned alertly to Maya. “American?”

“Yes.”

“Californian?”

“That’s right.”

“San Francisco.”

“You’re very clever.”

“I’m Paul, from Stuttgart. I program. This is Benedetta, she’s a coder from Bologna.”

“Maya. From nowhere in particular, really. Don’t do much of anything.” She offered her hand to the woman across the table.

“You’re a model,” Benedetta said wearily.

“Yes. Sometimes. Barely.”

“Ever had one real idea to trouble your pretty head?”

“Not really, but I can dust myself off if I trip over one.”

Paul laughed. “Benedetta, don’t be gauche.”

Benedetta brushed at Maya’s fingers with her smart-glove, and slumped back into the couch. “I came a long way to talk to this man tonight. I hope you can wait to flirt with him until everyone gets very tight.”

“Benedetta’s a Catholic,” Paul explained.

“I am
not
a Catholic! Bologna is the least Catholic city in Europe! I am an anarchist and an artificer and a programmer! I plan to hang the last gerontocrat with the guts of the last priest!”

“Benedetta is also a miracle of tact,” Paul said.

“I only wanted to ask about the mural,” Maya said.

“
The Garden of Eden
, Eva Maskova, 2053,” Paul said.

Eugene had returned from the bar, but he was wrapped up in another story from the raconteur. Eugene was leaning on his elbows on the back of the couch, snorting with laughter, and sipping absently from Maya’s mineral water.

“Tell me about this Eva person. Where is she now?”

“She took too many tinctures and fell off her bicycle, and she broke her neck,” Benedetta said coolly. “But the medicals patched her back together. So she married a rich banker in España, and now she works for the polity in some stupid high-rise in Madrid.”

Paul shook his head slightly. “You’re very unforgiving. In her own day, Eva had the holy fire.”

“That’s for you to say, Paul. I met her. She’s a perfect little middle-aged bourgeoise who keeps houseplants.”

“She had the holy fire, nevertheless.”

Maya spoke up. “Her mural. It’s all about people like yourselves, isn’t it? When they’re left to themselves, they do miracles. But when they’re scrutinized and analyzed from the outside, then they dry up.”

Paul and Benedetta exchanged surprised glances, then turned to look at her.

“You’re not an actress manqué, I hope,” said Benedetta.

“No, not at all.”

“You don’t dance? You don’t sing?”

Maya shook her head.

“You don’t work in artifice at all?” Paul demanded.

“No. Well—sometimes I take photographs.”

“It had to be something,” Benedetta said triumphantly. “Show me your spex.”

“Don’t have any spex.”

“Show me your camera, then.”

Maya pulled the tourist camera from her woven purse. Benedetta gave a short bark of laughter. “Oh, that’s hopeless! What a relief! For one terrible moment I thought I’d met an intelligent woman who liked to wear spangled tights.”

A tall man in a long gray coat and mud-smeared work pants stumbled down the stairs. “Emil has come,” said Paul, with pleasure. “Emil has remembered! How amazing! Just a moment.” He rose and left them.

Benedetta watched Paul go, with deep irritation. “Now you’ve done it,” she said. “Once Paul gets started with that holy fool, there’ll be no end to it.” She unplugged her writhing handkerchief and stood up.

It wouldn’t do to be abandoned. Not when she was just getting through. “Benedetta, stay with me.”

Benedetta was surprised. She looked at Maya forth-rightly. “Why should I?”

Maya lowered her voice. “Can you keep a secret?”

Benedetta frowned. “What kind of secret?”

“A programmer’s secret.”

“What on earth do you know about programming?”

Maya leaned forward. “Not much. But I need a programmer. Because I own a memory palace.”

Benedetta sat back down. “You do? A big one?”

“Yes, and yes.”

Benedetta leaned forward. “Illegal?”

“Probably.”

“How did someone like you acquire an illegal memory palace?”

“How do you think someone like me acquired an illegal memory palace?”

“I hate to speculate,” Benedetta said, pursing her lips. “May I guess? You traded sexual favors for it.”

“No, certainly not! Well … Yes, I did. Sort of. Actually.”

“Let’s pop your palazzo open and look about inside.” Benedetta deftly wrapped the kerchief around her neck. The cloth twitched a bit, then flashed into a pattern of gold and paisley. Benedetta picked up her smooth and slender notebook and her metal-studded purse. “We’ll go behind the bar where it’s discreet.”

“You’ve been so patient with me already, Benedetta. I hate to impose.”

Benedetta stared at her for a long moment, then dropped her eyes. “All right. I was stupid. I’m sorry that I was stupid to you. I’ll be better now. So can we go?”

“I accept your apology.” Maya stood up. “Let’s go.”

Benedetta led her into an especially bluish and subterranean niche behind the long mahogany bar. Someone had been doing blood sampling on the table top. There was a litter of crumpled chromatographs and a diamond-beaked mosquito syringe.

Benedetta swept the litter aside, thumped her notebook down, and unreeled an antenna from its top. “So. What is required? Gloves? Spex?”

“I need a touchscreen for my password.”

“A touchscreen! It must be fate that I brought my furoshiki.” Benedetta whipped her kerchief off, set it on the table, and smoothed it flat. “This will work. It’s from Nippon. The Nipponese love the obscure functionalities.” She plugged the corner of the inert cloth into her notebook and the cloth flashed into vivid glowing eggshell white.

“I’ve never seen one of these furoshiki.” Maya leaned over the table. “I’ve certainly heard of them.… ” The intelligent cloth was woven from a dense matrix of fiber-optic threads, organic circuitry, and piezoelastic fiber. The hair-thin optical threads oozed miniscule screen-line pixels of colored light. A woven display screen. A flexible all-fabric computer.

Benedetta opened her purse, removed an exquisite pair of Italian designer spex, and slipped them on.

“Those are lovely,” Maya said.

“You need spex and gloves? Well, you’re in the right crowd. We’ll ask Bouboule. We can trust Bouboule. All right?”

“I suppose so.”

Benedetta tapped her spex and clawed at invisible midair commands. “You’ll love Bouboule,” she promised. “Everyone loves Bouboule. She’s rich and generous and funny and promiscuous, and likes to punch cops in the face. She’ll be dead at forty.”

Benedetta stroked at her notebook keys. Then she aimed her spex across the table at Maya. Maya’s face bloomed across the fabric kerchief in full color.

“The Miracle of Saint Veronica!” Benedetta said, and smirked. “Let me find the touch function.”

“This is a big secret. I’m being very rash in trusting a stranger with this. I’m sure you realize that, Benedetta.”

“You’re very pretty,” Benedetta said slowly, staring into her screen and typing. “You shouldn’t be so pretty, and also push me so hard.”