Birds of Paradise by Oliver Langmead (read any book .TXT) 📗

costs money, and with the greenhouse so close to completion I think it’s time I raised a bit more. Of course, for passing along the message and acting as our agent in this matter, I think we can make an arrangement to suit you. How does five per cent of the final deal sound? I imagine it’ll be in the millions.”

“Millions?”

“Yes.” Frank smiles again, the tips of his lips becoming visible at the edges of his bristling moustache. “Five per cent, then?”

“Sure.”

Over the hill is an octagon of wooden decking overlooking a shallow lake, with carven pillars at each point, and at its centre rests a tall table with a bell jar upon it. It is to the bell jar that Frank goes, his feet leaving moist footprints across the pale wood. “Here,” he says, and he runs his hands lightly across the glass.

Inside the bell jar is a crisp white flower, speckled with dew. Its leaves are a vibrant green and unblemished, its thick stem is punctuated by wickedly sharp thorns, and its petals are each a perfect paleness. As Adam beholds it, he notices that the rest of the greenhouse seems to fade away. Worse than that, the trees and grasses and river all suddenly seem fake, as if nothing except the rose is real. “It’s a rose,” says Adam, and his words feel inadequate.

“Not just any rose,” replies Frank, reverently. “It doesn’t age, and it doesn’t die. My grandfather found it in the middle of the Saharan Desert, half hidden beneath the sand. Even there, in that barren place, it grew. Without the right conditions it wilts a little, and you can see the marks the desert left on it if you peer closely, but… give it the right light, and the right water, and enough earth, and it blooms forever. A moment in time, caught.” There is a twinkle in Frank’s eyes.

Adam frowns.

“When you find Magnus,” says Frank, “Tell him that I’m willing to sell. We can arrange a meeting, and you’re welcome to come along, if you like.”

“Sure,” says Adam, unable to take his eyes from the rose.

“Good.” Frank releases a long breath. “Very good. We’ll have our driver take you where you need to go. Any destination in mind?”

“Back to Edinburgh.”

“All right. Best of luck to you, Adam. I hope that you manage to find Magnus, and that we’ll meet again soon.” Frank takes Adam’s hand and shakes it energetically. “It’s been a real pleasure to meet you. No, an honour. It’s been an honour.” He smiles, creasing his ruddy face. “Oh! But before you go. There was one last thing I wanted to tell you. Only a small thing. I just wanted to remind you of one of my favourite passages of the Bible. Genesis one: twenty-eight. Do you know it?”

“Yes,” says Adam, but he’s unable to recall the passage. He’s never been too fond of the Bible. It doesn’t do Eden nearly enough justice.

“Wonderful,” says Frank Sinclair, and this time, when he smiles, he shows a row of tiny teeth, like a small dog. “Then we understand one another. I’m so glad to have met you, Adam.”

When Ada Sinclair takes Adam by the arm, and gently leads him away, back towards the airlock and the house, he can still see the rose in his vision, as if it’s been scarred there. The greenhouse seems dull now, its every arrangement so artificial and poised. He thinks that he would like to go back and sit with the rose for a while longer, and admire the curve of its petals. And as the car pulls away from the house, the rose remains lodged in his thoughts – a phantom flower blooming through his brain, thorns prickling down his throat as he swallows.

* * *

The Sinclairs’ driver stops for fuel on the way back to Edinburgh.

It’s cramped in the car, so Adam stretches his legs by wandering through the service station. It’s a place between places, and it shows in the vacant eyes of the drivers, and the staff stuck behind their desks; nobody looks as if they are actually here. The station is bizarrely labyrinthine and features more empty shopfronts than occupied ones, so that in places sounds echo. There is a set of garish slot machines, where a single wiry lady sits, slotting coins and pulling a lever. From time to time a little bell rings and the machine vomits a stream of silver coins at her. Without pause, she feeds them back into the machine.

Feeling hungry, he orders a burger and chips. The car’s driver places an order as well, and they sit with their little plastic trays together.

“What did you get?”

“Burger and chips. You?”

“Same.”

The burger is tiny. Adam lifts the soggy bun to reveal some sad, limp lettuce and a single joyless, juiceless wheel of tomato, beneath which sits a round grey slab of anonymous meat, half hidden by a perfect square of counterfeit cheese. The chips are hollow. Thoughtfully, he munches at them, thinking about how eating meat used to mean something.

The life you would have to take.

There was a respect, there. A respect built from years of care: of watching the cattle and seeing them grow fat and healthy, the decision to slaughter a weighty one. Or the respect earned of the hunt: the chase, the blood, the fall. And by your own hands, you would have to dismantle the body. Cutting, and tearing, and plucking, and dissecting, so that you knew your food intimately.

Through the window, Adam can see a flock of black birds pecking at piles of rubbish. They flap among skittering crisp packets, and their feathers are ruffled by the passing of trucks. He tries to count their legs, but all of them have two. Somebody throws a plastic bag filled with cardboard coffee cups onto the pile of rubbish, and they take off all at once, flapping into the grey sky.

IV

When Adam is back in Edinburgh, he goes to a park