The Winds of Marble Arch and Other Stories by Connie Willis

Author:Connie Willis [WILLIS, CONNIE]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction
ISBN: 9780575120396
Publisher: Orion Publishing Group
Published: 2015-12-30T16:00:00+00:00

Lacau had put some kind of contraption across her chest. It was plugged into the spiderweb of cords overhead. I set up the translator. There wasn’t much I could really do until Evelyn did a fix for us, but I fiddled with it anyway, and the bey watched me, all eyes. Lacau sprayed on plasticgloves and went over to the hammock to look at her.

“I gave her her shot half an hour ago,” he said. “It’ll be a few more minutes.”

“What are you giving her?” I said.

“Dilaudid and sulfadine morphates. It was all there was in the first aid kit. There were IV packs, but they kept leaking.”

He said that without emotion, as if he had not had the horror of trying to put an IV in an arm that could cut an IV pack to ribbons. He did not seem at all afraid of her.

“The dilaudid puts her out cold for about an hour, and then after that she’s pretty lucid, but in a lot of pain. The morphates are better for pain, but they put her under after only a couple of minutes.”

“If it’s going to be awhile, I’m going to show the bey the translator, okay?” I said. “If I take it apart and explain everything, we decrease our chances of finding it taken apart tomorrow morning. Is that all right?”

He nodded and went over to look at Evelyn again.

I pulled the face off the box, motioned the bey over, and started my spiel. Every burn chip, every hold strip, every circuit. I pulled them all out and let her handle them, hold them up to the light, stick them in her mouth, and finally put them back in the way they belonged with her own dirty little hands. Halfway through the electricity went off again, and we sat for five full minutes in twilight, but Lacau made no move to get up or to light the photosene lamp.

“It’s the respirator,” he said. “I’ve got one on Borchardt, too. It keeps overloading the generator.” I wished the lights would come back on so I could see his face more clearly. I was more than ready to believe the generator could overload. The one out at Lisii was off half the time without benefit of respirators, but I was still sure he was lying. It was that double-door refrigerator next to my cage that was overloading the generator and making the lights go out. And what was in that refrigerator? Coca-Cola?

The lights came on. Lacau leaned over Evelyn, and the little bey and I snapped the last burn chip in place and put the face back on the translator. I gave the bey a burned-out hold strip to keep, and she went off in a corner to examine it.

Lacau said, “Evelyn?” and she murmured something.

“I think we’re about ready,” he said. “What do you want her to say?”

I handed him a clip mike to fasten on the plastic drape above her head. “Refrigerator,” I said, and knew I’d gone too far.

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