Diamond Mask Page 9

  Dee said “How do you do” and shook the Evaluator’s very clammy hand. But Ken stared at him, dumfounded.

  “Kenneth!” Mummie chided him. “Your manners.”

  With great reluctance, the boy held out his hand. After the greeting had been exchanged, the Evaluator winked and said: “Noo, that wasna sae gruesome, was it?” Then he exchanged a few more jovial words with Gran Masha and took his leave, saying he was on his way to visit the usquebaugh works.

  “What a surprise, finding him here,” Rowan said. They all began heading back to their rented groundcar, a spacious blue Audi.

  Robbie laughed. “Not really, when you consider that Islay is probably the most renowned producer of single malts on Earth. It would be odd if old Lek and his ilk didn’t make the pilgrimage.”

  Ken was still looking shocked. Dee stared after the departing Evaluator. There was something creepy about him. But what? He looked very old, but lots of people didn’t want to be rejuvenated. Was it his fakey use of Scots dialect when he was obviously not Scottish at all?

  “What do you say we follow Throma’eloo’s example?” Robbie suggested. “There’s plenty of time to visit the Bowmore establishment before we’re due at Finlaggan for this evening’s festivities. It would be a pity if we didn’t come home from Islay with a few well-aged souvenirs.” When his stern-faced sister looked as though she were about to object, he laughed. “Oh, come on, Vi. Lighten up. It isn’t as though the bairns were going to absorb the product by oz-bloody-mosis.”

  “Unless the gene is dominant,” Viola said bitterly. “Oh … very well. If Masha can stand it, so can I.”

  They climbed into the car, the professor spoke the destination, and they drove off. What with the strange old man and the incomprehensible byplay among the adults, Dee felt totally mystified. But Ken was sitting in the front seat between Mummie and Gran and there was no way she could question him about what was going on without the grownups hearing, and she was too proud to admit her ignorance to them. So she sat back and looked out of the window while the car traveled at a sedate pace along the narrow roads, heading southwest and eventually reaching Lochindaal, the great arm of the sea that nearly divided Islay in two. The threatening feeling Dee had experienced at the dun had vanished.

  Bowmore, the unofficial capital of the island, was a tidy village with slate-roofed white houses and an unusual round church at the head of its broad main street. On the southern outskirts of town was some kind of sizable factory with shiny onion-shaped “pagodas” towering above its buildings. A peculiar odor filled the air, and when Dee asked what it was, Masha replied crisply. “Burning peat, fermenting barley water … and fine single-malt Scotch. We are going to tour one of the places where Islay whisky is made, because liquor from this small island is famed throughout the entire Galaxy.”

  At first Dee enjoyed the Bowmore Distillery tour very much. The pagodas turned out to be ventilators on top of peat-fired kilns for roasting malted barley. In another building they watched the sweet-smelling dried malt ground up and turned into porridge. Sugary liquid drained off the porridge was mixed with yeast, and fermentation eventually turned the sugar water to a kind of barley beer having a low percentage of alcohol. This was carefully heated to concentrate the spirits through distillation.

  Dee was especially intrigued by the stillroom with its huge copper vessels shaped like gnome hats. Numbers of other trippers were staring at the stills as well. The things were very old, and the tour guide began an elaborate explanation of how they operated … but suddenly Dee could no longer hear him.

  It was back.

  The threat of impending danger had abruptly returned. Even worse, Dee felt something prying at her mind, something cold and horrid and fearfully powerful, quite different from any human coercive-redactive prober she had ever encountered. She froze where she stood, unable to call out to Mummie or the other grownups who stood several meters away listening to the guide. There was only her brother close by, and four or five innocent-looking strangers.

  Then she saw them.

  They were lurking amongst a group of human beings who had just entered the stillroom: the three Gi from the ferryboat! In a flash she understood everything. Her fear turned to hot anger and indignation. She gave a mighty mental push, banishing the would-be intruder from her head, then poked her brother and whispered, “Kenny, look! Those awful Big Birds are here.”

  “So what?” he muttered. He had been unusually quiet ever since they had left Dun Bhorairaig.

  “They’re trying to probe my mind and they’re making me feel all spooky. I think they were sneaking about on the dun, too! If they keep following me, the holiday will be spoiled.”

  “Why should the Gi follow you? You’re bonkoid! What’s the matter—are you afraid they’ll tell Mummie about your new power?”

  Dee shook her head. “It’s not that at all. I’ve felt that something bad was going to happen ever since we got to Islay. And just now somebody really, really strong was trying to dig into my mind! It’s not one of the True People. It felt different. So it must be an exotic—”

  Ken grasped her arm and squeezed an urgent warning. “Shh! Pipe down. Didn’t you know? There’s another nonhuman here on the tour with us! Over there. That geeky professor or whatever he is that Gran Masha made us shake hands with. It must be him drilling at your mind-screen.”

  Dee followed her brother’s eyes and saw the man dressed in the orange nebulin sports jacket and funny pants. He was staring up at the row of gigantic copper pot stills. The expression on his face was one of religious awe.

  Dee was bewildered. “But he’s just a grownup!”

  “He’s not,” Ken said, with stark conviction. “He’s a ruddy great thumping Krondaku Grand Master! Metacreatively disguised. They do that sometimes when they go prowling on other folks’ planets and don’t want to be recognized.”

  Dee stared. Was it possible that that ordinary-looking person was actually a great warty tentacled monster with six eyes and a funnel mouth full of sharp fangs? She, like most very young Earthlings, was terrified by the supremely intelligent exotic beings, whose coercive and mind-probing powers were legendary. “But why would a Krondaku care about me?” she whimpered.

  Ken shrugged. A sly smile touched his pale lips. “Maybe he wants you for a snack.”

  But Dee was having none of that. “The Krondaku don’t eat people, silly!”

  “Then maybe he wants you for a stupidity specimen.”

  She very nearly punched him. But that would have meant losing control. She took a deep breath instead and spoke with complete calmness, even though her eyes blazed with anger. “Now you listen, Kenny! I’m not fooling. Something really is messing with my mind.”

  Ken’s attitude changed from mocking to sober in an instant. “You could tell Mum or Gran Masha,” he began. But his tone was dubious. He knew that the Evaluator must be a very important person, not to be lightly accused of the unauthorized mental probing of a child. Everyone knew that was a serious crime under the laws of the Galactic Milieu.

  “No.” She shook her head stubbornly. “I’m not even sure that he’s the one. Maybe it’s the Gi.”

  “It could be your imagination.”

  “It’s real! It felt like the mind-ream the latency therapists use, only ever so much stronger. And exotic.”

  “If you say so. But I don’t know what we can do about it—short of telling the oldies.”

  Dee’s face had gone stony. “I’ll be all right. Whoever’s doing it, I’m not going to let him in. But—”

  “What?”

  “Can I hold your hand?”

  He sighed. “Gaw! What a complete dragola. You know what? You’re turning into a faffing beanbag.”

  But he held on to her tightly until they were safely back in the car, and by then the queer sensations had once again disappeared.

  Early in the evening they visited the expertly restored seat of the Lords of the Isles, built on an island in Loch Finlaggan. It was both
a museum and the scene of a “medieval feast” presided over by costumed actors, with fourteenth-century entertainment accompanying the meal. Ken was very taken with the Macdonald castle and its pageantry; but Dee found the ambiance disturbing and once again felt unaccountably ill at ease, although this time there was no outsider attacking her mind-screen.

  All throughout the feast she felt as though someone were watching her. She whispered her suspicion to Ken and they studied the crowd of dinner guests carefully, but there was no sign of the three Gi or the camouflaged Krondaku. It was a relief to Dee when the bards sang their last song and she and her family walked back to the car park across the torch-lit lake causeway. The feeling of danger melted away completely as they drove to Bridgend, where they spent the night in a handsome inn.

  On Saturday morning they hiked up to see the “Giant’s Grave,” an important prehistoric site on Beinn Tart a’ Mhill. Then they visited the Museum of Islay Life in Port Charlotte, where there were exhibits of simple family dwellings ranging from Neolithic huts to homesteadings of the late nineteenth century. After that Masha, Viola, and Rowan drove off together to see the great Celtic cross and the carved grave slabs at Kildalton Chapel while Robbie and the children attended a lively little agricultural fair near Bowmore. Many of the other tourists (including the three Gi) were also at the gathering, buying up island handicrafts and homemade goodies and watching demonstrations of traditional folkways.

  The fair turned out to be an occasion of pure fun for Dee. There was no trace of her former feeling of foreboding as she and her brother and her good-natured uncle mingled with the happy crowd. Collie dogs showed off their shepherding skills; shaggy little West Highland cattle, lyre-horned Ayrshires, and other pampered pet livestock were paraded before critical judges by their proud owners; and there was an old-fashioned shearing contest with hand clippers that demonstrated the way wool was taken in the days before a simple pill that temporarily interrupted the hair-growing cycle caused sheep to drop their fleeces as neatly as unzipped fluffy coats.

  After spending that night at the Dower House Hotel in Kildalton, they went on Sunday morning to look at the little whitewashed cottage on the nearby Lochindaal seashore where their grandfather Kyle Macdonald had been born in 2006. The place had long since passed out of the family and become someone’s summer home. There was no possibility of going inside. Nevertheless Dee and Ken insisted upon getting out of the car and walking round the locked and deserted building.

  “Well, do be quick about it.” Viola’s irritation was plain. “Gran Masha and your aunt and uncle and I would much rather have our picnic than sit here in the car waiting for you two.”

  “We won’t be long,” Dee said. “But we really want to see Grandad’s house.”

  It had never really come home to the two children before that their grandmother had had a husband and a family. Dee and Ken mostly thought of Gran Masha as a professor at the University and a very important person—who coincidentally happened to be a rather jolly elderly relative. That she could also have been a wife to someone named Kyle Macdonald and a mother to Ian, their mysterious father, was something they had never really thought about before.

  “Grandad’s on Caledonia with Dad,” Ken said. “He writes books. I heard Uncle Robbie say so.” They were out of sight of the car, walking through the house’s back garden that faced the sea. Pinks and sandwort grew amidst the coarse grass, and the dog roses were in bloom. Beyond the strand, the wide sea-loch was almost as calm as green glass. The sky had become hazy.

  “Both Dad and Grandad are latent,” Ken added in a low voice. “Like us. That’s why Mum and Gran Masha never talk about them.”

  “I wonder if Grandad wore a kilt when he was little and lived here?” Dee tried to peer into one of the back windows, but the interior of the house was too dark for her to see anything.

  Ken gave a scornful laugh. “Not likely. He was born just before the Great Intervention. Kids back then wore clothes pretty much like ours …” He broke off, suddenly uncertain. “But I read that people on Caledonia wear kilts a lot, so maybe he does now. And Dad, too.”

  “I wonder if Grandad’s nice? I really wish we could visit him and Dad. Do you think we ever will?”

  “Mum will never take us. That’s a dead cert.”

  “No,” Dee agreed gravely. “She thinks Earth is the best place to live.”

  “I’m not so sure about that. When I grow up, I’m going to go to Caledonia and see for myself.”

  “Take me with you!” Dee begged.

  Before Ken could reply, his wrist-communicator peeped softly. With a sigh, he pressed the RECEIVE pad. Mum’s voice, incisive and not to be ignored, ordered the two of them back into the car at once.

  Suddenly Dee’s eyes were fierce. Both her fists were clenched. “Kenny—please! Please promise you’ll take me to Caledonia.”

  “Stupid git,” he said, but his voice was kind. “Oh … all right. I promise. Now let’s go back to the car before Mum comes after us and starts frizzing our ears.”

  The last activity Masha had planned for them before they caught the late evening shuttle bus back to the mainland was a picnic followed by a leisurely walk along the wild northwestern shore of the island, where they would be able to explore the cliffs and sea-caves and perhaps catch sight of some rare birds. The car carried them north to the Gruinart Flats that formed Islay’s narrow “waist.” Long ago the flats had been drained dry for crop planting, but now they had reverted to their original wetland state and were set aside as a bird sanctuary.

  “Islay once had over fifteen thousand people living on it,” Gran Masha said, “and much of the native wildlife was killed. But when the Great Intervention opened the way to the stars, many of the inhabitants went away and helped to colonize new planets, just as human beings in other parts of the Earth did. Those who still live here on Islay are very careful to take good care of the land and the plants and animals, so that the island will remain beautiful forever.”

  “Did some of the people who went away go to the planet Caledonia?” Dee asked.

  “Yes,” Gran Masha said shortly. Then she changed the subject, and began talking about the Battle of Gruinart.

  By now, everyone—even Ken—had already read the story of the Kilnave Fiend from the book that Dee had picked up on the ferry. (But when Robbie Strachan checked with Islay Telecom, there was no listing for subscribers named John Quentin or Magdala MacKendal, so Dee was allowed to keep the plaque.) Viola had been very dubious about the tale of the Fiend. She had taken the time to consult with the Keeper of the Islay Museum and found out that there was no evidence whatsoever that the dwarf known as the Dubh Sìth, a genuine historical character, had been responsible for the fiery massacre of the MacLeans. As for the notion that the Kilnave Fiend still stalked the moors dealing fiery death to the unwary, the Keeper had laughed and called it sensational rubbish. Viola had said that she suspected as much, and she used the occasion to lecture the children on the virtue of healthy skepticism.

  They spent a brief time looking over the scene of the 1598 battle, a glistening spread of salt marsh alive with waterfowl. Dee entered the birds that she could recognize into her Day List of species observed. Then the car headed up the road on the west side of Loch Gruinart toward Kilnave. After about five kilometers they came to a discreet notice board on their right that directed them down a short dirt track to a roofless stone church overlooking the sandy shallows. Everyone got out of the car, and Aunt Rowan took her camera and made a Tri-D video as they explored the scene of the ancient atrocity.

  The church of St. Nave was built of massive gray slabs stained with yellow lichen. A stone cross with dim carvings stood outside. Dee hated the place, in spite of the colorful wild-flowers that surrounded it. Her earlier feeling of uneasiness had returned more strongly than ever during the drive north. She refused to go inside the decaying stone-arched door of the ruin, which reminded her of a mouth with snaggleteeth, and she was the first to climb back into the
car when Gran Masha said it was time to move on.

  Beyond Kilnave the road led past some abandoned farmsteadings and then turned inland, away from Loch Gruinart, and skirted Loch Ardnave, a small body of freshwater that was alive with nesting ducks and grebes. They stopped briefly so that Dee could enter the birds in her notebook. Eventually they reached the road’s end at the sea, where there were several stone picnic shelters in niches among the sand dunes of Tràigh Nòstaig. Two other groundcars were in the parking area and a few people were visible down by the shore. The sky had partly clouded over again and great waves were crashing onto the beach. But it was pleasant inside their shelter, where Aunt Rowan and Uncle Robbie unpacked the lunch and set it out on the salt-bleached wood of the rustic table. A flock of gulls immediately appeared, evidently having designs on the food, and some of the bolder birds began buzzing the picnic grounds.

  Ken set out to chase them, but Gran Masha urged him to sit down and then used her strong coercion to shoo the pests away. Dee got out her bird plaque, ran through the gull pictures until she identified the correct species, then soberly entered them in her Day List with a tap of her fingernail: HERRING GULL. GLAUCOUS GULL. COMMON GULL. LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL. LITTLE GULL.

  “Very good.” Viola nodded in approval. “And do you see that large, dark bird soaring above the sea?”

  “Yes, Mummie.”

  “It’s a pomarine skua. Rather uncommon. Find it in your book.”

  Obediently, Dee pressed the plaque’s upper right-hand corner until the image of the marine predator appeared—

  And then it happened again.

  Dee’s face froze into a blank mask. The mind-prober was back! This time the digging was very gentle and cautious and she almost had not noticed it. Once she did, she had no trouble resisting the would-be intruder. But Mummie mustn’t know!