Portent (5 page)

    'I would say your life is somewhat charmed, wouldn't you?'

    He understood the reference. 'That isn't something I want to talk about…' He heard the man take in another breath.

    'Nor I, Mr. Rivers. May I give you my number so that you can call me back when you have more time?'

    'I see no reason to.'

    'If I mention one word it might help you decide.'

    'It still sounds like life insurance.'

    There was a pause. 'In a way, that's not too far from the truth.'

    Rivers realized his fingers were crushing the butt of his cigarette. It was the dream, still getting to him, making him tense. It had nothing to do with this stranger. 'I'm waiting,' he said impatiently.

    'Tinkerbell.'

    He stared at the vox as if it were Poggs, there in the room with him.

    A second or two went by before he pressed the MEMO button on the remote unit.

    'Give me the number,' he said.

    Rivers opened the Renault's door and flicked the cockroach off the driver's seat and on to the pavement. He crushed the insect with his foot before it could scurry away, an act that even the Animal Liberation Front wouldn't have complained of nowadays.

    'At least my day hasn't been in vain,' he told the mulched remains on the concrete.

    After a swift inspection he took an environment-friendly can (not friendly to roaches and their kind, though) from the glove compartment and sprayed the vehicle's interior thoroughly. He closed the door and smoked a cigarette while he waited for the chemicals to work.

    How had this man with the silly name known? he wondered as he leaned against the car. And what did he know about Tinkerbell? When the critically damaged research aircraft had crash-landed ten miles outside of Galveston and he had been pulled from the wreckage, one of only three survivors, apparently he had repeated the name over and over again. Tinkerbell, Tinkerbell, Tinkerbell… And that had been all he'd said for those first two weeks of recovery.

    It had taken that long for him to come to his senses, and at least half that long again for him to remember what the name meant. That was when it became an Official Secret.

    A passing neighbour, wearing a white short sleeved shirt with striped tie and dark knee-length shorts, his briefcase the only heavy thing about him, gave the climatologist a curt 'good-morning' nod. Sun protection cream smeared the man's bare parts and on his shirt pocket he sported a Sun Alert UV self-adhesive badge whose photo-sensitive chemicals would denote the sun's strength throughout the day by changing the colour of its dyes. Rivers returned the nod, unsurprised at the man's caution.

    How had this Hugo Poggs found out about Tinkerbell? And what was he implying? That name, Poggs… It meant something to him, but for the life of him he couldn't remember what. He'd heard it at some time, or perhaps read about the man somewhere. No matter, it'll come.

    He tossed the half-smoked cigarette into the dusty road and pulled open the car door again, allowing the worst of the fumes to waft out before climbing in. After a quick check for any more bugs lying on their backs kicking air, he switched on and drew away from the kerb.

    Even at that early hour, the sun was beating fiercely and as he passed his neighbour, a City broker of some sort he seemed to recall, Rivers contemplated pulling over and offering him a lift to the station. The businessman-Simpson or Timpson was his name-used to drive a maroon Jaguar saloon to his office every day, but since such gas-guzzlers and their drivers had become social pariahs, he had taken to using public transport. Rivers drove by-the hell with it, let him walk, there were too many other things to mull over this morning.

    The breeze through the open windows soon cleared the last dregs of the insect-spray; he closed them and let the air-conditioning take over.

    The main conference at Bracknell was expected to take up most of the morning and then, after lunch, would break up into smaller meetings in various parts of the massive Meteorological Office building and the nearby Hadley Centre. No doubt these would go on well into the evening, perhaps even into the night. His own briefing wouldn't take long-all the scientists and representatives present would be only too aware of the planet's chaotic weather patterns and their adverse effects on the environment. He and his colleagues, however, would be expected to come forward with calculated predictions on how the current irregular patterns would evolve and settle into an 'established constancy' (he grinned at the latter term, one that the US National Center for Atmospheric Research had recently come up with). Accurate paradigms devised from extensive scientific research and computer models were necessary if world governments were to prepare their countries for unnatural disasters and Rivers was unsure if his organization could deliver. Such predictions required evidence and information that had some kind of form, some kind of rule, no matter how complex; unfortunately, no such consistency or principle seemed to exist as far as the weather was concerned. The flutter of a butterfly's wings in Massachusetts might cause a tornado in India. Who would even know that butterfly had taken wing? All that the various working groups could offer was possibilities; and since the climate changes had become so erratic-and often, so violent-over the past few years, even possibilities were based mainly on calculated guesses. The truth was, the world had fucked itself up and nobody-scientists, climatologists, meteorologists, and little old men with seaweed, nobody-was able to say just what lay in store for the human race during the next few decades. Nor even the next few weeks.

    A sharp crack jolted him from his thoughts. Something had struck the car.

    He kept driving, aware of the probable cause. Blame the government, he mentally advised the stone-thrower: the present motoring restrictions were the politicians' idea, not his. At least it made the route through the city a little clearer, although a wary eye had to be kept out for the legions of cyclists and the taxi-tandem operators, many of whom seemed reckless beyond sanity. And the air itself was just a bit more acceptable to breathe, which was something to be grateful for.

    Rivers headed for the M4 out of London.

    

    

    The number of worldwide organizations attending the conference hosted by the UK Meteorological Office was considerable, ranging from the Scientific Committee on the Problems of the Environment (SCOPE) of the International Council of Scientific Unions to the Royal and Linnean Society (Evolution and Extinction); from the Intergovernmental Committee of the UN Environmental Programme and the World Meteorological Organization to the Norwegian Institute of Scientific Research and Enlightenment (NIVFO); from the United Nations' Food and Agricultural Organization, to the Institute of Terrestrial Economy. Just reading through the attendance list had made Rivers' head pound.

    Part of his address to the delegates-no more than five minutes, the whole report-dealt with the merits of the new Cray X-MP Mk IV, inarguably the world's most impressive weather forecasting computer, a twenty per cent improvement on its predecessor. The machine would soon be linked to other compatible computers around the globe, sharing knowledge instantaneously with every member nation of the 1993 World Environment Pact (WEP), and might even persuade those countries who, for reasons of their own (usually commercial), were not party to the agreement to join. The Cray X-MP Mk IV had the capability of identifying weather problems long before they reached crucial stage, and in some cases might even assist in solving those very same problems. This was technology at its most advanced and sophisticated, just one of science's contributions towards the Earth's increasing environmental difficulties. Rivers didn't mention the Massachusetts butterfly.

    After lunch, prearranged working groups wandered off to various departments around the building while the main conference continued, some of them adjourning to the Hadley Centre for Climate Predictions and Research building where discussions, arguments-and even insults-went on into the night.

    Rivers was among one of the latter groups, and it was not until 11.30 p.m. that he managed to steal away to a quiet office and make the phone call.

    He shifted his leg, the ache having begun only twenty minutes out of the city. Twice so far he'd stopped the car to walk around, mindful of the physiotherapist's advice to exercise the injured leg as much as possible, to stretch the muscles and tendons, never allowing them the chance to contract and weaken. He'd cursed her to her face for the pain the exercises caused, and then to her memory over the past few months, but had also sent her a bouquet of flowers-an expensive item these days-from time to time in appreciation of her insistence and persistence. In a year's time, she promised, the cane will be gone and a slight limp and the tendency for the left leg to tire easily would be his only reminder of the accident. She hadn't mentioned the physical scars. And he hadn't mentioned the mental scars.

    The summer drought had left the countryside wearied; the grasslands were seared brown, the tree leaves were brittle dry. Even the cattle in the fields he passed looked listless and thin. The last decent downpour had been fourteen weeks ago, even though the skies were often cloudy, seeming to threaten rain, but never delivering. Today was clear, the sky pallid, offering no respite from the sun whatsoever.

    Passing through a small Dorset town, two hours or so into the journey, a policeman had stepped off the pavement to flag him down so that he could take a closer look at the drive-time sticker on his windscreen. Forgeries were common and the fines for such had recently been increased enough to sting hard. When the officer noticed the Ministry of Defence stamp (the public generally was unaware that the Meteorological Office was an Executive Agency within the MoD) he straightened with a smart salute. Rivers had nodded back gravely, suppressing a grin until he was away again and the policeman was scrutinizing other traffic passing through his quiet little town. Because higher road taxes, punitive on high-performance cars and lorries, had only small effect on fuel consumption and pollution, the government had pushed through a Bill restricting vehicle usage, save for haulage and essential services, to alternate weeks. Blue-licensed vehicles for one seven-day period, orange-licensed for the next. The price of those licences alone (they had to be updated every quarter) was enough to deter the casual driver and together with the extortionate cost of fuel itself, the flow of traffic on Britain's roads eased enormously, and the public transport system at last began to make huge profits. It was a radical approach, but one that worked well enough for other countries-apart from North America, whose civil rights campaigners had easily swayed the Senate vote-to adopt the same system. Ironically, if the policeman who had stopped Rivers' car had not been colour-blind (no longer an obstacle in joining the force) he would have seen that the climatologist's windscreen was sporting a green sticker, which allowed him access to the roads at any time.

    Another forty minutes of driving and he was nearing his destination. Rivers pulled over into a farm track by the side of a quiet lane, this time to consult the guide Poggs had given him-'Easy to get lost in our neck of the woods,' he'd told the climatologist over the phone. As Rivers picked up the piece of paper with the directions from the passenger seat, he realized that the daylight had dimmed considerably. Glancing out the side window towards the sun, he saw dark clouds filling half the sky, a tremendous, dramatic mass that, had they not looked so ominous, might have made him smile with relief at the thought of the rain they carried.

    Instead he frowned, wondering where the hell they had arrived from. No storm weather had been forecast as far as he knew.

    Rivers reached for the earphone and pressed a digit. He watched the lumbering clouds in the distance while waiting for the number to dial then ring.

    'G23,' he said when it was answered. 'Jonesy? It's Jim.'

    'Don't you know it's Sunday? You get to rest, remember? No, we don't know how it got here, if it's that bloody great cloud bank you rang about. I've been on to Central and Observations, even gave Short-range a shot. None of them had a clue it was on the way until it showed up on the satellite a little while ago.'

    'It had to start some place, and it had to have had time to build like that. It's hard to believe we're in a drought and nobody noticed this looming up. No wonder the public's lost all faith.'

    'Yeah, yeah, I know, but that's not our department, is it? All they can tell us is that turbulence off the south coast is the cause.'

    'God knows we need some rain, but this doesn't look friendly.'

    'Stay inside is my advice. When it breaks-and it's got to soon-an umbrella won't do you much good.'

    'I'm already out.'

    'Then good luck. At least the gardeners will be happy, not to mention the fanners. I suppose we all should.'

    'Depends on the damage it does. Like I said, it looks mean.'

    There was a short silence.

    'Let's be optimistic,' Jonesy said.

    'Right. Listen, a full report tomorrow. I want to know where it started and the precise volume of rainfall when it's over. Also a record of the PPI and RHI changes as it travels.'

    'I thought you were on leave this week.'

    'Get it to my address.'

    'Done. Now get under cover and enjoy the rest of your day. At least the conference is finished and the Met Office won't be fielding awkward questions from our overseas friends. A mother of a storm on its way after one of the longest droughts in the UK's history, and nobody forecast it. It's almost as embarrassing as the '87 hurricane.'

    When Rivers replaced the receiver he looked back at the approaching storm clouds. Now he could see the movement in them, the swirling vapour, the leaden darkness massing at their base. He stepped outside the car to feel the atmosphere. It was unpleasantly muggy, the kind of heavy heat that needed a shower to dispel it. Well, more than a shower was on its way, perhaps a deluge that would bludgeon the very earth. Rivers was only too aware of what was happening to the rest of the world.