The Islanders (10 page)

Of the remaining three recipients described by Caurer, one was an alcoholic and another was morbidly obese. Caurer asked mildly that perhaps the geneticists should have looked around for more relevant gene mutations to personalize? The final recipient, identified only by the name ‘Xxxx’, was a middle-aged man with learning difficulties and deep personality disorders. He had already been convicted twice of rape and attempted rape, and was serving a prison sentence for arson. He was likely to spend the rest of his life in a detention hospital, and now the rest of his life appeared to be infinite.

Caurer concluded the book with an essay pointing out that all over the world there were people whose (finite) lives were already dedicated to the common good. She named no names, but suggested there were hundreds, perhaps thousands of eminent research scientists, inventors, religious leaders, social workers, composers, authors, artists, teachers, doctors, aid workers . . . all of whom were in their individual way attempting to make the world a better place. Were the ten people whose lives she had described any more likely to improve on what these others were already achieving?

The consequence of her book when it was published was that the Lotterie trustees appointed a panel of international judges to sit annually. Every year they were to nominate a small number of people whom they had judged should be given the chance of an undying future. The cost of these extra cases would be met from Lotterie funds.

However, many of these so-called laureates, when their names were announced, unexpectedly declined the treatment. In the fourth year, one of these refusers was the philosopher and author V
ISKER
D
ELOINNE
.

Soon after he had been selected he publicly refused the treatment. He was not alone – four other laureates that year also declined the award. But Deloinne then wrote and published an impassioned book called
Renunciation.

In the book he argued that to accept athanasia was to deny death, and as life and death were inextricably linked it was a denial of life too. All his books, he said, had been written in the knowledge of his inevitable death, and none could or would have been written without it. Life could only be lived to the full by the instinctive or unconscious denial of death, otherwise nothing would ever be achieved. He expressed his life through literature, he said, but this was in essence no different from the way other people expressed their own lives. To aspire to live for ever would be to acquire living at the expense of life.

Caurer came forward and said that Deloinne’s book had changed her mind. She apologized publicly for her error of judgement, retired to her island home and never again uttered or wrote a word on the subject of athanasia. Deloinne himself died of cancer two years after
Renunciation
was published.

Lotterie-Collago reverted to its random selection of winners and within a few years the athanasia treatment was being carried out without publicity or controversy, lottery tickets were sold all over the Archipelago and in the countries of the north, and every week and month a trickle of lottery winners travelled slowly across the island-congested seas to the quiet, rain-swept hills of Collago.

Visitors are discouraged on the island, although there are no formal bans. Strict shelterate laws are in place, but havenic rules are comparatively liberal. Tunnelling has never been attempted on Collago but one can imagine that tunnellers would not be welcome. Some seasonal jobs are available on dairy farms but visas must be obtained in advance.

Currency: Archipelagian simoleon.

Derill - Torquin

SHARP ROCKS

Little is known of this place and we have been unable to visit it in the cause of researching the gazetteer. D
ERILL
was formerly known as O
SLY
(patois: S
TEEP
B
ANK OF
G
RAVEL
) and is situated somewhere in the southern hemisphere. We know of no other islands in the alleged Torquin Group. (There happens to be an island paradoxically called Torquin in the Lesser Serques – that Torquin has become a ‘closed’ island due to the presence of a Glaundian army base.)

Occasional references to ‘Torquin’ as the name of a group or arc of islands should normally be treated as a spelling or typographical error.

There are persistent allegations that Derill, Sharp Rocks, changed its name in order to cash in on the perceived fortunes of either Derril or Derril (see below), but we know nothing of this and hold no opinions. We have never been there, have seen no pictures of it, have never met anyone claiming to have been born there, know no one else who has ever been there or heard of it and frankly do not care.

Derril - Torqui

LARGE HOME / SERENE DEPTHS

The largest island in the Torqui Group, also the administrative centre for the group, D
ERRIL
is frequently confused with another more recently named island called Derril, in the Torquils. (See below.)

In this case, island patois is useful to learn and remember. The name Derril, in Torqui patois, simply means L
ARGE
H
OME
. The Torquil Derril’s patois name means D
ARK
H
OME
or H
ER
H
OME
.

Since confusion between the two islands is a constant problem for travellers, and because both islands in their different ways are extremely attractive to visitors, we believe the clearest way of distinguishing between them is to describe the island groups to which they belong. We are here to try to clarify.

The Torqui Islands (alternatively, the Torqui Group, or more simply the Torquis) lie immediately to the south of the city of Jethra, which is on the southern coast of Faiandland. The closest Torqui island to the mainland is called Seevl, and although it is not itself an important island it is well known to the inhabitants of Jethra. It lies offshore of the city and is of course always in view. Indeed, it can be said to dominate the city, as it is a grim, bleak and mountainous island which casts deep shadows across the Jethran offing during most daylight hours. In the past there were family and trading links between Seevl and Jethra, but these were discouraged by the authorities when the war broke out.

The Torquis are therefore northern hemisphere islands, and the Torqui Group covers a signifcant area of that part of the Midway Sea. Seevl, the northernmost, suffers a chill climate, exposed to constant winds from the mountainous land to the north and enduring bitterly cold winters. However, many of the other Torquis are so much further to the south, and in the main stream of the benign Archipelagian winds, that they enjoy warm or even subtropical climates.

The principal distinction between the Torquis (location of Derril, Large Home) and the Torquils (location of Derril, Her Home, Dark Home) is that the latter islands are in the southern hemisphere. The two groups are a long way distant from one another and different in some respects, but by a cruel coincidence their topography and climate are alike, not to mention the fact that even their geographic coordinates are uncannily similar.

As is well known, all map references for the Dream Archipelago are approximate. Because in this case they tend to confuse matters rather than clarify them, we shall not dwell on the similarities, nor point out any more of the awkward coincidences, for there are several. Let us simply say that the Torquis (patois: S
ERENE
D
EPTHS
) occupy an area of the ocean roughly in the region of 44°N - 49°N and 23°W - 27°W, while the Torquils (patois: E
VENING
W
IND
) in the southern part of the world, are at approximately 23°S - 27°S and 44°E - 49°E.

It is probably best not to report the coordinates of the group allegedly called the Torquins, because they will only make things worse.

Derril, Large Home, the island with which we are concerned here, lies a long way to the south-east of Seevl, at the furthest extremity of the Torquis. It is not only the largest island in the group it is advantageously placed as far as the main shipping lines are concerned, it has two deepwater ports and is rich in mineral deposits. Industry thrives on Derril. The landscape is hilly rather than mountainous and much of the interior is given over to farming. Derril is in short a prosperous place and has always been infuential in Archipelago affairs.

No greater influence was exercised and enjoyed than in the years the C
OVENANT OF
N
EUTRALITY
was being planned, drawn up, and ultimately ratified and accepted by virtually every island group in the world.

The history of the Covenant is well known in detail, perhaps exhaustively to any child educated in our islands, so it need not be repeated here. But for centuries the Covenant has been the constitution, the bill of rights, which governs and directs life in the Dream Archipelago.

Although modified innumerable times by courts and legislatures on individual islands, to take account of particular cases or circumstances, the imperative holds good. The Covenant recognizes the individual identity and uniqueness of each island, or self-declared group of islands, grants delegated rights of self-governance, and ensures that the Archipelago remains neutral in all non-island concerns.

It has not prevented disputes between islands, although in practice there have been relatively few, but it has ensured that the islands do not become embroiled in the intractable and violent war being fought by the countries in the north.

At the time the Covenant was being planned, Derril attracted jurists, diplomats, philosophers, politicians, journalists, pacifists, historians, academics and sociologists from all parts of the Archipelago. Negotiations were complex and took more than eight years to conclude. There followed an administrative period of another five years, during which the organizing clerks translated the Covenant into every main language of the islands. It was also rendered into innumerable patois forms, to be announced orally to indigenous groups.

Another delay followed, for formal consultation and refection, but then all the legislators, judges and Seigniory offcials, and everyone else who had taken part in the negotiations, reassembled on Derril, Large Home, for the formal signing of the Deed of Covenant.

The signing took another twelve months – every island and island group was to take possession of original documents signed by all parties – but in the end it was done, and celebrations began.

In the present day the visitor will be delighted by the impeccably maintained Covenant Palace, where the negotiations and signing took place. There are several museums in the city where many of the original documents are stored, as well as a wealth of other material, such as formal robes, photographs, journals, paintings.

Conducted tours are arranged every day, using several different languages, and Derril City offers many hotels, pensions and guest houses at a range of prices.

The island has largely become a mausoleum to its own past, so other visitor attractions are few. There is a commemorative Yo Tunnel in the hills overlooking the bay, but it fell into disuse many years ago and no one knows how to make it function again. It can, however, be explored on foot. You will be required to use special footwear and headgear, but they may be rented at the site.

Long stretches of the coast have been industrialized – steel founding, ship-building and vehicle manufacture – and the inland areas are now dominated by intensive farming techniques. Much of the landscape is covered with plasticized cultivation tunnels, for the growing of the soft fruits which the island exports across the Archipelago.

On the far eastern side there is an area of the island which has always been leased, even in the years before the Covenant was signed. The Glaund Republic is the leaseholder and has a claim of inalienable right to use and occupy this immense tract of land. It has resisted all attempts by the Derril Seigniory to make it relinquish that right.

It is an ironic implied comment on the existence of the Covenant that the rentals paid by Glaund in effect underwrote the immense cost of forging the Covenant. Even deeper irony lies in the fact that on the island where neutrality was claimed, such a huge area should be operated as a military base.

Artillery and rocket ranges mean that the hills in that area are closed to walkers, in spite of a publicly declared Glaundian policy of openness to the public and a welcome to tourists. Now visitors are warned not to go anywhere near, because of a real danger from unexploded warheads and fragments of depleted uranium. The range is in use throughout the year. There are many submarine pens in frequent use, as are detention, interrogation and redaction centres, military training facilities and two huge airstrips. The whole area is sovereign territory, part of the Glaund Republic, but the matter is constantly in dispute.

Fifteen years after the Covenant was signed, and five years after the ratifcation process had ended, the Glaund base was shelled from the sea by units of the Faiandland Navy. There was much collateral damage to houses and businesses on the main part of the island. A naval and air battle ensued and an invasion of Derril followed, an attempt by the Faiandlanders to oust the Glaundians from their base. Militarily this failed. The native Derril people could only huddle in fear as their newly won neutrality was so cynically breached.