The Blood Tree Page 2

“Never mind me. What has that old tightarse in charge of your directorate been up to?”

  Davie grinned at that description of his boss, then frowned when he saw how happy it had made me. The public order guardian, Lewis Hamilton, was a founder member of the Enlightenment Party and had been on the original Council with my father.

  “I haven’t seen much of him,” Davie replied. “He’s serving his month as senior guardian.” The Council instigated a rotating system for the top job a couple of years back because of abuses when the position was permanent. My mother had been one of the holders of the city’s senior office, much to Hector’s disgust. They hadn’t been getting on for years and had taken advantage of the celibate state that used to be required of guardians to ignore each other completely.

  “May the Lord protect us,” the old man said, taking refuge in divine power like all the best atheists. “Lewis must be almost as doddery as I am.”

  Davie laughed. “Not quite.”

  Hector looked up, gave a stern stare then laughed weakly. “Very good, lad. Very good.” He started to cough again.

  Dave and I exchanged glances. The old man didn’t sound too healthy, but he was still quick enough to latch on to our concern.

  “What’s the matter with you two?” he complained. “Have you never seen someone who’s reached the end of the line before?”

  “What are you talking about?” I demanded. “I’m worried I’ll be spending the rest of my life coming down to Trinity every weekend.”

  The old man broke into a high-pitched laugh. “I know how much you look forward to these visits, Quintilian.” He turned his hooded eyes back to Davie. “You didn’t answer my question, Hume 253. What’s been going on in the Public Order Directorate?”

  I must have needled Hector. He’d normally have asked for my sarcastic take on the Council’s crime prevention activities first.

  Davie glanced at me uneasily, picking up the edge in the old man’s voice. “Well,” he said, “do you want the good news or the bad news?”

  “Give me the bad first, laddie,” Hector said, struggling to pull himself upright in the chair and glaring at me to discourage any offer of assistance. “That’s what we’ve got used to in this benighted city.”

  “Em, right.” Davie ran his fingers through the matted hairs of his beard. “Thirty-seven arrests for disorderly conduct in the suburbs in the last week – thirty-one of them involving minors.”

  “Disorderly conduct?” the old man asked. “What does that cover?”

  Davie raised his shoulders. “Anything from stoning guard patrols to nicking old ladies’ food vouchers. There’s a mandatory six-month spell in a Youth Development Department facility for anyone under twenty who gets taken in.”

  “Except those places are all full now,” I pointed out.

  “So we send them down the mines instead,” Davie said with a broad grin.

  “What else?” Hector asked, the question ending in a long wheeze.

  “Five holes cut in the fences on the city line, no smugglers or dissidents apprehended yet.” Davie shook his head. “And at least three illicit landings on the shoreline, judging by the tracks and footprints the patrols have found on the beaches. Ever since the Fisheries Guard all but fell apart last year, the coast has been impossible to secure.”

  “The dreaded democrats from Glasgow,” Hector said, his lips cracking into a bitter smile. “How will the Council manage to restrict the dangerous ideas they’ll spread?” Although he’d been as hardline as any guardian in his time, my father had eventually become disillusioned with his colleagues’ drive for total control over what Edinburgh citizens think and do. He reckoned that power had corrupted them. I reckoned he was right.

  Davie wasn’t buying it. “Democrats? Those people are just after a cut of the tourist income. How democratic is it to peddle dope and burn people’s lungs out with cigarettes?”

  “I suppose a compulsory lottery like the one the Council runs is all right in your book, is it, Davie?” Hector asked sharply.

  “Edlott’s all right,” Davie replied. “It doesn’t do any harm.”

  “Not now it doesn’t,” I said. “Now that it’s been cleaned up.” In 2025 I’d opened and closed a very nasty can of worms in the lottery.

  The old man started muttering about the iniquity of forcing citizens to accept fewer food and drink vouchers in exchange for the minuscule chance of winning a not very exciting prize. Then, suddenly, his legs shot out straight. His mouth fell open and his lips turned an unnatural shade of blue. The rattle that came from his throat made the hairs on my neck rise.

  “Get the nurse, Davie!” I yelled.

  I bent over my father and pulled the rug away from his chest. The citizen-issue grey pyjamas he was wearing were drenched in sweat. The noise in his throat had subsided. I put my head to his bony chest and listened for a heartbeat. For what seemed like an eternity I didn’t pick anything up. Then a faint, irregular thump came through.

  “Out of the way, citizen!” Simpson 46 pushed past me and leaned over the old man. “Stand back,” she said as she took Hector’s wrist and checked her watch.

  “What is it?” I asked, feeling Davie’s hands on my arms. He pulled me back gently. “What’s happening to him?”

  “Heart attack,” the nursing auxiliary said in a clipped voice. “Call the infirmary and get an ambulance down here right away.”

  Davie let go of me and pulled out his mobile. I was only vaguely aware of him talking as I watched Simpson 46 running through procedure that was clearly second nature to her. I stood there helplessly, fighting the impulse to shove the nurse out of the way and grab the old man’s hand. I glanced round the dimly lit room. Hector’s desk was covered with piles of books, the slips of yellow paper that he used to mark passages and make notes hanging limply like streamers the day after a parade. In the corner his bed was as neat as ever. He still made it himself every morning, as well as brushing the faded leather brogues – the sole mark of guardian rank he retained – that stood on the floor beneath.

  Davie came up to me. “The ambulance is on its way. I told them to give it top priority.”

  I nodded and watched as Simpson 46 folded the blanket carefully over Hector’s chest. Then a blast of anger hit me.

  “Pity you weren’t so meticulous in your care of my father earlier,” I said in a low voice, shaking off Davie’s hand. “He wasn’t listless. He was building up to this.”

  The nursing auxiliary looked at me impassively then shook her head. For her I was just the latest in a long line of relatives who’d lost their grip.

  “Leave it, Quint,” Davie said. “At least Hector’s still alive.”

  Simpson 46 nodded. “Quite so, Hume 253. Patients who survive the initial onslaught frequently recover.”

  I lunged forward. “And that makes your negligence acceptable, does it, you—”

  I broke off as a faint sound came from the old man. His eyes were half open and it seemed that he gave a shake of his head.

  There was the sound of a siren in the street below, quickly followed by the pounding of auxiliary-issue boots on the stairs. Hector was placed on a stretcher and moved out of his room with consummate skill.

  I stood there for a couple of seconds and looked at the books on the desk, wondering if my father would ever open them again.

  Then I turned and followed the stretcher out of the retirement home.

  There wasn’t room for me in the clapped-out ambulance so Davie took me in the Land-Rover. We didn’t talk as we drove towards the central zone then up the Mound to the infirmary. It was only as we pulled up outside the city’s main hospital with its château-like towers and dark grey stonework that Davie broke the silence.

  “He’ll get the very best treatment, Quint. I told them to inform the medical guardian.”

  “Thanks, my friend,” I said. I’ve never been one for queue-jumping but I wouldn’t have had any compunction in doing all I could for Hector. I was glad that Davie felt the same
way.

  We got out and headed for the main entrance. There was a light drizzle falling, just enough to blur the lights of the infirmary and give the nineteenth-century pile the look of a fairy-tale castle. That impression lasted as long as it took me to push open the door and walk into the chilly reception hall. It wasn’t drizzling inside, but the breath of citizens waiting for treatment even though it was after nine o’clock had made the place steam up like a surrealist’s version of a sauna – one from which the heat-source had been omitted.

  I accompanied the auxiliaries with the stretcher down the wide passageway that led to the intensive care unit. At one junction I forgot what I was doing and turned towards the morgue. I’d attended more post-mortems than I cared to remember in the infirmary. The way that I headed automatically for the autopsy room didn’t make me feel any better.

  A figure of medium height with white-blonde hair was standing at the door of the ICU. Despite the loose surgical robes she was wearing, the bulge in the medical guardian’s midriff was clearly visible.

  “Quint,” she said, smiling faintly. “I’m very sorry. I’ve asked the chief cardiologist to attend.”

  “Thanks, Sophia.” I went into the unit after her. Through a glass partition I could see a group of green-clad medics working on the old man.

  “According to the ambulance-men your father’s in a stable condition.” The medical guardian was at my side, a file in her hands. “The next few hours will be critical.”

  I nodded, glancing at her. Her expression was cold, as befitted someone whose nickname throughout the city was the Ice Queen, but her voice conveyed some emotion. Which had nothing to do with the fact that we’d had a relationship back in 2025, I was sure. All that survived of that was her letting me address her by her first name, a privilege she allowed no one else.

  “How have you been?” I asked, trying unsuccessfully to keep my eyes away from the bump in her otherwise slim figure.

  Sophia looked at me blankly then caught the direction of my gaze. “I’m not ill, Quint,” she snapped. “Pregnancy’s a perfectly normal state for a woman.”

  “Not for guardians, it isn’t,” I replied. Until a couple of years back, guardians were still expected to be strictly celibate. That was changed at the same time that their names were first published in the Edinburgh Guardian – in a belated attempt to make the city’s leaders more human. The idea of a guardian getting pregnant was still pretty hard to cope with. Sophia was the first and I suppose I was suffering twinges of jealousy. She’d declined to tell anyone who the father was, prompting rumours in senior auxiliary circles that she was carrying out a eugenics experiment on herself. You never know with guardians.

  “When’s it due?” I asked.

  “It?” she said, looking up from a clipboard. “The child is expected in mid-February.”

  “So you’ve got another four months of inflation to go.” I tried a winning smile on her and got frozen out for my pains.

  The city’s leading heart specialist came out of the treatment area and pulled his mask down. “All is well, guardian,” he said, nodding at his superior then turning to me. He was an elderly specimen, one who would have spent the last five years on the golf-course in a more frivolous and less hard-pressed society than Enlightenment Edinburgh.

  “You must be Hector’s son,” he said, stripping off a surgical glove and offering his hand. “The famous Quintilian.” He gave me a warm smile that took me by surprise. “I follow your cases avidly in the newspaper.”

  I eyed him dubiously. Groupies are all very well but I draw the line at superannuated males. “How’s your patient, Simpson 13?” I asked, reading the barracks number on his tunic.

  “Hector will pull through, I think.” The cardiologist broke off when he saw that I was puzzled by his use of the old man’s first name. “I knew him years ago.” He glanced at Sophia. “Back in the Enlightenment’s glory days.”

  “Complete your report, please,” Sophia said, unimpressed by the implied criticism of the present Council.

  “Yes, well, as I say, Hector will probably make a good recovery.” The aged surgeon nodded at me. “He’s a tough old bird. I suspect there’s some narrowing of the arteries but we should be able to control that with drugs.” He looked down at the tiled floor. “If the directorate can afford them.”

  “Thank you, Simpson 13,” the medical guardian said tersely. “I’m sure you have other work to engage you.”

  The cardiologist gave me an encouraging nod and went back into the unit.

  “As have I,” Sophia said, turning away. “Don’t worry, Quint. We’ll take good care of your father.”

  “Hang on a minute,” I called after her. “I want to make a complaint about one of your staff.”

  She stopped and looked back at me wearily. “Oh, for goodness’ sake. Who?”

  “Simpson 46, the nursing auxiliary at the retirement home.” I went over to Sophia and put a hand on her arm to make her face me. “She knew there was something wrong with Hector before tonight, but she didn’t do anything to prevent this.”

  The medical guardian glanced down at my hand and waited for me to remove it. “Prevent the heart attack? You must be joking. You know how stretched the city’s resources are. We’re lucky if we manage to treat everyone who’s actually in need. Preventive medicine’s largely beyond our capabilities.”

  I squeezed my fingertips into the palms of my hands and swallowed what I’d been about to say. There was no point in giving her the third degree. She was managing as well as she could with the dwindling funds the Council allotted her directorate and, anyway, she’d have had no hesitation in tossing me into the dungeons for insolence – no matter what we used to do together in my bed.

  “Brilliant,” I said under my breath. “Welcome to the third decade of the Edinburgh Enlightenment.”

  “Pardon?” the Ice Queen said.

  “Nothing,” I said, looking back at the old man through the glass screen. “Don’t let me keep you from your duties, guardian.”

  I heard an impatient sigh, then departing footsteps. It struck me that maybe I’d been a bit hard on her. Too late.

  I found a seat in the corridor next to a father-to-be who was waiting for the arrival of his first-born with extreme agitation. His nerves didn’t surprise me. Apart from the natural insecurity of a man in his position, he was also under a lot of pressure. Since the birth-rate in Edinburgh began to slump every healthy baby attracts what pass here for generous allowances, but they’re also monitored on a more or less daily basis. The Council claims that global warming and the pollution from poorly regulated factories in continental Europe have had deleterious effects on conception; most people believe the decrease in successful births is a direct result of the original Council’s attempts to do away with the family. I mean, if you attend a weekly sex session with a different partner each time, what incentive is there to commit yourself to child care for years of your life? Sex sessions aren’t compulsory any more, but plenty of people still attend them out of choice. I thought of Sophia and the lump under her surgical gown. I reckoned the stories about eugenics were off the mark – no doubt she was just doing her duty as a female and contributing to the city’s future generations.

  A fresh-faced nurse arrived to shepherd the nervous male citizen to the delivery room. I wished him luck and sank back in the uncomfortable plastic seat, waiting for an update on Hector’s condition. I’d been trying not to think about him too much because the impulse to go and strangle Simpson 46 was still strong. But something the old man said to Davie and me just before he had his attack kept coming back to me – “Have you never seen someone who’s reached the end of the line before?” The end of the line. Was that really where the old man saw himself? Then the realisation knifed into me. It wasn’t just Hector who was at the end of the line. I was too – stuck in this isolated city that was falling back into the violence that destroyed the United Kingdom after the millennium. More than that, I myself was literally the en
d of the line; the last branch of the Dalrymple family tree. I’d never had kids, had no prospect of having any now, would be dubious about bringing any into this unstable place. Jesus. Now I had a better idea of what Jim Morrison meant when he sang “The End”.

  A heavy elbow jabbed into my ribs.

  “Bloody hell, Quint, what is it?” Davie’s voice was full of concern. “Is Hector okay?”

  “Aye, don’t panic. He’s stable.”

  “Thank Christ for that. You look like death warmed up.”

  I nodded. “I was having some morbid thoughts, right enough.”

  “Well, snap out of it, pal. Tomorrow’s another—” Davie broke off as his mobile went off. “Commander. I’m off duty, you know.” He listened for a while. “Are you sure?” he asked, his brow furrowed. “All right, I’ll get over there. Out.”

  “What is it?” I said.

  He was shaking his head. “Now I’ve heard it all. Remember those skeletons we saw outside the Assembly Hall?”

  “The lucky workers getting overtime?”

  “Yeah.” He stared at me in disbelief. “It seems they were fakes. But their labouring skills were up to scratch. They dug all the way down to the old Scottish Parliament archive in the basement.”

  “What?”

  Davie nodded emphatically, his eyes wide open. “And now the bastards have disappeared.”

  Chapter Two

  Davie was heading for the exit at speed.

  “Hang on,” I said. “I’m coming with you.”

  He looked back over his shoulder. “Don’t be an idiot. You’re waiting to hear about Hector.”

  I caught up with him. “A case will take my mind off the old man. Christ, this could be an interesting one, Davie. The Parliament archive’s been off limits since the Council came to power. Why’s someone suddenly breaking into it now?” I put my hand on his arm. “Give me a minute to check with the nurses.”

  He stood in the corridor with his hands on his hips and shook his head slowly. “Bloody typical,” he said. “Nothing gets in the way of the Quintilian Dalrymple detection addiction.”