The Sons of Scarlatti. John McNally

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       FOUR

      DAY ONE 12:51 (BST). Hook Hall, Surrey

      Finn’s first view of Hook Hall was from above: a grand old country house with a formal garden, surrounded by a complex of ultra-modern buildings. Outside the largest of these buildings, as they came into land, Finn could see a clutch of officials and lab-coated scientists drawn towards the spot like ants to a dropped ice cream.

      Al took off his helmet as they touched down and indicated Finn should do the same.

      “We are still on holiday until I say so. OK?”

      “If you say so!” Finn yelled back, still numb with exhilaration from the short flight and having already decided to just go with the bewildering flow. He stepped off the aircraft after Al and stumbled self-consciously through the rotor wash, half deaf, towards the small welcoming committee.

      A shortish, fattish old man was first to greet them, overwhelmed apparently to be meeting –

      “Dr Allenby! An honour! Professor Channing. I reviewed your paper on anti-concentric-kinesthesis.”

      “Wonderful. This is Finn,” said Al.

      “Hi!” said Finn.

      “Is the resort this way?” Al asked.

      “Ah…?” said the Professor, confused.

      Huge road transporters packed with equipment were lined up outside the large building waiting to go through its hangar-sized doors.

      “What an unusual hotel. Is there room service?” said Al.

      “Er…”

      “Finn likes chips, don’t you, Finn?”

      “Or potato wedges,” Finn explained, unsure why this was relevant.

      “We have a canteen…?” tried the Professor.

      Al took in the line-up of trucks. “What’s all this for? Are you having a pageant?”

      By now Professor Channing was completely confused.

      “No, it’s… every centrifuge, laser and electromagnetic accelerator we can lay our hands on. This has just arrived from Harwell, part of the new Woolfson Accelerator, and…”

      “Oh my goodness, I think I spot an old friend!” said Al, taking off down the line of transporters, Professor Channing trotting to keep up.

      Finn’s strong instinct was to keep out of the way, but Al pulled him along front and centre, determined to make a spectacle, leading everyone a merry dance as he searched among the trucks like a weekend shopper in the aisles of Ikea.

      As they entered the Central Field Analysis Chamber, Finn felt like they were entering a game, the ‘facility’ level of a first-person shooter – concrete industrial construction, glass control booths, steel gantries and outsize scientific equipment: an outlandish vision of a not too distant future. The big difference here was that real human security personnel carried real guns: large, heavy and scary.

      “Aha!” Al cried. “It’s you, Fatty!”

      Al seemed to be addressing a large vehicle. But, as they came round it, Finn saw what was inside. Huge quarter-sections of a giant metal doughnut, each the size of a cottage, were being manoeuvred off the transporter by an outsize forklift, a freak-show mirror of perfect polished steel on the inside, a mess of hydraulics and wiring on the outside, featuring domestic plumbing and gaffer tape – a dazzling piece of engineering that looked like it’d been knocked together in a shed: very Uncle Al.

      Finn caught his distorted reflection on the perfect inner surface and remembered a night at home the year before when Al had appeared unexpectedly on the doorstep to demand Toad-in-the-Mustard-Hole from Grandma (the family comfort food). He had sworn and ranted at the table saying “they’ve mugged me” and “they have press-ganged Fatty”. There was little indication who ‘they’ or ‘Fatty’ were, but a general hatred and distrust of anyone In Charge had come across before he’d drunk too much and fallen asleep СКАЧАТЬ