Charles Stross - Singularity Sky

We’ll have to move on.”

“And your employers—” He couldn’t continue.

“Easy come, easy go.” She shrugged. “I’ve taken leave of absence before. This isn’t leave; it’s lying low, waiting to exit a hot zone. But if we could only make it back to Earth, there are lots of things I’d like to do with you. Together. There’ll be room to make plans, then. Here, if we stay, someone else will plan everything for us. Along with everybody else.”

“Alright.” He turned back to the cooker: a healthy red glow rippled beneath the coals that the adiabatic heater had goosed into combustion. “Today, the market. Maybe this evening we can think about when to—”

There was a pounding at the front door.

“What is it?” Martin shouted. Leaving the stove, he shambled through into the cold, dark shop: paused at the door. Opened the letterbox. “Who’s there?”

“Telegram!” piped a breathless voice. ”Telegram for Master Springburg!” With a rattle of bolts, Martin slid the door ajar. Blinding white snow, and a red-uniformed post office runner boy who stood staring up at him. “Telegram? For the toolsmith?”

“That’d be me,” he said. The boy waited: Martin fumbled for a tip, a few kopecks, then closed the door and leaned against it, heart pounding. A telegram !

“Open it!” Rachel loomed over him, eyes anxious with hope and surprise. “Who is it from?”

“It’s from Herman—” he opened the envelope and, mouth dry, began to read aloud:

TO: MARTIN SPRINGFIELD AND RACHEL MANSOUR,

CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR BABY.

I UNDERSTAND THE CHILD WAS BORN IN ORBIT AROUND ROCHARD’S

WORLD, AND SHORTLY DEPARTED IN VARIOUS DIRECTIONS. WHILE I

APPRECIATE THAT YOU ARE BOTH TIRED, YOU MIGHT BE INTERESTED TO

KNOW THAT I HAVE AN IMPORTANT BUSINESS VENTURE OPENING BACK

HOME. IF YOU’D LIKE TO BE INVOLVED, TWO TICKETS ARE WAITING FOR

YOU AT THE CENTRAL POST OFFICE IN NOVY PETROGRAD.

PS: I GATHER SPRING IS AN UNHEALTHY SEASON IN PLOTSK. PLEASE

DON’T TARRY.

Later that day, the old Wolff hardware store caught fire and burned down to the ground — the victim, local rumor had it, of neglect by its feckless owner. He had last been seen leaving town in a hired sleigh, accompanied by his fancy woman and a small carpetbag. They were never seen again in Plotsk, but vanished into the capital city like a drop of ink in the blue ocean: lost in the turbulence and excitement surrounding the arrival of the first civilian starship since the Festival departed, a tramp freighter from Old Calais.

They weren’t really lost: but that, as they say, is another story. And before I recount it, I have some wishes I would like you to grant me …