Connie Willis - Doomsday Book

"The vicar's looking for you," Colin said. He was wearing a jacket and shirt, and his hair was combed. He handed Dunworthy an order of service from a large stack he was holding.

"I thought you were going to stay at home," Dunworthy said.

"With Mrs. Gaddson? What a necrotic idea! Even church is better than that, so I told Ms. Taylor I'd help carry the bells over."

"And the vicar put you to work," Dunworthy said, still trying to get his spectacles clear. "Have you had any business?"

"Are you joking? The church is jammed."

Dunworthy peered into the nave. The pews were already full, and folding chairs were being set up at the back.

"Oh, good, you're here," the vicar said, bustling over with an armful of hymnals. "Sorry about the heat. It's the furnace. The National Trust won't let us put in a new fused-air, but it's nearly impossible to get parts for a fossil-fuel. At the moment it's the thermostat that's gone wrong. The heat's either on or off." He fished two slips of paper out of his cassock pocket and looked at them. "You haven't seen Mr. Latimer yet, have you? He's supposed to read the benediction."

"No," Dunworthy said. "I reminded him of the time."

"Yes, well, last year he muddled things and arrived an hour early." He handed Dunworthy one of the slips of paper. "Here's your Scripture. It's from the King James this year. The Church of the Millennium insisted on it, but at least it's not the People's Common like last year. The King James may be archaic, but at least it's not criminal."

The outside door opened and a knot of people, all taking down umbrellas and shaking out hats, came in, were order-of- serviced by Colin, and went into the nave.

"I knew we should have used Christ Church," the vicar said.

"What are they all doing here?" Dunworthy said. "Don't they realize we're in the midst of an epidemic?"

"It's always this way," the vicar said. "I remember the beginning of the Pandemic. Largest collections ever taken. Later on you won't be able to get them out of their houses, but just now they want to huddle together for comfort."

"And it's exciting," the priest from Holy Re-Formed said. He was wearing a black turtleneck, bags, and a red and green plaid alb. "One sees the same sort of thing during wartime. They come for the drama of the thing."

"And spread the infection twice as fast, I should think," Dunworthy said. "Hasn't anyone told them the virus is contagious?"

"I intend to," the vicar said. "Your Scripture comes directly after the bellringers. It's been changed. Church of the Millennium again. Luke 2:1-19." He went off to distribute hymnals.

"Where is your pupil, Kivrin Engle?" the priest asked. "I missed her at the Latin mass this afternoon."

"She's in 1320, hopefully in the village of Skendgate, hopefully in out of the rain."

"Oh, good," the priest said. "She so wanted to go. And how lucky she's missing all this."

"Yes," Dunworthy said. "I suppose I should read through the Scripture at least once."

He went into the nave. It was even hotter in there, and it smelled strongly of damp wool and damp stone. Laser candles flickered wanly in the windows and on the altar. The bellringers were setting up two large tables in front of the altar and covering them with heavy red wool covers. Dunworthy stepped up into the lectern and opened the Bible to Luke.

"And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed," he read.

Archaic, he thought. And where Kivrin is, it hasn't been written yet.

He went back out to Colin. People continued to stream in. The priest from Holy Re-Formed and the Muslim imam went across to Oriel for more chairs, and the vicar fiddled with the thermostat on the furnace.

"I saved us two seats in the second row," Colin said. "Do you know what Mrs. Gaddson did at tea? She threw my gobstopper away. She said it was covered with germs. I'm glad my mother's not like that." He straightened his stack of folded orders of service, which had shrunk considerably. "I think what happened is her presents couldn't get through because of the quarantine, you know. I mean, they probably had to send provisions and things first." He straightened the already straight pile again.

"Very likely," Dunworthy said. "When would you like to open your other gifts? Tonight or in the morning?"

Colin tried to look nonchalant. "Christmas morning, please." He gave an order of service and a dazzling smile to a lady in a yellow slicker.

"Well," she snapped, snatching it out of his hand, "I'm glad to see someone 's still got the Christmas spirit, even though there's a deadly epidemic on."

Dunworthy went in and sat down. The vicar's attentions to the furnace didn't seem to have done any good. He took off his muffler and overcoat and draped them on the chair beside him.

It had been freezing last year. "Extremely authentic," Kivrin had whispered to him, "and so was the Scripture. 'Around then the politicos dumped a tax hike on the ratepayers,'" she'd said, quoting from the People's Common. She'd grinned at him. "The Bible back then was in a language they didn't understand either."

Colin came in and sat down on Dunworthy's coat and muffler. The priest from Holy Re-Formed stood up and wedged himself between the bellringers' tables and the front of the altar. "Let us pray," he said.

There was a plump of kneeling pads on the stone floor, and everyone knelt.

"'O God, who have sent this affliction among us, say to Thy destroying angel, hold Thy hand and let not the land be made desolate, and destroy not every living soul.'"

So much for morale, Dunworthy thought.

"'As in those days when the Lord sent a pestilence on Israel, and there died of the people from Dan to Bersabee seventy thousand men, so now we are in the midst of affliction and we beseech Thee to take away the scourge of Thy wrath from the faithful.'"

The pipes of the ancient furnace began clanging, but it didn't seem to deter the priest. He went on for a good five minutes, mentioning a number of instances in which God had smitten the unrighteous and "brought plagues among them" and then asked everyone to stand and sing, "God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen, Let Nothing You Dismay."

Montoya ducked in and sat down next to Colin. "I have spent all day at the NHS," she whispered, "trying to get them to give me a dispensation. They seem to think I intend to run around spreading the virus. I told them I'd go straight to the dig, that there's no one out there to infect, but do you think they'd listen?"

She turned to Colin. "If I do get the dispensation, I'm going to need volunteers to help me. How would you like to dig up bodies?"

"He can't," Dunworthy said hastily. "His great-aunt won't let him." He leaned across Colin and whispered, "We're trying to determine Badri Chaudhuri's whereabouts on Monday afternoon from noon till half-past two. Did you see him?"

"Shh," the woman who had snapped at Colin said.

Montoya shook her head. "I was with Kivrin, going over the map and the layout of Skendgate," she whispered back.

"Where? At the dig?"

"No, at Brasenose."

"And Badri wasn't there?" he asked, but there was no reason for Badri to have been at Brasenose. He hadn't asked Badri to run the drop until he met with him at half-past two.

"No," Montoya whispered.

"Shh!" the woman hissed.

"How long did you meet with Kivrin?"

"From ten till she had to go check into Infirmary, three, I think," Montoya whispered.

" Shh !"

"I've got to go read a 'Prayer to the Great Spirit,'" Montoya whispered, standing up and starting along the row of chairs.

She read her American Indian chant, after which the bellringers, wearing white gloves and determined expressions, played, "O Christ Who Interfaces with the World," which sounded a good deal like the banging of the pipes.