Филип Керр - The Second Angel

Equally impressive were the lobby’s marble floor and brass-bound reception desk, which was a gigantic working orrery [103] After Charles Boyle, the 4th Earl of Orrery, for whom the first such object was made, in 1790. built to honor Galileo’s defense of the Copernican theory that Earth moves around the Sun. Here the Sun was represented by the globular golden desk in the center of the circular floor. Around it moved — by an ingenious system of invisible gears — three more globular guest service stations representing the three innermost planets, Mercury, Venus, and Earth, from whence various products could be purchased and services rendered: Mercury, for deliveries, errands, and the purchase of lunar currency; Venus, for beauty and health products and toiletries; and Earth, for all information media. These three ‘desks’ all moved around the Sun in the correct relative periods, although not, of course, at the correct relative distances. Representing the Moon’s orbit around Earth — although not inclined at the correct angle — was a large video-globe showing old pornographic movies of couples making love in one-sixth gravity.

The room rates were predictably astronomical. With the exception of Dallas, Ronica, and Cavor, this was the first time any of them had been in a luxury hotel.

‘Five hundred selenes a night,’ said Prevezer. ‘How much is a selene worth?’

‘About ten dollars,’ said Cavor. Observing the look on Prevezer’s face, he added, ‘Have you ever heard of the expression “moonstruck”?’

‘Bloody hell, yeah,’ chuckled Prevezer. ‘Now I know what that means. You have to be crazy to pay these kinds of prices.’

‘We’ll probably need to rob the First National just to pay our hotel bill,’ echoed Simou.

‘Why don’t you say it a bit louder, Sim?’ Lenina frowned. ‘I don’t think the guy on the desk could have heard you properly.’

‘A Table of the Principal Affections of the Planets,’ said Gates, reading what was written on the pink marble underneath his gravity shoes. [104] The sole of each shoe contains as much as twenty-five pounds of lead, which occurs in considerable quantity on the Moon. Up to fifty pounds in weight can be added to a person in this way. ‘I could sure get an affection for this kind of life.’

‘I never thought I’d like the Moon so much,’ Simou suddenly interjected.

‘It’s not all like this,’ said Cavor. ‘You should see the last place we stayed. Artemis Seven. They kept my arm when I couldn’t pay the bill.’

‘Hard to believe this is on the same planet,’ breathed Gates. ‘I never thought I’d feel so pleased to be back here.’

‘Hey, Gates,’ said Simou. ‘While we’re here, what are we gonna do for the root of all evil? I’d like to get me some of the local assignat. What are they called? Selenes? Just to keep up appearances, you understand. I’m supposed to be a single guy with some good, hot blood in his veins who is on vacation, right? The trouble is that I lack the essential letters of credit from my personal bankers back on Earth to facilitate the necessary exchange of currencies. On account of the fact that I don’t have any credit, and I don’t have any personal bankers.’

‘The man’s got a good point there, Gates,’ agreed Prevezer.

‘You’d better ask Dallas,’ said Gates. ‘He’s the one with the money, not me.’

‘I’m sure he’s already thought of it,’ declared Cavor. ‘He’s certainly thought of everything else.’

‘I hope so,’ sighed Lenina.

Gates took her hand in his own. ‘You okay?’ he asked.

Lenina fixed a weary smile to her face. She was feeling anything but okay. Deep inside herself she felt exhausted. She was also experiencing some difficulty in breathing: Every breath she took had to be just that little bit deeper than normal.

‘I’m just a little tired, after the flight, that’s all,’ she said. ‘As soon as we get to our room, I think I’ll lie down.’

‘I’ll see what’s keeping Dallas,’ said Gates, and he walked, a little clumsily — for, despite his gravity shoes, the big man was still adjusting to being a lot lighter on his feet — toward the reception desk.

The registration was actually proceeding quickly. The desk attendant had shown Dallas holographic pictures of the various suites that had been reserved, and Dallas had pronounced himself happy with the proposed accommodation. Not that there would have been much chance for him to change his mind about any of the rooms he had booked. Nearly every hotel on TB was full, many of them with guests who had flown in for the centennial of the first Apollo Moon landing. Indeed, it was one of the reasons Dallas had chosen this particular time to arrive on the Moon. Among so many lunar tourists, he thought it would be easier for Gates and the rest of the team to go relatively unnoticed.

‘So, are you here for the centennial?’ asked the desk attendant.

‘Only partly,’ said Dallas, and grinned meaningfully at Ronica for the hotelier’s benefit.

‘Yeah,’ said the man, organizing a whole fistful of key-cards. ‘Stupid question. History’s one thing. A good time’s quite another.’

‘You said it,’ said Dallas. ‘But actually we were also planning to do some hiking while we’re here.’

‘Not too far from the equator, I hope. You heard about the tragedy we had with those climbers down in the Leibnitz Mountains?’ The attendant rolled his eyes and shook his head. ‘They got stuck and ran out of solar energy when it got dark. Froze to death.’

‘How awful,’ said Ronica.

‘Yeah, it was terrible. Rescue team reckoned they must have forgotten to tell their trip computer that a polar lunar day is a lot shorter than an equatorial one. We have fourteen days of sunshine here at TB. It’s less than half that at the pole.’

Dallas shook his head. ‘We weren’t thinking of going much farther afield than the Central Highlands,’ he said. ‘Certainly no farther west than Schroter.’

‘Oh, it’s really beautiful down there. I went to Schroter myself just a few months back. I could recommend a good guide if you’re at all interested. And a pretty good equipment company.’

‘Thanks, but we brought our own.’

The attendant glanced up from his desk-screen and noted the large number of bags on the floor surrounding Dallas and his entourage.

‘You certainly have, haven’t you,’ he said. ‘I’ll get a porter to help you with all your luggage.’ He didn’t know it, but the luggage was mostly made up of the computer equipment with which Prevezer would create a simulation of the First National Blood Bank.

‘It’s okay,’ said Dallas. ‘Don’t bother. They’re used to carrying my stuff around.’

‘As you wish, sir.’ The attendant smiled. ‘And how will you be paying your bill, Mister Bourbaki?’

Nicolas Bourbaki was the name Dallas was using while they were on the Moon. It was possible that the company was still looking for him.

Dallas placed his wafer-thin breastpocket computer on the desk between them and said, ‘By Electronic Credit Transfer.’ The computer signaled its voice recognition with a quiet bleep and prepared for remote wireless connection with the hotel’s own computer.

‘ECT? Yes sir.’

Since leaving his former life, Dallas had spent a small fortune using a number of accounts to equip and provision his team. Through his personal treasury workstation (PTW), he had automatically changed all his account numbers and their respective encryptions in order to escape data tracing and detection. Only one of these accounts, so far untouched, was still substantially in credit, and this was the account that he selected, with the touch of a button, for simultaneous bill settlement: All transactions relating to his entourage’s stay at the Galileo would be checked by his PTW and then debited immediately from the account he had chosen.