David Mitchell - Cloud Atlas

Well, the one-wing gander now it was me, yay. What do Prescients eat’n’drink? Do they sleep in straw? Do they sleep? Six moons! Ma was cussin’ me for not goin’ to the Ship Barter, an’ even tho’, yay, Ma was the real chief o’ Bailey’s, I was the oldest man o’ the dwellin’ so I should o’ gone fair cop. I said, Look I’ll go to Abbess an’ tell her we can’t host no Prescient here … when knock, knock, knock , said our door.

Yay, it was Abbess bringin’ the Prescient to move in, with Mylo the school’ry ’sistant. We all knowed we was lumbered with the Valleys’ guest then, like it or not like it, we cudn’t say Get lost now, yay? It’d bring shame to our roof an’ shame to our icons. The Shipwoman she’d got that vin’gary stink o’ Smart an’ she spoke first, ’cos me’n’Ma was both tongue-knotted so. Good evenin’ , she said, I’m Meronym, an’ I’m thankin’ you kindly for hostin’ my stay in the Valleys . Mylo was grinnin’ mocksome’n’toady at my anxin’, I could o’ killed him.

Sussy mem’ried her hostin’ manners first, an’ she settled our guests an’ sent Jonas to fetch brew’n’grinds’n’all. Meronym speaked, My people got a custom to give small presents to their hosts at the beginnin’ of a visit, so I hope you won’t mind … She reached into a bag what she’d bringed an’ gived us presents. Ma got a fine pot what’d cost five–six bales o’ wool at Honokaa, an’ she was left breathy sayin’ she cudn’t accept such a presh gift ’cos welcomin’ strangers was Sonmi’s way, yay, welcomin’ should be free or not at all, but the Prescient woman answered these gifts wasn’t payments, nay, they was jus’ thanks b’fore kindnesses, an’ Ma din’t refuse the pot a second time, nay. Sussy’n’Catkin got necklesses what twinked starry, bug-eyed’n’joysome they was, an’ Jonas got a hole square mirror what fass’nated him, brighter’n any busted shard what you still see now’n’again.

Mylo wasn’t grinnin’ so toadsome now, but I din’t like this giftin’ not a bit, nay, see this offlander was buyin’ my kin sure ’nuff an’ I wasn’t havin’ it. So I jus’ said the Shipwoman could stay in our dwellin’ but I din’t want her gift an’ that was that.

I said it ruder’n I meant, an’ Ma looked spikers at me, but Meronym jus’ said, Sure I und’stand , like I’d speaked ord’nary’n’norm’ly.

Now a herd o’ visitors bleated to our dwellin’ that night an’ some nights after, from up’n’down the Nine Valleys, kin’n’bros’n’lastlife fam’ly’n’half-strangers what we only met at bart’rin’s, yay, ev’ryun from Mauka to Mormon came knockin’ to see if Old Ma Yibber spoke it true, that a real’n’livin’ Prescient was stayin’ at Bailey’s. We’d got to invite ev’ry last visitor inside o’ course an’ they gaped in wonderment like Sonmi herself was sittin’ in our kitchen, tho’ their ’mazement weren’t so great they cudn’t chomp our grinds an’ down our brew no worries, an’ as they drank years o’ questions ’bout Prescience an’ their whoahsome Ship came pourin’ thick’n’fast.

But the wyrd thing was this. Meronym seemed to answer the questions, but her answers didn’t quench your curio none, nay, not a flea. So my cuz Spensa o’ Cluny Dwellin’ asked, What makes your Ship move? The Prescient answered, Fusion engines . Ev’ryun nodded wise as Sonmi, Oh, fusion engines it is, yay , no un asked what “fusion engine” was ’cos they din’t want to look barb’ric or stoopit in front o’ the gath’rin’. Abbess asked Meronym to show us Prescience Isle on a map o’ the world, but Meronym jus’ pointed to a spot an’ said, Here .

Where? we asked. See, there weren’t nothin’ but blue sea an’ I for one thinked she was mickin’ us mocksome.

Prescience I weren’t on any map made jus’ b’fore the Fall, Meronym said, ’cos Prescience’s founders kept it secret. It was on older maps, yay, but not the Abbess’s.

I’d got a bit o’ the brave by now an’ I asked our visitor why Prescients with all their high Smart’n’all want to learn ’bout us Valleysmen? What could we poss’bly teach her what she din’t know? The learnin’ mind is the livin’ mind , Meronym said, an’ any sort o’ Smart is truesome Smart, old Smart or new, high Smart or low . No un but me seen the arrows o’ flatt’ry them words fired, or how this crafty spyer was usin’ our ign’rance to fog her true ’tentions, so I follered my first question with this pokerer: But you Prescients got more greatsome’n’mighty Smart’n this Hole World, yay? Oh, so slywise she picked her words! We got more’n the tribes o’ Ha-Why, less’n Old Uns b’fore the Fall . See? Don’t say a hole lot does it, nay?

I mem’ry jus’ three honest answers she gived us. Ruby o’ Potter’s asked why Prescients’d all got dark skins like cokeynuts, nay, we’d never seen a pale un or pink un come off of their Ship. Meronym said her ancestors b’fore the Fall changed their seeds to make dark-skinned babbits to give ’em protection ’gainst the redscab sickness, an’ so them babbits’ babbits also got it, like father like son, yay, like rabbits’n’cukes.

Napes o’ Inouye Dwellin’ asked, was she married, ’cos he was single an’ had a macadnut orchard an’ fig’n’lemon plantation all his own. Ev’ryun laughed, even Meronym smiled. She said she’d been married once, yay, an’ had a son named Anafi livin’ on Prescience I, but her husband’d been killed by savages years ago. She sorried losin’ the chance o’ them lemons’n’figs but she was too old for the husband market, an’ Napes shaked his head in dis’pointment an’ said, Oh Shipwoman, you breaked my heart yay you do .

Last up, my cuz Kobbery asked, So how old are you? Yay, that was what we was all wond’rin’. No un was ready for her answer tho’. Fifty . Yay, that’s what she said an’ we was ’mazed as you are now. Fifty . The air in our kitchen changed like the cold wind suddenwise comin’. Livin’ to fifty ain’t wondersome, nay, livin’ to fifty is eerie an’ ain’t nat’ral, yay? How old do Prescients live, then? asked Melvil o’ Black Ox. Meronym shrugged. Sixty, seventy … Oh, we all got the gaspin’ shock! Norm’ly by forty we’re prayin’ Sonmi to put us out o’ misery an’ reborn us quick in a new body, like bladin’ a dog’s throat what you loved what was sick’n’agonyin’. The only Valleysman who’d ever lived to fifty an’ weren’t flakin’ with redscab or dyin’ of mukelung was Truman Third, an’ ev’ryun knowed how he’d done a deal with Old Georgie one hurrycanin’ night, yay, that fool’d sold his soul for some extra years. Well, the yarnin’ was busted prop’ly after that, an’ folks left in gaggles to yibber what’d been said an’ answered, ev’ryun whispin’, Thank Sonmi she’s not stoppin’ in our dwellin’ .

I was pleased our dammit crookit guest’d teached ev’ryun to step slywise an’ not trust her, nay, not a flea, but I din’t sleep none that night, ’cos o’ the mozzies an’ nightbirds an’ toads ringin’ an’ a myst’rous someun what was hushly clatt’rin’ thru our dwellin’ pickin’ up stuff here an’ puttin’ it down there an’ the name o’ this myst’rous someun was Change.

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First, second, third days the Prescient woman was wormyin’ into my dwellin’. Got to ’fess she din’t b’have like no queeny-bee, nay, she never lazed a beat. She helped Sussy with dairyin’ an’ Ma with twinin’n’spinnin’ an’ Jonas took her bird-eggin’ an’ she list’ned to Catkin’s yippin’ ’bout school’ry an’ she fetched water’n’chopped wood an’ she was a quicksome learner. Course the yibber was keepin’ a close eye on her an’ visitors kept callin’ to see the wondersome fifty-year-old woman what jus’ looked twenty-five years. Folks what s’pected her to be doin’ tricks’n’whizzies was dis’pointed very soon ’cos she din’t, nay. Ma she lost her anxin’ ’bout the Shipwoman in a day or two, yay, she started gettin’ friendsome with her an’ crowy too. Our visitor Meronym this an’ Our visitor Meronym that , it was cockadoodlydooin’ morn till night, an’ Sussy was ten times badder. Meronym she jus’ got on with her work, tho’ at night she’d sit at our table an’ write on spesh paper, oh so finer’n ours. A whoah fast writer she was, but she din’t write in our tongue, nay, she wrote in some other speakin’. See, there was other tongues spoken in the Old Countries, not just ours. What you writin’ ’bout, Aunt Meronym? asked Catkin, but the Prescient jus’ answered, My days, pretty one, I’m writin’ ’bout my days .