The way that green shoots were grudgingly beginning to appear here and there through the dried crimson blight made it seem a possibility that one day the tiny number of survivors might be able to eat fresh fruit and vegetables again.
“One day,” he said, putting the glutinous contents of the can into the large enameled pan and placing it carefully onto low heat.
There was a flurry of fresh snow when he looked out of the window, but the trickle of water was wider and the temperature was obviously still rising.
There was a snowball fight going on between his children, with Jeanne favoring the two young girls against Paul and Pamela. Mac took up the binoculars once more and adjusted the focus with the milled black plastic wheel, bringing the faraway contest into sharp detail.
Jocelyn was laughing her head off, mouth open wide with delight, the distance turning the fight into a mime. She had just hit Paul flush in the face with a handful of packed snow, making him look like an enraged Santa Claus.
That thought made Henderson McGill wonder again about the rapid approach of Christmas.
The last family ceremony had been Pamela’s birthday on November 18. The warm, caring ritual full of happiness and emotion that in an instant had turned the white Victorian house up on Melville Avenue to a charnel house of death and bare-bones violence.
Mac shook his head and laid down the glasses, getting up to check the soup. It was just beginning to bubble gently around the edges. He took a ladle out of the cutlery drawer and stirred it for a few moments, worried about the chance of it sticking. There was a row of spice jars in a neat rosewood rack, and he added a few pinches of turmeric and some cumin to give the bland soup some extra flavoring.
He tasted it. “Not bad. Maybe I’ll take up cooking for real when we get to Aurora,” he said.
A noise outside made him start. Quickly he wiped condensation from the window and peered into the bright sunlight. The sound was repeated, but this time he saw what was happening. The warmth of the day was melting the snow, sending it tumbling off the low branches of the dead trees in great wet clumps.
“Could be on the move in a day or so,” he said, then tutted at the realization that he seemed to be talking to himself a lot recently, wondering if this was the male menopause that he’d read about in a magazine only a couple of days before blasting off into space in the Aquila.
Another bunch of snow fell heavily, landing on the domed top of the fuel tank with a hollow ringing noise. The melt was gathering momentum.
A sudden thought struck Mac, and he looked around for the binoculars. “Place is turning into a dump,” he muttered.
Finally he spotted it on the bench seat, half-hidden by Sukie’s favorite doll, a droopy trollop that rejoiced in the name of Mournful Megg. He took up the glasses and went to the window that gave the best view of the steep, overhung cliff where Angel had said she was going to ski.
Now he was aware of the melodious tinkling of water, running musically off the roof of the RV, down onto the rutted ice of the highway.
The glass was steamed up from the simmering pan of soup, and again he wiped it with a shirtsleeve, finding that his fingers were trembling when he lifted the binoculars. The lenses were clouded with condensation.
“There,” he breathed, finally aiming them toward where he’d last seen her, twisting the control until he located the twin trails of her skis vanishing among the trees, heading upward.
He found them again, higher, much higher.
He scanned the slope until he finally picked up a darting, twisting figure, cutting her own piste with a skillful agility that took his breath.
Mac watched Angel, his peripheral vision picking up the monstrous slab of undercut snow that toppled soundlessly above her. Frozen in disbelief, he saw it race down in a surging cloud of immense destruction, snapping off trees like matchwood.