Rama 2 by Arthur C. Clarke and Gentry Lee

He had been the principal of her new school. When she had taken her first full set of aptitude tests, Francesca had made the highest scores in the history of Orvieto. She was off the scale, a prodigy. Until then he had never noticed her. He had married her mother eighteen months before and fa­thered the twins almost immediately. Francesca had been a nuisance, an­other mouth to feed, nothing more than a part of her mother’s furniture.

For several months he was especially nice to me. Then Mother went to visit Aunt Carlo for a few days. The painful memories came fast, rushing like a torrent through her mind. She remembered the smell of wine on her stepfa­ther’s breath, his sweat against her body, her tears after he had left her room.

The nightmare had lasted for over a year. He had forced himself upon her whenever her mother was not in the house. Then one evening, while he was putting on his clothes and looking in the other direction, Francesca had smacked him in the back of the head with an aluminum baseball bat. Her stepfather had fallen to the floor, bloody and unconscious. She had dragged him into the living room and left him there.

He never touched me again, Francesca remembered, putting out her ciga­rette in the Raman dirt. We were strangers in the same house. From then on I spent most of my time with Roberto and his friends. I was just waiting for my chance. I was ready when Carlo came.

Francesca was fourteen during the summer of 2184. She spent most of her time that summer loitering around the main square of Orvieto. Her older cousin Roberto had just completed his certificate to be a tour guide for the cathedral in the square. The old Duomo, the chief tourist attraction of the town, had been built in phases, starting in the fourteenth century. The church was an artistic and architectural masterpiece. The frescoes by Luca Signorelli inside its San Brizio chapel were widely hailed as the finest exam­ples of imaginative fifteenth century painting outside of the Vatican mu­seum.

To have become an official Duomo guide was considered quite an accom­plishment, especially at the age of nineteen. Francesca was very proud of Roberto. She sometimes accompanied him on his tours, but only if she agreed beforehand not to embarrass him with her wisecracks.

One August afternoon, right after lunch, a sleek limousine pulled into the piazza around II Duomo and the chauffeur requested a guide from the tourist bureau. The gentleman in the limousine had not made a reservation and Roberto was the only guide available. Francesca watched with great curiosity as a short, handsome man in his late thirties or early forties climbed out of the back of the car and introduced himself to Roberto. Automobiles had been banned from upper Orvieto, except by special permit, for almost a hundred years, so Francesca knew the man must be an unusual individual.

As he always did, Roberto began his tour with the reliefs sculptured by Lorenzo Maitani on the outside portals of the church. Still curious, Fran­cesca stood just off to the side, smoking quietly, while her cousin explained the significance of the weird demonic figures at the bottom of one of the columns. “This is one of the earliest representations of Hell,” Roberto said, pointing at a group of Dantesque figures. “The fourteenth century concept of Hell involved an extremely literal interpretation of the Bible.”

“Hah!” Francesca had suddenly interjected, dropping her cigarette on the cobblestones and walking toward Roberto and the handsome stranger. “It was also a very masculine concept of Hell. Notice that many of the demons have breasts and most of the sins depicted are sexual. Men have always believed that they were created perfect; it is women who have taught them to sin.”

The stranger was astonished by the appearance of this gangly teenager expelling smoke from her mouth. His trained eye immediately recognized her natural beauty and it was clear that she was very bright. Who was she?

“This is my cousin, Francesca” Roberto said, obviously flustered by her interruption.

“Carlo Bianchi,” the man said, extending his hand. His hand was moist Francesca looked up at his face and could see that he was interested. She could feel her heart pounding in her chest. “If you listen to Roberto/’ she said coyly, “then all you’ll get is the official tour. He leaves out the juicy bits.”

“And you, young lady—”

“Francesca,” she said.

“Yes, Francesca. Do you have a tour of your own?”

Francesca gave him her prettiest smile. “I read a lot,” she said. “I know all about the artists who worked on the cathedral, particularly the painter Luca Signorelli/’ She paused for a moment. “Did you know,” she continued, “that Michelangelo came here to study Signorelli’s nudes before he painted the ceiling at the Sistine Chapel?”

“No, I didn’t,” Carlo said, laughing heartily. He was already fascinated. “But 1 do now. Come. Join us. You can add to what your cousin Roberto says.”

She loved the way he kept staring at her. It was as if he were appraising her, as if she were a fine painting or a jeweled necklace, his eyes missing nothing as they roamed unabashedly over her figure. And his easy laughter spurred her on. Francesca’s comments became increasingly outrageous and bawdy.

“You see that poor girl on the demon’s back?” she said while they were gazing at the bewildering range of genius exhibited by Signorelli’s frescoes inside the San Brizio chapel. “She looks like she’s humping the demon in the butt, right? You know who she is? Her face and naked body are portraits of Signorelli’s girlfriend. While he was slaving in here day after day, she be­came bored and decided to diddle a duke or two on the side. Luca was really pissed, So he fixed her. He condemned her to ride a demon in perpetuity.”

When he stopped laughing, Carlo asked Francesca if she thought the woman’s punishment was fair. “Of course not/’ the fourteen-year-old re­plied, “it’s just another example of the male chauvinism of the fifteenth century. The men could screw anybody they wanted and were called virile; but let a woman try to satisfy herself—”

“Francesca!” Roberto interrupted. “Really. This is too much. Your mother would kill you if she heard what you are saying—”

“My mother is irrelevant at this moment. I’m talking about a double standard that still exists today. Look at …”

Carlo Bianchi could hardly believe his good fortune. A rich clothes de­signer from Milano, one who had established an international reputation by the time he was thirty, he had just happened to decide, on a whim, to hire a car to take him to Rome instead of going on the usual high-speed train. His sister, Monica, had always told him about the beauty of II Duomo in Orvieto. It had been another last-minute decision to stop. And now. My, my. The girl was such a splendid morsel.

He invited Francesca to dinner when the tour was over. But when they reached the entrance to the fanciest restaurant in Orvieto, the young woman balked. Carlo understood. He took her to a store and bought her an expen­sive new dress with matching shoes and accessories. He was astonished by how beautiful she was. And only fourteen!

Francesca had never before drunk really fine wine. She drank it as if it were water. Each dish was so delicious that she positively squealed. Carlo was enchanted with his woman-child. He loved the way she let her cigarette dangle from the corner of her lips. It was so unspoiled, so perfectly gauche.

When the meal was over it was dark. Francesca walked with him back to the limousine parked in front of II Duomo. As they went down a narrow alley, she leaned over and playfully bit his ear. He spontaneously pulled her to him and was rewarded with an explosive kiss. The surge in his loins overwhelmed him.

Francesca had felt it too. She did not hesitate a second when Carlo sug­gested they go for a ride in the car. By the time the limousine had reached the outskirts of Orvieto, she was sitting astride him in the backseat. Thirty minutes later, when they finished making love the second time, Carlo could not bear the thought of parting with this incredible girl. He asked Francesca if she would like to accompany him to Rome.

“Andiamo,” she replied with a smile.

So we went to Rome and then Capri, Francesca remembered. Paris for a week. In Milano you had me live with Monica and Luigi. For appearances. Men are always so worried about appearances.

Francesca’s long reverie was broken when she thought she heard footsteps in the distance. She cautiously stood up in the dark and listened. It was hard for her to hear anything over her own breathing. Then she heard the sound again, off to the left. Her ears told her the sound was out on the ice. A burst of fear flooded her with an image of bizarre creatures attacking their camp from across the ice. She listened again very carefully, but heard nothing.