His tone was matter-of-fact. It generally had been too when Ulla saw the simulation of living Guthrie in her phone screen. Sometimes, though, it had gone soft, and the face had crinkled into a big grin, as when she showed him her children. “Stay as long as you want,” she told him. “Oh, please!”
“’Fraid that can only be overnight, querida. Too flinkin’ much to do. Also, if I was absent any length of time without carefully arranging it beforehand, the news pests would go into a feeding frenzy. I’m in this dinky body just so’s I could sneak off without them noticing. Give me a rain check for a proper visit sometime, okay?”
Lars smiled, a little stiffly. “Do you need one, for your own house?” he said. “We can take that walk now if you wish.”
“Aw, we might as well go inside. I’ve looked forward to poking around the old place on my personal feet.”
The house where mortal Guthrie spent his last years, and where he died.
Until then he had kept in touch with his great-grandson, especially after Lars was told of the kinship. It was never made public, and Guthrie never showed favoritism to him. In fact, they spoke less often than either did with Dagny Beynac. Yet theirs was a genuine bond.
The download continued it, and it strengthened after Lars perforce retired from piloting. Groundside, his experience soon joined with administrative talents he had not known he possessed, to make him more important—above all, to Fireball’s exploratory ventures—than ever when he ranged the Solar System.
Their images, the real and the synthetic, had chat3 ted one evening in Stockholm, afternoon in Quito. “I gather you and your wife want to move,” Guthrie said. “May I ask how come?”
“We grow restless,” Lars answered. “I have found Europe is as I remembered. Too … too tame, everything too controlled. And if space, for me, will be no more than visits to Luna or L-5, well, then I would rather haveuhe true Earth around me, Old Earth, as nearly as possible. Ulla agrees. She grew up in Lapland, a forest girl.” He paused. “Besides, we want a big family. That is frowned on here, you know, and heavily taxed. Already we have social problems. We think of North America.”
“Um-m, it’s a fairly free country these days, yeah. Dunno how long it’ll stay that way.”
“Oh? Why?”
“The Renewal pretty well destroyed its middle class. The Second Republic is tinkering too much, trying too hard to restore a productive society and bring the underclass into it, by actions from above, instead of letting people alone to heal things for themselves.” Guthne projected a shrug. “But liberty ought to last a while yet. And whether it does or no, our company communities should stay autonomous, in fact if not in name.”
“Jefe, I said we would like nature around us, Northern nature, not an enclave. Most of the time, anyhow.”
“Hm-m … Hey, an idea! Listen, I once bought myself a beautiful preserve on Vancouver. Island, Pacific Northwest, built a big house, spent as much time there as I could wangle. The poor thing’s stood empty ever since, aside from a caretaker. I bet it’d love some clatter and chaos.”
Lars stared. “What? But this is—is—”
“If you find you like it, I’ll make it over to Fireball and you the trustee, with the right to bequeath your position. It’s isolated, but a short hop by air to Victoria or Vancouver, not a lot longer by fast boat. The kids can go to school, call on their friends or invite ‘em over, as often as you can stand. The winters are no worse than Sweden; or you can spend them in a southerly clime. Think about it, talk with your wife, make an inspection trip, let me know at your convenience. I hope you’ll give it a try.”
“This is, is very sudden.”
“When factors click together for me, I don’t stall around.” Guthrie’s created gaze gentled. “Keep things in the family, as near as may be, hm?”
Going up the path to the verandah, he remarked, “I’m glad to see how well you maintain things. You still like the place?”