Radiance (14 page)

The first supper rush is coming on. My tea's gone cold. There is already a foxtrot tinkling away in Imperatrix Square: garlands of pale green callowlanterns swinging in the sea wind, heels clapping on the cobblestones like an audience, girls with short hair laughing at boys with feathers in their lapels. Perhaps I shall join them later. I am a fair dancer. Not superb, but fair. I am always honest about my capabilities. I am very pretty, though my prettiness lacks depth and therefore misses beauty by a hair. I have an extremely expressive face that I can contort at will. I am short, but I have a serviceable chest and practically perfect calves. For stage work I have a rich voice which carries well, though it is somewhat deeper than the fashion. I can alter it somewhat. I can pass for an American or a Frenchwoman, and I am working on a Muscovite lilt. Perhaps at twenty I shall be a superb dancer. Perhaps at thirty I shall be beautiful. Anything is possible.

My waiter has taken pity upon me and brought me a plate of walnuts and cheese and thus won my heart entire. Yes, my lad, I shall marry you. I
shall
.

Very well, Mary, very well! Get to it!

As of today, the Twentieth of August in the Year of Our Lord Nineteen Hundred and Eight, I believe the following to be Immutable Lunar Laws:

1. A woman has but eight roles open to her: ingénue, mother, witch, detective, nun, whore, queen, and corpse.

2. Sooner or later, someone's gonna own you, kid. Call yourself Queen of the May if you get a say in whom.

3. You have no pride. If you have it, misplace it. Under your mattress, in someone else's cupboard. It'll do you no favours.

4. That person you are when the camera's having its way? That's not you. That's a Looking Glass Girl. She lives on the other side of the lens. She's better than you are—prettier, more graceful, walks more properly, sparkles when she ought to, blushes when she ought to, fades to black before anyone gets bored. And better things happen to her than the sad little teas and flophouse fleas that happen to you. Love that Looking Glass Girl. Love her hard and love her true. Make obeisance; say your Aves. She is your personal god, and you'll chase her for the rest of your life.

 

Ship's Manifest, Small Commercial Craft
Clamshell

Owner-of-Record:
Oxblood Films/ Franklin R. Edison

Port-of-Call:
Tithonus, Luna, United Kingdom

Built:
1940, Copernicus Ironworks

Manufacturer:
Wernyhora Motors, Inc. (Subsidiary: J.P. Morgan & Company)

Model:
Cerigo VI (Inner System Restricted Permit #NK55781432F00QWP)

Occupancy:
35

Tonnage:
5,771

Length:
425 ft.

Beam:
56 ft.

Propulsion:
Ourania Class Cannon, Ford Quad-Firing Orbital Slugs, Carnegie Diesel-Balloon Braking, Foldback Magnetrisse Sails

Carriage Decks:
Bridge, Crew Berths, Cantina, Observation, Passenger Berths, Radio Room, Darkroom, Cargo Bay, Engine Hold, Fire Room, Ballast

Preflight Condition:
No Malfunctions. Kitchen Equipment, Data Transmission, and Interior Communication System Scheduled for Maintenance Upon Return to Dry Dock

Examined by:
Piotr Krupin, Arkady Lagounov, Ekaterina Bogomolova, Depot Noviy Kitezh, Moscow, 11.6.44

Great Railway Merger Expected 2100 12.6.44, Anadyomene Junction, Switch 9.6.4.2

Film Crew:

Severin Unck: Director

Cristabel Ossina: 1st Assistant Director

Erasmo St. John: Director of Photography

Horace St. John: Cameraman

Maximo Varela: Lighting Master

Mariana Alfric: Sound Engineer

Santiago Zhang: Best Boy

Konrad and Franco Sallandar: Craft Services

Support:

Anastaas Dajo: Pilot (Inner System Transit Authority Certified 1919, Hesperides Medal 1924)

Griet Van Rooyen: Navigator (Junior Cartographer, British Railways, Corps of Engineers Special Commendation 1942 for Work on the Venus-Mercury Toll Artery)

Isaac Deerfoot: Conductor (M.S. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1938, Junior Conductor, Mohawk and Hudson Railway, Mars-Asteroid Corridor 1939–1942)

Ghanim Boulos: Signalman

Balazs Almassy: Security

Dr Margareta Nantakarn: Surgeon (Edinburgh School of Medicine, 1922, Specialization in Epidemiology. Offworld Residency: Mercury, Trismegistus, St. Talaria's Children's Hospital, 1925)

Aylin Novalis: Venus Liaison (White Peony Station)

Henry Lamb, Simon Poole, Jaromil Kysely: Stewards (Contracted from Tithonus Savoy, Term of Contract 29.5.44-8.8.46)

William Kaur: Sanitation Engineer

Carolyne Derrick: Wire Walker

Arlo Covington, C.P.A.: Oxblood Oversight

Mr Tobias: Ship's Cat (Abyssinian, six years old, missing left ear)

Materiel:

1200 pounds beef

700 pounds mutton

775 pounds tinned beef

600 pounds veal, pork, sausage (beef-fennel, hot lamb-za'atar, chicken-tarragon)

1500 pounds chicken

250 tins preserved fruit

250 tins Dundee marmalade (orange, lemon, blood orange, muskbulb), Crosse & Blackwell jam (strawberry-peppercorn, gooseberry-port, cloudberry-champagne, Martian goji-serrano) and chutney (mango, cranberry, lunar coconut, Triton mint-miseryrose)

250 bottles pickles and sauces: Branston, Serapis Peppers, Nergal Morels, C&B Walnuts, HP Sauce, Hermeneus Fancy Catsup, Caloris Basin Hot Mustard, Worcestershire, Mount Penglai Soy Sauce, Tethys' Tail Fish Sauce, Io's Best Sweet Chili Sauce, McCollick's Bird Pepper Sauce, Lyle's Golden Syrup, Chinkiang Black Vinegar, Tethys' Tail Shrimp Paste, Celestial Moose Maple Syrup (grade B), Rose's Lime Juice. 65 bottles reserved for onsite sale/barter.

370 pounds Nereid roe (Interplanetary Quarantine cleared 2.5.44, Exotic Foodstuff Record #777121Ne, see attached form. Reserved for sale/barter in tot.)

250 pounds coffee

200 pounds tea

100 pounds potted fish (anchovy, salmon, herring, monkminnow)

900 pounds moist sugar (350 pounds reserved for sale/barter)

300 pounds lump sugar (100 pounds reserved for sale/barter)

660 pounds salt (200 pounds reserved for sale/barter)

510 pounds black pepper (200 pounds reserved for sale/barter)

825 pounds butter (various grades)

2 tonnes potatoes

1 tonne other vegetables

400 chickens, ducks, moonquail (live, egg-laying, to be bartered/sold upon landing in White Peony Station; buyer secured)

1.25 tonnes lard

78 barrels wheat flour

56 barrels rhea flour (Interplanetary Quarantine cleared 9.6.44, Exotic Foodstuff Record #413066Sa, see attached form)

40 barrels Phlegyas flour (Interplanetary Quarantine cleared 9.6.44, Exotic Foodstuff Record #900142Ma, see attached form)

7564 gallons fresh water

250 gallons callowmilk (Promotional Consideration Provided: 125 gallons Hathor Brand, 125 gallons Prithvi Brand)

21 quarts Prithvi ice cream (chocolate, vanilla, fig-pistachio, blueberry cider, black caramel, green-tea pink pecan, sweet potato, Saturn's Bounty, Ionian Fire Tart, Quandong Ripple, Phobos Macadamia Surprise, Morning on Ganymede. Reserved for landing)

21 bottles Domain Aphros champagne (reserved for landing)

16 cosmetic cases (Provided by Elizabeth Arden, Fifty Daughters. Unused supply to be sold/bartered before departure)

27 cases perfume (Provided by Chanel, Madame Zed, Saturnalia, reserved for sale/barter in tot.)

4 Underwood typewriters

50 reams paper

46,500 feet Eastman 35 mm film

3 dollies (custom + collapsible tracks)

10 Pharos lenses, various lengths

3 cases Jotunn brand batteries

2 Aitnaios generators

2 jib cranes

3 tripods

5 Eastman light meters

4 Edison microphones + sleeves

4 cases flares

Assorted gels, lights, blackwrap, filters, tape, mixer, recorder, boom, cables

3 cases clamps

2 Edison Model G III handheld 35 mm camera

2 Edison Model B II handheld 35 mm camera

3 diving suits

1800 m. breathing tubes, various sizes

(Primary funding provided by Oxblood Films, Inc. Secondary funding provided by Prithvi Dairy Products, Hathor Brand Callowmilk, Crosse & Blackwell, Redrose Deep Mars Mining Corp., Chanel, Carnegie Steel Company, Lumen Molnar.)

 

I Left My Sugar Standing in the Rain

Transcript from 1946 debriefing interview with Erasmo St. John, property of Oxblood Films, all rights reserved. Security clearance required.

CYTHERA BRASS:
Begin recording. Session one, day one. The time is eight-fifteen in the morning on Tuesday, January third, 1946, at the Oxblood Industrial Park, 1770 Endymion Road, North Yemaya, Luna. I, Cythera Brass, Chief Security Officer for Oxblood Films, Ltd., am the sole conductor of this final postproduction interview. Would you please state your full name, age, and place of birth for the record?

ERASMO:
Erasmo Leonard St. John. Thirty, Guan Yu, Mars.

CYTHERA:
Am I then to assume you hold dual citizenship?

ERASMO:
I believe my Chinese citizenship can best be described as “lapsed.” Why? Will I need to call down to an embassy for lunch? Or are you just wondering who might find my incarceration irritating?

CYTHERA:
You are hardly incarcerated, Mr St. John. Don't be absurd. And your last employment?

ERASMO:
Director of Photography on
The Radiant Car Thy Sparrows Drew
.

CYTHERA:
[sound of a ballpoint pen clicking] All right, then. Are you ready to begin, Mr St. John?

ERASMO:
Nope.

CYTHERA:
I think we've been exceedingly patient. It's been nearly seven months. If you prefer, we can provide you with materials and you can prepare a written statement, but either way, we see no reason to delay further.

ERASMO:
Then why bother asking if I'm ready? You've decided I'm ready. And you didn't even bring me a cup of tea. Some interrogation this is.

CYTHERA:
This is not an interrogation. This is a standard debriefing conducted by the studio at the conclusion of all off-Moon shoots.

ERASMO:
I've worked on … twelve? No, fourteen Oxblood pictures. I've been debriefed 'til I can brief no more and I don't think I've ever talked to a swot over the age of twenty. Debriefing is intern's work. The CSO wouldn't shine her shoes with a DP's report.

CYTHERA:
[intercom crackling] Would you bring two espressos, Jane? And some toast with butter. Thank you. And yet, you still decline legal representation.

ERASMO:
Oh, entirely. And I asked for tea.

CYTHERA:
Mr St. John, you are entitled to access the full resources of our legal department, as an employee of the studio. These resources are both substantial and free of charge. Given the circumstances, I highly recommend you use them.

ERASMO:
[short, sharp, quite humourless laugh] It strikes me as more than a little backward to allow a gaggle of Oxblood suits to look after my interests when, at the moment, you lot are the only ones accusing me of anything.

CYTHERA:
I don't know what accusations you're referring to. This is just a conversation between colleagues. It doesn't have to be anything more stressful or unpleasant than that. Everyone else has already given their statements and gone home.

ERASMO:
Then you already know more than I could possibly tell you. How about I get my own tea down at the Savoy and never have to look at your fucking face again?

CYTHERA:
Don't you
want
to go home, Mr St. John?

ERASMO:
I couldn't possibly give less of a shit.