Nature's Shift by Brian Stableford Page A

appointment with Rosalind. I suspect that he was well aware of it, and only made a show of checking his palm to remind me who was boss, but he let me in, and had a junior employee guide me to the appropriate reception-room.
    The pyramid was a very large structure; although its footprint was only a little larger than that of the Great Pyramid of Cheops, it was a good deal taller, its four faces being much more steeply sloped. The elevator buttons were numbered all the way up to thirty-two, but I knew that there were at least four floors above that, accessible only by strictly private means.
    I was taken up to thirty, which seemed a little high for my obvious unimportance in the scheme of the Hive’s dealings, although I had been up considerably higher in the past. The room into which I was shown had a spectacular view, not merely of Eden but a substantial fraction of Exmoor, but I didn’t go to the window to stare out. I don’t usually suffer unduly from acrophobia, but I felt that the last thing I needed at present was any hint of vertigo. Instead, I sat down and waited.
    Punctuality, they say, is the politeness of princes—which primitive generalization embraces queens—but Rosalind wasn’t being insulting in turning up twenty minutes late. She really was having a very busy day, and she had a lot on her mind.
    She offered me a drink. I asked for a glass of water. She poured it for me, along with something a little stronger for herself.
    â€œThank you for coming, Peter,” she said, by way of an opening. “Magdalen would have wanted you to be here.” Then she added: “I assume that Rowland didn’t tell you he wouldn’t be coming, any more than he told us?” That wrong-footed me completely, shattering all my expectations at a stroke.
    â€œI haven’t heard from him recently,” I said, glad to be able to offer it as a confirmation rather than an unwelcome reply to a probing inquiry.”
    Rosalind sat down beside me. I tried to tell myself that she wasn’t trying to be intimidating, that she found close proximity no other human beings as awkward as I did, but I knew how disciplined she was, and how determined. She looked directly into my eyes. I couldn’t sustain her gaze for more than a second, now, even though I had trained myself, ten years before, to meet even her gaze, if and when the occasion warranted it, for as long as a minute.
    Think of her as a work of art , I had told myself, then. Think of her as an artifice of exquisite beauty, not as a conscious human being. And if all else fails, remember that she’s a scientist, with a mind trained to objectivity .
    There was no possibility of any psychological ploy of that sort working now. I tried to concentrate hard on my glass of water, looking down into its transparent depths.
    She actually reached out and put her hand on my wrist, in a confidential and affectionate manner that was completely different from a formal and impersonal handshake. I had never known her do that before, even to Rowland or Magdalen.
    â€œI’m worried about him, Peter,” she said. “I need to ask you for a favor.”
    Oddly enough, that hit me like a bolt from the blue. In retrospect, perhaps I should have expected it. In retrospect, it almost seemed obvious—but it hadn’t seemed obvious in advance. Queen Rosalind of the Hive of Industry was asking me for a favor. Even though there was no logical reason why she shouldn’t, the idea had seemed somehow unthinkable.
    â€œWhat favor?” I said, warily, and perhaps not altogether politely. In retrospect, I should have asked: “Why are you worried about him?”—but I didn’t. I had to know what favor it was that she wanted from me.
    She was still touching my arm. “I want you to go to Venezuela,” she said. “I want you to visit Rowland—not for my sake, I hasten to add, but for his.”
    I was so stunned I had