Book 24 - An Imperfect Utopia, page 6
The next fuel convoy wasn’t expected for at least two days. It’s frustrating not having an exact date, but it’s coming from the other side of the mountains. We’d need a dozen relay stations to carry a radio message between the peaks and each would need to be staffed and supplied. How much effort would it take to run a copper phone line along the road? Obviously less in the long term, but in the short term, I wasn’t sure. I turned to a fresh page and tried to work it out.
“You missed a great dessert,” Kim said as she came into the office with a small tray.
“I missed dinner, too,” I said.
“I know, so I brought you this. Fillet of sole, fried with wild tomatoes, chillies, and green peppers.”
“Mustafa cooks this for the kids?” I asked, almost snatching the tray.
“No. His was a lot simpler, and sweeter. It was fried fish with a fruit sauce. The kids love foraging. Fania cooked this for you, just now. I came in via the kitchens. Janet’s there discussing your orders to bring the ceremony forward.”
“Well, if this is my punishment, I don’t mind getting the blame,” I said as I tucked in. “Who’s Fania?”
“Fania Valdez. The head chef. Two Michelin stars in Paris, though she’d moved back to Manilla to open her own restaurant. She was supposed to be the head cook for Cardinal Han and Mr Ibrahim, but when they cut down on numbers, they had to cut back on luxuries, too.”
“Was Janet still wearing her uniform?”
“She was. She really doesn’t want to take it off. Does she really need to resign from the Navy?”
“It’s precedent,” I said. “And since we’re abandoning so many, it’s important to keep all those that we can. It’s all part of the theatre of ceremony that allows us to believe our leader is not just the best of us, but better than us.”
“If it’s theatre, she should be allowed her costume. Any update from the ship?”
“Not yet. I was just working out how much of the Pacific a plane could survey before we’re out of fuel.”
She picked up the notebook. “Ah, you forgot to factor in the medical flight tomorrow morning.”
“What flight?”
“Twenty medics are going up to Fort St John to organise pre-surgical screenings,” she said. “We’ve got seventy patients on the list already.”
“That many?”
“It’s mostly tumours. A few were identified back in Nova Scotia, and we’re still only doing two operations a day, but we did say we’ll have free healthcare, available to all.” She looked down at my notes. “We can still manage three short flights. I suppose it’s better to wait until morning, when the ship will be nearer.”
“The lights would be easier to spot at night, but no, you’re right, we’ll wait.”
“Finish your dinner. I’ll see if there’s any new messages.”
It was a good meal. The vegetables weren’t numerous enough to collectively be called a side, but they definitely amounted to more than a garnish. They’d be freshly picked, too, from Vancouver Island where the crops planted when the Canadians first returned were now turning ripe. It would nearly be autumn before there was anything to pick from San Juan’s vegetable gardens, and that would only be a brief single harvest before the weather turned. But there were orchards and the grapevines, and there was always fish.
“The signal strength is improving, but the message is still quite garbled,” Kim said, as she came back into the office. She sat down opposite. “Miller’s arguing with Judith over how the power of the signal will impact their calculations. I get the impression anything they say about the position will just be guesswork.”
“We’ll send up a plane in the morning,” I said. “But we should wait a few hours in case we get a live reply.”
Kim nodded and settled in to wait. “It was a good meal. Pudding was a cross between a fritter and a pancake, with a berry topping.”
“Where did Mustafa get the flour?” I asked.
“The grain bricks the Australians sent.”
“Oh. And the fat?”
“Best not to ask,” she said. “Going out to eat like that really felt like old times, you know?”
“It was nice to do something normal, wasn’t it?”
“Well, normal for some of us. What were you scheming about with Eamonn and Chester?”
“Greta and Eamonn want to set up a news service and fund it with advertising. Job offers, salvage requests, and other personals, at least to start.”
“Oh, that’s a good idea,” she said. “Nadeo Sayuri is a saddler. Learned it from his father, who learned it from his, for about nine generations. While there’s no demand for saddles, there’s a lot of leather which could be salvaged and reworked into clothes or shoes. He has the skills, but the idea never occurred to him. Maybe he could place an ad for a business manager. Or maybe just offer his services. Leather worker accepts custom orders, no job too big, that sort of thing. And there must be lots of others like him whose talents are under-utilised.”
“I’m sure. But who is he?”
“Did you read the report about the fight we had about ten days ago? Nadeo from Indonesia, Javier Sabatin from the Philippines. Both nineteen and boy, do they act like it. They beat each other to a pulp, and all basically over a childish argument that can be summed up as my god is tougher than your god.”
“Those are the two Wendy sentenced to the Marine Corps?”
“She gave them the option of the Marines before sentencing so we could avoid the headache of working out precisely what the punishment would otherwise be. I mean, it was just a fight, albeit that it got out of control. It didn’t really warrant exile. Everyone’s doing hard labour, and are on thin rations. That only left the salt pond project, and Heather made her views on using that as a punishment very clear. Enlistment seemed a sensible compromise, at least for now.”
“And they’re training with Thelonious?” I asked.
“Yep, clearing buildings in Bellingham. But I talked with them both after the incident, and Nadeo was quite passionate about his leatherwork. I think it’s his calling. Hopefully the military will be Javier’s, because I’ve no idea what to do with him otherwise. Yes, if he could put an advert out in a paper, looking for a shoemaker, or maybe a hunter who wants to know what to do with the deer hides and pelts, we could end up with something new.”
“The newspaper is a long-term goal. Distribution will take time to establish. In the immediate future, Eamonn was talking about radio.”
“You mean they want to take over the radio station?” Kim asked, all expression leaving her face.
“They want to expand it,” I said. “Link it to Aisha’s School of the Air. Run educational programmes on one channel, and music on the other, with news on both. Adverts, too, I suppose.”
“I see. I guess it’s a sit-down job, and an office job, which would be good for Greta.”
“I know it’s what you wanted to do.”
“It’s just one of my dreams, Bill. Or it was. No, it’s a good idea. I don’t have the time to develop the radio station into what it needs to become, and it is something we need. We’re splitting into disparate groups again, leaning on old national identities, and dredging up the old baggage that went with them. We need a thread to connect people together. No, we need many threads. Enough to create a rope that’ll bind us forever. A radio station is one thread, assuming it’s done correctly. At least this way we can oversee it.” She picked up the notebooks. “How long would it take to sail from Japan?”
“About fifteen days. And at least thirty to get here from Australia. When did the last plane arrive?”
“Two weeks ago, with fifty-six passengers and a hold full of seeds. Some of the passengers were connected to the pilgrims, and we had a couple of Mr Kercher’s specialists. The rest were Canadians, including Fatima’s mum. She’s an interesting woman.”
“And they didn’t mention a ship?” I asked.
“No. Only to expect a plane in two weeks carrying three hundred Canadians plus a load of medicine and ammo.”
“Sir! Ma’am!” Miller called from the doorway. “I’ve got the complete message.”
As soon as we reached the radio room, Miller put the recording on speaker.
“This is the Winter Blossom. We are a passenger ship with two thousand souls aboard. We were refused entry in Japan. Please help us.”
“Two thousand, not one,” I said, and looked at Kim. “Can we handle that?”
“Do we have a choice?” Kim said. “Lieutenant, how far away do we think they are?”
“Over twelve hours,” he said. “It’s still just a recorded message. We don’t actually know if anyone aboard is still alive.”
Chapter 5 - The Inauguration
San Juan Island, 4th July
Not long after I first met Janet Gunderson, though after we’d cleared away the shrapnel following my brother’s revelations about the last election and Max’s death, I’d asked if she had been sworn in as president. She hadn’t and wasn’t interested in being elevated. She said it would be presumptuous before she’d returned to America, where she hoped she’d find someone higher up the pecking order had assumed the responsibility.
Even after we made contact with Australia, I think she held onto that hope. Meeting Lisa Kempton and the Guinns finally put that dream to bed. No one else with a legitimate claim on the presidency had survived. The righteous-good had been murdered. The evil had been executed. There were, however, many Americans in Australia wanting to return home. If Janet didn’t claim the throne, someone else would. Lots of someones. Tippy and Dwyer both proved that.
Even so, I wish we could have delayed the inauguration until next January. Among the customs and trappings of the old system we are keeping, for now, are the limits on the presidential term of office. A president can serve for up to two nonconsecutive four-year terms. If one ascends to the presidency mid-term, and if there is less than two years remaining until the election, they can serve out that term, and serve another two full terms. Ten years, assuming they win re-election twice. That two-year boundary is January 20th. If we could wait until the 21st, we’d get ten years of this administration. That’s certainly long enough to usher in all the changes we need. Instead, by being sworn in today, Janet will only be able to stand for one election in two and a bit years. Six years. That’ll be cutting things close.
Yes, our tenure could be extended by handpicking her successor. Would we pick the successor after that? Would we bring back the era of smoke-filled rooms where the likes of Lord Masterton selected the prime minister and the leader of the opposition, and thus ensured his agenda was fulfilled? How is that different to a dictatorship by another name? No, the measure of our success, or failure, is the completion of a free and fair election of someone whom we’re happy to see replace us.
We couldn’t wait any longer. Tippy has forced our hand. Thanks to Pierce Makepeace, we know she planned to engineer his appointment to the House of Representatives. Since most of our population is currently in Canada, it would be a very small Congress, so relatively easy for him to have won the appointment to Speaker. Since the speaker is third in line for the presidency it would only take two assassinations for him, or any other demagogue, to assume the top post.
It might seem counterintuitive, then, to hold an inauguration, since it appears to be the necessary first step for her plans to come into fruition. Now we know what Tippy was planning, we can publicise it, qualify the nature of the outbreak-era amnesty, reaffirm our abhorrence of slavery, and otherwise prevent her from getting a reprieve. We can also issue executive orders and implement other safeguards in case someone else, perhaps in Australia with a penchant for sending us serial killers and terrorists, attempts the same thing.
And there’s a more important reason, for which we have to go back to that benighted constitution. After she’s sworn in, Janet is only the acting president until her position is ratified by Congress. We need to have a speaker and a house. By formalising her position before the election, regardless of who they vote for, the very act of voting will ratify her right to have issued those executive orders that created our parliament of representatives. Her successor can overturn them, yes, but not nullify that they were issued once.
Obviously, the whole thing is a giant hodgepodge and has absolutely no bearing on the marginally more pressing issue of whether we starve before the end of next week. But that doesn’t mean it’s not important, especially to the millions of exiles in Australia who are looking forward to returning home.
Last night, I left the White House at eleven, but got home to find Wendy and Joseph waiting up for the latest news of the ship. I don’t know when I got to sleep, but I was up before five, and before Daisy. I dressed quickly, snuck out, and made my way to the Oval where Lieutenant Miller was back on duty in the radio room.
“Did you get any sleep?” I asked.
“About as much as you, sir,” Miller said. “We made contact with the ship and got a human reply. I’m just reviewing the recording. The conversation was plagued by static and pauses, and lasted about fifteen minutes.”
“Can you give me the highlights?”
“The current captain of the ship is Nariko Katayama. She’s a teacher who took command after an accident below decks saw them lose half their command crew. She cited an electrical fire and smoke inhalation as the main causes of death. They’re well-fuelled, heading for Colwood, and should arrive tomorrow, mid-afternoon. She’s in open water and had to gauge her position using the stars last night. Water is running low, and is rationed for drinking. At current levels, they will run out in five days. They asked if we would provide sanctuary. Contact was lost soon after.”
“What time did the message come through?”
“About three-thirty, sir. I’d left Sergeant Fonseca on duty. He woke me.”
“Half three. Not long before dawn,” I said. “Someone who knew how to tell their position based on the stars would be aware of how the sun affects radio signals.”
“I’d say so,” he said. “Listening to the raw recording, I would say some of the pauses are deliberate. Some of the rest is her filling time. She had a lot to say about the stars, the difficulties of fishing from a moving ship, the dead captain, and the electrical fire, none of which are germane to her arrival or why she departed.”
“She was obfuscating?”
“Yes, sir, and we should ask why a teacher is now captain if half the crew are still alive.”
“I’m sure you have a theory,” I said.
“Lots,” Miller said. “But I’d start by assuming it was no accident which caused their crew to die. I’d guess at a mutiny, maybe because they didn’t want to go ashore in Japan with its radiation and zombies.”
“Well, I assume we’ll find out when they arrive.”
“Yes, sir. What I mean is that it’s not so much a question of what we should do, but what they might do. They’ve asked for sanctuary, so they don’t want to be sent back. Their best way to guarantee that is to scuttle the ship. For that matter, why bother coming to the harbour? If it were me, I’d take to the lifeboats and go ashore in a secluded bay, then sink the ship or let it run aground.”
“Radio Colonel Bell, inform her of your thoughts, and ask her what she thinks we can do to mitigate that sort of risk. Who else do we have on Vancouver Island from the military?”
“Major Branofski. He went across first thing with one of the fishing boats. He left you a note, apologising for his absence.” Miller nodded to the large stack of overnight messages waiting in the in-tray.
“Radio Bran, then. Tell him of your thoughts. Ask Nanaimo to prep a plane, but not to send it up yet in case we need to send one to Fort St John to bring down more troops. I would like a plane in the air by lunchtime, though, heading in one direction or the other.” I picked up the messages. “I assume the president-designate has gone to the hospital?”
“First thing, sir. She tried sneaking out through the side gate.”
“If she’s not back by seven, send someone to fetch her.” I headed back into the Oval, skimming through the messages. Bran’s note voiced concerns similar to Miller’s. Judith had left a note saying she’d returned to Colwood to prep the boatyards and hangars to accommodate two thousand people for a few nights. Father Micheal was going to take a team to the ruins of Victoria to find more bedding and clothing. Heather was dispatching the fishing fleet to boost our food reserves.
An additional two thousand mouths to feed would make a significant dent in stocks we’d barely had time to create. In case I needed reminding, Heather added that four refrigerated vans were due to be packed with fish for when the fuel convoy returned to the north. We really needed to get the cannery operation underway. Three vans were for Fort St John. One was for Cooking Lake. We on the islands, in Bellingham, and the Skagit River Valley, were lucky because we had easy access to the sea. Inland, they had lakes, yes, but their stocks of fish is a finite resource. They had to rely on hunting and foraging, which left less time for farming. Even now, in July, and even in Fort St John, there is time to produce a small harvest of lettuce, radishes, or other quick crops before the winter arrives, but not if every spare minute is spent stalking through the forests.
The White House bustled with last-minute preparations, though the staff did graciously spare a few seconds to glare at me for altering the schedule. The event itself was taking place in the tasting room. From some of the old brochures, it had originally been a restaurant and still had the kitchens attached. Five years ago, they’d built the orangery, which doubled as their casual dining space in winter, with a semi-enclosed but fully air-conditioned covered patio for the summer. I hate to think what their electricity bills were like. The reason for the change had been their shift from tours and meals as a way of selling a few bottles, to corporate events and weddings where they could sell wine by the crate. The tasting room was still small, able to only seat fifty for an indoor wedding ceremony. I’d suggested we make it standing room only, so we could fit more people in. With so many now busy with the ship’s imminent arrival, I worried we might have to use the staff as place-fillers.
