The Afterlife of Alice Watkins 2 Read online

  The Afterlife of Alice Watkins

  Book Two

  Matilda Scotney

  Copyright © 2018 by Matilda Scotney

  All rights reserved.

  No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. Short passages of text may be used for the purposes of a book review or for discussion in a book club.

  This is a work of fiction. Any similarity between the characters and situations within the pages and places or persons, living or dead, is unintentional and coincidental.

  Matilda Scotney has asserted her moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  The Afterlife of Alice Watkins - Book Two

  ISBN: 978 0 648 3191 2 2

  Cover design and formatting by Beehive Book Design (beehivebookdesign.com)

  For Wyn Howard.

  A truly great lady

  Contents

  Also by Matilda Scotney

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Epilogue

  The Soul Monger

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Matilda Scotney

  The Afterlife of Alice Watkins: Book One

  The Soul Monger (August 2018)

  Curious Star (due 2019)

  www.matildascotneybooks.com

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  Chapter 1

  Several days after Alice’s return to Earth, Principal Ryan stood on the bridge of the Significator listening to his new second officer expound the virtues of her new communications array. For the last half-hour, Statesman Junnot had vigorously and enthusiastically presented to the bridge officers her research into enhanced frequency propagation and her early, promising trials with transmissions that exceeded previous velocity limitations.

  Principal Ryan appreciated Junnot’s zeal and expertise, but communicating with anyone without good cause didn't interest him, unless they happened to be a newly discovered alien civilisation—that offered a type of challenge in which technology seldom played a part. So he was glad when offered a distraction; a coded message from Principality One, a top priority link from the Office of the World Principal, for his eyes only.

  He bowed to Statesman Junnot, promising not to be too long, knowing who called even before he sat in front of the registry to accept the link.

  “Aunt Katya.”

  “Nephew.”

  “What have I done?” Principal Katya always addressed him as “nephew” when she perceived him in the wrong.

  “You are flying about above my head in space dock a whole week and I have not heard a single word from you. Are you too important for me now?”

  “No, Aunt.”

  “Have you spoken to your mother?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your sisters?”

  “Yes, both, and the nieces.”

  “So, you leave your old auntie to last?”

  “Auntie?”

  “Yes, it’s my new title.”

  “I called the first day we arrived, but you were in Cloisters, so I couldn’t disturb you. I left a message.”

  “Humph, that was not a message for me, that was an official report on your passenger,” Principal Katya snorted. “Very well, I forgive you. Are you coming to the Cotillion Ball?”

  No-one refused an invitation from the World Principal, no matter how closely you were related. She disregarded his look of resignation.

  “Yes, Aunt.”

  He would be there. He wouldn’t dare do otherwise.

  “Will I see you before then?”

  “I’m going home for a couple of weeks so possibly not until the day before the ball.”

  “Make sure that is what happens. I will be displeased if you change those plans. Now, you look pale, Noah. You need proper nourishment—that space junk food is poisoning you.”

  “It’s nutritionally balanced, Aunt. I’m not exactly starving.”

  “Alice showed us hamburgers,” Principal Katya’s face broke into a huge grin.

  “Hamburgers?”

  “Yes, where there is meat—she makes hamburgers, meat that is mashed and squashed flat and called patties. You put them in bread with lettuce and tomatoes and sauce. Far better than anything you can have on your ship.”

  She didn’t paint a particularly appetising picture, but eating, like communicating, carried only a nuisance factor for Noah Ryan—something performed from necessity, distracting him from other, more important tasks.

  “Doubtless, you are correct, Aunt. I might stick to space junk poison. It would appear you and Dr Langley found much in common?”

  "Yes, Noah, we loved having her here. She instructed us in ancient handicraft, even though she was to be on vacation. She gave generously of her time to teach us this crochet and to show the chef hamburgers and sauce. She made many friends. Such a breath of fresh air through these musty old halls. I don't think she realised her impact on us all. Did you spend much time with her on the ship?"

  "Me?" The question took him by surprise. "No, far too busy. I realised her scientific significance of course, but with the ship in preparation for the Gravidarum modifications, the new mission, new second officer and countless other things demanding my attention, I didn't have time."

  “Her scientific significance? Noah, she is a human being!”

  Principal Katya pursed her lips in annoyance. Her nephew knew that face; time to wheedle himself out of her bad books.

  "I only met her a couple of nights before we left Saturn Station, Aunt Katya, and I paid little attention. We all got conned into a dinner by Abel Hardy, and that was the first time I set eyes on her. Hardy didn't attend the dinner and didn't disclose her identity until later when he assigned her to the Significator for her return to Earth."

  “Were you not astonished to learn her identity?”

  Principal Katya knew better than to ask her nephew about feelings because he kept his carefully hidden, but even as she dismissed any likelihood of a response, his expression changed. He looked down, frowning, seeking to recapture a moment. She waited. A rare experience, to see her no-nonsense nephew distracted and searching for words. When he found them, he didn’t look up, just shook his head, his voice soft and reflective.

  “I mentioned in my report to you she plays the piano, though I found that out quite by accident. I saw her late one night in the auditoriu
m," then as an afterthought said, "her playing quite puts our resident pianist to shame!" He gave a short, breathy laugh, but his off-the-cuff comment lifted his expression, and Principal Katya smiled. "Then, when I confronted her, she seemed flustered and confused and said she wanted to return to her stateroom. She refused my offer to escort her. I didn't know what to make of it," he concluded, almost to himself, and lifted his shoulders a little as if consigning it to the too hard basket. It seemed to Principal Katya that he was still back in the auditorium, trying to make sense of it all.

  "Why would you confront her, Noah?" Principal Katya asked, more sternly than she intended. Her nephew was not known for his sensitivity, and she didn't like the idea of the gentle, sweet Alice being terrified by him. She softened her tone to match his unexpected reflection.

  “Did she break one of your rules?”

  “No!” His reply was too quick, too sharp, and he looked her right in the eye, giving her cause to wonder at his defensiveness. Again, a rare occurrence, her nephew was always measured in his replies.

  “No, Aunt, she didn’t. I heard her as I was passing and when I spoke to her, got the impression she wasn’t sure why she was there. She wore a green dress and no shoes.”

  He’d added the last sentence without thinking and cursed himself as it left his lips, knowing full well his aunt would latch onto any self-indulgent thought and blow it out of proportion.

  Principal Katya nodded sagely, a green dress, eh? He noticed her green dress? So, this girl captivated her nephew as well as Patrick. She’d waited a long, long time for this. She’d seen the faintest of smiles on his lips before he pulled himself together.

  “So, Noah, you paid her little attention then?”

  “No, very little,” came the rapid and dismissive reply. “But I’m glad you made a new friend.”

  "We all did. How fortunate are we that it was Alice who woke and not a cryogenically frozen head onto which we had to graft a body!"

  Ryan grinned. Perish the thought.

  “I suppose she gave you blue hair too.”

  "Indeed. In Alice's time, this is what the stylish ladies did," Principal Katya lifted her chin. "It makes me feel distinguished and regal."

  “Aunt, you are the most distinguished and regal person on the planet! You are World Principal! What else would you expect?”

  “Alice treated me as a friend and companion. As a contemporary. She is without guile or pretence. I believe we have become good friends."

  “That’s inevitable Aunt, everyone on Earth adores you.”

  “Humph,” she sniffed, but his words pleased her because she loved the people too. “I am but a figurehead. The mantle of responsibility falls largely to Mellor and Evesham. The local principals generally answer to them now.”

  “Did Patrick come to see you?” he asked, changing the subject, mindful of the bridge meeting he needed to return to and hoping to avoid any more discussion about Dr Langley. “He went to the surface to see his family, but he only spent a few hours. He’s already back on board.”

  “He came, but more to see Alice I think. They went down to the waterhole to swim and then shot some arrows. They didn’t come back for many hours.”

  Considering his earlier comment, she watched for a reaction, but there was none. He would not let his guard down again.

  “They seem close,” she continued, mischievously prodding for a change in expression, but his face remained typically blank. “I wonder if Patrick’s days of breaking hearts are over.”

  "I doubt it," Ryan said, thinking first of Engineer McIntyre and then of Principal Hardy's concerns about Patrick. Perhaps those concerns were not as misplaced as Ryan first thought. He'd dismissed them initially, but maybe that was an error on his part. Patrick's habit of being reckless with female hearts and his romantic pursuits were of no interest to Ryan; they wouldn't be now if not for that tacit directive, the subject and his aunt's apparent fondness. Patrick was still under his command; he might have to ask him about his relationship with Dr Langley, just for neatness sake.

  “Well, Noah, I promised Alice she should make her own decisions now. She has gone now to her new home, with people to love and protect her. I miss her presence here greatly. Patrick will escort her to the Cotillion Ball, I am sure."

  “Quite likely, Aunt Katya, but I must go. I was in a bridge meeting with Statesman Junnot when this top priority call came, demanding an immediate response.”

  “I can contact you by these methods whenever I choose Noah. As you say, I am World Principal. Who will tell me no?”

  Chapter 2

  Alice spent her first morning in her new home getting to know Mary and Jane, their huge slobbery dogs, a cat with half a tail, and three beautiful horses who lived in the stables and paddock. The sounds of Australia filled her ears once more—crickets, magpies and even briefly, a kookaburra cackling in one of the tall gum trees.

  Mary showed her to the beautiful room she and Jane prepared for her, much smaller than her suite at the Tabernacle, but just as comfortably furnished with a large wooden bed, an ancient, triple-mirrored dressing table and a sofa. Mary suggested they go to the city if she wished for anything different or needed other furniture, but to Alice, the room felt cosy and homely, and she didn't want to change a thing. The floor was carpeted, with a soft and luxurious pile that Alice once saw in a shop and dreamed of for her own home, instead of cold linoleum tiles. There were the usual nods to this century—a fancy shower, the never-get-cool bath, a laundry receptacle that made your clothes disappear and later deposited them in a flat pile on a shelf all clean and ready to hang in a closet.

  "I love it, Auntie Mary. Thank you," she hugged Mary. "Absolutely no need to go shopping for furniture and the view…" Alice looked out the window. The sun's rays bounced off the ocean, forming millions of diamond sparkles on the deep blue background, "…the view is spectacular!"

  Mary laughed. “Wait till you see it at night Alice. It’s amazing. The moonlight creates a staircase effect across the water.”

  But one feature in the room Alice preferred to do without.

  “Auntie Mary, do I need to have the registry in here?”

  "Well, no," Mary said, not sure why a registry would be a problem. Registries featured in all households in some form. "I know you've made friends along the way and I thought you might like privacy when they link. This unit is limited; you can use it for local information, weather, city info and for communication. We have the full registry by the parlour. Don’t you want it here?”

  “You’ll think I’m silly, but I don't like that…" she pointed to the blinking command light. "The registry in my room at the Tabernacle was communication only; it didn't have the responder icon."

  Mary went to the registry, “I can take it out if you wish, but you can just do this…”

  And she switched it off by flicking a beam beside the panel. Of course, a machine would have an off switch. The blinking stopped. This flicking movement hadn't worked previously for Alice; she always needed to wave her hands around as if casting a spell to get a response. Practice, she guessed.

  “I didn’t think of that. I’m not used to them yet. The registry on the principality ship couldn’t be turned off because it was part of the ship’s systems.”

  "That would be the case on the principality ships. We live in an age of technology Alice; you'll get used to it in time."

  Alice decided now might not be the best time to tell Mary why she didn’t like the command light and that her first solo encounter with the registry on the principality ship resulted in her seeing her own grave.

  Alice recognised few of the variety of dishes served for lunch, only that most of them were baked and vegetable-based. She tried a little of everything and found them largely to her liking. Jane, the cook of the family, was happy with Alice’s response.

  Alice already decided, after Principal Katya's fondness for eating every couple of hours, she would take more care and not eat too many pastries; judging by this m
eal, the aunties took care with their diet, and Alice felt much relieved. At the Tabernacle, she always seemed to be sitting down to eat!

  The aunties told her about their neighbours, the wildlife and landscape, and painted for her a picture of paradise directly opposite Alice's earlier imaginings of the Calamities. Jane placed a portable registry in the centre of the table and displayed stunning areas perfect for walking and horse riding, places to collect wild berries and plants for use in the kitchen, and an abundance of birdlife; there was even a sweep over the coastline showing shoals of fish.

  Jane spoke quietly, contributing to the conversation in either single words or short, measured sentences. Mary told Alice that Jane suffered chemical gas burns to her throat and mouth many years before while on assignment to Saturn Station. Dr Clere's team saved her life, but at that time hadn't regrown a larynx, so she was left with limited capacity with her speech. Jane and Mary appeared to find a macabre humour in being left speechless, and the way they told it, it was funny, though Alice hesitated at laughing at another person's misfortune.