“Do they even have choir schools in Italy?” Pat asked.
“There’s one in Rome and one in Milan,” he said. “Or there’s Wells. Wells is the best one in England, everyone says.”
“There’s King’s College right here in Cambridge,” Pat said. “Going away to school costs a lot of money, and also we’d miss you.”
“I’d miss you too,” Philip admitted.
After dinner they switched the television on again, and were rewarded with some actual news. It was announced that in a joint communication from Moscow and Brussels that the USSR and United Europe had informed the governments of India, Pakistan and China that no more nuclear strikes would be tolerated.
“Does that mean it’s over?” Flora asked.
“I have no idea,” Pat said. “It might. Or it might mean that if those countries won’t listen, then we—or the Russians—would hit them from the moon. That could mean the end of everything.”
“What are the Americans doing?” Jinny asked.
“Splendid isolation,” Bee said. “Always their default policy. It’s what they do best.”
They went to bed and woke the next morning to a world that, as after the Cuban Exchange, seemed determined to carry on as if nothing had happened. The millions dead in China and India, the millions more predicted to suffer radiation and cancer deaths, were not exactly forgotten but swept under the carpet. The mood was that of having dodged a bullet. The girls in Pat’s classes the next day seemed on the edge of hysteria, needing very little to tip them into either laughter or tears. It was almost exam time, and she read poetry to them, couching it in terms of revision.
Three weeks later the family were in Florence. Pat went alone into the Duomo and quietly gave thanks to God for the world still being there. She went with the children to the Sunday morning service and prayed for the preservation of Florence.
On Monday morning Michael joined them. The children were off with their friends, and the three adults bought gelato in Perche No! and went to sit in the piazza to watch the sky darken behind the Palazzo Vecchio. Pat kept dissolving into tears. “We have to do something to stop this all being on a knife edge,” she said.
“What can we do?” Bee asked.
“Your books help people appreciate what they’re looking at when they see it,” Michael said.
“I was wondering whether I could use the semi-demi-fame I have from the books to start a movement to say that some places just shouldn’t be harmed. But I’m sure everyone would agree and then not take any notice.”
“Maybe we could start an organization,” Michael said. “Get the paper behind us.”
“Maybe. But it would need to be international to do any good.” Pat stared out across the square where Florentines and tourists were mingling on the ancient cobblestones in the twilight. “And why would China care about Florence? And the US left the United Nations, they don’t care about anything, but they have all those nukes.”
“The problem is that we say using nukes at all is barbarous and unthinkable and nobody should do it, and then we do it. If we said there were certain places that were sacrosanct then it would be tantamount to admitting that using them was acceptable,” Bee said.
Pat leaned down and put her hand on Bee’s shoulder. “But people are using them. The Americans and the Russians, and now the Indians and the Chinese. People will carry on using them to end arguments. And it’s all very well if the Russians will act with Europe, the way they did this time, but what if it’s us against them next time? In space and on Earth? All those bombs in orbit and on the moon?”
“There might not even be plants left,” Bee said. “But that doesn’t mean we can condone using them at all in any circumstances.”
“You sound like CND.”
“Maybe we should join CND,” Bee said. “We used to go on peace marches, not that it did any good.”
“We just live our lives and hope history doesn’t notice us,” Michael said. “But we could try to start up a list of places so precious they shouldn’t be harmed. An international list. The Great Wall of China. Angkor Wat. Machu Picchu. Florence.”
“The seven wonders of the world,” Bee said.
26
In Sickness and in Health Trish 1982–1988
Trish flew to Boston to see George get his Ph.D. “We’re going to the moon, Mum,” he said, when he met her at Logan airport.
“Because of the song?” she asked.
“Well, it probably helped, and we are going to be the first people to get married there, but really it’s because of our work.”
“That’s wonderful,” she said.
“When we come back we’ll have another wedding on Earth. We don’t want you to miss it, or Sophie’s parents either. But it does seem like a wonderful opportunity.”
“How long will you be on the moon?” she asked. “On the moon. Amazing to think of it.”