Chapter 18: Progress Report

Castwich had asked me to meet him at his office. It was tiresome to have to take the railway to London when there was so much work remaining to be done with my charge in Brighton but I felt obliged to satisfy him.

I found him poring over his Geneao Plan. The clusters of red, black and white markers had changed: many now seemed clustered around the centre of the map. "Skiing!" Castwich exclaimed. "They're all off at Klosters. Too many genetic units in too close proximity! We lose sight of the risks when there are so many of them in the same place. It's a limitation of our systems I fear."

I noticed Julian's assistant, the voluptuous girl who had been moving markers on my first visit. She was busy as before but I noticed her take a swiftly hidden glance across at me. Had Castwich told her of my work I wondered? Did she harbour desires of being treated as Helena was, perhaps?

As Julian completed his tasks at the Plan I permitted myself a few moments imagining the girl impaled on the Orrery or crouching in the cage at Highgate. It was a pleasant diversion.

Julian put down the last of his markers. He, too, caught the girl's glance, frowned at her and took me by the arm. "Let us go," he said, "where our discussions will not disturb essential work." He drew me out into the corridor.

I followed him. We passed by the room where I had first seen the brown-clad girls that were the object of the Prince's benevolence. A group of them were seated in a semi-circle at one end of the room. In the centre, to my astonishment, sat the Prince, engaged in earnest discussion with the group. He was more animated than I had seen him before. Smiling and laughing together with the group. "I had not realised that the Prince was so directly involved," I remarked to Castwich. The Prince either did not notice us or chose not to acknowledge our presence, preferring to continue his discourse.

"Indeed he is," Castwich responded. "I worry that he may disturb some of the genetic patterns I hope to induce, but his sponsorship is central to the success of the programme, so I have little choice but to tolerate it."

I looked down at the group, watching them deep in conversation. In my view they would progress better as a result of sympathetic dialogue than they ever would as a result of Castwich's regime of corseting. I thought for a few moments about pressing my view of the futility of his project but in the end abandoned the thought. What would it achieve? If I was to be able to persuade him that the project lacked sense the girls would no doubt be thrown back out into society with no means of support. It was a case of least said, soonest mended.

We continued on our way and found ourselves in one of the museum's exhibition galleries. Dark wood and glass cabinets held an astonishing array of seemingly identical fossils. Along one wall cabinets of shallow, brass-handled drawers stretched from floor to ceiling. I was certain that each of the dozens of drawers held more of the things.