Rachel nods and hands over her phone. Jan unlocks the screen and fiddles with the buttons — master of modern technology as well as midwifery.
Doesn’t mean people can get into your nudey photos and private stuff, she assures, but they can access names of loved ones, the hospital, me.
I didn’t even know phones did that.
Oh, yes. Air ambulance are always complaining when people don’t bother. No one thinks how hard it might be to trace families in an emergency.
She hands the phone back.
Pop your other numbers in now.
Not like Binny after all, Rachel thinks. Binny couldn’t even master ring-back or last number dialled on her landline. At the end of the meeting, Jan walks her to the surgery door, past a couple of other women in the waiting room at various stages of pregnancy. She points to a car in the staff row outside the health centre — a small, vulpine-looking vehicle, sporty, bright orange.
That’s me, she says. The Renault. She goes like the clappers when she has to.
Jan bids Rachel goodbye and good luck, as if she is about to undertake a race, and heads back inside. Will it help to like her when it comes to the birth? Rachel wonders. Or will she not care whether the devil himself is in the room, telling her to pant and push, holding her knees, getting the scissors out? It will help, she decides. It must.
*
By the second half of quarantine, the wolves have become much less nervous, smelling the meat being brought to them and anticipating the spot where it will be dumped. They come close in the wolfery, and do not strike back into the enclosure if a sudden move is made, or the gate clangs. Rachel and Huib rotate feed personnel and times when the carcasses are delivered. But the pair still slope towards them through the grass, heads slung low, cunning eyes. It is impossible to decoy, or approach in secret. They are too clever, hardwired; they know. Sometimes it is difficult not to believe they have additional senses, abilities not biomechanical — a kind of clairvoyance. Sometimes they are waiting in the right spot for the food the moment she has chosen its location and begun to approach. She has seen them turn to look and sniff before the wrapped deer in the Land Rover has even arrived, when it is en route, as if there is preternatural knowledge of the blood travelling to them, rather than the iron waft leaking from the wound, through hide and fur.
They discuss the matter with Thomas at the monthly review meeting in the Hall. The problem is presented and extra scare tactics proposed, so the carcasses can be placed more quickly, staff members won’t be as intrusive, and the wolves will reassociate their human keepers. Thomas listens attentively and seems regretful about the plan.
Yes, I suppose they’re not pets and shouldn’t act like it.
They’re not pets, Rachel says. It would be wrong to let them become any friendlier. They’re seeing too much of us. By which I mean, we’re seeing too much of them.
Shame, he says. It’s wonderful to observe them down there — they’re so magnificent.
She wants to remind him of the seriousness of the undertaking, the experiment he has committed to; he seems less focused. She wonders whether he has been visiting the wolfery out of hours, though he knows the schedule is restricted. Sylvia explains again the need for distance. Her tone is patient, and slightly confiscating — clearly she understands her father’s tendencies.
Daddy, the trouble is, if they get used to being around people, even if they aren’t completely tame, they might learn to scavenge, and we don’t want that. They have to remain as wild as possible, for their own good.
He smiles with tenderness and pride.
Yes, darling Soo-Bear. I do understand. How clever you are. No, you’re right, Rachel. Whatever you think best. These scare tactics — what do you suggest? Play Bach very loud?
Puccini, Sylvia says.
The Earl and his daughter laugh, a quiet conspiratorial laugh — a private joke about musical tastes, possibly. There are occasional tells between them during such meetings, but mostly Sylvia remains professional, and does not play princess. She works hard, reads up on the subject. But at times like this, Rachel is reminded that she is guesting on the project, that it is a year out rather than a year in for her.
There are a few reliable methods we can use, Rachel says. Including loud noises. My feeling is it won’t take much to restore a bit of caution.
Very good, Thomas nods. Is there anything else on the agenda?
Rachel considers updating him on the levels of protest, the regular occult letters from Nigh, and the more organised legal correspondence from The Ramblers, though his lawyers will surely be keeping him in the loop on the latter. She decides against it. He has been successfully distanced from the public face of the project, and she wishes to keep it that way.
No. We’re in good shape, overall.
Excellent.
He claps his hands together.
And have they fallen in love yet?
He raises an eyebrow, begins to hum a tune. Love is in the air. Rachel smiles tolerantly, but does not find him funny. The spontaneous foolery of her employer, his hop-skip-and-jump attitude, still leaves her feeling awkward. She wonders if this is his persona in the House of Lords, too, whether he gets away with flamboyance and buffoonery, whether he prospers because of it in a climate of old schoolboys, all of whom aspire to or claim eccentricity in some degree. She thinks back to their original meeting, his studied attempt to win her over to the project. Since then, it seems his knowledge on the subject has gone into serious decline. But now that he has Rachel running things, perhaps he can afford to be less invested. It is perhaps his habit, to surround himself with experts, then dislocate.
They’re bonding, she says. I’m hopeful they’ll mate in the winter.
In fact, all the signs in the run-up to the release are good. The health reports are reassuring. The implants have proved negligible. They have been vaccinated. They are acclimated to the terrain, its hard carapaces and grasslands, via the microcosm of their acre. All that remains is for their human aversion to prevail.
And how are you, Rachel? Thomas asks. Not long to go now. We’re all very excited about our other new addition to Annerdale.
She has no wish to discuss the details of the pregnancy with him, especially in front of the group. But the tenor of estate membership is such that almost familial interest is taken in the workers’ lives, like a factory town, or Ford’s empire. The baby is being regarded as part of the fabric, part of the community — she knows, an idea both securing and suffocating.
I’m fine, thanks. Everything’s fine.
Wonderful. Anything you need, please just ask. Right, I better go. I’ve a tedious meeting across the border.
The Scottish referendum is in a few weeks and the Earl is part of the monetary committee. Rachel has heard him on the radio a few times; his position on independence withheld, talking about the cost of setting up new nations. Everything has overheated, politically; most days the news features fresh accusations and tactics, business leaders switching sides, spokespeople from the military, the judiciary, European representatives speculating on continued EU membership. Thomas leans down to kiss his daughter.
See you in Edinburgh, darling.
In the days that follow, the heat of summer lifts, and the sun becomes less concentrated. September. Rachel walks in the cool early mornings. Sometimes there is a text from Alexander first thing — he seems oblivious to any withholding on her part. They have spent a few more nights together — the arrangement practical, but affectionate and enjoyable. The trees fluoresce, as if in a final bid to stay green. There is already a tint of autumn about the roads, leaves beginning to gather and flutter along the verges, field-stumps rotting in the drizzle after haying. In the sky, a more complicated portfolio of colours: lilacs, yellows, like a warning — bad weather brewing in the Atlantic. In the hedges hang early sloes, unripened black drupes pinned to the spiny trees. She remembers Binny making gin with them; her mother could turn any berry into lethal poteen. The parties in the post office cottage were torrid, involved villagers with only the strongest constitutions, the pub diehards, the dancers. Binny would have gone down well at the Reservation parties, she had entirely the right constitution.