скачать книгу бесплатно
“It’s the latest Gini figures, do you know those?”
“No?”
“They’re a measurement of income distribution in a population, so an index of the gap between rich and poor. Most industrialized democracies rate at between 25 and 35, that’s where we were in the 1950s, see, but our numbers started to shoot up in the 1980s, and now we’re worse than the worst third-world countries. Forty or greater is considered to be very inequitable, and we’re at 52 and rising.”
Anna looked briefly at the graph, interested in the statistical method. A Lorenz curve, plotting the distance away from perfect equality’s straight line, which would tilt at forty-five degrees.
“Interesting … So this is for annual incomes?”
“That’s right.”
“So if it were for capital assets—”
“It would be worse.” Frank shook his head, disgusted. He had come back from San Diego in a foul mood. No doubt anxious to finish and go home.
“Well,” Anna said, “the Khembalis have gotten a couple of grants.”
“Very nice, did you do it?”
“I just pointed them at things. They’re turning out to be good at following through. And I helped Drepung rewrite their grant proposals. You know how it is, after doing this for a few years, you do know how to write a grant proposal.”
“No lie. Nice job. Good to see someone doing something.”
Anna returned to her desk, glancing after him. He was definitely edgy these days. He had always been that way, of course. Dissatisfied, cynical, sharp-tongued; it was hard not to contrast him to the Khembalis. Here he was, about to go home to one of the best departments in one of the best universities in one of the nicest cities in the world’s richest country, and he was unhappy. Meanwhile the Khembalis were essentially multigenerational exiles, occupying a tidal sandbar in near poverty, and they were happy.
Or at least cheerful. She did not mean to downplay their situation, but these days she never saw that unhappy look that had so struck her the first time she had seen Drepung. No, they were cheerful, which was different than happy; a policy, rather than a feeling. But that only made it more admirable.
Well, everyone was different. She got back to the tedious grind of wrangling data. Then Drepung called, and they shared the pleasure of the good news about the grant proposals. They discussed the details, and then Drepung said, “We have you to thank for this, Anna. So thank you.”
“You’re welcome, but it wasn’t really me, it’s NSF.”
“But you piloted us through the maze. We owe you big-time.”
Anna laughed despite herself.
“What?”
“Nothing, it’s just that you sound like Charlie. You sound like you’ve been watching sports on TV.”
“I do like watching basketball.”
“That’s fine. Just don’t start listening to rap, okay?”
“You know me, I like Bollywood. Anyway, you must let us thank you for this. We will have you to dinner.”
“That would be nice.”
“And maybe you can join us at the zoo when our tigers arrive. Recently a pair of Bengal tigers were rescued off Khembalung after a flood. The papers in India call them the Swimming Tigers, and they are coming for a stay at the National Zoo here, and we will have a small ceremony when they arrive.”
“That would be great. The boys would love that. And also—” An idea had occurred to her.
“Yes?”
“Maybe also you could come upstairs and visit us here, and give one of our lunchtime lectures. That would be a great way to return a favor. We could learn more about your situation, and, you know, your approach to science, or to life or whatever. Something like that. Do you think Rudra would be interested?”
“I’m sure he would. It would be a great opportunity.”
“Well not exactly, it’s just a lunchtime series of talks that Aleesha runs, but I do think it would be interesting. We could use some of your attitude here, I think, and you could talk about these programs too.”
“I’ll talk to the rimpoche about it.”
“Okay good. I’ll put Aleesha in touch.”
After that Anna worked on the stats again, until she saw the time and realized it was her day to visit Nick’s class and help them with math hour. “Ah shit.” Throw together a bag of work stuff, shut down, heft the shoulder bag of chilled milk bottles, and off she went. Down into the Metro, working as she sat, then standing on the crowded Red Line Shady Grove train; out and up and into a taxi, of all things, to get to Nick’s school on time.
She arrived just a little late, dumped her stuff, and settled down to work with the kids. Nick was in third grade now, but had been put in an advanced math group. In general the class did things in math that Anna found surprising for their age. She liked working with them; there were twenty-eight kids in the class, and Mrs. Wilkins, their teacher, was grateful for the help.
Anna wandered from group to group, helping with multipart problems that involved multiplication, division, and rounding off. When she came to Nick’s group she sat down on one of the tiny chairs next to him, and they elbowed each other playfully for room at the round low table. He loved it when she came to his class, which she tried to do on a semiregular basis.
“All right Nick quit that, show the gang here how you’re going to solve this problem.”
“Okay.” He furrowed his brow in a way she recognized inside the muscles of her own forehead. “Thirty-nine divided by two, that’s … nineteen and a half … round that up to twenty—”
“No, don’t round off in the middle of the process.”
“Mom, come on.”
“Hey, you shouldn’t.”
“Mom, you’re quibbling again!” Nick exclaimed.
The group cackled at this old joke.
“It’s not quibbling,” Anna insisted. “It’s a very important distinction.”
“What, the difference between nineteen and a half and twenty?”
“Yes,” over their squeals of laughter, “because you should never round off in the middle of an operation, because then the things you do later will exaggerate the inaccuracy! It’s an important principle!”
“Mrs. Quibler is a quibbler, Mrs. Quibler is a quibbler!”
Anna gave in and gave them The Eye, a squinting, one-eyed glare that she had worked up long ago when playing Lady Bracknell in high school. It never failed to crack them up. She growled, “That’s Quibler with one b,” melting them with laughter, as always, until Mrs. Wilkins came over to join the party and quiet it down.
After school Anna and Nick walked home together. It took about half an hour, and was one of the treasured rituals of their week—the only time they got to spend together, just the two of them. Past the big public pool, past the grocery store, then down their quiet street. It was hot, of course, but bearable in the shade. They talked about whatever came into their heads.
Then they entered the coolness of their house, and returned to the wilder world of Joe and Charlie. Charlie was bellowing as he cooked in the kitchen, an off-key, wordless aria. Joe was killing dinosaurs in the living room. As they entered he froze, considering how he was going to signify his displeasure at Anna’s treasonous absence for the day. When younger this had been a genuine emotion; sometimes when he saw her come in the door he had simply burst into tears. Now it was calculated, and she was immune.
He smacked himself in the forehead with a Compsognathus, then collapsed to the rug face-first.
“Oh come on,” Anna said. “Give me a break Joe.” She started to unbutton her blouse. “You better be nice if you want to nurse.”
Joe popped right up and ran over to give her a hug.
“Right,” Anna said. “Blackmail will get you everywhere. Hi hon!” she yelled in at Charlie.
“Hi babe.” Charlie came out to give her a kiss. For a second all her boys hung on her. Then Joe was latched on, and Charlie and Nick went into the kitchen. From there Charlie shouted out from time to time, but Anna couldn’t yell back without making Joe mad enough to bite her, so she waited until he was done and then walked around the corner into the kitchen.
“How was your day?” Charlie said.
“I fixed a data error all day long.”
“That’s good dear.”
She gave him a look. “I swore I wasn’t going to do it,” she said darkly, “but I just couldn’t bring myself to ignore it.”
“No, I’m sure you couldn’t.”
He kept a straight face, but she punched him on the arm anyway. “Smartass. Is there any beer in the fridge?”
“I think so.”
She hunted for one. “There was some good news that came in, did you see that? I forwarded it. The Khembalis got a couple of grants.”
“Really! That is good news.” He was sniffing at a yellow curry bubbling in the frying pan.
“Something new?”
“Yeah, I’m trying something out of the paper.”
“You’re being careful?”
He grinned. “Yeah, no blackened redfish.”
“Blackened redfish?” Nick repeated, alarmed.
“Don’t worry, even I wouldn’t try it on you.”
“He wouldn’t want you to catch fire.”
“Hey, it was in the recipe. It was right out of the recipe!”
“So? A tablespoon each of black pepper, white pepper, cayenne, and chili powder?”
“How was I supposed to know?”
“What do you mean? You should have known what a tablespoon of pepper would taste like, and that was the least hot of them.”
“I guess I didn’t know it would all stick to the fish.”
Nick was looking appalled. “I wouldn’t eat that.”
“You aren’t kidding,” Anna laughed. “One touch with your tongue and you would spontaneously combust.”
“It was in a cookbook.”
“Even going in the kitchen next day was enough to burn your eyes out.”
Charlie was giggling at his folly, holding the stirring spoon down to Nick to gross him out, although now he had a very light touch with the spices. The curry would be fine. Anna left him to it and went out to play with Joe.
She sat down on the couch, relaxed. Joe began to pummel her knees with blocks, babbling energetically. At the same time Nick was telling her something about something. She had to interrupt him, almost, to tell him about the coming of the Swimming Tigers. He nodded and took off again with his account. She heaved a great sigh of relief, took a sip of the beer. Another day flown past like a dream.
Another heat wave struck, the worst so far. People had thought it was hot before, but now it was July, and one day the temperature in the metropolitan area climbed to 105 degrees, with the humidity over ninety percent. The combination had all the Indians in town waxing nostalgic about Uttar Pradesh just before the monsoon broke. “Oh yes just like this in Delhi, actually it would be a blessing if it were to be like this in Delhi, that would be an improvement over what they have now, they need the monsoon very badly.”
The morning Post included an article informing Charlie that a chunk of the Ross Ice Shelf had broken off, a chunk more than half the size of France. The news was buried in the last pages of the international section. So many pieces of Antarctica had fallen off that it wasn’t big news anymore.
It wasn’t big news, but it was a big iceberg. Researchers joked about moving onto it and declaring it a new nation. It contained more fresh water than all the Great Lakes combined. And pouring down toward it, researchers said, was the rapid ice of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, unimpeded now that the Ross Shelf in that region had embarked. This accelerated flow of ice had big implications. The West Antarctic Ice Sheet was much bigger than the Ross Ice Shelf, and if it broke up sea level might rise a few meters, quite quickly.
Charlie read on, amazed that he was learning this in the back pages of the Post. How fast could this happen? The researchers didn’t appear to know. Charlie followed it up on the web, and watched one trio of researchers explain on camera that it could become an accelerating process, their words likewise accelerating a bit as if to illustrate how it would go. It might happen fast.
Charlie heard in their voices the kind of repressed delirium of scientific excitement that he had once or twice heard when listening to Anna talk about some extraordinary thing in statistics that he had not even been able to understand. This, however, he understood; they were saying that the possibility was very real that the whole mass of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet would break apart and float away, each giant piece of it then sinking more deeply into the water, thus displacing more water than it had when grounded in place—so much more that sea level worldwide could rise by an eventual total of up to seven meters. It depended on variables programmed into the models—on they went, the usual kind of scientist talk.
And yet the Post had it at the back of the international section! People were talking about it the same way they did any other disaster. There did not seem to be any way to register a distinction in response between one coming catastrophe and another. If it happened it happened. That seemed to be the way people were processing it. Of course the Khembalis would have to be extremely concerned. The whole League of Drowning Nations, for that matter. Really everyone. All of a sudden it coalesced into a clear vision, and what he saw frightened him. Twenty percent of humanity lived on coasts. He felt like he had one time driving in winter when he had taken a turn too fast and hit an icy patch he hadn’t seen, and the car had detached and he found himself flying forward, free of friction or even gravity, as if sideslipping in reality itself …
But it was time to go downtown. He was going to take Joe with him to the office. He pulled himself together, got out the stroller so they would spare each other their body heat. Life had to go on; what else could he do?
Out they ventured into the steambath of the capital. It really didn’t feel that much different than an ordinary summer day; it was as if the sensation of heat hit an upper limit where it just blurred out. Joe was seat-belted into his stroller like a NASCAR driver, so that he would not launch himself out at inopportune moments. Naturally he did not like this, and he objected to the stroller because of it, but Charlie had decorated its front bar as an airplane cockpit dashboard, which placated Joe enough that he did not persist in his howls or attempts to escape.
They took the elevators in the Metro stations, and came up on the Mall to stroll over to Phil’s office. A bad idea, as crossing the Mall was like being blanched in boiling air. Charlie, as always, experienced the climate deviation with a kind of grim “I told you so” satisfaction.
At Phil’s they rolled around the rooms trying to find the best spots in the falls of chilled air pouring from the air-conditioning vents. Everyone was doing this, drifting around to find the coolest drafts, like a science museum exercise investigating the Coriolis force.
Charlie parked Joe out with Evelyn, who loved him, and went to work on Phil’s revisions to the climate bill. It certainly seemed like a good time to introduce it. More money for carbon remediation, new fuel efficiency standards and the money to get Detroit through the transition to hydrogen, new fuels and power sources, carbon capture methods, carbon sink identification and formation, hydrocarbon-to-carbohydrate-to-hydrogen conversion funds and exchange credit programs, deep geothermal, tide power, wave power, money for basic research in climatology, money for the Extreme Global Research in Emergency Salvation Strategies project (EGRESS), money for the Global Disaster Information Network (GDIN), an escalating carbon tax—and so on and so forth. It was a grab bag of programs, many designed to look like pork to help the bill get the votes, but Charlie had done his best to give the whole thing organization, and a kind of coherent shape, as a narrative of the near future.
There were many in Phil’s office who thought it was a mistake to try to pass an omnibus or comprehensive bill like this, rather than get the programs funded one by one, or in smaller related groupings. But the comprehensive had been Phil’s chosen strategy, and Charlie agreed with it. He added language to make the revisions Phil wanted, pushing the envelope in each case. Now was the time to strike.
Joe was beginning to get rowdy with Evelyn, he could hear the unmistakable sound of dinosaurs hitting walls. All this language would get chopped up anyway; still, best get it armored against attack. Bill language as low-post moves to the basket, subtle, quick, unstoppable.
He rushed to a finish and took the revised bill in to Phil, with Joe leading the way in his stroller. They found the senator sitting with his back directly against an air-conditioning duct.
“Jeez Phil, don’t you get too cold sitting there?”
“The trick is to set up before you’re all sweaty.” He glanced over Charlie’s new revision, and they argued over some of the changes. At one point Phil looked at him: “Something bugging you today?” He glanced over at Joe. “Joe here seems to be grooving.”
“It’s not Joe that’s getting to me, it’s you. You and the rest of the Senate. Because the current situation requires a response that is more than business as usual. And that worries me, because you guys only do business as usual.”
“Well …” Phil smiled. “We call that democracy, youth. It’s a blessing when you think of it. Some give-and-take, and then some agreement on how to proceed. How can we do without that? If you have a better way of doing it, you tell me. But meanwhile, no more ‘If I Were King’ fantasies. There’s no king and it’s up to us. So help me get this final draft as tight as we can.”
“Okay.”
