Miles, Mutants and Microbes - Lois McMaster Bujold [99]
"Yes, yes, I understand . . ." Madame Minchenko twitched a somewhat strained and absent smile at Silver, who hung one-handed from a strap listening. "You must be Silver?"
"Yes, Madame Minchenko," said Silver breathlessly in her most-politest voice. This woman was quite the most aged downsider Silver had ever seen, bar Dr. Minchenko and Dr. Cay himself.
"We must go now, to get Tony," Dr. Minchenko said. "We'll be back as quick as we can drive. Silver will help you; she's very good. Hold the ship!"
The two men hustled back out, and within moments the land rover was boiling off across the barren landscape.
Silver and Madame Minchenko were left regarding each other.
"Well," said Madame Minchenko.
"I'm sorry you had to leave all your things," said Silver diffidently.
"H'm. Well, I can't say I'm sorry to be leaving here." Madame Minchenko's glance around the shuttle's cargo bay took in Rodeo by implication.
They shuffled forward to the pilot's compartment and sat; the monitor scanned the monotonous horizon. Madame Minchenko still clutched her giant spoon suitcase in her lap. Silver hitched herself around in her wrong-shaped seat and tried to imagine what it would be like to be married to someone for more than twice the length of her own life. Had Madame Minchenko been young once? Surely Dr. Minchenko had been old forever.
"However did you come to be married to Dr. Minchenko?" Silver asked.
"Sometimes I wonder," Madame Minchenko murmured dryly, half to herself.
"Were you a nurse, or a lab tech?"
She looked up with a little smile. "No, dear, I was never a bioscientist. Thank God." Her hand caressed the black case. "I'm a musician. Of sorts."
Silver perked with interest. "Synthavids? Do you program? We've had some synthavids in our library, the company library that is."
The corner of Madame Minchenko's mouth twisted up in a half-smile. "There's nothing synthetic in what I do. I'm a registered historian-performer. I keep old skills alive—think of me as a live museum exhibit, somewhat in need of dusting—only a few spider webs clinging to my elbow. . . ." She unlatched her case and opened it to Silver's inspection. Burnished reddish wood, satin-smooth, caught and played back the colored lights of the pilot's compartment. Madame Minchenko lifted the instrument and tucked it under her chin. "It's a violin."
"I've seen pictures of them," Silver offered. "Is it real?"
Madame Minchenko smiled, and drew her bow across the strings in a quick succession of notes. The music ran up and down like—like quaddie children in the gym, was the only simile Silver could think of. The volume was astounding.
"Where do those wires on top attach to the speakers?" Silver inquired, pushing up on her lower hands and craning her neck.
"There are no speakers. The sound all comes from the wood."
"But it filled the compartment!"
Madame Minchenko's smile became almost fierce. "This instrument could fill an entire concert hall."
"Do you . . . play concerts?"
"Once, when I was very young—your age, maybe . . . I went to a school that taught such skills. The only school for music on my planet. A colonial world, you see, not much time for the arts. There was a competition—the winner was to travel to Earth, and have a recording career. Which he subsequently did. But the recording company underwriting the affair was only interested in the very best. I came in second. There is room for so very few . . ." Her voice faded in a sigh. "I was left with a pleasing personal accomplishment that no one wanted to listen to. Not when they had only to plug in a disc to hear not just the best from my world, but the best in the galaxy. Fortunately, I met Warren about then. My permanent patron and audience of one. Probably as well I wasn't trying to make a career of it, we moved so often in those days, when he was finishing school and starting work with GalacTech. I've done some teaching here and there, to interested