The Eyre Affair_ A Novel - Jasper Fforde [509]
“I’m not convinced, Mr. Goliath,” I told him. “I thought you were becoming a religion to evade the Seventh Revealment of St. Zvlkx.”
He gazed at me with his piercing green eyes. “It’s avoid, not evade, Miss Next. A trifling textual change but legally with great implications. We can legally attempt to avoid the future but not evade it. As long as we can demonstrate a forty-nine-percent chance that our future-altering attempts might fail, we are legally safe. The ChronoGuard is very strict on the rules and we’d be fools to try and break them.”
“You didn’t ask me up here to argue legal definitions, Mr. Goliath.”
“No, Miss Next. I wanted to have this opportunity to explain ourselves to you, one of our most vociferous opponents. I have doubts, too, and if I can make you understand then I will have convinced myself that what we are doing is right, and good. Have a seat.”
I sat, rather too obediently. Mr. Goliath had a strong personality.
“Humans are molded by evolution to be short-termists, Miss Next,” he continued. His voice rumbled deeply and seemed to echo inside my head. “We need only to see our children to reproductive age to be successful in a biological sense. We have to move beyond that. If we see ourselves as residents on this planet for the long term, we need to plan for the long term. Goliath has a thousand-year plan for itself. The responsibility for this planet is far too important to leave to a fragmented group of governments, constantly bickering over borders and only looking towards their own self-interest. We at Goliath see ourselves not as a corporation or a government but as a force for good. A force for good in waiting. We have thirty-eight million employees at present; it isn’t difficult to see the benefit of having three billion. Imagine everyone on the planet working towards a single goal—the banishment of all governments and the creation of one business whose sole function it is to run the planet for the people on the planet, equally and sustainably for all—not Goliath, but Earth, Inc. A company with every member of the world holding a single, equal share.”
“Is that why you’re becoming a religion?”
“Let’s just say that your friend Mr. Zvlkx has goaded us into a course of action that is long overdue. You used the word ‘religion,’ but we see it more as a one, unifying faith to bring all mankind together. One world, one nation, one people, one aim. Surely you can see the sense in that?”
The strange thing was, I began to see that it could work. Without nations there would be no border disputes. The Crimean War alone had lasted for nearly 132 years, and there were at least a hundred smaller conflicts going on around the planet. Suddenly Goliath seemed not so bad after all, and was indeed our friend. I was a fool not to realize it before.
I rubbed my temples.
“So,” continued the CEO in a soft rumble, “I’d like to offer an olive branch to you right now and uneradicate your husband.”
“In return,” added Schitt-Hawse, speaking for the first time, “we would like for you to accept our full, frank and unreserved apology and sign our Standard Forgiveness Release Form.”
I looked at them both in turn, then at the contract they had placed in front of me, then at Friday, who had put his fingers in his mouth and was looking up at me with an inquisitive air. I had to get my husband back, and Friday his father. There didn’t seem any good reason not to sign.
“I want your word you’ll get him back.”
“You have it,” replied the CEO.
I took the offered pen and signed the form at the bottom.
“Excellent!” muttered the CEO. “We’ll reactualize your husband as soon as possible. Good day, Miss Next. It was a very great pleasure to meet you.”
“And you,” I replied, smiling and shaking both their hands. “I must say I’m very pleased with what I’ve heard here today. You can count on my support when you become a religion.”
They gave me some leaflets on how to join New Goliath, which I