Cloner A Sci-Fi Novel About Human Clonin - By Emma Lorant Page 0,3
put up only a couple of weeks ago. In keeping with the perpetual meadows he was nurturing. Meg was opening it, smiling at them.
‘Meg! I didn’t notice you were there. We were just coming to see you.’
‘I know; you think my teas baint filling enough so you be stuffing yourself up.’ The brown eyes steadied. ‘Not too much, mind. Baint good fer you.’
As russet as a cider apple, and as round, Meg Graftley unlatched the new gate and waited for Lisa and Seb to amble through.
‘Not good for you? You mean the clover?’
‘They cattle and they horses be really sweet on it, but it be dangerous for sheep. Makes they swell up. Get off, Mikey, do,’ she urged a towhead clambering up beside her. Bare feet swung across the top bar as he grinned his gapped teeth back at her and pivoted himself on the swinging gate. Another boy, a slightly younger version of Michael, suddenly emerged from behind Meg and twirled himself up on to the top bar and at his big brother. Both boys tumbled off, breathless and sun kissed, in front of Lisa.
‘You’ve got your hands full in the holidays, I see.’
‘Not really. Alan and Mikey just come along of me ter meet yer. Them be with Frank most times. Or they be round Don, helping with they chores.’ She turned to smile. ‘Well, it do start the boys on farming ways, and them can do their bit right early on.’
‘Isn’t Don about today? He isn’t sick or anything, is he?’
‘Sick? Don? Never missed a working day for Frank, nor for his Dad afore him.’ Meg laughed. ‘Steady as a rock, old Don. He be about right enough; just Alec asked to talk to Frank and Don together. Said the boys would get in the way of it.’
The thought crossed Lisa’s mind that Alec might find his own children ‘got in the way’ of his life. So far his interest in Seb had been somewhat peripheral. And her husband had been decidedly grudging about her getting pregnant again.
‘Alec mentioned there’s been another fertiliser breakthrough.’
‘Flaxton’s special,’ Meg said. ‘That Multiplier stuff we done testing out. Some of they clover leaves be doubled up - two for the price of one.’
Lisa smiled vaguely, then slipped her sandals on. ‘So now I’ve got a one-year-old, and another on the way.’ Delightedly she swung her son up in her arms and held him away from her, her hands under his armpits, clover-leaf in her mouth.
‘Yer be an earth mother, Lisa,’ Meg told her, sober now. ‘I do own as I didn’t think yer had it in yer when yer first come. But yer be quite blossomed out.’ There was a slight pause as she eyed her friend’s son. ‘And Seb be that clever,’ she added thoughtfully, looking him over. She tousled her own two sons’ hair and pushed them playfully together. ‘Not like they two pumpkin heads!’
‘I don’t know about Mikey and Alan,’ Lisa said gaily, ‘but I know Paul and Phyllis are just as bright as Seb; and much sturdier, I’d say.’ It irritated Lisa that her son was so slight compared with the Graftley twins, born a mere nine weeks before him.
Meg beamed her delight. ‘That bit stockier, maybe; but them don’t talk the way Seb do.’ Her eyes shone joy. ‘Get that gate shut, Alan. Purdle along now; the twins’ll be finishing their nap and wondering where I be.’
‘I’m pregnant again,’ Lisa confided to Meg, speaking softly. ‘Found out this morning; Seb’s birthday! Isn’t it wonderful?’
‘Very true, my duck. After all the trouble yer had before settling here. Right in the air, I swear it.’
‘And I found a four-leaf clover,’ Lisa told her, holding it out.
Meg took the clover leaf and looked at it carefully. ‘There’s that many with leaves doubled into two sets of three,’ she said. ‘But this one be different, somehow.’
‘I know!’ Lisa could hardly contain her delight. ‘It’s a good luck charm; means my wishes will come true.’ Her eyes shone happiness. ‘Guess what? I have a hunch it’ll be twins this time.’
‘Twins?’ Lisa was surprised to hear her friend sound startled, almost shocked. ‘Whatever makes yer think o’ that?’
‘Just intuition, really. And wishing on that four-leaf clover.’
The pause before Meg spoke again made Lisa search her friend’s face.
‘That really what yer be after?’ Meg sounded oddly unenthusiastic about the idea.
‘I’d love it,’ Lisa said, exulting in the thought. ‘I’d really love it. Why? Did you prefer having one at a time?’