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“I had more important things to do—packing up our household. And saying good-bye to all my friends.”

  Red had handled the packing; all Mamie had done was point and command. And what friends was she talking about? Mamie had acquaintances by the score, but none of her country club peers would be so gauche as to have friends. Their primary entertainment was getting together in groups and saying vicious things about whoever wasn’t coming or had just left.

  The corners of Penelope’s mouth turned up just a bit. I already knew she had a sarcastic streak in her, and I rather liked her for it. “Just think,” she said, “you’ll never have to say good-bye to any friends again as long as you live.”

  Mamie looked at her sharply. “What do you mean?”

  Penelope was all innocence. “Why, because we’ll all be together forever. One big happy permanent family.”

  “Mamie treats all her friends just like family,” Stef said. Did Penelope get the double meaning of that? Mamie certainly knew something was wrong with what he said—she gave her husband a withering look. But Penelope’s smile only broadened.

  Lydia pulled on Red’s shirt, as desperate for attention as her beloved grandmother had been. “Are we home already?” she asked. “When is breakfast? Why do all the houses look like cartoons?”

  “They’re balloon buildings, Lydia,” Red said. “People blow them up just like balloons.”

  “Oh, wouldn’t we just wear ourselves out with puffing if we did!” said Penelope. “No, there’s an air vent inside every house, putting out the gentle air pressure that keeps the structures standing.”

  “It sounds very drafty,” said Mamie.

  “Cool and refreshing, most people think,” said Penelope.

  “What if the ventilation system fails?” asked Stef.

  “Oh, Stef, must you ask worrisome questions in front of the children?” asked Mamie.

  “There’s a semirigid structure built into the walls. You can always get out, and there’s always enough air to breathe. But that was a very good question.” Penelope patted Stef on the arm. Stef smiled wanly—he knew that whatever happened in this quiet catfight between Mamie and Penelope, he was going to pay for it later.

  Since we couldn’t escape the funeral, we trudged toward the church behind Penelope. Trudging was only a state of mind on the Ark, because the lower gravity lightened our steps. In fact, it lightened everyone’s steps so much that practically everyone stumbled several times.

  “It’s physics,” Penelope explained cheerily. “We still have the same mass, even if we don’t have the same weight. So you hurtle along with as much force as you ever had, and gravity won’t help you slow down. Your children will doubtless bump into walls a lot till they learn how to stop. It’s another benefit of inflatable walls—you can’t get hurt bumping into them.”

  I inspected the village as we crossed the town square, and I was amused to see that every one of the dwarf trees that made up the orchards and beautified the landscape here and there was neatly contained in a pot. Portability was the word of the day. There’d be no spreading chestnut trees large enough to shelter a village smithy, unless the potters here had exceptionally large potter’s wheels.

  People were still flowing into the village church that faced the town square; the funeral hadn’t started yet. The closer we got to the church, the more it looked like a parody of the ones in New Hampshire. The inflatable church had an inflatable steeple, as functionless as the steeples back home. A lot of trouble had been taken to make Mayflower as homelike as possible, but in my opinion humans who were that susceptible to homesickness should have stayed on Earth where they belonged.

  Outside the church was a table, stacked high with clear packets of some sort. A woman sat behind the table, looking officious.

  “Oh, it’s you, Penelope,” she said when we approached. “I’m sure you’ll want to spread the word about Odie Lee.”

  “Oh my, yes!” Penelope extended her sausage fingers, and the woman handed her a strange object encased in a clear protective sheath. It looked like a flower, with a green stem and filigree leaves. But at the top of the stem, the flower was a puff of tiny white threads that looked as if they would scatter at the slightest provocation.

  “Those are dandelions,” Stef said, wheezing dryly.

  Mamie giggled. “You actually brought weeds to the Ark? Even out in the country we had exterminators. I haven’t seen a dandelion in years.”

  Penelope shook her head vigorously. “These may be dandelions, but here they’re not weeds. They’re a very useful flower. Glory village grows them for the leaves. Nothing is better than a mess of young dandelion greens. Plymouth village grows dandelions for the yellow flowers; you can make a delicious wine from the blossoms. And the bees like them, of course.” She bounced her sausage hand on Lydia’s head a few times; no doubt she meant the gesture as a love pat. “You like honey, don’t you, you sweet thing? That’s why we need dandelions—so the bees can make honey for you.”

  Lydia looked at her as if she were crazy.

  “I’m afraid I still don’t understand what dandelions have to do with funerals,” Carol Jeanne said.

  It was interesting to see how Penelope deferred to Carol Jeanne. She delighted in needling Mamie, and she enjoyed flirting with Stef—though whether that was because she was attracted to him or simply wanted to annoy Mamie it was impossible to tell. But when Carol Jeanne asked a question, everything changed. Penelope immediately became sincerely deferent. Apparently she knew her place in the hierarchy, and wished to ingratiate herself with the Ark’s chief gaiologist. She almost stammered when she spoke to Carol Jeanne. Either she really was in awe or she was very good at simulating it.

  “It’s a little custom we’ve developed here,” said Penelope. “I hope you don’t think we’re too silly. It’s a way of—I don’t know, sharing with each other. Giving the dead back to the world. Releasing the soul to flight. You’ll see how it works. All the villages do it—it’s an Ark thing, not just in Mayflower.”

  “Will we need dandelions?” asked Carol Jeanne.

  “Oh, I don’t think so,” said Penelope. “I mean, you don’t even know Odie Lee! How could you possibly spread the word about a stranger?”

  Carol Jeanne said nothing, but I knew what she was thinking: If Odie Lee is such a stranger, why are we at this funeral at all?

  Penelope herded us inside the church, holding her dandelion packet as carefully as she would a vial of liquid nitroglycerine. “Sit here,” she whispered. “No! There’s a better spot up in front.” She opened a path for us through the congregation milling in the aisles. We had to file along behind her as she loudly announced, “Move aside, please! We have important guests here. The Cocciolones just arrived. Please make way for the Cocciolones.”

  Necks craned to see us. Carol Jeanne was embarrassed, of course; she hated the trappings of celebrity, and having Penelope call out her name like that was excruciating. But Mamie loved it. Oh, she didn’t like it that Penelope identified everyone by the Cocciolone name, but having all eyes upon us, people straining to catch a glimpse—that was heaven. Carol Jeanne might be trying to disappear, but Mamie strutted down the aisle like an ocean liner surrounded by tugboats. She knew how to look important. Anyone glancing at us would naturally assume that she was the celebrity among us.

  Penelope scooted down to the center of a long pew, sat, and patted the wooden bench next to her so we would sit with her. One after another, we found our places and took a seat. Pink squealed once and Red lifted her into his lap, so she could see. I never had to interrupt Carol Jeanne’s thoughts for petty help like that—but then, it didn’t much matter whether Red’s thoughts were interrupted or not.

  “Look! A monkey!” It was an ugly little girl on the row in front of us. “Have you ever seen such tiny black hands?” She had buck teeth and her nose looked squashed, like someone had used her face for a whoopee cushion. I estimated her age at eleven or twelve. Closer to sentience than Lydia or Emmy; she was mature e
nough to keep her remarks to a whisper, though of course I could hear her easily.

  The boy next to her, no doubt her older brother, turned and looked. “There’s a pig, too,” he said. “They must be witnesses.”

  She got a look of disgust. “Of course they’re witnesses. You can tell by the i/o ports in the back of their necks. That’s where they hook up to computers.” She craned her neck for another look at Pink. “Besides—who’d let a pig into church if he wasn’t a witness?”

  He rolled his eyes and faced front again. “Who’d have a pig for a witness? That’s the stupidest choice I’ve ever seen. They should have gotten two monkeys.”

  I knew on the spot that these were bright children, charming children, and buck teeth and squashed noses were not altogether ungraceful features.

  “Whoever they are,” said the girl, “they must have just left the ship. They smell like they haven’t bathed in a month.”

  Observant children, logical children. I hoped Carol Jeanne and Red had overheard their comments. Everyone stank, but I was cute. I was practical. I was a perfect witness. On the other hand, Pink couldn’t even hop up on a crowded bench without help, and she squatted on Red’s lap as precariously as if she were on a tightwire. I chattered at the children and made faces; the boy soon realized he was being patronized and stoically faced front, but the girl kept stealing glances at me. I stood on my head. She smiled. I waggled my hips. She broke up laughing and her brother jabbed her with an elbow.

  Carol Jeanne relaxed into her seat as I performed. She knew what was going on, but she didn’t mind. I think she felt that regular people would be less in awe of her if they liked me.

  All too soon, a scrawny old man revved up the synthesizer, and the service began with a rousing Protestant hymn. As mourners chirruped to the music, the star of the funeral—the dead body herself—was wheeled up the aisle on a cart. She was round and healthy looking; she didn’t look sick enough to be lying there dead. The way she was rolled up to the front of the church, she looked like a rib roast at a prime rib banquet. Carol Jeanne would have appreciated that observation, and I wished again for a clipboard.

  Everyone sat reverently through the invocation. I groomed Carol Jeanne while the heads were bowed.

  The minister plunged right in at the end of the prayer, not even stopping for a breath between “Amen” and the opening remarks. “We’re here for a sad but glorious occasion.” He did a remarkable job with his facial expression; he looked both mournful and exalted, all at once, like a medieval painting of a saint. I imagined him practicing in front of a mirror all during his years of study in the seminary. “Odie Lee Morris was our chief administrator’s wife. If that had been her only accomplishment, people would have honored her, for she was a gracious accompaniment to that good man all her life.”

  He paused for this profound idea to sink in. The man was a philosopher, a poet of the quotidian. “But the praise of the world meant nothing to Odie Lee,” he continued. He also had a remarkably large and active Adam’s apple. “From the moment she set foot on the Ark, she devoted herself…to others. Here was a woman who never worried about herself. Despite her poor health—and we who knew her are well aware how much Odie Lee suffered—she spent her life administering to others’ needs.”

  The minister bowed his head for a moment. His Adam’s apple quivered in indecision, waiting for a cue to begin dancing again. “But enough of my humble words.” His tone had changed. He was through with the ministerial part, and now he was master of ceremonies. “I will speak of no particular creed or doctrine. Odie Lee lived as a Christian—an exemplar of Christianity at its best—but she belonged to all of us in the Ark, Christian or…” The words pagan, heathen, heretic, and infidel no doubt crossed his mind.”…non-Christian. Now it’s time to let the people who loved her spread the word about Odie Lee. Form a line here, to the left of the podium. Take your turn. Everyone who wants to speak will have a chance.”

  Immediately, dozens of people stood and walked to the front of the church. The seated audience buzzed with approval at the number of people who were queueing up.

  “You can tell how important Odie Lee was,” Penelope said as she stepped over us to get to the aisle. “Usually, only a few people spread the word. Today, we may have as many as fifty.” When she reached the aisle, she followed her bosom to the podium, where she got in line about twenty people back.

  When the crowd had settled down, the minister beckoned to the first woman in line. She stood at the microphone and carefully took the protective dome off her dandelion.

  “I’d like to spread the word for Odie Lee,” she said. “Odie Lee was an angel in human form. She and her prayer partners were the first to help me when my husband Hyrum was down with prostate cancer. I’ll never know how they even found out we needed help, but she and the prayer partners were at my door, bearing food and leading us in prayers. That’s what I’ll remember about Odie Lee.”

  When the speaker ended, she stood motionless at the podium. Then, hesitantly, the crowd murmured, “Spread the word!” Timidly, the woman held the white flower in front of her mouth and, filling her cheeks with air, blew mightily on it. Immediately the puffball disintegrated; white threads scattered in all directions. Many of them landed on the inert form of Odie Lee that was lying on its cart under the podium. Others were carried aloft by the air currents, and they flew haphazardly across the sanctuary.

  One cluster of filaments landed on the head of a man two rows ahead of me. I leapt from Carol Jeanne’s arm and scampered over the shoulder and lap of the little girl directly in front of us; she gasped in delight. Standing on the back of the next pew, I reached up and picked the piece of white dandelion fur from the top of the man’s head. Several people turned to watch me, smiling or frowning or pointing, but I ignored them. I was only interested in the projectile. I carried it back to Carol Jeanne and held it out to her, but she shook her head and patted the crook of her arm for me to lie next to her there.

  I settled next to her body and inspected my find. The white portion was as soft as down. I tickled my nose with it. Then I reached up and tickled Carol Jeanne’s nose with the featherlike strands. She looked down at me and smiled.

  Attached to each filament was a pale brown seed. That explained it. Once I saw the reason for the buoyancy of the white threads, there was nothing for me to do but discard the fluff and eat the seeds. There was no substance to them, though; they were dry and tasteless.

  The next voice from the podium was so loud and tearful and discordant that it piqued my interest. “I was a prayer partner of Odie Lee’s,” the woman said. “She was always the first to know who had a problem and lead the prayers on their behalf.”

  I heard another woman’s voice mutter in the row behind us, “That’s because her husband couldn’t keep his mouth shut.” Someone shushed at her. “Cyrus told her everything we ever said to him in confidence.”

  “Liz, hush!” another voice hissed.

  Liz hushed. Not that many humans could have heard her anyway—she spoke very softly. Nevertheless, her words intrigued me. Maybe this Odie Lee wasn’t the saint that Penelope and all these other people thought she was. I wriggled up and peered over Carol Jeanne’s shoulder to get a look at Liz. She was a fairly attractive woman, very skillfully made up, with not a hair out of place. The bull-necked, overmuscled man sitting beside her had to be her husband. From the rigidity of her pose, she did not like it when he hushed her.

  She looked down at me—not moving her head, not varying that perfect posture—and stared coldly at me until I turned back and looked at the podium.

  “Spread the word!” the crowd was murmuring, more confidently than the first time. A puff, and the dandelion seeds were propelled across the church. The prayer partner, a young and tearful woman, marched down the aisle to her seat.

  “I was another prayer partner,” the next woman said piously. “Odie Lee always told us who to pray for, and why they needed our prayers. She always took a dinner to th
e family and told them we were praying on their behalf.”

  “Prying on their behalf is closer to it,” Liz whispered behind me. “She was only twisting the knife.”

  I couldn’t help looking at Liz again—and this time everything had changed. It was her husband who held a rigid posture, staring coldly straight ahead, and Liz seemed much more relaxed. She even smiled at me. What kind of war was going on between these people? Why did people like that stay married, when life was a bitter contest between them, a wrestling match that never ended?

  “Spread the word!” the audience commanded the tearful young woman. Each time the audience gave the command, they spoke a little louder. By the end of the service, they’d be hoarse.

  This time, the speaker’s breath missed the mark. She had to blow three times before the dandelion stem was clean of white fuzz. She was red with exertion or embarrassment when she left the podium to return to her seat.

  When Penelope reached the podium, she told the crowd that Odie Lee was the most honest person she had ever met. “In fact,” she said, “Odie Lee often recognized people’s predicaments before they did. How often she mourned because they couldn’t face the truth! Odie Lee prayed with them and counseled them until they recognized their problems and turned to God for help.”

  I waited for Liz to respond to Penelope’s testimony, but she held her tongue. Of course, she knew we were with Penelope, and she knew I was listening to her, and she certainly knew that witnesses reported on what they heard. She could not have known that Carol Jeanne and I were not Penelope’s friends—that Carol Jeanne was going to laugh with me about Liz’s comments when I reported on them later.

  When Liz remained silent, I turned and watched Penelope take a mighty breath and scatter her dandelion all over the church. Then, having caught the drift of what people were going to say about Odie Lee, I slept through the rest of the service. I could always skim through the rest of the word-spreadings when I did my memory dump later.

  After a mournful closing hymn and a prayer, Odie Lee’s corpse was wheeled out of the sanctuary. I hopped over Carol Jeanne and Stef and Mamie and Lydia and Red to see the procession. Sitting on Emmy’s lap, I watched the cart bearing Odie Lee roll up the aisle and out the door. The dead woman’s body was covered with white dandelion filaments. A disproportionate number of them had landed on her chin, leaving her with a dandelion beardlet. Odie Lee didn’t look like the kind of woman who would enjoy having a goatee.