was expected. Curiosity had probably helped them decide.
The media trainer had suggested Leonâs mother and sister act as audience for his press-conference training. How foolish and pretentious heâd felt, striding across the sprung floor of the rehearsal room, lifting his chin to speak, the trainer adjusting the angle of his limbs as if he were a mannequin. After three months of work, he still stuttered over occasional words when he caught sight of the red eye of the camera, still surreptitiously checked his reflection in the studio mirrors to see if he was standing or sitting straight enough.
During their stay the two women spoke in awkwardly formal voices with everyone. They tried to help the staff becausethey were unused to being cooked for and having a housekeeper make their beds. While Leonâs nephew spent all day outdoors following the gamekeeper around, his niece had stared openmouthed at Kathryn for the entire first day, then started asking her question after question, then turned her attention to Christos and Yuri, then to Rhona. On the last day of the visit, as they exchanged their relieved good-byes, the girl threw her arms around Kathrynâs waist, pushing her face between the folds of Kathrynâs cloak and into the warm woolly belly. Kathryn went still. She had made it clear that she was not to be touched, ever, not to be hugged or to have a hand held or even to be tapped on the shoulder.
âOh dear,â Rhona said softly. âOh, sweetheart, you shouldnât . . .â
They watched, amazed, as Kathryn bent her head and drew the girl in tight, kissing her swiftly on her crown before pushing her away and offering a polite spoken good-bye to Leonâs mother and sister. She was shaking. The moment Leonâs family turned to gather the suitcases, she melted from the room.
While the Wonders trained, Kyle had been doing groundwork for the launch. A filmed four-second clip of Christos opening his wings in a darkened room was set free on the net. For a couple of weeks Kathryn flew around the world in a chartered jet. She turned up at a club in Tokyo, a film premiere in Paris, a restaurant in Shanghai, the after-party of a location wrap in Berlin, the opera in New York. She was fully swathed, the image of a wealthy fashionable woman. At each venue, her instructions from Kyle were to go to the ladiesâ room and, while she was there, stand in front of the mirror. She was to shrug off her head and shoulder covering and give herself a quick finger massage of the neck or adjust her makeup. If anyone stared or spoke, she would yawn and make an innocuous remark, such as: âItâs exhausting, isnât it?â or âThese events really wear me out.â Thenshe was to smile, pull her scarf up over her head and shoulders, and leave the venue. Kyle would escort her to a waiting car to hurry her away. He would have given her the go-ahead to perform as soon as the bathroom was populated with three or four of the important people he had targeted who had enough influence and talking power to become vectors.
For Leon, he commissioned a comic animated game called Clockwork Man in which the player had thirty different ways to assemble a mechanical heart and get it into the character before any number of silly disasters happened. It was addictive, and within a week it was the top-selling app on handheld devices.
Once that was all in place, and the buzz was happening, the Wonders were to appear together on the worldâs most famous TV talk show and launch with a bang.
Finally the day came. Training had begun in March and now, in July, they would be tested. Theyâd driven out of Overington, with the sun flaring over its flower-dotted gardens, down to a fetid New York and into a cool dry TV studio.
The cameraman came toward Leon, lens aimed at his breast as if he was about to pin a victorâs ribbon on the chest of a race winner. I am a winner! Leon kept smiling as
The media trainer had suggested Leonâs mother and sister act as audience for his press-conference training. How foolish and pretentious heâd felt, striding across the sprung floor of the rehearsal room, lifting his chin to speak, the trainer adjusting the angle of his limbs as if he were a mannequin. After three months of work, he still stuttered over occasional words when he caught sight of the red eye of the camera, still surreptitiously checked his reflection in the studio mirrors to see if he was standing or sitting straight enough.
During their stay the two women spoke in awkwardly formal voices with everyone. They tried to help the staff becausethey were unused to being cooked for and having a housekeeper make their beds. While Leonâs nephew spent all day outdoors following the gamekeeper around, his niece had stared openmouthed at Kathryn for the entire first day, then started asking her question after question, then turned her attention to Christos and Yuri, then to Rhona. On the last day of the visit, as they exchanged their relieved good-byes, the girl threw her arms around Kathrynâs waist, pushing her face between the folds of Kathrynâs cloak and into the warm woolly belly. Kathryn went still. She had made it clear that she was not to be touched, ever, not to be hugged or to have a hand held or even to be tapped on the shoulder.
âOh dear,â Rhona said softly. âOh, sweetheart, you shouldnât . . .â
They watched, amazed, as Kathryn bent her head and drew the girl in tight, kissing her swiftly on her crown before pushing her away and offering a polite spoken good-bye to Leonâs mother and sister. She was shaking. The moment Leonâs family turned to gather the suitcases, she melted from the room.
While the Wonders trained, Kyle had been doing groundwork for the launch. A filmed four-second clip of Christos opening his wings in a darkened room was set free on the net. For a couple of weeks Kathryn flew around the world in a chartered jet. She turned up at a club in Tokyo, a film premiere in Paris, a restaurant in Shanghai, the after-party of a location wrap in Berlin, the opera in New York. She was fully swathed, the image of a wealthy fashionable woman. At each venue, her instructions from Kyle were to go to the ladiesâ room and, while she was there, stand in front of the mirror. She was to shrug off her head and shoulder covering and give herself a quick finger massage of the neck or adjust her makeup. If anyone stared or spoke, she would yawn and make an innocuous remark, such as: âItâs exhausting, isnât it?â or âThese events really wear me out.â Thenshe was to smile, pull her scarf up over her head and shoulders, and leave the venue. Kyle would escort her to a waiting car to hurry her away. He would have given her the go-ahead to perform as soon as the bathroom was populated with three or four of the important people he had targeted who had enough influence and talking power to become vectors.
For Leon, he commissioned a comic animated game called Clockwork Man in which the player had thirty different ways to assemble a mechanical heart and get it into the character before any number of silly disasters happened. It was addictive, and within a week it was the top-selling app on handheld devices.
Once that was all in place, and the buzz was happening, the Wonders were to appear together on the worldâs most famous TV talk show and launch with a bang.
Finally the day came. Training had begun in March and now, in July, they would be tested. Theyâd driven out of Overington, with the sun flaring over its flower-dotted gardens, down to a fetid New York and into a cool dry TV studio.
The cameraman came toward Leon, lens aimed at his breast as if he was about to pin a victorâs ribbon on the chest of a race winner. I am a winner! Leon kept smiling as
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