The girl walked cautiously towards him and stopped when she reached the imposing desk.
‘You’re new aren’t you?’
‘Yes Leader. I started yesterday’. She said, gingerly handing him the folder.
‘Good, good. I’m sure you’ll soon get used to me and my, er, how would you describe my working practices, Carter?’
The words Carter had in mind, but dared not say were, ‘bloody strange’, ‘freakishly abnormal’ or ‘hellishly weird’. Instead he said, diplomatically, ‘Idiosyncratic, sir?’
‘”Idiosyncratic?” Yes. An excellent choice of words, Carter’.
As the Leader took the folder from a very nervous Miss Havering he gently held her chin and tilted her face up so he could look straight into her deep green eyes.
‘That word, “idiosyncratic”, it’s a difficult one to get your tongue around isn’t it? Could you get your tongue around it Miss Havering?’
Miss Havering gulped and nodded. ‘Y-Yes sir’.
‘Splendid!’ said the Leader. His fingers moved from her chin and caressed her smooth, soft cheek just for a moment, but long enough for her to feel very uncomfortable. It was a very flushed-looking Miss Havering who left the office, closing the door behind her.
The Leader turned to his manservant. ‘Carter, when we’re done, tell Miss Havering that I want to see her back here at six o’clock’.
‘Yes sir. And if she asks what for?’
‘I don’t care. Just tell her any old bullshit but make sure she is dressed appropriately’.
Carter raised his eyes and sighed inwardly at the same time as the Leader gently turned a hidden switch located under his desk. With a whirring sound, a piece of the wall panelling slowly and precisely slid upwards revealing a clothes rail which glided smoothly out into the office on castors. When this was fully extended the Leader rose and examined various items hanging there, feeling and smelling them, mentally weighing up their pros and cons.
‘What do you think, Carter? Nurse or ballet dancer. Or maybe the cat woman?’
‘It’s a very personal choice, sir’, Carter answered, shaking his head imperceptively.
‘That it is, Carter. That it is’. The Leader continued to peruse everything on the rail, fingers deftly flicking across hangers. He’d almost examined every single item when his fingers stopped and his eyes lit up.
‘Eureka! I forgot about this one. And it looks like it’s her size’.
The leader removed a garment and looked at it admiringly before placing it in a bag and handing this to Carter.
‘Very good choice, sir’. Carter replied, placing the bag at his feet and wondering how on earth he’d manage to persuade a young and impressionable new member of the Party’s administration staff to meet with the Leader that evening dressed as a milkmaid.
Seated at his desk again, the clothes concealed once more behind the panelling, the Leader flicked though the folder.
‘Vera’s found herself a good protégé in this Mr. Brunel. I liked his plan for Jack but the follow-up is even more ingenious — capitalising on all the murders. The public have an insatiable appetite for scandal and gossip and seeding these stories in the media will spread the word like wildfire. The rogue mechanical harlots will soon be destroyed and over-sexed women and men will be too frightened to consider becoming prostitutes or indeed, visiting them. All in all, a terrifically good result, wouldn’t you agree?’
Carter nodded. ‘I would, sir. This Mr. Brunel seems to be quite skilled. It is fortunate that he has come to our attention’.
‘It is indeed’. The Leader put the folder down. This time he frowned. ‘He has demonstrated that he thinks very differently to his colleagues’.
Carter, who had been pondering whether Miss Havering would believe the ‘You’ve been enrolled on a farmyard familiarisation course’ story, was slightly taken aback by the Leader’s tone. ‘Thinking differently?’, Carter asked. ‘Well that’s commendable, isn’t it sir?’.
The Leader stood and looked out of his wide office window high up in the Party headquarters, lord over all he surveyed. He looked down at all the citizens going about their daily routine, a happy, content, but most importantly, controlled, population.
‘I’m not sure. Mr. Brunel worries me slightly. He’s conscientious, efficient and highly intelligent, all attributes the Party can exploit. Despite this, he makes me feel slightly uncomfortable. Something about him keeps irritating me. He’s like a tiny pebble in my shoe’.
The Leader closed his eyes and clenched his fists by his sides. He took a deep breath and shuddered.
‘I can feel… I can feel… a disturbance in the Fabric’.
Carter looked confused. ‘Does sir mean the curtains?’
The Leader sighed. He opened his eyes, sighed again, and turned to face Carter. ‘No. I mean the ‘Fabric’’.
‘As in cushion covers?’, added Carter.
‘No!’, exclaimed the Leader with more than a trace of annoyance in his voice. When I say ‘Fabric’ I mean the fabric of society. I mean I feel a disturbance in the energy that binds everything together in the universe and controls how it all works’.
Carter nodded and asked, ‘You mean like ‘a Force’. Like a ‘disturbance in ‘The Force’?’
The Leader’s eyes instantly widened.
‘Shhhhhhhhhhhh!’, he exclaimed. ‘Don’t use that word!’
‘“Force?”’, asked a confused Carter.
‘I said “don’t say it!”’ This time the Leader shouted.
‘It’s just that I think that talking about a disturbance in the Force is better than talking about a disturbance in the Fabric’, Carter added, quite reasonably. ‘A disturbance in the Fabric could be misconstrued as a flaw in the weave or defective stitching’.
The Leader hit the window hard with his fist before speaking through gritted teeth. ‘I know… but we have to use a different word to…’ He looked conspiratorially from side to side before whispering, ‘Force’.
‘Like “Fabric?”’, Carter proposed.
‘Yes, like “Fabric”’, the Leader agreed, his patience fast wearing out, ‘Because there are certain important legal issues involved, all right!?’.
The Leader had a way with his delivery that made it crystal clear when a matter was closed for discussion. This was one of those instances. Not only was the subject closed, it was boarded up with a sign saying ‘Keep away’ and two more that said ‘Enter at your peril’ and ‘Beware of the dogs’. The Leader continued. ‘Now where was I?’
‘Mr. Brunel and the Fabric, sir’, prompted Carter, with an almost unnoticeable inflection of contempt in his voice when he used the ‘F’ word.
‘Yes, of course’. The Leader said, turning back from the window, ‘I’ve instructed Vera to monitor his progress carefully’.
He studied a photograph of Dick that was fixed to the inside cover of the folder. ‘He is a most interesting fellow who reminds me of someone else though I can’t, for the sake of me, think who it is’.
Before the Leader could think any more about Jeremy Brunel, Carter had pulled a gun from his pocket and pointed it at him. In a flash the Leader almost simultaneously picked up a heavy table lighter from his desk and hurled it at the weapon, while throwing himself into his chair and propelling himself backwards. The lighter struck Carter on the wrist with a sharp ‘crack’. He gave an exclamation of pain and dropped the gun, then in a move that belied his age, hurled himself over the desk straight at the Leader. The chair toppled over, dumping both men unceremoniously on the floor.
Rolling over and over on the thick pile carpet they both fought for supremacy and the chance to inflict serious physical damage on the other. The Leader was younger and more agile but Carter was a larger man and physically stronger. The two men rolled back and forth and would have rolled some more if the Leader’s head hadn’t thumped against the one of the substantial desk legs, causing momentary concussion. Exploiting this moment, Carter used his weight to pin the Leader to the ground, managing to shuffle up his writhing body until he was astride him. Restraining the Leader’s arms with his knees, Carter now had both his own hands free to strangle him and in fact, this was exactly what he did.