Omega

'At any rate, I am afraid that a majority of my flock disagreed with me. The Crusade stormtroopers – and I used that word in my sermon – are very active in our parish, and I made it clear that Christian or not, they were far worse than the witches because they were motivated by intolerance and hatred; and in my experience the witches are not so motivated.' He half-smiled again. 'Maybe that was overstating it; there are wicked witches just as there are wicked Christians. But in our parish, certainly at the time, it was the Crusaders who were guilty of intolerance and hatred -and quite a number of them were members of my congregation. As their priest, I had no choice but to say so.'

The smile had disappeared now. He said, wearily: 'I was mobbed outside my own church.'

There was silence around the camp-fire for a while. Then Rosemary asked: "Did they hurt you?'

'Physically? Oh, nothing much; it was not that… My curate – and it is not for me to judge him, he is young and fiery, as I was myself once – he disagreed with me, root and branch. To him, the witches were Antichrist, to be stamped out… He went to the bishop. And I am afraid the bishop supported him. He told me, in so many words, to watch my tongue.' Father Byrne sighed. 'And so I did, though with difficulty; I believe in obedience though not to the exclusion of all else… I even kept quiet after this latest Order in Council when witchcraft was made illegal. As if you can make conscience illegal!… But I could not evade my own conscience indefinitely. A man came to me for confession… I could not tell you, of course, in the ordinary way – but he made it public himself. I knew he was a Crusader and had been out at night smashing windows, and worse, and I knew he had every intention of doing so again. I had to refuse him absolution because he was frankly, even blatantly, unrepentant… My curate took him to the bishop who gave him absolution himself and suspended me from my parochial duties. He put my curate in temporary charge of the parish.'

‘I don't know the rules of your Church,' Dan said. 'But couldn't you have gone to the archbishop?'

Father Byrne shook his head. 'Whether I could or not hardly matters. The man I'd refused to absolve told the whole story, in public, from a Crusader platform. The audience went straight to the presbytery and smashed up all my belongings. They left the curate's alone… I was out at the time, fortunately, perhaps. When I came home and saw what had happened, I went into my church and prayed for guidance. And the mountains called me – by God's will,

I humbly believe… That was two nights ago. And here I am, my Samaritan friends.' 'Le cuidiu De,' Peter said quietly. 'Failte romhat’ The old man's eyes lit up. 'An bhfuil tu o Eireann

freisin?'

'taim’

‘Holy Mother, it seems a thousand years since I heard my native language!… Kerry, I'd say?'

'Right, father. I was born in Kenmare. And I recognized your Galway accent as soon as I met you.'

'And if that's not a fitting-exit-line,' Eileen laughed, 'I don't know what is. Take him off to bed, Peter. Nurse's orders.'

Moira and Dan sat in their tent-mouth in the moonlight, long after everyone else was asleep. Neither of them had spoken for quite a while when Dan asked: 'What on earth are we gathering together here, darling missus?'

'The Goddess alone knows,' Moira answered him. 'And that's not being pious. I mean it.'

13

‘For God's sake, Harley,' Jennings said, 'Beehive Red will be any day now. Which means your experts believe the big quake is any day after that. And the big quake means the Dust…'

‘We don't know that, Sir Walter,' Harley told him. 'The Dust may have been an isolated phenomenon. Several of those same experts believe it was.'

'Isolated? In twenty or thirty places all over Europe, rather more in the States and Canada and however many in Russian and China?'

'So it is suggested. That the Dust was released by the first, untypical, disturbances of the Earth's crust, under pressures which were thus dissipated. Further disturbances will not release more, because although they are expected to be more violent, the pockets of Dust have already been breached.'

'Bullshit. A more violent quake might breach deeper and bigger pockets.'

'Are you a geologist, Sir Walter?'

'No, I'm bloody not. But I know bluff and floundering when I see it. And your experts are guessing-. God knows what the next quake may let loose – because I'm sure they don't. Nor you.'

'I will admit that we are having to work on probabilities. And that involves taking calculated risks.'

‘With other people's lives? Millions of my members -or had you forgotten I'm General Secretary of the Trades Union Congress, in this cosy little power-drunk cabal we've got down here?'

Harley paled with anger. Jennings was notoriously blunt, but 'power-drunk' was overstepping the mark. ‘I have not forgotten,' he said icily. 'The Beehive administration -the effective Government of United Kingdom – is the guardian of the long-term interests of the people. And they include your members.'

'When men like you start talking about "the people",' Sir Walter snorted, 'I don't know whether to laugh or throw up. I'm cynical enough, God knows, or I wouldn't be in your bloody cabal. But you, Harley – you take the cake… I wouldn't have reached General Secretary and a flipping knighthood if I hadn't known from way back that people have to be manipulated. But manipulation's one thing – and gambling on their lives is another.'

'I don't see…'

'Come off it, of course you see. If your experts are wrong and the Dust gets loose on a big scale – tens of millions of your "people" could go incurably mad, and all because you wouldn't make an announcement about the vinegar masks Long-term interests, eh?'

'Really, my dear chap – you're talking wildly. "Tens of millions!" The total of incurable inmates of the Emergency Units, since the Midsummer tremors, has been one hundred and three.'

'The total of inmates. They're all incurable.'

'Still only a hundred and three. All located, rounded up and isolated, with remarkable efficiency. And next time, even if there should be another Dust outbreak – which, as I said, is regarded as unlikely – our people will be prepared and will isolate the victims with even greater speed… In the present crisis, Sir Walter, we must face the hard fact that the possibility of two or three hundred Dust casualties is less important than the panic and disruption that could be caused by the announcement you ask for.'

'If it is only two or three hundred.'

'The considered opinion of my experts – who are not so stupid as you appear to think – is that there will be fewer than that and probably none at all.'

'A moment ago,' Sir Walter pointed out, 'you said "several" of your experts held that view. Are you now saying it's all of them?'

'The ones I find most convincing.'

'But they could be wrong.'

'I repeat – we are having to work on probabilities.'

The TUC man was on his feet now, pacing about Harley's office. 'And you have the final decision on those probabilities?… Two or three months ago, you seemed to regard the four of us – you, me, Stayne, and General Milliard – as the power behind the throne, the real deciders. 'The key minds in the key positions", I think your phrase was. Is it now reduced to you’

'By no means. But somebody has to make the on-the-spot judgements.'

Involving millions of people?… All right, I'm on the spot too, right now. Where are Stayne and the General? What do they think about it?'

'Lord Stayne is at the Glasgow Beehive, conferring with his shipyard people. The General is fully occupied with the Army's preparations for Beehive Red.'

‘I repeat – what do they think about delaying the announcement on vinegar masks?'

'In a day or two, they should both be available for a meeting. You can ask them then.'