“Please. Don’t go anywhere.”
There was a quaver in her voice. Only now did it fully dawn on me how much I must have scared her. And what I’d been doing.
I’d gone looking for my house. Spent the best part of an hour traipsing the streets, trying to find it. But I couldn’t remember the address and didn’t have a clear idea of its specific location. I’d begun to panic, clinging on to my memory of the girls’ bedroom, with its amethyst walls and big heart-shaped mirror on the back of the door. I must have climbed the hill until I reached the top.
“Owen?”
“I’m still here.”
“I’m on my way. Don’t move.”
“If you can’t see me,” I told her with a levity I didn’t feel, “I’ll be in the pub.”
“No, you won’t,” she said firmly. “It’s only nine-thirty.”
Two young boys were standing under one of the bridge pontoons, trying to make a hole in the ice with a broken propeller blade. A crude fishing rod and a small canvas bag lay on the ice beside them. They were totally focused on the task, ignoring the steady trundle of military traffic overhead that was passing from south to north across the bridge towards Parliament Square.
Owain was mentally subdued. We sat in moist chilly air on a riverside boulder, the smell of exhaust fumes and vegetable broth in Owain’s nostrils. A paper bowl was cradled in one hand. The broth had come from a soup kitchen on the embankment above.
Military police were everywhere, redirecting what few civilian vehicles were braving the streets. There were new roadblocks and diversion signs, helicopters patrolling, sirens in the distance that doubtless signified traffic patrols swooping on vehicles or citizens who were in the wrong place.
Owain used a husk of bread to scoop the last of his broth from the bowl. He waited until the bread was saturated before swallowing it. The food sat like a warm dense mass in his stomach. He screwed up the bowl and tossed it aside.
The convoys mostly comprised trucks and ATVs, with the occasional ambulance and mobile missile platform. Nothing tracked or too heavily armoured: the bridge wouldn’t have held them. Supply columns, most likely, headed out of the city. Something was definitely afoot. Which was what had made him take pause, seek a little time alone. He had waited until Legister’s car had driven out of sight before heading down towards the relative tranquillity of the river margins. Close at hand a waste pipe was leaking steam into the air, its warmth having melted the snow round about and provided a micro-climate in which he’d been able to sit comfortably for—how long?
His thoughts were muted, with little volition. I willed him to look at his watch. It was not yet ten o’clock. He became aware that one of the boys was standing in front of him, was asking him if he could spare a little bread.
He’d eaten it all, but croutons lay scattered on the pebbles where he’d tossed them earlier. The boy was about eleven, his dark hair severely shorn around his ears. He was filthy but looked reasonably well fed. There was an enterprising air about him.
“Take those,” Owain said, pointing.
The boy gathered up the croutons, putting them into a little canvas bag. He scampered back across the ice to his friend, whereupon they proceeded to peer into the bag as if beholding treasure.
Bait. Bait for fish they were never going to catch, even if they succeeded in penetrating the ice.
An MP on the bridge had spotted the boys. He called another man over. There was a brief discussion before the second man went off.
The first man drew his pistol and began firing shots into the ice near the boys, making them leap and scurry for cover under the bridge.
“No! No!” Owain heard him yell. “Out! Out where I can see you!”
The boys emerged reluctantly. The MP flourished his weapon at them, indicating that they should move further back from the bridge. Warily they did so.
The second man reappeared, leaning over the parapet, the squat tube of a rocket launcher over his shoulder.
Without any warning, he fired.
The back flash and the impact were instantaneous, the shell striking close to the boys, showering them with debris.
As the smoke slowly dispersed, Owain saw that a neat hole had been punctured in the ice. It was still bubbling, churning with white-streaked water. They’d probably used an armour-piercing shell without the explosive charge.
He heard the men laughing, saw one of the boys smear blood from his cheek. Both began to scramble around, one retrieving the rod and the bait bag, the other dragging a large stone across the ice for a seat.
Owain rose. Nothing had come back to him to fill the gap in his night’s recollections. It was still a void. A blank confusion was his prevailing emotion, along with uncertainty about the allegiances of those closest to him. What was Rhys up to? Where was he? Why was his uncle apparently avoiding contact with him? What did Legister want, beyond information on Marisa’s whereabouts?
He crossed a path through Parliament Gardens, past the concrete flowerbeds and blackened saplings. A corpse lay frozen in the derelict gazebo, a drift of snow covering it like a bed sheet. He was conscious of the labyrinth of rooms and chambers far beneath his feet that would be bustling with subterranean activity, all of t dedicated to the preservation of the state. He felt like an ant on the skin of a whale, out of place, at sea. His entire career as a soldier had been geared towards taking pragmatic action according to clearly defined circumstances. There was seldom the time to dwell on matters of morality or cause and effect; any such inclinations were positively discouraged in the field. Here, very little was clear, while taking any sort of action precipitated a host of unforeseen consequences. Webs of intrigue in which he felt ever more entangled.
He approached the first of the guards outside the building and showed them his ID. The man checked through sheets on a clipboard. He saluted.
“I’ll notify them you’re on your way, sir,” he said. A walkie-talkie was crackling at his hip.
“Am I expected?”
“You’re listed personnel, sir.”
A female guard at the main entrance didn’t even bother to check his ID; she stepped aside to let him through. He didn’t have a cap or beret and felt somehow naked as he entered the bustle of the main hall. But no one paid him any attention. Everyone was busy on telephones and typewriters. Much ado about something very pressing indeed.
I made him head for one of the lifts. Their buttons had a granular texture, were supposed to contain circuitry that gave an instant thumbprint match with a personnel catalogue on AEGIS. Or so it was rumoured: no one would ever confirm such things.
The lift arrived empty. I’ve no gun, Owain thought as it took him down. Legister’s men had never returned it. His usual anxieties about confinement and falling didn’t surface. Possibly it was my influence: probably he had more urgent priorities.
Another guard in the lobby, a Sikh in an incongruously white turban. His homeland was now under American administration. How does it feel? I felt like asking. Would you rather be there or here? What difference would it make to your loyalties?
The man escorted us to Sir Gruffydd’s quarters. Knocked on the outer door and opened it.
Giselle Vigoroux was just getting up from a desk, a sheet of paper in her hand. On seeing Owain, she put it down.
The guard withdrew, closing the door behind him.
“Major Maredudd reporting for duty,” he said with ostentatious formality.
“Where on earth have you been?”
She sounded irritable, looked less than pleased to see him. There was a young female secretary working at another desk nearby. Apart from this, the administrative area was empty.
“Out and about,” he said. “Walking.”