Bold as Love (11 page)

‘What went wrong?’ he gasped, shook his head and spat out some blood. ‘I thought we were mates. I thought we understood each other.’

‘Nothing went wrong,’ said the Pig. ‘The plan changed.’

Blam! There goes Paul.

Paul’s body was dragged away. A hippie came up with a foam fire extinguisher and smothered the blood: came back with a bucket of water and splashed it casually around. It was Paul’s plot, thought Fiorinda. Paul had a plot, and maybe Allie was in it, she knew something anyway, but she wasn’t expecting what happened tonight. It was Paul’s plot but the Pig has double-crossed him, and taken over. And
this
is what the Think Tank was all about,
this, not nothing…
but she couldn’t hold it together, couldn’t think. Fear and shock took over, please God, I never provoked him, never challenged him, I didn’t laugh at him, I kept my head down, didn’t I?
I knew he was dangerous—

What is he going to do with us?

Pigsty watched Paul being hauled off. He bowed his head, took a deep, fierce breath. ‘Now I want the Ax and Sage. You first, Sage.’

Tall Sage walks out from guarded corral. The skull is looking unperturbed. Neat trick.

‘Take off the mask,’ orders Pigsty.

The skull vanishes, the crippled hands are bare.

‘Will you kneel to me?’

Sage kneels, like he’s been doing it all his life. Doesn’t look up, doesn’t look down, no theatrics.

‘Will you obey me, Sage? Will you accept me as your boss?’

‘I will obey you,’ he says. ‘I will accept you as my boss.’

‘That’s good, that’s enough for now. You can go.’

Sage gets up and doesn’t know where to go. Decides to return to the corralled group. This seems to be okay.

‘Now I want the Ax.’

Pigsty is going to kill Ax. There’s no question. Looking back now you know you’ve seen
the desire to kill Ax
smouldering in his eyes, every time Ax came out with one of those smart one—liners, every time Ax made it clear that he is very clever and Pig is dumb as pigshit—

‘Well, Ax. Will you kneel?’

Ax kneels. Everyone waits, knowing this can’t possibly be enough. Pigsty pulls down his zip, heaves out his prick, which looks enormous, weighted by the thick steel thong through the glans. He starts to piss. Ax kneels there, piss on his hair and running down his face.

‘Will you say, ‘thank you boss’?’

‘Thank you boss.’

‘There.’ says Pigsty, zipping up. He waves for Ax to go away, Ax retreats, wiping his face on his sleeve.

Pigsty takes another of those deep, deep breaths. He stands tall, the coarse nobility of his features suddenly apparent under the bright lights. The men holding Fiorinda and Fereshteh release them, and they join the others; the hippie guards stepping back.

‘Now you’re my team. Not Paul’s. Mine. Let’s go. We got a lot to do.’

He took them to the building where the Think Tank sessions had been held. It was full of lights, people were rushing about. News of the incident in the Park had clearly already arrived. The Organs and the hippie goons left their rifles in the vans, but they were probably still armed: no one dared to make a break for it. Maybe no one even thought of trying. The Pig lead them with a swagger, talking to someone all the while on a radiophone. He used his keycard to pass through security doors, up to the familiar room. How strange the place looked now: the stately indifferent pictures on the walls, the coffee trolley in the corner.

‘Sit down.’

One of the Organs brought in a small tv and put it on the trolley, where everyone could see it. They saw the scene in the Park. Benny Preminder (whose absence from the reception nobody had noticed) was on the screen, standing against a background of flashing lights, darkness, bloodstained people wrapped in blankets, sobbing people being comforted; covered stretchers being carried. The reporter with him was explaining to camera, for probably the fiftieth time, that armed ultra-greens had burst in on the Home Secretary’s reception and opened fire, killing at least thirty people; and that Pigsty Liver and the Organs had retaliated.

‘Mr Preminder, what
happened
here? Can you explain why the security was so inadequate, at an event of this kind? And how did Pigsty and the band come to be armed?’

‘These are not normal times,’ said Benny Prem. ‘In extreme cases, normal rules do not apply. If it hadn’t been for Pigsty’s ability to fight back, there would have been a lot more casualties before the police arrived. As it is, many innocent lives have been spared. Surely a horrific incident like this proves that those on the positive side of the Countecultural Movement have to be free to fight fire with fire.’

This is what it was about, thought Fiorinda.
This,
not nothing. Feeling like a guilty child. They had all of them stayed out playing by the riverside too long, refusing to go home (but Fiorinda never, never wanted to go home): and this is what happens. The monsters get you.

‘Prem can be on the tv,’ said Pigsty, dismissively. ‘He can do the talking. That’s his shit. Now I’ll tell you something Prem doesn’t know. We’re setting off the Green Blitzkreig, as of tomorrow. It’s gonna happen all over, there’s a shitload of us, finally going for it, no more pissing around. We’re mad as hell and we’re not going to take it any more. Gonna save our mother earth, in England’s green and pleasant land, and I want to do a proper job of it. The only question is, are you brainy types going to help me?’ He reached down, pulled the big handgun out of the waistband of his leather jodphurs, cocked it and rested it on the table. He grinned at them. ‘Or not?’

A moment of stunned readjustment, then Ax says, ‘yeah, I’ll help you. Get me some maps.’

The others sat, bloodstained, immobile and hardly breathing, while the maps were fetched: listening to Pig explain how he’d been approached by Prem and agreed to take over Paul’s plot, but then Pig had decided to take command for himself. Listening to Ax calmly discussing the whole thing; able to realise that Ax was saving their lives. Rob began to get restless, began to twitch like a limb to which circulation is painfully returning, having been cut off. He started to mutter:
he killed…gotta…he killed…gotta, can’t let…

‘Get him out of here,’ said Ax, casually. ‘He’s bothering me.’

Fiorinda and DK, who happened to be sitting on either side, took Rob by the elbows and moved him out. Pigsty’s goons didn’t stop them, but followed closely. ‘Get me a phone’, said Fio, imitating Ax’s manner; and this worked. A phone was produced. But then she couldn’t handle it, so DK called The Eyes. They were safe. They were still in the Park, but they could leave. They would come at once. ‘What’s going on there?’ DK demanded.

‘I don’t fucking know,’ answered Felice. ‘We’ll come and get our man.’

On the steps of the building Rob wept and struggled, beside himself. The goons stood by, while Fio and DK held him, until the pink Cadillac rolled up out of the streetlight dark. ‘He killed a sister. He killed a sister, man, the fucking bastard, I can’t stand for that—’

‘It’s all right,’ Fio pleaded. ‘The Eyes are okay, they’re here now—’

‘He means Cecile, I think. Rob, hey, that was an
accident.
Friendly fire. The Pig is cool. Be calm, the Pig is cool, you don’t mean what you’re saying.’

Fiorinda was sure there had been no accidents, the Pig had known exactly who he wanted to murder. But Rob’s losing it was also in some way a performance. He wasn’t struggling
too
hard. They piled him into the car: the Eyes looking grim on the front seat, Rob into the back, like tipping a wild animal out of a net into safe captivity.

‘You’re driving home?’ asked DK, ‘Are you sure it’s safe?’

‘We can look after our sweet selves,’ snarled Felice, ‘Why’d you think there’s three of us?’

‘That’s how many it takes,’ said Cherry. Her face was streaked with tears. ‘What the fuck
happened
? What’s going on? We thought you were all
dead—
’

‘Any sister waits in hope for a black man to look out for
her
, is a fool.’ said Dora, her voice shaking in the bitter fury of relief. ‘C’mon, fellow-babes. I don’t
care
what’s going on.’

The Cadillac rolled away. DK and Fiorinda, released from their terrifying burden, stumbled into a hug, clinging tight, white knuckled, bone on bone.

‘My God,’ he muttered,
‘My God—’

‘We’re still alive,’ she whispered. ‘We’re alive, hang onto that.’

They were taken back. Then, in the familiar room, there followed an extraordinary session in which Ax handed over detailed knowledge of how Pig’s ‘Green Blitzkrieg’ should be run. Where the arms factories were, how best to contain the security forces, the most effective way of closing an airport or tearing up a major highway. The most poisonous chemical plants and how to decommission them without disaster,
leave the nuclear power stations alone
. Channels of communication that must be kept open and frequently fed, calming the people and the world out there beyond… Often in the Think Tank, Ax had teased Paul Javert, letting slip hints of how much politically and socially useful information he kept stored with his Lennonisms. Now it all came out. There was no one taking notes, and if the Pig’s wishes had been obeyed there were no recording devices in this room, but that didn’t seem to matter. All that mattered was that Ax could keep talking, holding the Pig fascinated, so Ax went on doing that, while the handgun stayed on view, sometimes pointed in one person’s direction or another, the hippie goons stood around, and of course Pig was joking. He wouldn’t shoot anybody, not in here, he just liked to see them scared.

Fiorinda remembered Martina’s terrified face. He could do what he liked.

Pigsty’s tremendous physical strength and resilience became evident. While Ax turned grey and sank into his chair, while his hands began to tremble, Pig stayed bright as a button: not stressed at all by the events of his busy evening, showing not a sign of fatigue. Twice he sent the guards out, once for cigarettes and once for curry. (Ax vetoed alcohol, the Pig took this like a lamb). And still the facts poured out. Verlaine and Chip, Fiorinda and Sage started to give each other wondering looks.

Finally it was over. The last phase blurred, the Pig abruptly satisfied. They were taken to another part of this building, where two connecting rooms and a bathroom had been prepared, evidently prepared in advance for this planned emergency, with camp beds and blankets. Ax went straight into the bathroom and threw up, ran a lot of water, came out with his head and face dripping, wiping his mouth; and collapsed on one of the cots.

The others grouped round him.

‘Ax,’ said Sage, softly, ‘You’ve got a warehouse chip, haven’t you.’

‘An implant,’ whispered Verlaine. ‘You
must
have.’

‘Yeah,’ said the Ax, muffled, choking. ‘You’re true. Don’t tell Pigsty. I think he’d tear my head off.’

In the morning, Ax was separated from the others and sent on a tour of the provinces: on what seemed like a rampage of mob violence but was actually pretty structured, Ax should know because he structured it. Within a few days he knew that the decision he had made was in some sense justified. Pigsty really did have an army, an army of wild young men, and a few women: led by hardened Green-violence veterans. It was growing all the time; and the Pig really was in command of this army, so far as anyone could be. There were no other leaders left, at least no one who was prepared to claim that rank after Massacre Night. The wild rumpus couldn’t have been stopped, not without a major escalation of violence and death, but what was more shocking, more disorienting, was that nobody seemed to
want
to stop it. The police, the government, they were going to stand by, and let the thing burn itself out. So that’s what Ax was doing, or directing, the burning out of this energy: guiding the destruction, as best he could, along less than utterly destructive channels. He felt like a lone paramedic at a massive traffic accident, except that this paramedic was the same person who had allowed the drunk driver to take the wheel. He’d been so determined not to peak too soon—and to be honest, hoping the violent phase could be avoided entirely. But Ax had got it wrong and Pigsty was the boss: well on his way to declaring himself King, Emperor, Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Milosevic.

At least there were remarkably few human fatalities.

Considering. Yet.

It was horrible, but it was quite an experience leading Pigsty’s barmy army. There came, maybe inevitably, a moment when it started to feel right. It was in a vast supermarket, outside Wolverhampton—a staged event, this one, with a local tv crew in attendance and Ax himself leading the action—as the mob, the barmy army and a local crowd, let rip with blowtorches and chainsaws.
This had to happen
, thought Ax. Two hideous little children sleeping in a shop doorway, their names are WANT and IGNORANCE. We cannot make terms with those children, they’ve grown to monster size, they can only be driven out by force. He had just made a stupid speech about the crimes of profiteering fat cats, and the real, terrifying consequences of profit-motive consumerism, but though stupid it was also true. Smash! Destroy! He had never wanted it to be this way, but maybe there was no other way, the crashing chords, the furious energy of sound and meaning fused—

(they would put his Jerusalem solo on the soundtrack for the tv item, he’d made sure of that…)

Later: the Disney version. It was March, the postponed Dissolution Day had come to pass. A retired Prime Minister, ceremonial Head of State since the Royal Family quit, had quietly resigned and fled. President Saul Burnet, (aka Pigsty) would take office now: a figurehead post but a substantial and fitting compliment to the leader of the CCM. Fiorinda and the Ax—best candidates for romantic revolutionary prince and princess—featured in the parade, rolling up Piccadilly and down the Mall behind Pigsty’s biker escort, in a coach left behind by the Royals. It was balmy weather, the sky was clear and china blue, the buds on the plane trees swelling and unfolding in a mist of green and gold. The cheering crowds included many ordinary Londoners; but few tourists.