Send My Love and a Molotov Cocktail! (25 page)

“It'll do,” said Mitzi.

“The malady lingers on.” Mr Bug's representative flicked his robot driver with his whip. “We'll try Hampstead Heath again now.”

The driver's voice was feminine. “What are we looking for, sir?”

Mr Bug's representative shrugged. “Whatever they're looking for.”

“Do you think we'll find it, sir?”

“I'm not sure it matters. But it's something to pass the time. And we might meet some interesting people.”

“Are there any real people left in London, sir?”

“I take your point. The city seems to be filling up with nothing but the ghosts of old anarchists. Not to mention Chartists and the like. Have you seen any of the Chartists?”

“Not recently, sir.”

“There's bound to be a few on Hampstead Heath. What London really lacks at present is a genuine Mob.”

“Any news?”

Frank Cornelius looked anxiously at the cryptik. It didn't seem a patch on some of Miss Brunner's other machines, but she put a great deal of faith in it.

“A few more record companies have been broken into. Tapes and records stolen. Some accounts. Majestic Studios have been blown up. Rockfield have had a fire. Island's sunk.”

“And the casualties?” Bishop Beesley mopped his brow with an old Flake wrapper.

“They don't look significant. Everybody seems to be evacuating.”

“Mr Bug?”

“Not sure. No data.”

“Why are we sticking it out, then?” Frank gave a swift, resentful blink. “Why should we be the only ones?”

“Because we know best, don't we?” Miss Brunner reached absently towards where Maggy had been sitting. Now there was just a little pile of clothes. Maggy had been absorbed some hours ago. “Someone's going to have to go out for some food. I think it's you, Frank.”

“You're setting me up. If my brother finds me, you know what he'll do. He's got a nasty, vengeful nature. He's never forgiven me for Tony Blackburn, let alone anything else.”

“He's too busy at present.” She waved the printouts. “Anyway, he hardly ever bothers you unless you've bothered him.”

“How do I know if I've bothered him or not?”

Miss Brunner became impatient. “Go and get us a meal.”

“And some chocolate fudge, if possible,” said Bishop Beesley.

Frank put his Browning in the pocket of his mack. He sidled reluctantly towards the door.

“Hurry,” hissed Miss Brunner.

“Any special orders?”

“Anything tasty will suit me.” She returned her attention to the cryptik. “At this rate we'll be eating each other.”

This made her feel sick.

There was a bouncer on the door of the New Oldies Club as Mo tried to go through.

“No way, my son,” said the bouncer.

Mo blinked. “You know me.”

“Never seen you before.”

“What's going on? Who's playing tonight?”

“Deep Fix.”

“Is the Captain there?”

“Not for me to say. Not for you to ask.”

“But I'm with the band.”

“What band?”

“What band do you want me to be with?”

“Off!” said the bouncer. “Go on.”

“Ask the Captain.”

“You, mate, are persona non bloody grata. Get it?”

“Is the Captain in there?”

“You're a persistent little sod, ain't ya?” The bouncer hit him.

“What did you do that for?”

“Security.”

Mo nursed his lip. “Oh. You shouldn't be afraid of me.”

“It's not you, chum. It's the people you're hanging around with.”

As Mo reached the street again, and began to walk in the general direction of Soho, he looked up. Over the rooftops was the outline of a small, sagging airship. It seemed to be drifting aimlessly on the wind.

To the North, quite close to the Post Office Tower, a fire was blazing.

United Artists, thought Mo absently.

Mr Bug's representative said: “Things look as if they're hotting up.”

They were crossing over Abbey Road. Police were making a traffic detour around the ruins.

“All the old targets.” Mr Bug's representative lit a fresh cigarette and put it to his tube. “Still, what new ones are there?”

The driver pressed the horn.

Mo leaned on the gates of Buckingham Palace and dragged the book from his inside pocket.

The book was called
The Nature of the Catastrophe.
He opened it up. All the pages were blank. He was getting used to this sort of thing.

“Oh, there you are!” Mitzi came running over from St James's Park. “We thought we'd lost you.”

“I don't trust you, Mitzi. You're with them again.”

“Why not join us?”

“What for?”

“There's safety in numbers.”

“So you say.”

“Anyway,” said Mitzi, “you shouldn't be hanging about here, should you? Everyone's getting very security conscious. They might arrest you. Or shoot you. SAS and that.”

“Everything else has been arrested, by the look of it.”

“I'm worried about you, Mo.”

“Don't be.”

“We can help you.”

“That didn't work the last time.”

Army trucks were coming down the Mall. Garbled voices called through loudspeakers mounted on the tops of the trucks.

Mo decided to follow Mitzi round the corner into Buckingham Palace Road. She took his hand. “Coming along then?”

“No,” he said. “I think I'll catch a train from Victoria.”

STEVE JONES: Twenty. Born in London. Lives in a one-room cold-water-only studio in Soho where the band rehearses. Ex-approved school. He was the lead singer with the Sex Pistols before he took up the guitar.

He has the reputation of being a man of a few words. But his sound intuition and low boredom threshold makes him great fun to be with. He's always looking for action. Of the four he probably had the most difficult childhood. His real father was a boxer whom he never knew. He never got on with his stepfather and since the family lived in one room only, this led to a very fraught home environment. The first record he remembers being impressed by was Jimi Hendrix's “Purple Haze”. He always wanted to play electric guitar.

—Virgin Publicity, 1977

“Delusions of grandeur will get you a very long way in this world.” Martin Bormann leafed through his cut-price deletions. “You just missed him, I'm afraid.”

Una Persson handed him the album she'd selected. “I'll have this, then. Do you know the times of the planes to New York?”

Bormann looked at his watch. “There's one in an hour. You'd better hurry. It could be the last.”

“Ain't she fuckin' radiant, though?” Mrs C. studied the blue and white picture on her jubilee mug before putting it to her lips. “Thassa nice cuppa tea, Frank. Wotcher want?”

“Jerry.” Frank was furtive. “Mum, I haven't got much more margin. Have you seen him?”

“Yeah.”

“When?”

“Yesterday.”

“Where?”

“At work. 'E watched ther picture four times.”

“Why?”

“I fink 'e wanted a rest. 'E was asleep through most of 'em.”

“When he left, did he say where he was going?”

“'E said 'e 'ad a few jobs ter do. Somefink abart pushin' a boat aht?”

Frank remained puzzled. “That's all?”

“I fink so.” She puckered her brows. “You know what 'e's like. Yer carn't fuckin' understand all o' wot 'e says.”

“Was he with anybody?”

“I dunno. Maybe wiv that bloke in a kilt. Like in ther film.”

Frank dropped his cup into the saucer. “God almighty.”

“I didn't catch 'is name,” said Mrs Cornelius.

From where he stood on the Embankment, near the cannon, Mo could see the half-inflated airship tied to one of the spikes of Tower Bridge. Either the Assassin was stranded, or he was becoming more catholic in his targets.

As he climbed up the steps to the bridge, he thought he saw a flash of tartan darting down the other side. He hesitated, not sure which lead to follow. It had to be “Flash” Gordon.

“Oh, bugger!”

The last of the Musician-Assassins, clambered unsteadily down his steel ladder, a Smith and Wesson Magnum held by its trigger guard in his teeth.

“You look a lot better,” said Mo.

“Feeling it, squire.” Jerry dusted off his black car coat and smoothed his hair. “I've been eating better and getting more exercise. What's the time? My watch has stopped.”

Mo didn't know.

“It doesn't matter, really. We'll be all right. Come on.” The Assassin took Mo's arm.

“Where are we going?”

“I had a nasty moment last night,” said the Assassin obliviously. “Somebody must have tried to slip some disco tapes into my feeder. Nearly blew my circuits. I think they're trying to get rid of me.” He strode rapidly in the direction of Butler's Wharf on the South side of the bridge.

“Where are we going?”

“1977.”

“What?”

“Nineteen bloody seventy seven, Mo. We've got a bloody gig to do. And this time you're going to do it properly.”

Miss Brunner was white with rage. “What on earth possessed you, Frank?”

A dozen dogs growled and grumbled as Frank tried to untangle their leads. “I had nowhere else to bring them. And I need them.”

Bishop Beesley crouched in his corner munching handfuls of Poppets. “This is a very small bunker, Mr Cornelius.”

“I've worked out what my brother's up to. He's made a tunnel into 1977.”

“Oh, no.” Miss Brunner began to punch spastically at her terminal. “That was why he was doing all that stuff with record companies. To get the energy he needed.”

Frank nodded. The dogs began to pant. “We're going to have to follow him. He's got that little wanker Collier with him and maybe the rest of them, I'm not sure.”

Bishop Beesley clambered to his feet “What are his plans?”

“To create an alternative, obviously. If he succeeds it means curtains for everything we've worked for.”

Miss Brunner was grim. “We managed to abort it last time. We can do it again.”

Frank stroked the head of the nearest Doberman. “This could be the end of authority as we know it.”

“Aren't you being a trifle apocalyptic, Mr Cornelius?” Bishop Beesley reached a plump hand for the Walnut Whips on the steel table. “I mean, what can he do with a couple of guitars and a drum kit?”

“You don't know him.” Frank unbuttoned his collar. “He's reverting to type, just when it seemed he was getting more respectable at last.”

“He's fooled us before,” said Miss Brunner. “And we should have known better.” Her hands were urgent now, as she fed in her programme. “1977 could have been a turning point.”

The cryptik began to give her a printout. She grew whiter than ever. “Oh, Jesus. It's worse than we thought.”

“What?” Frank's arm was yanked by a sudden movement of his dogs.

“I think he's trying to abolish the Future altogether. He's going for some kind of permanent Present.”

“He can't do it.” Bishop Beesley licked his fingers. “Can he?”

“With help,” said Miss Brunner, “he could.”

“How can a few illiterate and talentless rock and rollers be of any use?”

“It's what they represent,” she said. “There's no getting away from it, gentlemen. He's playing for the highest stakes.”

“Can we stop him?” asked the Bishop.

“We're under strength. Half our usual allies are in stasis.”

“What will wake them up?”

“The Last Trump,” said Frank, He was panting now, in unison with his dogs.

“Are you sure you know what you're doing?” said Mo, not for the first time.

Jerry was hurrying through the corridors of the vast warehouse. It had become very cold.

“I told you. I never know what I'm doing. I have to play it by ear. But I've got a shifter tunnel and I've got a fix and I'm bloody sure we can make it. After that it's up to all of us.”

“To do what?”

“The Jubilee gig, of course.”

“But we've done it.”

“You've
tried
it, you mean. Just think of that as a rehearsal.”

“I wish I'd never got in touch with you.”

“Well, you did.” The Assassin was humming to himself. It seemed to be some sort of Walt Disney song.

Mo tried to pull back. “I'm fed up with it all. I just want … “

“Satisfaction squire.” Cornelius glowed. “And I'm going to give you your chance.”

“All I wanted was the booze and the birds,” said Mo weakly. “I was enjoying myself. We all were.”

“And so you shall again, my son.” The Musician-Assassin turned a crazed eye on his old comrade. “Better than ever.”

The walls of the warehouse began to quiver. A silver mist engulfed them. From somewhere in the distance came the muffled sound of bells.

“We're through!” The Assassin cackled.

He burst open a rotting door and they stood on the slime of a disused wharf. Beside the wharf was a large white schooner with a black flag waving on its topmast. The schooner seemed to be deserted. On the poop deck a drum kit had been set up and Mo noticed PA all over the boat.

The Assassin paused, checking his wrist. “My watch's working again. That's good. We made it. The others should be along in a minute.”