Rainbow Bridge (24 page)

‘How—how far along is she?’

‘We’re not rock solid on dates,’ admitted Ax. ‘Say twenty-two weeks?’

‘
Twenty two weeks!
That’s—
’
Norman’s lips moved. ‘Five and a half
months
!’

‘Well done.’

Norman passed a trembling hand over his aureole. ‘This was, this was never fully explained to me!’

‘For once, Norman,’ remarked Sage, dreamily. ‘You have a right to say that.’

‘My God. My God! But why wasn’t I told? Why was it kept secret?’

‘I don’t know that it’s been kept
secret
.’ Ax thought about it. ‘Her personal friends know, her doctor knows, our families know. We haven’t yet made a public announcement, we’re not ready for that.’

Norman scowled. ‘That is not an answer! Please be serious!’

They glanced at each other. ‘When we first knew, we didn’t want the Second Chamber to find out,’ said Ax. ‘Since then, there’s never been a good moment. Can you accept that? It’s the truth. You know Fiorinda’s history, it’s a sensitive topic.’

‘Oh God, I see. The poor brave girl. I do see.’

He wanted to ask them which was the father, but felt inhibited.

‘I think you’re the one who’s got some explaining to do,’ said Sage, mildly. ‘It looks as if your Unoccupied Intelligence missed a few points about Rainbow Bridge.’

Norman put his head in his hands, his dress nails spiking up like caterpillar horns. ‘My God!,’ he moaned. ‘I have
never
been so shocked. The Countercultural dress. Right in front of me! The weapons! Unbelievable! Shameless! It was all I could do to behave naturally.’ He wiped his face, trembling. ‘The situation must be a very recent development…
Of course
we had to venture into situations where you three could encounter rebel sympathisers, and reach hearts and minds through constructive dialogue. I
expected
you would find sympathisers here. But this is unthinkable!’

Sage moved to the offensive. ‘Yeah but you knew the rules in Rainbow Bridge Arena, didn’t you? Don’t bother, we know you did. “Naked” has been your favourite word since we left Hackney. You’re asking us why Fiorinda didn’t tell you she was pregnant? Why didn’t
you
tell what kind of gig this was? Why didn’t you bring it up when Fiorinda specified no nudity, fer fuck’s sake? You signed something, hm?’

‘I DID NOT KNOW!’, howled Norman.

‘Calm down,’ suggested Ax. ‘You’ll fall off the roof.’

‘I had no idea. I envisaged nakedness in a pure way, the ultimate honesty!’

‘Oh really? How original of you. I usually like to keep my socks on. I get fuckin’ cold feet on those nude photo shoots. Leave it out, Norman.’

‘I was plunging you into the unknown! Artists make conditions, I say yes then later I get them to do what I want, because they trust me. She’s the punk-diva wild child of the rock and roll revolution. I had
not
fully understood what happens in the Arena here, I had no reason to think Fiorinda would not, would not come round—’

‘You don’t know her very well,’ said Sage.

‘You cannot deny that we created something wonderful at Warren Fen! You refused to view the rushes, I didn’t understand that, but already I know I have a huge global hit, a masterpiece. I have been
good
for you!’

‘Yeah,’ said Ax, bitterly. ‘Right.’

‘But this is all nonsense,’ Norman drew a breath: terribly defeated, shattered to the core, staring into a dreadful abyss. ‘This is over. We have to get out of here, we must leave at once—’

‘And how are we going to achieve that?’, wondered Ax. ‘Shoot our way out?’

‘Of course not! I’ll send for a ship, it will be here immediately. But if there were any interference with us,’ Norman hesitated, looked from one to the other. ‘This is classified, please, but as you may have realised, we’re not entirely defenceless.’

‘We spotted the bodyguard, yeah. Carn’ say I like the numerical odds.’

‘Norman,’ Ax said, in a different tone, ‘it won’t do. If we pull out that means total loss of face for this mission.’ Cousin Caterpillar shuddered and nodded, head bowed. ‘That would be bad for you, and bad for us. Wang Xili believes in us, we need to prove ourselves, we want the Peace Tour to be a success. Here we are. We’re prepared to do the gig, what do you say? To you it sounds grotesque, but it would win plenty hearts and minds in the camps. What do you
really
want to happen, right now?’

The impresario wrapped his robe closer around him. ‘Why did you hit me, Ax? In front of those appalling hoodlums! I have an eye-socket cam, why shouldn’t I allude to it? The so-called Committee invited me here, they knew I would be recording. It was negotiated.’

(You don’t know the half of it, Norman). ‘You’re here to record the show in the Arena, that doesn’t mean they want you making a secret video in their council chamber. They may not have read the small print.’

There was a stiff silence.

…

‘Very well, I accept your apology,’ said Norman, at last.

They had reached a level of sobriety where the night seemed two dimensional. ‘Tell me one thing. Are they—?’ Norman hesitated, afraid his fear would be evident in his voice, ‘Are they
Celtics
?’

‘Nothing like,’ said Ax. ‘Anglians are a different brand. More like
Danes
.’

‘Oh, I see.’ He took a deep breath. ‘You would
do
this? General Wang has the utmost faith in you, Ax, and so do others, more highly placed still. I feel you should be told that. You two are prepared to do this?’

‘We
three
,’ Ax corrected him. ‘It’s Fiorinda they want. Can you blame them?’

Norman pressed his fists to his breast, completely overcome.

‘Hey,’ said Sage. ‘This is our culture.’ He leaned over, and before Norman knew what was coming he had been softly kissed on the mouth by Aoxomoxoa: who drew back, mockery and affection in his bright eyes. ‘Born an’ bred in this booze-sodden briar patch, Norman. Born and bred.’

The stars, glittering and scintillating over the great arc of sky, shone down on waterbound no man’s land. Something cried out there, one desolate squeal, cut off.

Norman raised his voice, it came out in a register far above his customary basso. ‘I’m concerned about Toby.’ He cleared his throat and tried again. ‘He’s going through a difficult adjustment, and he needs to take more water with it, as you people say. We all know he is not responsible for his words or actions.’

‘He has nothing to fear from us,’ said Ax, gently.

‘Yes, I understand that.’ Norman heaved a sigh, and got up; carefully. ‘You have responded very well to him. I have been favourably impressed.’

They saw that he was shaking from head to foot. The Chinese system is unforgiving of failure, but his relief struck them as extreme. Get a grip, Norman. How
do
they punish a fake Colonel for pulling out of a daft propaganda stunt?

‘I’m going to bed. It’s very, very shocking. I would be greatly in your debt.’

Rainbow Bridge after curfew was a beetle-infested basement. The crowds were hidden, scuttling in the shadows, teeming and scratching behind paper-thin walls; the sounds of someone being beaten up, round a corner somewhere. The young woman and the girl, in dark leggings and jackets, and hooded ski-masks, stared at graffiti; whilst their guide parleyed through a slot in the prison warden’s door. Grimy rainbows, badly-drawn wedding tackle, crude flowers; tags. The partition wall was pieced together with filler, there was a ragged section missing at the top.

‘I know where I was when this place was being converted,’ said Fiorinda.

‘I know where I was too,’ offered Frosty, like a child. ‘We were in a camp near Holbeach, that’s in Lincolnshire Miss, it’s where Dad comes from.’

‘I was living in the Palace of Rivermead.’

At random moments the touch of that dead flesh would come back to her; it was clay in her throat. They say nothing’s too bad if you know why you’re doing it, why you
must
. It’s not true, but you do it anyway. For nothing, no return.

‘I remember that time,’ whispered Frosty fervently, taking hold of her hand. ‘I was only a kid, but it was well scary. You saved us all, Miss.’

Their guide, the worn down sportsman in his peculiar tweed jacket, had agreed a price. He ushered them in to a room almost filled by the shaft rising through it. It looked like a brutal work of art, or a giant model of some alien musculature. Fiorinda saw chunks of hardcore under the black paint. Broken girders, plastic timbers, lath and plaster, verdigrised piping; carved masonry that might have come from a Christian church. This was where the coffin cells were hidden; in this tower of waste.

‘Who made it?’

‘No one,’ said the prison warden. ‘It just happened, like, when they were converting. There was a hole through the levels, that they filled with junk, an’ the junk kinder formed into a hollow nob. Our lot found it when they were cutting back these walls, an’ made it a feature. We’ve got passages and secret rooms all over the shop. If we were taken our warriors could carry on for years, harrying them.’

‘You’ve been playing too many computer games.’

‘It’s deep water at the bottom, they say it useter be the old churchyard. There useter be a village down below, called Eyot.’

Fiorinda peered into a gap that had been hacked through the side. The inner surface of the shaft was as lumpy as the outside, grey shards of light ran through the darkness. ‘We won’t need the rope,’ she said to Frosty. ‘That’s good. But we’ll take it with us, in case we get stuck.’

‘Hey!’ cried the warden. ‘What the fuck? Look don’t touch, little ladies!’

He was youngish, bedraggled, ragged black hair and an acned, burnt-umber complexion. He had a stool to sit on, a game-pod for entertainment, the remains of meals kicked into a corner. There wasn’t room for much else. A gamma-lunatic, risen to this responsible position, unlikely to rise further. She peeled off her ski mask.

His jaw dropped, sweat bloomed. ‘It was n-nothing to do with me. I wasn’t a part of it. I have to do what I’m told, I didn’t agree!’

‘I see you know who I am.’ She included the sportsman in a glance. ‘Get out of here both of you, don’t come back tonight and don’t tell anybody you saw me.’

Frosty handed over two more boxes of matches each, and then decided to pursue the men out of the door. My God, teenagers. Thankfully, she was quickly back again. ‘For fuck’s sake, what was that about?’

‘I wanted to ask about Gator. She’s got to be still alive. They won’t have slaughtered a good strong young workhorse! That’s just crazy!’

Finding Gator was the kids’ first priority. The adults didn’t have the heart to try and convince them the horse was
gone
. ‘Well, okay.’

They bolted themselves in, and began the descent. The baby knew there was something up, she was very quiet. Better talk to her (not aloud, don’t want to freak Frosty out), hey, little shoot, this is called
climbing
, it’s excellent. More fun going up, but this is good. Down we go, easy as pie, great big hand and footholds… She hoped her silent tone was reassuring. The shaft was never entirely dark. Dislodged fragments rattled and fell, the sound ricocheting; no splash at the bottom. What if the whole thing collapses under our weight?, she wondered. But the waste was rock solid.

‘How far down do we have to go, Miss?’

‘Orange level.’ Red level was the underground car park. Orange level was the basement of the shopping centre. There were no colours in the bird’s nest pit, but a sweetish, gagging smell was getting stronger.

‘How do they send them food down here, Miss?’

‘They don’t.’ There was something scrabbling, rats in the bird’s nest? The climbers looked at each other, ghost faces. ‘Richard?’ called Fiorinda. ‘Corny—?’

The sound increased, as if something was trying to retreat deeper into the wall. Another two metres or so and their dark-adapted eyes didn’t need the torch. They could see an iron grille, set in fairly new cement. Fiorinda found a place to stand, and grasped the bars. The smell was bad, but something was moving.

‘Richard? Corny? It’s Fiorinda. We’re going to get you out.’

Something lunged forward, a claw of a filthy old hand groped over her clutching fingers. ‘
Weers us weers us
,
nihao feeerrrinda eaah
?’

‘Corny…! Cornelius, we’re here, we found you, you’re getting out of this. Is Richard with you?’

‘
Aw
…
eeeeh
…
Nahm, Nahm, uhuhu…’

‘
He doesn’t speak English anymore
,’ came a thread of a voice.
‘He’s lost his head, poor old Corny.’

‘Richard—!’

‘
They don’t feed us, but there’s water dripping all the time, I get him to lap, enough. I’m holding up. Only thing is, when…fired on, shattered my shinbone. It’s infected, I’m afraid it’s not too good
.’

‘I’m going to shine my torch, are you ready?’

She struggled out of the straps of the backpack, gave it to Frosty to unload and pointed her torch into the horizontal shaft. ‘Hide your eyes, light.’ An uneven coffin, barely wide enough to hold two bodies; and some fragments of sodden straw. Rags of wet clothing clung to the tangle of limbs, they were chained together wrist and ankle. Here is the commander of Ax’s barmy army; and his
eminence grise
. Here are the career soldiers who saved all our fucking hides, while the rockstars stole the glory. At least we haven’t forgotten. Richard had covered his face. The old man gaped, bewildered. She held the light steady on Richard’s left leg. Below the knee it was a blackened mess, the foot hideously swollen.

‘Rich, can you give me your hand?’

‘
He keeps trying to get out. He never lies still. He can’t understand when I tell him. Keeps trying to crawl out, and it fucking hurts me.
’

Frosty pushed pouches of juice, yeast concentrate strips, dried tomatoes, a pack of hempseed crackers; boiled sweets, hand-milled aspirin, through the bars. Hope they connect with the juice, thought Fiorinda, the rest’s surely beyond them. She switched off her torch and looked into blackness, listening to the drip of water.

‘Richard. You have to let me touch you.’