Seventy-Two Virgins

bloodied hand pulled harder on the wires that were linked to the funny little box on the floor of the ambulance.

CONNECTING, said the mobile.

‘Ooof,’ said Eric, and sat up on the gurney, and out of the box popped first a red wire, and then a green one.

CONNECTING, said the mobile.

‘Death to America!’ cried Benedicte. ‘Death to imperialism! I die for Palestine and to avenge injustice.’

CONNECTION FAILURE, said the mobile.

And then the klieg lights went phut, and the hall was plunged into comparative darkness, and the upper air of the chamber was full of a blizzard of glass. Through every window in the building crashed the special forces of Britain and America, and they executed their task of saving life with pent-up rage and professionalism. Of the Brotherhood of the Two Mosques, all the four who were still conscious and willing — Benedicte, Habib and the two Arabs — were arrested unharmed. The only casualties were Barry White and Chester de Peverill, who were running to escape at the North End, when they contrived to cushion the fall of the left arm and right breast of Philippa of Hainault, which had been dislodged by Agent Cabache, and now fell victim to a stun grenade. These objects, as a result, were undamaged, and able to be replaced with no obvious ill effects. Which was more than could be said for Chester and Barry, who sustained a range of contusions, none of them very severe.

In less than thirty seconds, about 200 officers had surrounded Dean, Cameron and the odd tableau of Jones and the President.

But as the squads of black catsuits with guns moved among the crowd, Dean spotted her again; and this time, shyly, she waved. It was Lucy Goodbody, aka Vanessa, she who had infiltrated RitePrice in Wolverhampton, and who had been sent by the Guardian to cover what they had imagined would be a torpid speech about the Special Relationship.

As Dean looked, he realized she wasn’t the Lucy Goodbody of his tortured imagination, the Lucy Goodbody whose flagrant X-rated enjoyment of sex with his best friend had so fried his ego and moved him half to madness. She was just a tired and frightened reporter with a spot on her forehead, visible even at this distance; and it wasn’t her fault, thought Dean, that she had fancied his friend more than him.

‘Yow roight, Vanessa?’ he waved, and began to grow up.

The cordite settled around them, and the fluffy wadding stuff from the inside of the warning shots, and the broken glass crunched underfoot as people made for the exits. No one took much notice of Dean and Cameron as they now huddled together on the stairs. He had his arm round her, and noticed that she smelled lovely. She was crying and crying and crying from shock and exhaustion.

‘Oi,’ said Dean, ‘don’t cry. Yer man — wotsisname?’

‘Adam.’

‘He really didn’t know anything about it. We told him a load of crap. I promise you.’

‘Really?’ She stopped and snivelled.

‘Yeah. Yow’ll be foine, love.’ She turned to him and because her lips were so trembling and vulnerable he kissed them. To his astonishment, they opened a little, and for a second she returned his kiss, and he could taste the inside of her mouth, and remembered why people talked about kisses being sweet. He knew she didn’t mean anything by it. He knew she was just kissing for the joy of being alive, and she knew she would never do it again. But for Dean it was a possession forever, and the joyous phenylethylamines coursed in his veins.

Well, thought Roger Barlow as he sat back down again, stone me. He was a bit stunned by his own recklessness; but one thing was for sure — they’d never bother with the Eulalie business now.

Eulalie! What a prat he’d been. Twenty thousand of his own hard-earned pre-tax pounds, sunk without trace in a lingerie shop called Eulalie, which, at least according to the Daily Mirror’s pestilential Debbie Gujaratne, was a front for a brothel. MP RUNS KNOCKING-SHOP was the headline he was dreading, but if tomorrow’s front pages were about his drivelling escapades with Eulalie, he would eat his hat. It was, no doubt about it, a good day to bury bad news.

Deep in their respective unconsciousnesses, Jones and the President lay on the stone dais, curled like twins awaiting their rebirth into a weird and unfair world.

Outside the rain had stopped. In that sudden summery way, the heat was on the street again, and the smell of dust and warmed-up dogshit up rose from the paving stones. The flags of Britain and America fluttered in the sun.

Up above London the clouds were no longer threatening, but high and white, fleecy and friendly. As he was passed carefully out of the ambulance, Eric Onyeama admired them, and knew he had a word for that fat, beautiful look. It would come back to him.

‘Wait,’ he said to his stretcher-bearers as he was carried round the front of the ambulance. He printed off a ticket from the Sanderson machine, and stuck it under the wiper.

‘Tee hee hee,’ said Eric Onyeama, and fainted again from loss of blood.

And later that day Roger cycled home, having dealt with Mrs Betts, the respite centre, and many other matters. He received something approaching a hero’s welcome. ‘You were on TV,’ said the four-year-old, and climbed his knee, with the others, the envied kiss to share; and they all daubed him with tomato ketchup, so he could be like the other people they’d seen on TV.

AUTHOR’S NOTE

The only implausibility in this story is to imagine that Jones & Co. could for a moment elude the police who guard the Palace of Westminster with such vigilance, tact and kindness.