“Then the rumour is wrong.” Theo added: “What sort of group are you? Do you always meet here in this church? Are you some kind of religious organization?”
It was Miriam who answered. “No. As Rolf explained, Luke is a priest, although he hasn’t a full-time job or a parish. Julian and he are Christians, the rest of us aren’t. We meet in churches because they’re available, they’re open, they’re free and they’re usually empty, at least the ones we choose are. We may have to give this one up. Other people are beginning to use it.”
Rolf broke in, his voice impatient, over-emphatic. “Religion and Christianity have nothing to do with it. Nothing!”
As if she hadn’t heard him, Miriam went on: “All sorts of eccentrics meet in churches. We’re just one set of oddballs among many. No one asks any questions. If they do, we’re the Cranmer Club. We meet to read and study the old Book of Common Prayer.”
Gascoigne said: “That’s our cover.” He spoke with the satisfaction of a child who has learned some of the grown-ups’ secrets.
Theo turned to him. “Is it? So what do you reply when the State Security Police ask you to recite the Collect for the first Sunday in Advent?” Seeing Gascoigne’s embarrassed incomprehension, he added: “Hardly a convincing cover.”
Julian said quietly: “You may not sympathize with us but you don’t have to despise us. The cover isn’t meant to convince the SSP. If they started taking an interest in us no cover would protect us. They’d break us in ten minutes. We know that. The cover gives us a reason, an excuse for meeting regularly and in churches. We don’t publicize it. It’s there if anyone asks, if we need it.”
Gascoigne said: “I know the prayers are called Collects. Do you know the one you asked me?” He wasn’t being accusatory, merely interested.
Theo said: “I was brought up with the old Book. The church my mother took me to as a boy must have been one of the last to use it. I’m a historian. I have an interest in the Victorian church, in old liturgies, defunct forms of worship.”
Rolf said impatiently: “All this is irrelevant. As Julian says, if the SSP take us they’re not going to waste turn examining us on the old catechism. We’re not in any danger yet; not unless you betray us. What have we done so far? Nothing but talk. Before we do act two of us thought it might be sensible to make an appeal to the Warden of England, your cousin.”
Miriam said: “Three of us. It was a majority. I went along with Luke and Julian. I thought it was worth a try.”
Rolf again ignored her. “It wasn’t my idea to get you here. I’m being honest with you. I’ve no reason to trust you and I don’t particularly want you.”
Theo replied: “And I didn’t particularly want to come, so we meet on equal footing. You want me to speak to the Warden. Why don’t you do that yourselves?”
“Because he wouldn’t listen. He may listen to you.”
“And if I agree to see him, and if he does listen, what do you want me to say?”
Now that the question was so baldly put it seemed that they were temporarily nonplussed. They looked at each other as if wondering which one would begin.
It was Rolf who answered: “The Warden was elected when he first took power, but that was fifteen years ago He hasn’t called an election since. He claims to rule by the people’s will, but what he is is a despot and a tyrant.”
Theo said drily: “It would be a brave messenger who was prepared to tell him that.”
Gascoigne said: “And the Grenadiers are his private army. It’s him they take an oath to. They don’t serve the State any more, they serve him. He’s got no right to use that name. My granddad was a private in the Grenadiers. He said they were the best regiment in the British Army.”
Rolf ignored him. “And there are things he could do even without waiting for a general election. He could end the semen-testing programme. It’s time-wasting and degrading, and it’s hopeless anyway. And he could let the Local and Regional Councils choose their own Chairmen. That would at least be the beginning of democracy.”
Luke said: “It isn’t only the semen testing. He should stop the compulsory gynaecological examinations. They degrade women. And we want him to put an end to the Quietus. I know that all the old people are supposed to be volunteers. Maybe it started out like that. Maybe some of them still are. But would they want to die if we gave them hope?”
Theo was tempted to ask “Hope of what?”
Julian broke in. “And we want something done about the Sojourners. Do you think it’s right that there’s an edict prohibiting our Omegas from emigrating? We import Omegas and others from less affluent countries to do our dirty work, clean the sewers, clear away the rubbish, look after the incontinent, the aged.”
Theo said: “They’re anxious enough to come, presumably because they get a better quality of life.”
Julian said: “They come to eat. Then, when they get old—sixty is the age limit, isn’t it?—they’re sent back whether they want to go or not.”
“That’s an evil their own countries could redress. They could begin by managing their affairs better. Anyway, their numbers aren’t great. There’s a quota, the intake is carefully controlled.”
“Not only a quota, stringent requirements. They have to be strong, healthy, without criminal convictions. We take the best and then chuck them back when they’re no longer wanted. And who gets them? Not the people who need them most. The Council and their friends. And who looks after the foreigners when they’re here? They work for a pittance, they live in camps, the women separate from the men. We don’t even give them citizenship; it’s a form of legalized slavery.”
Theo said: “I don’t think you’ll start a revolution on the issue of the Sojourners, or on the Quietus for that matter. People don’t care enough.”
Julian said: “We want to help them to care.”
“Why should they? They live without hope on a dying planet. What they want is security, comfort, pleasure. The Warden of England can promise the first two, which is more than most foreign governments are managing to do.”
Rolf had been listening to their exchange without speaking. Then he said suddenly: “What’s he like, the Warden of England? What sort of man is he? You should know, you were brought up with him.”
“That doesn’t give me an open entry to his mind.”
“All that power, more than anyone has ever had before—in this country anyway—all in his hands. Does he enjoy it?”
“Presumably. He doesn’t seem anxious to let it go.” He added: “If you want democracy, you have somehow to revitalize the Local Council. It begins there.”
Rolf said: “It ends there too. It’s how the Warden exercises control at that level. And have you seen our local chairman, Reggie Dimsdale? He’s seventy, querulous, shit-scared, only doing the job because it gets him a double petrol allowance and a couple of foreign Omegas to look after his bloody great bam of a house and wipe his bum for him when he gets incontinent. No Quietus for him.”
“He was elected to the Council. They were all elected.”
“By whom? Did you vote? Who cares? People are just relieved that someone will do the job. And you know how it works. The Chairman of the Local Council can’t be appointed without the approval of the District Council. That needs the approval of the Regional Council. He or she has to be approved by the Council of England. The Warden controls the system from top to bottom, you must know that. He controls it, too, in Scotland and Wales. Each has its own Warden, but who appoints them? Xan Lyppiatt would call himself the Warden of Great Britain except that, for him, it hasn’t got quite the same romantic appeal.”
The remark, thought Theo, showed perception. He recalled an old
