“There is another possibility worth considering,” Wingfield said. “Lawrence could have been set up by corrupt senior officers. It’s a common scam in the glory trusts—I’d go further and say such corruption is endemic. Corrupt senior officers protect themselves by pulling cronies up to create private hierarchies. I’ve worked with the Corporate Audit of General Wardian to clean such bastards out of our home lands, but Oban is a distant satellite, very much a little world of its own.”
“That’s an excellent point—under the circumstances we’ll have to look into it—fast,” TK said, making a note. To Donald, he said: “How are you going to find Miss Newman?”
“I had her documents photographed,” Donald said. “She holds a passport of the Friendly Cooperative of North Kensington basin. The basin isn’t on any Public Era atlas I could find. However, my butler informed me it’s a perfectly civilized place just outside the Grande Enceinte along a short stretch of turnpike. It would be a simple matter for me to go there and meet her.”
TK rubbed his palms up and down his face and sighed. He was obviously exhausted by the strain of problems from all directions. He did not need another problem. That was why Donald was trying to give him the solution.
“Well,” TK said. “There’s no harm in your going out to North Kensington basin to see her. It’s a low-risk endeavour. Can you fix that, Wings?”
“Actually, it would be a most valuable trip,” Wingfield said. “It’s notoriously hard to build contacts amongst those barging families—they’re fanatically independent.” He laid a hand on Donald’s shoulder. “Our new man is turning out to be a most versatile operator: appointed regent, chief demographer, economic guru—and now a spy!”
“Right, that’s what you’ll do,” TK said. “I suggest Saturday morning as traffic will be heavy with servants going home for the weekend. Report back to Wingfield afterwards so that we can pursue any leads.”
“I’ll fix you up with a fake passport and ID—this will be such fun!” Wingfield was singing with glee.
Donald almost keeled off his seat with relief. He had not told any lies and he had escaped. Not only had he escaped, he had solved a problem that had confounded him since hearing Vasco Banner’s address to the Westminster Assembly—how to reach Brent Cross asylum on the 30th October to attend the National Party’s annual conference. The 30th was... this Saturday!
Chapter 9
Flash like a blink of sun, thunder that buckled knees and hunched shoulders. Men snarled curses. Women gasped. Donald’s ears hummed with aftershock. Again the flash and again the shudder of blast. Ladbroke fort’s Naclaski battery had fired. Its 6-inch guns lashed windows and clouds and faces with a cat of lightning. Five salvoes, with ten seconds between them. Then silence. A young man yelled:
“Fuck the dogs!”
The queue cheered. Donald cheered, raising both fists into the air. ‘Dog’ was asylum slang for glory trooper.
“Fuck the sovereigns!”
Again the queue cheered.
“Vive the revolution!”
The roar curled like a wave and broke across the Grande Enceinte. In the pre-dawn gloom, shadows rippled along the parapet of Ladbroke fort. The crowd hunched into silence as the rippling shadows became glory troopers aiming rifles at them.
A woman behind Donald whispered: “They’ve never done that before.”
A squad led by a cold-faced young glory officer belched from the gatehouse and formed a funnel of pump-action shotguns. The officer took a microphone from a trooper carrying a loud-speaker like a tuba. This officer addressed them in a coarse, contemptuous voice.
“If you rabble of trash utter so much as one more snigger, we will shut the gate and you can forget about your weekend. Shut the fuck up and stay the fucking shut up.”
He and his squad withdrew inside the gatehouse. The glory troops on the parapet lingered. Donald discovered just what an unpleasant experience it is to find the dot of a muzzle laid on one’s face. The queue shifted forward. More clogs drummed up Ladbroke Grove. Saturday morning meant torrents of servants flowing out of the Central Enclave to the industrial asylums for the weekend.
The process inside Ladbroke fort customs was just as Wingfield had described: a long counter staffed with grumpy glory troopers. Donald stepped forward and laid a passport on the counter. The trooper who served him was a skinny teenaged basic with over-sized hands and a spotty chin. He had cut his nostril shaving that morning. He smelled of polish and soap, which put him on a pleasanter basis than the middle-aged slob in filthy dungarees next along the counter.
The passport was nearly identical to Donald’s real passport. It gave his real name, the real code for his place of residence (in this case, Bloomsbury 00172), a photograph and his occupation (“messenger”).
A messenger was one who carried documents between customers inside the Central Enclave and businesses out in the industrial asylums. A surprisingly good income was to be had from inherited security clearance that enabled one access to the most exclusive districts of the Central Enclave. In effect, one made a fat living by carrying bundles of paper through a wall. He was dressed for the occasion in old boots, raincoat and denim dungarees. Messengers had to blend in to the asylum population to avoid being kidnapped by ultramarines, gangs of corrupt glory troops, or anyone else out for easy bounty.
The stamps in this passport revealed Donald routinely crossed the Grande Enceinte through Ladbroke fort. It was essential to show routine, as customs personnel pounced on the least suspicion of the unorthodox—such as a barrister dressed as a slummy seeking to leave the Central Enclave without any apparent reason. Indeed, he was exposing himself to the risk of abduction. There would
