may do so. Liners will arrive next Wednesday to take you to Southampton. Passage to the destination of your choice will be provided there.
‘Those who require a more extensive relocation may remain here until the details have been worked out.
‘But you do not have to leave this Village. You may stay if you like. Repeat: You may stay if you like. We are not being closed down, merely opened.’
I t was good to be in London again.
He leaned back against the bus seat and looked down through the window at the street below. A newsboy stood in the grey twilight: a red and white sweatered figure against asphalt grey paving. The buildings were red, soot-blackened brick with dun, soot-blackened casements. There was debris—old newspaper, bits of cardboard, shattered plastic, a weatherstained playbill—blowing along the sidewalk and out into the street, where it was flattened beneath the wheels of passing cars.
MINISTRY SCANDAL—HIGH OFFICIALS SLAIN ROVING YOUTHS BATTLE POLICE IN PICCADILLY COMMUNIST PLOT CLAIMS M.P.
‘So, you know, I says to her: If you don’t get your arse into gear and go out and get yourself a job, I’m gonna kick your butt. And she says to me—get this: the girl’s been laying around there ever since she got outta school, doing nothing but watching the telly and talking to boys on the phone—and where they get the time, I don’t know—and I tell her to go out and get a job, and she looks up at me and smiles and says, “I don’t know if I should, ma, I think I’m pregnant.” And you wanta know something else: she says she don’t know who the father is.’
‘Well, I never. That’s almost as bad as—’
KNIFING ON OMNIBUS
KILLER OF FOUR CAPTURED THROUGH ACCIDENT
There was a high-pitched scream.
‘Leave me alone.’
A young man glared indignantly at his companion, and as the bus came to a stop, he slapped the offender, leaped to his feet and stormed down the stairs.
The stench of sweat, wine and urine was unbearable. In the pastoral reality of the Village he had forgotten air could be so foul. The indulgent softness of the voices was like the sound of grease sputtering or the wetness of poured garbage. Their faces were coarse, hardened, impoverished, smouldering with resentment. He got up, went to the back exit and down around it to the street. A newspaper stand displayed its headline: OXFORD RIOT—65 ARRESTED.
A sign above the door read: FISH & CHIPS. He went in.
‘What’ll it be, love?’
‘Fish and chips.’
‘Aught to drink?’
‘Ginger beer.’
She slid open the door of the fryer, reached in with a scoop. Two fat golden fish came out. She lay them on a paper and brought out the chips. Then she folded the paper into a neat parcel.
‘Vinegar and salt?’
‘Please.’
She got a bottle from the cooler. ‘That’ll be sixpence.’
He paid it and turned around.
A camera was mounted over the door, swivelling slowly from right to left. TELE-GUARD SECURITY CAMERA, the identification plate said. Monitored twenty-four hours a day!
He stepped out on to the street.
All motion froze. Reality ground to a halt. Everything was still, even (he was certain) the motion of particle and electron.
Some terrible dislocation wrenched through marrow and bone.
Alone on the suddenly silent earth, he was as frozen as they.
This had been reality: deep in the fibre of his being, in the bedrock of his mind, he had believed this reality. Each blade of grass, each breath of air, each glimmer of light had seduced and compelled him. He had given himself up to the illusion.
And reality had broken.
Then, from far away, like the distant wail of the wind, a force blew up, stirring the dry grey dust of reality, and rising along his hackles in a frigid, blistering gale.
It lashed up about him and the fabric of reality quickened, grew thicker, took on life. The figures began to change. First their expressions (little flickerings of eye and mouth) and then their bodies (hair, complexion, length
‘Those who require a more extensive relocation may remain here until the details have been worked out.
‘But you do not have to leave this Village. You may stay if you like. Repeat: You may stay if you like. We are not being closed down, merely opened.’
I t was good to be in London again.
He leaned back against the bus seat and looked down through the window at the street below. A newsboy stood in the grey twilight: a red and white sweatered figure against asphalt grey paving. The buildings were red, soot-blackened brick with dun, soot-blackened casements. There was debris—old newspaper, bits of cardboard, shattered plastic, a weatherstained playbill—blowing along the sidewalk and out into the street, where it was flattened beneath the wheels of passing cars.
MINISTRY SCANDAL—HIGH OFFICIALS SLAIN ROVING YOUTHS BATTLE POLICE IN PICCADILLY COMMUNIST PLOT CLAIMS M.P.
‘So, you know, I says to her: If you don’t get your arse into gear and go out and get yourself a job, I’m gonna kick your butt. And she says to me—get this: the girl’s been laying around there ever since she got outta school, doing nothing but watching the telly and talking to boys on the phone—and where they get the time, I don’t know—and I tell her to go out and get a job, and she looks up at me and smiles and says, “I don’t know if I should, ma, I think I’m pregnant.” And you wanta know something else: she says she don’t know who the father is.’
‘Well, I never. That’s almost as bad as—’
KNIFING ON OMNIBUS
KILLER OF FOUR CAPTURED THROUGH ACCIDENT
There was a high-pitched scream.
‘Leave me alone.’
A young man glared indignantly at his companion, and as the bus came to a stop, he slapped the offender, leaped to his feet and stormed down the stairs.
The stench of sweat, wine and urine was unbearable. In the pastoral reality of the Village he had forgotten air could be so foul. The indulgent softness of the voices was like the sound of grease sputtering or the wetness of poured garbage. Their faces were coarse, hardened, impoverished, smouldering with resentment. He got up, went to the back exit and down around it to the street. A newspaper stand displayed its headline: OXFORD RIOT—65 ARRESTED.
A sign above the door read: FISH & CHIPS. He went in.
‘What’ll it be, love?’
‘Fish and chips.’
‘Aught to drink?’
‘Ginger beer.’
She slid open the door of the fryer, reached in with a scoop. Two fat golden fish came out. She lay them on a paper and brought out the chips. Then she folded the paper into a neat parcel.
‘Vinegar and salt?’
‘Please.’
She got a bottle from the cooler. ‘That’ll be sixpence.’
He paid it and turned around.
A camera was mounted over the door, swivelling slowly from right to left. TELE-GUARD SECURITY CAMERA, the identification plate said. Monitored twenty-four hours a day!
He stepped out on to the street.
All motion froze. Reality ground to a halt. Everything was still, even (he was certain) the motion of particle and electron.
Some terrible dislocation wrenched through marrow and bone.
Alone on the suddenly silent earth, he was as frozen as they.
This had been reality: deep in the fibre of his being, in the bedrock of his mind, he had believed this reality. Each blade of grass, each breath of air, each glimmer of light had seduced and compelled him. He had given himself up to the illusion.
And reality had broken.
Then, from far away, like the distant wail of the wind, a force blew up, stirring the dry grey dust of reality, and rising along his hackles in a frigid, blistering gale.
It lashed up about him and the fabric of reality quickened, grew thicker, took on life. The figures began to change. First their expressions (little flickerings of eye and mouth) and then their bodies (hair, complexion, length
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