Midnight Lamp

by Gwyneth Jones

  He walked into one of the big, bland, reception rooms and was surprised to find Ax there, watching himself on tv. A superstar-anchor-person was asking about Yap Moss. Five hundred people dead in an afternoon, Mr Preston, in a bloody, brutal mediaeval battle in the Yorkshire countryside. Is that your idea of non-violence? The media folk were fascinated by the Islamic Campaign, Ax the rockstar-warlord; to Mr Preston’s disgust.

  Sage sat on a different couch. ‘Why are you watching this?’

  ‘Reality check.’

  On the tv, Mr Preston gave a decent, thoughtful, moderate answer. Looking good, guitar-man. Every thought of going into politics?

  ‘How was lunch?’

  ‘Diabolical.’

  Click. The English, in a body, all smiles and kooky cameraderie, swanning into a music gig. ‘Mr Branco has discovered that I never headlined on Top Of The Pops, so he can’t work for the movie.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘You know that surveillance we had such fun subverting?’

  The shipwrecked paparazzi had departed after the storm, with their ruined van on a recovery truck, thrilled and eternally grateful. They’d been asked no questions, no comments had been made. The English had decided it would be cooler just to see what happened. They’d been watching the Hollywood quantum computer output, but nothing clear-cut had surfaced.

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘It wasn’t your friend Janelle. Or if she set it up, she did it for Mr Branco. He’s been watching our old videos, and never suspected a thing. Now he knows we made a fool of him, and he does not see the funny side.’

  ‘Oooh. Tha’s unfortunate. How bad is it?’

  ‘Dead in the water.’

  ‘Grovelling apology?’

  ‘Red rag to a bull. He didn’t confess. You could say I’m just guessing. But if I’m right, and I’m sure I am, an apology would be worse than useless. We’d just be telling him to his face we know we made an idiot of him.’

  Ax continued his dour ego-search, and turned up a shopping channel that was auctioning antique Insanitude teeshirts. Sky-hook prices.

  ‘You did headline on the sucessor of TOTP,’ said Sage, at last. ‘October of Dissolution year, ‘Dark-Skinned They Were And Golden-Eyed’, Ax Preston and the Chosen Few, as I recall: and Jordan went mental.’

  ‘Oh yeah, I’d forgotten. But that was after I went into politics.’ He switched off and tossed the remote aside. ‘You know… Those stinking fights we used to have, it wasn’t always entirely Jor’s fault. I was hard on him.’

  ‘You had your eyes on the prize, my dear.’

  ‘God, I was such a wanker. Why did anyone put up with me?’

  ‘Carn’ imagine.’

  Ax stared at the pastel ceiling. ‘How was your session?’

  ‘Barbed, interesting. Dropping things in the quantum computer. Janelle is no pussycat, but… Oh.’ He had remembered that malicious twinkle. ‘You’re right. She knows about Branco. Shit. We are idiots. Why couldn’t we just block the signal, like Fee an’ Ammy said?’

  ‘Because we’re idiots.’

  The bastard won’t even sit next to me, thought Ax, because he knows how I’m feeling. Thank God they no longer had to share a bed: that would have been awful, impossible. Every time Sage was near he flashed on unbelievable memories, how it felt to kiss the guy passionately, how it felt to hold this man’s naked body in his arms—

  He laughed, Sage laughed. They didn’t explain why they were laughing.

  ‘Oh well,’ said Ax. ‘There goes world peace. I better tell Harry.’

  Harry already knew. Harry was clearly one of those annoying people (make a note of this) who just won’t deliver bad news. He’ll leave you to find out for yourself, at the worst moment, like that forcible medical procedure at the border. Mr Branco had been so impressed with his stolen footage of the Few’s home life he’d decided to package it and sneak it onto the grey market, anonymously: a ploy within normal limits for Hollywood, if a little cavalier about his clients’ privacy. A routine international copyright search had turned up the cuirous resemblance to a legitimately published work, and if the thing had ended there there’d have been no harm done. Alas, the story of how Mr Big got dusted, by a mere ex-dictator from a minor European state, had leaked, and was being whispered (in secret worlds foreign visitors couldn’t penetrate), all over tinsel town. Branco was furious. And it got worse. Much as many people hated him, it was going to be next to impossible to find an agent who’d take on the movie Lou had dumped, and dumped with menaces.

  The A&R man was shattered, and he couldn’t hide it.

  The Internet Commissioners, who had passed on vital information to their prisoners all through the data quarantine, were still keeping in touch. They special-delivered the news of Westminster’s Bonded Labour Bill to Ax, which pissed him off, because he didn’t want to know: but he had to be grateful when he met the hostile question: is this your post-modern alternative to the Welfare State, Mr Preston? The rich take the poor into private ownership?, in his next interview. The Commissioners hadn’t told him about Jordan, agreeing to accept a fancy country house from the government. He had to field the question about Does this imply that your brother’s being groomed for the Ceremonial Head Of State job? Completely unprepared. Fuck’s sake, Jor. Couldn’t you have waited? Did you have to take the bait right next to the Bonded Labour Bill? But probably Jordan saw no connection. Ax would have killed to get back to El Pabellon, but he had to keep handling these questions, doing what Ax Preston used to do.

  It was maddening.

  At last the President of the United States came to Bellevue, his beloved retreat in the San Gabriel Mountains. The former rulers of the Rock and Roll Reich were invited to his Memorial Weekend barbecue. They drove from LA in the Rugrat, with a second car full of minders (studio minders, they weren’t allowed to take their own security): ran the gauntlet of big fences and heavily armed soldiers in a crawling motorcade, waited in line and passed through the cattle-gates where the great and the good were scanned for bio-weaponry and suicide bombs, and made their bows with the throng, to the leader of the free world.

  Fiorinda was dressed as Fiorinda, in the kind of small-waisted, full-skirted party frock that had been her signature when she was a teenage punk diva: blue satin, with a random pattern of gold scribbles in oblique ref to the flag of Europe, but this dress didn’t come from a charity shop. She hadn’t paid for it at all, which felt like a demotion. In England she had never taken freebies, never allowed herself to be used as a designer’s dummy. The president shook her hand, able to do so because she’d been scanned by something fearsomely invasive, and said, ‘I’m proud to meet you, Ms Slater. I’m Kathryn’s uncle Fred, you know. She talks about you so much. You’re a very brave lady, I thank God you came through.’

  Kathryn Adams, Ax’s sponsor the US trip that had ended so badly, had been Fiorinda’s secret lifeline, when the Green Nazis were in power and everyone else thought Ax was dead; but she couldn’t form a sentence for her friend’s uncle. She was having trouble with this VIP crowd. If she didn’t get away quickly, she would be cursing the fucking lot of them… She smiled, and scooted: crossed the Japanese-landscaped terrace where the barbecue was being served, and hid behind a screen of trees. Forested ridges stretched away forever. The heat was leaden, the light strangely layered through a gleaming overcast—

  ‘Fiorinda?’

  Sage had followed her. Damn, he’s always watching.

  ‘I’m okay. It was the crush at the entrance: everything went a bit unreal. I’m good, I’ll come and mingle.’

  She reached up to straighten his black tie, which did not need straightening, and laid her hands lightly on his shoulders. ‘You two look fantastic in formals. I’m good. It’s just, that nice middle-aged bloke sh-shakes my hand, and I think of Pigsty Liver. Deja fucking vu, you know? Government receptions are difficult.’

  ‘My brat. I know you’re okay.’

  ‘Hey, not the nose. Don’t kiss my nose. Not in publ
ic!’

  ‘Nyah, we’re behind a tree. Listen, Ax has been told that the unofficial meeting won’t be ’til late. You an’ I don’t have to stay. We can leave now, if you like.’

  ‘Please don’t baby me. I need to look around. I can work a crowd, thanks.’

  In the front hall of the house, a seasoned, mellow log-cabin on the grand scale, they were accosted by a whey-faced young woman, with tiny eyes and lank, colourless hair, wearing a purple trouser suit that did nothing for her bulk.

  ‘Hi,’ she said, shyly, ‘Fiorinda? I’m Kathryn. I missed you at the meeting, greeting. Oh, it’s so cool that you’re here—’

  Kathryn had been a trisomy, a Downs Syndrome baby. Her parents had had the cognitive and internal problems fixed, but no cosmetic treatment, because they were Christians. Grown up, she’d decided to stick with the deal. She and Fiorinda had never met in person before.

  ‘Text pal! Oh, how great! It’s very cool to be here!’

  Sage stayed long enough to be sure that Fee was really happy, and went to join Ax: blissed out on a vision of his brat’s old starry smile. They walked around noting the exits, distribution of concealed-arms guards, the layout. They couldn’t stop themselves doing this; could only hope she wouldn’t notice. They were popular: plenty government and industry luminaries wanting to say hi. It would be a different story, alas, when the news got out that their movie was on the rocks. People are so shallow. The ex-dictator got into a conversation and Sage wandered off. A female suit in very sober formal wear came up, soon as she saw him alone, murmured that the president was waiting, and led him away. He’d made a private appointment, and the President hadn’t forgotten.

  Mr Eiffrich was in his study: by the bookshelves when Sage was shown in, somewhat stageily examining a volume of poetry. He peered, over the top of his reading glasses, like a schoolmaster. ‘Do you know Houseman, Mr Pender? Or should I say Aoxomoxoa? “What God abandoned, these defended, and saved the sum of things for pay…”’

  ‘Sage, please.’

  ‘Okay. Come on in, sit down with me’ He didn’t say, call me Fred.

  He brought the book with him to the rustic fireplace, where a pair of armchairs presided over a summer firebasket of decorative logs and cones.

  ‘To save the sum of things for pay… That’s what it means to be a soldier: soldari, solidus, a man who has sold himself, sold his will and his bodily strength to be freely spent, hopefully in a cause he can believe in.’ The President studied Sage carefully. ‘I remember my niece Kathryn and her friends, smart young kids, going wild over Aoxomoxoa, years ago. It was a mystery to me, I have to admit.’

  ‘No problem.’

  ‘But you gave it all up. You didn’t run out, you stayed to serve your country in time of need. I admired that.’ He seemed to trying to locate the admirable bit, and failing. ‘You won’t be joining us, at the meeting later?’

  ‘No, I’ll be taking Fiorinda home.’

  ‘I see!… Well, er, Sage, this is your gig. What did you want to discuss?’

  Sage had met some strange reactions on this trip. He hadn’t expected open hostility from Kathryn’s uncle Fred, but there you go. Blame it on Aoxomoxoa.

  ‘I don’t want to discuss anything. I’d like to give you this.’ Sage reached in his pocket (and saw the President react despite himself, the fight/flight twitch, hey, compadre), for a glassine envelope, containing a pinch of white crystals.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘It’s cocaine, Mr President. Organic cocaine, from Drumbeg Castle, Rufus’s place. I got hold of it from the Gardia, that’s the Irish police, some months ago.’

  ‘I know who the Gardia are. I’m sorry, I don’t—?’

  ‘When Ax was rescued, last year, organic cocaine was found in the kidnap house. I want to know if Rufus’s supply was by any chance from the same source. The Mexican authorities don’t have the evidence any more, but if it still exists, I bet you could have access.’

  Mr Eiffrich took the envelope. ‘The possibility of a connection between Rufus O’Niall and the hostage-taking was investigated. It’s an obvious issue.’

  ‘Yeah, but humour me. Ax was taken hostage, supposedly by a bunch of amateurs, coincidentally leaving England open to attack. The ringleader, the Brazilian João, is still at large, and you may have a problem with so-called black magic. I don’t know, but it’s suggestive. I thought your private network in the enforcement agencies might check this out, if it’s still possible.’

  ‘Ax wants me to pursue this?’

  I killed the bastard who tortured my Fiorinda, thought Sage. I’d like a few minutes alone with the bastard who did the same to my beautiful guitar-man. No, no, perish the thought (also I’d probably get stuffed). This is not revenge.

  ‘Ax doesn’t know. Ax thinks the kidnapping was his own stupid fault, and that he’s to blame for what happened in England when he didn’t come home. I’d like to be able to tell him he didn’t fall, he was pushed.’

  Mr Eiffrich gave Sage a hard, wondering look. He stood, went to an antique library desk, and locked the envelope away. ‘Leave it with me.’ He came back to the fire, and announced, sternly. ‘We’re completely private in here.’

  ‘If you say so, Mr President.’

  ‘However,’ The president cleared his throat, passed a hand through his rusty, thinning hair and continued at speed, ‘The Bellevue estate is fully surveilled, and I’m informed at once of anomalies.’ He touched the earpiece of his glasses, ‘By an AI. So that’s fine, that’s okay. No human agency. But I can’t guarantee no one will walk around the trees. I consider Ax Preston a personal friend of mine. I’m not saying anything against a very brave young lady, but I thought your affair with your friend’s wife was a thing of the past.’

  Sage put his hands in his pockets.

  ‘I know this is not my business,’ exclaimed Mr Eiffrich. ‘European mores are different, the heart has its reasons, I understand, but it is vital that you, Ax, and Fiorinda present a united front. Call it hypocrisy, naiveté, but that’s what the American people will expect. I’m not passing a moral judgement, I’m not threatening to tell tales. But could you for God’s sake be more discreet?’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Eiffrich. I’ll take that as a friendly warning.’

  ‘Good.’ Mr Eiffrich took his seat, and ran a hand through his hair again, only succeeding in tousling it further. ‘Sage, I’m sorry I had to… We really should talk. We have a lot to say to each other, and I’m glad—’

  ‘No worries. Thanks fer your time. Got to go now.’

  The younger crowd had gathered in the billiards room, drinking champagne and chattering, around a closely contested game. Fiorinda kept to the edge of the group, knocking back champagne (which helped her temper) and listening carefully to these inner circle juveniles. They knew the buzzwords: Crisis Europe, fusion consciousness, mind/matter revolution, but they would, wouldn’t they? She couldn’t spot anything out of place. Kathryn was sitting by Harry, where she could laugh at his jokes: Fiorinda had caught her gazing secretly, whenever the dandy young producer was looking the other way.

  Oh dear, poor Lurch. I hope that’s not too deep, because it looks painful.

  Lurch was Kathryn’s online handle. Fiorinda was debating, irrisistibly, if there was any way she could safely tweak things for her friend, when the gilded youths close to her fell silent. Sage came stalking up, graceful and intimidating. She’d seen the tiger and the wolf prowling together, earlier, and wondered if she should tell them they were scaring people: but it would only have made them worse.

  ‘Hi, Sage,’ piped up one bold gilded youthette.

  ‘Hi,’ said Sage, destroying the girl with a glance.

  He looked dangerous. ‘How are you?’ asked Fiorinda, cautiously.

  ‘Pharmacologically starved. You had enough?’

  ‘Yes. Let’s find Ax and tell him we’re leaving’

  ‘Ax is fine, he has his meeting, let’s you and me just go.’

  On their way
out they crossed paths with Lou Branco: who pretended not to see them, and said to the woman with him. ‘Fred ought to get himself a better party organiser. Someone who knows you don’t have to invite the whole town.’

  They had to wait to get the Rugrat out of bond, in a stark hangar where they were doubtless getting scanned again, and militarised flunkies stood at present arms. Sage drove without being asked, they swept down from the hills in a dazzling twilight. Neither of them said a word until they hit the LA grid, and the unacceptable face of car culture reasserted itself.

  ‘What shall we do?’ asked Sage, restlessly, as they crawled, nose to tail, nose to tail, nose to tail as far as the eye could fucking see. ‘Back to the house?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Want to look for an immix theatre an’ do some research?’

  ‘I don’t want to think about movies.’

  ‘Okay, got an idea. Let’s find the Steel Door, and see how Chip and Ver make out with the local heroes. But first I want a drink.’

  The Steel Door was a hot club where Chip and Ver, in their techno-duo identity as the Adjuvants, were guesting tonight.

  ‘Fine,’ said Fiorinda, recognising a lost cause. ‘Beer, not vodka.’

  ‘Deal.’

  ‘But not more than three per cent?’

  Mysteriously, this was a terrible thing to say. It earned her a truly savage look, like the living skull of old breaking through the veil of flesh.

  ‘Fuck that.’

  She hadn’t realised how much she missed the mask…

  ‘Okay, just don’t blame me when you throw up. Let’s see if we can get the Rugrat to find us a nice bar.’

  The Rugrat adamantly refused to find them a nice bar, unless they answered a multiple-choice questionnaire designed to prove you were sober now and wouldn’t dream of driving after taking liquor; not even on automatic. Ax and Sage had omitted to disable this wrinkle back in Mexico (they hadn’t been thinking about alcohol). Once they’d started trying to answer the stupid questions the Rat would not let them switch it off… In the end they parked on the street, vaguely in the region of the Steel Door. Unlike Ax, they weren’t trying to grasp the geography. The City of the Plain was just there, in varying states, when you left the freeways. They found a bar that was quiet, froze out the friendly waitress, and drank Sam Adams.