by Robert Ford
After twenty minutes’ drive Sam came to the high iron gates that marked the end of Enclave GK 4310. A member of the private security team that ran the border clambered out of his hut, crunching over the gravel in thick black boots and a mottled green uniform.
‘Morning,’ croaked Sam, holding out his identity card for inspection.
Without responding, the guard inspected the ID, lupine features creasing as he struck a broad smile. ‘Nice photo.’
‘Yeah, thanks,’ said Sam, a little annoyed, his large eyes blinking a rapid and involuntary protest.
The guard ran the barcode across a small black scanner. After a second or two the light changed from red to green and he handed back the card. ‘Have a nice day,’ he said without sincerity, waving a lazy arm in the direction of his colleague at the control desk.
Sam pocketed the ID whilst ahead the gates creaked open. Then, with a slight nod of the head and a few more blinks, he crossed the border into GK 4311.
An hour or so later and Sam had been through this process a further four times as he crossed the Estate, a mild sense of panic rising as he realised with each border the increasing distance from home.
After a time, the houses became less regular and the roads narrowed and curved as he moved from the outskirts of the Estate into the industrial south, what used to be the Surrey/Sussex borders, the air thick with the cloying residue of the vast factories that stood on either side of the road behind high wire fences and the omnipresent wink of digital surveillance. Then, in turn, this landscape gave way to the open spaces of the countryside beyond, so that Sam found himself driving past empty fields and tangled woodland, edging his way along single-track lanes shrouded by thick pockets of algal mist. For years, he had read the stories splashed throughout the press about the decline of agriculture and the subsequent breakdown of rural communities. England’s green and pleasant farmland had become an empty, feral place viewed by those in the Estate with an increasing degree of mistrust and alarm. Although he had never placed much store in these reports, now that he was here, in the midst of the unknown, Sam began to feel nervous, sweat prickling his hands as he tightened his grip on the slim plastic steering wheel.
Sam glanced over at the tracker and was alarmed to see its screen falter, spluttering black with an ominous electronic yelp. His heart began to race; this was bad, really bad, stuck in the countryside with no means of navigation, stuck in an area populated by strange and unusual folk, monsters even.
He slowed the car to a crawl.
‘Fuel. At least I have fuel.’ Sam thought to himself. Reaching across, he slammed his fist down on the dash hard.
Nothing.
‘Stupid piece of...’
Sam’s hand crashed down once more, sending the tracker skidding across the dash and on to the floor of the passenger’s side with a sharp thwack.
With one hand still on the wheel, and checking that he was aligned with the road, Sam stretched his midriff way over to the passenger’s side. With a lot of straining and a little grunting he extended his free arm in the direction of the tracker, but try as he might, could not quite reach the box.
Through the fog Sam could see a tall white structure ahead, and as he moved closer, realised it was a petrol station, a relic from the age of fossil fuels, global warming and such like - as good a place to stop as any.
The station was derelict, thin metallic pillars stretching skyward towards a dilapidated roof, paint peeling, ripped plastic flapping in the wind. Sam turned around, taking it all in; the mist was clearing and he was able to catch slim segments of the view across the road, into the valley and the fields below, a desolate, empty vista, but one that was not without a certain stark beauty of its own.
Sam moped round to the other side of the car and opened the door, picking up the tracker and shaking it a couple of times next to his ear.
‘Junk,’ he said, before throwing it on to the forecourt amongst the other detritus, the empty Coke bottles, the papers and plastic bags that already lay there.
Barely had the tracker landed when the air was pierced by the sharp whine and blue flash of an approaching police car. Sam looked at the car. Looked at the tracker. Looked at the car. Looked at the tracker.
The vehicle coasted shark-like over the forecourt, stopping some twenty metres short of him. The engine cut and the driver’s door swung open. Seconds later, a thickset policeman sprang out and rolled across the ground into a squat, aggressive crouch. He wore heavy black boots, combat trousers and body armour, with a strange protective object covering his right eye, similar to a jeweller’s loupe. More importantly, he also carried a large semi-automatic rifle, the gun now very much trained on Sam.
‘I’m sorry, officer. The. My. It was broken. And...’ Sam froze, and then, for want of a better idea, extended a stiff arm to point in the direction of the tracker, raising his thumb to an odd angle as he did. ‘That is. I’m lost. I think.’
The policeman turned his large leguminous head and spat a great wad of phlegm onto the ground to his right. Then with a certain practiced agility he sprang to his feet and advanced towards Sam, gun extended waist high as he went.
‘Hands above your head, please, Sir,’ said the policeman as he moved to within ten yards.
Sam raised his hands, a more difficult task than one would imagine given the strictures of his suit jacket, his wrists exposed to the chill breeze as they slipped their respective cuffs.
‘Where are they?’ The policeman’s eyes narrowed. ‘In the car?’
‘Excuse me?’
‘The boot. What’s in the boot?’
Sam’s heart pounded, adrenaline coursing through his veins, filling his mind with the awful guilt that plagues the innocent in such situations.
The policeman moved forward and popped the latch on the boot, swinging his rifle into the firing position as the door came up, but on seeing that it lay empty, he began to chuckle, almost to himself.
‘Yes. Very clever. Yes.’
The policeman moved around from the back of the car towards Sam.
‘I’m sorry, I...’
Sam was looking at the ground, wondering quite what to do, when a shout came from behind, a distressing guttural squawk, the kind of noise that you might hear from a stray sheep or goat caught in a barbed wire fence. Such was the cry that came as a large plump and completely naked man sprang from the roof of the car and onto the policeman, knocking him backwards on to the floor with considerable force.
‘Pig! Government pig!’ shouted the man over and over, as the two of them rolled this way and that in the dirt of the forecourt, wrestling furiously and with the utmost determination.
At first it seemed like the policeman had the upper hand but then with an impressive turn of speed, his naked assailant managed to force a flip and gain something of an advantage. Arms swung, legs kicked, pink flesh wobbled, indeed such was the ferocity of their clinch that the two men began to appear as one, an eight-limbed beast caught in the grip of some terrible metamorphosis.
For several minutes Sam stood in the chill country air, hands held aloft, transfixed by this most bewildering sight. But at last, and with one final thrust, the naked man managed to untangle himself and stagger to his feet. Somehow he had managed to liberate the policeman’s badge, gun and belt, a swag he now cradled with great care across his ample chest. For a second he stood as if only just woken from a deeply textured dream, eyeing Sam with a puzzled, jovial look. Then, remembering suddenly where he was, the naked man turned and sprinted away across the fields, whooping and hollering as he went.
It was quite some time before the policeman found the strength to clamber to his feet, his uniform now ragged, torn and dust covered: Robinson Crusoe in riot gear.
‘You!’ the policeman shouted, breathing hard. ‘You stay there!’
‘Sorry... I...’ Sam started, but before he could say anything further, the policeman took off across the unkempt pastures in pursuit of the naked man, eventually disappearing with som
ething like a flourish as he sprang over a small fence and into a stretch of woodland.
The wind was picking up, the clouds darkening as they sped across an oatmeal sky. Sam stood and shivered, and wondered what on earth he was letting himself in for.
EDGE HILL
It was nearly four in the afternoon by the time Sam nosed the car through the wrought-iron gates of Edge Hill and up the sloping gravel drive. A cold wind was sweeping in from the east, a brisk Siberian draught that was enough to disturb the yellowed leaves that lay in patches across the formal lawns. Ahead sat the main house, an Elizabethan pile rendered in the distinctive three-pronged formation of the period. Its walls were of red brick aged to a pastel-tinged orange and punctuated by huge, stone-lined windows, the glass of which was tinted to the extent that the panes were almost completely opaque.
There was a kind of bleak beauty to this place quite unlike anything Sam had ever seen before; indeed there was not a soul in sight. But as he stood there feeling rather lost, a small fat Labrador emerged from around the far edge of the house, padding towards him across the drive. Now it was a fact that at this point in his life Sam had only ever seen three dogs; two of which had been on television, one which had snarled and barked and smelt. On top of this, his mother had insisted for many years that a good deal of the world’s ills could be traced directly to the domestication of wolves; that they were in fact turncoats capable of great mischief, animals to be avoided at all costs.
Sam eyed the dog as it slowed and sat just a few yards away.
‘You are a dog man. I can see that now.’
Sam looked up with a start to see a lively, barrel-chested man striding towards him from the far side of the house.
‘You are a dog man, aren’t you?’ he repeated.
‘Well I...’ Sam trailed off into a mumbled adjunct as he looked down at the dog, who was by this time rolling about on the grass.
The man stood in front of him, his plump red face split by an enormous, eager smile. Draped entirely in tweed, he was perhaps fifty years old, with a ruddy, weathered complexion.
‘I really...’
‘Yes, of course you are.’
The man held out a chubby hand.
‘Andrew Daniels. And you must be Mr Swift.’
‘Nice to meet you,’ said Sam as they shook hands. ‘I’m here to see Mr Grimes. He telephoned me. Last week. About the vacancy?’
Daniels looked at his shoes momentarily, his expression clouding.
‘Ah. Tricky. Well, suffice to say Howard is... no longer with us.’
‘Oh dear. He’s dead?’
‘Who?’
‘Mr Grimes.’
‘No.’
‘Right.’
‘Right?’
Silence.
Mr Daniels smiling. Sam not.
‘There was a problem, an incident, really, on the way here. There was a police car and a man...’
Sam trailed off as he noticed Mr Daniels was holding a finger to pursed lips, shushing.
‘Unfortunately such things do tend to happen in these parts, Mr Swift. Farmers. Insurgents. Troublemakers. Police business, you know? Unpleasant, really. Let’s agree, I think, to say no more about it.’
‘But I really...’
‘You happen to have arrived just in time for tea,’ Daniels interrupted. ‘So if you should like to follow, Mr Swift, I’ll give you the tour.’
With that Mr Daniels led the way across the drive and through the front door of the house, in to a huge atrium, the centrepiece of which was a sweeping wooden staircase that led up to a gallery running left and right. The walls were panelled with oak, the floors lined in pale stone; here and there hung the dour portraits of pale aristocratic types, the former incumbents of this once magnificent seat.
Sam craned his neck and spun on his heel to see the great height of the building stretch up to the ancient beams above.
‘The residents’ quarters are in the side wings of the house. The staff live up there. Makes quite an impression, what?’ He waved an arm loosely and in no particular direction.
Soon they passed from the atrium into a wide cloister, which led in turn to a set of heavy double doors. Here Daniels stopped and turned and struck an elaborate pose, arms flung wide for added emphasis. ‘Feeding time at the zoo, Mr Swift!’
As he threw open the doors, the first thing that struck Sam was the noise which came as a great wave, a shocking clamour somewhere between a large hen house and the high-strained calls of a primary school playground. But this was nothing next to the unholy smell that followed it, a terrific gusting stink, akin perhaps to a mixture of cherry drops and faeces and disinfectant - a strange and unnatural odour.
Sam followed Daniels into the great hall, a huge, light space awash with activity. Large oak tables were laid out in parallel along its length, at which sat well-dressed young men and women, all seemingly in the region of twenty-five to thirty years old, and numbering eighty in total or thereabouts. They each had in front of them a small plastic pot that contained a green, porridge-like mixture; some ate this in silence, while others simply sat and stared into space. However, a great many of them seemed to be in a state of extreme distress; they squawked and drooled and chattered incessantly, banged cutlery, stamped feet and shoved tables, quite oblivious to the attentions of the white-coated warders who moved quickly between the many disturbances, calming where they could.
For a time Sam stood, absorbing the atmosphere of the room, trying to fathom the awful scene playing out in front of him. The view was terrible, and quite unlike anything he had ever seen before, unlike anything he had expected. His eyes began to sting, his knees to loosen. What madness was this? What people?
Daniels sat behind the desk, a small chestnut pipe clutched to the side of his thick mouth as he leafed intently through the ragged folder in front of him, stopping here and there, raising an eyebrow, grunting.
The study was small, cave-like in some way, cluttered though not chaotic. Sam sat opposite Daniels, arms folded across his front. He looked pensive, still more than a little unnerved by what he had just seen.
‘Mr Grimes recommends you very highly, Swift.’
‘He does?’
Daniels put down the file and kicked back in his chair, hands clasped behind his head.
‘Old friends, you know. In many ways he was a mother to me. But then, you probably already knew that?’
‘No, I...’
‘Of course. Of course.’ Daniels glanced back at the file. ‘I see your mother is unwell?’
‘Yes, she is, I’m afraid.’
Sam let his eyes drop to the floor, feeling the first pangs of guilt aroused by his absence from home.
‘Well, they can do wonders these days for... well, for people in her kind of situation. Time, Swift. Time is all. Don’t forget that.’
Sam tried to smile but his expression was something closer to a grimace, the muscles of his face refusing to collaborate fully in the lie.
Daniels leant forward across the desk, quite earnest now. ‘And why is it, Mr Swift, that you would like to work in the retirement home industry?’
Sam looked up at his open, solid face, hoping in some way that he might find an answer to this question there. The job had been arranged by chance; Mr Grimes was an old friend of Sam’s mother and he had stayed in contact over the course of her ill health, calling at irregular intervals, hoping for better news. The offer had been made; Sam had accepted. He knew little or nothing of what was expected of him, of the tasks he would be asked to perform. This was not a career move, a rational move in any sense. This was an escape, a chance to jettison the claustrophobia of the Estate and the terrible weight of apprehension brought on by his mother’s condition. A throng of ideas, the hopes and dreams and fears that led him to come to Edge Hill, raced through Sam’s mind. How could he possibly shape these competing notions into anything coherent?
‘Well. I’ve always had a...’ Sam started but before he could finish Daniels raised
a plump hand.
‘Really, dear boy. What a perfectly dreadful question. I am sorry. Don’t say another word. We are not, after all, in the United States of America, are we?’
Sam paused for a moment, wondering if this was in fact a trick question. ‘Well, no.’
‘Exactly,’ said Daniels, rocking back in his chair and lighting the pipe.
‘You must have smelt them, Swift, what?’ he said, in between mildly plosive pulls.
‘Yes, I think so. In the dining room?’
‘Yes. Yes. Unfortunate byproduct of the ‘process’. You’ll get used to it after a while, believe me. The average age of our residents is one hundred and thirty-five, although, as you may have seen, it is rather difficult to tell the old from the very old and the very, very old. And so on. But why not? The rejuvenation of the body, of the skin, is a wonderful process, and apart from the smell, the tech is pretty faultless these days. The mind, however... well the mind is a most slippery thing, Swift, and quite honestly at this point in time the science hasn’t caught up. The body can just go on and on. But the mind... well, it turns to mud.’
‘So they’re mad, then?’
‘Mad? No. Not mad. Old, Swift. Antique. Mentally diminished, I believe, is the current parlance.’
‘Right. I see,’ said Sam, imagining what it would be like to escape, to return home again.
Daniels struck a thoughtful pose, drifting off momentarily. Then, quite without warning, he sat up, turning towards Sam with a pained, earnest expression on his face.
‘Do you like to dance, Mr Swift?
‘Do I like to dance?’
‘What exactly do you think this is? I will not have this establishment treated like a Gazino Bere!’
Sam stared back at him.
‘Excuse me?’
‘Edge Hill... is not... a gazino bere.’
‘Bere?’
‘Gazino Bere.’
‘Gazino?’
‘Gazino Bere. A Gazino, Mr Swift, as one might find in Las Vegas.’
‘A casino?’