19

THE NEED TO UNDERSTAND

A LINE OF AMBULANCES appeared through the smoke and haze, waiting outside the Accident & Emergency entrance of Brooklands Hospital. The rioters had moved down the street facing the hospital, wrecking several of the shops. The broken windows of a travel agency lay on the pavement in front of me, a glass snare ready to bite the ankles of any incautious stroller.

I picked my way through the ugly needles, and noticed a woman in a white coat who stood beside a parked car, gesturing in a vague way at the drifting smoke. Recognizing Dr Julia Goodwin, I felt a rush of pleasure in seeing her, and for a moment the whole disastrous evening fell behind me.

‘Julia? What’s happened? You look . . .’

‘Mr . . . Pearson? God, everything’s happened.’ She seemed confused, fists drumming on the car as if haranguing an obstinate patient. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I’ve been taking part in a riot.’ I tried to calm her, holding her wrists in my hands, a pair of pulses that seemed to throb to a different beat. ‘Are you . . . ?’

‘All right? What the hell do you think?’ She wrenched her hands away from me, and noticed an ambulance driver stepping from his cab. She waved to him rather giddily, and lowered her voice, eyes swerving across the haze. ‘Richard, you’re pretty sane, some of the time. What exactly is going on?’

‘Don’t you know?’

‘I haven’t the least idea.’ She stared at the car, and said matter-of-factly, as if not wholly believing herself: ‘Geoffrey Fairfax is dead.’

‘The bomb at the Metro-Centre. Tragic . . . I’m sorry for him.’

‘He was a bit of a thug, actually.’ Saying this seemed to revive her. ‘He tried to defuse the bomb.’

‘Who told you that?’

‘Sergeant Falconer. An odd little fish; I wouldn’t like her interrogating me. Geoffrey must have seen the device in the bomber’s car. She says they’ll trace the owner. Who drives around with a bloody bomb in the back seat?’ She turned to me and without thinking brushed the soot from my shoulder, as if grooming a neighbour’s cat. ‘Richard, this whole place is going mad.’

‘I think that’s the idea. It didn’t really work, though.’

‘What are you talking about? Have you seen Tony Maxted and Sangster?’

‘All over the place. They’re everywhere. Practically cheerleaders.’

‘They’re trying to lower the temperature. Calm people down, and head off anything really ugly. The police are backing them.’

‘Is that what Sergeant Falconer said?’

‘More or less. She was a bit shaky, as you’d expect. I don’t know what Geoffrey Fairfax saw in her . . .’

I held Julia’s shoulders, trying to steady her when she stumbled against the car. I pointed to the hospital, as an ambulance driver switched off his engine. ‘Shouldn’t you be in—?’

‘A&E? My shift ended ten minutes ago.’ Reminded of her professional role, she eased me away and straightened her gown. ‘Thanks for the help. You’re very sweet. It’s amazing there aren’t more casualties. Kicking in windows, setting fire to cars—people in Brooklands seem to have the knack. I want to get home, but look at this . . .’

She pointed to the shattered windscreen, a spider’s web of fractured glass left by a baseball bat. Raising her head, she began to wail softly to herself.

‘Julia, we’ll call a taxi.’ I tried to take one of her hands. ‘Listen, I’ll walk you back to the hospital. Perhaps you should see someone?’

‘Who?’ My inept question stopped her in mid-breath. ‘One of the medics? Holy Jesus!’ She blew the hair out of her eyes, genuinely amazed by me. ‘Richard, I work with them all day. There isn’t one of the little shits I’d trust myself with . . .’

‘Fair enough.’ I leaned over the windscreen and used my elbow to force in the glass. ‘You can still drive the car. Just keep the speed down.’

‘Good.’ Brightening, she said: ‘I’ll give you a lift. Where’s your car?’

‘It . . . the engine blew up. They’ve taken the car away to have a look at it.’

‘Too bad. I know the feeling.’ She opened the door and swept the beads of glass from her seat. Settling herself behind the wheel, she said: ‘In the end, the street is all you can trust.’

WE DROVE THROUGHthe empty town, fragments of windscreen glass blowing onto our laps. The Metro-Centre was quiet, the last smoke rising from the overturned Land Cruiser. A fire-engine crew were hosing down another gutted vehicle in the deserted plaza. The riot had ended, as if full time had been called by a referee. A few supporters walked home, St George’s shirts tied around their waists, bare-chested husbands arm in arm with their wives. A police car cruised past them, quietly retaking the night.

Driving calmed Julia. She peered through the hole in the windscreen, and whistled at the burnt-out cars.

‘Richard, what happened here? Something new and very dangerous is going on.’

‘You’re right. The bomb at the Metro-Centre was the signal. The damage to the dome was supposed to trigger a general uprising.’

‘It did.’

‘No. Tonight was just another football riot. Maxted and Sangster are being used. I don’t know about Geoffrey Fairfax. The real people behind the bomb want street revolution, something violent and ugly, spreading to all the motorway towns. With David Cruise as the Wat Tyler of cable TV, leading a new peasants’ revolt. Then the police and Home Office will move in. Close down the dome, wheel on the cucumber sandwiches and relaunch the kingdom of Surrey.’

‘It nearly happened.’

‘Not quite. David Cruise wouldn’t take the bait. He hasn’t spent all these years in television for nothing. He could see it was a set-up.’

‘But why? I hate the damned dome, but I don’t want to kill anyone.’

‘You’ve still got your job. There are people who were doing very nicely and feel left out. Power has moved to the Metro-Centre and the retail parks along the M25. It’s a new kind of consumerism—sponsored football teams, supporters’ clubs, marching bands, stadium lights blazing all night, cable TV. A lot of people don’t like it. The police, the local council, old-style businessmen who can’t get their noses in the trough. They want to discredit the Metro-Centre, and they’ll do anything to harm it.’

‘Tony Maxted? And Bill Sangster?’

‘They’re too amateurish. For Maxted the whole thing is a case study. One day he’ll write a book and get it adapted on BBC2. Sangster is different, how and why I don’t know.’

‘I do. Listen, he’s drawn to the madness of it all. Every day he has to hold his school together, a huge effort of will. Why bother? Secretly, he’s tired. He wouldn’t mind if the whole bloody place was flushed down the loo . . .’ She reached out to grip my hand. ‘Richard, I’m sorry about Brooklands, it’s been a nightmare for you . . .’

I sat back, glad to be with this spirited and chaotic young woman, even in this shambles of a night, which had left me more confused than ever. Part of me wanted to confront Julia Goodwin about my father’s fatal injury and the mysterious role played by Duncan Christie. She wore her unease over the old man’s death like a badly tailored shroud. Emotions crowded her face, competing for space among its frowns and grimaces. Like a child, her guilty feelings played around her mouth and bared teeth, fretting her tired eyes and the muscles of her cheeks. At times, her entire personality was a courtroom sitting in judgement on herself.

When we reached my father’s flat she turned carefully into the drive, then lost her bearings in the darkness. A privet hedge thrashed what was left of the windscreen, sending a shower of sharp beads across us. I took the wheel, forced the gear lever into neutral and let the car freewheel across the gravel. Julia peered into the driving mirror, wincing at a tiny nick on her forehead.

‘You ought to look at that.’ I helped her from the car. ‘There’s an old airline first-aid kit. Have a drink while I call a taxi . . .’