Europe in Winter (The Fractured Europe Sequence)(56)

Rupert looked out across the lawn in front of the house. A couple of security men were patrolling. One had a large and dangerous-looking dog. The security men were wearing combat gear and windbreakers with Arabesque Security lettered across the shoulders in green.

“The salary is pathetic, if you want to know,” he said.

“That’s a pity,” Michael said. “It’s hard to make a decent living these days. It’s rather brave of you to come, you know. Lion’s den, and all that.”

“Oh, do stop patronising me,” Rupert told him. “I had enough of that before.”

Michael glanced at him. “I thought we were friends.”

“I can’t imagine what gave you that idea,” said Rupert.

Michael beamed. “There,” he said. “That’s better. Shall we walk?”

“Won’t they miss you in there?”

“I can’t think why. The Europeans will probably be glad to see the back of me; I have the impression I’m starting to annoy them. I know they’re starting to annoy me.”

They walked away from the house. The gardens tipped steeply down towards a screen of trees, and Michael had to walk carefully because his leather-soled shoes kept slipping on the wet grass.

“It’s good to see you, actually,” he said. “We’ve been trying to contact you, but you never answer.”

“Is Molson here?”

“Andrew goes wherever the wind blows him.” Michael looked at him. “Which I regret to say is not here, for the moment.” He almost lost his footing, recovered himself. “How are you enjoying Europe, by the way? The food’s wonderful, isn’t it?”

They walked into the trees, and Michael stopped for a few moments as if trying to get his bearings before setting out again along a path between dense, bushy foliage. “How did you find out about this soiree?” he asked.

“We’ve been keeping an eye on Arabesque,” said Rupert. “They have a security contract in Luxembourg which we’re quite interested in.”

Michael nodded. “Yes. In fact, that’s one of the things we’ve been discussing today, Luxembourg. Very perplexing.”

“They call it the Realm,” Rupert said. “The Europeans.”

Michael laughed. “I know. Bless them. We’re actually very angry about it. But so are they. Nobody seems to know who’s responsible.”

“Or nobody wants to admit it.”

“All we want is the return of our citizens,” said Michael. “The Europeans want to give them back – I think they find the whole thing quite embarrassing, really – but they won’t do anything until they receive assurances that we won’t do it again. Which we can’t give them, because we didn’t do it in the first place. As I said, perplexing.”

The path dipped down slightly and turned to follow a little stream through the trees. Michael strode across it and Rupert followed. On the other side, the ground rose again, and all of a sudden they stepped out of the woodland and two Community soldiers with European rifles slung across their chests were standing there.

Michael stopped and showed the soldiers some documents. “This gentleman will catch his death if he’s not careful,” he told them, indicating Rupert, and one of the soldiers took off his combat jacket and held it out. Rupert put it on and looked about him. The estate was gone, the house was gone, Sweden was gone, Europe was gone. There was just a bleak expanse of moorland rising gently towards a screen of hills. There was a road in the middle distance, and parked on it were a number of electric cars, guarded by more soldiers. Rupert sighed. He had sworn to himself that he would never come back here.





2.





THE WHITTON-WHYTES, THE creators of the Community, had started modestly. They had, bit by bit, built themselves a county just to the west of London. When this was successful, they had extended their creation until it occupied an expanse of territory from the Iberian Peninsula to a little east of Moscow, an invisible Continent. They, and their descendants, had then gone on to conquer it.

At its most basic, the Community was a beautiful thing, an artifact like the gardens of an English country house. Its geography was roughly similar to that of Europe, but its landscape was not. A tributary of the River Trent had run through the Campus, Rupert’s lost home, but it had been ringed by mountains modelled on the Alps. The landscape Rupert could see through the windows of the car was not very like the landscape of southern Norway; it looked, he thought, more like the North York Moors, where he had spent a pleasant week or so two years before. The Whitton-Whytes, it occurred to him, had mapped England across the whole of Europe, with a few pleasing embellishments stolen from other countries.

There was a wicker basket on the floor at the back of the car. It contained plates and cutlery and glasses and little jars of jam and tins of foie gras and caviar and packets of wafer biscuits and bars of expensive chocolate and small bottles of wine and champagne. Michael had a fondness for Fortnum & Mason picnic hampers. For less refined tastes there was a thermos of milky tea and a paper-wrapped package of ham sandwiches made with doorsteps of white bread. Rupert declined both.

“So,” Michael said. “Shall we clear the air a little first, or do you want to plunge right in?” When Rupert didn’t reply immediately, he asked, “How’s the girl, by the way? The one you took over the border with you?”