En route, they planned their campaign as best they could. But the message they carried did not fit comfortably into the purview of any government office they could name, and they found that they knew embarrassingly little about the bureaucracy itself and still less about the people who made it up.
Anofi’s joking suggestion that the Foreign Office would be most interested put an end to the effort, and they followed Schmidt’s example by sight-seeing the rest of the way. They peered through grime-streaked windows as Essex and Hertfordshire flashed by, the dry stone walls, the endless towns and villages of an island thoroughly tamed by its human inhabitants.
When they disembarked at the Broad Street Station, it was an hour after the start of the business day, and so the underground and buses were idle, not to move again until the evening exodus. They set off on foot to Westminster, nearly five kilometres distant, in a cold swirling mist. South on Bishopsgate past Lloyds and the tower of the Stock Exchange, and across the new London Bridge they went. The Thames was dotted with barges; the Tower Bridge was a ghost downstream.
They hastened west through Bankside, past the sprawling hulk of Waterloo Station and the stark face of the South Bank cultural complex. When they reached the Westminster Bridge at last, their goal was in sight: the Houses of Parliament, rising above the walled west bank of the river.
As they crossed the long span, Eddington seemed transfixed by the intricate beauty of the Parliament structures. “Mourning the death of peerage and privilege?” asked Schmidt, walking beside him.
“Perhaps a little,” Eddington admitted. It was true that in earlier times, better times, the House of Lords would have been a club for the Eddingtons and their ilk. Now, with the Lords abolished in the Reformation, he was merely one of many whose name had once meant ruling class.
The peer representing Cambridgeshire refused to see them. They had to be satisfied with a junior staff member, who advised them that no support for basic research was politically or fiscally possible, whatever the topic of research.
That proved to be one of the more positive moments of the next three hours. More than once, they were turned away as soon as they gave their names. Where they were not, the mention of the reason for their visit brought a swift, curt dismissal—and occasionally a withering rebuke.
Aikens quickly learned to state their credentials in terms of college and degree rather than specialty, and to couch their purpose in ominous but ambiguous terms. Even so, they could not penetrate the bureaucratic shield that surrounded the Lord Privy Seal, the Home Secretary, and the like.
At one point they stood in a huddle of Whitehall, a few paces from Downing Street. “It’s almost as if we were expected,” Anofi said gloomily.
“How could that be?” asked Aikens. Anofi had no answer, and they continued on.
Ironically enough, it was at the Foreign Office that they at last received some encouragement. Aikens introduced them as ministers-without-portfolio for a sovereign nation seeking recognition, and were they interested in setting up a dialogue?
Perhaps because of the instability in a dozen African and Central American countries, that got them admitted to an inner office, where each was given several forms to complete. When they turned them in, they were sent to an office in the west end of the labyrinthine building. Unescorted and despite the helpful directions of three different clerks, it took them nearly forty minutes to find it. There a junior minister received them and ushered them quickly into his office. In hushed tones, he asked, “You’re actually from Cambridge, aren’t you?”
The trio exchanged glances. “Yes,” said Aikens.
“And this sovereign nation—it’s not on this planet, correct? We’ve gotten some unconfirmed reports about astronomers having made contact—”
“It is, and we are the astronomers.”
“Well, I’m certainly glad you came to us. This is an important matter, and it needs proper attention.”
Aikens sighed, relieved. “I can’t tell you what it means to find a sympathetic ear. We’ve been turned out of a score of offices—”
“Acting on our instructions. We had to see that it was played down—we wouldn’t want newsboys shouting this on the streets, now, would we?” Promising to have an audience arranged with the appropriate officials, the minister dispatched them to a photographer located on a subterranean level.
Though the minister’s directions seemed explicit enough, again they got lost. The photographer fiddled and fussed and talked to himself, oblivious to his subjects’ impatience.
At long last, they returned to the junior minister’s office, and he escorted them to a conference room nearby. A dozen men and women were arrayed around a large table, and they grew silent and solemn when the scientists appeared.
They listened intently as Aikens introduced the others and then told of the receipt of the signal and the decoding of the message. He passed copies of its text around the table, and as he watched them read, he felt it was going well. There had only been one interruption—a messenger with a large envelope for the junior minister. And although a few mouth corners were turned up in tolerant smiles, Aikens felt the rest of his audience was at least open-minded and possibly with them.
That is, until the questions began.
“Graham Blackett, maintenance engineer. Ah, what sort of sex life do these critters have? I mean, will the embassy staff there be able to enjoy themselves on a Saturday night?”
The question and Blackett’s leering wink prompted laughter and more questions, hurled one after another at the scientists like spoiled fruit from a rowdy dance-hall crowd.
“Michael Smythe, Far East clerk. D’ you think they’d be willin’ to donate a few young’uns for a display at the London Zoo?”
“Donna Laytham, food service. Where do you get your rocket ship overhauled between flights?”
“Vernon MacPherson, commerce. Tell us, how much human blood will their confectioners be looking to import? And will they be hirin’ an agent to handle this end for ’em?”
Aikens was stunned into silence, and the others were little better off: Anofi red-faced, Eddington sputtering monosyllables. In the midst of the tumult, as the questioners began to call out sarcastic answers to their own questions, the junior minister opened the envelope and came to the head of the table. There he presented each of the visitors with a photo ID badge identifying them as Ambassadors from Pluto. There was a greenish cast to their faces, and their heads had sprouted silver antennae.
“All in fun, sport,” said the minister, patting Aikens on the shoulder and laughing so hard he was near tears. “Sir Winston told us to watch for you and we couldn’t resist.” Gesturing to the others to follow, he left the room, chortling.
But one middle-aged man, balding and paunchy, was slow to leave, and stopped at the door when the others were gone.
“Look—I understand,” he whispered conspiratorially, glancing over his shoulder into the corridor to see if he was being watched. “Not that I can talk to anyone here about it. But I used to read Aldiss and Clarke—saw all nine
Star Wars
flicks, you understand?”
His voice dropped to the barest rustle. “It’s a good go, and a bonnie tale. But you watered it down too much with that corny English-language bit, like a flick where the Japanese all speak Hyde Street English. First contact’ll be made in the language of scien—of nature. The decay of neutrons, the spectra of stars—you know. You’ve got to jazz it up a bit, get more mystical, a little more sweep. Knock them back a little. And good luck to you. Somebody’s got to do something. My favorite books are all falling apart.”
They sat together in a Victoria Street pub afterward, too deflated to even consume the drinks placed before them. “There’s not a confessed scientist in the whole British government, and damned few closet ones,” Aikens said bitterly.
“But it’s nothing new,” Schmidt observed dispassionately. “There have always been people suspicious of science—those who never understood it and resented feeling the fool, those who got lost in the details and never saw its vision, those who were bored or belittled or made to feel left out. They’re having their day now. And you know, there were always more of them than there were of us.”
“Damn you and your philosophy,” said Aikens. “And damn Terence Winston, too. I never dreamed he could be this petty—sabotaging us because he couldn’t accept the facts. A bloody meddler, that’s what he is.”
“You have that flaw of thinking well of people,” Schmidt agreed. “We’ll have to get to someone he can’t get to,” said Anofi gloomily.
“The table is open for suggestions,” Eddington said.
“This isn’t the only country, you know.”
“Dream on,” said Eddington.
“Perhaps we need to aim higher,” Aikens said thoughtfully. “At people who can act without getting approval from the next three levels above them. And perhaps we’ll have to go through the back door.”
“What are you getting at?”
“How about the Prime Minister himself?”
“And how will we manage that, if we can’t even manage a chat with our peer?” asked Eddington. “By being more forceful,” said Anofi. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean, do whatever it takes.”
“He’s the wrong man, anyway,” Schmidt reminded them.
“He’s ignorant and proud of it.”
“We could always go to Hyde Park and harangue the passersby,” Eddington said cynically. “Or write a scathing letter to the
Times
.”
“No,” Anofi said quietly. “I know who we should target.”
“Who?”
“The King.”
The others stared at her. “William?” asked Schmidt, incredulous. “Why riot? He had a liberal education, including the sciences—trained as a pilot and all that.”
“Good Lord, yes!” gushed Aikens. “She’s bloody well right. We’ll go after the King.”
Anofi struck the table with a fist for emphasis. “But no halfway measures. Whatever it takes. He’s the one we’ve got to get to. Then they’ll have to listen.”
In their celebratory mood, no one noticed the young man rise from the table beside them and leave the pub. But there was no missing the grim-faced constables who returned with him a few minutes later to take the four of them away.
The metallic clank as the cell door unlocked startled Marc Aikens from his far from peaceful sleep. “Time to go, cant-spinner. It’s court day for you,” boomed the grinning guard who stood in the doorway.
“Court day? That can’t be. I haven’t even talked with a barrister yet,” Aikens protested, sitting up and squinting at the corridor lights.
“You’re the prisoner Marc Dan-i-el Aikens, and the daybook says it’s court for you. You don’t need a barrister because it’s a King’s Witness who’ll testify, and they’re sworn to honesty. Now let’s be going.”
“But look at me, man—I haven’t even washed up yet. Am I to appear in court like this?”
“And I suppose you want Dame Justice to wait while you primp. Ha to that! Now, give us your hands behind your back, there’s a good fellow.”
With a sigh, Aikens gave up his wrists to the handcuffs. Then, hair unkempt and wearing the wrinkled clothes he had slept in, Aikens found himself escorted down the corridors to the prison’s loading area. A transfer van was waiting, and it roared off once Aikens was inside and the doors were slammed shut.
The ride was a short one, and Aikens caught but glimpses of the city through the small slitted windows at the rear of the van. But he did not need to see the streets of London to know that they were taking him to Old Bailey—the Central Criminal Court.
He was unloaded in the privacy of a sealed garage, with no one but a guard and a nattily dressed detective sergeant there to see him. He was led by the sergeant down brightly lit but deserted hallways to an unmarked doorway. When the door was opened in response to the sergeant’s knock, Aikens caught a quick glimpse of polished wood and the figures of several people.
As he had expected, it was a courtroom. As he had hoped but dared not expect, standing in the dock already were Anofi, Eddington, and Schmidt.
“Oh, hell, the gang’s all here,” Anofi said with faint humor as Aikens joined them.
“How have things been for you, Marc?” Schmidt asked.
“Mo better than for any of you, I’m sure. Has anyone had any outside contact? A barrister, family, anything?” None had, and they were sobered by the discovery. “This has to be a preliminary hearing of some kind,”
Eddington said with a confidence he did not feel.
“I’m afraid we are here for our trial, Larry,” Aikens said, watching the clerks putting their papers in order and topping off the pitcher on the judges’ bench.
“A trial
in camera
, I would guess,” said Schmidt, eyeing the empty benches in the public area.
“They can’t do that,” Eddington protested.
“Just watch them.”
“Quiet in the dock!” cried the bailiff. “All rise!”
Three bewigged jurists entered via a door to the right and moved to their seats. “Where are the barristers?” whispered Anofi. ‘This is a bench trial, like in my country,” Schmidt whispered. “The judges will question the witnesses.”
“The King’s Plenipotentiary Court is now in session, the honorable Kelly Smythe-White, First Magistrate, presiding,” intoned a clerk.
Smythe-White examined a sheet of paper, then looked up. “Who brings these charges against the accused?” he asked.
“I do, First Magistrate.” The voice came from behind the dock, but none who stood in it needed to turn to know who spoke.
“Winston, you bastard pup—” Eddington’s outburst was cut short by a sharp warning jab between the shoulder blades with a constable’s billy club. Eddington turned and glowered at the officer, who merely raised an eyebrow and tapped his billy in the palm of his hand.
“State your complaint.”
“Sir, I have personal knowledge that these prisoners have engaged in a seditious conspiracy to deceive and defraud this government through the practice of humanist arts,” Winston said smoothly, coming forward to the rail. “Out of duty to the Crown, I sought and obtained the signature of an officer of this court on my complaint. That is the document now before you.”
“And did you make testimony regarding this complaint?”
“I did, Your Honor, to Inspector Gruen of the Metropolitan Police.”
“Is this your testimony?” asked Smythe-White, holding up a stapled bundle of sheets. A clerk brought the sheaf to him, and he riffled through the pages quickly. “It is, Your Honor.”
“Thank you for your aid and alertness, Sir Winston. You may go.”
Winston bowed his head in acknowledgement and contrived to pass close by the dock on his way out. “I warned you,” he said nastily.
Aikens was attempting to be recognized by Smythe-White, but the handcuffs constrained him. “Your Honor, a question, if you will,” he called out finally. He winced as the constable delivered a jolting blow to his spine. “Your Honor, when will we hear Winston’s testimony against us?” He was struck again, harder, but went on. “We’ve heard charges but no evidence.”
“You be quiet, now!” said the constable, grabbing him by the arm.
Smythe-White narrowed his gaze to stare at Aikens. “I would caution the prisoners that further outbursts could result in a summary judgment against them,” he said, then looked away. “Inspector Gruen.”
“Here, Your Honor.”
“What action did you take on the charge by the complainant Winston?”
“Your Honor, as is customary in such cases, I enlisted a King’s Witness to gather such evidence as would confirm or refute the charge.”
“They paid a squeak to snoop on us,” Anofi whispered. “I couldn’t figure what had happened.”
“Is the King’s Witness present?”
“Yes, Your Honor. In our judgment, his findings justify prosecution under the Emergency Powers Act for Misappropriation of resources and the practice of proscribed humanist arts. The Metropolitan Police will also prosecute on its own account a charge of conspiracy to commit treason against the Crown. Should the court confirm these charges, we would recommend the penalty of death by hanging.”
An involuntary cry of dismay escaped Anofi’s lips.
“They can’t do that,” Eddington growled under his breath.
“Quiet, both of you,” said Aikens. “We’ll have our turn.”
With growing apprehension, the prisoners listened as the young man from the pub recounted the group’s conversation there. “It sounds so damning,” Eddington said in quiet despair. “But we didn’t mean it that way.”
“I did,” said Anofi, to his surprise.
Eventually Smythe-White dismissed the King’s Witness and turned his attention to the group in the dock. “I’ll not have dialogue with a rabble. Who’ll speak for you?”
“I will,” said Aikens. “Do you contest the facts that have been presented here?”
“I contest the context in which you’ve seen them,” Aikens began, “and that one crucial fact has been excluded. Why did we do this—”
“We are not discussing motive, we are discussing objective facts. Did you meet on the days so described?”
Aikens sighed. “We did.”
“And did you without proper authority utilize the facilities of both the University of Cambridge and the Royal Air Force station at Duxford?”
“Yes, but—”
“Did you represent yourselves as ambassadors to members of His Majesty’s government?”
“Only because no one would listen—”
“And were you present in the Wilshire Pub as alleged by the King’s Witness?”
Aikens gave no answer.
“Did you hear the question?”
“Yes.”
“Then answer it.”
“No.”
“Let me warn you again, your intransigence—”
“Fuck that,” Anofi said suddenly. “Don’t you understand—he’s just refusing to be a party to a lynching. You had this decided before we came in here. But because we’re English, we have to keep up appearances. Yes, we were in the pub, your King’s Squeak remembered it all quite well. We were setting our sights on the King because all of his tin-headed servants are too stupid to recognize the importance of what we know. I only hope you three live long enough to die of a heart attack when the first spaceship pops out of the sky.”
“Attagirl, Jeri! You tell ’em,” Eddington whooped.
“You abuse the goodwill of this court,” said Smythe-White crossly. He gestured to the clerk. “Delete all but her direct answer, ah, ‘Yes, we were at the pub, your King’s Witness remembered it all quite well.’ ”
He turned to the other members of the panel. “Have you any other questions for the defendants?” They did not. “Then I ask you for your verdict.”
Each scrawled something on a slip of paper and slid it along the bench to Smythe-White. The First Magistrate unfolded each in turn and read its message.
“You were right, but it won’t change anything,” Schmidt said quietly to Anofi.
“I know,” she said.
Smythe-White raised his head. “Marc Aikens—Jeri Anofi—Laurence Eddington—Josef Schmidt. You have agreed to the facts, and your explanation has been found fraudulent on its face. This court finds you guilty of criminal conspiracy, fraud, and treason against the Crown. You are hereby sentenced to be hung by the neck until dead. Before sentence is carried out, the customary reviews of this case will be requested on your behalf.”
Following the trial, a profound depression settled over Aikens, and he passed the long hours alone in the cell block in a lethargic haze in which nothing seemed to matter. He could not rouse himself to care enough to count the passing days or even to see that he ate enough to sustain his body. Larger concerns such as the coming visitors or his own impending death were too unreal to contemplate.
No prison psychiatrist came to plumb his psyche, nor did a chaplain visit to offer solace; he was spared those cinematic clichés. The only interruption was the click of footsteps and perhaps a word of badinage from the guard, three times daily when his meals were brought and once more when it was time for his obligatory walk in the open courtyard.
They made no other demands on him, nor he on them. After a time—he could not say how long—he began to hope for the final interruption and lay awake on his bunk listening to the empty spaces of his world, listening for a note of finality and a respite from his ennui.
At last there came the novelty that Aikens had come to expect would signal his execution day. Rather than one set of footsteps, there were several, mingled arrhythmically, and voices. Two men and a woman passed through the open checkpoint at the end of the corridor and stopped in front of his cell. One of the men carried a bundle under his arm. Supine on his bunk, Aikens eyed them curiously.
“That’s Aikens?” asked the woman.
“That’s him.”
“Great God, we can’t take him like that. Get him up and get him cleaned. That will never do.”
Aikens was taken to a shower room he had never seen before, where he dutifully washed himself to the specifications of his escort. Returned to the cell, he changed into the new clothing they had brought, oblivious to his own nudity before the woman. The clothes hung loosely on his diminished frame; the woman clucked unhappily.
“It will have to do,” she said finally. “Bring him along.” Automatically, he offered his wrists behind him for handcuffs. “No need for that. You’re not going anywhere, now, are you?” asked one of the men.
Aikens’ spirits brightened at that, and he fell in between the two men with some bounce restored to his step. He knew where the executions were carried out; a helpful guard had volunteered the information. So it came as a surprise when the woman led them away from that part of the complex and, instead, toward the prisoner receiving area.
There he was bundled into the back seat of a black police sedan, the woman joining him there, the man who had carried the clothing taking the left seat beside the driver.
“Westminster,” the woman told the driver.
“I thought—” Aikens said, his voice breaking.
“So you can talk, after all. You thought what?”
“I thought this meant—” After so much time spent thinking it, he was surprised to find he could not bring himself to say it.
“Your execution?”
He nodded.
“No. Not today.” Then, seeing his puzzlement, she added, “That’s scheduled for next week. But today you get an audience with the King.”
King William V of the House of Windsor had been dubbed by the public “the boy-king of Westminster” only partly because of his youthful features arid slender build. The French-made, IRA-wielded rocket which had killed King Charles and made a paraplegic of Diana, the Queen Mother, had in the same stroke made William V the youngest monarch to ascend to the throne in five hundred years.
The “boy-king” sobriquet was affectionately used for the most part. An almost tangible public shock resulting from the tragedy which had befallen William’s parents had brought to the surface the fierce pride which the modern Englishman harbored for the monarchy. (A pride little, if any, reduced by the savage retribution for the assassination carried out by British forces in Northern Ireland.)
But Aikens was an educated man. Just as he had little patience for preachers, he saw little relevance in the comings and goings of an anachronistic medieval figurehead. Consequently, he knew deuced little about the man in whose gardens he waited for an audience he had never expected to be granted.
Presently the King appeared on one of the garden pathways without fanfare or entourage. In a voice that was childish in timbre but commanding in tone, he sent the police guard away, then sat down on a stone bench opposite Aikens. Aikens, painfully aware of his ignorance of proper manners, found the informality discomfiting.
“Professor Aikens, do I understand all this correctly? Do you and your colleagues claim to have received and translated a message from space?” asked William.
“Yes—from the direction of the constellation Cassiopeia.”
“There. What am I to do with you? You insist on making claims that are patently nonsense—except for the fact that it’s you who makes the claim.”
“It wasn’t easy to convince myself. I spent many hours looking for less outrageous explanations.”
“And because you failed to find one, you are scheduled to die next Tuesday in Old Bailey.”
“They really will do that—for such a trivial offense?”
“Haven’t you wondered why the prisons are so empty? In times such as these, there’s little support for feeding, clothing, and boarding the Crown’s enemies.”