Chapter 16

'Glad you could make it up to London today, Roger,' said Sir Anthony quietly. Like my own, Tony's usual cheerfulness had evaporated over the last few months. Boisterous ho, ho, ho's were few and far between these days.

'Rather a bit of bother getting up here, Tony,' complained Hamilton. 'Practically all the roads were blocked. Usual rubbish blown into them. Think we could get all that sort of thing sorted out by now. We should have had enough practice.'

Sir Anthony smiled thinly at the complaint. 'So what do your weather boys think about the situation now?' he asked.

'They think this and then they think that and finally they think the other again. Sometimes I think they don't think anything at all,' huffed Hamilton. 'Bloody meteorology always was a confidence trick, as far as I'm concerned. Those chaps couldn't find a thunderstorm lying dead off their backsides with both hands, let alone predict general climate change.'

Sir Anthony smiled more firmly at that, but couldn't raise so much as a single "Ho-ho-ho". 'Let me introduce you to Jim Peters, Roger,' he said, 'Jim, Roger Hamilton. Jim's attached to the Cabinet Office. He's helping us with certain planning details for the emergency.' I rolled my eyes and inspected the carpet in minute detail.

Peter's fishy eyes slid over in my direction and met mine on the way back up from the carpet. 'Very pleased to meet you, Dr Hamilton,' he said. He stood and offered his hand. Hamilton shook it briskly.

'We'd like to get your views on several problems today, Dr Hamilton,' said Arthur firmly. After the initial shock, Arthur had seemed to gain confidence and strength over the last few months, even while Tony and I had lost ours.

'Of course,' replied Hamilton, 'How can I help?'

'Please, tell us about the current status of the Cape Verde Bulge, Dr Hamilton,' asked Arthur.

'Well, gentlemen, our best available information is that the feature is still expanding at approximately five miles per day,' replied Hamilton. 'It's currently rolling up along the West African coast. We predict it'll hit the Canary Islands at the beginning of next month. We expect the effect to be much the same as the Cape Verde Islands. More people there, of course, so higher casualties.'

'What about the height?' asked Arthur.

'Bulge height, as far as we can tell, is not increasing appreciably at the centre. There does seem to be some reflection and interference with the African coast.'

'So what's that doing?' asked Sir Anthony.

'Nothing much, really,' he answered. 'It's imposing a plus or minus 10% modulation on the margins of the Bulge; interesting, really.'

'But the plateau theory is still the current runner?' I asked.

'Yes, that is correct,' replied Hamilton. We all looked desolately at one another.

'Any new theories on the origin of the Bulges?' I asked.

'No,' replied Hamilton crossly, 'Because of the weather here, we've been unable to mount any sort of oceanographic research expedition into the area. We really know very little more about the Bulge than we did five months ago. Some of our geology chaps are looking at your tectonic plate buckling theory, but there's nothing to either support or refute it.'

'What about remote sensing data?' I asked.

'The blasted Americans have clamped off our high quality information sources from Seasat,' growled Hamilton. 'They're still giving us images from the area, but they've smoothed most of the relevant features. We're almost blind now. They've somehow managed to penetrate our own satellites and degrade quality very significantly.'

Peters smiled a little; a ghastly sight. 'So much for the special relationship. Don't you have any other sources of information about this feature then, Dr Hamilton?' he asked quickly.

'Well, we have received some indirect chemical data from Woods Hole in America and have examined routine oceanographic survey reports from institutions all over the world,' replied Hamilton. 'It's not much use, frankly. We suspect that most of that's being tampered with, as well as the satellite images.'

'But what about tracking the edges of the Bulge?' asked Sir Anthony. 'How do you know where it is then, Roger?'

'Oh, one of our bright young sparks at the Institute has had a rather ingenious idea. He mathematically combines NOAA polar orbiting weather satellite infrared time series images with Meteosat and GEOS images. This produces a sort of synthetic aperature, side-scanned 3-D image of the sea surface,' explained Hamilton.

I knew roughly what Hamilton was talking about. 'But isn't the resolution of weather satellites fairly crude?' I asked.

'It's not all that bad, actually. The main problem is that geographical location of weather satellite images is imprecise over open ocean areas, even with satnav. Meteorologists depend on coastline features to give location, normally.'

'So how have you managed to get around that?' asked Arthur.

'Well, since we knew where the Bulge was in the first place, from Seasat, it wasn't all that difficult to locate its position from images in the weather satellite archives. That served as our calibration image. I don't think we could confidently have detected the Bulge using this weather satellite technique, but it is sufficient to track height and position once we knew that the signal was there.'

'Well, that's very interesting, Dr Hamilton,' said Peters. 'Do you think other scientific organisation are doing this sort of thing?'

'It's quite possible,' replied Hamilton. 'Weather satellite images are available to anyone with the radio equipment to receive them. Many schools have satellite receivers. Even some hobbyists have them.'

'Is the equipment needed for this highly specialised?' asked Peters, making a note.

'Not particularly,' said Hamilton. 'Schools often make their own weather satellite receivers and aerials. Recording and hard copy output quality usually is low, however; and amateurs normally only receive one satellite at a time.'

'So this technique of yours requires a professional installation, then?' questioned Peters.

'Yes, I suppose that's right,' answered Hamilton. 'We need to receive and record at least three different satellites nearly simultaneously. The computer animation and time-space series matching software are the really difficult bits, though. You'd need some fairly hefty computers and a few very capable programmers to do that.'

'And who exactly is this bright spark that's doing this work for you?' asked Peters.

'He's one of Frank Powell's new lads,' replied Hamilton.

'Do you think you could you let me have his name, please, sir?' asked Peters.

'I can't actually remember the chap's name at the moment, Mr Peters,' replied Hamilton off-handedly.

'Could you telephone us his name as soon as you get back, Dr Hamilton?' persisted Peters.

Hamilton glared at him with annoyance. 'Mr Peters, why are you asking these strange sort of questions? I thought this was supposed to be a scientific committee.'

Sir Anthony coughed loudly. 'Ah, what exactly is the current status of the English Channel modelling project, Roger?'

'Well,' replied Hamilton sulkily, 'The work was going extremely well, but it's been severely set back by the death of one of the key project members'.

'A great loss,' murmured Sir Anthony. He lowered his head.

'Who was that?' I asked.

'Lydia Broakes,' replied Hamilton. 'She was the research assistant who discovered the Bulge. She was setting up the computer simulations for the 3-D modelling project.'

'What happened to her?' I asked. I always had a sort of morbid fascination for hearing details about accidents - not any more, of course.

'She was electrocuted in her bath,' said Hamilton.

'What?' I asked incredulously. 'Electrocuted?'

Hamilton shrugged. 'Apparently, she was taking a bath during a storm. The ceiling collapsed into the bathroom and some wiring fell into the water.'

'Zzzt,' buzzed Peters quietly. Hamilton stared frostily at him. Peters put his head down and scribbled into his notebook.

'So what's happened with the project?' asked Arthur.

'We're trying to get in someone to take her place and get things going again,' replied Hamilton. 'But it's not easy to find someone with her skill and background. Especially at the moment.'

'Since you are recruiting, Dr Hamilton, may I remind you of ... ' said Peters.

'Of the Official Secrets Act, Terrorism, et cetera,' I interrupted. Peters shot me an absolutely filthy look. Obviously, he'd wanted to break the news to Hamilton himself. I'd spoiled his fun. I grinned happily at him; I nearly stuck out my tongue.

'That is correct, sir,' resumed Peters. 'Any replacement staff member will require positive vetting before they can be assigned to the Bulge project.'

'Lydia Broakes wasn't PV'd,' protested Hamilton.

'I did hear that was causing some concern in certain circles,' mentioned Peters casually. 'Inappropriate environmentalist connections.'

'That's rubbish!'

'Well, as I said, that issue is causing some very real concern in certain circles, Dr Hamilton,' insisted Peters.

'That's absolutely ridiculous,' snapped Hamilton. 'And why should it?'

Peter's eyebrows rubbered halfway up his forehead. 'I suppose you are aware that some of your staff are members of the Friends of the Earth, the WWF and similar environmental activist groups?'

Hamilton looked down his nose at Peters. 'That wouldn't surprise me very much,' he replied.

'Oh, really, Dr Hamilton?' asked Peters, raising his eyebrows.

'It's only natural that scientists should take a responsible interest in what's happening to our earth,' said Hamilton.

Peters eyes become hooded. 'Ah, would you say, then, that you are, umm, personally sympathetic to the aims of certain environmental activist groups, Dr Hamilton?' he asked.

'I don't really see how anyone could not be, Mr Peters,' replied Hamilton stiffly. 'We're about to pay a terrible reckoning for our abuse of this planet. It's a pity that the people in power didn't think about the consequences of our greed many, many years earlier.'

Peters' eyes slitted. 'Dr Hamilton, are you or have you ever been a member of an environmental group?'

Hamilton's mouth set and he stood. 'Well, I think I've made just about as much contribution to this committee as I care to make, gentlemen. Please excuse me. Good day.'

'Dr Hamilton, please,' I said urgently, 'We need your advice badly.'

'I'll see myself out, thank you,' he said, ignoring me. He slid his papers under his arm, turned and marched out of the room. Sir Anthony and Peters looked at one another. Arthur lifted his telephone. Sir Anthony shook his head and Arthur set it down again.

I stood. 'Excuse me, I need to have a pee.' I left the room without waiting for their reply and hurried after Hamilton. I caught up with him in the corridor. I took hold of his sleeve. 'Please hold on, Roger,' I said. 'Wait a minute.'

Hamilton stopped and glowered at me. 'Oh no, you just hold on, Turner,' he growled. 'I'm not having anything more to do with you and your blasted Thought Police.'

'What do you mean?' I asked.

'The Government, and your committee is one of its tools, are doing their dead level best to make sure that the Bulge is kept as quiet as possible. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if permanently quiet is what they have in mind, too.'

'Look, Roger, what are you talking about?' I stammered.

'What I'm talking about, Turner, is that people like Lydia Broakes don't take baths in the middle of storms. Anyway, there were no storms the night she was supposed to have died.'

'You've got to be joking,' I gasped.

'That would be a joke in exceedingly poor taste, indeed, Turner,' replied Hamilton. 'And I suggest that you watch the obituary pages in Nature, Professor. There seems to be some very serious disease going around among earth scientists.'

'You're saying that the Government is killing people to suppress knowledge about the Bulge?' I whispered incredulously.

'I'm not saying anything more to your committee and I'm not saying anything more to you, either, Turner,' he snapped. He pulled my hand loose from his sleeve and limped briskly down the hall.

I shrugged and turned back down the corridor. I opened the door to the lavatory. I unzipped my flies and stepped up to the urinal. I unlimbered and aimed at the polished brass plughole.

Suddenly, I was jerked violently away from the urinal and slammed against the wall. Large rubbery hands seized my collar and Peters' angry face pushed up against mine. 'What were you two talking about?' he snarled.

'What ... what the hell are you talking about?' I grunted. I didn't know what to do. I hadn't been handled like this since I was a schoolboy. I was embarrassingly conscious that my penis was poking out of my trousers.

Peters lifted me up against the wall. I didn't think anyone could possibly be that strong. I didn't even try to struggle. He bumped me gently against the wall twice. 'What were you two talking about?' he repeated.

'I just ... I just sort of ran into Hamilton on the way here to the loo,' I said feebly.

Peters banged me harder against the wall. My head bounced off it and I saw bright flashes of light. Up until then, I had thought that "seeing stars" was just a figure of speech. 'Stop it, Peters, stop it,' I protested wildly, 'You can't go around beating up people in the Cabinet Office toilets.'

Peters didn't even bother to reply. He punched me in the stomach. I'm sure it wasn't very hard, but it really was a terrible shock to me. 'Uhhh!' I puffed. Hot tears brimmed in my eyes. I felt like I couldn't breathe for a minute or two.

'Want another?' he growled. 'Tell me what he said.'

* * *

I wish I could tell you, gentle reader, that I kneed that bastard Peters in the groin and left him grovelling on the hard floor, but it didn't happen like that. Yes, sometimes I still dream that I nailed him right there. I can feel that hot, happy adrenalin coursing through my veins, even now. But no, no, I didn't do it. I didn't know how, then. I didn't even try it. Instead, I spilled the beans.

'Hamilton told me that he thought the Government was killing people to shut them up about the Bulge,' I blurted. My God, how I've made myself pay for that shameful moment; over and over and over. Peters smiled, really smiled for once, and let me drop back to the floor. He turned on his heel and stalked out of the lavatory. I looked down. My poor little dicky was still peeping out of my trousers. It had turned dark blue and had shrivelled to about the size of an acorn.

* * *

That night, I was in bed, in my pyjamas, reading a report on my laptop. There was a brisk triple rap and my door was unlocked. Peters poked his ugly head into the room. I couldn't help recoiling after what had happened, but I'd had plenty of time to get angry. 'You call that a knock? Is this a prison? What if there's a fire, how will I get out?' I blustered.

Peters leered at me. 'Evening, Professor. Seeing you with your prick out today and knowing you're missing your wife, my superiors decided to provide you with a little relief for your personal problem. Maybe you're not completely gay, after all.' He tossed a DVD on the bed. 'Sweet dreams,' he said mockingly, stepped out of the room and locked the door.

I picked up the disk. It was unmarked, not even any serial numbers on it. Government issued pornography, I thought; government cuts, no hookers, not even telesex. I popped it in the drive and the computer brought up the video player. There was a yesterday afternoon timestamp for about 15 seconds then the camera zoomed onto a partly undressed couple in a car entwined. There wasn't much definite to see, branches and the pillar were in the way and the light reflecting off the windscreen but I could feel myself rise immediately. The couple dipped down out of sight except for an occasional flash of an arm rising up as clothes were removed. This went on for a few minutes, then nothing could be seen at all. Nice start, I thought, but there's not a lot to see; I began to droop. You could hear blackbirds whistling, but nothing more than the wind rustling and perhaps a little shriek or two. The car began to rock; ah, that's more like it, I thought, beginning to rise again. Then two very shapely legs rose up; one gently bouncing foot slid out the open side window, the other planted itself against the windscreen. After a few minutes the lady's legs stiffened and, as she came, so did I. A moment later what I thought was the man sat up, wiping his mouth with a tissue; it was butch Monique Fairweather, our doctor's wife. The camera panned out. The car was a Land Rover pulled into a field. The camera zoomed onto the licence tag; it was mine, ours.