Where is the horse gone? Where the rider?
Where the giver of treasure?
Where are the seats at the feast?
Where are the revels in the hall?
Alas for the bright cup!
Alas for the mailed warrior!
Alas for the splendour of the prince!
How that time has passed away,
The Wanderer, translated by Sean Miller from The Book Of Exeter
CHAPTER 72 SALISBURY CATHEDRAL
Saturday was market day in Salisbury. Mothers watched their children in the “Alcatraz” play ground on its island between the rivers. Fathers watched their pennies and sighed at the weight of shopping. Boys watched girls. Girls pretended not to watch boys. Old people remembered the time when people watched them. Stall holders smiled at customers and watched nothing was nicked.
Sebastian Moran was one of the crowd. Walking on the red brick path besides the River Avon, watching ducks and swans and pretty girls.
He crossed the rivers and went down the arcade besides the public library, into the main market square. His watch said there was time to spare, time to wander through the stalls of jewellery and clothes, fruit and veg, stationary and books, meat and cheese, telephones and watches, tools and spares.
Men shouted out their prices, women called on him to look at bargains, shoppers mumbled apologies as they squeezed past, gypsies tried to sell lucky heather.
God this was so wonderful. Britain, Europe. All this wealth. All this trust, all this honesty. There were no police to be seen, no robbers, no government enforcers, no swaggering leaders of the youth group or bandits demanding protection money. Amazing. The British just did not realise how lucky they were. This was a free people in a free nation. They had built paradise, right here, so unlike Africa. So unlike…..
Was he right to kill MuRillo?
MuRillo, with his smile, his speeches, his ability to make you believe that this time it would all turn out right. This time there would be no secret police or concentration camps. This time he wouldn’t waste the nation’s wealth on palaces or armies. This time he would just let the Chinese build their factories and employ his people and bring peace and prosperity to the land.
Except with people like MuRillo it was never quite the right time. It was always soon. Just as soon as the rebels were sorted out. Just as soon as his followers had been allowed to steal as much as they wanted. Just as soon as the people worshipped him as a God. Then he would distribute largess to those who believed in him. But he would never let them be free. Never let them forget that they owed everything to his generosity. Never let them own anything complete and outright. Not their land or their money or their houses or their children or even their lives. You could only keep that sort of thing as long as it pleased MuRillo to let you.
Moran wandered through to Butcher Row, past pavement café’s and restored medieval shop fronts, to the Poultry Cross where more stalls sold carpets and flowers and toys. The traffic, what there was, crawled past at a civilised twenty miles an hour, enough time for people to cross roads and step aside for electric trucks and horse drawn tourist buses.
Why couldn’t Africa be like this? They used to blame years of colonial exploitation, till they realised Africa was actually going backwards. So why was that? Were the people just too decent and gentle to stand up to the likes of MuRillo?
Had he done right to kill him?
It was common justice for the murder of Maria Pinto, and all the others who’s blood was on his hands. If MuRillo had maintained decent government, with an honest police force and courts and laws, and allowed factories and farms to give jobs without stealing from them and forcing them to close, then the Nzimba would never have got started. They’d have been dealt with by the child welfare people and juvenile courts and…..
What was the use? He had
done it. He had done it. He had altered history. Now he had to live
with it. Had to dream with it. Wake with it. Had to check whatever
was half seen in the corner of his eye, really wasn't there. He was
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