Fractions_ The First Half of the Fall Revolution - Ken MacLeod [152]
The crowd stopped about forty metres short of the cops. One of them stepped forward with a loud-hailer.
‘THEECE EECE EN EELLEEGAL GETHEREENG—’
The loud-hailer had not the volume to match the shout of fury and disgust from the crowd. Jordan rolled his eyes upward. Thank you, God. They couldn’t have made a worse choice. Exiles from South Africa were popular with the Warriors, and with nobody else.
Another officer hastily took the mike and continued.
‘I MUST ASK YOU TO DISPERSE! RETURN TO YOUR HOMES!’
‘Go home, ya bums, go home,’ the women sang back at them. Thousands of voices behind took up the chant with enthusiasm. Jordan wondered wildly where they could have heard it before, until he remembered that one of Beulah City’s preaching stadia had once been a football ground.
‘THIS IS A NATIONAL EMERGENCY!’
‘We shall not, we shall not, we shall not be moved!’
‘The whole world is watching! The whole world is watching!’ Oh, so there were cadres up here: female cadres. That chant didn’t get taken up, probably because nobody could believe it.
Jordan heard distant, rhythmic shouting from the other side of the boundary. Behind the Warriors’ heads he saw the banners, red flags and tricolours of another demonstration passing along City Road, swinging down into Pentonville Road.
He climbed on to a telecom box and stared. The crowds were less than a hundred metres apart; he could make out faces turning to look and then turning away. The shouts he heard didn’t sound friendly. Baffled, Jordan looked back over the crowd he was with and saw it as if from the outside: a forest of weird black-lettered slogans on white sheets and placards, crosses waving here and there. Like a mob of religious nutcases. He caught the eye of a woman who seemed to know what was going on, and mimed a walkie-talkie. She shook her head and spread her hands.
‘The workers! United! Shall never be defeated!’
That one too fizzled out, and certainly couldn’t have carried across the barrier. The Warrior boomed on about REBELS and COMMUNISTS. Jordan looked down at Cat. She reached out for something that was being passed from hand to hand, and passed it up to him. A loud-hailer, as if this were what he wanted.
‘Weren’t the cadres ready for this?’ he asked. Cat shook her head.
‘Expected the Warriors to be busy somewhere else. Drop didn’t come off. Comms are going haywire.’
‘Oh, shit! There’s got to be something—’ He squatted down, one eye on the wavering crowd, and said, ‘Cat! Think! Is there some slogan or song or something that sounds religious enough for this lot but, you know, would let the others know we’re on their side?’
Cat frowned up at him and then broke into a huge smile. She held out a hand to him and he tried to haul her up, but she tugged and he jumped down. ‘Hold the hailer high,’ she said, and took the mike. ‘Don’t look back.’ She began to walk backwards, step by deliberate step, beckoning with one hand to the women at the front of the crowd. Jordan walked beside her, holding the hailing horn over his head.
‘Here goes nothing,’ she said, and switched on the mike.
‘And did those feet in ancient time…’
She paused for a moment, making a lifting gesture until the second line was taken up:
‘WALK UPON ENGLAND’S MOUNTAINS GREEN?’
The crowd began to move forward. The voices were distorted, echoing between the buildings, but the tune was unmistakable and the gathering numbers joining in drowned the amplified squawking that got closer and closer to their backs. By the time they reached the DARK SATANIC MILLS Jordan could hear other voices from behind, another multitude taking up the lines of England’s anthem, when it had been a state of the United Republic.
Then there was a bang at his back. His whole body contracted in a reflex jolt that brought his head down and his feet up off the ground. At the same moment something whooshed above him. As his feet jarred back down he saw a burst of smoke between two ranks about