Chapter 18

After Harry’s meltdown, everything was quiet for a few days. One young woman, who’d previously given Harry the cold shoulder, maybe felt sorry for him and chatted with him, and their sleeping bags were side by side the next few nights, but I think only side by side. I didn’t investigate!

Then maybe he tried to go further than she wanted to, or maybe she just got fed up with him. Whatever, Harry found himself alone again.

A few days later, he caught Irene on her own while Will was in the loo. They were still arguing when Will returned.

‘Leave her alone, Harry.’

‘She’s my wife, dammit!’

‘Not once I get a divorce lawyer I’m not.’

‘I don’t suppose you’ll find one of those in a hurry. There’s plenty of time to change your mind.’

Irene looked daggers at him, then looked at Will, as if expecting him to say something.

‘You’ve burned your bridges mate, there’s nothing you can do now.’

‘Don’t call me “mate”, you bastard!’

Irene said, ‘Calm down, Harry. It’ll be a lot easier for all of us.’

Harry punched her in the face before Will could react, but was face down on the floor again a moment later.

Will turned to the crowd that had gathered, ‘Shall I break his arm this time, or give him one more chance?’

Blood was pouring from Irene’s nose.

One of the big blokes spoke up, ‘Don’t break his arm, mate. Just hold him there a minute, I’m coming. I’ll take charge of him.’

Then he turned to Irene, ‘Will your nose be all right, young lady, or should I call a doctor?’

So he is some kind of official. And now he’s blown his cover. Does that matter to him?

‘I think I’ll be okay. He’s done it before. The blood’ll stop in a minute or two, and I’ll have a sore face for a few days, but there’s no need for a doctor.’

‘He’s done it before? So that’s twice he’s hit you, and once he tried to hit this chap? Silly little man. Like this chap said before, we can’t afford to have nutcases running amok in here.’

The big man led Harry away to one of the turnstile exits, then returned without him.

Irene was concerned. ‘What will happen to him?’

‘Don’t worry about him. As long as he doesn’t try to hit anyone else, he’ll be okay, but none of us will see him again for a while. Maybe never, I really don’t know.’

Irene asked the question Will and I had decided we didn’t want to ask. ‘Who are you? And how much do you know about what’s going on?’

‘You must have guessed by now that I’m a security guard. We knew that couldn’t remain a secret forever, but your man made me come out of hiding sooner than anyone expected. I have to admit that I tossed up in my mind whether to let his arm get broken, and decided that revealing myself was the lesser of two evils. I hope I was right – it’s up to all the rest of you now to prove that I was.’

Well. You can’t get much more straightforward than that, I suppose. And he’s obviously a good deal brighter than the stereotypical security guard – maybe quite a lot of them are, really – and better trained.

Irene still wanted to know how much the security guard knew about what was going on, but either he didn’t know much or he didn’t want, or wasn’t allowed, to tell us much. ‘I know how to call for a doctor, or reinforcements, a few things like that, but that’s about it.’

I wondered whether he was being as straightforward as he’d been before – and where the doctor and the reinforcements were, and how long they’d take to get to us.

Has Harry simply been moved into a different population? The security guard must have had some special method to open the turnstile at the wrong time. He’s presumably warned the security guards in the other group that Harry is on his way. Maybe that other group is staff, including all those ‘reinforcements’, the doctor or doctors, and so on. Probably technicians to maintain this incredible place. There could be two groups like ours, and bad boys – or girls – could be sent backwards from the other one just as Harry seems to have been sent forwards.

Or maybe the three groups are all similar, and sending someone into a different group is the only punishment they’ve got. At least the security guards in that group will know who Harry is, but he won’t know who they are. They can only do it twice, though. And although no-one but the security guards will know anything about Harry, quite a few people might realize he was a new arrival, and wonder how, or why. Or maybe not – would I know if someone here was a new arrival?

Maybe he’ll even find himself a girlfriend, who knows? He won’t have a history working against him.

I’d have shared these thoughts with Will, but I didn’t know when or whether we’d have another conversation. I didn’t have anyone else to share them with.

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