A Blink of the Screen

where people did what they wanted to do,’ she said.
    ‘It’s a democracy,’ I said. ‘And it’s fine for people to do what they want to do, provided they do what’s right.’
    She bit her lip thoughtfully. ‘That does not sound sensible.’
    ‘That’s how it works.’
    ‘And when we have a, a democracy, every man says who shall be king?’
    ‘Something like that, yes.’
    ‘And what do the women do?’
    I had to think about that. ‘Oh, they should have the vote, too,’ I said. ‘Eventually. It’ll take some time. I don’t think Albion is ready for female suffrage.’
    ‘It has female sufferage already,’ she said, with unusual bitterness.
    ‘Suffrage. It means the right to vote.’
    I patted her hand.
    ‘Anyway,’ I told her, ‘you can’t start with a democracy. You have to work up through stuff like tyranny and monarchy first. That way people are so relieved when they get to democracy that they hang on to it.’
    ‘People used to do what the king told them,’ she said, carefully measuring bread and milk into the shallow bowls. ‘The high king, I mean. Everyone did what the high king said. Even the lesser kings.’
    I’d heard about this high king. In his time, apparently, the land had flowed with so much milk and honey people must have needed waders to get around. I don’t go for that kind of thing. I’m a practical man. When people talk about their great past they’re usually trying to excuse the mediocre present.
    ‘Such a person might get things done,’ I said. ‘But then they die, and history shows’ – or will show, but I couldn’t exactly put it like that to her – ‘that things go back to being even worse when they die. Take it from me.’
    ‘Is that one of those things you call a figure of speech, Mervin?’
    ‘Sure.’
    ‘There was a child, they say. Hidden somewhere by the king until it was old enough to protect itself.’
    ‘From wicked uncles and so on?’
    ‘I do not know about uncles. I heard men say that many kings hated the power of Uther Pendragon.’ She stacked the dishes on the windowsill. I really hadn’t got much idea about penicillin, you understand. I was just letting stuff go mouldy, and hoping.
    ‘Why are you looking at me like that?’ she said.
    ‘Uther Pendragon? From Cornwall?’
    ‘You knew him?’
    ‘I – er – I – yes. Heard of him. He had a castle called Tintagel. He was the father of—’
    She was staring at me.
    I tried again. ‘He was a king here?’
    ‘Yes!’
    I didn’t know what to say to her. I wandered over to the window and looked out. There was nothing much out there but forest. Not clear forest, like you’d find Tolkien’s elves in, but deep, damp forest, all mosses and punk-wood. It was creeping back. Too many little wars, too many people dying, not enough people to plough the fields. And out there, somewhere, was the true king. Waiting for his chance, waiting for—
    Me?
    The king. Not any old king.
The
king. Arthur. Artos the Bear. Once and Future. Round Table. Age of Chivalry. He never existed.
    Except here. Maybe.
    Maybe here, in a world you get to in a broken time-machine, a world that’s not exactly memory and not exactly story …
    And I was the only one who knew how the legend went.
    Me. Mervin.
    With his leadership and my, er, experience … what a team …
    I looked at her face. Clear as a pond now, but a little worried. She was thinking that old Mervin was going to be ill again.
    I remember I drummed my fingers on the cold windowsill. No central heating in the castle. Winter was coming. It was going to be a bad one, in this ruined country.
    Then I said, ‘Ooooooh.’
    She looked startled.
    ‘Just practising,’ I said, and tried again, ‘Oooooooooooh, hear me, hear me.’ Not bad, not bad. ‘Hear me, O ye men of Albion, hear me. It is I, Mervin, that’s with a V, who speaks to you. Let the message go out that a Sign has been sent to end the wars and choose the rightwise King of Albion … Oooooooooooh-er.’
    She was near to panic by this time. A couple of servants were peering around the door. I sent them away.
    ‘How was it?’ I said. ‘Impressive, eh? Could probably work, yeah?’
    ‘What is the Sign?’ she whispered.
    ‘Traditionally, a sword in a stone,’ I said. ‘Which only the rightful heir can pull out.’
    ‘But how can that be?’
    ‘I’m not sure. I’ll have to think of a way.’
    That was months ago.
    The obvious way was some sort of bolt mechanism or something …
    No,