The Carhullan Army

apples, and mushrooms. The glass jars on the larder shelves looked old and domestic – saved from the time before the mass importation began. There was a small dairy where the milk was strained, separated, and churned, made into cheese and butter. Nearby, in the meadows, were the beehives. The honey was speckled with black. It tasted floral with a slightly tropical note from the gorse blossom and the heather. Lorry used it as a mild antiseptic, I discovered, and when it was available the royal jelly was divvied up among everyone. Meals were small and basic, but mostly they managed, Jackie told me.
    The driest of the sheds contained salt and sugar, oils and seeds, provisions brought up in great quantities before the place became autonomous and sustainable, though some of the containers looked new and when I saw them I began to suspect that Jackie’s visits to the town were perhaps raids, and that she lifted items out from under the Authority’s nose from time to time. In the terrace quarters we had been told that our rations were low because of stealing that had gone on while the food was en route, but no more details were ever given out. When I told Jackie this she said the first rule of population control was that enemies of the state had to be played down, never described as a serious threat. Otherwise people might get ideas. Though the Authority seemed forceful and despotic, with the bulk of the army gone the country was weak. It would only take a small uprising to punch holes in the fabric of government, she said.
    The crates of fruit were laid out carefully, with none of the pieces touching, so that blight and mould could not spread. Anything rotten would be given to the animals, or composted. It was a serious and honest existence at the farm. There was no external support system. Carhullan had burned its bridges the day the women failed to show up for the Civil Reorganisation. They were on the blacklist, illegals. But the more pressing concern was how to survive.
    One hundred years ago, Jackie said, I could have walked up the fells and found the same sort of industry as this, with the same severe penalties for mismanagement. There was a purity to the existence, a basic sense of solvency, that the country had long since discredited. And I could already see the satisfactions of such a way of life. After so many months of tin openers and foil packaging, reconstituted food and dependence on the foreign shipments, this was as honest and raw as I could get.
    ‘It’s incredible,’ I said to her as she lifted the latch on the door of the largest byre. ‘You own all this.’ She paused before going inside. ‘No. We’ve never owned anything, Sister. The lands of Britain belonged to the Crown, ever since the Norman Conquest. The government has always had the power to nationalise land, and declare it state-owned. It never did until now. Crisis management. That’s how they’ve been able to move people into those rat holes they call quarters. The flood zones just got the ball rolling, made it all seem reasonable. A wet run for the real thing.’ I stared at her, amazed. She shrugged. ‘No one knew about any of that. And ignorance leaves people vulnerable, doesn’t it?’
    She pulled open the wooden door of the barn and it grated on the ground. A slanting light fell in through the narrow windows. Inside, under tarpaulin covers, were the Land Rover and the army wagon. The huge deep-treaded tyres of the Bedford stuck out from under its sheeting. Next to these was a substantial supply of diesel in heavy plastic containers and metal drums. I was right to have assumed Jackie Nixon had predicted the economic spiral. She had removed from civilisation those things that she needed to assist her enterprise, her brave new world, and then she had become self-reliant.
    She sat on a drum, crossed her arms and pointed at me. ‘I’ve seen a lot of what’s gone on, Sister, just as you have. I’ve even been down to the so-called capital. It’s in a bad state. You would not believe it if I told you. But I’m not interested in London. London’s finished. We’re no longer the nation we were. If you think about it, there’s no central command. We’re back to being a country of local regimes.’ She paused, put a hand to her face and rubbed her jaw. ‘Sister, you’ve been on the inside, I want you to tell me everything you can about Rith. I want to know exactly how the Authority operates. And I want to know where the