The Power of Five Oblivion

way down here and I was amazed he’d found the strength to save us in the way he just had. At the same time, I knew he didn’t have a lot of time left.
    “George…” I began and choked on his name. Tears were pouring down my cheeks and I was wondering how all this could have happened. Only a few days ago, I’d been picking apples and he’d been making bread.
    Then I heard the sound I dreaded most, the stamp of leather on concrete, and I knew that although Jamie had tried to trick them, there were more policemen on the way, running down the main road towards the quay. George slumped to his knees. He couldn’t stand up any more. At the same time, he swept the dead policeman’s machine gun into his hands and pressed it against his chest. I understood what he was going to do.
    “Go on, Holly,” he said. “Get out of here.”
    “George…” I couldn’t believe I was saying goodbye to him.
    The Traveller wasn’t waiting any longer. He grabbed my shoulders and dragged me in the direction he’d wanted to take. Jamie came with us. He looked sick, in shock. George stayed where he was and I didn’t look round.
    I felt a slight rise in the ground. I knew that we were following the towpath along the edge of the river. We ran for about five minutes – and there it was in front of us, a black bulk that had to be the Lady Jane , the Traveller’s home, stuck in the mud, where it had been for the last seven years. I allowed myself to be bundled on board. I felt the wooden deck beneath my feet and collapsed onto it. Behind us, on the quay, I heard machine-gun fire and knew that it was George, protecting me to the very end.
    I didn’t know what would happen next. I thought that we would hide here until it was all over. Perhaps the Traveller thought that the police would never look for us here. But then I heard the most extraordinary sound: a metallic cough followed by a rumble somewhere below. The entire boat began to vibrate and I realized that although the Lady Jane had been pulled by a horse when it arrived, that had just been a trick, a diversion, and that it still had a working engine. The Traveller even had fuel.
    He and Jamie released the ropes. George was still firing short, uneven bursts, keeping everyone back, stopping them seeing where we had gone. The Traveller was standing next to me. He leant out and pushed us away from the bank. Jamie climbed in and crouched beside me. A last stammer from the machine gun, then a single shot and a sudden cry. The Traveller went over to the tiller.
    The engine made little sound, a dull throbbing, as we slipped into the night. I looked back one last time and saw nothing close by, but in the distance a red glow spread across the landscape as the village burned.

ENDGAME – THE CONFERENCE

EIGHT
    The car slowed down and stopped at the traffic lights and at once nine or ten children ran forward. They were the usual crowd – barefooted, dressed in rags or half-naked, starving, with empty, saucer eyes, their hands cupped in the universal symbol for food. They almost seemed to be vying for who could look the most pathetic. We’re starving , they pleaded, their shirts hanging open to reveal the skin stretched over their ribcage. Give us something to eat. Give us money . Their hairless heads swivelled on their scrawny necks, trying to catch the driver’s eye. Give us anything .
    The driver ignored them, staring straight ahead through his sunglasses, waiting for the lights to change. Outside, the temperature was well into the thirties and the streets stank of filth and decay, with raw sewage trickling down the gutter, actually moving faster than the traffic.
    There were shops on both sides but most of them had been abandoned, plate-glass windows displaying grey interiors and shelves that had been emptied long ago. Any buying or selling was being done on the pavements. There were food stalls: foul concoctions, brains and entrails, bubbling away beneath a layer of scum in battered metal pots. Old men and women sat cross-legged in front of tiny piles of fruit and vegetables which they had brought in from the fields that spilt over into the suburbs, hoping to sell them to get money for what? For more fruit and vegetables to sell another day? One half-crazed woman crouched over a pyramid of dried milk in tins, a decade past its sell-by date. Another had a collection of batteries, as if anyone would have a use for them even if they could have afforded them. And, of course, there