a friend, but her repeated nonanswering of his messages must have put him in an impossible position.
It was not as if she felt confused. It was not as if she felt driven, precisely, overtaken, losing her mind, anything like that. It was just, she thought, that she could not concentrate on anything else. She was not hysterical. It was just that having discovered that London was not what it was supposed to be, having discovered that the world had been lying to her, she had to know more. And she still had to know what had happened to Leon.
Not that he was alive. She knew that ridiculous sputtering message in bad light must be true.
Which brought her here, to this little sculpted grassland by the river’s defences. There at the notional mouth of the river, by the industrial lowlands of Silvertown, the piers of the Thames Flood Barrier squatted in the water like huge alien hives, like silver-carapaced visitors. Between them chopped brown water, and below that water in the slime of the river’s bed ten gates hunkered, ready to rise.
It was a long way round to the foot tunnel in Woolwich, but Marge had the whole day. She could see the barrier control building rise from the roofs of the south bank. She thumbed at her phone.
Christ Jesus it was depressing, she thought, this part of the city. She took the route by City Airport and under the river, huddling into her coat. She did not check the details she had printed out: she knew them by now. The information had been hard to winkle out of her online informants but not that hard. It had taken wheedling and guile but not quite as bloody much as it should have done if you asked her. As she’d been able to tell, yes, these were “secret” bulletin boards, but plenty of their members were just bursting with pride about what they knew. It was all I’ve said too much, and You did not hear this from me.
From who, you fucking prick? Marge had thought at that particular disavowal. All I know is your screen name, which is blessedladee777 if you fucking please, so please just get on with it.
Pre-armed by the cult-collector with the terms “floodbrother,” and the location of “the barrier,” it had taken a couple of days, but no more, to uncover a little bit more information. This time it was a place of work and an affiliation, the outlines of a system of belief.
Marge finished her cigarette. She shook her head and jogged on the spot for a bit, then came rushing into the Thames Barrier Visitors’ Centre. The woman behind the reception desk stared at her in alarm. “You have to help me,” Marge said. She made herself gabble. “No, listen. Someone here calls themself floodbrother, yeah online. Listen, you have to get them a message.”
“I, I, what, what’s their name?”
“I don’t know, but I’m not crazy. I swear. Please, this is a matter of life and death. I mean it, literally. There must be a way of getting a message to everyone who works here. I’m not talking just about the Visitors’ Centre, I’m talking about the engineering. Listen to me, I’m begging you, I’m begging you.” She grabbed the woman’s hand. “Tell whoever here’s nickname’s floodbrother, just say that, that there’s a message from Tyno Helig. He’ll understand. Believe me. Tyno Helig, got it?” She scribbled the name on a scrap. “I’ll be waiting. I’ll be in Maryon Park. Please.”
Marge stared into the woman’s eye and tried for some insinuatory sisterly thing. She wasn’t sure how well it went. She ran out and away, until she had turned a corner, at which point she slowed and wandered calmly along Warspite Road, past the roundabout to the park.
The weather was too different and too bad to jog much reminiscence, but she looked around until she was pretty sure she had found a spot recognizable from the film Blow-Up. She sat as close to it as she could. She watched everyone who came in. She fingered the little flick-knife she had bought, for whatever useless good it would be. She was banking rather on daylight and passersby. Marge wondered whether she would know if her quarry entered the park.
In the event, when, after almost an hour, her call was answered, there was no question at all. It was not one person but three. All men, they strode urgently along the little paths, looking in all directions.