House of Dust (24 page)

I was beginning to get the feeling that we had landed in an extremely weird place.

That feeling stayed with me as we came on to the High Street. Apart from a lot of silver boxes sprouting aerials and tubes by the porter's lodge the college looked much as I remembered it from when I was a teenager. After the old man had given his lecture, he took me for sherry with a shrivelled old classicist in Magdalen. I drank too much and had to make use of a bush afterwards, much to Hector's amusement. But when we got outside the college now I realised there had been some pretty major changes.

“What are they for?” I asked, pointing up at the see-through panels that extended horizontally from the walls about thirty feet above the ground.

“Protection from the elements,” the proctor said, leading us towards a wheeled contraption at the roadside. “There was a major problem with acid rain when New Oxford was in its formative stages. Most of the industry that produced it was destroyed during the drugs wars, but there's still a residual danger. The panels also act as screens from the summer sun – they have a computer-controlled tint facility.”

“What the hell's that?” Davie demanded, pointing at what looked like a cross between a pick-up truck and a rickshaw. It was shrouded in clear glass, through which eight comfortable seats were apparent. The wheels were large and thin, like those of late nineteenth-century cars.

Connington stopped by the vehicle. “That is the Nox Transportation Systems gas-powered people transporter. Its popular name is the Chariot.”

Davie was staring in the windscreen. “How do you steer it?” he asked. “There aren't any controls.”

The doctor shook his head and smiled tolerantly. “You are incorrect. The Chariot has a full set of operational controls.” He opened the glass door and pointed at a small mesh-covered button on the roof. “The driver has only to speak simple commands and the chariot's onboard computer does the rest.”

“Really?” Davie looked impressed. “Can I have a go?”

The smile faded from Connington's lips. “I don't think so. You must first learn the commands I referred to.”

Davie wasn't giving up. “You're a teacher, aren't you?”

“Not of students at your level,” the proctor said sharply. “Take us to the Camera, Trout.”

One of the bulldogs nodded and got into the front of the Chariot, his colleague joining him. The doctor gathered his garish robe about him and clambered in behind them, while we brought up the rear.

Trout wasn't playing fair. He spoke in a low voice that was difficult to hear; he obviously didn't want us to learn the control commands. There was a hiss, then the Chariot moved forward at surprising speed, overtaking a couple of students on pedal bikes before they even noticed us.

We followed the gentle upward curve of the High Street, past imposing academic façades and colleges that were better fortified than your average castle. The streets beneath the rain shields were busy despite the hour, students in the garb we'd seen earlier walking purposefully, gowns flapping around their hips. When I was last in Oxford, students only moved like that when the pubs were about to open, but I reckoned from their serious expressions that this lot were on their way to lectures or tutorials.

Then a shopfront caught my attention.

“Stop!”

I was glad to see that the Chariot understood my instruction. I told the door to let me out before Connington and his canine escort could respond.

The door to the shop slid to the side automatically as I approached.

“Good afternoon, sir.” A middle-aged man with thin hair plastered over his scalp, and restless hands, came out of the shadows. The words on the shop sign – NOX University Outfitters – were written in old-fashioned script and the interior was a replica of what seemed to be an early twentieth-century gentlemen's apparel supplier. The lights were low and the place smelled of leather and heavy-duty fabric. The attendant was dressed in a dusky suit and high collar, and he was giving my tatty Supply Directorate gear the once-over. “How may I be of service?” The way he was licking his lips suggested that he reckoned he was about to double his day's takings.

“Footwear,” I said. “Specifically, model NF138B.”

“Size, sir?” he enquired, his eyes wide.

“Eleven,” I replied.

The salesman looked at my feet – I take an eight. “For yourself, sir?” he asked dubiously.

I ignored the question. “Do you have them in stock?”

“Let me see, sir,” he said, going over to a small screen. After a moment he looked back at me. “It's not a standard model,” he said. “Could I recommend NF73s for everyday wear?”

I could tell he was stalling. “Do you have them in stock?” I repeated.

I felt a rush of air as the door opened again.

“What are you doing, citizen?” Connington asked. “Taking steps to improve your wardrobe?”

“You don't, do you?” I said to the salesman, ignoring the proctor. “Who do you normally supply them to?”

He rubbed his hands together nervously, keeping his eyes off Connington. “I think . . . I think there have been production problems . . .” His voice tailed away and the only sound in the shop was his rapid breathing. “Who do we supply them to? I can't . . . I really can't say . . .”

“What's this all about?” the academic demanded.

I turned to the door. Even though I moved fast, it was way ahead of me and opened before I got there.

“Citizen?” Connington's voice was raised. “What were you doing?”

“I'll tell you later,” I replied. “After you've given me that full briefing.”

Further up the High Street, Trout turned the Chariot right into a cut that had been made in the pavement and took us into Radcliffe Square. I felt Connington's eyes on me all the way. My detour to the outfitters was puzzling him, but I was pretty confused by it too. Why was the salesman so reticent about the NF138Bs? Raphael herself was the source of that information. It was hard to believe she'd made a mistake with it.

I let the thought go and looked out of the canopy. This was the part of Oxford I could remember most clearly, the part that all tourists thought of as the iconic heart of the city. To the south, on the side we'd just passed, stood the university church – St Mary the Virgin, as far as I could remember. It looked exactly as it had done twenty-eight years ago, its great spire adorned with pinnacles and statues giving off a deep golden glow. Then I turned my gaze to the front and got a shock. Here was the Camera that we were being taken to, the Radcliffe Camera; it was then that I remembered Raphael's use of the term when she was speaking into her nostrum in Edinburgh. But what the hell had happened to the great rotunda?

The Chariot stopped and we spilled out on to the elliptical lawn surrounding the structure. Apart from some patches of lighter-coloured stone around the arches of the ground floor and the double columns of the central section, the lower parts of the mausoleum-like building were intact. It was what had happened to the upper area above the transparent shields that took my breath away.

“What's that up there?” Katharine asked, shading her eyes as she bent her head back.

“Search me,” I muttered, trying to make sense of the huge uneven ball made of hundreds of opaque glass panels that surmounted the camera. “There used to be a domed roof.”

Connington stepped forwards. “Impressive, don't you think? This is New Oxford's security centre.” He looked upwards proudly. “We keep an eye on everything that happens in the city from here.”

“What's inside that glass thing?” Davie asked.

The proctor was unimpressed. “That glass thing, as you put it, contains our main surveillance equipment. I'm quite sure that your imposing frame is filling a screen as we speak.”

Security centre? Surveillance equipment? Those words didn't exactly make me feel on top of the world. Still, installing it in a building called the Radcliffe Camera suggested that at least some people in Oxford had a sense of humour. Then it struck me that perhaps the city's rulers had chosen the place as a heavy-handed statement of intent to the native population rather than a smartarsed pun. That made me even more suspicious about the set-up.

As did the realisation that, despite this state-of-the-art security facility, there had recently been a particularly brutal killing in the city; one whose perpetrator, according to Raphael, had completely escaped the attention of the watchers in the sky.

Chapter Eleven

Connington led us up to a door of dark glass. In front of it was a chest-high metal post with a line of green light running down it. The proctor parted the flaps of his robe and spoke into his nostrum.

“I take it you all still have the cards you were given on the helijet,” he said when he'd finished. “Good. I have now programmed them to allow you entrance to the Camera.”

That explained the absence of sentries. Everything seemed to run like clockwork in New Oxford – as long as you had the right bits of plastic.

The opaque door opened silently and we followed the man in the robe into the building.

“Bloody hell,” Davie muttered, looking up at the great arches that supported the upper floors. “The new command centre back home's a doll's house compared with this.”

He had a point. Although the outside of the Camera – apart from the glinting ball on top – retained its classical lines, the interior was like something out of the twenty-fifth century. The walls were sheathed in polished steel, the windows shielded and light provided by long strips that were suspended in the air by almost invisible wires. The circular floor was filled with screens and small computer terminals manned by operatives dressed in dark suits like the ones worn by Trout and Perch. In the centre there was a wide and transparent column of glass which, as we got closer, I realised was a lift shaft.

Doctor Connington stopped next to it and glanced upwards. “The elevator gives access to the surveillance equipment in the dome,” he said, stepping in as a panel opened with a sibilant breath. “But we are going down.” He leaned forward and spoke inaudibly at a half-inch fine-meshed dot on the glass wall.

The lift moved so quickly that it was impossible to make out anything of the subterranean levels we passed, apart from the fact that there were a lot of them. Then the brakes were applied and we stopped with more of a jolt than I'd expected.

“That was pleasant,” Katharine said with an ironic smile.

We stepped out into a corridor that ran further than the eye could see in both directions.

“Are you sure you wouldn't like the bulldogs to look after your bags?” Connington asked. He'd already tried to get us to leave them in the Chariot after we arrived at the Camera.

“Quite sure,” I said. I didn't want his heavies rummaging around in the files I'd brought, let alone laughing at my small stock of tattered clothes.

“Very well.” The doctor sounded uninterested. “I'll take you to the Viewing Room.”

“What are we going to view?” Davie said in an undertone. “Dark blue movies?”

“What floor are we on?” I asked Connington.

“Minus eight,” he replied. “We're approximately forty-five metres underground.”

I glanced round at the walls. They were of the same silvery steel material as those upstairs. “It must have cost a fortune to dig this place out. Did you run out of space at street level?”

The doctor looked over his shoulder at me. “Not exactly. The city went through a sustained period of conflict during the first decade of the century. Some buildings were completely destroyed. This one survived, though not unscathed; you saw the damage to the exterior. The underground security centre was designed in response to the threat posed by the drugs gangs.”

“But they were driven off years ago, weren't they?” I said, catching up with him and looking at his florid face. “Why do you need so much security now?”

Connington declined to answer that question. He brought us to a halt outside a steel door. It was unmarked apart from a small panel in the centre bearing the letters HOMVR.

“Let me guess,” I said. “VR is viewing room, obviously.”

“And HOM must be homicide,” Katharine put in, staring at the proctor. “Just how many killings does the university-state have on an annual basis, doctor?”

Another good question; and another the man in red and blue didn't favour with an answer.

The door hissed shut behind us and we breathed in the sterile smell of air-conditioning. The Viewing Room was about fifty by fifty feet. Its main features were the complete lack of furniture and the propensity of large and small screens built into every wall. I gave up counting after twenty. The only other occupant was a young blonde woman in the standard dark suit, set off by a dark blue tie with the emblem of a closed book beneath the knot.

“Haskins,” Connington said with a nod. “Have you prepared the disks?”