Flight of the Gazebo

Chapter 7 - Amblesby

John Banks cast a critical eye around the overcrowded village hall. It hadn't been decorated for years and the walls were festooned with yellowed bits of sticky tape, hardened lumps of tacky putty and out-of-date posters. Strings from long-dead balloons dangled from the rafters above the heads of the villagers who crammed the hall. People were perched on every available seat, table, window sill and any other horizontal surface. Those who hadn't been lucky enough to get a seat stood at the back and sides. The hubbub of raised voices echoed off the walls and filled the confined space with noise.

Dora stood nearby, talking to a group of women.

She's taking all this in her stride.

He, on the other hand, felt he hadn't been coping well, what with the encounter with the debris creature being so confusing and the suspicion that Jones had manipulated him. He also had a growing sense that perhaps the people of Amblesby hadn't quite grasped the enormity of their situation. It was the little things like the sprinkling of colourful rosettes pinned to the clothing of certain members of the crowd as though this was some kind of election rally, a couple of pensioners with ancient gas-mask boxes on strings around their necks and Mrs Lacey from the bank in the high street taking a collection for the Red Cross.

Where was Jones? He couldn't see him anywhere.

It was time to start. He raised his arms above his head. "Quiet please!" he shouted. The noise gradually died away, and all eyes turned to him. "As Mr Jones suggested," he began, "we've gathered here to discuss what we should do next. I think it's only fair that the first thing we should sort out is who should be in charge during this crisis. It's all very well Jones nominating me, but I'm sure you would all feel better if we have a vote. I propose we elect four people. The first a quartermaster to oversee our supplies - food, tools and so on; the second to form a party to explore the surroundings outside the village and search for fresh water; the third to organise our defences; the fourth to find some way of meeting our energy needs, you know, generating electricity or something."

"What about getting us back to Earth?" shouted a voice from the centre of the hall. "Someone needs to sort that out." There was a murmur of agreement.

John scanned the faces in front of him, looking for who had spoken. His eyes settled on Peter Reeves. Tall and distinguished looking, Reeves had been one of the regular commuters on the trains to London that had, until a few hours ago, stopped at the little station near the river at the bottom end of the village.

"That's the most important job of all, and it's something everyone should be involved in," said John.

"But someone needs to coordinate it," said Reeves. "Otherwise no-one will bother or we'll be duplicating efforts because we're all doing the same things."

"All right, we'll also vote for a fifth person to coordinate the efforts for finding a way of returning us to Earth."

A sea of blank faces stared back at him. Only a few here and there were nodding or looking in the least concerned.

"OK, let's begin with nominations for quartermaster. Who would like to nominate someone to be in charge of rations?" There was silence, punctuated by a few coughs. "Anyone?"

In the front row, a hand went up.

"Yes, Mr Collins?" said John.

"Um, I don't want to nominate anyone. It's just that I was wondering how long it'll be before you get the televisions going again."

John closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

******

Stark fluorescent lighting bounced off the white walls of the bunker buried in the manor's foundations, sharply contrasting with the dark figure hunched over a grey metal table covered in papers and books. Montgomery-Jones pored over the unrolled sheets of the gazebo's building plans, his fingers stroking the black ink lines he'd so painstakingly drawn by hand. The corners of the plans were held down by forks, spoons and a half-drunk cup of tea. Also on the table were the stack of his wife's books he had used when he had originally researched the designs for the gazebo. They ranged in subject from alchemy, through pyramidology, crop circles and ley lines, to wicca and were all fairly new, apart from one old leather-bound volume with yellowed pages.