Modem Times 2.0 by Michael Moorcock Read Free Book Online Page B

their corps for their healthcare and their massive mortgages? Would you care to have negative equity and be unemployed?” Rupert Fox spread his gnarled antipodean hands, then mournfully fingered the folds of his features, leaning into the mirror-cam. This facelift had not taken as well as he had hoped. He looked like a poorly rehydrated peach. “Platitudes
are
news, old boy.” He exposed his expensive teeth to the window overlooking Green Park. In the distance, the six flags of Texas waved all the way up the Mall to Buckingham Palace. “We give them reality in other ways. The reality the public wants. Swelp me. I should know. I’ve got God. What do you have? A bunch of idols.”
    “I thought idolatry was your stock in trade.”
    “Trade makes the world go round.”
    “The great idolater, eh? All those beads swapped with the natives. All those presents.”
    “I don’t have to listen to this crap.” Rupert Fox made a show of good humour. “You enjoy yourself with your fantasies, while I get on with my realities, sport. You can’t live in the past forever. Our Empire has to grow and change.” He motioned towards his office’s outer door. “William will show you to the elevator.”
8. IS HE THE GREATEST FANTASY PLAYER OF ALL TIME?
    One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief … My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it. If I have a chance to invade … if I had that much capital, I’m not going to waste it …
    —George W. Bush to Mickey Herskowitz, 1999
    B ANNING NEVER REALLY changed. Jerry parked the Corniche in the disabled parking space and got out. A block to the east, I-10 roared and shook like a disturbed beast. A block to the west, and the town spread to merge with the scrub of semi-desert, its single-storey houses decaying before his eyes. But here, outside Grandma’s Kitchen, he knew he was home and dry. He was going to get the best country cooking between Santa Monica and Palm Springs. The restaurant was alone amongst the concessions and chains of Main Street. It might change owners now and again, but never its cooks or waitresses. Never its well-advertised politics, patriotism, and faith. Grandma’s was the only place worth eating in a thousand miles. He took off his wide-brimmed Panama and wiped his neck and forehead. It had to be a hundred and ten. The rain, roaring down from Canada and up from the Gulf of Mexico, had not yet reached California. When it did, it would not stop. Somewhere out there, in the heavily irrigated fields, wetbacks were desperately working to bring in the crops before they were swamped. From now on, they would grow rice, like the rest of the country.
    Jerry pushed open the door and walked past the display of flags, crosses, fish, and Support Our Troops signs. There was a Christmas theme, too. Every sign and icon had fake snow sprayed over it. Santa and his sleigh and reindeers swung from all available parts of the roof. A big artificial tree in the middle of the main dining room dropped tinsel around its base so that it seemed to be emerging from a sparkling pool. Christmas songs played over the speakers. A few rednecks looked up at him, nodding a greeting. A woman in a red felt elf hat, who might have been the original Grandma, led him through the wealth of red and white chequered table-cloths and wagon-wheel-backed chairs to an empty place in the corner. “How about a nice big glass of ice tea, son?”
    “Unsweetened. Thanks, ma’am. I’m waiting for a friend.”
    “I can recommend the Turkey Special,” she said.
    Twenty minutes went by before Max Pardon came in, removing his own hat and looking around him in delight. “Jerry! This is perfect. A cultural miracle.” The natty Frenchman had shaved his moustache. He had been stationed out here for a couple of months. Banning had once owed a certain prosperity, or at least her existence, to oil. Now she was a