The Vengeance of Rome by Michael Moorcock Page A

that the real villain was internationalfinance which was bent on centralising its operations in New York (or New Jerusalem as we called it), controlling a secret empire more powerful even than Stalin’s, with which it had well-defined links. Alone, Mussolini was not strong enough to challenge Stalin, but if Il Duce were to gather some strong European allies to him, we knew that a pre-emptive strike on Moscow would be possible. We needed to pull society’s disparate forces together and turn them into one mighty modern social machine which benefited all, not just a few rich businessmen who drained our nations of their wealth and hid it in Swiss banks. We believed education would raise the consciousness of the masses, but we had been wrong. Now people must be disciplined into putting the common interest before their own shortsighted greed.
    I was to appreciate later how thoroughly Majorca helped in my restoration. I still revisit my old haunts occasionally. Mrs Cornelius takes the OAP specials to Palma Nova and sometimes I go with her. I would stay in Port d’Andratx if I could, but it is so expensive now. I am forced to rub shoulders with lager-swilling ‘tomatoes’ as the locals call the English. I, of course, do everything to maintain my standards. I always wear a good linen suit and a panama. When Mrs Cornelius prefers to spend time on the beach or in the pubs, I take cultural bus trips. I called on Graves, last time I was there. I only had about an hour before the bus left Deya, which is nothing but Germans now. Apparently Graves wasn’t in. I hear these days he’s a slave to marijuana. This has happened to several of the intellectuals who remained. Others left for Ibiza or Formentera. But before its vulgarisation the island was to prove a benign friend to European gentle people.
    During the time I was with Lieutenant Pujol, Shura came and went from the harbour. Very infrequently Shura asked me to join him on
Les Bon’ Temps
and remain aboard to check periodically with the radio operator while my cousin made a visit ashore. Stavisky kept a permanent hotel suite at the Bristol and while we were in port we used it, transferring from our cabins on the yacht to the suite. We lived like kings. Because of his old wound, Shura was fond of morphine and marijuana as well as cocaine, and he was a great drinker, but I lacked his capacity. Meanwhile, and I do not remember how, I again became known by my Odessa nickname, translated into French as ‘the Colonel’ or ‘the Cossack’, and because this gave me a frisson of secure familiarity I did not object, even though it did not go especially well with my new
nom de guerre
. Of course, there were few who believed me a native-born son of Spain. Many accepted me for what I actually was—a Russian aristocrat preferring not to use his title and so revealhis true ancestry. I had many reasons for keeping quiet about such things in those days. I had become used to a certain kind of anonymity.
    Imagine, therefore, the considerable shock to me one morning when, having rowed myself from the yacht to the quayside, still a little bleary, I walked up the cobbled lane to the baker’s for my usual cup of coffee and croissant and heard, as if from nowhere, someone shout: ‘Max! Max Pyatnitski! Still in the airship business?’ I detected mockery in the tone.
    Had Brodmann found me at last? Feeling sick, I turned, seeking the source of what was surely my nemesis.

SIX
    There are patterns to our universe. Patterns so vast and at the same time so minuscule that we rarely detect them. They present a problem of unimaginable scale. If we could detect them they could explain the mysterious movement of all creatures across the face of the planet. I am convinced that physically or spiritually, though quite unconsciously, men and women of a particular disposition travel broadly similar routes. Those of us who move about the world and are active in its