Remember, remember the 5th of November,
Gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason
Why gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.
I didn't really want the assignment but even after three years I was still classed as a junior so I went where I was told.
“Just get out there girl” my editor had said “and find out what the country’s doing”.
In any case I was fed up with covering England’s on-going sporting successes and the ‘oh, can it get much better than this’ from besotted fans every time we hit a ball a bit further or ran a bit quicker. So they got me a standard fare Overland pass, fired up a com-link and I was off.
No one could quite remember how it had all begun. No one knew who had put the plans on the Craft Channels or how the clubs had started. But, as if it had always been done, everyone was doing it.
Children loved it of course. Truth be told, quite a few fathers and grandfathers as well. Both, especially the grandfathers, telling the children how they’d collected old clothes and bits of rag and pestered their mothers for the more complete items for weeks beforehand. The charity shops did a roaring trade, selling as many old clothes as they could lay their hands on and there wasn’t a scrap of rag put into recycling for weeks. The fashion industry loved it. At a stroke any guilt over casting away barely worn garments in favour of the latest fashion vanished in patriotic fervour. People saw it almost as their duty to pass on clothes barely out of their packing creases.
The more cynical thought the Government had dreamed it up. Anything, they said, to keep people's minds off the worst economic downturn, and the longest, for a generation. Later, when things turned more sinister, people said it was the Russians, or the Chinese, or the French, or this or that religious group, or aliens, or – and even today this was close to heresy – the Americans.
Treason and Plot clubs had been formed up and down the country. Every village, every town, every district in the larger towns, every borough in the cities had them. The clubs were suddenly there, fully formed and operating. From mid-October the clubs would sort and parcel out old clothes and rags, wood for bonfires, give out copies of the “how to” guides posted on the Craft Channels and generally co-ordinate the production of millions of life-sized effigies of Guy Fawkes. Not celebrated for more than thirty years the revival of Bonfire Night, now called The Gunpowder Festival, would mark the 450th anniversary of the attempt to blow up Parliament.
No one saw any harm in this. In fact parents were grateful for anything that got their kids heads out of the Play Channels. Everyone except me, so it seemed, was involved and ‘got your Guy ready yet’ became almost a greeting, even replacing comments about the weather.
The Festival suited perfectly an England, now sandwiched between a hugely powerful Europe and a still powerful America, that had been increasingly inward looking; retreating into a world of theatrical pageant. Almost a country-sized theme park. And it was just England of course and ended precisely at its borders. Northern Ireland, now reunited with the Republic, Scotland and Wales, long since independent, had dropped most things they regarded as English in favour of home‑grown heroes and villains.
Even the weather, so often the bane of English events, couldn’t be faulted. It had been the latest in a line of wonderful summers. The most perfect anyone could remember. Summer had gradually faded into a glorious autumn, which was now slipping gently into winter. Bonfire Night was forecast to be dry and mild with clear skies. Just perfect, everyone said.
I had visited Treason and Plot clubs and spoke to the people busily organising the clothes or supervising the Guys’ production. Either they didn’t know how the clubs had been formed or by whom or they weren’t telling.
And then, as soon as the preparations were complete, and as mysteriously as they had been formed, the clubs vanished, as if they’d never been.
But people seemed not to care where the clubs had come from or why there was a revival of Bonfire Night. Most saw it as a way of expressing their patriotism. Not a few, angered by what they saw as the failure of successive Governments to get to grips with the Country’s problems, thought that perhaps blowing up Parliament wasn’t such a bad idea after all. No one believed anything the Government said. The increasingly wild promises of the opposition parties were seen as either ruinously expensive or unworkable. All agreed though that ‘someone should do something’.
However, as the Festival approached, people became more and more uneasy and many spoke of a feeling of dread, though of what they couldn’t say. Certainly, once made, no one cared to be near the Guys. Children refused to have them in their rooms and most were banished to dark corners of sheds and garages until taken out for the Festival. The country had gone from eagerly anticipating Bonfire Night to just wanting to get it over with.
It was unnerving seeing all those effigies. Because of the clubs and the instructions all were exactly the same, except for the variety of clothes they wore. And all with the same face. That was the strangest thing of all. The instructions were absolute on the image to be used and where to get or how to make the mask, providing a template for the purpose. This was rigorously imposed by the Treason and Plot clubs and no deviation was tolerated.
By the evening of the 4th of November practically every garden, every park or open space had its Guy perched on a mound of wood ready for the anniversary. But when people woke up on the morning of the 5th, instead of patiently awaiting their fate, the Guys had gone. Not gone in the sense of vanished but gone in the sense of being somewhere else. Only the night owls, the shift-workers, the party animals and the down-and-outs saw them go. In interviews ranging from incoherent to unbelievable people described how the Guys had sat up, looked around and climbed down from their pyres, untying the most elaborate knots and, forming up in ranks, had marched off.
Stories of disappearances began to flood the Chat Channels. MPs, community leaders, journalists, webcasters, anyone with popular influence, senior police and army officers were visited by two or three Guys and, however much they struggled, were taken away.
It wasn’t until the late afternoon that the country realised what was happening but by then it was too late. Every police station, fire station, hospital, army barracks and local government office was occupied by the Guys. Central Government was the same. The House of Commons’ and the House of Lords’ Treason & Plot clubs, with much amusement given the subject, turned out their Guys. Both Houses now consisted of row upon row of rag-clothed Guys seemingly perfectly at home. Even Downing Street and Buckingham Palace now had resident Guys. Both the Prime Minister and the King had young families and had entered into the spirit of the event, in tune, as they thought, with the mood of the country.
My sister had invited me for a Bonfire Night party.
"Please come" she'd said "the kids are so excited. There’ll be the bonfire, Mike's doing a barbeque and we'll have some fireworks. Dad says it'll be like old times. You'll enjoy it".
I knew I wouldn't but Jean and I were close and I hadn't seen the twins for a while. But the bonfire remained unlit, the barbeque cold and the fireworks stayed in their box. We were on-line to the Info Channels. Didn't matter which one, they were all to show the Prime Minister's special webcast.
Everyone, and I do mean everyone, had gone on-line. When the webcast started it was not the PM who sat before us but a stranger. But not a complete stranger as his face was somehow familiar; someone met briefly perhaps some time ago but who couldn't quite be placed. Then it dawned on us. We had seen that face a million times; whenever we had looked at a Guy.
About the author
P. A. Westgate, Paul, lets his imagination run wild through short-story writing. In addition to writing, Paul enjoys an eclectic mix of activities including reading, singing, the Arts and cocktails. He lives quietly in his native Essex where he tries, with varying degrees of success, to keep his house and garden tidy.
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