Children of the Dust by Louise Lawrence Page B

excitedly.
    Ophelia leaned against the wall. She did not care about the helicopter or what it might find. She only cared about Dwight, sixteen years of friendship coming to an end because he was having trouble growing up. Ophelia was growing up too, but she had not let it spoil things. And it was not just hormones causing Dwight to change his attitude towards her, it was her father's teaching methods!

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    Ophelia had not been present when Dwight found the spray can and wrote the message on the wall . . . GENERAL MACALLISTER IS A FASCIST PIG ... in huge blood-red letters in the pale green corridor. She heard of it later, after some young child had innocently pointed the accusing finger and Dwight had admitted his guilt. Colonel Allison offered to deal with him in a way he would never forget, but instead Dwight had to appear before the disciplinary committee. He was sentenced to twelve months' menial labour, clearing raw sewage from the septic tanks and spreading it to dry on the river fields.
    As for the rest of Bill Harnden's students who might share similar views . . . General MacAllister came personally to the schoolroom to deliver a lecture. For an hour and a half he went droning on about dangerous left-wing ideals and extreme socialist principles, about the threat to democracy which had resulted in nuclear war, and why subversive political activity would not be tolerated now. There was no such thing as freedom without order, General MacAllister said, just degeneration into lawless anarchy and social chaos.
    That's why I'm in authority, and why we have rules in this bunker!' General MacAllister barked. 'And that's why I expect you to stick to them. We're all British citizens and we need to pull together to get this country back on its feet. We've got no room for deviants! Those of you who don't like the way things are run will have their chance to voice their complaints when the new parliamentary system has been established. We intend to keep the spirit of democracy alive. That's what we've always fought for, and what we'll go on fighting for! We, of the military, are here to protect the democratic principle. Meanwhile a state of international emergency still exists which requires that we continue as we are.'
    But the continuation was not the same.
    Dwight was banished from the schoolrooms.
    And gone from Ophelia's life.
    'I hope you're satisfied!' Erica said to Bill. 'I told you this would happen! That boy was at an impressionable age and you encouraged him in his foolish thinking!'
    'I taught him to think for himself, that's all.'
    'And what good has it done him?' 
    'Hopefully,' said Bill, 'it will make him a better man.' 
    'Or waste what he could have been!' 
    Ophelia did not know what Dwight had become or what effect the punishment was having on him. She seldom saw him any more. With the sounding of the eight o'clock work buzzer he donned his white protective suit and went outside, day after day among the dung and dust, creating a few more fertile acres that might one day grow. Ophelia only knew what Wayne told her . . . that Dwight not only smelt shitty he was also a shit to live with, and all he and Colonel Allison did was yell at each other.
    It was Erica who told her that Dwight had been moved to a single room on the opposite side of the underground complex. And it was Erica, more than her father, who seemed to understand how Ophelia felt, bereft and purposeless, her life gone empty of meaning. She had to find something for herself, said Erica — become a complete person within herself and not rely on relationships to make her whole and happy. Love from a member of the opposite sex was not the be-all and end-all of a woman's existence.
    'You don't need Dwight Allison to become a good geneticist,' Erica said. 'You can do that quite well without having him around.'
    Genetics were not everything, Ophelia thought. Without Dwight she could feel no pleasure. There were no more baseball games. The storage depot was