I try not to laugh, while a couple of homeless people faintly clap their hands next to me. “Yeah, the apocalypse. I remember it,” a toothless man says, then goes asking someone for change. Other than this, no one even pays attention at the Moses-posing man on the roof.
The Pillar lowers his instruments and looks down at me with that smug grin on his face. “Don't you love the carelessness of the sane world? I mean, I could be wrapped up in dynamite and no amount of warning will make them do something about it.” His whole face is shimmering with delight. Then in a blink of an eye, he changes to dead serious again. “Are you ready to meet the Duchess?”
Chapter 34
“I don't suppose she is really a 'Duchess' in this time and age." I stop next to the Pillar, watching the news on a TV that’s for sale behind a shopping window. He came down from the rooftop and we started walking, but something about the TV caught his attention.
"Of course not," the Pillar says absently, glancing at another TV next to it. It’s broadcasting news about people being evacuated from their homes. "I told you the Wonderland Monsters were reincarnated in modern day people. The Duchess is reincarnated in what you'd call the equivalent of a 'Duchess' in our time.” He is still taken by the news. There’s a documentary about poverty in African countries. I don’t know what’s so interesting to him, and I can’t read his face.
"Equivalent? What is she?" I ponder. "Wait. The Duchess isn’t the Queen of England, is she?"
"Oh, no," the Pillar finally looks away from the horrible news all over the world. "That's just silly," he tells me.
"As if all the rest wasn't."
"Silly is different from nonsense. Queens of England have always been fond of Lewis. As a matter of fact, Queen Victoria was a good friend of his."
"Then who is the Duchess?"
"Margaret Kent," the Pillar announces.
"Who?"
"A very well-known woman in the Parliament," he says.
"The British Parliament?"
"No. The Parliament of Oz. Focus, Alice," the Pillar pouts. "She is a TV superstar,” he points at another TV behind the glass window, showing a meeting of the British Parliament. There are too many important people in suits. I don’t know who Margaret Kent is. “I don’t expect you to recognize her. You’ve been living underground for years. But she is loved by most sane people.”
“How is the Duchess loved by other people? Isn’t she supposed to be a Wonderland Monster?”
“Like most politicians, she’s fooled them by promising the impossible,” the Pillar says. "Did you ever notice if you promised the possible, people won't believe you?"
"She is one of those people with two different faces. How wasn't she exposed until now?"
"Some have tried, actually. A year ago, a young man drew a caricature of her in the Daily Telegraph, mocking her as the ugliest woman in Britain."
"Is she that ugly?" I scan all women of the Parliament on the screen. They all look just fine.
"In fact, she is modestly beautiful, with all her plastic surgeries, pearl necklaces, and elegant blonde hair," the Pillar says. "Her ugliness mentioned in the newspaper stems from all the ugly things she does under the table. Bribes, extortion, and tampering with trials in favor of the big guys. One of the rules of the sane world… the poor keep getting poorer, and the rich keep getting...richer."
"Margret Kent?" I try the name on my lips, as I recognize her from the plate in front of her as she speaks on TV. She looks like the perfect female politician, a face everyone would normally trust.
"Of course, the artist who drew the caricature was mysteriously assassinated by a ‘terrorist’ a week later."
"That's awful."
"Alice," the Pillar holds me by the shoulder. "You're not focusing. The artist was assassinated by someone sent by Margaret Kent because he was exposing her dirty laundry."
"Are you sure?"
"And do you know who assassinated him?" the Pillar’s face is too close to mine. I have an idea about the answer, but it just refuses to surface on my lips. "The Cheshire Cat was the Duchess’s grinning cat in the book. In real life, he is her private assassin."
I take a step back, my hands on the wall. My head is dizzy, and I get that feeling again, that the world in my private cell is a better place than all of this. "This can't be," my voice is almost inaudible as it starts to rain all of a sudden.
Chapter 35
The Pillar's limousine, somewhere in Oxford
"This is how the world operates,” the Pillar says. We’re sitting in the back of his limousine. “Why do you think killers like me and the Cheshire don't get caught? People like Margaret Kent are occupied with making money and getting more powerful every day. There is famine, wars, people dying, and poverty all around us. But you know what? The heck with all that. Let's just make more money, and kill anyone who gets in the way. Or better, let's drive them insane."