The Romanian Question

COLD SNAP

President Iliescu of Romania claimed yesterday that the police and parts of the army had been ‘psychologically incapable’ of putting down anti-government protests, which was why he was setting up a new riot-control force. An unrepentant Mr Ionescu accused Western governments of overlooking the difficulties provoked in the police and army by the traumatic experiences during the December revolution.

He also disclosed that he was considering a formal request to Britain to train the controversial new force.

The Times, 25 June 1990

IT JUST MIGHT be Hampton Court, he thought, wheeling his bicycle out of the maze at night. The Tardis - or police box - put the date at around 1965, the year of his immaculate conception, when an empty winter had been filled with the warmth of very young children and an overwhelming sense of responsibility, to self and to them. Jerry now wondered if that hadn’t been just before the depression set in. The times were a-changing and interpretations varied; he was all at sea.

Defeated again, he returned to Blenheim Crescent. It had been an age since he had cycled that far in the snow.

“‘Ere ‘e is!” His mum came to the door, her sleeves rolled up on her red forearms and a huge knife in her right hand. “A regular bad ef fin’ penny, ain’cher, Jer?”

“‘Appy Xmas, Jer, boy.” His brother Frank’s weaselly expression shifted between pacific leer and burning hatred. It was his common response to Jerry’s arrival. “Caff’s on ‘er way, she said.”

Jerry shivered. He was not sure he was emotionally ready for his sister’s manifestation. Yet it was too late to worry.

Obediently, he took his old place at the table.

“Now, Jer - isn’t this better than freedom?” Frank grinned across the turkey as their mother poised the knife, her sweat dripping from elbow to half-burned carcass, to mingle with her coarse gravy.

At last Jerry remembered what he had always loved in his sister and no longer felt afraid of her.