Precautions against tiger attack: Chapter 1

God almighty, I’m trying to get this tiger story into some sort of order, but it’s a herculean challenge.

All I have is this random collection of anecdotes, stories, diary entries, newspaper articles. In some, the tiger is real, vividly described, a wild beast on the prowl, in others it serves more as a metaphor for a defunct society. In some accounts, life continues as normal, with just an added dimension of fear underscoring events, an awareness of the imminence of death protruding into daily existence. Yet in another account London is abandoned, the streets are empty, industry and commerce has stalled, only a handful of survivors remain in a barren land.

This isn’t one story, it’s a million individual tales, and none of them fit together, it’s like a box filled with a piece from every different jigsaw in the world and I’ve been asked to assemble the picture.

I had to see the truth for myself. My paper weren’t really interested, “We’ve covered the tiger,” my editor said dismissively, knowing how even the evacuation of the capital city is only news for a day or two, people lose interest.

I was angry though, I forget about what, and shouted my reply. “How can a newspaper close down its main office, relocate all its staff 150 miles away and say that there’s no story. The people need to know what’s going on.”

If my track record wasn’t so strong I would have been sacked on the spot for my outburst. As it was Mike felt obliged to appease me, offering me a week to do a piece for the weekend supplement, maximum of two pages plus picture.

There were no trains in or out of the city so I drove. It was a strange journey, every street and road was empty of people and traffic, abandoned cars littered the way, even on the M25 I saw just 4 other cars and within London itself there was nothing. It was like entering a city-sized Marie-Celeste. Even so, I had to pay my congestion charge in advance of my journey, even in these empty, abandoned streets the charge still applies and the fines for non-compliance are astronomical.

I drove to the newspapers offices, now dark and empty, along with the rest of the buildings in the street. Mike had reluctantly given me the keys and security codes, so I was able to drive into the underground car park usually reserved for executives. I parked in the CEO’s personal space.

Even though the office was in darkness, everything was working. Once I’d switched on the lights, made myself a black coffee, I found I had internet connection and could access all the files on the intranet. Even the drawer in my desk, which was usually slow and sticky to open, opened and closed smoothly, as if it had been especially oiled in my absence.

I began working through the information, trying to make sense of it, though I already knew it was hopeless. Quite simply it was madness, why would an entire city become abandoned just because one solitary tiger had escaped from the zoo? It made no sense, let alone a sense that could be conveyed in two pages of text.

An hour in I made my second cup of coffee. As I was boiling the kettle the phone on my desk started to ring. Madness, I thought, who would ring a London number when the tiger’s on the prowl. Mike knew I was here, of course, but he would only ever use my mobile. “Why would I ring your desk phone,” he’d said on another occasion, “you don’t take your desk phone with you when you go for a shit.”

I picked it up after nine rings. “Hello,” I said.

I didn’t recognise the voice on the other end.

“If you want to know the truth about the tiger,” the man said, “then meet me in the Plough and Compasses in one hour precisely.”

The phone went dead.