Free The Lords' Day (retail) by Michael Dobbs Page A

mistress behind.
    But not the judges, who sat directly in front of the Throne, nor the ambassadors, nor the bishops, not anyone of consequence. The same was happening at the other end of the Chamber. Only the
minor players were allowed to leave the stage.
    Nothing could resist the control of the attackers. There was no immediate security around the Chamber. On a day like this, it was supposed to be the safest spot in the kingdom, buried deep
within the cordon that had been thrown wide around the parliament building. Most of the armed police who in normal times guard the entrances to the parliament building had been withdrawn for
decorative reasons. Inside the Chamber there was little but a single royal protection officer and a couple of toothless retired generals with ceremonial swords. Most of the doorkeepers had
backgrounds in either the military or the police, but they were unarmed and were long past being fleet of foot. The Queen’s official bodyguard, the Gentlemen at Arms and the Yeomen of the
Guard, were stationed in the Prince’s Chamber and Royal Gallery. They were dressed magnificently in their plumes and garters, but their average age was in the sixties, and their weapons of
Tudor origin. They would have had difficulty cutting their way through a bowl of syrup.
    As the galleries above their heads were emptied, one of the gunmen scurried around attaching what appeared to be cans of Coca-Cola to the locks of the doors with pieces of wire – clearly
grenades of some sort. On the floor of the Chamber, the two wheelchair attackers were fiddling with the cushions they had carried with them. Not only had these pads been used to conceal weapons,
but also, it soon became clear, their contents were not foam rubber but high explosive. What had begun the day as cushions were soon transformed into a primitive explosive jacket like those worn by
suicide bombers in the Middle East. One of the gunmen slipped it over his shoulders and went to stand directly behind the Queen. Westminster was rapidly beginning to resemble the West Bank.
    11.45 a.m.
    One of the first to react was Daniel, the BBC producer for the occasion, seated in an Outside Broadcast van in Black Rod’s Garden just a short walk away. He was trained to
believe what his screens told him, but even he required a few seconds for understanding to seep through the disbelief. He jumped up from his seat and stared, then he began to sweat, before swearing
most violently. This was history in the making and the most exciting moment of his professional life, yet he knew that what he had to do was to take the safe option. These scenes were fascinating,
but terrifying. His bosses wouldn’t forgive him for putting out images that would have thousands screaming their way through therapy for years to come. He might even have to join them.
He’d never watched anyone die before. The scenes gripped him, not out of any sense of ghoulishness but because he knew he might live to be a hundred and never be part of a moment like this
again, a moment he knew would be talked about for as long as men had memories. It was with immense reluctance that he instructed his vision mixer to cut away from the action and cast the viewers
back to the studio. Yet he kept recording everything his cameras saw. He would still be part of this.
    The police inspector who had been chased away by the guns of the attackers was now standing in Central Lobby amidst a swirling sea of uncertainty. On all sides people were
shouting and scattering. The chaos infected him, too. He had escaped with his life, but he knew his career was gone; there was no way he could survive this one. It was more than forty years since
John Kennedy had been shot, yet still they talked about it, and this was heading in the same direction. Mechanically he began shouting orders, clearing the area of stray bodies, summoning the armed
response units. He was a dead man walking, professionally, but he could still save others.