Wyndham, John (10 page)

It was close on midnight when we had finished adding our own
secondary wants to the list of musts. The result resembled a department-store
catalogue. But if it had done no more than serve to take our minds off
ourselves for the evening, it would have been worth the trouble.

Josella yawned and stood up.

“Sleepy,” she said. “And silk sheets waiting on an ecstatic
bed.”

She seemed to float across the thick carpet. With her hand
on the doorknob she stopped, and turned to regard herself solemnly in a long
mirror.

“Some things were fun,” she said, and kissed her hand to her
reflection.

“Good night, you vain, sweet vision,” I said.

She turned with a small smile and then vanished through the
door like a mist drifting away.

I poured out a final drop of the superb brandy, warmed it in
my hands, and sipped it.

“Never—never again now win you see a sight like that,” I
told myself.
“Sic Transit...”

And then, before I should become utterly morbid, I took
myself to my more modest bed.

I was stretched in comfort on the edge of sleep when there
came a knocking at the door.

“Bill,” said Josella’s voice. “Come quickly. There’s a
light!”

“What sort of a light?” I inquired, struggling out of bed.

“Outside. Come and look.”

She was standing in the passage, wrapped in the sort of
garment that could have belonged only to the owner of that remarkable bedroom.

“Good God!” I said nervously.

“Don’t be a fool,” she said irritably. “Come and look at
that light.”

A light there certainly was. Looking out of her window toward
what I judged to he the northeast, I could see a bright beam like that of a
searchlight pointed unwaveringly upward.

“That must mean there’s somebody else there who can see,”
she said.

“It must,” I agreed.

I tried to locate the source of it, but in the surrounding
darkness I was unable to decide. No great distance away, I was sure, and
seeming to start in mid-air—which probably meant that it was mounted on a high
building. I hesitated.

“Better leave it till tomorrow,” I decided.

The idea of trying to find our way to it through the dark
streets was far from attractive. And it was just possible— highly unlikely, but
just possible—that it was a trap. Even a blind man who was clever, and
desperate enough,
might
be able to wire such a thing up by touch.

I found a nail file and squatted down with my eye on the
level of the window sill. With the point at the file I drew a careful line in
the paint, marking the exact direction of the beam’s source. Then I went back
to my room.

I lay awake for an hour or more. Night magnified the quiet
of the city, making the sounds which broke it the more desolate. From time to
time voices rose from the street, sharp and brittle with hysteria. Once there
was a freezing scream which seemed to revel horribly in its release from
sanity. Somewhere nor tar away there was a sobbing that went on endlessly,
hopelessly. Twice I heard the sharp reports of single pistol shots I gave
heartfelt thanks to whatever it was that had brought Josella and me together
for companionship.

Complete loneliness was the worst stare I could imagine just
then. Alone, one would be nothing. Company meant purpose, and purpose helped to
keep the morbid fears at bay.

I tried to shut out the sounds by thinking of all the things
I must do the next day, and the day after, and the days after that; by guessing
what the beam of light might mean, and how it might affect us. But the sobbing
in the background went on and on and on, reminding me of the things I had seen
that day, and would see tomorrow....

The opening of the door brought me sitting up in sudden
alarm. It was Josella, carrying a lighted candle. Her eyes were wide and dark,
and she bad been crying.

“I can’t sleep,” she said. “I’m frightened—horribly
frightened. Can you hear them—all those poor people? I can’t stand it

She came like a child to be comforted. I’m not sure that her
need of it was much greater than mine.

She fell asleep before I did, arid with her head resting on
my
shoulder.

Still the memories of the day would not leave inc in peace.
But, in the end, one does sleep. My last recollection was of remembering the
sweet, sad voice of the girl who had sung:

So we’ll go no more a-roving

When I awoke I could bear Josella already moving around in
the kitchen. My watch said nearly seven o’clock. By the time I had shaved
uncomfortably in cold water and dressed myself, there was a smell of toast and
coffee drifting through the apartment. I found her holding a pan over the oil
stove. She had an air of self-possession which was hard to associate with the
frightened figure of the night before. Her manner was practical too.

“Canned milk, I’m afraid. The fridge stopped. Everything
else is all right, though,” she said.

It was difficult for a moment to believe that the expediently
dressed form before me had been the ballroom vision of the previous evening.
She had chosen a dark blue skiing suit with white-topped socks rolled above
sturdy shoes. On a dark leather belt she wore a finely made hunting knife to
replace the mediocre weapon I had found the day before. I have no idea how I
expected to find her dressed, or whether I had given the matter any thought,
but the practicality of her choice was by no means the only impression I
received as I saw her.

“Will I do, do you think?” she asked.

“Eminently,” I assured her. I looked down at myself. “I’d
wish I’d had as much forethought. Gents’ lounge suiting isn’t quite the rig for
the job,” I added.

“You could do better,” she agreed, with a candid glance at
my crumpled suit.

“That light last night,” she went on, “came from the University
Tower—at least, I’m pretty sure it did. There’s nothing else noticeable
exactly on that line. It seems about the right distance, too.”

I went into her room and looked along the scratch I had
drawn on the sill. It did, as she said, point directly at the tower. And I
noticed something more. The tower was flying two flags at the same mast. One
might have been left hoisted by chance, but two must be a deliberate signal:
the daytime equivalent of the light. We decided over breakfast that we would
postpone our planned program and make an investigation of the tower our first
job for the day.

We left the apartment about half an hour later. As I had
hoped, the station wagon, by standing out in the middle of the street, had
escaped the attentions of prowlers and was intact. Without delaying further, we
dropped the suitcases that Josella had acquired into the back among the triffid
gear, and started off.

Few people were about. Presumably weariness and the chill m
the air had made them aware that night had fallen, and not many had yet emerged
from whatever sleeping places they had found. Those who were to be seen were
keeping more to the gutters and less to the walls than they had on the previous
day. Most of them were now holding sticks or bits of broken wood with which
they tapped their way along the curb. It made for easier going than by the
house fronts
with
their entrances and projections, and the tapping had
decreased the frequency of collisions.

We threaded our way with little difficulty, and after a time
turned into Store Street to see the University Tower at the end of it rising
straight before us.

“Steady,” said Josella as we turned into the empty road. “I
think there’s something going on at the gates.” We parked the car and climbed
into an adjoining garden whence we could prospect discreetly.

Whatever was going on was right at the front. We managed to
find a slightly higher mound which gave us a view of the gates across the heads
of the crowd. On this side a man in a cap was talking volubly through the bars.
He did not appear to be making a lot of headway, for the part taken in the
conversation by the man on the other side of the gates consisted almost
entirely of negative headshakes.

“What is it?” Josella asked in a whisper.

I helped her up beside me. The talkative man turned so that
we had a glimpse of his profile. He was, I judged, about thirty, with a
straight, narrow nose and rather bony features.

What showed of his hair was dark, but it was the intensity
of his manner that was more noticeable than his appearance.

As the colloquy through the gates continued to get nowhere,
his voice became louder and more emphatic—though without visible effect on the
other. There could be no doubt that the man beyond the gates was able to see;
he was doing so watchfully, through born-rimmed glasses. A few yards behind him
stood a little knot of three more men about whom there was equally little
doubt. They, too, were regarding the crowd and its spokesman with careful
attention. The man on our side grew more heated. His voice rose as if he were
talking as much for the benefit of the crowd as for those behind the railings.

“Now listen to me,” he said angrily. “These people here have
got just as much bloody right to live as you have, haven’t they? It’s not their
fault they’re blind, is it? It’s nobody’s fault—but it’s going to be your fault
if they starve, and you know it.”

His voice was a curious mixture of the rough and the educated,
so that it was hard to place him—as though neither style seemed quite natural
to him, somehow.

“I’ve been showing them where to get food. I’ve been doing
what I can for them, but, Christ, there’s only one of me, and there’s thousands
of them.
You
could be showing ‘em where to get food, too—but are
you?—hell! What are you doing about it? Damn all, that’s what. Just look after
your own lousy skins. I’ve met your kind before. It’s ‘Damn you, Jack, I’m all
right’—that’s your motto.”

He spat with contempt and raised a long, oratorical arm.

“Out there,” he said, waving his hand toward London at
large, “out there there are thousands of poor devils only wanting someone to
show them how to get the food that’s there for the taking. And you could do it.
All you’ve got to do is
show
them. But do you? Do you, you buggers? No,
what
you do is shut yourselves in here and let them bloody well starve when each
one of you could keep hundreds alive by doing no more than coming out and
showing
the poor sods where to get the grub. God almighty, aren’t you people
human?”

The man’s voice was violent. He had a case to put, and he
was putting it passionately. I felt Josella’s hand unconsciously clutching my
arm, and I put my band over hers. The man on the far side of the gate said
something that was inaudible where we stood.

“How long?” shouted the man on our side. “How in hell would
I know how long the food’s going to last? What I do know is that if bastards
like you don’t muck in and help, there ain’t going to be many left alive by the
time they come to clear this bloody mess up.” He stood glaring for a moment.
“Fact of it is, you’re scared—seared to show ‘em where the food is. And why?
Because the more these poor devils get to eat, the less there’s going to be for
your lot. That’s the way of it, isn’t it? That’s the truth—if you had the guts
to admit it.”

Again we failed to hear the answer of the other man; but,
whatever it was, it did nothing to mollify he speaker. He stared back grimly
through the gates for a moment. Then he said:

“All right—if that’s the way you want it!”

He made a lightning snatch between the bars and caught the
other’s arm. In one swift movement he dragged it through and twisted it. He
grabbed the hand of a blind man standing beside him and clamped it on the arm.

“Hang on there, mate,” he said, and jumped toward the main
fastening of the gates.

The man inside recovered from his first surprise. He struck
wildly through the bars behind him with his other hand. A chance swipe took the
blind man in the face. It made him give a yell and tighten his grip. The leader
of the crowd was wrenching at the gate fastening. At that moment a rifle
cracked. The bullet pinged against the railings and whirred off on a ricochet.
The leader checked suddenly, undecided. Behind him there was an outbreak of
curses and a scream or two. The crowd swayed back and forth as though uncertain
whether to run or to charge the gates. The decision was made for them by those
in the courtyard. I saw a youngish-looking man tuck something under his arm,
and I dropped down, pulling Josella with me, as the clatter of a submachine
gun began.

It was obvious that the shooting was deliberately high; nevertheless,
the rattle of it, and the whizz of glancing bullets, was alarming. One short
burst was enough to settle the matter. When we raised our heads the crowd had
lost entity and its components were groping their ways to safer parts in all
three possible directions. The leader paused only to shout something
unintelligible, then he turned away too. He made his way northward up Malet
Street, doing his best to rally his following behind him.

I sat where we
were
and looked at Josella. She looked
thoughtfully back at me and then down at the ground before her. It was some
minutes before either of us spoke.

“Well?” I asked at last.

She raised her head to look across the road, and then at the
last stragglers from the crowd pathetically fumbling their ways.

He was right,” she said. “You know he was right, don’t you?”
I nodded.

Yes, he was right. And yet he was quite wrong too. You see,
there is no ‘they’ to come to clear up this mess— I’m quite sure of that now.
It won’t be cleared up. We could do as he says. We
could
show some,
though only some, of these people where there is food. We could do that for a
few days, maybe for a few weeks, but after that—what?”

“It seems so awful, so callous

“If we face it squarely, there’s a simple choice,” I said.
“Either we can set out to save what can be saved from the wreck—and that has to
include ourselves—or we can devote ourselves to stretching the lives of these
people a little longer. That is the most objective view I can take.

But I can see, too, that the more obviously humane course is
also, probably, the road to suicide. Should we spend our time in prolonging
misery when we believe that there is no chance of saving the people in the end?
Would that be the best use to make of ourselves?”

She nodded slowly.

“Put like that, there doesn’t seem to be much choice, does
there? And even if we could save a few, which are we going to choose? And who
are
we
to choose? And how long could we do it, anyway?”

“There’s nothing easy about this,” I said. “I’ve no idea Ac
what proportion of semidisabled persons it may be possible for us to support
when we come to the end of easy supplies, but I don’t imagine it could be very
high.”

“You’ve made up your mind,” she said, glancing at me.

There might or might not have been a tinge of disapproval
her voice.

“My dear,” I said, “I don’t like this any more than you do.
I’ve put the alternatives badly before you. Do we help those who have survived
the catastrophe to rebuild some kind of life? Or do we make a moral gesture
which, on the
face
of it, can scarcely be more than a gesture? The
people across the road there evidently intend to survive.”

She dug her fingers into the earth and let the soil trickle
out of her hand.

“I suppose you’re right,” she said. “But you’re also right
when you say I don’t like it.”

“Our likes and dislikes as decisive factors have now pretty
well disappeared,” I suggested.

“Maybe, but I can’t help feeling that there must be
something wrong about anything that starts with shooting.”

He shot to miss—and it’s very likely he saved fighting,” I
pointed out.

The crowd had all gone now. I climbed over the wall and
helped Josella down on the other side. A man at the gate opened it to let us
in.

“How many of you?” he asked.

“Just the two of us. We saw your signal last night,” I told
him.

“Okay. Come along, and we’ll find the Colonel,” he said,
leading us across the forecourt.

The man whom he called the Colonel had set himself up in a
small room not far from the entrance and intended, seemingly for the porters.
He was a chubby man just turned fifty or thereabouts. His hair was plentiful
but well-trimmed, and gray. His mustache matched it and looked as if no single
hair would dare to break the ranks. His complexion was so pink, healthy, and
fresh that it might have belonged to a much younger man; his mind, I discovered
later, had never ceased to do so. He was sitting behind a table with quantities
of paper arranged on it in mathematically exact blocks and an unsoiled sheet of
pink blotting paper placed squarely before him.

As
we came in he turned upon us, one after the other,
an intense, steady look, and held it a little longer than was necessary. I
recognized the technique. It is intended to convey that the user is a
percipient judge accustomed to taking summarily the measure of his man; the
receiver should feel that be now faces a reliable type with no nonsense about
him—or, alternatively, that he has been seen through and had all his weaknesses
noted. The right form of response is to return it in kind and be considered a
“useful fella.” I did. The Colonel picked up his pen.

“Your names, please?”

We gave them.

“And addresses?”

“In the present circumstances I fear they won’t be very
useful,” I said. “But if you really feel you must have them—” We gave them too.

He murmured something about system, organization, and
relatives, and wrote them down. Age, occupation, and all the rest of it
followed. He bent his searching look upon us again, scribbled a note upon each
piece of paper and put them in a file.

“Need good men. Nasty business, this. Plenty to do here,
though. Plenty. Mr. Beadley’ll tell you what’s wanted,”

We came out into the ball again. Josella giggled.

“He forgot to ask for references in triplicate—but I gather
we’ve got the job,” she said.

Michael Beadley, when we discovered him, turned out to be in
decided contrast. He was lean, tall, broad-shouldered, and slightly stooping,
with something the air of an athlete run to books. In repose his face took on
an expression of mild gloom from the darkness of his large eyes, but it was
seldom that one had a glimpse of it in repose. The occasional streaks of gray
in his hair helped very little in judging his age. He might have been anywhere
between thirty-five and fifty. His obvious weariness just then made an estimate
still more difficult. By his looks, he must have been up all night; nevertheless
he greeted us cheerfully and waved an introductory hand toward a young woman,
who took down our names again as we gave them.