He made a shuddering intake of breath, staring at Leila as though seeing her for the first time, and fought to control the spasmodic twitching which had developed in the muscles around his mouth. “Here’s what you’ve got to do, Leila. That house in Gilpinston is the bolt-hole, and that’s why it’s so far away. Seconds before the bomb explodes…just before the big bang…the thing, the puppet master, will be taken there by Albert. After the bomb explodes there’ll be complete silence. Scry-silence, I mean. The Thrice-born will wait for a time, listening, but there’ll be complete silence, and he’ll go away again, satisfied.
“I’ll probably be dead, too—because the puppet master won’t take the risk of my somehow revealing it’s still alive, but you can prevent all that. You and I working together can prevent all that—by killing the puppet master before the bomb is dropped. The Thrice-born will know what has happened. He’ll scry-sense it and he won’t drop the bomb. At least, I don’t think he will. You’ll help me, won’t you, Leila? Say you’ll help me, for Christ’s sake!”
Redpath lurched forward and grabbed Leila by the shoulders, crooking his fingers deep into the soft flesh. She flinched and her lips moved silently as she thrust the knife into him. The pain was a shocking, sickening admixture of every other pain he had known. Retaining his grip on Leila’s shoulders, he looked down at the knife. It had gone through his shirt and penetrated some distance into the gathering of subcutaneous fat just above his belt, but the thrust had been checked at that point. Leila, still gripping the handle of the knife, was locked in a trembling rigidity.
“You didn’t mean to do that,” he said gently, almost benignly, taking the blade from her and drawing it clear of his own body. “I frightened you, and you reacted out of fear, and we’re not going to let a minor incident like that affect our plans, are we?”
“No, John.” Leila’s voice was virtually inaudible and tears glistened on her cheeks. “I’m sorry I…”
“Good girl!” Redpath set the knife down, tore a handful of kitchen tissue from the wall-mounted roller and tucked it inside his shirt, forming a loose pad in the region of the wound. Blood had been channelled along the top of his belt, creating a broad horizontal stain across his waist. He applied pressure to the pad with his left forearm and turned his attention back to Leila. The geyser of pain seemed to have had a purging scouring effect within his head, but the intangible pressures had increased immeasurably. Something had been thwarted, and now it was impatient and angry.
“Can’t talk much longer,” he said in whispered panic. “It wants to listen. Don’t take time to pack a bag, Leila—just get your passport and credit cards and all the money you have. If you leave now you can be at London Airport soon after midnight. With luck you’ll be able to get a walk-on flight to Chicago before morning. As soon as you get there find some…”
“Chicago!” Leila backed away from him, shaking her head. “I can’t.”
“Don’t argue!“Redpath’s voice was thunderous in the confined space of the kitchen, and his gaze alternated wildly between Leila’s face and the knife which was lying beside the sink. “Why are you arguing? You bitch! What are you trying to do?”
“John, I …” Leila stared at him for a moment, eyes flaring white, then turned and ran into the living-room.
Redpath—swearing dementedly, his limbs rigid with fury—picked up the knife and went after her.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Mini’s engine, powered by a new battery, turned over with all the scrabbling eagerness of a terrier going after a rat, shaking the framework of the vehicle with its energy, but the ignition sequence refused to sustain itself. Alarmed by the engine’s perversity, Leila Mostyn kept turning the key and pumping the accelerator pedal until a listless note amid the mechanical frenzy told her she had flooded the system. She paused, trying to breathe steadily, and looked back over her shoulder towards the house. The lights were on in the narrow outside stairwell, and at any second she could expect to see the tall, lurching, stoop-shouldered, bleak-eyed apparition that had once been John Red-path bounding down the concrete steps. It was a vision which threatened to undermine what was left of her self-control. She bit her lower lip, forced herself to count slowly to sixty and tried the starter again. The engine fired into healthy life.
She switched on the lights, swerved the car out through the gates into the Leicester Road and drove towards the town centre. Her intention was to go straight to the Calbridge police station, but at a distance of a hundred yards from the house—encased in a mobile metal shell which gave her the ability to outpace the devil himself—the crushing sense of fear abated slightly and old modes of thought began to reassert themselves. She knew John Redpath and, regardless of what had happened to him or had been done to him, the notion of handing him over to the authorities to be restrained and sedated and mentally dissected seemed like the ultimate act of betrayal. He was insane, frighteningly insane—so much so that in one hideous moment of panic she had almost sunk a knife into his body—but it had to be a temporary condition, caused by the treatment he had received at the institute.
Henry Nevison would know what to do, she decided. Henry could give the best advice, would have all the right polysyllables on tap. Should Compound 183 prove to have psychosomimetic properties…And so on, and so on.
At the thought of being able to transfer her burden of responsibility to Nevison’s shoulders, where it properly belonged, Leila reduced the car’s speed, and at once other considerations came into her mind. If she brought the police in now there would be an immediate explosion of scandal—the story the media would noise abroad would be a sensational cocktail of strange Karloffian experiments, madness, flying saucers, and blood-letting in a suburban love nest—and it would be harmful to everybody who was directly or indirectly involved. The repercussions would reach as far as her own parents down in Pangbourne.
A fresh decision made, she turned left at the next intersection and went left again so that she was driving back the way she had come on an avenue which ran parallel to Leicester Road. At the first cross-street above her starting point she made another left turn, drove slowly to the end of the street and halted almost at the corner in a position from which she could observe the entrance to her apartment house. She switched off the car’s lights but left the engine running, unwilling to risk the consequences of perhaps being noticed by John when he emerged and not being able to take flight in time. His sudden lunatic rages in the flat had been terrifying enough, but she sensed they would be as childish tantrums compared to what he would do on learning she was not at that moment speeding on her way to Gilpinston, via London Airport and Chicago.
Leila gave an involuntary shudder and drew her coat closer together at her throat as she recalled those last few minutes alone with John in the apartment…his abrupt descent into total irrationality…the brandishing of the knife as he followed her about in search of her passport…the incoherence and the wild ramblings…
Remember the address, Leila…I can beat the puppet master, but it doesn’t know that…go straight to Gilpinston…the Thrice-born is too close…hire a car if you need one…fill the bottles with petrol and stop up the necks with rags…I can break the control, but the Once-born doesn’t know…both houses have to go up at the same time…we can kill it, Leila.…midnight tomorrow night—that’s seven o’clock in Illinois…don’t worry—the bottles won’t explode in your hand…have faith, just have faith in me…light the rags and throw the bottles through the front windows…the Thrice-born will know what has happened …