‘Ready?’
Matt nodded. He was as ready as he’d ever be. Under his thick clothing he also wore a rubber skin-diving suit, remembering how the worms were no longer deterred by clothes the way they had been when he’d first met them in the sewers.
‘Rhys, if we come face to face with them, we retreat.’
‘My dear fellow, it shall be as you say. You’re the man with the combat experience. So lead on.’
The cobbled shopping street was as quiet as death. So often he’d walked along here with Jenny running and chattering at his side, greeting the shopkeepers and others, but now there was only an eerie silence. They kept cautiously to the centre of the road. It was like entering a war zone after a neutron bomb attack, with all life exterminated though the buildings remained.
This sensation was reinforced by the sight of Fran’s craft shop with its broken window. He stooped to look inside. His mouth went dry.
Worms lay in loops across the counter, lazily explored the display shelves and squirmed over the floor. They were mostly about four feet long, though a few were shorter, and they moved sluggishly, ignoring the two men staring in at them.
‘Like an army of occupation,’ Rhys whispered ecstatically. ‘If only we could communicate with them.’
‘You can,’ Matt told him sourly. ‘One step inside that door, you’d get the message right away.’
The butcher’s next door had also been taken over. There was no meat in sight, only worms. Sleeping in the window; coiled up on the scales. And in the outfitter’s they’d draped themselves langorously over the mannequins, their colouring in vivid contrast with the sailing jackets and white sweaters. One worm eyed them lethargically from amidst a disarray of underwear.
‘They don’t see us as a danger any longer,’ Rhys was saying excitedly. ‘They feel they’ve won their battle. Here we are, strolling among them like tourists almost! Matt, I’m sure we could reach some understanding with them if…’
‘Try reaching some understanding with a cobra!’ Matt retorted contemptuously. ‘They’re not attacking us because they’ve gorged themselves silly already on all the livestock that used to live round here, the pigs, sheep, hens, cows, ducks, dogs, cats, rabbits… If you don’t believe me, you stick around till they’re hungry again.’
But maybe they could get to the cottage safely, he thought. Pack his films and stuff into a couple of rucksacks and get back before they changed their minds. It was risky, but…
He led the way through the narrow lane. The clear stream tumbled and gurgled as it had always done, littered by the same soggy cigarette packets and empty beer cans. The mongrel which had always barked at him from the end garden was no longer there, nor was the old woman he’d so often seen at the open window of the third cottage.
‘It’s uncanny,’ Rhys commented, his voice now a little unsteady. ‘Seagulls on the rooftops, and nothing else.’ He pushed open a rickety garden gate and crossed the tiny patch of grass to peer in through the front window. ‘St Christopher and all the saints!’ he murmured.
Matt joined him. Through the spotlessly-clean pane he saw the raw carcase of old Dave Trewin with several worms still feeding on it. The dead man’s stomach gaped open and a worm was emerging from it, streaked with red, gripping a large section of intestine. Part of his face was gone, though enough was left to recognize him; his crutches too lay on the floor beside him. Twenty years earlier he’d been injured helping to rescue the crew of a Dutch freighter driven on the rocks; he was well-known in Westport pubs, spinning yarns to holiday-makers in exchange for drinks.
Something moved.
A quick slither on the tiles above.
Matt dodged back instinctively even before his mind had registered the danger. The worm slipped over the guttering and fell with deadly accuracy on to Rhys’s shoulders.
It didn’t bite immediately. It first steadied itself, then pulled its head back as if wanting to examine its victim’s face before selecting which portion to feed on. Rhys’s eyes bulged with terror. He opened his mouth as if to scream, but there was no sound. Only a rattle in his throat.
The worm was on the point of striking when Matt’s hand gripped it just below the head. It whipped about furiously this way and that, trying to fix Matt with its eyes, then twisting its neck in a vain attempt to bite his wrist. He held it steadily and stared back, asserting his own superiority. Gradually the worm’s resistance slackened. Now he need only tighten his fingers slightly…
‘Don’t kill it!’ Rhys’s voice had returned. ‘We’ll take it back for Professor Jones. A present from Westport!’
‘It’s asking for trouble!’ Matt protested.
‘Why?’
‘The others…’
‘Half-asleep, most of them,’ Rhys scoffed. ‘The rest are too busy.’ He added triumphantly: ‘So you do admit there’s communication between them?’
Matt didn’t argue. Still holding the worm in front of him, he marched back into the cobbled street, abandoning all idea of visiting his own cottage. It had been a crazy notion anyway. If there was one place in the whole of Westport which would be crawling with worms, it would be his cottage.
In the shop windows he caught the occasional glimpse of eyes watching him. They were following his progress back to the quayside, yet not obviously moving. He thought at one point he heard something, swung around… Nothing.
‘You’re getting nervous,’ Rhys observed, his confidence now fully restored.
Matt stopped, irritated. He thrust the worm’s head towards Rhys’s face and felt the ripple of interest passing through its body as its jaws opened. ‘Would you like to carry it?’ he demanded.
‘My dear fellow, I didn’t mean to offend you!’ Rhys backed away. ‘Let’s just get it back to the boat.’
Rounding the corner at the foot of the cobbled street they came to the wide quayside where he’d often been with Jenny to buy lobster or mackerel from the fishermen unloading their catch. It was crowded with worms, some lying with their heads flat on the cobbles, though others raised them in that interested, periscope-like manner which had become so familiar.
‘What d’you suggest now?’ asked Matt cynically. He felt weary and realized he no longer minded dying, though he’d prefer it to happen quickly.
‘They want their friend back, that’s obvious!’ Rhys squeaked with delight at this confirmation of his theories. ‘So if you place him carefully on the ground…’
‘And have it take a piece out of my nose?’ Matt refused scornfully. He was sickened by the whole expedition. Twenty yards off the boat was waiting for them, standing wisely a couple of feet away from the quayside. But to get there they’d have to pass the worms. ‘There’s only one way out of this mess, Rhys.’
‘What mess? Don’t you see…’
But Matt wasn’t listening. He tightened his fingers around the worm he was holding, squeezing it to death, and then threw the body into the centre of one of the thickest groups a few feet away. As usual, they fell hungrily on their dead brother.
‘Now make a dash for the boat!’ he shouted at Rhys as he transferred his stick to his right hand. ‘Keep over to the right by those boxes. Move!’
‘But’ Rhys started to argue. A large worm slid rapidly towards him at that moment and reared up to strike at his thigh.
‘Go!’ Matt pushed him, bringing his stick down on the worm’s head at the same time.
Rhys forgot all his theories and sprinted for the boat. Something was happening on board but Matt was too busy to watch. Out of the corner of his eye he saw one of the ratings had jumped on to the quayside to help Rhys aboard. It seemed to take ages, but what was the difficulty?