"Masses of them," Sacco said, coming back out of breath. "And you knowwhat, sir? You know what? I read what it said on the notice and it said,
'Health and Safety at Work,' it said, 'Obey These Signs,' it said, and itsaid, 'They Are There for Your Protection.' "
"That's what it said?" said Dorcas.
" 'For Your Protection,' " Sacco repeated.
"Can you get it down?"
"There's a coathook next to it," said Nooty enthusiastically. "I bet wecould sling a hook up and then pull it over toward the window, and then-'
"Yes, yes, you're good at that sort of thing," said Dorcas. Nooty couldclimb like a squirrel. "I expect Nisodemus will be very pleased," headded.
Nisodemus was, especially with the piece that said "For Your Protection."
It showed, he said, that, urn, Arnold Bros. (est. 1905) was on theirside.
Every bit of board and rusty sheet of metal had to be pressed intoservice. The nomes went at it cheerfully enough, though, happy to bedoing something. Next morning the sun rose to see a variety of Signshanging, not always squarely, on the battered quarry gate.
They had been very thorough. The Signs said: NO ETNRY. EXIT THIS WAY. DAGNER--HARD HAT AREA. BLASTIGN IN PROGRES. ALL
TRUCKS REPORT TO WIEGH-IN STATION. SLIPERY WHEN WET. THIS REGESTIR
CLOSED. ELEVOTAR OUT FO ORDER. BEWARE OF FLALING ROCKS. ROAD FLOOODED.
And one that Dorcas had found in a book and was rather proud of: UNEXPLODED BOM.
Just to be on the safe side, though, and without telling Nisodemus, hefound some more chain and, in one of the greasy old toolboxes in theCat's shed, a padlock nearly as big as he was. It took four nomes tocarry it.
The chain was massive. Some of the nomes found Dorcas painstakinglylevering it along across the quarry floor, one link at a time. He didn'tseem to want to tell them where he'd found it.
The truck turned up around noon. The nomes waiting in the hedge by theside of the truck, saw the driver get out, look at the signs, and ...
No, that wasn't right. Humans couldn't do that sort of thing. It couldn'tbe true. But twenty nomes, peering out from the undergrowth, saw ithappen.
The human disobeyed the signs.
Not only that, it pulled some of them off the gate and threw them away.
They watched in astonishment. Even UNEXPLODED BOM was whirled into thebushes, nearly knocking young Sacco from his perch.
The new chain, though, caused the human a few problems. It rattled the chain once or twice, peered in through the wire mesh of the gate, stamped around for a bit, and then drove off. The nomes in the bushes cheered, but not too happily. If humans weren't going to do what was expected of them, nothing was right in the world.
"I reckon that's it," said Dorcas when they got back. "I don't like the idea any more than anyone else, but we've got to move. I know humans.
That chain won't stop them if they really want to get in." "I absolutely forbid anyone to leave!" said Nisodemus.
"But you see, metal can be cut through-" Dorcas began in a reasonable tone of voice. "Silence!" shouted Nisodemus. "It's your fault, you old fool! Um! You put the chain on the gate!" "Well, you see, it was to stop the pardon?" said Dorcas.
"If you hadn 't put the chain on the gate, the signs would have stopped the human," said Nisodemus. "But you can't expect Arnold Bros. (est.
1905) to help us if we show we don't trust him!" "Um," said Dorcas. What he was thinking was: Mad. A mad nome. A dangerously mad nome. We're not talking about teapots here. He backed out of Nisodemus's presence and was glad to get out into the bitingly cold air.
Everything's going wrong, he thought. I was left in charge, and now it's all going wrong, we haven't got any proper plans, Masklin hasn't come back, and it's all going wrong.
If humans come into the quarry, they'll find us. Something cold landed on his head. He brushed at it irritably.
I'll have a word with some of the younger nomes, he thought. Maybe going to the barn wasn't such a bad idea. We could keep our eyes shut on the way. Or something. Something else, cold and soft, settled on his neck.
Oh, why are people so complicated?
He looked up and realized that he couldn't see Ae other side of the quarry. The air was full of white specks, and more appeared as he watched.
He watched it in horror.
It was snowing.
Chapter 8
VII. And Grimma said, We have two choices.
VIII. We can run, or we can hide.
IX. And they said, Which shall we do?
X. She said, We shall Fight.
-From the Book of Nome, Quarries III, v. VII-X
It wasn't much of a snowfall, just one of those m nippy littlesprinklings that come early in the winter to make it absolutely clearthat it is, well, the winter. That's what Granny Morkie said.
She'd never been very interested in the council anyway. She liked tospend her time with the other old people, exchanging grumbles and, as sheput it, cheerin' them up and takin' them out o' themselves.
She strutted around in the snow as if it belonged! to her.
The old-Store nomes watched her in horrified silence.
" 'Course, this is nothing to some of 'em," she said. "I mind we've hadsnow so deep we couldn't walk around in it, we had to dig tunnels! Talkabout laugh!"
"Er madam," said a very old nome, gravely, "Does it always drop out ofthe sky like this?"
" 'Course! Sometimes it gets blown along by the wind. You get great bigpiles!"
"We thought it-you see, on the cards-that is, in the Store-well, wethought it just sort of appeared on things," said the old nome. "In arather jolly and festive way," he added, looking embarrassed.
They watched it pile up. Over the quarry the clouds hung like overstuffedmattresses.
"At least it means we won't have to go to that horrid barn place," said anome.
"That's right," said Granny Morkie. "You could catch your death, goingout in this." She looked cheerful.
The old nomes grumbled among themselves, and scanned the sky anxiouslyfor the first signs of robins or reindeer.
The snow closed the quarry in. You couldn't see out across the fields.
Dorcas sat in his workshop and stared at the snow piling up against thedirty window, giving the shed a dull gray light.
"Well," he said quietly, "we wanted to be shut away. And now we are. Wecan't run away, and we Gan t hide. We ought to have gone when Masklin left."
He heard footsteps behind him. It was Grimma. She spent a long time near the gate these days, but the snow had driven her indoors at last.
"He wouldn't be able to come," she said. "Not in the snow."
"Yeah. Right," said Dorcas uncertainly.
"It's been eight days now."
"Yes. Quite a long time."
"What were you saying when I came in?" she said.
"I was just talking to myself. Does this snow stuff stay for a long time?"
"Granny says it does, sometimes. Weeks and weeks, she says."
"Oh."
"When the humans come back, they'll be here for good," said Grimma.
"Yes," said Dorcas sadly. "Yes, I think you're right."
"How many of us would be able to ... you know ... go on living here?"
"A couple of dozen, perhaps. If they don't eat much, and lie low during the day. There's no Food Hall, you see." He sighed. "And there won't bemuch hunting. Not with humans around the quarry the whole time. All thegame up in the thickets will run away." '
"But there's thousands of us!"
Dorcas shrugged.
"It's hard enough for me to walk through this snow," he said. "There's hundreds of older nomes who'll never do it. And young ones, come to that.
"So we've got to stay, just as Nisodemus wants," said Grimma.
"Yes. Stay and hope. Perhaps the snow will be-"
"We could make a run for the thickets or something," he said vaguely.