'I'm not wrong.' Reitze's voice was as emotionless as ever. 'My tests have proved beyond doubt that the throw-backs can't stand the winter.'
'Did you really have to ... to kill those few to prove that?' Caldecott's eyebrows knitted, accusing.
They died.' A politician's answer, avoid replying to a direct question. 'If you want me to do tests then there are bound to be casualties.'
The Defence Minister and the Prime Minister exchanged glances. Both were uneasy. They gave up blaming the Americans, looked for another outlet; there weren't many left.
'But we've got to do something.' Caldecott spread his hands in despair. 'If only it wasn't winter.'
There's nothing we can do.' Reitze took his time selecting and lighting a Camel, 'The way the snow's blowing up right now we won't be able to get out of here ourselves before long. Even if we could, even if the weather was mild, it would be an impossibility rounding these people up again. They've dispersed, are trying to adapt to a new environment. Towns and cities are foreign to their primitive nature so no way will they be coming back. We've just got to face up to it—by the spring there won't be many of 'em left.'
Silence. The battery clock on the wall sounded deafeningly loud. Time was everybody's enemy right now.
'What about these . . . these latest tests you're doing?' Caldecott asked hesitantly. 'The ones in the ... outdoor shelter.'
'I've just come back from there.' Reitze took his time replying. Damn them, they would ask about that. There was no point in lying; the truth could be known in a matter of hours. Just don't try blaming me. 'We've got a problem.'
'What sort of a problem?'
'At the moment I'm not sure. Newman and Barnes are conducting tests right now on a man who collapsed less than an hour ago. It isn't from exposure to the elements, I'm virtually certain of that.' 'What then?'
'I'm not sure. I'll let you know the minute I am.' That should break the meeting up if anything could.
'All right,' Caldecott nodded, 'we'll be waiting to hear from you, Professor. I just hope it isn't bad news. It seems that time is on the side of the enemy who did this awful thing to us. They have only to sit and wait and within a matter of months the unpopulated western world will be theirs for the taking! I just hope you're wrong.'
'It's bad.' Brian Newman's features were devoid of colour. He sat on a chair in the corner of the laboratory. There was no sign of Barnes and Reitze didn't ask after him. On the operating table a sheet covered the body of the man they had brought in earlier. There was no movement from beneath it and Reitze did not enquire if he was dead because he never wasted his time on futile questions.
'How bad?' Don't rush him, let him take his time giving the facts.
'A virus,' Newman replied. 'An off-shoot of the microorganism that worked on the skin tissues, doubtless. It affects the lungs like the fastest cancer you've ever known and the heart can't stand the strain. Triggered off by a drop in body temperature. If those we deep froze hadn't died so quick they'd've got it almost certainly. Cold and wet brings it on. Whether it will affect every single one of the millions of throwback Britons is anybody's guess, but I'd say you'd have to be bloody lucky to survive out there. Another thing, and I'm not absolutely sure about this, but I'd say it's contagious.'
The hell it is!' Reitze instinctively moved back a pace. 'In that case we'd better start work with some antibiotics, inject all that lot up in the environment compound. Right now I can't think of anything else.'
They took the Land Rover again. The blizzard had increased to gale force, restricted visibility to less than fifteen yards. The snow was beginning to drift and several times they had wheel-spin but they scarcely noticed it.
The same sentry unlocked the gate, climbed on the tailboard. It wasn't going to be easy injecting a crowd of primitive men and women who had a terror of civilisation.
Reitze drove right up to the hut, parked the Land Rover across the entrance and killed the engine.
'Jesus H. Christ!' was all he said.
His companions stared where he was looking. There was limited vision through the driving white flakes but it was enough. More than enough.
Newman wanted to say 'Maybe they're just sleeping, huddled together for warmth.' It would have been a pointless lie. The soldier had jumped down from the rear, was pressed up against the side of the vehicle, his rifle still slung on his shoulder because he wouldn't be needing it.
Two of the hut's occupants squatted against the far walls, heads forward, nodding as though they were on the verge of slumber. They did nof look up even though they had surely heard the Land Rover's approach. Two children lay just inside, arms entwined around each other.
The rest were strewn across the entire floor space, lying in various poses, some on their backs, others face upwards. Not moving.
The snow was cutting a virgin white path inside as far as the centre, creating a fluffy shroud which was fast covering the bodies in the foreground. Maybe in a few hours it would fill the whole shed, hide the horror of it all. Nature's final apology before the world died.
Reitze pushed the starter-button, began to reverse back out into the paddock.
Test Number Three was conclusive enough without further examination of the specimens—the new virus was fatal within a matter of hours*.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
THE THROWBACKS would not be attacking again, Jon Quinn was optimistic about that. They would not face guns; they had learned their lesson.
He had spent the remainder of that awful night at the bedroom window, but there had been no sign of the enemy out there in the darkness. They had withdrawn, were doubtless watching from the hills around. But they had no answer to the sudden death that firearms were capable of. They would not risk another raid, would rely on stealth, maybe an ambush if they got the chance.
Dawn came gradually, a slow greyness, a creeping hill-fog that reduced visibility to a few yards. He could make out the gate, the tall hedge that bordered the lane, but only because he knew what and where they were. Detail was obscured in a still damp world. If you listened hard enough you heard the. steady dripping of condensation. Not even the harsh squawking of a crow in the fir spinney. Nothing.
Sylvia was sleeping heavily. He bent over her, for one awful moment thought she had stopped breathing. Her breasts scarcely rose and fell. A combination of shock and exhaustion. She would probably sleep the clock round.
As he turned away from the bed an awful feeling of loneliness assailed him. He didn't even have Sylvia any more. Physically she was here in the cottage but her love, her thoughts, were out there up in the hills. Eric Atkinson was a terrible sight to behold but everything in her had gone back to him. She might even go to him now and if that was her wish then he would let her go. There was no point in trying to stop her.
Another awful thought; out there in the yard were three dead bodies.
Murderer!
He winced, did not even try to convince his conscience that it was self-defence, that he had shot them to save Sylvia; just accepted that he had killed them. The corpses had to be buried, there was no question about that, and there was only one person to do it. It was a task that could not be delayed,
He went downstairs and outside, took the gun with him. The sooner he got it done, the better. Funerals were therapy, a sort of climax to grief, and once they were over and done with time could begin to heal; perhaps his conscience would be easier when the dead were below ground.
The cultivation patch was the obvious choice; the soil there was soft and the digging would be relatively easy. AH the same, it would take him most of the day.