Jaquiline and Cola brought several large lumps of coal into the hut, and they were considerably blackened by such work. Their two captors then decided to lock the door for the night, and were soon fast asleep from the heat of the fire, and also no doubt from their adventures of the last few days. Jaquiline only half slept.
Eager for more thrills, Peter and Paul prodded them awake with their toecaps so that they could set out for Agbat, where they intended to register the exploits so far achieved. A faint streak in the east gradually made the stars go paler. While the two men slaked themselves on Cola inside the hut, Jaquiline watched the birth of a new day. The first light changed to a band of gold on the mountainous horizon. Each lofty peak in succession was tinged with a roseate blush. Shadows gradually melted away, revealing forests, spurs, fields, and villages, in emerald green and patches of dull brown. From grey cold night the sun suddenly burst from behind the mountains and flooded the whole landscape with light and warmth, as Cola came out of the hut smiling shyly, followed by her two licensed adventurers.
Thus the orange sun from Cronacia warmed them as they walked along. Cola and Jaquiline went hand in hand, dazed by exhaustion, bedraggled, without luggage, their clothes and faces black with coal. Jaquiline reflected that nothing had gone right since crossing that seemingly harmless frontier. It was almost as if she had come to this country in an unwitting act of self-destruction, having placed herself in a situation where, threatened and helpless, there was no one to whose good nature she could appeal, not even a consulate she could run to and find refuge in.
They went along a path by the single-track railway, no houses in sight, though here and there were areas bearing clear plough marks, and groves of scarecrow trees that passed for orchards. When she stopped to take a stone out of her shoe, Peter pushed her on. ‘We’re late already,’ he snapped. ‘The office will be closed if we don’t hurry.’
‘It can’t even be opened yet,’ she said.
‘Don’t argue. We want to register, then we’ll be awarded tickets for a hotel.’
‘What fun we’ll have!’ Paul laughed. While they were discussing who would rape Jaquiline first, Cola explained to her that the office would indeed be closed if they didn’t get there soon, because it stayed open all night, and shut early in the morning. Jaquiline reproached her with wanting to hurry, in that case, pulling her arm so that they would go more slowly.
‘Why?’ asked Cola, her mouth round and hungry for some great experience that certainly would never satisfy her. ‘I want us to get there so that we can claim a hotel ticket for seventy-two hours. It isn’t often an ordinary patriotic Nihilonian woman like me gets such a chance. It certainly will be better than Aspron. And I’ll at least have a romantic memory when I’m thrown into the despair of a cure. It’s awful to be cured, I hear. That’s the worst part of Aspron. It brings on an awful feeling of melancholia. People have been known to kill themselves after a cure, but I won’t, I know I won’t, because at least I shall have this brief encounter to look back on.’
The idea of being passed like a parcel from one brutish Nihilist to another appalled. Jaquiline, and an urgent feeling of sickness rose in her throat. Where at first there had been laughter and good fellowship between Peter and Paul, they now stood bellowing into each other’s faces. ‘I demand the tall, fair one,’ said Peter. But Paul wanted her too, and Jaquiline felt anything but flattered by their urgent desires. Cola turned pale and vampiric, as if about to rend her with jealousy. They stopped and looked back. Peter suggested tossing a coin, and when Paul won he was accused of cheating.
‘Let the clerk who fills out our hotel voucher decide,’ Peter said, standing glumly by, hat in hand.
‘You’ll bribe him. I know your sort,’ Paul scoffed.
Peter looked at his watch. ‘It’s too late. It’s eight o’clock. They’ve closed.’
Paul was almost in tears. ‘Now what do we do?’ Jaquiline was too tired to feel joy at the good news. ‘We’ll have to wait until ten o’clock tonight,’ he cried.
The path turned into a lane, with the imprints of carts and motorcars on it. Houses were scattered over the hills. A young man walked by, his face pale and sweating. He had a short dark beard, and his eyes were turned from them, as if he were embarrassed. Behind came two young boys, possibly his sons, one of ten years old who carried a bundle of brushwood on his head, another of about six who had a filthy half-filled sack on his shoulder. It was a depressing sight, but at least they were people. She was choking from thirst, feeble with hunger and lack of sleep, and was almost ready to welcome a bed under any conditions.
She felt more than ever menaced on hearing the two men whisper. Both heads were close, and she saw the sweat on their skin, and the half-hidden workings of their lips. Peter laughed softly, and spoke such unmistakable evil that she began to run.
‘Come back!’ Cola shouted treacherously, before either of the men saw her escape. The lane went downhill, more of a road now, and a few hundred metres away lay the first houses of Agbat. There was a sharp explosion like a firework. A chip of stone flew off a boulder by the roadside and struck her forehead. The pain was icy, but she couldn’t stop, with the footsteps of either Peter or Paul drumming after her.
A train whistle sounded, a sharp comforting civilized note cutting the warm morning air. Blood ran down her face, and she tasted it on her lips. If only she could reach the houses. She saw it was impossible. Who would help her, anyway? She might even be worse off. A shoe left her foot, and she kicked the other free, to run in her stockings. Cola and the men behind shouted again for her to stop. They didn’t mean it: they were her friends, they said. No harm would come to her. Another bullet hit the trunk of a tree, but she ran, hair flying loose, filled with dread but not caring if they killed her, yet too frightened to consider whether or not it was worth dying for.
For some reason she wanted it to rain. She stumbled, feet cut, and her stockings in rags. Houses slid out of sight. A weight suddenly fell on her, and it felt as if her back were broken when she tried to rise. Her face was pressed into the dust, her flowing tears changing it to mud.
Magically, the pressure was off. Whoever had sought to crush her bones rolled to one side, and someone else was running. There were further shots, and a scream of shock. She was afraid to get up and see the cause of these mysterious noises, unable to believe the danger was over. But the man at her side lay still, his face turned. She kept her head down in the silence, as if more danger might be coming.
A hard blunt object pressed itself in her side. When she looked, the man took his boot away and bent down. He held a rifle, and wore a sort of blue overall. ‘Get up and follow me,’ he said. His head was shaved, and his face was hollow of cheek. She stumbled, unable to stand properly, and though his eyes were expressionless and staring, as if they had not yet fully comprehended the last sight they had seen, he held a hand out to help her.
Chapter 26
Enjoying the civil war from behind the bullet-proof glass of the café by the main square of Nihilon City, Richard decided not to open the large briefcase which the professor had left with him. At least, not before he had called for another bottle of Nihilitz.
‘Yes, general,’ the waiter said, reminding him too abruptly of the new post that had been thrust upon him by the insurrectionary forces. He had no intention of becoming a soldier in this squalid power-switch, though he felt sure that if he were to step outside, the dissidents would certainly recognize him, and confirm him in his new post with such celebration that he might not survive it. ‘I hope you have a good campaign, sir,’ said the waiter. ‘The weather is perfect for it. It rained last time, and the revolution fizzled out. Those taking part put down their guns and went home.’