As I turned to him and lifted the mask away, he lifted his arm weakly, and said, 'Gee, my head.'
'Can you hear me?'
'My head. God, my head!'
Moving behind him, I drew my fingers gently through his hair. His breath hissed and he winced suddenly as I touched a lump like a small mountain at the back where his hair was thinning. He hadn't got that collapsing in the snow!
I said, 'Who did it?'
Allen's head moved weakly from side to side.
'Who?'
He blinked up at me; real consciousness was returning now.
'Somebody did hit you?'
'Sure he did.' Allen's eyes closed tightly.
'Who?'
'Didn't see who. Had his .., his parka hood tight. That's all I saw. Then - Bam!'
'You've no idea? No clue at all?'
'No.'
'Where did it happen? Before or after you got the keys?'
Allen looked puzzled for a moment, then said slowly : 'Oh yeah, the keys. Never got that far.'
All the same, the keys had gone from the rack.
'Coffee?' His eyes had closed. He didn't open them as he nodded. Walking out of the theatre to the coffee machine in Kirton's office, I felt chillingly alone. Allen was in no condition to help; there was no sign of Kelleher; and inside me lurked an uncomfortable certainty that I was next on the list of targets.
I still had no idea why.
My hand shook a little as I filled the coffee-cup. My brain pounded with that question: Why? Why the long chapter of destruction, the skilled sabotage, the readiness to kill men, singly like Kirton or indiscriminately with the blunt sweep of poisoned food? Why, why, why? But I had only questions. No answers. And even if the answers had been there to reason out, my brain now seemed incapable of hard thought; Hundred had deadened it and there was just dull reaction to events, followed by weary frustration at a deadly riddle which grew hourly less answerable. I took the coffee in to Allen and watched morosely as he sipped. The acute discomfort in his guts and the brutal bang on the head combined to make him almost helplessly weak. He needed to be warm in bed, not lying awkwardly on this damned operating table. If only there were a bed . . . Then I groaned at my own stupidity. Of course there was a bed; there was the one Kelleher had occupied. I went through to check and stared in astonishment. Kelleher was in it, his eyes glaring up at me!
'What the - !' But the sight told its own story. Kelleher was back in the straitjacket, the straitjacket was fastened to the bed, and there was a wide strip of surgical tape across his mouth!
Chapter 15
I bent to strip the plaster from Kelleher's mouth, thought better of it, and instead unfastened the strappings of the jacket. Once his hands were free, he took off the plaster himself with a mixture of impatience and extreme care. He massaged stiff, sore skin carefully as he told me what had happened.
'Door opened and I heard Coveney's voice, just minutes after you'd gone. I climbed back in here just to avoid trouble, and turned away, pretending to be sleeping, damn it, so I didn't get the chance to see who did it.'
'Did what?'
'Listen. I'll tell you. Coveney looked at me; I know it - I could sense his septic aura - then he went out. When he'd gone, I started to sit up and somebody tried to bust my head. When I woke up, I was strapped in.'
'Somebody from the ward?'
Kelleher shrugged. 'Who knows? There were some guys with Coveney; it could have been one of them. Stayed behind a moment and - splat !' He shook his head and muttered at the pain.
'Can you stand?'
'Sure I can stand.'
'Good. We need the bed." I told him about Allen, and together we carried the master sergeant in, stripped him down to his underwear and tucked him up. As I up-ended his trousers to fold them and preserve the still immaculate creases, a bunch of keys fell out of one of the pockets, and as I bent to pick them up, a thought struck me. The camp had been searched for Carson, but had all of it been searched ? I said to Allen: 'Is there anywhere in this place that's out of bounds?'