Whiteout!

I yelled, 'Again!' waited, nodded, and heaved upwards with all my remaining strength. Slowly it lifted, and all down my back and thighs the muscles strained and then trembled as the strength went out of me. Grunting under the strain, I struggled to hold it, to continue the lift . . , forcing every ounce of energy I could muster into one last upward burst. Slowly the monster began to tilt, to lean forward, to begin to balance itself, to move through the point of balance . . , and suddenly with a crash the axe handle rose free and weightless and the generator crashed out into the tunnel on its side. As I staggered after it, the far end of the hut began to disintegrate. I knew from the direct heat on my body that my parka was burning and hurled myself full length to the trench floor, rolling over and over so that the snow could douse the fire. It took only seconds, because the trench floor was water-covered. I'd forgotten that in the panic. Now, instantly, it soaked me, the water ice-chilled, and in no time at all I was shivering, my teeth chattering.

'You okay?' the other man shouted.

I nodded, coughing.

'I'm gonna get some help.'

I nodded again and heard him splashing away. Then my thought processes resumed some kind of function. Help meant, ultimately, the arrival of Coveney, and I'd better make myself scarce. I lurched to my feet and staggered off down the smoke-filled tunnel towards the darkness of Main Street, still coughing hard. I turned gratefully into the cold clean air that blew along that vast trench between the two entrances, and headed for the reactor trench, feeling better as the ache in my lungs began to subside a little, but shivering in the icy grip of my soaking clothes.

A couple of minutes later I was telling Kelleher what had happened. An emergency lantern burned on his desk. He listened, rummaging round for some clothing for me, and I stripped as I talked. When I told him about the water, he nodded grimly.

'Simple. He cut through the water lines. They'd just drain themselves into the tunnel. But, boy oh boy, we're in bad shape now. The water line'll have to be fixed before the power can come into use. And new electrical connections'll have to be improvised. Time margin's gonna be narrow.'

'Four hours, Barney told me, the first time the lights went.'

'Maybe a little less. Everything's been low-power. What heat there is will dissipate faster.'

'And he's free to strike again. And it'sdark.' I bent to lace the dry boots.

'Right. But maybe at last I got something now.'

My head jerked round. 'What?'

'A fluke. Christ knows what the odds were in parts per million ! I came back here and got going on the water samples again. Never did figure that contamination.'

'Go on.'

'Got nowhere in the beginning. Then there was a real flash on the spectrometer. Couldn't figure it at first. Not one hundred per cent sure even now. But when I got it isolated on a slide and used the microscope I reckoned I knew.'

'What was it?'

'Tissue.'

I blinked at him. 'Human tissue?'

'Christ, I'm no pathologist.' He watched me, waiting for me to come to the conclusion he'd reached. Nor was it difficult. 'Kirton,' I said.

His mouth tightened. 'Maybe Carson, too.'

'No,' I said. 'The well was out of use before Carson disappeared.'

'Sure, but it's a hell of a handy place to dispose of a body.'

'Doesn't tell us who he is, though,' I said bitterly. 'Nothing ever does that. He burns down the bloody diesel shed and actually goes by me in the dark and still we've no idea.' I reached for my soaking jacket top and felt in the pocket for the sheet I'd taken from Kirton's folder. 'Read this. It doesn't tell us anything either. But I've got a feeling in my water that this is him.'

Kelleher unfolded the wet paper carefully. The note had been written with a ball-pen and fortunately remained legible. He read it slowly. 'Where'd it come from?'

I told him. Then I said, 'Kirton knew who it was. Must have known. That has to be the reason he was killed.'

'Well, he sure can't tell us.' Kelleher gave a long sigh of irritation, a sigh that suddenly caught in his throat.

'Wait a minute,' he said slowly. 'Maybe he can at that.'

'Spirit writing or table-tapping?' I said sarcastically. 'Or maybe you're a medium?'

'Uh-uh,' Kelleher said. 'But Kirton kept a diary.'

'If he did, it'll be in his quarters. Or it will if our friend hasn't stolen it.'

'He kept it on him.'

'How do you know?'

'I do it, too. Have since I was a kid. We talked about it once.'

I stared at him in silence, not wanting to contemplate the consequences of this piece of information about Kirton and looking for sensible objections. I said, 'Diaries are paper. If it is Kirton down there, it'll be illegible by now. He's been down there for - '

Kelleher handed me the sheet of paper I'd given him. 'Look at it. It's wet, sure, but you can read it. The diary's in a pocket, held together. It'll be soaked, but it'll be readable.'

'Even so, there's no guarantee.'

He took the sheet from me. 'What's it say here? Listen: "I made a note at the time." That's what it says, and the diary's got to be where he made the note. I know, believe me. I know all the crazy mechanics of writing up a diary. And there's another little thing you've forgotten.'

'No,' I said. 'I haven't forgotten. But if Kirton was already down there then - '

He didn't wait for me to finish. 'If! Okay, but if he was dumped later, our friend has fingered his pigeon in the unlikely event that Kirton's found. Don't forget - a new well had to be started immediately.' He looked at me steadily.

I said defensively, 'It's not on! In any case, there's no power.'

Kelleher glanced round. 'You can feel it. It's a mite cooler already. It'll get a whole lot colder real fast. One more little accident and Hundred's finished. Maybe it's finished right now. But if the guy can be identified positively, at least there'll be no more sabotage, right ?'

'There's no power for the motor!'

'Wrong,' Kelleher said. 'There's power, muscle power on the winding handle.'

I opened my mouth to speak, but the words didn't come quickly enough and Kelleher went on grimly:

'We need one more guy and him I can get. Only question is, who goes down: you or me?'

The protesting words came, then, but they were only words, and they rolled off Kelleher's answers. Coveney, he said, wouldn't go for this theorizing. Coveney's hands were full and his antagonism plain; he wouldn't even listen. But the attempted cover-up in the death trench and a body in the well were proof enough of murder, and the diary, if it was there, might well be proof of guilt, powerful if not totally conclusive. Enough to force action. But I knew, and Kelleher knew too, why I was arguing so desperately: it was a matter of relative weight and strength. Kelleher was more than fifteen stone and strong as a horse whereas I, wet through, weighed less than eleven. But he was determined to play out the farce of random choice and pulled a quarter from his pocket.

'Call.'

Whatever I called, the answer would have to be the same, but I went along. As it happened, the forces of chance for once recognized the force of logic, and pointed to me. Suddenly the temperature seemed to drop violently, and I began to tremble.

Reaching the well trench was not difficult. As we slipped along Main Street there was no one to see us, though the glow of rigged emergency lights from the diesel tunnel cast a pool of light further along. Once inside, we closed and locked the door, and as I turned, the beam from my handlamp illuminated the circle of corrugated iron protecting the old well-head and the metal hoisting frame above. Kelleher fitted the handle quickly. I walked unsteadily towards the well and shone the handlamp down into the unimaginable depths and immediately began to shiver again. Not far below, giant icicles hung into the void like the waiting teeth of some implacably hostile giant, their tips pointing like signposts of death to the black, narrow neck which led through into the second chamber, and more icicles which I couldn't see but knew to be there. And below them . . . Bile climbed abruptly into my throat. I turned away quickly, and said,