Down Cemetery Road Part 41

'The consequences. I might not be around any more, but the, ah, department I work for will be. And I'm afraid they'll have to go into overdrive at that point. Which means that you, your friend back there, Downey, the child, your husband, your old friend, er, Wigwam . . . Everyone you might have had contact with, really. Will all meet major accidents.'

'I ought to kill you.'

'That's your choice. But you won't just be killing me. You'll be starting something you can't stop. You've been lucky so far, you know. Very lucky. We've been a little stretched. Turn this into a full-scale emergency, and what's happening in the Gulf right now will look like tea-time. Now, perhaps I ought to give you a while to think about this, but that's hardly crucial, is it, Sarah? I mean, this isn't a difficult choice you're facing. Happy ever after, or let's f.u.c.k everybody. Pardon my French.'

'You're not human.'

'Compared to some of my colleagues, I'm a teddy bear. A teddy bear that's been awarded the n.o.bel peace prize. Now, I really think you ought to put the gun down, Sarah. Before everyone you know and love gets hurt.'

And to his deep relief, he saw that she was considering doing just that.

He breathed in, breathed out. Somebody's life pa.s.sed before his eyes . . .

Howard stepped forward, and picked the gun from the ground where she'd dropped it, then took a number of steps back, and raised the barrel so it pointed at Sarah.

'What's the matter?' she asked him.

'Let's not be obtuse.'

'But you said '

'I said you could sign some papers. I'm sorry. I lied.' He raised the gun and sighted down the barrel.

'But '

'But no. I'm sorry. You're brave. I'm sorry.' He lowered the gun. At this range, he was hardly going to miss. No need to make a production of it.

'But '

'I'm sorry.'

He fired.

And Sarah . . .

For one split moment Sarah was standing at the end of a long long corridor, watching a bright light rushing towards her at one hundred miles an hour. With it came a noise, something like an angry wind or a whole gang of lions roaring at once, and it changed colour as it approached: now red, now green, now red, now white, now red. In the end it was all red and it swallowed her up just as the noise vanished, and it was like having a telescope she was looking through shatter, leaving her disoriented but exactly where she should be. Then the noise came back, only this time without lions: just a high-pitched scream which scaled the trees, looking for a way to break the sky.

Sarah took a deep breath, and knew she was alive.

The man lay on his back a few yards away, the appalling stump of his right arm gushing blood, though he gripped it by the elbow with his left as if that might help. Sarah had never heard another human issue sounds like this. It was what people meant when they spoke about banshees. His face growled at her, all his features colliding, as if the bland disguise had dropped away, showing the child of darkness beneath. The darkness, though, was mostly made of pain.

The shotgun was a twisted mess of metal at his feet.

She opened her mouth to say something, but found nothing to be said.

After a while she undid her belt and knelt by the screaming man; slipped it round his arm below the elbow, and drew it tight. His remaining hand clawed at her face but when she pushed him down, he subsided. The scream became a whimper. All around his mouth was a thin white paste. The belt looped his arm four times before she could fasten the buckle, and even then, as far as she could see, had no effect whatsoever. But she was no nurse, and you did what you could, that was all . . . The word haunting her was cauterized. But he'd have to take his chances.

'Listen to me.'

Her own words, transmitted from somewhere outside s.p.a.ce.

'Are you listening? You have to lie still. Thrash around, you'll bleed to death.'

Lie still, you'll also bleed to death, she thought. Listen: whose fault was this anyway?

'I'll bring help.'

He spat: a bright gob of phlegm which spattered his own shirt front. In his eyes, she could read approaching death. It was like looking down another tunnel, whose distant light was an oncoming train.

'G.o.d forgive you,' she said.

When she stood, Michael's denim jacket flapped loosely in the breeze. Dipping into its pocket, she scattered the last of the shotgun sh.e.l.ls; gold droppings fell to earth like magic goose s.h.i.t. Though as they winked at her from their brand new hiding places, Sarah was thinking not of them but of the bright red plugs tidy Michael had tucked in his pocket. One fragment of which she could see now, poking blindly from the wreck of the shotgun stock.

And back she walked through the trees, sunlight dancing in her footsteps. Back she ran, actually, filled with sudden fear: for Zoe, for Michael . . . Most of all for Dinah, whom she'd come a long way to lose in a hurry.

I came all this way to find you, and I do remember why. Because we're survivors, the two of us. We survive.

Alive, she ran through the trees, then; and in an astonishingly short while reached the chapel: old stone, straggly bushes, blue 2CV. Her legs almost gave way at that point. As if she were faced with an unexpected hurdle, Sarah found herself weak in the calves; almost stumbled, almost fell; had to reach out and steady herself with both hands on the roof of the tinny car. Through whose window she looked down to see Dinah, looking up at her.

She opened the door. The child wasn't crying. Something of a miracle. On the other hand, all she'd been through, well: she's probably tougher than me, Sarah thought. Probably is. Not that I ever set out to prove anything.

For a moment, she felt a jagged memory intrude: of a cat seen through a window, mocking her from the far side of the gla.s.s. Then it went.

She reached down and took Dinah in her arms. The child thought about it, but didn't struggle. Opened her mouth to say something, but must have changed her mind.

Sarah reached for words of comfort, while behind her a door opened, and someone stepped lightly into the sun, flicking a cigarette lighter.

'Everything's going to be all right,' Sarah said. Then she turned and smiled at Zoe.

'. . . it is theoretically possible to develop so-called "ethnic chemical weapons", which would be designed to exploit naturally occurring differences in vulnerability among specific population groups. Thus, such a weapon would be capable of incapacitating or killing a selected enemy population to a significantly greater extent than the population of friendly forces.' US Army Mobility Equipment Research and Development Center, Decontamination of Water Containing Chemical Warfare Agent (Fort Belvoir, Virginia, January 1975) '. . . we should do well to remember that in the field of chemical and biological warfare once a thing has been shown to be possible, it has generally been done.' Harris and Paxman, A Higher Form of Killing (1982)

Acknowledgements.

The extract from A Higher Form of Killing by Robert Harris and Jeremy Paxman, published by Arrow, is used by permission of The Random House Group Limited.

The extract from 'Toads Revisited' by Philip Larkin is reproduced by permission of Faber & Faber.

end.