Bats Out of Hell (3 page)

She ignored him and turned in the direction of the door.

"I said listen to me!" his hand shot out, grasping her by the shoulder and turning her round to face him. "There are one or two things we've got to get ironed out."

"I have no idea what you're talking about, professor." Only her eyes gave away her innermost feelings, bitterness that an outward show of indifference could not cloak.

"You know damned well what I'm talking about!" he rasped. "About last night at the Shoal Hill Tavern."

"Oh, so you went drinking, did you?"

"And that wasn't all," his voice was raised. "I was with a bird. And I was going to screw her only
you
stopped me!
You
put me off my stroke!"

"Me?"

"Yes, you. Out on a snooping trip. Well, I don't blame you, but I can't stand liars."

"Neither can I, Professor. And just lately you've been telling quite a few yourself." Her self-control began to snap, and she added savagely, "You think you're God's gift to women, don't you, Brian Newman? Well, let me tell you this. All you're trying to do is prove something to yourself, though God knows what. Maybe 'conquer and move on' is your motto. Well, I'm not standing for it. You thought you could drive me off, didn't you? That I'd pack and run? Well, I'm not leaving the Center. I'm not giving up a good job because of you. I'll move out of your bungalow so you can have her in the bed all to yourself, but I'm staying right here in this very lab as far as work goes. I'm not going to give you the satisfaction of seeing me go to Haynes and ask for a transfer to Rickers's lab. The pair of you would love that, in your own warped ways, but I'm staying put, bats and all. But lay one finger on me again, try to get familiar with me, and I'll be lodging an official complaint that will really put paid to your career. You've got me with you all the time in an official capacity, and nothing more, whether you like it or not!"

"You bitch!" His left hand went back, and before he could stop himself he had struck her across the face with a resounding slap.

She staggered back, tears filling her eyes, gasping with pain. He stood aghast, mouth opening to voice an apology.

"I'm . . ."

Suddenly everything seemed to explode inside her, and she was hurling herself at him, beating at his body with clenched fists, tearing, scratching, biting, kicking. He staggered back, Susan Wylie clinging on to him, screaming insults at him,

"Damn you!" he yelled. "I'll teach you a lesson you won't forget. I'll . . ." His words trailed off as his back met with something solid but movable. The table. He felt the nearside legs being lifted clear of the floor, objects sliding, crashing, splintering, fragments of glass tinkling. In desperation he pushed her away from him, and even as he turned he saw guinea-pigs and other rodents scampering about, frightened, bewildered by their unexpected freedom,

"Oh, God!" he gasped.

Something flew past his face, a rush of air from tiny wings fanning him. Another. And another.

"The bats!" he cried, his face turning a deathly white. "
The bats have escaped!
"

Susan Wylie backed away. It was true. The cage of death was lying in splinters, the bats which had died from the mutated virus spilled beneath it. Yet it was the living ones which brought a cry of terror to her lips. They were flying crazily about the room, cannoning into walls, getting up again, jinking, swerving. One hit a row of test-tubes and sent them showering to the floor.

"Under the table!" Brian Newman grabbed her around the waist, dragging her down beneath the long table with him. "Keep still! They're not after us. It's just that their radars are damaged and they've no sense of direction."

The high-pitched squeaking was much louder now that the tiny creatures were free of their cage. Newman and Susan heard them striking against the windows. Sooner or later they must find the open one.

More breaking glass.

"The window's gone. The big one!" Brian Newman gasped. "The pane must have been cracked or faulty. They'd never break it otherwise."

The incoming fresh air seemed to attract the bats. Whereas their disturbed radars had previously forced them to fly aimlessly, panic-stricken, now they scented freedom. In a matter of seconds they had gone, speeding across the Chase like jet-propelled butterflies, lost to the view of the two people who stared after them through the shattered window of the laboratory.

"Well, they're gone," Brian Newman slipped an arm around Susan, and this time she made no attempt to squirm from his grasp. "I'm sorry," she said weakly.

"It wasn't your fault. I shouldn't have hit you."

"What are we going to do now?"

Newman looked around the lab, noting the slivers of broken glass on the floor, the smashed cages, mice and guinea-pigs scuttling fearfully to and fro.

"Well, I guess we'll have to tell Haynes the whole truth now," he said, "and we can only pray that the virus died in those victims, and that the bats which escaped are neither infected nor carriers. Otherwise . . . " He shook his head slowly, and his expression was grave. If the virus had been carried from the Biological Research Center, then the possible consequences did not bear thinking about.

Voices in the corridor outside interrupted them. Someone was banging on the door.

"What's happening in there? Are you all right, Newman?" It was Haynes' voice.

Brian Newman strode to the door and unlocked it. Haynes, Professor Rickers—a tall, balding man with rimless spectacles—and the night-porter, who had been just on the point of going off duty, crowded into the small laboratory.

"What the hell . . ." Haynes' face took on a deep flush as he surveyed the wreckage.

"There's been an accident," Newman said. "I slipped and overturned the table."

"You'd better get these rodents caught quickly," Haynes snapped, noting two or three white mice running around the perimeter of the room.

Professor Newman closed the door and leaned up against it, looking at the others. "I think we've got a lot of talking to do," he said softly.

"Talking?" Haynes glanced at him with a puzzled expression on his face.

"I think Johnson was just going off duty," Newman nodded to the porter. "We don't need to delay him."

Johnson grunted, and Newman opened the door to let him out. He could not take any risk of wild stories finding their way into civvy street.

"Now,"—Haynes adjusted his spectacles and glared at the bacteriologist—"perhaps you'd tell me just what the hell is going on."

In a few words Newman explained about the mutated virus and the fact that about a dozen bats, possibly carrying the disease, were loose upon Cannock Chase.

"Impossible," Rickers snapped.

"I wish it was impossible," Newman retorted. "But the first thing we've got to do is to carry out tests on the dead bats and try to determine the extent of this virus."

"Well, let's get cracking." Haynes glanced at Rickers, "I suggest that Professor Rickers carries out the postmortems here and now."

"Fair enough," Newman replied, "but I suggest we all wear rubber gloves and protective clothing. From what I've seen these last few days we're dealing with a virulent disease which could be capable of striking us all down."

Somewhat reluctantly Professor Rickers donned a white coat and gauze mask, the others following suit. Brian Newman stood back. He was content to be a spectator from now on, as he was confident that whatever there was to be found inside the dead bats, Rickers would find it.

For the next hour the three of them watched Rickers working painstakingly, dissecting bat after bat, examining entrails with the aid of a microscope, making notes on a scrap of paper, scraping furry remains into a plastic bag, and then starting on another tiny corpse. They could not see his expression behind the mask, and not once did he indicate his findings.

Finally, with every bat dissected and the remnants enclosed in the waste bag, Rickers removed his mask and gloves and turned to the others. His expression alighted briefly on Newman, disbelief and mockery in his eyes.

"These bats died of a brain disease," Rickers said. "Meningitis, which is what they were injected with anyway, so that's hardly surprising. The virus is dead, so we can hardly be expected to pronounce a mutation. To ascertain that we should have to examine a living creature, but as they have all apparently escaped there is no opportunity to do that. Doubtless they will die from meningitis in the wild, their bodies will never be found, and that will be that. I would doubt very much whether mankind or even wildlife is at risk."

Haynes was gloatingly triumphant as he turned to Newman. "You are making mountains out of molehills, Professor Newman," he said, drawing himself up to his full height. "And it would seem that a whole week of work has been needlessly wasted."

"I tell you, the disease is deadly!" Newman spoke hotly.

"I suggest you compile your negative report," Haynes turned to the door, ignoring his protest. "Let me have it by tomorrow, please."

Two minutes later only Susan and Brian Newman remained in the laboratory.

"And that's that." Newman sighed, "Officially, anyway."

"What are we going to do?"

"We can't do anything except wait. Whatever happens now will happen in the outside world, instead of in the laboratory where we stood a chance of controlling it." His hand found hers and squeezed it lightly. "By the way, I'm sorry about last night."

"So am I. What are you going to do, though? I mean, about that girl?"

"I dropped her off home, and as far as I'm concerned that's that"

"So we're back to square one. Just you and me."

"Perhaps we can manage to make a go of it this time." he said, avoiding her gaze.

"Maybe." She picked up a broom and began sweeping up broken glass. "Like everything else, we'll just have to await developments."

The Wooden Stables, as the sprawling, untidy outbuildings were known, had fallen gradually into a state of disrepair since the war. Once they had been the property of the Marquis of Anglesey, and thoroughbred stock had been stabled there. Then, with the breaking up of the estate, which had once stretched from Cannock Wood down to Lichfield, they had undergone a series of ownerships, and the quality of horseflesh housed there had deteriorated along with the structure.

Walter Williams cursed to himself as he swung the old Austin pick-up truck off the Cannock Road and felt the wheels spinning in the mud of the rough track. It had not rained for almost a fortnight now, but the bridle path was still like a quagmire. He revved up, and as he felt the vehicle shoot forward he made a mental note to bring a load of slag up next time and attempt to fill in one or two of the pot-holes, something which he had been meaning to do ever since he had bought the place three years ago.

Dusk was gathering, and the shadows from the conifer wood on his left prompted him to switch on his headlights. The twin beams lit up the dereliction ahead of him, a vista of crumbling brickwork and rotting timbers, with gaping holes in the slate roof of the nearest building. Something large ambled out of the shadows and trotted towards him as he brought the vehicle to a halt.

"Hello Penny, old gal," he called out to the piebald mare as he climbed out and went round to the tailboard. There were four bales of hay in the back of the truck. With luck he wouldn't have to come up here again for two or three days. He would be glad when his daughter, Shirley, was old enough to look after her own horses. It had been the same all along, the rabbit, the guinea-pig, the dog, even the goldfish. Walter had had to tend to the lot.

The mare nuzzled him as he let the tail-board down.

"There's a good girl," he coaxed, fondling her. "But where's Stango?"

Stango was Penny's mate, a black stallion who looked good until one examined him closely, and realized why he was housed in the Wooden Stables.

Walter peered into the darkness. It was strange, indeed, that Stango had not come to meet him. Perhaps the horse had already bedded itself down in the building. It had never happened before, though. Then he heard the drumming hooves in the field.

"Hey, Stango," he called. "Good boy. C'm'ere!"

Stango came into view at a fast gallop, moving from left to right, passing in front of the truck but making no attempt to approach it. With a whinny the animal came to a halt about twenty yards away, and stood there flicking his tail restlessly the way he usually did in hot weather when the flies were troublesome. He pawed the ground and snorted.

"What the devil's up with you?" Walter walked steadily towards the horse, hand outstretched. Stango backed away, and in the darkness Walter Williams saw the whiteness of his rolling eyes. The stallion snorted and, breaking into a canter, galloped away to the other end of the field.

"Bloody vandals been up 'ere again," Walter muttered. "Throwin' stones at 'im, I suppose. No wonder the bugger's upset. Better 'ave a look an' see if 'e's 'urt."

But Stango had no intention of letting Walter Williams approach him. Ten minutes later a breathless and angry Walter was shaking his fist at the silhouette of the horse which stood on the opposite side of the small field.

"All right, bloody well stay there if that's how you feel, damn you!" he snarled, and returned to his task of unloading the bales of hay from the pick-up.

"C'mon, old girl," he called to the watching Penny as he struggled to the nearest building carrying a bale. "Some nice fresh hay 'ere. Come and get it."

But Penny would come no further than five yards from the doorway.

"So you're bein' bloody stupid, too, are you?" Walter was fast losing patience. With a final curse he threw the bale into the stable. It thudded onto the stone floor, rolled over, and then, as it came to rest, he heard a movement in the rafters.

He stood still, listening. The noise came again. A soft rustling sound like moths beating against a lampshade.

Sparrows roosting in the rafters, he told himself, but knew that it was not so. The movements were too light. He experienced a prickly sensation up and down his spine. There was definitely something up there in the roof.