The Night of the Triffids (7 page)

    'It is.'

    The Mother paused. 'How dark?'

    I told her that without a lamp I couldn't see my hand in front of my face.

    She considered for a moment. 'First darkness, then triffids… it strikes one as being rather a sinister omen, doesn't it?'

    At that moment the light from my lamp finally died. Even though we should be safe - for a time, anyway - my stomach spasmed painfully. I had lost the power to see again.

    I swallowed. 'Do you have a two-way radio? We need to get in touch with the authorities. I've already warned them about the triffids but we should let them know we're safe for the moment.'

    'Indeed we should, Mr Masen. Follow me - we'll go up to the house. It lies just beyond those trees across there.'

    'Ah, excuse me, Mother.'

    'Why sound so nervous, young man? What's wrong?'

    'My lamp has gone out.'

    'You mean to say it is so dark that you really can't see a thing?'

    'It is, yes.'

    'Hmm, this really is rum, isn't it? Well, Mr Masen, allow me to take your arm and I shall be your guide.'

    Then that old lady who'd been thirty years blind walked briskly along the driveway, her arm through mine, leading me through the inky dark, our feet crunching on the gravel.

    I walked with one hand held in front of me, level with my eyes. Like all people suddenly deprived of sight I was wary of walking into something hard and hurting my face.

    'Mr Masen, do you see the lights of the house yet?'

    'No. Not a thing.'

    'You should in a moment. Perhaps they are still screened by the trees.'

    
Or perhaps,
I told myself fearfully,
the triffids have already slipped in by another entrance to exterminate everyone with their lashing stings.

    'Now, Mr Masen. I hear plenty of news stories about your father's laudable work to root out those bloody plants. However, I've not heard
your
name mentioned at all.'

    'That's because I don't work with my father. I haven't his head for science.'

    'What do you do, then, Mr Masen? If that doesn't sound too damn nosy?'

    'I'm a pilot.'

    'Ah, one of our brave few. But you must find those cockpits awfully cramped. I can tell you're a tall man, well above average height. Six foot two, perhaps?'

    'Six foot four.'

    'How exceptional.'

    She chatted to put me at my ease, knowing as she must have done how uncomfortable it was, to say the least, to be suddenly deprived of one's sight. But the truth of the matter was that I was anything but relaxed. I didn't like this unnatural darkness. I didn't like it one little bit. And, moreover, I knew that the triffids would be hurrying to the house as fast as their woody stumps could carry them, like a pack of starving dogs drawn by the scent of roasting meat.

    'Are you married, Mr Masen?'

    'No.'

    'Not found the right girl?'

    'Partly. But sometimes I'm away from the island for weeks at a time. It wouldn't be fair to a wife.'

    'Ah, a man of sensitivity as well as of heroic stature. We really must talk later. You're a greater asset to the island than perhaps you yourself realize. Now - how is your mother? I remember long ago reading her novel
Sex is My Adventure
with enormous avidity.'

    'She's very well, thank you. Although her writing is now confined to lab reports and the… Wow! I hadn't expected that.'

    'The "Wow," I take it, indicates that the floodlights have been switched on?'

    The first thing I saw in the wash of light blazing from electric lamps set on posts along the driveway was the Mother's smiling face. The next, as we rounded a dense barrier of bushes, was the grand three-storeyed mansion and children playing on a quadrangle to one side, which was illuminated by a series of more humble electric lamps.

    'Well, now you can actually see again perhaps you would help me get these children indoors.' She clapped her hands. 'Timothy, Lucy. Out of that tree at once.' How the devil she could identify individual children playing in the tree mystified me. Then she reached something like a telegraph post set in the ground beside the driveway. Attached to that was a rope. I couldn't see the top of the post as it was lost to the dark. But the moment she tugged on the rope I heard the sound of the bell ringing across the rolling lawns and away into the nightlands beyond the walls.

    The children responded to the bell obediently enough. They ran past me, calling in those high, excited voices, thrilled rather than frightened that the sun hadn't risen. As far as I could tell they were streaming into one of the wings of the house where lights shone through the windows.

    The Mother still pulled hard on the cord; the bell continued to ring out. It told the children to return to their classrooms. Yet it also sent out a clear signal to the triffids roaming the fields. For them it could have been the peal of the dinner bell. I knew it wouldn't be long before they'd cluster about the gate, pressing against it, testing its strength.

    A sighted Mother about twenty years old walked lightly along the drive toward us. 'All the children are indoors now, Mother Susan.'

    'Thank you, Mother Angela. Best that you go indoors yourself now. And please ask all the Mothers and auxiliaries to gather in the refectory, I need to speak to you all.'

    'Yes, Mother.' After an appraising up-and-down glance at me she returned quickly to the house.

    There was nothing else to do now but wait.

    Every gate into the grounds had been locked. They'd withstand the triffid assault for an hour or so at the very least, which would give the anti-triffid squads ample time to arrive. Besides, the doors of the house itself were stout enough should any of the plants break through into the grounds.

    With nothing else to occupy me I mooched around the ancient building for a while. In the library I noticed above a Jacobean fireplace a stone tablet that had been set into the wall by the builders of the house. There, deeply chiselled, were the words
Sol lucet omnibus.
Helpfully for me the translation had been inscribed below:
The sun shines for everyone.

    Well, no… not any more, it didn't.

    The world outside was as black as Hades. And who knew how long it would stay like that?

    After the library I retraced my steps along the corridor. From one schoolroom I heard the class singing an old hymn:

    

    
All things bright and beautiful,

    
All creatures great and small,

    
All things wise and wonderful,

    
The Lord God made them all…

    

    The sound of the children's voices at that moment sent an icy prickle across my skin. They sang, feeling safe and secure in their familiar world. But beyond the walls, out there in the darkness, triffids would hear the rising and falling of the melody. In my mind's eye I saw them. Those grotesque plants, their stems swaying with all the menace of cobras moving to the sounds of a pipe. Only these vicious monstrosities would be far from charmed by the music. Given half a chance they would lash their ten-foot stings into the infants' faces.

    The mental image unsettled me. If I'd been in charge I would have been inclined to herd the children into the relative safety of the cellar.

    Mother Susan, however, had thought it best not to alarm them. So, with the exception of the darkness beyond the windows, it was business as usual - although I did suggest the precaution of posting a number of sighted Mothers as lookouts. These now patrolled the flat roof of the building. Occasionally, they would report back to a Grand Mother that slender stalks could be seen moving in that characteristic jerky motion beyond the walls.

    

    

    Later, Mother Susan unerringly tracked me down to the refectory where I was being fortified with tea and toast. Joining me at one of the long tables she said briskly, 'Mr Masen, I usually find it best to ask this straight. Are you registered with any of the Mother Houses?'

    'Registered?' I asked, deliberately playing dumb.

    'Now, now, don't be coy with me, Mr Masen, you know perfectly well what I mean. Come now, are you registered?'

    'No, I'm not.'

    'But the island's population would benefit enormously from such fine blood as yours.'

    'Well, I don't know if-'

    'You have no philosophical objections to eugenics?'

    'No, but-'

    'Well, that's settled then. After this storm in a tea cup has blown itself out, and once we've returned to our proper routine you must call on us as our guest for dinner.'

    'I'm due to fly out to-'

    'Oh, there'll be no pressure, Mr Masen,' she said with a bright smile. 'Would next Friday suit?'

    'Er, I'm not sure…'

    'Excellent! Next Friday it is, then. And just you remember: the oats you sow needn't necessarily all be wild ones. Right, I'll leave you to your toast. And do try the gooseberry jam - it is sublime.'

    As she climbed to her feet she smiled before adding breezily, 'Now, it's not every day you're invited to contribute in such a physical way to repopulating the world, is it?'

    'Er, no… no, it's not.'

    She left me feeling a trifle dazed and with her extraordinary invitation still hanging in the air. I would certainly have to think
that
one over for a bit.

    At that moment, despite the shock of finding myself in darkness when there should have been daylight, and my alarm at the incursion of triffids that had crossed the Solent to land on the beach at Bytewater, I still believed that my life would, sooner or later, go on as before. I would continue to ferry passengers by air to the Scillies, Jersey and Guernsey, and make rarer forays deep into the mainland. I had no idea when I woke to the nightlands that all of that was over - the future I had envisaged dashed to pieces and then swept away like so much broken glass.

    

    

    Later that day the anti-triffid squads arrived in their protective gear, armed with triffid guns. These teams of men and women were mustered from every walk of life. As soon as the triffid alert sounded they would have dropped whatever they were doing and rushed to their designated assembly points, ready to deal with any triffid attack. With their appearance I remained convinced that life would soon return to normal.

    From an upper window of the Mother House I watched as vehicles closed in on the plants, their headlights blazing. Within minutes the triffids were being efficiently decapitated, thus depriving them of their ability to sting. Then, one by one, they were toppled and their stumpy timber legs were hacked away. After that, the stems and woody boles were hauled off to be processed and pulped as if they were nothing more sinister than bales of waste paper.

    Within a few hours the island had been cleared of the triffid invasion. Triumphant radio broadcasts trumpeted the news.

    But there were still ominous question marks hanging in the dark skies above us.

    What had happened to the daylight?

    Just where had the triffids come from so suddenly, and so murderously?

    But as things fell out, I wouldn't have to wait long for some answers. That afternoon I received an urgent message to report to my airbase at once.

    Little did I know that the short trip there was to be the first leg of the most remarkable journey of my life.

    

    

    

    BY three-thirty that afternoon the pace of events was hotting up.

    A weather-beaten but mechanically sound staff car brought me back from the Mother House at Bytewater to my airbase on the other side of the island.

    With the world still immersed in inky darkness floodlights blazed, illuminating the aircraft hangars and the runway.

    I was greeted by the airbase commander's PA who told me to suit up immediately. I was to take up our only Panther jet fighter and determine just how far the cloud cover extended.

    'Heard you were taken out by a seagull, Masen!' The cheery voice of 'Mitch' Mitchell greeted me the moment I stepped through the door into the locker room. He was a tiny man, yet had long wiry arms that sometimes earned him the extra sobriquet 'Monkey'. From a radio in the corner a selection of jaunty Noel Coward show songs rattled the windows. Island Radio was doing its bit to raise spirits. An ironic 'A Room with a View' was followed by a hastily composed pastiche called 'Don't Let's Be Beastly to the Triffid'.

    Mitch Mitchell lobbed a biscuit at me, then returned to pouring boiling water into a teapot. 'This seagull, then. What was she toting? Thirty-millimetre cannon or air-to-air rockets?'

    'Very funny, Mitch.'

    'Much damage?'

    'Smashed prop. She'll be airworthy by tomorrow.'

    'So you get the hero's job, I hear?'

    'I don't like the sound of that.'

    'You'll be front-page news tomorrow, sunshine.'

    'For all the right reasons, I hope.'

    'The girls will be queuing, old cock.'

    'You really think so?'

    'Dead cert, mate. Then chocks away, open your throttle and you'll be into the wide blue yonder with more skirt than you can shake a stick at.'

    'But heroes have a habit of winding up very dead, very quickly.'

    It was our typical kind of banter. I'd gone through pilot school with Mitch, and by now we'd developed a kind of patois of our own that outsiders often found baffling. As we knocked one-liners back and forth like tennis players enjoying a sustained rally I changed into my pressure suit.