The Touch of Death (13 page)

“Sure?”

“Positive. Listen. We're assembling Project Ninety-one – that's a faster-than-sound aircraft that can carry three – in the secret shaft. We sneak a piece out at a time, with a little fuel. Trouble will come when we start to leave – we'll have to be out of reach of Klim, Anak, of anyone. I won't go into details. Take it from me, we're all getting ready to go.”

“Why all?”

“You crazy?” Mick asked, sharply.

“No.”

“I don't understand you.”

“Three could get away, but the others should stay – they'd become a useful fifth column later,” Banister said.

“It
might
work. I'll see.” Mick was very earnest. After a pause, he went on: “We can't talk much longer. Anak is the king-pin – you'll soon meet him. Klim's only in charge at High Peak. Try to fool Anak, make him believe you're falling for the idiocy. If you can fool him you might get a chance to do something really worthwhile.”

Mick spoke very quickly, his round face solemn – anxious.

“Time's up,” he added. “I won't name anyone else. We'll identify ourselves when necessary.” He gave a twisted smile. “I hope we can trust you!”

Banister didn't speak.

“Those men you saw today making the new shafts,” Mick said. “Old and not so old. They're what Klim and Anak call traitors. People who have been press-ganged to come here, and refuse to work. Or men who were to be converted and to go and spread the gospel down below. Or men like me, who realised that it's all a hideous sham. If this is perfection, give me good, wholesome corruption! Neil—”

“Yes?”

“Be careful of Rita.
Very
careful. The serpent in the new Eden. Sometimes I think she has good impulses, but Klim and Anak overcome them for her. Don't trust her with a word. And Neil – if I get caught, you, any one of us, the horror of punishment would make Belsen seem a pleasure.” His grin was very taut. “Last thing – they're very interested in you as a naturally immune subject. They know that Palfrey might have discovered a way to make you immune, of course – and they'll want to find out whether he has or whether you're a natural. Watch your step – if Anak believes you've been insulated, you'll be in bad. Now – off you go. Hurry – they'll know you've been a long time. They'll soon send scouts down for you. You're watched all the time.”

“I know.”

“Another last thing,” Mick said. “I made a deadly mistake when I opened that wrong door. Intentionally.” He didn't smile now. “I hoped Rita wouldn't see what I'd done. If she reports it to Klim or Anak, then I've had it. Don't be surprised if I just disappear.”

Banister felt constriction at his throat.

“All—right.”

“Off with you,” Mick said.

He turned and walked between two rocks, and disappeared. The snow closed behind him. Where he had been there was only the crystal clear air with the blue sky above, and the brilliance of the snow dimming with the setting of the sun.

Banister hurried up the slope.

As he passed the outcrop and came within sight of the chalet again, he saw two men speeding down towards him.

 

 

Banister made his way slowly towards the skiers. He did not recognise either of them. He tried to stop his heart from thumping with wild fear, but could not. It was as if death were winging towards him on the air.

They drew level, passed, and swung round, swerving skilfully and breaking their downward plunge. Next moment they were plodding along on either side of him. He did not recognise them. Both were youngish men, bright-eyed, with all the outward excellence of men who lived here.

“We thought you'd got lost,” one said.

“I was tired.”

“Dangerous thing, to rest out here on your own.”

“I know. I tried a short cut. I won't again – it was too steep.” “Snow's too deep, too. I certainly shouldn't do it again.” They plodded on, in silence; then: “Did you see anyone?”

“No.”

“No one at all?”

The man made the question sound like a threat; he seemed to be saying: “You're lying, we know you're lying, now tell the truth.”

Perhaps Mick was wrong; perhaps there was an all-seeing eye.

“No – the others swerved off to the right,” Banister said. “Is that the best run?”

“Yes.”

They didn't ask any more questions; it might have been because they were breathless. So was he. At the top of the run, he felt as if he could collapse. He went into the chalet. There was no sign outside of Mick's wife or the two children; but they were inside, sitting at a table where a dozen other children and two or three women appeared to be giving a party.

Then Mick appeared, in one of the ordinary khaki-drill suits of the city itself; smiling; apparently untroubled. Banister didn't ask himself how he had contrived to get back so quickly; didn't ask or answer any unspoken question; but he understood the look in Mick's eyes.

Mick wanted to know if all was well.

Did he?

If he were genuine, would he have taken such a chance of confiding in a man known to be a close associate of Rita?

How Mick
hated
Rita – if he could be taken at his word.

 

“Enjoy it?” Rita asked, when Banister was back.

“Very much.”

“Feel better?”

“I think so.”

“You must,” Rita said. “Klim and Anak are coming back tonight. They'll want to see you. There's been some trouble, I don't quite know what it is. Be reasonable with them.”

“I'll try! Who is Anak?”

If he didn't ask, she might wonder how he knew the name. “Our leader,” she answered.

“I thought Klim—”

“He is in command here at High Peak. Anak is the leader everywhere.” She glanced at the dull, silent television screen. “Anak wants to send a message to Palfrey, and I think he will choose you as messenger. Don't do anything that might antagonise him. He's—”

She hesitated.

The television screen flickered.

“He's coming tonight,” she said, and changed the subject smoothly. It was a consolation to know that they could always tell when they were being watched; a dead or dull screen meant reasonable safety. “Enjoy it in the snow?”

“Very much.”

The screen went dull, a little later. Rita spoke as if there had been no interruption in their original conversation.

“Anak is sometimes both domineering and impatient.”

“Der Führer?”

“
You
might think so. He's—he is the brain behind it all. The perfect man.” She said that almost as if she were in a coma. She repeated it, looking towards the screen – and it began to flicker: “The perfect man, Neil. You must come to believe that, to realise the good we're doing.”

The screen became dull again, five minutes later.

She said: “I told you down below – I'm in love with you. So deeply.” Her voice seemed to tell him that it was true; yet he saw Mick's face and heard Mick's warning again. “I dread to think that anything might happen to you. Be careful – don't upset Anak, don't annoy him.”

Banister said: “I'll try not to.”

The television screen flickered, and this time it went very bright. It was not simply that someone was looking and listening-in; someone was getting in touch with Rita.

“Hallo, Rita.” That was Klim.

“Hallo, Klim.”

The man's face appeared on the screen suddenly; and there was another beside him. Banister found himself looking into the face of a man who seemed to dominate the screen; who made Klim look a weakling. The face itself was so regular, strong, aggressive; if an Epstein were to carve a composite face of all men of good looks, it would be like this – hard, rugged, handsome, with a dominating nose, thick black eyebrows, compelling eyes.

Banister felt the fingers of fear again . . .

“Take Banister to Hall Three,” Klim said.

“Now?”

“Yes. Anak wants to see him.”

The other man was Anak, of course, but he didn't speak.

 

This time, they went in the opposite direction to the one they had taken when they had gone to the factory and laboratory levels. They reached the end of a wide street, then turned down a narrow alley, and came to a large square, where there were several larger buildings. These were the cinemas, theatres and lecture halls. Two or three men were about, busying themselves at the entrances, but that was all.

The doorway of Hall Three was at a corner.

Two men stood outside, dressed in exactly the same way as the others in High Peak, but they were like guards; bodyguards. They were not armed, but guards would need no weapons where a touch of the hand could kill.

A man on duty at the swing door bowed slightly and opened it; that was the first sign of obsequiousness that Banister had seen.

They went into a dimly lighted hall. It was large enough for five hundred people or more, but only a dozen or so were present, all seated at the back.

A shadowy figure approached Banister and Rita.

“Will you please sit down – Anak will see you afterwards.”

“Very well,” Rita said.

They sat down in comfortable chairs; foam-rubber cinema seats, which tilted slightly. It was warm – the same even temperature that seemed to be general everywhere within the mountain fastness. There was a moment of silence, then a man's voice came, speaking very clearly in English; a slow and deliberate voice.

“You are about to see actual pictures taken three days ago, on the nineteenth of November, of incidents which took place in Kelsingham, a small town in the Cotswold country of England. Kelsingham was the home of Professor Morris-Jones, whose services were required by the Upper World. A man named Bruton, an American—”

Banister felt a shock, as if he had been touched by an electric current.

“—was for some reason not yet known with Professor Morris-Jones at the time that he was due to leave his home. Bruton, who works with the now notorious Dr. Palfrey, appeared to have some prior knowledge of the journey planned for Morris-Jones. Bruton had arranged for the home of the Professor to be closely guarded.

“Project Thirty-nine was used,” went on the man with the slow, deliberate voice, “this time through the medium of a cat. The effect you will see . . .”

The voice faded into nothing.

There was silence; yet Banister's flesh crawled.

Then pictures came on the large cine-screen. They were in black and white, but very clear and three-dimensional; it was as if they were sitting and looking at the actual scene. Shots of the Cotswolds, the trees bare and dark against a cloudy sky, shorn even of the last leaves of autumn. A long, low house of Cotswold stone, with mullioned windows – part of a world that might have been a million miles away from here.

Men were moving about outside; five or six of them. Bruton appeared, stepping out of a car which drew up slowly; he walked briskly to the front door. He was exactly the same as when Banister had last seen him, had much of the familiar brisk confidence. He knocked at the door and turned and smiled, as if he knew that a camera was focused on him.

Rita leaned forward and whispered: “We have developed automatic cameras which can be placed wherever we wish, and are subject to remote control.”

Banister squeezed her knee, as he would, perhaps, in any cinema when he didn't want to speak.

Her hand slid into his.

The door of the house of Cotswold stone opened, and Bruton went in.

Until that moment, the film had been silent. Now sounds came, soft at first, and far away. The engine of a car. Voices. Footsteps. A man came into sight, walking slowly. He was one of the guards. There was a close-up of him, of his big, good-looking face; he showed a kind of confidence.

There was a long shot – of a cat.

Banister felt Rita's hand tight in his.

It was a black cat, just a black cat, which appeared, slinking, round the corner of the garden wall.

Then: “Hallo, puss.”

The cat drew nearer the man. Another close-up showed its eyes, expressionless, glowing; and its whiskers, its mouth.

It opened its mouth.
“
Miaou
.”

The shot changed. The man was approaching the cat, which stood quite still, back slightly arched, staring up. The man's fingers were long and broad and strong.

The fingers drew nearer the furry head.

They touched . . .

Light flashed, and lit up the hall; showed the few people sitting there in sharp, clear silhouettes. It blinded them; and when the light faded and they could see, the cat wasn't there and the man lay dead. Not writhing, not unconscious, not in pain – just still and dead.

Then the feet of other men were shown, approaching cautiously; and the men drew round the body in a circle, faces were shown, with all the horror reflected on them. Footsteps, heavy breathing, opening doors, a man running, calling:

“Be careful, don't touch—
mind that cat!
”

“Cat!” one of the men near the body called.

“
Cat!
”

They scrambled away, for safety – but there was no safety. The cat leapt and touched one, just brushed against him; and there was a flash and he fell.

The screen and the hall seemed to be lit up by a series of flashes.

Banister was rigid in his seat; felt as if he would never be able to move again. It was like lightning striking, vicious, merciless, caring not whom it struck down.

It faded.

There lay five dead men – and Bruton, alive, staring at them with his lips parted, as if the horror had paralysed him. He looked from face to face. He stared along the street towards the distant hills, the hedges, the square stone chimneys – and towards the cat, which turned round the corner. He began to run—

He fell.

Banister could not tell what struck him, but he saw a car draw up, and men hurry into the house; and come out, very soon, holding a man between them, an elderly man who struggled in their grasp and looked frightened and indignant; and then simply shocked at sight of the dead men. He was hustled into the car; its engine sounded loud as it moved off.

There was a different noise, inside the hall; a kind of moaning. It affected Banister more than anything had yet. He looked about him, but could not see where it came from, yet it came again.

Rita clenched his hand tightly, her fingers dug into his.

The film went on – showing long shots of the cat, that was all. It walked along the street, and the suspense was agonising. A cyclist passed, a boy, whistling; he stopped: “Hi, puss!”

The cat stalked on. An old woman came slowly along the street, and looked at it, smiling, fond, so sweet and kind. She held out her hand. The cat stopped and looked at her.

“Pretty pussy – come here, pretty pussy.”

Banister heard that groaning again; as if there were someone in this hall terrified and in great pain; or anguish. Yet even that could not distract his attention now. He watched the cat, which watched the old woman who tried to attract it; and then it stalked past her.

She disappeared.

A child came running out of a house; its footsteps pattering. A woman's voice sounded: “
Betty, don't go into the road!
”

The woman appeared, alarm on her face – the look of fear that a mother would have for a child in danger. But the child stopped.

“Puthy,” she lisped. “Puthy.”

“Oh, thank goodness,” the mother exclaimed. The car passed, at a fast speed. “Betty, you mustn't run into the road, I shall be very cross with you if you do, Betty!”

“Puthy . . . puthy.” The child had fair ringlets and big eyes.

“I don't like you playing with strange cats, either, but just pat him, then, and—”

The groaning stopped; and there came a scream which cut through Banister, made him turn and stare towards the little group of people sitting near. It was a man, screaming. He was trying to get up, but others were pulling him down.

The film went on.

“Puthy—” the child lisped.

A tiny hand drew near and then touched the black fur; and a blinding flash lit up the hall.

The man here screamed again.

The hall went dark.

Then the mother appeared on the screen, staring incredulously, too shocked to show horror. Her face was set in lines of astonishment, of disbelief, until gradually dread crept upon her, and she rushed forward, went on her knees to gather up her child.

Flash!

“I cannot stand it, I cannot see any more!”

The man in the hall screamed and jumped up again and tried to get out of his seat. He was pushed down. The scuffling sounds ceased; there was silence – while on the screen the black cat walked along the wide street and then along the pavement and into a busy thoroughfare. The cat walked along among the people, touching none – but every time a leg or hand drew near it, Banister felt the horror – and the man screamed again.

A dog appeared.

Cat and dog stared at each other, the dog's back bristling, the cat arching its back. The cat turned blindly, cannoned into a man in the queue—