Transit

TWELVE

It was evening by the time they had restored some semblance of order to Camp One. It was evening, warm and clear; and the bright jewellery of the sky was dominated once more by a pair of palely glowing moons.

Avery, Mary and Barbara were sitting round the fire, recovering from the trauma of the day and digesting a meal of steak—cut from the side of Tom’s Lilliputian deer—supplemented with fruit. Tom had had the luck to chase the deer into a thicket, where it became hopelessly entangled. He had been able to break its neck with a staff he had provided for himself.

He had not, however, enjoyed the spoils of the hunt. When, at last he had regained control of himself after the humiliating exposure of his private world, he joined the others in salvaging what was left of their possessions. But he said nothing, and moved about almost as if he were in a, trance. Mary tried to shake him out of it, but her approaches were blocked by silence. After a time, she stopped trying.

At last the camp was in reasonable shape, and Tom spoke once more. He said in quite a normal voice: ‘Barbara, I wonder if you would be so kind as to spare me half a bottle of whisky? I’m celebrating an extra birthday.’

She gave him a botde and, clutching the photographs in one hand, he retired with it into the tent he and Avery shared. That was a couple of hours ago. He had not come out since. There had been no sound other than the occasional muffled movements of the bottle.

Avery stared moodily into the fire. Here endeth the second day, he thought. Here endeth also pride, self-confidence, organization and bloody leadership.

He had been a fool to think they could play The Famous Four on Coral Island in a situation like this. He had been a fool not to insist on maximum security all the time. He had, in fact, been a fool without any qualification whatsoever.

It must have been one or more of Mary’s ‘Greek Gods’ who ‘processed’ the camp. Clearly it could not have been the work of animals. And unless, he, she, it or, more probably, they had attacked purely by chance when the camp was deserted, it seemed to follow in a nastily logical sort of way that he, she, it or, more probably, they had had Camp One under observation for quite a time. Even now, of course, they might still be crouching in the darkness about fifty yards away, planning the next little surprise entertainment. Avery shivered at the thought, and tried to will it out of his mind. If he continued in that vein, pretty soon he would have the darkness ringed entirely by unseen eyes—and a couple of battalions of homicidal savages.

Fortunately, Barbara diverted his thoughts to a moqe constructive level.

‘What are we going to do?’ she said simply.

He had an answer for that one. Anybody could have an answer for that one. ‘Move,’ he said. ‘As soon as it’s daylight we are going to find a place that can easily be defended. Then we are going to protect ourselves as well as we can, and live in a state of semi-siege until further notice.’ He could have added: or until we just disintegrate, or the bogyman gets us, or we fall ill, or the wild life takes care of us, or golden spheres come raining out of the fourth dimension, or we all get anaesthetized once more by crystals and wake up in wonderland. As things were, each of these seemed quite a reasonable possibility. In fact the only absurd notion was that the four of them had any chance at all of surviving for any length of time.

But Barbara, also, was lonely and afraid. And it was the alleged duty of an English gentleman (extinct species!), thought Avery, to put women and children first. So he decided to make up reassuring fairy tales.

‘Don’t worry too much. This is only the second day. We’ll get on top of things before very long…. Today was a shambles all round, but in a way it was also a lucky break. It taught us that we don’t take any damn single thing for granted. At all. That was a lesson worth knowing, and all it costs us was a few luxuries and a few bits of camping equipment. First thing tomorrow we’ll look for a base that is pretty near impregnable, and then ’

‘Lift up your hearts,’ interrupted Barbara drily. ‘It may have cost us more than you think, Richard.’ She nodded her head towards the tent. ‘And I know who paid the bill.’

Mary sighed. ‘Poor Tom Do you think he’ll be all right?’

‘Of course, he’ll be all right,’ snapped Avery irritably. ‘He’s taken a kick in the psyche, that’s all. Everybody collects one sooner or later. Usually, it’s sooner rather than later.’

‘Evidently Tom has been collecting them with monotonous regularity for about fiften years. Maybe this final one will operate on a make-or-break principle…. I wouldn’t like to guess which.’

At that moment, the tent flap was pushed back. And Tom appeared. The whisky bottle was in his hand—empty.

‘Children,’ he said thickly, ‘I do believe you are taking the name of one Thomas Sutton Esquire considerably in vain May I join the party?’

Avery thought nonchalance was the best approach. ‘Glad you were able to come.’

‘Would you like something to eat?’ asked Mary. ‘That steak was delicious.’

Tom shook his head vigorously. ‘For he on honey dew hath fed, and drunk the milk of paradise…. Pardon me, folks, I have presents for you.’ He disappeared into the tent and then emerged with an armful of pictures.

He gave one to Avery. ‘Cop that one, old boy. Coitus exoticus. How the devil do they get into that position, eh?’

Avery committed himself to nonchalance irrevocably. ‘There are two solutions. They either do it by plastic surgery or mirrors.’

Tom cackled. ‘Not bad, skipper. Let’s humour the poor devil, eh? Pretend nothing has happened, and all that rot…. The stiff upper lip, by God! ’

He turned to Barbara, and thrust one of the pictures at her. ‘Consider the artistic merits of this one, me proud beauty. Coitus syntheticus. The weapon, dear lady, is of finest teak.’

‘Tom,’ said Barbara evenly, ‘what the hell are you trying to prove?’

He was delighted. ‘Ah, a good question! I see that I have before me a mature and sensible audience tonight. What am I trying to prove? What, indeed! Dear lady, there is nothing left to prove. All is fait accompli. Tom, the infantile regressive has been unmasked. The late Thomas Sutton Esquire now stands before you, mewling and psychiatrically puking, as with his former wont.’ Mary began to cry. ‘Tom, darling, stop it! Stop it!

We need you…. We need you so much.’ The words came half muffled by sobs. But their effect was magical.

‘Methinks I hear a damsel in distress,’ began Tom. Then he stopped, blinked, swayed perilously near to the fire and finally sat down by Mary’s side. ‘What did you say? Mary, what did you say?’

‘Don’t,’ she sniffed, ‘don’t hurt yourself any more, please…. We can’t manage without you…. You and Richard…. You have to keep us together.’

He put an arm round her shoulder. In a moment, he seemed miraculously sober. ‘You said: Tom, darling…. That was nice—but unnecessary. It doesn’t have to mean anything, Mary. You must understand that. It doesn’t have to mean anything at all…. But that you can say: Tom, darling, after what you know…. Nobody ever said: Tom, darling, before…. My mother, I suppose. Nobody else…. Don’t cry, Mary. I need to be needed. I’ve needed it a long time.’

Avery wanted to annihilate himself. So did Barbara. This was something too sharp, too searing and too private to be shared. But there was nothing to do, nowhere to go. They could only sit and watch.

Suddenly, Tom grabbed all the photographs and pinups and flung them on the fire. ‘A burnt offering to the goddess of diminishing hormones,’ he cried. ‘The Englishman’s farewell to obscenity.’ He laughed and— further miracles—the laughter had a healthy ring about it. ‘God, what a price those would have brought in the Lower Fourth! ’

Mary dried her eyes. ‘It’s an example,’ she said seriously. ‘I’m going to swear off chocolates and my rag doll.’ Barbara began to giggle. ‘Prigs,’ she said. ‘You’re both so much stronger than I am. Can I lean on my whisky just a little longer?’

‘This is the headquarters of the League of Purity, Madam,’ said Tom. He hiccuped. ‘You shall be rationed to three slugs a day—by order of Herr Kapitan Richard, who, being without vice, is the noblest of us all.’

Barbara smiled and glanced at Avery. ‘He’s not without vice, Tom. He has the worst one of all.’

Avery raised an eyebrow. ‘And what is my particular vice?’

Barbara placed a hand on his knee. ‘Remembering,’ she said gently. ‘Remembering far too much.’

He thought of Christine. And then he thought of the deadly coldness of all the years without her. Maybe Barbara was right. Maybe there was a kind of remembering that was itself a vice. Maybe it had to do with pedestals and perfection—and the bitter, lonely happiness of creating an image that was too good to be true. He had tried to be honest—but what price honesty when you were looking for a convincing excuse for failure. Maybe Barbara was more right than she thought.

‘So all God’s chillun got vices,’ he said lightly. ‘Well, it looks as if we are going to have to translate a few of them into virtues—and the only worthwhile virtues in this particular dream world are the qualities that make for survival.’