The Children of Men (29 page)

At first his voice sounded strange to his own ears, but by the time he got to the psalm the words had taken over and he spoke quietly, with confidence, seeming to know them by heart. “ ‘Lord, thou hast been our refuge: from one generation to another. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever the earth and the world were made: thou art God from everlasting, and world without end. Thou turnest man to destruction: again thou sayest, Come again, ye children of men. For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday: seeing that is past as a watch in the night.’ ”

He came to the words of the committal. As he spoke the sentence “Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust; in sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to eternal life, through our Lord Jesus Christ,” Julian squatted down and threw a handful of earth over the grave. After a second’s hesitation Miriam did the same. With her graceless swollen body, it was difficult for Julian to squat, and Miriam put out a supporting hand. There came into Theo’s mind, unsought and unwelcome, the image of a defecating animal. Despising himself, he thrust it aside. When he spoke the words of the grace, Julian’s voice joined his. Then he closed the prayer book. Still Rolf neither moved nor spoke.

Suddenly, in one violent movement, he turned on his heel and said: “Tonight we’ll have to get hold of another car. Now I’m going to sleep. You’d better do the same.”

But first they made their way along the hedge, stuffing their mouths with the blackberries, hands and lips purple-stained. The bushes, unplundered, were heavy with the ripe berries, small plump grenades of sweetness. Theo marvelled that Rolf could resist them. Or had he already that morning eaten his fill? The berries, breaking against his tongue, restored hope and strength in beads of unbelievably delicious juice.

Then, with hunger and thirst partly assuaged, they returned to the copse, to the same fallen trunk which seemed to offer at least the psychological reassurance of a hiding place. The two women lay down closely together, Luke’s stiffening coat wrapped round them. Theo stretched himself at their feet. Rolf had already found his bed on the other side of the trunk. The earth was soft with the mulch of decades of fallen leaves but even had it been hard as iron Theo would still have slept.

It was early evening when he awoke. Julian was standing over him. She said: “Rolf’s gone.”

He was instantly wide awake. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

He believed her, yet even then he had to speak the spurious words of hope: “He could have gone for a walk, needed to be alone, wanted to think.”

“He has thought; now he’s gone.”

Still obstinately trying to convince her, if not himself, he said: “He’s angry and confused. He no longer wants to be with you when the child is born, but I can’t believe he’ll betray you.”

“Why not? I betrayed him. We’d better wake Miriam.”

But there was no need. Their voices had reached Miriam’s wakening consciousness. She sat up abruptly and looked across to where Rolf had lain. Struggling to her feet, she said: “So he’s gone. We ought to have known he would. Anyway we couldn’t have prevented him.”

Theo said: “I might have kept him with us. I’ve got the gun.”

It was Miriam who answered the question in Julian’s eyes. “We’ve got a gun. Don’t worry, it could be a useful thing to have.” She turned from Julian to Theo. “Kept him with us maybe, but for how long? And how? One of us holding the gun to his head night and day, taking it in turns to sleep, to guard him?”

“You think he’s gone to the Council?”

“Not to the Council, to the Warden. He’s changed his allegiance. He’s
always been fascinated by power. Now he’s joined forces with the source of power. But I don’t think he’ll telephone London. This news is too important to be leaked. He’ll want to give it in person to the Warden alone. That gives us a few hours, maybe more—say five if we’re lucky. It depends when he left, how far he’s got.”

Theo thought: Five hours or fifty, what difference does it make? A weight of despair dragged at mind and limbs, leaving him physically weakened so that the instinct to sink to the earth almost overpowered him. There was a second—hardly more—in which even thought was numbed; but it passed. Intelligence reasserted itself and with thought came a renewal of hope. What would he do if he were Rolf? Make his way to the road, hail the first car, find the nearest telephone? But was it that simple? Rolf was a hunted man without money, transport or food. Miriam was right. The secret he carried was of such importance that it must be kept inviolate until it could be told to the one man to whom it would mean most and who would pay most for it: Xan.

Rolf had to reach Xan, and to reach him safely. He couldn’t risk capture, the casual bullet from some trigger-happy member of the State Security Police. Even arrest by the Grenadiers would be hardly less disastrous; the prison cell in which he would be at their mercy, his demands to see the Warden of England immediately meeting with laughter and contempt. No, he would try to make his way to London, travelling, as they were, under cover of night, living off the land. Once in the capital, he would show himself at the old Foreign Office, demand to see the Warden, secure in the knowledge that he had reached the place where that demand would be taken seriously, where power was absolute and would be exercised. And, if persuasion failed and access was denied, he would have that final card to play. “I have to see him. Tell him from me that the woman is pregnant.” Xan would see him then.

But once the news was given and believed, they would come quickly. Even if Xan thought that Rolf was lying or mad they would still come. Even if they thought that this was the final phantom pregnancy, the signs, the symptoms, the bulging womb, all destined to end in farce, they would still come. This was too important to chance a mistake. They would come by helicopter with doctors and midwives and, once the truth was established, with television cameras. Julian would be tenderly lifted away to that public hospital bed, to the medical technology of
childbirth which had not been used for twenty-five years. Xan himself would preside and would give the news to an incredulous world. There would be no simple shepherds at this cradle.

He said: “I reckon we’re about fifteen miles south-west of Leominster. The original plan still holds. We find a refuge, a cottage or house, as deep in woodland as possible. Obviously Wales is out. We could strike south-east to the Forest of Dean. We need transport, water and food. As soon as it’s dark I’ll walk into the nearest village and steal a car. We’re only a few miles from one. I saw its lights in the distance just before the Omegas got us.”

He almost expected Miriam to ask how. Instead she said: “It’s worth a try. Don’t take more risks than you need.”

Julian said: “Please, Theo, don’t take the gun.”

He turned on her, biting back anger. “I shall take what I need to take and do what I have to do. How much longer can you go on without water? We can’t live on blackberries. We need food, drink, blankets, things for the birth. We need a car. If we can get into hiding before Rolf gets to the Council there’s still a hope. Or perhaps you’ve changed your mind. Perhaps you want to follow his example and give yourself up.”

She shook her head but didn’t speak. He saw that there were tears in her eyes. He wanted to take her in his arms. Instead he stood distanced, and, putting his hand in his inner pocket, felt for the cold weight of the gun.

He set off immediately darkness fell, impatient to be gone, resenting every wasted moment. Their safety depended on the speed with which he could get hold of a car. Julian and Miriam came to the edge of the wood and watched him out of sight. Turning to take a final glance he had to fight down a momentary conviction that this might be the last time he saw them. He remembered that the lights of a village or small town had lain to the west of the road. The most direct way might be to cross the fields, but he had left the torch with the women and to attempt a cross-country route with no light and in unknown country could invite disaster. He broke into a run and then, half-walking, half-running, followed the route they had travelled. After half an hour he reached a crossroads and, after a little thought, took the left fork.

It took him another hour’s brisk walking to get to the outskirts of the town. The country road, unlit, was bordered on one side by tall straggling hedges and on the other by a thin copse. He walked on that side and, when he heard a car approaching, stepped into the shadow of the trees, partly from an instinctive wish for concealment, partly from the fear, not wholly irrational, that a solitary man walking briskly through the darkness might arouse interest. But now hedgerow and copse were giving way to isolated houses, detached, set back from the road in large gardens. These would certainly have a car in their garage, probably more than one. But houses and garages would be well protected. This ostentatious prosperity was hardly vulnerable to a casual and inexperienced thief. He was looking for victims more easily intimidated.

And now he had reached the town. He walked more slowly. He could
feel his heartbeat quickening, the strong rhythmic thump against the rib-cage. He didn’t want to penetrate too far into the centre. It was important to find what he needed as soon as possible and make a getaway. And then he saw, in a small close to the right of him, a row of semi-detached, pebble-dashed villas. Each pair was identical, with a bay window beside the door and a garage built on to the end wall. He moved up almost on tiptoe to inspect the first pair. The house on the left was empty, the windows boarded up and a sale board wired to the front gate. It had obviously been empty for some time. The grass was long and straggly and the single round flowerbed in the middle was a mass of overgrown rose bushes, spiky stems entwined, the last overblown flowers drooping and dying.

The house on the right was occupied and looked very different. There was a light in the front room behind the drawn curtains, the front garden had a neatly cut lawn with a bed of chrysanthemums and dahlias edging the path. A new fence had been nailed against the boundary, perhaps to conceal the desolation next door, or to keep the weeds at bay. It seemed ideal for his purpose. With no neighbours, there would be no one secretly to watch or hear, and with easy access to the road he could hope to make a relatively quick getaway. But was there a car in the garage? Walking to the gate, he looked intently at the gravel path and could make out the mark of tyres, a small stain of oil. The stain of oil was worrying, but the little house was so well kept, the garden so immaculate, that he couldn’t believe the car, however small and old, wouldn’t be in running order. But if not? Then he would have to start again and a second attempt would be twice as dangerous. As he paused beside the gate, glancing left and right to see that this loitering wasn’t observed, his mind explored the possibilities. He could prevent the people in this house giving the alarm; it would only be necessary to cut off the telephone and tie them up. But suppose he was equally unsuccessful in finding a car at the next house he tried, and then the next? The prospect of tying up a succession of victims was as risible as it was dangerous. At best he would have only two chances. If he were unsuccessful here the best plan might be to stop a car on the road and force the driver and passengers out. That way he would at least be certain that he had a vehicle that was running.

With one final quick glance round, he unlatched the gate quietly and
walked swiftly, almost on tiptoe, to the front door. He breathed a small sigh of relief. The curtains had been only partially drawn over the side pane of the bow window and there was a gap of about three inches between the curtain edge and the frame of the window through which he could clearly observe what was happening in the room.

There was no fireplace and the room was dominated by a very large television set. In front of it were two armchairs and he could see the grey heads of an elderly couple, probably man and wife. The room was sparsely furnished with a table and two chairs set in front of a side window, and a small oak bureau. He could see no pictures, no books, no ornaments, no flowers, but on one wall hung a large coloured photograph of a young girl and beneath it was a child’s high-chair with a teddy bear wearing an immense spotted necktie.

Even through the glass he could hear the television clearly. The old people must be deaf. He recognized the programme:
Neighbours
, a low-budget television series from the late 1980s and early 1990s, made in Australia, and preceded by a jingle of unparalleled banality. The programme had apparently had a huge following when first shown on the old-type television sets and now, adapted for the modern high-definition sets, was enjoying a revival, becoming indeed something of a cult. The reason was obvious. The stories, set in a remote, sun-warmed suburb, evoked a nostalgic longing for a make-believe world of innocence and hope. But, above all, they were about the young. The insubstantial but glowing images of young faces, young limbs, the sound of young voices, created the illusion that somewhere under an antipodean sky this comforting, youthful world still existed and could be entered at will. In the same spirit and from the same need, people bought videos of childbirth, or nursery rhymes and old television programmes for the young,
The Flower-Pot Men, Blue Peter
.

He rang the doorbell and waited. After dark he guessed they would answer the ring together. Through the insubstantial wood he could hear the shuffle of feet and then the grating of the bolts. The door opened on the chain and through the inch gap he could see that the couple were older than he had expected. A pair of rheumy eyes, more suspicious than anxious, looked into his.

The man’s voice was unexpectedly sharp. “What do you want?”

Theo guessed that his quiet, educated voice would be reassuring. He
said: “I’m from the Local Council. We’re doing a survey into people’s hobbies and interests. I have a form for you to fill in. It won’t take a moment. It has to be done now.”

The man hesitated, then took off the chain. With one swift shove Theo was inside, his back against the door, the revolver in his hand. Before they could speak or scream he said: “It’s all right. You’re in no danger. I’m not going to hurt you. Keep quiet, do what I say, and you’ll be safe.”