The Children of Men (32 page)

From time to time the two women stopped and Julian bent over with Miriam’s arm supporting her. After the third time this had happened, Miriam signalled Theo to stop. She said: “I think she might be better in the car now. How much further?”

“We’re still skirting open country. There should be a turning to the right fairly soon. After that it’s about a mile.”

The car shuddered on. The remembered turn revealed itself as a crossroads and for a moment he was irresolute. Then he drove to the right, where the track, narrower still, sloped downhill. Surely this was the way to the lake and, beyond it, the remembered wood-shed.

Miriam called out: “There’s a house, over to the right.”

He turned his head just in time to see it, a far dark shape glimpsed through a narrow gap in the great tangled heap of bushes and trees. It stood alone on a wide sloping field. Miriam said: “No good. Too obvious. No cover in the field. Better press on.”

They were now moving into the heart of the forest. The lane seemed interminable. With every lurching yard the path narrowed and he could hear the scratch and scrape of branches on the car. Overhead the strengthening sun was a white diffused light hardly visible above the tangled boughs of elder and hawthorn. It seemed to him, desperately trying to control the steering, that they were slithering helplessly down a tunnel of green darkness which would end in an impenetrable hedge. He was wondering whether memory had deceived him, whether they
should have taken the left turn, when the path suddenly widened and opened on to a grassy glade. They saw before them the pale glimmer of the lake.

He stopped the car only yards from its edge and got out, then turned to help Miriam half lift Julian from her seat. For a moment she clung to him, breathing deeply, then let go, smiled, and walked to the edge of the water, her hand on Miriam’s shoulder. The surface of the pond—it was hardly a lake—was so thickly strewn with the green blades of fallen leaves and water weed that it looked like an extension of the glade. Beyond this green and shivering cover the surface was viscous as treacle, beaded with minute bubbles which gently moved and coalesced, broke apart, burst and died. In the patches of clear water between the weeds he could see the reflection of the sky as the morning mist cleared to reveal the opaque first light of day. Beneath this surface brightness, in the ochre depths, the sinews of water plants, tangled twigs and broken branches lay thickly encrusted with mud like the ribs of long-sunken ships. At the edge of the pond clumps of sodden rushes lay flattened on the water and in the distance a small black coot scurried in busy agitation and a solitary swan breasted her way majestically among the weeds. The pond was surrounded by trees growing almost to the water’s edge, oak, ash and sycamore, a bright backcloth of green, yellow, gold and russet which seemed in the first light, despite the autumnal shades, to hold some of the freshness and brightness of spring. A sapling on the far bank was patterned with yellow leaves, its thin boughs and twigs invisible against the first light of the sun, so that it seemed as if the air was hung with delicate pellets of gold.

Julian had wandered along the edge of the lake. She called: “The water looks cleaner here and the bank’s quite firm. It’s a good place to wash.”

They joined her and, kneeling, thrust their arms into the lake and dashed the stinging water over their faces and hair. They laughed with the pleasure of it. Theo saw that his hands had swilled the water into greenish mud. This couldn’t be safe to drink even if it were boiled.

As they returned to the Citizen Theo said: “The question is whether we get rid of the car now. It may provide the best shelter we’re likely to get, but it’s conspicuous and we’ve nearly run out of petrol. It would probably only take us another couple of miles.”

It was Miriam who answered. “Let it go.”

He looked at his watch. It was just coming up to nine o’clock. He thought that they might as well listen to the news. Banal, predictable, uninteresting as it would probably be, to hear it was a small valedictory gesture before they finally cut themselves off from all news but their own. He was surprised that he hadn’t thought of the radio before, hadn’t bothered to turn it on during their journey. He had driven in such taut anxiety that the sound of an unknown voice, even the sound of music, would have seemed intolerable. Now he reached his arm through the open window and switched on the radio. They listened impatiently to details of the weather, information on the roads which were officially closed or which would no longer be repaired, to the small domestic concerns of a shrinking world.

He was about to turn off the set when the announcer’s voice changed, becoming slower and more portentous. “This is a warning. A small group of dissidents, one man and two women, are travelling in a stolen blue Citizen car somewhere on the Welsh border. Last night the man, who is thought to be Theodore Faron of Oxford, forced his way into a house outside Kington, tied up the owners and stole their car. The wife, Mrs. Daisy Cox, was found early this morning bound and dead on her bed. The man is now wanted for murder. He is armed with a revolver. Anyone seeing their car or the three persons is asked not to approach them but immediately to telephone the State Security Police. The registration of the car is
MOA
694. I’ll repeat that number:
MOA
694. I am asked to repeat the warning. The man is armed and dangerous. Do not approach.”

Theo wasn’t aware that he had switched it off. He was conscious only of the pounding of his heart and of a sick misery which descended and enveloped him, physical as a mortal illness, horror and self-disgust dragging him almost to his knees. He thought: If this is guilt, I can’t bear it. I won’t bear it.

He heard Miriam’s voice. “So Rolf has reached the Warden. They know about the Omegas, that there are only three of us left. But there’s one comfort, anyway. They still don’t know that the birth is imminent. Rolf couldn’t tell them the expected date of delivery. He doesn’t know. He thinks Julian still has a month to go. The Warden would never ask people to look out for the car if he thought there was a chance they’d find a new-born child.”

He said dully: “There is no comfort. I killed her.”

Miriam’s voice was firm, unnaturally loud, almost shouting in his ear. “You didn’t kill her! If she was going to die of shock it would have happened when you first showed her the gun. You don’t know why she died. It was natural causes, it must have been. It could have happened anyway. She was old and she had a weak heart. You told us. It wasn’t your fault, Theo, you didn’t mean it.”

No, he almost groaned, no, I didn’t mean it. I didn’t mean to be a selfish son, an unloving father, a bad husband. When have I ever meant anything? Christ, what harm couldn’t I do if I actually started to mean it!

He said: “The worst is that I enjoyed it. I actually enjoyed it!”

Miriam was unloading the car, shouldering the blankets. “Enjoyed tying up that old man and his wife? Of course you didn’t enjoy it. You did what you had to do.”

“Not the tying up. I didn’t mean that. But I enjoyed the excitement, the power, the knowledge that I could do it. It wasn’t all horrible. It was for them, but not for me.”

Julian didn’t speak. She came near and took his hand. Rejecting the gesture, he turned on her viciously. “How many other lives will your child cost before she gets herself born? And to what purpose? You’re so calm, so unafraid, so sure of yourself. You speak of a daughter. What sort of life will this child have? You believe that she’ll be the first, that other births will follow, that even now there are pregnant women not yet aware that they are carrying the new life of the world. But suppose you’re wrong. Suppose this child is the only one. To what sort of hell are you condemning her? Can you begin to imagine the loneliness of her last years—over twenty appalling, endless years with no hope of ever hearing another live human voice? Never, never, never! My God, have you no imagination, either of you?”

Julian said quietly: “Do you think I haven’t thought of that, that and more? Theo, I can’t wish that she had never been conceived. I can’t think of her without joy.”

Miriam, wasting no time, had already pulled the suitcase and the raincoats from the boot and lifted down the kettle and the saucepan of water.

She spoke more in irritation than in anger: “For God’s sake, Theo, take hold of yourself. We needed a car; you got us a car. Maybe you could have chosen a better one and got it at less cost. You did what you
did. If you want to wallow in guilt, that’s your affair, but leave it until later. OK, she’s dead and you feel guilty, and feeling guilt isn’t something you enjoy. Too bad. Get used to it. Why the hell should you escape guilt? It’s part of being human. Or hadn’t you noticed?”

Theo wanted to say: “In the past forty years there are quite a number of things I haven’t noticed.” But the words, with their ring of self-indulgent remorse, struck him as insincere and ignoble. Instead he said: “We’d better get rid of the car, and quickly. That’s one problem the broadcast has settled for us.”

He released the brake and put his shoulder to the back of the Citizen, scraping a foothold in the pebbled grass, grateful that the ground was dry and gently sloping. Miriam took the right-hand side and together they pushed. For a few seconds, inexplicably, their efforts were unsuccessful. Then the car began to move gently forward.

He said: “Give it a hard shove when I say the word. We don’t want it stuck in the mud nose-first.”

The front wheels were almost at the edge when he called out “Now,” and they both pushed with all their strength. The car shot over the rim of the lake and hit the water with a splash that seemed to wake every bird in the forest. The air was clamorous with calls and shrieks and the light branches of the high trees shook into life. The spray flew upwards, splattering his face. The cover of floating leaves shattered and danced. They watched, panting, as slowly, almost peacefully, the car settled and began to sink, the water gurgling through the open windows. Before it disappeared, on impulse, Theo took the diary from his pocket and hurled it into the lake.

And then there came for him a moment of dreadful horror, vivid as a nightmare, but one which he could not hope to banish by waking. They were all there together trapped in the sinking car, water pouring in, and he was searching desperately for the handle, trying to hold his breath against the agony in his chest, wanting to call out to Julian but knowing that he dare not speak or his mouth would be clogged with mud. She and Miriam were in the back drowning and there was nothing he could do to help. Sweat broke out on his forehead and, clenching his wet palms, he forced his eyes from the horror of the lake and looked up at the sky, wrenching his mind from imagined horror back to the horror of normality. The sun was pale and round as a full moon but blazing with light in its aureole of mist, the high boughs of the trees black
against its dazzle. He closed his eyes and waited. The horror passed and he was able to look down again at the surface of the lake.

He glanced at Julian and Miriam, half expecting to see on their faces the stark panic which must momentarily have transformed his own. But they were looking down at the sinking car with a calm, almost detached interest, watching the clustered leaves bobbing and bunching on the spreading ripples, as if jostling for room. He marvelled at the women’s calmness, this apparent ability to shut away all memory, all horror in the concern of the moment.

He said, his voice harsh: “Luke. You never spoke of him in the car. Neither of you has mentioned his name since we buried him. Do you think about him?” The question sounded like an accusation.

Miriam turned her gaze from the lake and gave him a steady look. “We think of him as much as we dare. What we’re concerned about now is getting his child born safely.”

Julian came up to him and touched his arm. She said, as if he were the one who most needed comforting: “There will be a time to mourn Luke and Gascoigne. Theo, there will be a time.”

The car had sunk out of sight. He had feared that the water at the edge might be too shallow, that the roof would be visible even under the cover of reeds, but peering down into the murky darkness he could see nothing but swirling mud.

Miriam said: “Have you got the cutlery?”

“No. Haven’t you?”

“Damn, they’re in the front of the car. Still, it hardly matters now. We’ve no food left to eat.”

He said: “We’d better get what we have got to the wood-shed. It’s about a hundred yards up that path to the right.”

Oh God, he prayed, please let it still be there, let it still be there. It was the first time he had prayed in forty years, but the words were less a petition than a half-superstitious hope that somehow, by the strength of his need, he could will the shed into existence. He shouldered one of the pillows and the raincoats, then picked up the kettle of water in one hand, and the suitcase in the other. Julian slung a second blanket round her shoulders and bent for the saucepan of water only to have it taken from her hand by Miriam, who said: “You carry the pillow. I’ll manage the rest.”

Thus encumbered, they made their slow way up the path. It was then
that they heard the metallic rattle of the helicopter. Half-imprisoned by the interlocking boughs they had little need for extra concealment but instinctively they moved from the path into the green tangle of the elder bushes and stood motionless, hardly breathing, as if every intake of breath could reach up to that glittering object of menace, to those watching eyes and listening ears. The noise grew to an ear-shattering clatter. Surely it must be directly overhead. Theo almost expected the sheltering bushes to shudder into violent life. Then it began to circle, the rattle receding then returning, bringing with it renewed fear. It was almost five minutes before the noise of the engine finally faded into a distant hum.

Julian said softly: “Perhaps they aren’t looking for us.” Her voice was faint and, suddenly, she doubled up with pain and grasped at Miriam.

Miriam’s voice was grim. “I don’t suppose they’re on a joy-ride. Anyway they haven’t found us.” She turned to Theo. “How far is this wood-shed?”