Vampires Overhead (25 page)

‘And it looks as if it’s going to give one of us a chance to get what he wanted too,’ Bingen grinned slyly.

‘What the hell d’you mean by that?’

‘Aw! Nothing. Keep your wool on.’

‘Then don’t be funnier than you can help. Give me a hand to pile these things together.’

We heaped the Vampires, covering them with dried fern fronds and pouring brandy over them. The bonfire burned clearly at first, and then gradually the flame dulled and a great plume of smoke towered into the sky. We watched it for a while, silently.

‘You know, Bingen, I’ve wondered for a long time. Do those things burn away in the flame, do they disappear, or doesn’t the fire hurt them at all? You know, in all the buildings we’ve been, there hasn’t been a sign of a dead Vampire. Yet we’ve seen them right in the middle of burning houses. I wonder if fire does harm them. They must have caused the fires. I wonder . . . Oh, hell! What’s the use of wondering? We’ll come back when this has burned out and see if those bodies have gone. Come on.’

Later, after we had gone down in the valley and reassured Janet there was no possibility of Dusty Rhodes returning, cooked, and eaten a meal, I climbed back to where the bonfire had burned itself out. In the circle of burned bracken a pile of grey ash moved gently in the breeze. With a branch broken from a slender larch I probed, turned the ash, and in the white, under the grey, still glowing with heat, were the black bodies of the Vampires. They lay as we had piled them, unscathed! Their sleek bodies showing no sign of having been in contact with heat, and, as I poked with the branch, one of those horrible, decapitated heads rolled from the pile, bleak eyes regarded me, and under the skin upon the temple beat erratically a thin ribbon of pulse.

I killed it!

So my premonition that they came unscathed through fire was correct, and with the certainty of the knowledge I felt physically sick.

Lanes ran from the bonfire through the bracken, burning fitfully. I stamped and beat them out. The Vampires had attacked Dusty and Bingen. Did that mean they were . . .?

Back in the valley, I was subdued, and Bingen spoke to me several times before I heeded.

‘What! What was that?’

‘What’s the matter with you?’ Bingen queried. He jerked his thumb to the hills. ‘They gone?’

‘No. They weren’t touched at all.’

‘Well, both of us thought that all the time, didn’t we? No need to let it upset us.’

‘Yes. We both thought it, but the confirmation is a bit upsetting when you think it over. Still, as you say, no good worrying over it.’

‘What are you two talking about?’ Janet asked curiously. ‘Have what gone? And what did you know?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ I answered her, and lapsed into silence.

It was some time before I spoke again. I stared reflectively at Janet.

‘Janet, you know all the Vampires haven’t gone yet,’ I said. ‘Well, I think now, after they’ve attacked Bingen, we’d better keep a sharper watch out for them than we have been doing for the past few days. Until today, I was convinced that the few we’ve seen flying overhead, and the few which have visited us, were just odd stragglers, and that the main body had gone. But now, I’m not so sure.’

‘No! You were right. They have gone. All but a few,’ Janet spoke decisively. ‘I’m sure they’ve gone. I
feel
they’ve gone. There are only a few left and, soon now,
they’ll
be gone too. Oh, I know it.’

I looked at her shining eyes as she tried to convince me. She was so sure. I hoped that she was right, and later events proved her to be correct. Days there were when huge swarms of Vampires flew effortlessly overhead, days when we saw but a few, and then days when we saw none at all. Those which attacked Dusty Rhodes and Bingen were the last we actually came in contact with. Several flights dropped to squat in the valley, watching the barricaded cave, but we did not interfere with them and, unable to touch us, at last they went away. The weeks went by, they grew scarcer and scarcer until at last we were convinced Janet had been right, that they were going, and now had gone. We felt the world we knew was free of them.

They came . . . destroyed man and his works, burned the land, drained it dry of humanity . . . and left. Those who must come after may comprehend, perhaps. We, who lived under them, do not. Never will, I think. We can only surmise. And I, who have attempted this record of events, have tried hard to avoid conjecture, imagination. I have attempted the telling of this, our story, as a bare record of fact and event.

In the cave that night, after we had disposed of Rhodes, I lay awake, pondering upon the outcome, speculating on the future.

By my side Bingen lay snoring lustily, and behind the partition which had replaced the curtain Janet slept. At least, I suppose she slept. What would happen to the three of us? Would there be trouble between Bingen and myself over the girl? I could not tell. Fervently, I hoped against it. Later, if things went as they had been going, and let us three see we were the only survivors then . . . if Janet chose. That would dispose of any future trouble. And it looked to me as if she had already chosen, preferred Bingen. Undoubtedly. So apparent it was that she preferred his company. And Bingen . . . was he to be trusted with her? I tried to appease my wondering with thoughts that somewhere would be other people. That, later on, we would find, maybe, an elderly woman who would befriend the girl. Was Bingen to be trusted with her? Was I? The Vampires. Would they appear again? Twisting, circling, my brain dwelt upon the future and the past, until I tried to stop thinking, turned upon my side, trying vainlessly to sleep. All that night I lay awake, thinking, thinking, until, to my relief, dawn light came stealing through cracks in the barricade. Softly, to avoid wakening the others, I slid the barrier ajar and went out into the morning. As yet, the dawn had not dispersed the shadow in the valley, and I watched the skies lighten over the hills.

Gradually the pathetic cottages, standing emptily with burned walls and tumbling roofs, swam from the dusk into the lightening dawn while I leant, smoking, against the garden wall. Another day with the world gone up in flame and smoke, leaving three survivors hidden fearfully in a cave, contemplating only the provisions they could salvage and who was to have the girl! I flung my cigarette away, watching the glowing arc of its fall, and then, with the morning born, pulled water from the well, icy cold, to douse gloominess away.

‘Been thinking about the girl and couldn’t sleep?’ Bingen’s voice came unexpectedly to me as I towelled vigorously. He dipped his hand in the bucket. ‘That’s the stuff to take those thoughts away, m’lad. Cold water for hot desires. Here, after you with the bucket.’

‘For Gawd’s sake, Bingen,’ I answered morosely, while he turned the windlass. ‘Can’t you forget she’s a woman? This isn’t any time to flirt about, or rather, try to . . . You know what I mean? Hell! Why don’t you try to treat her as a child. Anyway, until we get somewhere where it’ll be different. Where there’s someone able to look after her.’

‘She’s a woman. She’s old enough to look after herself.’ Bingen eyed me curiously. ‘We can’t forget that. Neither can she. Not unless she’s queer. And she certainly isn’t queer. If things go like this, us living here together, she’ll have to choose one of us. We can’t live here, like two eunuchs waiting on a harem beauty. At least, I can’t, not without providing evidence to the contrary.’

He laughed and bent over the bucket.

‘I suppose you’re right,’ I agreed with him at length. ‘Actually, I expect, I’ve known it all along, but . . . I hadn’t the courage to realize. Yet the very idea of you or I, Bingen, living with Janet while the other hung around . . . is incredible.’

‘Of course it’s incredible,’ Bingen grinned at me. ‘Where’ll you be off to, Garry?’

‘What about breakfast,’ I said surlily, ‘and forgetting this, until we’re forcibly reminded about it.’

‘You’ll be forcibly reminded of it, just as soon as I get a chance.’

‘And you’ll be getting that beating up Dusty Rhodes was nearly getting. Come on, let’s go and see about some breakfast.’

Together we walked slowly across to the cottage, and then Bingen halted.

‘Listen!’ he whispered. ‘D’you hear anything?’

At first I did not. Then to me came the slithering sound of pebbles rolling beneath somebody’s softly treading feet. Someone crept, but the betraying pebbles rolled down the hill.

‘What’s that?’ Bingen dropped the towel from his shoulders, sprang back towards the cave. ‘Get the guns. Quick!’

My rifle was in the cottage, and walking backwards, watching the hilltop from where the noise came, I retreated towards it. With loaded gun, I peered through the window. Across the yard I could see Bingen watching. We waited. Above, on the hill, the noise ceased.

Once, in the silence, I heard a stone roll, tumbling down into the valley, but we could see nothing, so that, after some minutes of waiting, Bingen gestured nonchalantly there was nothing to be afraid of, and walked from the cave into the yard. He lit a cigarette and, while his hands were shielding the flame of the match, a rifle on the hill crackled and echoed through the valley.

Bingen dropped as though he had been poleaxed.

On the hilltop, among the heather in the clear morning, there drifted a little cloud of smoke. My eyes fixed balefully upon the spot. Rhodes had come back. Bingen lay out in the yard. I hoped to God Janet would not dash out to him. Rhodes would kill her too.

‘Janet! Janet! Stay there. Dusty’s up on the hill.’

She did not answer, but the silence was broken sibilantly. I heard a whispering voice.

‘It’s Dusty. Go and get him. I’m all right. He only creased me. If I move, he’ll shoot.’

Bingen’s voice! For a moment I did not understand. He was lying in the yard, and, by his side, the cigarette he had dropped sent up a little spiral of smoke.

‘You all right? Thank God! Bingen, I thought he’d got you.’

‘He has got me, you thundering idiot. But I’m all right.’

‘How long can you stay without moving?’ I whispered. ‘If we can stick it, he’ll start to come down. Then I can get him.’

‘I can wait. S’long as he doesn’t see me breathing. Gosh! I can feel a bullet smacking into my back every minute.’

I looked at Bingen. His shoulders lifted gently. I wondered if Rhodes could see the movement from up on the hill. If Bingen moved, I felt that Dusty would not miss again! Peeping cautiously, I could see no sign of Rhodes stirring about the spot from where cordite from his rifle had burned to smoke. There was nothing we could do except wait. Janet in her cave; Bingen flat on his face in the yard; myself crouched by a window in the cottage; up on the hill a demented drunk with a cocked gun. It seemed we waited hours silently, minutes dragging slowly were days. I spoke softly to Bingen again, and he did not answer. Lying under the hot sun, he had fainted. Something must happen now, I thought, and stared vengefully upwards, and as I stared, Dusty moved. Easing slowly above the heather his shock head rose, peering down, and yet I dared not shoot. Upwards, from an awkward position, the shot was too risky. This time there must be no mistake. While I waited, Rhodes knelt, stood gradually erect, with rifle aiming down into the valley, until the whole of his figure stood boldly against blue sky. Probably he thought, if that drink-smothered brain of his allowed him to think at all, that I was away, that the girl and Bingen were alone. And he thought he had killed Bingen! Presently, as though satisfied, though still he kept his rifle pointing ready to shoot, Dusty began to climb down into the valley. At the bottom he hesitated, then, assured of safety by silence and the motionless figure on the ground, tucked his rifle under his arm and walked towards the cave. I heard him swearing, mumbling savagely. He spoke louder, called.

‘I come back proper this time. Proper. ’N now for the girl. C’mon, lass. Where are you? Dusty’s come back for you.’

He clambered over the wall, and when he turned towards the cave I stepped from the cottage. Called vibrantly.

‘Rhodes!’

My finger curled about the trigger, squeezed. The bullet hit him in mid-air as he jumped to turn. The big tramp swayed, dropped almost over the body of Bingen. I shot him again, walked towards him.