Temple of the Winds

by James Follett

  `Push it in harder,' breathed Harding, his eyes gleaming with suppressed excitement.

  Malone did so and the digits changed to 14 and then 13. When he pulled the watch out to rub his fingers, the digits jumped to 22 and the watch carried on running normally. The police officer was so intrigued that he repeated the experiment twice. He looked inquiring at Harding. `Strange,' he murmured. `Isn't this where you say that we're up against strange forces that are totally beyond our understanding?'

  `Well, I'll say that if it makes you feel better, Mr Malone. But I'd rather say that we're up against something that's possibly within our understanding, but beyond our ability.'

  `Sounds like a cop out.'

  `Pretty well.'

  `This thing has come between me and having my kids stay with me for the weekend, so I'd like to hear your cop out, sir.'

  Harding realized that he was beginning to like Malone. `It was Arthur C Clarke who said that the products of a sufficiently advanced technology would seem like magic to a lesser technology. Well -- we can eliminate magic right away. This Wall -- we might as well call it that -- is economical with energy. The polarizing effect is only apparent as and when and where it's needed.'

  `Like security lights that come on only when they detect body heat instead of burning all the time?'

  Harding nodded. `Exactly. That tells us that the people who made, or formed, or built this Wall are up against the same conservation of energy laws, and the same design problems that confront any engineer.' He gazed at the woodland beyond the track. `And if that is the past we're looking at, then Cathy Price was right.'

  `Cathy Price?' Malone was interested but careful to make his tone faintly dismissive.

  `She put me onto the idea. I think the Wall's inner boundary is the beginning of a time wedge. A centimetre's penetration is one second in the past. Two centimetres, perhaps two seconds back into the past, and so on. A linear or exponential progression -- I don't know, but that countryside looks like it predates Man. I'll know tonight when I've had a chance to look at the sky.'

  `How can time create a physical barrier?' Malone asked.

  The scientist was lost in thought for few moments. `Now you're putting me into the realms of guesswork. Maybe time has entropy just like everything else in the universe. You try moving back in time and time pushes you back to into the present. The harder you push, the harder it repels.' He extended his forefinger and watched the characteristic darkening around the tip. `Damned clever trick, though. You know, it's possible that there's someone not a metre from us on the other side of this Wall who's just as baffled as we are.'

  Malone touched his sleeve and pointed. Harding suppressed an expletive. Not thirty metres ahead, a giant deer had appeared in a clearing. It was bigger than a moose or elk, and its magnificent antlers had a spread of at least three metres. It moved to a convenient overhanging branch and began rubbing the huge rack back and forth as though it had an itch. Bits of chewed bark fell onto its reddish-grey haunches.

  Malone suddenly clapped his hands and shouted. The huge creature continued rubbing its rack unconcernedly on the branch. Eventually it tired of the project and melted into the forest.

  `What the hell was that?' Harding breathed.

  It was Malone's turn to provide information. `Last year I gave my eldest daughter a big colour book on extinct creatures. She loves it so I had to buy another copy to keep in my flat for weekends. I have to go through it with her everytime they visit. The sabre-tooth tiger, mammoth, the dodo. That was a megaloceros.'

  `When did it become extinct?'

  `Can't remember exactly. About 10,000 years ago. Clever special effects, don't you think? Projecting the past all around Pentworth.'

  `That's one way of looking at it.'

  `There is only one way of looking at it -- the way we're meant to. I took my kids to the London Planetarium for their Christmas outing. They showed the 1999 total eclipse of the sun, and the night sky as it looked in Israel at the time of the birth of Christ. All done from a projector in the centre of the dome, just as Pentworth Lake is at the centre of this thing.'

  `Meaning that there was a UFO on Tuesday night afterall and that it's now sitting in Pentworth Lake?'

  `You're the scientist, Mr Harding. You tell me.'

  Harding was silent for some moments. He shook his head. `I don't know what to think, Mr Malone.'

  Malone jabbed at the Wall. `Maybe the ufologists will have better luck getting back in than we've had getting out. They were certainly determined enough. We'd better be getting back. I've got a lot to do.'

  They returned to the Escort. Malone was silent until they were on the main road. `There's a lot of radio gear in your workshop, Mr Harding. Can you use it while there's no power?'

  `It's mostly amateur radio stuff -- 12-volt DC equipment. I've got a huge truck battery as my standby uninterruptable power supply. Why?'

  `Do you have the capability of transmitting on broadcast bands?'

  `I have. But I don't. It would be contrary to the conditions in my amateur radio licence.'

  `How about the FM band?'

  `I've got a couple of old Spectrum Band II transmitters. Meant for community radio. I bought them at a junk sale.'

  `Working?'

  `Yes.'

  `Frequency?'

  `87.5. What's this leading up to, sergeant?'

  `Would one of them cover the whole of the area inside the Wall?'

  `A five kilometre radius? No trouble. If you're thinking what I think you're--'

  `What's the first thing revolutionaries do in tinpot republics when they seize power?'

  Harding was in no mood for games and made no answer.

  `They grab the palace and the radio station. The Divine Adrian Roscoe's already got the palace. We have to beat him to the radio station.’

  Chapter 35.

  LIKE MANY IN OUTLYING HOMES, the Taylor's were better-equipped than town dwellers to cope with the crisis. They relied on an LPG supply from a large tank in their garden for their central heating and cooking which had been refilled the previous week following heavy use during the hard winter. Also, not uncommonly, their water supply came from the original well, now capped, that served as a borehole. Without electricity for the automatic pump it was necessary to periodically crank an outside hand pump to force a supply of water through the filtration system to the header tank in the roof, but they had done it before during power cuts. Main drainage consisted of a large fibre glass septic tank buried under the front garden which meant that they were already in the habit of not flushing the toilet after taking a pee, and they used their washing machine sparingly with its discharge emptying into a soakaway.

  While many in the town were having to go without, Anne and Vikki were able to sit down in the kitchen to hot coffee upon their return from Ellen Duncan's shop.

  Vikki sipped her drink appreciatively, keeping her left hand out of sight on her lap. She avoided her mother's eye. The drive back from the town had been an agony of embarrassed silence.

  `How are you feeling now?' said Anne at length.

  Vikki smiled and glanced around the friendly kitchen, the shining copper pans that were never used, the strings of swollen Spanish onions hanging from an overhead rack. `Glad to be home.'

  `Is that all you've got to say?'

  `I'm sorry, mum.'

  `You've already said that about a million times.'

  `No -- I'm not just saying it. I'm sorry deep down inside that I lied to you.'

  Anne sighed and shook her head. `That Sarah Gale -- she put you up to that story? The girl's a slut. I don't know what you see in her.'

  `She's kind, mum.'

  `I've heard a lot about her kind of kindness.'

  Vikki deemed it wise to say nothing.

  `I only pray to God that you're telling the truth about nothing happening.'

  `I've told you the absolute truth, mum. He started to try it on and then the lights went out and I managed to run away.'

&nb
sp; `After your clothes had been ripped to shreds.'

  `Someone grabbed at me while I was running.' Vikki gave an inward shudder at the recollection of her flight from Pentworth House but was unable to choke back the sob that rose unbidden in her throat.

  Anne rose and put her arms around her daughter. `My turn to say sorry. Milly Vaughan said you were okay. It's just... Oh well... All's well etcetera, eh?' She kissed Vikki on the cheek and brushed away an errant strand of blonde hair.

  Vikki nodded.

  Anne sat and picked up her mug. `We'll forget all about it. But if there is something you want to tell me, tell me now and let's have done with it.'

  The girl looked at her mother. Large, troubled green eyes. `There is something... I lost my hand there...'

  `Oh. Did Dave Weir go and get it then?'

  `No. It must still be there.'

  Anne stared at her daughter in bewilderment. `So you're wearing your spare? But I thought...'

  Vikki stared down at her mug. `I'm not wearing anything, mum... It's not my real hand...'

  `Not your...?'

  `What I mean is that it is real...'

  `What on earth are you talking about?'

  Vikki clasped the mug with her left hand and picked it up. She now had reasonable control but not good enough yet to chance using the handle. She set it down again while Anne stared, speechless, the colour draining from her face. Then Vikki held up the hand and spread her fingers. She was fearful of her mother's reaction, and had wondered what would happen, but was not prepared for what happened next.

  Anne screamed in terror and jumped up. The kitchen chair keeled over as she staggered backwards and grabbed the sink, her face contorted in abject horror. She crossed herself -- something that Vikki had never seen her do outside a church.

  `My God, child!' she screamed. `What have you done! What have you done!'

  Frightened and confused by her mother's response, Vikki could only cry out, `What do you mean? I haven't done anything! It started growing yesterday!' She stood and thrust her left hand out of sight.

  Anne clutched the edge of the sink. And then she was babbling, but with a terrible logic. `They've got a temple there! You did a deal!'

  `Deal?' Vikki was now on the verge of tears. `I don't know what you mean!' She took a step towards her mother but Anne shrank back in terror. This was God's final punishment for that momentary lapse of motherly attention all those years ago. Her punishment was living through the ordeal of countless operations on Vikki's wrist, sitting with Jack in bleak, anti-septic corridors, waiting for verdicts. Taking Vikki to specialists who had prodded and probed and said little but their accusing eyes speaking unspoken thoughts. And now this -- the culmination of all that torment -- the most hideous punishment of all: her daughter's abandoning of God in favour of something too terrible to even think about.

  Vikki took another step towards this wide-eyed, terrified woman who was now a stranger. `Mum... please!'

  Anne's hand scrabbled blindly at the draining board. She snatched up a knife. `Don't come near me!'

  Vikki froze. Her thoughts a maddened kaleidoscope of terror in the eye of a hurricane of despair.

  `Mum...'

  `You made a pact! You're not my Vikki! You're vermin! Vermin from hell! A witch!'

  Her mother's words cut like a whip. Coming after 24-hours of torment and agonising terror, they were enough to snap what little was left of the girl's otherwise remarkable resilience. Her mind went blank and her reason imploded to a nothingness save for a sudden and terrible resolution. She yanked a drawer open and seized a meat cleaver.

  `If that's what you think then I'll get rid of it!' she screamed.

  She laid her left wrist on the table and raised the cleaver high above her head.

  Chapter 36.

  `ONE THING,' SAID MALONE, as he dropped Bob Harding off at his shop. `You said that you had two of those Spectrum transmitters?'

  `Yes. Why?'

  `It might be an idea to keep quiet about the second one.'

  Harding was puzzled. `Why?'

  `The best aces are always the ones up your sleeve, Mr Harding.'

  The scientist grinned. `You're an odd character, Malone, but I'll keep mum if it makes you feel better.'

  Malone thanked him and drove to the police station to report to Inspector Harvey Evans. The sector inspector had been on duty for 14-hours and it showed. His face was haggard from lack of sleep. He waved the sergeant to a chair.

  `Damned strange not having phones ringing all the time. Okay -- fire away.' He listened intently to Malone's account of the visit to the Wall with Harding.

  `So he thinks it's here to stay?'

  `I got that impression, too. Whatever put it there didn't intend it to be a five minute wonder. Mr Harding also thinks that it's a completely enclosing sphere with Pentworth Lake in the exact centre according to his survey.'

  Evans turned his chair and studied a wall map. The acetate overlay was grease pencil marked with a series of short arcs around Pentworth. They could be joined to form a circle. `Well -- we all thought it was a dome, but a sphere?'

  `Which is why the gas, water and telephones are cut. They're all underground.'

  There was a silence apart from the pecking of a typewriter that someone had rescued from the basement.

  `For an advanced intelligence, or whatever they are, they're not very well informed,' Evans remarked at length. `Obviously they've not done much reading or watching movies. They've not gone around in fearsome flying machines incinerating everything they see. They've just ignored us.'

  Malone thought about the crab-like machine that he and Cathy Price had seen and decided to remain silent on the matter for the time being. `Mr Harding is also concerned about the air quality. Carbon build-up from car exhausts and barbecues. Sulphur from diesels.'

  `The petrol and diesel problem will solve itself,' said Evans, consulting a handwritten document. `The Jet filling station say that haven't got a hand pump. Air pollution is on the list of problems to be looked at tomorrow. We've only got so many hours of daylight.'

  `We could deal with it today,' said Malone. `I've seen Asquith Prescott.' Not strictly a lie because he had -- the previous day at Pentworth Lake. `Would you think it a good idea if he made a broadcast this evening in his capacity as chairman of the town council?'

  Evans considered the question; it was hardly a police matter. `Well...'

  `He could include an appeal to everyone not use their cars unless it was absolutely essential, and ask people to combine forces with neighbours for communal cooking. And anything else we'd like put across in the interim.'

  `Certainly an idea,' said Evans thoughtfully. `Yes -- a good one, but a small point, sergeant: what would he use for a radio station?'

  `Robert Harding has got a battery-powered Band II FM transmitter. He can have it working in time for an 1800 bulletin.'

  `Well, it sounds a damn sight more efficient than wasting petrol with response cars going around with PA gear.'

  `We'll need them to publicize the time and frequency, sir. 87.5 at six o'clock. I'll get that organized. You look beat, if you don't mind me saying.'

  Evans smiled. `Not at all, sergeant. Smart of Asquith. People are used to getting their news fix at that time.'

  `That's what I thought,' said Malone, moving to the door.

  `You know,' mused Evans. `Not that I'm saying anything against Asquith Prescott, you understand, but it surprises me --him coming up such a bright idea. In fact, I've a shrewd suspicion that...'

  But Malone had gone, leaving his superior officer counting his blessings that he had at least one officer on his tiny force who was prepared to use his initiative.

  Malone left the police station and drove to Asquith Prescott's house -- a fine Tudor mansion that fronted the main farm -- where he found the farmer try to help his manager get a hand-operated milking machine into working order. In the manager's office Malone wasted no time in getting straight to the point in terms that appeal
ed to Prescott's vanity:

  `Inspector Evans thinks it would be an excellent idea if, in your capacity as chairman of Pentworth Town Council, you made a broadcast to the people of Pentworth at six o'clock this evening, sir. A Churchillian rallying speech. Wartime spirit. Need for co-operation and mutual support -- that sort of thing. Councillor Bob Harding is fixing up his workshop as your broadcast studio.'

  Prescott's florid features sagged in alarm. `You mean that this thing might go on?'

  `It's better to assume the worst and be wrong than to assume the best and not be right, sir. Old Chinese proverb.'

  `Is it? Yes, but--'

  With remarkable timing, aided largely by Malone pressing the PPT key on the radio in his pocket and sending three bursts of blank carrier, a response car cruised by at that moment, its driver armed with a loudhailer:

  `Please tune in your radios this evening at six o'clock to 87.5 FM when Asquith Prescott, Chairman of Pentworth Town Council, will broadcast an address on the present crisis. That's 87.5 FM at six pm... If you have a neighbour without a battery radio, please invite them to listen to this important broadcast with you.' The repeated message faded into the distance.

  `It's being well-publicized, sir. People will listen to you because they're looking for leadership. They need the sort positive leadership that only you can provide.'

  `Yes -- of course. But dammit, it's nearly four... I haven't got time to write a speech.'

  `That's being taken care of, sir. Your time is much too important. A speech writer has been appointed to you. Churchill had one.'

  `He did?'

  `So did Margaret Thatcher. Great leaders always have their own speech writers, sir. Naturally, you can add your own touches to breathe life into it. If you could be at Bob Harding's place at 5:50 to go over it.' `Yes -- of course. Hang on, though -- that will only give me ten min--'

  `If you'll excuse me, sir. I have to rush. Several urgent calls before it gets dark. 5:50 at Councillor Harding's shop. Good day, sir.'

  Malone drove straight to see Harding. The scientist was in his workshop, headphones clamped over ears and reciting `Mary had a Little Lamb' into a desk microphone that was connected to a transmitter not much larger than a car radio.