The Plague of Silence

by John Creasey

  “We’re going upstairs to my room,” he said. “You’ll be more comfortable there.”

  “No,” she said, chokily. “I will stay here.”

  “Kathleen, you’re coming up to my room.”

  “I won’t come, I want to stay here, I want you to go away!” she cried. “I don’t know anything about Maureen, I don’t know anything at all. Go away from me! I can’t stand being questioned any longer, go away from me!”

  Matt said: “We’re going upstairs, Kathleen,” and moved forward. She started to draw back, but he took her wrists, pulled her to her feet, and hoisted her over his shoulder. He held her so that she could kick and strike at his back, but could not get away. He turned towards the open door. He saw Palfrey and one of the other men just outside, and Palfrey formed words with his lips:

  “Want any help?”

  Matt shook his head, turned out of the room, and went towards the back staircase. With luck he would meet none of the staff or guests on the way. He did pass Z5 agents; he wondered how many of them were here now. The girl had stopped kicking, as if she realized that she was only wasting her effort. She was hardly a lightweight, and by the time he reached the door of his own room she felt very heavy.

  Sarak stood outside, and he opened the door.

  Matt carried the girl in.

  He lowered her to an easy chair and backed away swiftly, half expecting her to spring towards the door. She just sat glaring, her lips wide open, breathing very hard. But it could not rob her of beauty; a kind of savage beauty now.

  Matt knew what Palfrey feared.

  He believed that the girl was very near the borderline of nervous collapse; that if she did collapse it would be impossible to make sure that she would talk. If he stepped up the pressure too much it would do more harm than good, and Palfrey realized it.

  Palfrey didn’t really trust him, and had to be convinced.

  Matt pulled up a small chair, sat down in front of the girl, and took out cigarettes. He crossed to the radio, lighting a cigarette for himself, and switched on. Music flooded the room. He took the cigarettes to her and she accepted one: the first voluntary movement which she had made for a long time.

  He lit it for her. The flame of the match seemed to burnish her eyes, and he was reminded of the eyes of a giant cat, tawny, shimmering.

  “Like a drink?”

  She shook her head.

  “You ought to have one,” he said. “You’ll feel better after that.”

  The music stopped and a man said that the latest bulletin would be broadcast in half a minute. Matt stood smoking and looking down at Kathleen, seeing that she was not used to smoking and wasn’t enjoying the cigarette. She had turned her head and was staring at the radio. She still wore the black dress, the white apron, the lace cap.

  “... this is the half-hourly emergency broadcast for the whole nation. The Government has issued a statement from Number 10 Downing Street, declaring a state of national emergency, but it is emphasized that the movements of the populace are a greater danger to the security of the realm and to the individual than the actual menace of the insects. Medical treatment is many cases is proving effective. The Government, however, has no desire to minimize the dangers inherent in the present situation, and a curfew has been imposed on the nation, to begin at nine thirty this evening. This announcement will be repeated at the end of every bulletin. It is emphasized that householders should have insecticides handy, it now being fully established that most domestic and agricultural insecticides are fatal to the carrier insect, which closely resembles a mosquito.

  “It is also generally known that …”

  Matt switched off, and turned and said:

  “Kathleen, whatever is keeping you quiet is nothing compared with what is happening outside. That bulletin gives you some idea, but only a glimmering. These insect swarms are killing thousands of people and paralysing hundreds of thousands more. Nothing matters against that.” He made himself speak very slowly and didn’t look away from her. “What is frightening you?”

  She closed her eyes and her lips moved, and he just heard her say:

  “They’ll kill Maureen and they’ll kill my parents. God curse them all their lives.”

  She seemed to have to fight to go on: as if the words tormented her.

  “It was Larsen himself who told me what they’d do, and it’s no comfort that Larsen is dead, he’s not alone in all these evil things.”

  Matt asked softly: “Do you know who is working with him?”

  “I don’t know at all,” she said. She opened her eyes and looked at him almost cunningly. “I don’t know anything, except that I found out where Rondivallo had taken Maureen. But Larsen told me if ever I betrayed that—”

  “He can’t hurt you now,” Matt said, and went to the telephone and lifted it and said: “Dr. Palfrey, please.” He waited only a second, while the girl stared at him. “Hallo, Dr. Palfrey. Can you arrange for a special guard to be set on the home of Kathleen O’Shea, in Eire? … the town of Horan? … Yes, you have their address … Yes, telephone the request at onces please.” He kept this voice formal and looked away from the girl; when he turned back, replacing the receiver, he saw a gleam which might have been of hope in her eyes. “It’s all right,” he said. “Within half an hour your home will be guarded by men who’ll make sure nothing can go wrong, you needn’t worry about that any more. Now will you tell me where Maureen went with Rondivallo?”

  She said: “It is a place in the forest.”

  As she spoke, there was a distant booming sound, and then without warning the lights went out.

  Kathleen cried: “What’s that?” Matt heard her jump up and went swiftly to her side. She hadn’t tried to make for the door, but was standing by the chair. He felt her foot against his as he groped, then he put an arm round her waist.

  “It’s an electrical failure, that’s all,” he said “The lights will soon be on again. Where is this place in the forest?”

  She didn’t answer.

  The first blackness had eased a little, and he could just make out the shape of her head and shoulders, and when he glanced round he saw the light of the stars, looking very bright. And there was another light, a yellow one, not more than a mile away; somewhere in the forest. It was a leaping light, too.

  It shone on Kathleen’s eyes.

  “Never mind that,” he said, and prayed that the lights would go on, to give her back brief courage. “This place in the forest, is it the agricultural experimental station?”

  “Yes,” she said in an empty voice. “Look, it is burning. And Maureen is there.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  RING OF FIRE

  Her words were whispered, as if she could not bear to utter them, and Matt could feel the stiffness of her body pressing against him as she stared towards the yellow light. She was right, for it was a burning fight, the dance of flames which had started quickly and which now seemed to be leaping higher, and to be running to the right and to the left. Then he saw another burst of light in a more easterly direction: a third and a fourth.

  The door opened.

  He swung round.

  The light of the stars had dimmed, but the light of the flames was fiercer now, and he could just make out Palfrey’s figure in the doorway.

  “You all right, Matt?”

  “Yes.”

  “The lights will be on again in a moment,” Palfrey said. “There’s been a power failure, but I’m told there’s an emergency plant in the hotel.” He came nearer. “What has Kathleen told you?”

  “Didn’t you hear?”

  “Everything electrical went dead,” Palfrey said.

  “Maureen is out there with Rondivallo,” Kathleen said in that whispering voice. “In the forest.” She moved towards the window slowly, and now the flames outside
were so fierce that they spread a glow about the room, burnishing her features and turning her hair to a kind of fire.

  Outside, the beams of torches were flashing and men were moving about. Suddenly, car lights were switched on and the whole of the front of the hotel was floodlit. Engines turned, and the headlamp beams carved strange arcs in the night as some of the cars were turned to face the steps and the lawns beyond, criss-crossing the whole of the approach to the hotel with light, some beams white and powerful, some much dimmer. Some of the cars were turned towards the sides, as if in defence formation.

  The room light didn’t come on.

  Palfrey had come close to the girl.

  “Do you know what part of the forest?”

  “The agricultural experimental cottages,” Matt said.

  “It is in William’s Glade,” she declared slowly as if speaking really hurt her. “The farm.”

  Palfrey turned round. A light shot out from a torch in his hand as he neared the door. He opened it and the light fell on Sarak’s face.

  “Get me the big map,” Palfrey said.

  Sarak turned at once.

  Along the passage one of the hotel guests was saying: “It’s outrageous, to plunge us into darkness like this. Something ought to be done about it.”

  “I don’t suppose they could help it, dear,” a woman said timidly.

  “Then they damned well ought to be able to!”

  Outside, the blaze in the forest was much fiercer, the flames were so bright that it was possible to see the smoke rising among them, and then towards the sky. Great patches of cloud seemed to cover the stars. The flames stretched a long way in each direction, and Matt could see that it was a ring of flames encircling a part of the forest. At first he thought that it was meant only to cut off the hotel, but other bursts of flame appeared and gradually he could make out a wide circle of fire without being able to guess its radius.

  Palfrey spread the map out on a table and shone the torch on to it. As he traced the position of the glade, his pointing finger showed reddish white, the shadow sharp against the detailed map. Matt stood with his arm round Kathleen’s waist, staring at the moving finger; and Kathleen looked deep into the flaming forest.

  Palfrey’s finger stopped.

  “That’s it,” he said, and looked out of the window, “The fire is encircling William’s Glade and the experimental farm. But we’ve searched it.” He paused, then added roughly: “Bring her into my room.” He went out, and Matt drew the girl towards the door; she strained against him, as if anxious to keep staring at the fire. Then she gave way, and he led her into the passage.

  Lights came on, yellow and dull, but showing everything clearly enough; pictures on the panelled walls, two people at the head of the stairs, a maid carrying one lighted and a box of unfit candles, Palfrey striding towards his own room, and Sarak standing so that he could follow Matt. Sarak had not yet uttered a word.

  Palfrey’s door was open when Matt reached it, and the lights were on inside. The muffled throb of an engine sounded; so there was an emergency generator here, probably at one time there had been no grid electricity. Two or three other men were in the room, and all turned towards the doorway as Matt went in. The girl did not seem to notice them, just went towards the window, where the view was so beautiful by day.

  Palfrey spoke into the telephone.

  “Call the Lauriston and Winchester Fire Services by short wave, and call the two nearest military units for special fire- fighting equipment,” he ordered crisply. “Arrange meeting places between here and the place where the fire is burning …

  The military units should be here within an hour.” There was a note almost of hopelessness in his voice, but the tone strengthened as he went on: “What helicopters have we here? … Only the one? … All right, four of us can go, get it ready at once, will you? … Ten minutes, fine.

  “What’s that? … Larsen put in a call to Whitehall 96871, but there was no answer … just before we found him dead, was it? Ask London to try to trace that number.” He seemed to add silently: “Any straw’s better than none.”

  He rang off.

  “Now, I want to know more about your sister being at William’s Glade,” he said to Kathleen. “Everything, at once.”

  She told him, now.

  She had come here to find out all she could about Maureen, and had soon heard about Rondivallo, the big man who lived here. Maureen was known to have gone into the forest with him to help with some kind of agricultural research.

  Kathleen had found her way to the glade, a clearing in the heart of the forest, with low, wooded hills behind it, a stream, and some swampy land not far away. She had gone there on her bicycle one day, and wandered in the woods where Maureen had wandered, come upon the farm—and seen Maureen!

  “She had a cottage, somewhere in the forest,” Kathleen said in that shocked voice. “But she was taken away and I didn’t see her again.”

  “Taken?” Palfrey interrupted.

  “When I came back Mr. Larsen told me so. And he told me that if ever I talked of seeing Maureen it was Maureen who would be killed. This very day he told me that if I spoke to anyone about this my parents would be killed, old though they are,” she went on hoarsely. “What could I say to you?”

  “Why did you go into the forest today?” Palfrey asked.

  “I hoped to see Maureen.” Kathleen said wearily. “I was near the glade when I met you, Mr. Stone.” Her voice was flat and unemotional, and the firelight still flickered on her eyes. “And after you’d gone Mr. Larsen asked me why I was there; he wanted to know if I’d talked to anyone about Maureen. Of course I had not, for I dared not.”

  “You needn’t be frightened any more,” Palfrey assured her gently, and went on to Matt: “We want the cottages inside that ring of flames, and we need parachute forces in support.” He looked at Matt. “You coming with the advance party?”

  “You could wait for the parachute troops.”

  “We don’t know how long they’ll be. Hours, certainly. We can be there in ten minutes,” Palfrey went on, moving towards the door. “If they’ve started that fire deliberately and it looks as if they have, then it might be to keep us away for a few hours. They’ll know that we can break through the fire once we have the right equipment—some armoured cars could do it in half an hour. So we’re in a hurry.”

  He was at the door.

  “Sure, I’m coming,” Matt said. He squeezed Kathleen’s hand, then dropped her arm and turned and hurried after Palfrey. The light was still dim and yellow, but at least it revealed everything. Palfrey was talking over his shoulder, loudly and clearly; Matt couldn’t understand it, could not see what was making him talk so that anyone could hear. Hotel residents, now in the main lounge, some at card tables, some still near the radio and television sets, heard every word as Palfrey elaborated the plans: how they would get inside the circle of flame and make sure that whatever Rondivallo set out to do could be stopped.

  They went out.

  Not far off, a helicopter engine was reverberating on the night air. The car headlamps were still on, showing many men moving about. Palfrey led the way towards the sound of the roaring engine. Soon it was so dark that he needed to show a torch on the gravel path. The roaring became louder, almost deafening. He stopped at a small cement outhouse, opened the door and ushered Matt inside. It was a gardener’s shed, filled with tools, smelling strongly of creosote.

  “Now what’s on your mind?” Matt asked, and he tried not to be abrupt, tried to see Palfrey as the quiet, ruminative, but outstanding leader of Z5, a man of vision, of courage and of genius; not as a man who didn’t trust him.

  “We’re not going to William’s Glade just yet,” Palfrey said quietly. “There could only be one reason for that ring of fire, to draw us into it. And they wouldn’t want to draw us into it if t
hey really wanted us there. I’d say that they guess that Kathleen’s told us about the glade, so they expect us to be ready to move against it. That your guess, too?”

  Matt leaned against the wall.

  “You could be right. Where do we go from here?”

  “We sent four men up in the helicopter, carrying shortwave radio, and they radioed reports telling us just what’s on inside there,” said Palfrey. “We’ll get to work on the one thing that matters now—finding out who is behind this.”

  Then he added:

  “Who is it, Matt?”

  The air in the shed seemed to go cold. Matt didn’t say a word, and Palfrey stared at him intently: coldly.

  “Well, who?”

  “Sap, it’s been obvious that you’ve stopped trusting me,” Matt said very slowly. “I’d like to know why.”

  “A Washington message to London said you were a bad risk.”

  “It’s not true, Sap.”

  “I’ve got to assume it is until I can prove it isn’t,” Palfrey said. “You know what’s on. You know that a life or two more or less won’t really make much difference. Matt, look at some facts. You’ve been through the infected areas and haven’t been hurt. Some other people seem to be immune too: the guests and the staff here. They knew Rondivallo, and you knew a lot about him. Where is he, Matt? What is he doing?”

  Matt spoke very slowly:

  “I don’t know a thing, Sap. I’m on the level. Show me a way to prove it.” There was a moment of chill silence. “Just show me a way. I hate all this as much as you do.”

  “Matt, I’ve got to know the truth,” Palfrey said as if painfully. “I’ve got to find out if you’re a Rondivallo man. I’ve got to bring pressure on you which I wouldn’t want to use on anyone. I’ve got to make you talk.”