The Plague Dogs: A Novel Page 19

  Clearly through all, as of a tree visible behind drifting mist, he continued to be aware of the actual voice of the man, calling him authoritatively yet kindly to approach. This voice, he now realized, was that of Death; but Death who must himself die—had himself died—and would therefore not be hard on a mere dog. In this place there was, in any case, no distinction between him who brought life to an end and him whose life must be ended. He himself, he now knew, was carrying death as a gift, both to bestow and to receive. He padded forward again, deliberately entering the spiral of cries and voices, and in so doing heard more loudly the ringing in his own head, now become a part of their lament. As he went slowly on in the bidden direction, the whirling spiral stretched and elongated, tapering to a point that pierced him, a sharp arrow of song: and this arrow he retrieved, carrying it obediently, as he had carried the wind’s song on the fell.

  “From Warsaw and from Babylon

  The ghosts will not release the lives.

  A weary burden falls upon

  The groping remnant that survives.

  So this distracted beast contrives

  His hopeless search as best he can.

  Beyond the notebooks and the knives

  A lost dog seeks a vanished man.”

  Snitter came to the car. As he had hoped, the man stooped and patted him; then, with a hand under his jaw, gently lifted his head, scratched his ears and examined his collar, speaking to him soothingly and reassuringly as he did so. Bemused, he found that he was wagging his tail and licking the lavender-soap-scented fingers. Then the man opened the rear door of the car, leaned in and patted the seat, his black glass tubes dangling forward on their strap. He made no attempt to drag or lift Snitter inside, only continuing to talk to him in a quiet voice of sympathy.

  Snitter clambered awkwardly into the back of the car and sat down on the seat, his nostrils beginning to run as he drew in the forgotten smells of oil and petrol fumes, together with those of artificial leather and cleaned glass. Still enclosed in that strange trance which he had entered of his own accord upon the road, he now had no awareness of the wind and sunlight outside, of the white wing-flash of a chaffinch in the sycamore or the sound of the pouring Duddon. He might have been sitting in a roped pail, listening to echoes rising from the well-shaft below him.

  Mr. Ephraim lifted his gun by the barrel, rested the butt on the ground beside the open rear door and stooped to put on the safety catch. As he did so Snitter, turning his head, caught sight in the driving mirror of the figure of a man striding down the hillside—a grey-haired man, carrying a walking-stick and wearing an old tweed overcoat and a yellow scarf. Barking loudly, he leapt for the door. Startled, Mr. Ephraim involuntarily pulled the barrel of the gun towards him. Snitter, trying to push past him, struggled wildly. One front paw clawed at his sleeve while the other became caught in the trigger guard. There was a deafening explosion and the gun fell to the ground, dragging Snitter with it. A moment later Mr. Ephraim, his face pouring blood, silently toppled and fell with his body half in and half out of the car.

  When the farmer’s wife, the soap-suds still dripping from her bared forearms, came running out of the gate, Snitter, howling in tenor, was already across the bridge and two hundred yards up the windy hillside of the Hard Knott, tail between his legs and jaws frothing as though he had been loosed out of hell.

  It was after this that the bad things began.

  FIT 5

  A

  t least one went more easily alone, thought Rowf, plodding up Dunnerdale for the second time in twenty hours; not so much of this damned creep and peep stuff. Wherever Snitter’s got to I’ll find him; and bring him back too—unless he’s dead. And I’ll go the quickest way, exposed or not—he may be in some sort of trouble, or wandering about in one of his mad fits. And if anyone, human or animal, tries to stop me, they’d better watch out, that’s all.

  Yet all the time his thoughts, like a dog keeping just out of range of a man with arm raised to throw a stone, were avoiding the question, “What’s going to become of the two of us without the tod?” They had parted with no further words, the tod, chin on paws among the ling, merely staring sardonically after him as Rowf, lacking only provocation to turn back and bite, set off over the north-east saddle of Caw. Straight over the top he went, through the disused slate quarries below Walna and down to the Tongue ‘Us meadows. Here he rested for a short time, heedless whether anyone might see him or not. Then he skirted Thrang and crossed the marshy Tongue itself, dropping down to the road below Birks Bridge. There was much coming and going, or so it seemed, of cars on the road—surely a great many for so lonely a place?—but evidently those in them, whatever their business, were too much preoccupied with it to pay attention to a solitary, furtive dog making his way up the valley along the grass verge.

  Rowf had intended to retrace their previous night’s route, but as he neared the spot where they had crossed the road his spirit baulked at the thought of the plunge—alone this time—into the tumbling Duddon, and the unpleasant moments of the struggle across. Though tired, he decided to continue up to the bridge and the shallow water above, where he and the tod had crossed that morning,

  He was less than two hundred yards below Cockley Beck when he became aware of the cars and the throng of people. He stopped, sniffing and staring. Little as he knew from experience of the ways of humans outside the Research Station, he could perceive something strange about the behaviour of these men—something which gave him pause. Their purpose was obscure: they appeared to be doing nothing, to have no intention, to be going nowhere. Uneasily, he sensed that they were in some way at check and under strain. Something unusual had thrown them off balance. He went cautiously nearer, pressing himself against the dry stone wall on his off side. His collar caught on a projecting snag and he freed it with a quick tug.

  He gazed ahead of him. Some men in dark-blue clothes were gathered round a large, conspicuous white car, talking in low voices and from time to time turning to look at something lying on the ground under a blanket. A little distance away was a group of rougher-looking men, all with guns; farmers, by their smell and—yes! he could tell, now, from their clothes—the very men that he and the tod had watched below Caw that morning. In the moment that he recognized them Rowf started and shied away from the wall. As he did so one of the men flung out an arm, pointing towards him and shouting, and the next moment a shower of pellets rattled among the stones beside his head. The quick whizz of a ricochet mingled in his ears with the sound of the shot. Rowf leapt the opposite wall, ran down the meadow, plunged headlong into the Duddon, dragged himself out on the further side and disappeared beyond the alders.

  Monday the 8th November

  The noise of the traffic, rising from the treeless, grassless street below, caused the none-too-clean windows to be kept almost permanently shut, thus removing competition from the clacking of typewriters and the ringing of telephones. Also permanent was the low, whining sound of the air conditioning, which extracted some of the cigarette smoke while mingling the remainder with the intake of motor-exhaust-filled air from outside. The daylight, though entering along two sides of the enormous room, was insufficient to illuminate the labours of those whose desks stood (or “were positioned,” as they themselves would have said) near the centre, so that throughout working hours patches of electric light burned with a steady glare. As in a cage of budgerigars, the place was filled with an incessant, light movement and arhythmic, low chatter—an irritant and disturbance never quite strong enough to become unbearable by the various individuals who contributed to it. Each of these, with his or her name displayed on the desk, occupied an appointed place and used appointed possessions—telephone, blotter and diary; electric lamp, soap, towel, teacup, saucer and lockable drawer; with here and there a photograph and here and there a dusty, spindly Rhoicissus rhomboidea or Hedera helix, part-worn but surviving every bit as doggedly as its owner.

  As a matter of fact—you may be surprised to learn—Dr.
Boycott had had no hand in this place. No, indeed; it was not one of his experiments to discover who could endure what for how long and ascertain in what manner it might affect them. This was, in fact, a part of England where the folk were all as mad as he: it was that admired exemplar of modern working conditions, the open-plan main office of the London Orator, lynch-pin of the Ivorstone Press, a great daily newspaper syndicated, indicated and vindicated all over the world, watchdog of liberty, cat’s cradle of white-collar banality, ram’s horn of soft pornography, crocodile’s tear of current morals, gulf and maw of the ravined salt-sea shark and personal monkey-wrench of Sir Ivor Stone himself. Below, over the main door, the porter of which was R.S.M. O’Rorke, Irish Guards (retired), doyen of the Corps of Commissionaires and arguably the only honest man in the place, were blazoned Sir Ivor’s arms, above his rebus motto, Primus lapidem iaciam. Immediately above projected the elegant bow window of the small conference room, where (refreshed by drinks kept in a cocktail cabinet made to resemble two rows of leather-bound books on shelves) important visitors (for example, those who spent a great deal on advertising in the Orator) were received and the editors and subeditors met to discuss policy among themselves.

  And this, in fact, is what they are doing now, on this fine November morning. Far beyond London, red and yellow beech leaves are pattering into the lake at Blenheim, at Potter Heigham great pike are on the feed and the west wind is blowing sweetly across Lancashire from the Isle of Man, but he who is tired of London is tired of life (though Dr. Johnson might have had second thoughts after a few days with the Orator). Gaze, reader, through the window—at the mock oak-panelled walls, at the portrait, by Annigoni, of Sir Ivor, over the Chair, at the grate-full of cosy living fire of solid smokeless fuel (supplied by Sir Derek Ezra and his merry men), the reference books on the side-table—Who’s Who, Burke, Crockford, Wisden, Vacher’s and the Local Government Directory—the writing desk with headed stationery ready to hand beside the signed photograph of Miss “Comfy” Effingbee, that popular screen actress (who some little time ago opened the building as effortlessly as her legs, while recuperating in England from her third and anticipating her fourth “marriage”), the bell that really works and will summon a real manservant, the wainscot, the pargeted ceiling, the expensive and ugly carpet, the—but hush! There are three men present and one of them is speaking.

  “The thing is,” said Mr. Desmond Simpson (sometimes referred to by his subordinates as “Simpson Agonistes,” on account of his habit of talking round every potential decision until his colleagues were ready to scream), “the thing is, if we put an energetic reporter on to this and make a big thing of it—you know, daily sitreps, ‘Exclusive from the Orator’s man in Cumberland,’ ‘Latest developments,’ ‘Orator invites readers’ views’ and all that; and then the whole thing folds in the middle—you know, fizzles out in some sort of anticlimax and back to square one—then perhaps we lose circulation—”

  “I’ve thought about all that,” replied Mr. Anthony Hogpenny, M.A. Oxon., eighteen stone in a white jacket with carnation button-hole, who was smoking a large cigar with that air of detached and confident superiority that large cigars can so effectively complement, “and I’m convinced the idea’s perfectly viable. We’ve got to send someone with the ingenuity not to let it fold, whichever way it may happen to break.”

  “But suppose a farmer shoots the dog next week, for example?” pursued Mr. Simpson. “Surely that’s bound to be the end of it, and perhaps just when we’ve gone to a lot of trouble and expense building up—”

  “No, no, dear boy,” put in Mr. Quilliam Skillicorn, pink-gin-flushed, epicene and somewhat elderly, once styled by himself “the meteoric Manxman,” but more recently referred to, by the sub-editor of a rival daily, as “the rose-red cissie, half as old as time.” “I mean, just think of the lovely build-up that’s there already. First of all you’ve got the recommendation of the Sablon Committee that more public money ought to be spent on medical research. So after any amount of prodding—far too much of it from their own back-benchers—the Government finally accept the report and give this silly arse place more money. No one has the teeniest idea what the scientists are doing with it up there, and half the amenity organizations in the country hate their guts for starters, simply because they’re in a national park. Then there’s local talk of sheep-killing and apparently the station won’t say a word in reply to questions from farmers and the local press. So after a bit this splendid Ephraim man tries to help, purely out of the kindness of his tiny heart—all events, that’s our line, and anyway what’s wrong with the public image of a good man of business?—and gets himself shot dead, apparently by the horrid dog that escaped—what a story, too!—”

  “Ah, but was it?” interposed Mr. Simpson, his voice squeaky with the pangs of doubt. “Was there a dog involved in the shooting at all?”

  “There were muddy paw-marks and dog’s hairs on the back seat of the car, and Ephraim himself didn’t own a bow-wow. The farmer’s wife says that after the gun went off she heard a dog howling—”

  “But did the dog necessarily do it? I can’t remember any similar case. On the evidence—”

  “Oh, Simpy, and you’re a newspaperman? Can’t you see it doesn’t matter a damn what the dog did? We say it’s evident that there was a dog and by the very act of so saying we put the research fellows on the spot to deny it. They’re sitting on something they don’t want to be forced to say—one can smell that from here, if I’m any judge. Little Eva—the boss—he wants us to discredit Government, right? So that’s what we’re out for. Our line is first, that Government had to be virtually forced to give the station more money, and secondly, that they stood back and let the station waste it; and then the station imperil the local agricultural economy by letting a dangerous dog escape. Now a life’s been lost—well, what, oh, what more could any newspaperman want?”

  “And on top of that,” added Mr. Hogpenny fatly, “there’s all the schmalz we can do about poor little doggies and hoggies and darling catties and ratties—”

  “But that’s inconsistent, Geoffrey,” squeaked Mr. Simpson, “if we’re taking the line that the Research Station ought to be doing their work more efficiently—”

  “Pooh,” answered Mr. Hogpenny, puffing a cloud, “who ever cared a damn about consistency on a national daily? Don’t you remember ‘Miners Deprive Nation of Coal’ and ‘Keep Hungarians out of British Coal Pits’ on two pages of the same issue? It’s emotions that sell popular newspapers, old boy, not logical arguments, as you very well know.”

  “This particular little game’s not really dissimilar from chess, is it?” put in Mr. Skillicorn. “What it comes to is that we feel pretty average sure that if we hopefully position a knight on queen’s bishop’s fifth, we’ll subsequently get some play out of it, even though we can’t see exactly what as of now.” (This was how Mr. Skillicorn often talked—and very much how he wrote too.)

  “But which knight, I wonder?” asked Mr. Hogpenny, after waiting a few moments to see whether Mr. Simpson to peace and contemplation was dismissed, and quiet of mind, all passion spent. “We need a good chap—someone who knows how to seize whatever opportunities may offer themselves.”

  “I’d say Gumm,” suggested Mr. Skillicorn.

  “You mean Digby Driver?” said Mr. Simpson.

  “Well, Driver, Gumm, whatever you like to call him.”

  “Why him?”

  “Well, he’s shown that he’s got a flair for making the public dislike anything or anyone he wants them to. That Coulsen business—there wasn’t really an awful lot in it, you know—especially the minor offenders—but by the time Gumm had finished with them everyone was absolutely howling for their blood and circulation was up quite a bit. Cheap at the price of two suicides, wasn’t it?”

  “Can we spare him?”

  “I think so,” said Mr. Skillicorn, reflecting. “Yes, I don’t see why not. He’s been on ‘English Friends of Amin’ for the past week, but he c
ould perfectly well hand that over to someone else and get up to Cumberland right away. The tooter the sweeter. This afternoon, in fact.”

  “How should I brief him, then, Tony, d’you think?” pursued Mr. Simpson.

  “To stimulate public speculation and interest over the dog and over Ephraim: you know, ‘What is the Sinister Mystery of the Fells?’ ‘Will Killer Dog Strike Again?’ and all that; and to watch for any opportunity that may arise to discredit Animal Research. And any other little larks you can think of, Desmond. But look, I really must be getting on now. I’m supposed to be lunching at the Ivy Leaf with some clean-air civil servant from DoE. I’m thinking of pushing them around a bit over lead in the atmosphere—there’s a fellow at Durham University who’s prepared to say virtually anything we want him to. There’s embarrassment potential there all right.”

  He gulped the last of his whisky and was gone, leaving Mr. Simpson to send for Digby Driver.

  Tuesday the 9th November

  It was full moon, cloudless, and brighter for being a cold night—the coldest of the autumn so far. From the summit of Harter Fell the peaks of the Scafell range, more than four miles away across the upper Esk, rose clearly in the silver light—Great End the killer, Ill Crag and Broad Crag, the Pike itself and the long, southern shoulder of the Slight Side. Peaceful they looked in the moonlight, old stumps of great mountains long ago, worn down by ages of storm, wind and ice. Yet for Rowf, wandering back and forth in the dense, coniferous forest of Harter between Hard Knott and Birker Moor, there was no peace and only such little light as fell between the trees and along the open rides between. The movements of roosting birds, the pattering of water, the cracking of sticks and stirring of branches—all imparted to him, in the near-darkness, those feelings of tension and uncertainty which sentient creatures, from men downwards, have always known on strange ground among thick trees. To these, in his case, were added hunger and fatigue.