Strange how dusk-like it seemed out on the streets, even though it was only late afternoon. It was as if all the city's dust had been shaken into the air to mix with the still lingering sirocco sand, washing the sky a golden red, with the sun a muted fireball above the rooftops. The excited faces of the people who cluttered the streets were sanguine in the glow, belying their frightened mood. Many seemed to be in a state of shock, while others filled pubs and bars, spilling out on to the pavements, as if to celebrate their survival. The city had taken on an air of vibrancy, a mixture of fear and nervous hilarity, as everyone debated the unbelievable. An earthquake had hit London. Already newscasters were playing down the event, explaining to the public (no doubt urged by the appropriate government department to do so) that Great Britain underwent thirty-three earthquakes a year on average, so the event was not as spectacular, or even as unexpected, as one might imagine. Nevertheless, the impact of this one could not be denied-location alone gave cause for the gravest concern. This one had to have had a magnitude of at least 4.1 on the Richter scale, and scored at least 7 on the Modified Mercalli scale, Rivers thought, an assessment he had been unable to verify as yet. All lines to the Met Office were blocked when he had tried to get through earlier, even those special numbers which only the privileged agency members held. That there had been no warnings, no softer seismic disturbances prior to the main tremor, was not that unusual; but it was worrying. The quake itself had lasted only a few minutes and so far there had been no aftershocks. Now he wondered if there would be any at all.
From the damage he had observed as he made his way through the streets, he had been close to the epicentre, just above the focus point, when the earthquake had struck. None of the buildings that he had seen had sustained serious structural damage, although several would require urgent maintenance and many windows would need replacing. Roads were cracked and even buckled, but no holes or chasms had opened up, and he'd heard that a water surge along the Thames had wrecked several small craft. Inevitably public transport and communications had been badly disrupted, with subways and overground railways closed until walls, bridges and tracks had been thoroughly examined and all signalling checked. The traffic light system had been knocked out in a large area of the city by a power cut, further hindering the efforts of the police to clear the snarl-ups.
When Rivers had regained consciousness in his wrecked car he found the woman with the bloodied face slumped against the front passenger seat, the vehicle itself tilted at a crazy angle, almost on its side. The rumbling in the ground had stopped; in fact, everything was unreasonably quiet. He had clambered up the rear seat and pushed open a door.
People were standing around the street, most of them, it seemed, in a kind of daze. Some were weeping-men as well as women-while others just stared in amazement. Then the noise began-shouts, calls, vehicles being started up again, the crunching of shattered glass as people crossed the road. The chatter had become a clamour as people poured from the buildings.
Rivers turned the comer into his own road and breathed a sigh of relief. The long journey through the city had drained him of energy, but without a car and with public transport in chaos there had been no choice but to walk home. The painkillers he always carried had scarcely taken the edge off the ache in his leg, and by now he was limping badly. A red slash of congealed blood across the back of his hand stood proud of the minor cuts he had received the night before; his cheekbone was already turning a purplish-blue from a blow he assumed he had received when he blacked out in his car. His jacket was slung over one shoulder, his shirt sodden with perspiration and he leaned heavily on the cane as he doggedly limped on.
Rivers closed his eyes for an instant in relief when he saw the steps leading up to his home further along the road. Oh for a cool drink and a tepid shower, in that order. But would he have enough strength left to make it up those bloody steps?
He stopped only thirty yards or so away from the front steps, his leg almost giving way under him. Come on, this is ridiculous, he told himself. He hadn't walked miles through the crowded streets in this strength-sapping heat only to be beaten this short distance from his own doorstep. 'Bastard,' he muttered, referring to his leg.
Ahead a car door swung open and someone stepped out. 'Diane?'
She came towards him, unsmiling.
'Are you okay, Jim?'
She wore a white short sleeved blouse and light, pleated skirt. 'What are you doing here?'
'Are you okay? You look terrible.'
'It's been mentioned.' And that had been before the earth tremor.
'You look as though-'
'I've been through an earthquake?'
'Were you hurt?'
'Scraped a little. Nothing serious. Tell me why you're here.'
'Let's get you inside first.'
'Diane, I'm not sure…'
She slid under his arm, grabbing his waist. 'Don't be an idiot. Come on, lean on me and let's get up those steps.'
'At least it's not raining this time.'
She gave a short laugh. 'Storms and earthquakes. We meet in dire circumstances.'
'You sound very English.'
'That's what living with Poggsy and Bibby does for you.'
'And your husband.'
'Yeah, let's not forget him.'
He glanced at her in surprise and saw resignation rather than anger in her expression.
They passed the car she had been sitting in, a battered red Ford with an open sun-roof. 'I thought you travelled by minibus,' he remarked as they reached the steps. He gritted his teeth, ready for the climb.
'We only use that for all the family. On my own it's more economical to use that old thing. You ready?'
He nodded and they began the brief ascent. Rivers suppressed a groan as he used both Diane's shoulder and his stick for support.
'Can you make it?' she asked, trying to take more of his weight than he would allow.
'If we stop I'm done for.'
'A couple more to go.'
'Where's your husband, Diane?'
She ignored the question until they were outside the front door. Rivers leaned against the frame, giving himself time to recover his breath and for the pain to subside a little. 'My physic would tell me this is good for me. She'd probably make me go back down and do it all over again.'
'I know that kind of sadist. I worked as a nurse a short while before I got married. Tony's dead, by the way.'
'Tony?'
'My husband, Poggsy and Bibby's son.'
'I'm sorry.'
She shrugged. 'I am too-a little.'
Rivers looked at her quizzically, but she offered nothing more. He dug into his trouser pocket for his keys. Two locks had to be turned before the door would open.
It was blessedly cool in the hallway and both of them breathed a sigh.
'You own the whole place?'
'Just the ground floor. Basement's empty at the moment and two guys share the top.'
'No more stairs then. Good.'
He swayed unsteadily and Diane was by his side again, a hand clutching his elbow, her body firm against his.
'You really are in bad shape.'
'It comes and goes.' It was said with more levity than he felt. He pointed to a door along the corridor and singled out two more keys on the ring he held. She took them from him and went to the door. He followed and rested against the wall as she inserted first one key, then the other, wondering why she had come all this way to his home. It seemed like Hugo Poggs and his family were not going to let him go so easily. Yet what the hell did they expect from him?
Diane opened the door and stood aside. 'Can I help you?' she asked.
'I'm okay now,' he answered brusquely and went through to the apartment.
She followed without being invited and quickly took in her surroundings. The place was tidy without being fussily so. Filled bookshelves rose on either side of the fireplace; a small-screen wall television set was mounted opposite a wide comfortable-looking sofa; a
n assortment of magazines and newspapers were stacked on a low coffee table; on a long sideboard behind the sofa were framed photographs-two of an elderly couple, another of a youngish family, a man and a woman seated on a garden swing-seat, two boys kneeling on the grass before them, all of them smiling brightly at the camera. The bleakness of the living room's white walls was broken up by three vivid original landscape pastels, all of them easily recognizable as Provence and signed by David Napp. Rivers' hi-fi system was an old-fashioned Bang & Olufsen. The room's drapes were light and too elegantly feminine to have been chosen by Rivers himself. Unless, of course, she had got him entirely wrong.
'Look, I need to get out of these things and into the shower,' Rivers was saying as he turned to her. 'I don't want to be unsociable, but…'
She waved a hand at his unfinished sentence. 'You go ahead and let me mix us both a cool drink. Something with a stiffener in them, yes?'
'Can't any member of your family take a hint?'
She smiled. 'Poggsy has taught me to be thick-skinned. Where's your ice-box-your fridge?'
He nodded towards an open doorway. 'Kitchen's through there. There's vodka, gin, Scotch in the sideboard behind you.'
'Vodka Collins sound good?'
'Yeah. I think I've got the makings. I, er, I've got to be alone for a little while.'
'Don't be embarrassed about plugging in around me. I saw you naked yesterday, remember? I caught sight of the point in your knee. Do those things really work?'
'They ease it, sure. The oscillation somehow settles the nerve endings. Don't ask me how.'
'Don't electrocute yourself. I'll fix the drinks and wait here till you're done, okay? Anything else I can get for you?'
He shook his head. 'Will you answer some questions for me?'
'More? When you're feeling better.' She crouched at the sideboard, pulling open a door. 'In here, you say. Ah, I see it. Vodka. My, you keep well stocked. I'll do plenty of ice for us both, right?' Rivers had already disappeared into the bedroom.
'Right,' Diane said quietly to herself.
'You look better,' Diane said, handing him a tall glass.
Rivers had changed into light chinos and cotton T-shirt. His feet were bare, his hair still shiny wet. He took the drink from her and pulled over a chair from the writing desk by the window. She raised her glass and took a deep swallow. He did the same.
'Tell me why you're here,' he said without preamble.
Diane tucked her legs beneath her on the sofa and leaned against an arm. 'Josh and Eva wanted me to come.'
'Josh and Eva? Why?'
'They knew you were in danger.'
'They saw the earth tremor?'
'Uh-uh. A negative. They just sensed you were in danger.'
Before he could stop himself, Rivers said, 'The light…'
She regarded him curiously. They sensed something was happening to you. Poggsy thought one of us should find out what was wrong, particularly when we couldn't contact you by phone. I was nominated. No, not quite: I nominated myself.'
'But I thought I saw…' He'd said it slowly almost to himself.
'What, Jim, saw what?'
He straightened his shoulders as if reasserting rational thought. 'Nothing. I thought I saw the weird light again, but it was just a mental image, a memory.'
'You're sure of that?'
'I'm not sure of anything. But I know it was like before, in the research plane. Except… except it wasn't real this time.'
'Was it last time?'
He rested the glass on the coffee table. 'That's an odd thing for you to say, especially when your own children claim to have seen it.'
'Oh, I'm not saying the light hasn't been seen. I just wonder if it's actually there.'
'You're not making sense.'
'What if it's a warning, a mystical sign of some kind that's only in the mind. Don't you find it significant that it always precedes a disaster? That's when the children sense it, just before something terrible happens.'
'But today…'
'A tremor, that was all. Not a full-blown earthquake, it wasn't serious enough for a vision.'
'You really think what I saw in the eye of the storm was only a vision?'
'For want of a better word, yes. And the children saw it again today, but it was unclear, unfocused, not like the other time. I think they saw it in your mind when you were in danger.'
'Mental telepathy. Are you serious?'
'You know I am.'
Rivers reached for his drink again.
'Don't be such a cynic, Jim,' Diane urged. 'For once in your life just accept what you hear, believe in the sincerity of others.'
'Oh, I believe you're sincere.'
'Let's not go through the whole debate again. I can't give you any proof, but you know within yourself that something unusual -and that's a pretty mild word-is going on in the world around us. Josh and Eva are part of it, that's all I'm asking you to believe.' She uncurled her legs and leaned towards him. 'And so are you, Jim. So are you.'
12
The ICI-sponsored BBC 24-Hour Television Newsdesk naturally was full of the day's main event: the Great London Earth Tremor (the earlier title of the Great London Earthquake had been revised in later reports). Power lines had been damaged in some parts, quite a few buildings had been left structurally 'unsound', all public and private transport had been seriously disrupted, the River Thames had flooded at its weaker points; yet only four fatalities so far had been reported (one of these being the man that Rivers himself had seen sliced in half by falling glass), although there were many casualties. Rivers flicked through the ten channels, catching another disaster piece on SKY News-a freak hailstorm over Los Angeles had caused multiple collisions on the freeways and many deaths-but had returned to the BBC Newsdesk with its three excited newscasters every few minutes. He smiled as the attractive female of the trio advised that no more disturbances were expected; no doubt a mass exodus of the capital was the last thing the local authorities, with their token-only Civil Defence Corps, wanted to encourage.
Evening had seemed to draw in both early and quickly, no doubt due to the dust and fine sand still in the atmosphere, and if anything, the air was even more sultry than it had been during the day. Voices drifted in through the barred window, many of the street's residents sitting on front steps or on chairs brought to open doorways, a custom of old London that had found a resurgence in these warmer times. The day's big event had enhanced the desire for doorstep gossip.
Rivers switched on a lamp, realizing that he and Diane had been talking in the flickering shadows cast by the TV screen for the past half-hour or so.
'D'you mind if I turn this off now?' he asked, indicating the television.
'It'd be a relief,' she replied, fanning herself with a magazine from the coffee table. 'I think we know all we need to about today's little drama.'
He used the remote control to switch off the set. 'Are you hungry?'
'Famished.'
'I could rustle up something unless you want to eat out.'
'I don't think many restaurants will be busy tonight, but let's eat here anyway.' She flapped the neckline of her blouse. 'Do you mind if I take a shower? I feel sticky all over.'
'Go ahead. There's a spare robe behind the bathroom door.'
'You keep a spare?'
'Occasionally it comes in handy.'
'Can I ring home first, check on the children? Come to think of it, they might be worried about me.'
'The main receiver's in here if you want to use it. Just press P for privacy and it won't come through the external speakers. I'll get into the kitchen.'
'No need.'
'S'okay. I'll be fixing us something quick. You like omelettes?'
'Fine.'
He rose and took the telephone receiver from its unit on the wall. 'Come through when you're finished,' he said, handing her the instrument. 'Have your shower after we've eaten.'
In the refrigerator he found enough eggs for two omelettes a
nd set about whisking them into a pulp, adding some mushrooms and chopped ham for good measure. Diane came in as he was setting the table.
'They saw it happen,' she said.
'The tremor?'
'No. Later. They saw the hailstorm over Los Angeles. They saw the light again.'
He lifted the omelettes from the pan on to the plates. 'Come on, eat,' he said.
She looked at him incredulously. 'That's it? "Come on, eat?" Josh and Eva had another vision, didn't you hear me?'
'Sure I heard. But I'm hungry. You are too.'
She sat at the table. 'We're not getting through to you, are we?' About to return the pan to the stove, he paused. 'The truth is, you might be. What you just said didn't surprise me, that's all. Maybe I'm getting used to the idea.'
'At last.'
'I said maybe. Tell me about your call.'
She picked up a fork and hived off a portion of omelette. 'Mm, not bad,' she said after her first taste. 'You're obviously used to coping for yourself.'
'Years of practice. The kids-what happened?'
'I spoke to Bibby. She was quite anxious about us both. Apparently the first reports of the tremor were wildly exaggerated. She calmed down soon enough when I told her the damage was pretty limited. She was really concerned though when she heard you'd been in the thick of it.'
He joined her at the table, sitting opposite.
'Josh and Eva went into one of their trances-well, not a trance exactly. They just stop what they're doing and become very still and quiet. You'd think they were listening for something if you saw them-their eyes look to one side, never straight ahead, you know, like when you hear something but aren't quite sure of its source? After a while they close their eyes.'
Rivers began to eat, but scarcely tasted the food.
'Sometimes they've "gone" for a few minutes,' Diane continued, 'other times just a few seconds. Today was a quick one. They saw the little light and then what they described as big rocks falling from the sky, killing or hurting anybody they struck.'