Blood Worm

7

Guy had offered to drive Tony to hospital himself, but Mary insisted so vehemently that it was her responsibility, and her face had become so drawn, so intense, that he dared not contradict her for fear of how she might react. Besides, having something practical to do might be the best thing for her, he thought.

They were ail on edge, every one of them. Tessa from the Gazette was actually trembling as she tried dutifully to write down the main points in her notebook, getting on Guy’s nerves with her questions. Only Tony himself seemed absolutely calm as he patiently allowed Mary to plug both ends of his wound with lint from the first-aid box in her car. When she had finished, he nodded and got into the passenger seat without accepting help from anybody.

‘Guy, I’ll call you later in the day,’ Mary said with a quiet urgency before she drove off. ‘Will you be in your office?’

‘Mostly.’

He needed to think it all through, he felt, as he stood watching her car slowing down at the end of the road and seeming to pause for a few seconds before slotting itself into the main stream of traffic. He needed to look at the facts again, including this latest incident, if only to work out why each encounter with these insects left him with such a strong sense of foreboding.

Tessa put her finger on it when she asked, ‘Other insects feed on humans, don’t they? Yet we don’t feel half so scared of them. It’s spooky.’

She was right, too. These were different.

Stooping, Guy picked up the beam section he and Tony had gone through so much trouble to obtain. Balancing it upright on one end, he considered for a moment stowing it in his car boot in case they could Seam something more from it. Christ, as if they hadn’t learned enough already! The way that worm had bored through Tony’s hand was something he’d never forget, not as long as he lived.

Yet…

He hesitated. Taking the timber with him would mean cutting it in half to get it into the boot, which was a prospect he didn’t welcome. God knew how many other worms were hidden inside. Nor did he like the thought of taking them anywhere near Dorothea or Kath.

Impulsively he carried it over to the ruined building and tossed it into the rubble. ‘Best place for that!’ he declared. ‘Could be full of woodworms.’

‘Bloodworms,’ Tessa said.

Her thin lips twisted into a weak smile, then she made some more notes.

‘Hell!’ he exploded at her. ‘D’you have to write everything down?’

Parking close to his own house proved impossible, as usual, but eventually he found a space at the far end of the road, reversed into it, then got out, locked the car and began to walk back. To judge from the pointed glances he received from passers-by he must have looked a bit of a scarecrow.

Dorothea thought so too when she saw him.

‘You back? What happened — did they sack you?’ She sounded amused rather than concerned. ‘And bloody hell, your clothes! Guy, have you been mugged or what?’ Briefly he explained about the collapsed building and how they had needed a sample of the timber for tests. Then he told her what the worm had done to Tony’s hand.

‘So you had to climb down there!’ she exclaimed, disgusted. ‘Guy, you might have been killed!’

Yet a look of understanding crossed her face as she went to him and there was a glint of interest in her eyes which he hadn’t seen for years. ‘But you knew that, you bastard,’ she went on, her voice softening. ‘You bloody knew it. You’re still the crazy boy I married, aren’t you?’ She leaned forward to kiss him and he felt the tip of her tongue darting rapidly across his, though before he could respond she’d pulled away again and begun to brush the dust off her dark blue suit.

‘Oh, look at my skirt! This is muck off your clothes. You’re quite hopeless, Guy. You should’ve stayed in the Army instead of selling adding machines, or whatever it is you do. An eternal boy scout, that’s you!’

‘Why are you al! dressed up?’ he asked, noticing that she was wearing the new suit they had bought together on a shopping spree only a few weeks earlier.

‘Temp job, phoned through this morning. Managing director in the City. One of his secretaries was in a traffic accident so they want someone right away.’

That must be why she was in such a good mood, he thought, She’d nagged for years about buying a house of their own, but she was only really happy when she could get out of it.

‘I must go,’ she said in a rush, ‘but have a look at the front _room first. Tell me what you think. Though don't get too close to the wall; I don’t want your dirt on the fresh paint.’

All the woodwork was jet black, the end walls a deep green and the two longer walls a light rusty colour. The room, though empty of furniture, seemed dark and forbidding. Guy made some complimentary noises, but then said:

‘Kath’s in school, I suppose?’

‘Where else?’

‘Did she mention beetles to you?’

‘What beetles? Oh, Guy, can’t you get your mind off beetles?’

‘She said something about one of the classes keeping two beetles in a jar. We should get in touch with the school and check up on it. You know her teachers, I don’t, so I wondered if you…’

‘Not this morning. I’m off to work.’ Dorothea went back into the hall and examined herself in the mirror. ‘You’ll have to do it, Guy, if you’ve so much time. Never been to her school, have you? Now’s your chance.’

She picked up her handbag, opened it to check that she had everything, offered Guy a quick peck on the cheek and went.

Guy felt unaccountably hungry. He glanced into the kitchen but Dorothea had obviously not yet been shopping that morning. No eggs even. She and her helpers must have used up the last few the night before, after finishing the painting, and the bacon with them. He made himself a round of bread and marmalade to eat while he was changing.

Upstairs, he stripped everything off and stood under the shower for a couple of minutes to wash the dust out of Ins hair. Plenty of old woodwork in these houses too, he thought as the hot water streamed down over his body; of course they’d had a full report from the surveyors but…

But.

That was the problem. The workshop owners had taken that precaution too. Where had it left them?

While he was dressing he put a call through to his office to warn his secretary that it might be noon or later before he could get to the office.

‘Mr Rawnsley phoned again,’ she informed him, slightly offhand. He heard a whisper in the background; he’d probably caught her gossiping again with the girl from the next office. ‘He says he’s sorry but he can’t make it tomorrow. Could you lunch with him today by any chance? I said I’d ring him back.’

‘Damn.’ That was the third time Rawnsley had cancelled, but it could be an important order if they got it.

‘I’ve checked your diary. You’ve nothing else written in A sotto voice See you later told him her visitor had left.

‘Same time, same place, I suppose? You’d better tell him it’s all right. Say I’m looking forward to it. Oh, and Sarah—’

‘Yes?’

‘Be nice to him.’

‘Aren’t I always?’ she laughed. ‘But he is a bit of a creep, you must admit.’

A creep with the power to channel a six-figure commission in their direction, Guy recalled as he replaced the receiver. Half a million at least.

He searched the telephone book for Kath’s school, intending to warn the head before going along, but he must have mistaken the name because he couldn’t find it. It was not a name they ever used. Both Kath and Dorothea — who had taken her along there when they moved into the district — simply referred to the place as school. He considered trying directory enquiries but decided it would be quicker just to drive there. Before leaving his house, he searched the kitchen cupboards for a container of some kind. The best he could find was a small, empty biscuit tin, which he slipped into his briefcase.

The school was a huddle of single-Storey inter-linked, brick buildings with large windows and flat roofs on which the most distinguishable features were the squat water tanks. Around it was a generous playground area with one section set aside for the teachers’ cars; all the marked-out spaces were occupied. Guy parked near the main entrance and went in search of the head’s office.

Beside a glass-paned hatch marked Reception he found a bell-push, which he pressed. The glass was frosted but he could see someone moving about inside; yet two or three minutes passed before the hatch slid open. The woman behind it held a clutch of forms in her hand and could hardly spare a moment to glance up from the file she was checking. When Guy asked to see the head, she pushed a strand of greying hair back from her face and sighed.

‘Parent, are you? He’s not meeting parents till four o’clock. Didn’t you read the circular?’

Guy decided that being a parent was not the best idea.

‘I’m here on behalf of the Public Health Department,’ he lied cheerfully. It was not such a big lie either. He was doing Mary’s work for her as he hadn’t managed to tell her about the beetles that morning. ‘We’ve had information about a couple of beetles being kept in one of your classrooms.’

‘That’ll be Miss Tumstall. Regular zoo, that classroom. Is there something wrong?’

‘I’d just like to see them, that’s all,’ he said almost apologetically. ‘No, I don’t imagine there’s anything wrong, but we have to check.’

‘Well, the head’s busy and I’m up to my eyes, but if you can find your own way to the classroom…. Second corridor on your right, third door along.’

‘Thanks.’

Schools were a strange world of their own, he thought as he counted the doors, and quite unlike anything outside. Even the sounds were different — that unceasing concert of chattering voices in the background, the whispers, the mock groans and stifled laughter, the chairs scraping over wood-block floors, the teachers’ persistent questions and the mumbled answers… He hadn’t really once been part of that life himself, had he? And the smell: why did schools always have a special smell?

He found the right door and was about to open it when from inside he heard a class of very young children — perhaps no older than six or seven years of age — beginning to chant an old nursery rhyme which he recognised. He stopped abruptly to listen.

Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home,

Your house is on fire, your children are gone,

All but the little one under a stone,

Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home.

They spoke the last line very softly. Through a glass panel in the door he could see the young teacher conducting them, mouthing the words with them. When they had finished they sat wide-eyed and silent.

The teacher broke the silence. ‘And we can imagine the little baby ladybird hiding under the stone,’ she was telling them as Guy went into the room. ‘But that’s just a story because ladybirds are really beetles, lovely tiny beetles, and what does that mean?’ A scattering of hands went up. ‘Yes, Joan?’

‘Beetles don’t have babies like we do,’ Joan said promptly. ‘They lay eggs, and the e^s grow into worms… and..

"And what happens then?’ But she noticed Guy. ‘Oh, we’ve a visitor!’

‘Miss Tumstall? Fin Guy Archer from the Public Health Department. I believe you’re keeping a couple of unusually large beetles here in a jar.’

‘Yes, d’you want to see them?'' She seemed surprised. ‘Just a minute, 111 tell the children. They’ll be very excited.’

Guy watched her as she talked to the class. She was very lively and obviously gifted with the ability to infect them with her own enthusiasm. Her face was full of expression: rather narrow but with high cheek-bones, big brown eyes and a nose that was slighdy prominent, though not too much; he could easily imagine her starring in some major historical film. She was certainly beautiful enough. He found himself speculating— there in the classroom — what she would look like if she left that rich brown hair free instead of keeping it combed back into a tail held in place by an ordinary rubber band.

‘Now, who 'is going to escort Mr Archer round our menagerie?’

A scattering of hands went up. ‘Lise! Lise, me!’

‘Joan, then. Because it was Joan who found the beetles, wasn’t it?’

The little girl, very self-conscious, led Guy to the rear of the classroom, where several hutches were displayed along a wide shelf. ‘ ’Course, we don’t always keep ’em in here,’ she informed Guy. ‘We take ’em out sometimes. That’s our gerbil. We call him Joe.’

In the hutches were one gerbil and two rabbits, all seemingly contented with their lot. Next along the shelf was a large glass sweet-jar of the kind shops use. It contained some pebbles, sand and fragments of wood, together with a fresh cabbage leaf and two motionless objects which looked like coloured stones: beetles.

‘Giant ladybirds,’ Joan said. ‘ ’Course we only call ’em that. We’re not sure.’

Guy experienced that familiar tightening of Ms stomach muscles as he bent down to inspect them through the glass. The dark green spots against a hard pink background were immediately recognisable, though it was true they had no antlers nor the usual yellow patches.

‘We’re not certain what to feed them on, if anything at all,’ Lise explained cheerfully, and loud enough for the class to hear. ‘I’ve checked in the books. It seems some beetles do eat and others don’t.’

‘Did you manage to find this variety in your books?’ ‘No, ’fraid not,’ she admitted. ‘D’you know what they are? We think they’re a bit like big ladybirds because of the spots, but they could be scarabs, from the pictures. I don’t really know much about these things.’

‘You didn’t see the public health poster?’

‘Yes, but these are quite different!’ she exclaimed. ‘For one thing, where are the antlers?’

He shook his head. That colouring was too similar to that of the beetles on Mary’s desk for him to be happy leaving them there with all the children around. Kath, too, was probably in one of the other classrooms along the corridor. It would be stupid to take such a risk.

i’m sorry, I must take them away to be checked, Miss Turnstall,’ he told her, trying not to sound too brutal about it.

‘Lise,’ she said. ‘All the children call me Lise. Can you bring them back if they’re harmless?’ i’ll do my very best,’ he promised, meaning it. Turning to the class, Lise announced the sad news that their pet beetles were being ‘taken into custody’, as she pot it. ‘But Guy here seems such a nice man,’ she added, her eyes challenging him, i’m sure he’ll look after them, won’t you, Guy? And next time he comes here he’ll be able to tell us what they’re called.’

‘Yes, I hope to do that.’ Seeking all their expectant faces before him, he felt some more reassurance was necessary. ‘So will you lend them to me? Please?’

It was decided he should keep them in their jar rather than attempt to transfer them into the biscuit tin he had brought in his briefcase. The metal screw-top closed it securely, though Lise explained that she had punched some air-holes in it. She came out into the corridor with him.

i’m trying to foster a love of nature in these town children, and some respect for the world we live in,’ she told him, keeping her voice down, i don’t want them frightened.’

‘Nor do I, but there’s no harm in taking precautions. You said it was Joan who found the beetles. D’you know where?’

‘At home, I think she said. Her parents have a music shop. You probably know it. They specialise in reggae, highlife, that sort of thing.’ in Worth Road, on a comer?’

'That’s the one.’

‘Lise, could you ask her again when it’s convenient? And then ring the Public Health Department. Ask for Mary Armstrong. This is serious, you know.’

‘Even without antlers?’ she started to argue, but at that moment the bell rang and she had to hurry back into the classroom.

Guy made his escape from the school, dodging through the shoals of animated children who were pouring out into the corridors. Reaching his car, he laid the glass jar carefully on its side on the passenger seat, threw his briefcase into the back and drove slowly out of the playground.

His first stop was Worth Hall, where this time he found a woman on duty at the reception desk. Miss Armstrong was out, she told him, but she directed him to a room in the basement. There he handed over the jar to a young man in a white lab coat, who also lent him a memo pad on which he scribbled a quick note to Mary.

‘Those beetles could be highly dangerous,’ Guy warned before he left.

The young man tipped the jar sideways to examine them more closely. ‘Similar colouring,’ he observed, ‘but no antlers. Could be females.’

‘Glad I brought them in then,’ Guy answered. Bloody hell, he thought, why hadn’t he considered that? ‘Could you tell Mary I’ll call her later this afternoon in case there’s anything more.’

On leaving Worth Hall he drove directly to the office. It was shortly after eleven and with any luck he’d manage to get some of his correspondence cleared before he went out for his appointment with Rawnsley. First, however, he rang Hatchards to ask what books they had about beetles; something he should have done weeks ago.

Hazel Roberts stood outside the fishmonger’s and pondered. Nothing on offer was cheap, but then she hadn’t expected it to be, not in this West End shop, which catered mainly for top restaurants and directors’ dining rooms; even for younger royalty, she’d heard it said. The trouble was, she’d hunted ail over and this was the first place she’d found with fresh lobster and she had wanted to give Jim a treat. Since their holidays in Cornwall, lobster with mayonnaise was one of his favourites.

But it was so terribly expensive.

Even lying there on that marble slab it exuded an air of expense-account luxury, she thought; an aura of success — maybe because of those horrible claws, which looked so much more dangerous once they were boiled that bright red. Straight out of the sea — she remembered from Pol-perro harbour — they had seemed to her eyes rather pathetic.

She moved away, uncertain whether she should really spend so much money, though with Jim coming home for a late lunch she had to make up her mind quickly. His interview for the new job — branch manager at Swift’s (Everything You Need Under One Roof) — started at three-thirty and she was determined he should go there feeling he could win.

But perhaps lobster was not the right choice, not at that price. Once he actually got the job, yes. Then they’d have something to celebrate.

Not for lunch today, though, she decided regretfully.

No, she’d buy a nice piece of steak instead. There was a good butcher’s a couple of shops along the same road; she'd pop in there.

By herself, she thought as she waited to be served, lunch was a meal she never bothered about. She might do an egg if she was hungry but mostly a sandwich was all she needed; or a Danish pastry when she was flush. Once on her birthday she’d really indulged herself and bought a great doorstep of Black Forest gateau with extra whipped cream. She’' regretted it afterwards, though; the cream had been a bit off.

‘Nice bit o’ rump!’ the butcher exclaimed, placing the meat in front of him and picking up his knife.

He cut the steak lovingly and she noticed how red his strong hands seemed, matching the meat itself. He was a big, jovial mas with a long, drooping moustache, quite different from Jim, who was short and wiry, Ml of nervous energy.

‘That do you, love?’ the butcher asked, transferring the steak to the scale. ‘Don’t overcook it, mind, or you’re wastin’ your money. Keep it a nice pink inside.’

She hoped it was right. Jim always seemed so much more confident once he had a good meal inside Mm; he was funny that way, quite unlike her. She usually couldn’t care less one way or the other. But he’d been a bit down recently and he needed that job. 'It would suit him, quite apart from the extra money — and she wouldn’t say no to that.

At home she left the steak on the kitchen table, still wrapped in its paper, while she got on with scraping the new potatoes which he preferred to chips these days, specially since reading that article on cholesterol. What if she was making a fuss of him? Didn’t he make a fuss of her too? Her friends said they overdid it and they’d change when they had children, but she knew she couldn’t have children; you have to play the cards you’re dealt, don’t you?

Anyway, those seven years she’d been married had been the best she’d ever known, whatever other people said, Jim was easy to get on with; in fact they suited each other, unlike some of the girls she’d shared a flat with before. As for jobs, he didn’t mind whether she worked or not; she might even find another some day. She’d had a whole string of different jobs in her rime and ended up hating every one of them,

‘Sight, now what’s next?’ she asked herself after setting the table. ‘Mustard, salt, bread, butter…’

The potatoes were already boiling, but she’d not start grilling the steak till he got home. She could get everything ready, though.

Unlike her own local butcher, who usually put his customers’ meat into little plastic bags which he sealed to prevent the juices spilling out, the jovial man with the drooping moustache prided himself on more traditional methods. Already as she removed the outer wrappings she noticed stains where the blood was seeping through. Jim was going to enjoy this, she felt sure. Come to that, so was she. Sharing a meal with Jim was always so much better than eating alone.

Among the folds of paper something moved.

Hazel blinked, wondering if she was imagining things.

Then she saw it again: a definite movement. A mouse? Oh, God, no! Don’t say they had mice!

Yet…

It was a nasty pink creature with yellow and dark green spots which crawled out from the grease-proof paper around the meat. She shuddered at the sight of it. Growing out of either side of its head were lobster-like claws, and for a second or two she was convinced it must somehow have come from the fishmonger’s slab, from among the crayfish and prawns, the lobsters and crabs, the mussels and oysters and cockles and squid and..

But alive? Urgbl

No, that wasn’t possible. She stared with growing horror at how it seemed to be tearing obscenely at a comer of blood-red steak, squatting over part of it as the claws went to work. Then another of the creatures appeared out of the crumpled wrapping paper, joining the first.

She bit her lip, not knowing what to do, undecided whether to risk trying to snatch the meat away from them. Squash them, she thought in a panic, that’s the best thing. Reaching into the cupboard, she found her roiling pin and was poised to bring it down hard on the nearest one when she noticed more.

Her kitchen table was always kept pushed up hard against the wall immediately beneath the window. On. the ledge, scrambling busily among the flower pots, were several of these creatures — whatever they were — and even as she watched, two of them dropped down on to the table, scurrying over towards the meat.

The sight made her suddenly furious. After all the trouble she took to keep her kitchen absolutely spodess, and then to find it crawling with these horrid things! Well, they weren’t going to rain that steak, whatever else they touched.!

She grabbed it, intending to wash it under the tap and cut off the bits they had spoiled, but one of the beetles turned on her, slicing through the loose skin between her thumb and hand.

‘Oh hellV she swore at the quick stab of pain. ‘Bloody hell and—’

Ignoring the sharp pain, she took a grip on the beetle with her other hand and tugged it off, throwing it to the floor and stamping on it, but accidentally dropping the meat at the same time. From the wound the blood welled out, dripping down on to her skirt and shoes. She could have cried; she’d wanted to make it so nice for Jim before he went off for his interview.

Bending down to retrieve the steak she discovered more beetles crawling over her shoes, attracted by the blood, but even at that point she felt more angry than scared. She attempted to brush them away but they clung to her tenaciously, their nippers cutting through the nylon into the top of her foot.

God, they hurt!

She picked them off one by one, tugging them clear, but others came to take their place. Then she sensed something drop on to the back of her neck; fearfully she reached up to check and discovered two more on her forearm. They began probing her flabby flesh.

‘Oh, Jesus, I’ve got to stay calm!’ she whispered, forcing herself to flick them away from her arm. ‘I know I’ve got to stay calm… mustn’t panic…’

The beetle on her neck was now edging its way around her collar-bone towards the front, then heading upwards till its sharp claws lightly touched the base of her throat, nipping casually at the skin. A second one joined it, aiming along her jaw-line… passing her ear…

Her nerve broke. She screamed: a high-pitched, insane scream, and she couldn’t stop.

Those pincer claws dug into the lobe of her ear, while the beetle at her throat continued merely to explore, and yet another came jumping at her from out of nowhere, landing just above the cleavage of her breasts in the V-neck of her knitted jumper. The more she longed to brush them away, the deeper they dug into her, till she was on her knees begging them to leave her alone, to, let her live.

She felt so helpless… so useless… her screams were no more now than pathetic whimpers.

All over the floor they were scrambling towards her, hundreds of them emerging from every comer of the skirting board, swarming over her raw, bleeding ankles, biting through her tights into her calves, into the soft patches behind her knees, probing higher beneath her pleated skirt.

Over her hands too, jabbing their claws into the bulging veins and arteries of her wrists… climbing up her naked forearms… under her short sleeves… making their quick, neat incisions like razor-slashes in her neck…

Feeding on her, her mind told her. They were simply feeding on her and she couldn’t prevent it happening] Her strength had simply ebbed away.. her will-power gone… even her voice, save for one last strangled., choking yell of agony as & beetle penetrated her open rnouth and set to work on her tongue.

Oh Jim, she thought.

Though he seemed so far away now. Jim.

Five minutes later Jim Roberts arrived home, letting himself in. ‘Hazel, I’m back!’ he called out, hanging up his coat in the hall.

Then he went into the kitchen.

At three-thirty that afternoon the managing director’s secretary at Swift’s Retail Holdings PLC slipped discreetly into the boardroom where the interviews for the post of branch manager were being held. As Mr Roberts had not turned up, she whispered in his ear, would it be in order for her to send in the next candidate?

Rawnsley had come up trumps. During lunch at his Pall Mall club — selecting an old mellow claret of rare vintage to accompany the tender venison — he announced that his board had voted in favour of going ahead with the plan to scrap their existing system of computerised stock control and invest in the new generation technology. Guy returned to his office feeling more than pleased with himself. To provide the full range of hardware and tailor-made software for a major national motor maintenance chain could put his own company firmly into profit for the current year. This time the scheme felt right too, and that was important. Once — while still in the Army — he’d been allocated the task of escorting one of Australia’s self-made millionaires on a Ministry of Defence PR exercise to demonstrate their management training operations, which was the military’s latest fad. ‘Success in business?’ the Australian had drawled. ‘First, know what you’re talking about — that’s ten per cent. Next, use your head. Judgement — that’s another ten per cent. For the rest, gut feeling. Hunch. An’ you can’t teach hunch.’ Guy’s bunch was that this deal would work out just right.

‘I’ve put a message on your desk,’ Sarah greeted him when he walked through the door. ‘Seems to be urgent.’ ‘Who from?’ he asked.

She gave him one of her quizzical smiles. ‘Miss Armstrong again. Could you meet her this afternoon? She gave an address. Said it was urgent, but it was over an hour ago when she phoned.’

Guy glanced at his watch. It was already past four o’clock. On his blotter was the tom-off sheet from the message pad with the address in Sarah’s handwriting. His in-tray was piled high with the paperwork he should try to get through before the end of the day, and his managing director would want to know about the Rawnsley deal.

‘Did Miss Armstrong say anything else? Any details?’ ‘Nothing.’ Sarah thought back, frowning. ‘Except something about two more. There are two more. But then she said no, just give you the address.’

‘Bloody hell!’ She must mean two more people killed,

but by what? They now knew both the beetles and their larvae were equally deadly. ‘Look, Sarah, can you check this address in your A to Z while I find out if Mrs Lee can spare me five minutes?’

‘Think she’s out,’ Sarah told him, taking the paper. Guy tried her number on the intercom and got her secretary. It seemed that Mrs May Lee, the company’s managing director, had gone to Cambridge and was not expected back that afternoon. At least that got one problem out of the way, though he felt a pang of disappointment; after his big disaster earlier in the year he’d been looking forward to reporting this little triumph.

‘The road is not far from where you live,’ Sarah said, coming back into his office with the open book in her hand. She showed it to him. ‘Worth Road.. turn into Egerton Street… then left, and left again.’

‘They’re all clustered around the same district.’ The thought had suddenly struck him that none of the known incidents so far had been very far from the old school. ‘All within about a mile radius.’

‘I’ve not the slightest idea what you’re talking about,’ she retorted. ‘What’s the big mystery?’

‘Beetles.’

‘You mean the kind that—’ She pointed to his face. ‘Urgh, hope I never meet any.’

‘Sarah, so do I.’

He would have to return afterwards to clear the stuff in his in-tray even if it meant working through the evening, he decided. At Sarah’s insistence he delayed long enough to sign four or five letters that had to get into the post; then, apologising to her for having to rush off once more, he headed for the door.

‘Don’t get yourself all chewed up again, will you?’ she said lightly as he went out.

Her words stayed with him as he drove, cursing the traffic. She was right about the address being close to where he lived; in fact, it was no more than a few streets away, and under those circumstances he knew he would never have been abie to concentrate at his desk. Probably by this time Kath would be home, and the thought of her playing alone in the house worried him. Before returning to the office later he’d have to drop in to see how she was, because he doubted if Dorothea would be back.

Following Sarah’s instructions, he found the street without difficulty. People were standing about on the pavement in uneasy little groups, obviously curious about what was going on. A pest-control van was parked in front of number 20, which was one of the terrace of small Victorian villas. Nearby were two police cars.

The house door was open, but when Guy tried to go in, he was stopped by a uniformed policewoman.

‘D’you live in this house? she questioned him.

‘My name is Guy Archer,’ he told her. As he spoke he realised he’d slipped into his old authoritative military manner again, a habit he’d been struggling to lose. Softening his tone, he continued: ‘Miss Armstrong of the Public Health Department asked me to be here.’

‘Wait outside, I’ll check.’ Unsmiling, she disappeared briefly into the house, returning almost right away. ‘Miss Armstrong will come out.’

She looked very young and attractive in her uniform. He was tempted to ask her about the two casualties, if only to get her talking, but one glance at her set face was sufficient to inhibit him.

Mary did not keep him waiting. ‘Oh, Guy, am I glad you’re here!’ she exclaimed as she came out of the house. The WPG stood to one side to let her pass. ‘This is an awful mess, much worse than we feared. The whole ground floor is badly infested with beetles. We must have killed hundreds already. The men are still spraying.’ ‘What did you mean on the phone by “two more”?’ ‘That was your secretary, was it, who took the message? I didn’t want to upset her. Mary frowned, clearly worried. ‘It was a Mr and Mrs Roberts. Apparently Mr Roberts’ sister had a key and let herself in when they didn’t answer the bell. She found them in the kitchen. Dead, of course. Beetles crawling all over them.’

‘And worms?’ he demanded.

His mouth tasted stale as he suddenly visualised him self back in that old school with the beetles exploring his face and penetrating under his clothes; and then he saw the dead tramp again with those giant creatures feeding on him obscenely..

‘No,’ she answered very definitely. ‘No maggots, no worms, whatever you care to call them. Unless they’re buried in the woodwork somewhere. Beetles are bad enough by themselves. Guy, you should have seen those poor people. The sight would scare anybody. I wanted to run out of the house screaming; but of course I couldn’t, could I?’

She was confessing to him, he realised. Her hand was on his arm and she was standing very close to him, as though afraid of being overheard.

‘1 can tell you, because you’ve experienced it as well, that same fear,’ she went on. ‘Evan doesn’t understand, though he tries. He thinks being bitten by insects is merely unpleasant and nothing else, but when you know you can’t escape from them, there are so many, and they’re overwhelming you, and there’s nothing you can do to.. ’

'Mary, get a grip on yourself,’ he said quietly. ‘Calm down now.’

‘Don’t worry, I didn’t let the side down.’ Her voice had hardened. ‘Not this time. But seeing those people dead in there brought it all back. I’m not normally like this.’

‘Tell me, was there any smell from the beetles this time? he asked. ‘That poison gas they seem to use?’

‘Oh yes, that too. Which didn’t help.’

‘I still wonder if that doesn’t have an effect on the nerves,’ he suggested. ‘We talked about this before.’

She shook her head. ‘Guy, I’m rather ashamed of being a coward. It’s something I never knew about myself before and it’s not easy to live with.’

He made another attempt to reassure her, but she refused to listen to any excuses. Instead, she changed the subject and began to explain how she had sent the two beetles in the jar to an entomologist friend at Oxford; he already had three or four antlered specimens, she said, and if there was anything in Guy’s theory about the defensive gas, he was the man to find out. While she talked, Guy stared at the house where the Robertses had died, irritated that there seemed to be nothing he could do. He interrupted her at one point to ask if he might take a look inside, but she told him he’d only be in the men’s way, which was probably true.

‘By the way. I’ve some news for you, Guy,’ she added. ‘Tony is going to be all right, though they’re keeping him in hospital overnight, apparently. And Evan — Detective-Sergeant Evans — has been talking to the pathologist doing the post-mortem on that security guard who died at the workshop. They say he bled to death. ‘I saw no blood on the ground.’

‘Nor did the constable who found him. As though something had sucked him dry — those are the words he used. It ties up with the tramp and the dog.’

From the house came the voices of the pest-control men, and a second later ‘two of them appeared at the front door carrying some of their equipment. One was a lanky, youngish man in stained white overalls and he seemed to be in charge. He came over to tell Mary that they had done all they could for the time being, but they would be back in a day or so to see how effective the treatment had been.

‘Nasty little brutes, aren’t they?’ he commented cheerfully, removing the face-mask which had been hanging loosely around his neck. ‘Nearly took a bit out o’ my finger, one o’ them, only I had my gloves on. But he’ll not try that again. I broke him in half.’

‘Downstairs, were they?’ Guy enquired curiously.

‘Odd that,’ the young man agreed. ‘Usually wood-borers get established in the loft. In the rafters. The grubs can live there in the timber for years before you know you’ve got ’em. Not these buggers, though. Couldn’t find any trace of anything under the roof. Come from beneath the floorboards, these have, an’ behind the skirting. Still, you live an’ learn!’

Two more men came out of the house and began loading the gear into the van.

‘Hey! One of the neighbours detached himself from the group a few yards up the street and came striding towards them. ‘Hey, you’re not packing it in, are you? What about the other houses?

Guy had noticed him before. He'd driven up in a sleek BMW, which glinted ostentatiously in the pale sunshine, like something out of a commercial. He was a tough-looking character in jeans and a brown leather jacket; probably he’d been in more than a few brawls too, judging from his face and hefty fists.

‘Know nothing about any other houses,’ the young pest-control man said. ‘We was told only this address.’ ‘Look, mate. I don’t care what they told you. I want my house checked same as this one.’ He blocked the pavement in front of the van, refusing to let the men pass. ‘At least have a dekko, for Chrissake! I’ve got my kids living there. How would you feel?’

‘Yeah, he’s right!’ The other neighbours had joined him and were crowding around. ‘You can’t jus’ quit like that, not without doin’ somethin’.’

‘I do what the office tells me.’ The young man was defending himself. ‘You book with them if you want your houses done,'

‘You’re not Moody leaving here till you do have a look,’ the brown-jacketed tough threatened.

The young man turned to Mary in despair, it’s more than my job’s worth,’

‘To spare five minutes?’ The policewoman came across to find out what was going on, and he turned to her, ‘Look, miss. We know what you’ve been up to in that house, an’ we want our places given the once-over while these blokes are here.’It’s not too much to ask, is it?’ Mary cut in before the policewoman had a chance to reply. ‘Where d’you live?’ she demanded.

‘Me? Nest door. Number 18.’

‘We can at least carry out a quick inspection, can’t we?’ she pleaded with the young man. Til sign your worksheet and take responsibility.’ i’ll have to ring the office first,’ he said grudgingly. ‘Do it from my house then,’ the worried tough told him, only slightly mollified. ‘But get a move on. Kids an’ the missus are over at her sister’s, but I’ll have to fetch’em any minute.’

With an apologetic glance in Guy’s direction Mary followed the two men into number 18.

The dead couple’s front door was still open, though the WPG had left to go into a huddle of consultation with two of her colleagues near a panda car. Guy seized the opportunity to slip inside. In the narrow hall the pungent smell of insecticide irritated his nostrils, making him sneeze. The carpets had been turned back and in several places sections of floorboards removed. In the kitchen — where the bodies had been discovered — the cupboards and all the floor-tiles had been ripped out to reveal the joists underneath. Even without stooping Guy identified the powdery frass around the flight holes.

Dead beetles lay near the bottoms of the walls, on the draining board, in the sink, around the fridge, on the window ledge…

‘Bit of a mess, don’t you think? Bit of a bloody mess?’ The detective-constable had come up behind him, walking lightly. Guy recognised him from the hospital: a thin, slightly angular face and a receding hairline.

‘Mr McNair, is it?’

‘That’s right, sir. I noticed you coming in here.’

When he returned to the street the pest-control men were preparing to start on number 18. Mary was chatting to the tough; he was eating out of her hand, Guy noticed. He pointed to Guy’s scars.

‘Do that, did they?’ came the inevitable question. ‘Can’t understand why something wasn’t done then, right away, instead o’ waiting all these weeks.’

The young foreman had armed himself with a crowbar. He would start, he informed them, by taking a general look at the woodwork in the kitchen and removing any skirting boards; meanwhile, everyone else should stand back to gi ve him and his assistant plenty of room.

‘This isn’t your ordinary woodworm, or your death-watch beetle,’ he warned them, undisguisedly nervous. ‘It’s a kind I’ve not come across before, but what they did to those two people next door doesn’t bear thinking of. All I hope is that they haven’t spread into this house.’

At first it seemed as though number 18 was free of them after all. Two of his men carried out the kitchen table and chairs, stacking them up in the garden. Then they moved the fridge out of the way to allow him to examine the full length of the wall at the point where it met the composition-tiled floor. Behind him stood his assistant with the spray, ready for action the moment they spotted anything moving.

Using the crowbar, he began to ease the skirting board away from the wall, but nothing came scurrying out. Not even a spider.

it could be your house is OK,’ he said, taking a breath, i don’t want to cause too much damage.’

Tuck the damage.’

The next wail was concealed behind a row of low cupboards with a sink unit set between them. They emptied out one cupboard chosen at random. Its contents were coloured plastic bowls, a couple of packets of detergent and cleaning materials, all of which they took outside. 'Flie foreman went down on his knees, bending low to peer inside, then glancing up with a confident smile as if to indicate that everything was in order. To make quite sure, he took the crowbar and gave the back of the cupboard a couple of smart taps with the curved end.

From the dull, yielding sound it made, everyone in the kitchen realised that the wood must be rotten through and through.

The crowbar fell from his hand with a clatter and he cried out — a strangled cry of fear and disgust — as he half-crawled, half-rolled away. Not quite fast enough, though. He was still on his hands and knees when the beetle appeared, its hard body gleaming regally against the dark flooring. Within a foot of the foreman’s knuckles it stopped, its claws flexing in anticipation, and there they faced each other, both briefly motionless.

It reminded Guy only too vividly of his own confrontation in the old school — how first one beetle, then a second, and a third, and a dozen more beetles came forward to observe him as a hunter might observe his prey before attacking. He could sense what the young foreman must be going through in those vital seconds; that paralysis of will that made it impossible to escape.

The man’s assistant was fumbling with the tap on the pesticide cylinder, but it was plain he was going to be too slow. At Guy’s elbow was an upturned mop, which he seized, slamming the hand-end down on the beetle’s back and grinding it against the floor till the juices squelched out of it.

‘Get to your feet, man! Quick! On your feet!’ he yelled at the foreman. He grabbed his arm to pull him up, at the same time shouting back to the assistant: ‘Start spraying, for Chrissake! What the hell are you waiting for?’

Already the poisonous acid fumes from the dead beetle were catching at his breathing. He struggled to help the dazed foreman out of the kitchen while the man with the spray directed a cloud of pesticide towards the cupboard.

‘Guy, watch your feet!’ Mary screamed the warning at him.

He glanced down in time to see a second beetle beginning to explore the edge of his shoe with its claws. His reaction was instinctive. Bringing his foot down on it with his full weight, he felt its hard shell crack under the pressure. Fresh waves of defensive odour rose from its squashed remains.

Coughing, his eyes watering, he managed to drag the young foreman out of the kitchen.

The tough was also coughing as he shoved past him. ‘Scared o’ beetles? What’s the matter with you lot?’ he was sneering as he struggled for breath. ‘Christ, what a pong! But that’s all they are — little fuckin’ beetles! Here, gimme that!’

Grabbing the spray-lance from the assistant’s hand, he stood defiantly in the middle of the kitchen directing pesticide at any beetle that ventured too near. They were emerging now on every side. Several came from the gap where the skirting board had been removed, others from behind the sink, or crawling out around the central-heating boiler, or even appearing — only God knew how— along the shelf among the pots and pans. Keeping clear of the floor, which by now was fairly soaked in pesticide, they began climbing over the walls, dropping off one by one as the fumes overcame them.

Guy left the foreman partially recovered and instructing his men to ‘get that madman out of here before he kills himselP. Mary was already outside where he found her insisting vehemently to the policewoman that the entire row should be evacuated immediately.

‘She’s right,’ Guy said. ‘If those other houses are as badly infested as these two, there could be several more people dead before morning. The question is whether the whole street shouldn’t be cleared.’

Mary frowned at him, annoyed at his interference.

‘I’m making this an official request,’ she informed the policewoman idly, ‘from the Public Health Department. Will you please call up your superintendent and tell him what’s happening here. I could go and search for a public callbox, but that would only waste precious time.’

The policewoman undipped her personal radio and went a step or two away while she contacted the station for instructions.

‘I’m not staying,’ Guy announced. ‘I’ve got an eleven-year-old daughter at home, probably alone in the house. I must make sure she’s all right.’ He paused, troubled. ‘It’s a whole new ball-game, isn’t it? Those two people in number 20, and now what we’ve just seen next door?’ ‘Beetles, Guy,’ she said with emphasis. ‘Not snakes, nor anything like them. The same this morning at the workshop — that was a tiny maggot we saw, however vicious. A grub. No snakes there either.’

‘And what killed the security man? His body drained of blood, but only that one wound?

She shook her head, not answering. Over by the house he saw the tough being helped out by a couple of the pest-control men. It was a stupid thing to do, breathing in all that insecticide, but he could not help feeling a lot of sympathy for the man. No normal person could merely stand by and watch his home being desti yed by a handful of beetles.

Christ, of all things — beetles!