“I don’t know,” murmured Clayton.
“What’s that smell?” Emma asked.
“Yes,” Wells remarked, sniffing the air, “what a stench.”
“It seems to be coming from upstairs,” Clayton observed, gesturing toward the staircase leading to the upper floor housing the inspectors’ offices.
The group glanced nervously at one another, realizing they had no choice but to go up there. Handing the prisoner over to Murray, Clayton took out his pistol and led the hesitant procession as they climbed the stairs. With each step, the evil smell grew more intense. When they reached the floor above, which was equally deserted, it became unbearable. Grimacing with revulsion, Clayton led the others down the corridor where Scotland Yard’s inspectors and other high-ranking officers had their offices. By chance, the nauseating odor guided him to the end room, which belonged to Inspector Colin Garrett. The coincidence baffled Clayton. The office door was closed, but the stink was clearly coming from within. Clayton swallowed hard, placed his metal hand on the doorknob, and gave the others a solemn look, as though warning them to be prepared for anything. The others nodded, equally solemn, and watched as he tried to open the door with his fake hand while brandishing his firearm with the other. For a few moments, Clayton struggled feebly, testing his companions’ patience, until finally he succeeded in prising open the door. The putrid odor wafted from the room, turning their stomachs. Gritting their teeth, they ventured into the office, trying hard not to retch. But the bloody vision they found inside was more appalling than any of them could have expected.
The room seemed to have been turned into a kind of makeshift abattoir. In the center, piled on top of one another like sacks of flour, lay more than a dozen half-dismembered bodies. Besuited inspectors, uniformed policemen, and even a few high-ranking officers in full dress lay in a ghastly jumble, faces twisted, guts ripped out, blood dripping from their multiple injuries, red rivulets slowly merging as they trickled down the pile, pooling on the floor below. All of them had met a grisly end, throats slit, bones snapped, stomachs brutally sliced open, slain by a killer with no notion of pity. Limbs torn from sockets and various organs lay strewn about the macabre monument, giving the impression that whatever had done this had slaughtered its victims all over the building and then hidden them there, gathering up every piece down to the last morsel of lung.
“Good God . . . ,” Clayton muttered. “Who could have done this?”
Wells stifled the urge to vomit.
Stepping gingerly over a piece of liver lying on the floor, Clayton leaned over and examined a wound on one of the victims’ faces: three deep cuts from the forehead down to the chin. It looked like the work of a fierce set of claws, which had not only flayed the skin but had gouged out one eye and sliced off half a nose. The inspector shook his head slowly as he surveyed the baleful scene. Wells was stooping over the pile of bodies, observing some of the wounds with clinical interest. Murray had dragged the girl out into the corridor, opening a window so the evening breeze would revive her, while the prisoner stood in the doorway, white as a sheet. Then Clayton noticed the dead man slumped in Garrett’s chair, his head turned toward the wall at an impossible angle, as though the killer had broken his neck by twisting it round a hundred and eighty degrees. His stomach had been ripped open and his intestines lay in a heap on his lap. And yet instead of throwing him on the pile like the others, his killer had clearly taken the trouble to sit him in the chair. Curious as to the identity of the policeman who had been singled out for this special treatment, Clayton turned the dead man’s head around.
“What on earth?” he cried, startled out of his wits.
The others looked at him in alarm.
“What’s going on?” Wells asked, walking over to the inspector and trying not to slip on the entrails strewn over the floor.
“It’s Colin Garrett,” Clayton explained, bewildered. “The young inspector I was talking to not five minutes ago outside the bicycle shop.”
He went out into the corridor, overcome in equal measure by the nauseous smell and his own bewilderment. Wells followed.
“Are you sure it’s the same man?” asked Murray. Clayton was about to nod when a spine-chilling voice echoed along the corridor.
“Didn’t they teach you to respect the dead, Clayton?”
As one, the group turned toward the direction the icy voice was coming from, only to discover a dim figure observing them from the end of the passageway. As the intruder moved toward them, stepping into a halo of lamplight, they made out the features of the same pale, skinny young man whose broken neck and torn face they had just seen inside the room. They stared at one another in disbelief at the sight of this disquieting double.
“This is not possible,” Clayton whispered.
“I thought you believed anything was possible, Clayton,” the false Garrett retorted, his voice devoid of all humanity.
Clayton responded to the provocation by stepping forward away from the others and raising his revolver.
“Stop! Don’t move another inch, whatever you are,” he commanded in an unnecessarily theatrical voice.
The false Garrett contemplated him for a few seconds with the air of a sleepwalker, then replied almost indifferently, “I wasn’t intending to, Clayton.”
At this, his mouth opened grotesquely, and what looked like an incredibly long, reddish tongue like a toad’s or a chameleon’s darted along the corridor toward Clayton. The inspector felt the hideous appendage coil itself round his arm, and his gun went off without him even realizing he had pulled the trigger. Even though he had not had time to aim, Clayton saw the bullet hit the head of the false Inspector Garrett. As Garrett dropped to the floor, his monstrous tongue uncoiled, furling back into his mouth like a ball of flesh. Before anyone had time to react, Garrett’s body began to writhe hideously in the middle of the corridor.
Agent Cornelius Clayton of the Special Branch at Scotland Yard, who was standing between the convulsing form and his companions, saw how the same monster he had seen emerging from the tripod shot down on the outskirts of London—that reptilelike biped that had dragged itself moribund along the ground for a few moments before expiring in front of them—began to worm its way out of Garrett’s body. The head of the hapless Garrett began to contract as though it had been crushed in a vise. His jaw stretched until it resembled a crocodile’s maw. At the same time, his hands began to taper into hideous talons, joined by a kind of membrane, while his skin grew greenish scales and his body swelled up to monstrous proportions. And then, before the ghastly transformation was complete, the monster, which still bore a faint resemblance to Inspector Garrett, sprang to its feet and once more shot out its slimy tongue at Clayton, who was still aiming his now empty gun at the creature. Diving to the floor, Clayton managed to avoid the viscous coil. He watched helplessly as it struck the prisoner’s chest, knocking him to the floor. Then it raised the poor wretch up off the ground and began drawing him toward its enormous fangs. Struggling desperately, the prisoner managed to grasp hold of the open window. This halted his advance for a moment and even managed to confuse the creature as its laborious metamorphosis continued. Overwhelmed with pure terror, the apelike porter managed to plunge out of the window, grabbing hold of the windowsill from the outside. He stubbornly clung on in midair, while the hideous tongue tried to jerk him back into the corridor. Clayton stood up, placing himself once more between the creature and the terrified group. Not knowing what to do, he simply watched Garrett’s continuing metamorphosis into what looked more and more like a two-legged reptile, shredding the hapless inspector’s skin. Just then, with a swift movement that surprised everyone, Murray leapt away from the group toward the window, where with savage determination he began pounding the hands of the unfortunate Mike, who, unable to cling on, gave a muffled yell as he plunged downward. The rest of them looked on as the monster’s tongue tensed and the weight of its victim dragged it, helpless, toward the window. The startled creature made a de
sperate lunge for Murray, who managed to tear himself free with a cry of pain, then it clasped hold of the window frame. Fortunately, the monster’s claws were not yet properly formed, and it was powerless to stop itself from plummeting to the street, attached to the prisoner by what looked like a grotesque umbilical cord.
After Murray’s astonishing intervention, thanks to which they found themselves alone once more in the corridor, safe from attack by any hideous creature, the group gradually recovered their composure. Everything had happened incredibly quickly; moments before they had been in mortal danger, and now, suddenly, they were not.
“I’m sorry I had to sacrifice him,” Murray lamented a few seconds later, “but it was his life or ours.”
“Don’t apologize, Mr. Murray,” Emma replied, trying to stop her voice from shaking and to appear as resolute as possible. “If that creature had completed its transformation, it would have killed us all.”
“Quite, Gilliam, you needn’t apologize,” said Wells, still a little pale, although unable to prevent a hint of sarcasm creeping into his voice. “And you needn’t make excuses for him either, Miss Harlow. Not on this occasion.”
They all shuffled over to the open window and found themselves gazing down at an alleyway piled with refuse. The man named Mike lay in a crumpled heap on the ground. Next to him, still attached by its monstrous tongue, the thing was sprawled in a pool of greenish blood.
The group raced downstairs and into the alley where the bizarre creature had fallen. But when they arrived, they found only the body of their former prisoner. All that remained of the creature was a big patch of greenish liquid on the ground.
“Curses! Where the devil is it hiding?” Murray declared, rubbing his shoulder, which had a small scratch, visible through the rent in his jacket.
“I don’t know. The alleyway appears to have no other exit,” Clayton replied, pacing around the group in circles. “But it was here only a moment ago!”
In his irritation, he kicked at the greenish puddle, causing the revolting substance to splatter in all directions. With a martyred look, Wells noticed that some of it had landed on his trousers.
“Do you think it had time to reach the main street?” asked the millionaire.
“It’s possible,” Clayton replied pensively.
“I doubt it,” remarked Wells. “There’s no trace of blood, or whatever it is the creature exudes, leading to the—”
He broke off as Clayton, oblivious to what he was saying, ran toward the street, swinging his head from side to side like a street sweeper’s broom. Suddenly, he stopped in his tracks, then, retracing his steps, he stood dramatically, arms akimbo, tut-tutting mechanically as he eagerly examined the fronts of the buildings facing the alley. Wells gave a sigh. He could not decide which irritated him more: the inspector’s supercilious attitude in moments of calm or the theatrical gestures with which he accompanied his deductions in tense situations.
“Do you think the creature can climb, or . . . fly?” Wells heard him ask.
“If he could fly, he would have done so before hitting the ground, don’t you think?” the author retorted.
“Perhaps the prisoner’s weight made that impossible,” Clayton surmised.
“Surely you aren’t serious?” Wells said scornfully. “That thing must weigh twice as much as—”
“Do be quiet!” cried Emma. Until then, although pale and trembling, the girl had managed to control her nerves, but now she seemed on the point of collapse. Murray gallantly offered her his arm, and the girl leaned on him like a delicate bird. “My God, didn’t you see that . . . thing? Garrett was turning into a . . . Oh, my God, it looked like a . . .” Her voice gave way suddenly, and Murray had to seize her to stop her from falling to the floor.
“Emma . . . ,” he whispered, holding her in both arms. “Emma, look at me. You can’t give in now, do you hear? Not now.”
“But what are we to do, Gilliam? What is that thing?” she said, gasping for breath.
“Calm yourself, Emma,” whispered Murray. “I won’t let anything happen to you, do you see? I swear on my life.”
The young woman looked at him in silence for a few moments. She gulped hard several times before replying in a faint voice.
“But Gilliam . . . How can I believe someone who swears on their life and yet has been dead for two years?” she replied, in an attempt to revive her beleaguered sense of humor.
“Emma . . . ,” Murray breathed, transforming her name into a vault in which the tumult of his feelings could scarcely be contained.
“Ahem . . .” Clayton cleared his throat awkwardly. “Clearly we shall gain nothing if we give way to panic. We must keep our heads and try to look on the bright side,” he suggested. “The fact is we are better informed now. We know the Martians can change into any one of us. And I’m sure knowing that will give us an enormous advantage over them.”
“We also know they aren’t merely out there, trying to invade London,” Wells said. “They’ve already infiltrated and are here among us. And who knows since when,” the author added, and, remembering the cadaver that had been lying in the basement of the Natural History Museum for the last twenty years, he glanced meaningfully at the inspector, who of course did not take the hint.
“Well,” concluded Clayton, “let’s not waste time speculating. We know what the situation is—or at least part of it. We must go to a safe place where we can consider what to do. We need to pool our information and devise a plan.”
“Didn’t you say your department was prepared for this kind of contingency?” the author asked dryly. “I thought you already had a plan.”
“My aunt!” Emma remembered suddenly. “She’s an old lady . . . We must rescue her! And my maids! My God, we must tell them they can’t trust anyone!”
“Calm yourself, Miss Harlow,” the inspector hastened to reassure her, ignoring Wells’s comments. “Naturally, the very first thing we will do is to send for your venerable aunt and your beloved maids. After that . . . But let’s not waste time chattering, I shall inform you on the way. Now let’s be going!” he cried, clapping loudly and marching ahead, even as he shot Wells an annoyed glance. “Man has a thousand plans, Heaven but one,” he murmured.
Murray and Wells followed behind resignedly. When they reached the main street, they perceived a reddish glow and plumes of smoke rising above the rooftops down toward Chelsea. And as if that were not enough to make plain what was going on, the evening breeze brought the familiar hiss of the Martian rays. Emma clutched Murray’s arm, and he squeezed her hand tight.
“It looks as if they’ve already entered London,” Wells declared solemnly, trying to conceal the fear he felt for Jane’s safety.
XXVIII
EMMA WAITED FOR A FEW MOMENTS, MAKING SURE her face betrayed none of the shame she felt. When she had composed herself sufficiently, she turned toward the three men, who were standing behind her in the middle of the opulent drawing room they had just entered, and gave them a nonchalant smile.
“Well, clearly the house is empty!” she declared with a shrug. “We’ve searched every inch of it, from the servants’ quarters down to the last sitting room. Evidently my aunt Dorothy and her staff, and my maids, have vanished, no doubt to find somewhere more secure.” She pretended to smooth down the cuffs of her dress, struggling to contain her growing anger. “And it seems they’ve done so without any thought of me. Without even leaving so much as a note telling me where they’ve gone.”
“You mustn’t think that, Emma,” Murray hastened to console her. “Perhaps they had to leave in a hurry. Imagine how terrified your aunt must have felt when she learned of the invasion, a frail old lady like her.”
“My aunt is no more a frail old lady than you are a missionary,” the girl objected, finally venting her fury. “She’s a selfish old spinster who has never cared a bit for anything or anyone, least of all her only niece, as you can see.” Emma smiled ruefully as she stared at the three men, then gave a bitter laugh.
“Do you know what my mother used to threaten me with when I spurned another of my suitors? ‘You’ll end up like your aunt, old, alone, and embittered!’ she would say. But the prospect never scared me. On the contrary, my mother would despair when I told her I couldn’t imagine a more agreeable fate. Only now . . . now . . .” The girl was surprised to feel her eyes suddenly brim at the memory of her mother. She could picture her sitting in the small sunny music room, peering at her daughter over her gold-rimmed spectacles with her usual look of concern, and it seemed so far away and dreamlike now, that world without Martians, where the worst she could expect was to end up like Aunt Dorothy. “I’d give anything now to take back all the times I made my mother angry,” she said at last, turning her grief-stricken face toward the large drawing room window, through which Southwark Cathedral loomed.
“Don’t fret, Emma,” Murray implored, taking a few hesitant steps toward her. “I promise you will live to infuriate your mother many more times. And even your father. I don’t know how yet, but you will return to New York safe and sound.”
Wells glanced sideways at Clayton, who was rolling his eyes to Heaven, a gesture that only added to the author’s dislike of the young man. Who the devil did that prig take himself for? Much as it pained Wells to admit it, Murray had so far proved himself a much more invaluable companion than the conceited inspector from Scotland Yard’s Special Branch. Indeed, apart from his timely intervention at the farm, Wells had yet to see what they had gained from having ferried the insufferable young man back and forth. Fortunately, the two others did not notice Clayton’s rude gesture, for they were too involved in their own drama.
“Would you care to ask your aunt’s neighbors as to her whereabouts, Miss Harlow?” Wells suggested, taking advantage of the sudden silence. “Perhaps they might know something.”
The Map of the Sky Page 38
