Complete Works of Nevil Shute

by Nevil Shute

  The American nodded. “That’s so. Maybe they’ll send her over here one day with mail or passengers. Diplomats, or something.”

  “Where is Montevideo?” asked the girl. “I ought to know that, but I don’t.”

  Dwight said, “It’s in Uruguay, on the east side of South America. Way down towards the bottom.”

  “I thought you said she was at Rio de Janeiro. Isn’t that in Brazil?”

  He nodded. “That was when she made her cruise up in the North Atlantic. She was based on Rio then. But after that they moved down into Uruguay.”

  “Was that because of radiation?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Peter said, “I don’t know that it’s got there yet. It may have done. They’ve not said anything upon the radio. It’s just about on the tropic, isn’t it?”

  “That’s right,” said Dwight. “Like Rockhampton.”

  The girl asked, “Have they got it in Rockhampton?”

  “I haven’t heard that they have,” said Peter. “It said on the wireless this morning that they’ve got it at Salisbury, in Southern Rhodesia. I think that’s a bit further north.”

  “I think it is,” said the captain. “It’s in the middle of a land mass, too, and that might make a difference. These other places that we’re talking about — they’re all on a coast.”

  “Isn’t Alice Springs just about on the tropic?”

  “It might be. I wouldn’t know. That’s in the middle of a land mass, too, of course.”

  The girl asked, “Does it go quicker down a coast than in the middle?”

  Dwight shook his head. “I wouldn’t know. I don’t think they’ve got any evidence on that, one way or the other.”

  Peter laughed. “They’ll know by the time it gets here. Then they can etch it on the glass.”

  The girl wrinkled her brows. “Etch it on the glass?”

  “Hadn’t you heard about that one?”

  She shook her head.

  “John Osborne told me about it, yesterday,” he said. “It seems that somebody in C.S.I.R.O. is getting busy with a history, about what’s happened to us. They do it on glass bricks. They etch it on the glass and then they fuse another brick down on the top of it in some way, so that the writing’s in the middle.”

  Dwight turned upon his elbow, interested. “I hadn’t heard of that. What are they going to do with them?”

  “Put them up on top of Mount Kosciusko,” Peter said. “It’s the highest peak in Australia. If ever the world gets inhabited again they must go there sometime. And it’s not so high as to be inaccessible.”

  “Well, what do you know? They’re really doing that, are they?”

  “So John says. They’ve got a sort of concrete cellar made up there. Like in the Pyramids.”

  The girl asked, “But how long is this history?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think it can be very long. They’re doing it with pages out of books, though, too. Sealing them in between sheets of thick glass.”

  “But these people who come after,” the girl said. “They won’t know how to read our stuff. They may be . . . animals.”

  “I believe they’ve gone to a lot of trouble about that. First steps in reading. Picture of a cat, and then C-A-T and all that sort of thing. John said that was about all that they’d got finished so far.” He paused. “I suppose it’s something to do,” he said thoughtfully. “Keeps the wise men out of mischief.”

  “A picture of a cat won’t do them much good,” Moira remarked. “There won’t be any cats. They won’t know what a cat is.”

  “A picture of a fish might be better,” said Dwight. “F-I-S-H. Or — say — a picture of a sea gull.”

  “You’re getting into awful spelling difficulties.”

  The girl turned to Peter curiously. “What sort of books are they preserving? All about how to make the cobalt bomb?”

  “God forbid.” They laughed. “I don’t know what they’re doing. I should think a copy of the Encyclopaedia Britannica would make a good kickoff, but there’s an awful lot of it. I really don’t know what they’re doing. John Osborne might know — or he could find out.”

  “Just idle curiosity,” she said. “It won’t affect you or me.” She stared at him in mock consternation. “Don’t tell me they’re preserving any of the newspapers. I just couldn’t bear it.”

  “I shouldn’t think so,” he replied. “They’re not as crazy as that.”

  Dwight sat up on the sand. “All this beautiful warm water going to waste,” he remarked. “I think we ought to use it.”

  Moira stood up. “Make the most of it,” she agreed. “There’s not much of it left.”

  Peter yawned. “You two go and use the water. I’ll use the sun.”

  They left him lying on the beach and went into the sea together. As they swam out she said, “You’re pretty fast in the water, aren’t you?”

  He paused, treading water beside her. “I used to swim quite a lot when I was younger. I swam for the Academy against West Point one time.”

  She nodded. “I thought you were something like that. Do you swim much now?”

  He shook his head. “Not in races. That’s a thing you have to give up pretty soon, unless you’ve got the time to do a lot of it, and keep in training.” He laughed. “I think the water’s colder now than when I was a boy. Not here, of course. I mean, in Mystic.”

  “Were you born in Mystic?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “I was born on Long Island Sound, but not at Mystic. A place called Westport. My Dad’s a doctor there. He was a navy surgeon in the First World War, and then he got this practice in Westport.”

  “Is that on the sea?”

  He nodded. “Swimming and sailing and fishing. That’s the way it was when I was a boy.”

  “How old are you, Dwight?”

  “I’m thirty-three. How old are you?”

  “What a rude question! I’m twenty-four.” She paused. “Does Sharon come from Westport, too?”

  “In a way,” he said. “Her Dad’s a lawyer in New York City, lives in an apartment on West 84th Street, near the park. They have a summer home at Westport.”

  “So you met her there.”

  He nodded. “Boy meets girl.”

  “You must have married quite young.”

  “Just after graduation,” he replied. “I was twenty-two, an ensign on the Franklin. Sharon was nineteen; she never finished college. We’d made our minds up more than a year before. Our folks got together when they saw that we weren’t going to change, and they decided that they’d better stake us for a while.” He paused. “Her Dad was mighty nice about it,” he said quietly. “We could have gone on until we got some money somehow, but they thought it wasn’t doing either of us any good. So they let us get married.”

  “They gave you an allowance.”

  “That’s right. We only needed it three or four years, and then an aunt died and I got promoted, and we were all set.”

  They swam to the end of the jetty, got out, and sat basking in the sun. Presently they walked back to Peter on the beach, sat with him while they smoked a cigarette, and then went to change. They reassembled on the beach carrying their shoes, drying their feet in leisurely manner in the sun and brushing off the sand. Presently Dwight started to put on his socks.

  The girl said, “Fancy going round in socks like that!”

  The commander glanced at them. “It’s only in the toe,” he said. “It doesn’t show.”

  “It’s not only in the toe.” She leaned across and picked up his foot. “I thought I saw another one. The heel’s all holes across the bottom!”

  “It still doesn’t show,” he said. “Not when I’ve got a shoe on.”

  “Doesn’t anybody mend them for you?”

  “They’ve paid off a lot of the ship’s company in Sydney recently,” he said. “I still get my bed made up, but he’s too busy now to bother about mending. It never did work very well aboard that ship, anyway. I do them myself, so
metimes. Most times I just throw them away and get another pair.”

  “You’ve got a button off your shirt, too.”

  “That doesn’t show, either,” he said equably. “It’s way down at the bottom, goes underneath my belt.”

  “I think you’re a perfect disgrace,” she remarked. “I know what the admiral would say, if he saw you going round like that. He’d say Scorpion needs another captain.”

  “He wouldn’t see it,” he replied. “Not unless he made me take off my pants.”

  “This conversation’s taking an unprofitable line,” she said. “How many pairs of socks have you got in that condition?”

  “I wouldn’t know. It’s quite a while since I went through the drawer.”

  “If you give them to me I’ll take them home and mend them for you.”

  He glanced at her. “That’s mighty nice of you, to offer to do that. But you don’t have to. It’s time I got more, anyway. These are just about done.”

  “Can you get more socks?” she asked. “Daddy can’t. He says they’re going off the market, with a lot of other things. He can’t get any new handkerchiefs, either.”

  Peter said, “That’s right. I couldn’t get socks to fit me, the last time I tried. The ones I got were about two inches too long.”

  Moira pressed the point. “Have you tried to buy any more recently?”

  “Well — no. The last lot I bought was sometime back in the winter.”

  Peter yawned. “Better let her mend them for you, sir. You’ll have a job getting any more.”

  “If that’s the way it is,” Dwight said, “I’d be very grateful.” He turned to the girl. “But you don’t have to do it. I can do them for myself.” He grinned. “I can, you know. I can do them quite well.”

  She sniffed audibly. “About as well as I can run your submarine. You’d better make up a parcel of everything you’ve got that needs mending, and let me have it. That shirt included. Have you got the button?”

  “I think I lost that.”

  “You should be more careful. When a button comes off, you don’t just chuck it away.”

  “If you talk to me like that,” he said grimly, “I really will give you everything I’ve got that needs mending. I’ll bury you in the stuff.”

  “Now we’re getting somewhere,” she remarked. “I thought you’d been concealing things. You’d better put it all into a cabin trunk, or two cabin trunks, and let me have them.”

  “There’s quite a lot,” he said.

  “I knew it. If there’s too much I’ll shove some of it off on to Mummy and she’ll probably distribute it all round the district. The First Naval Member lives quite near us; Mummy’ll probably give Lady Hartman your underpants to mend.”

  He looked at her in mock alarm. “Say, Scorpion certainly would need another captain, then.”

  She said, “This conversation’s going round in circles. You let me have everything that you’ve got that needs mending, anyway, and I’ll see if I can’t get you dressed up like a naval officer.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Where shall I bring the stuff to?”

  She thought for a moment. “You’re on leave, aren’t you?”

  “On and off,” he said. “We’re giving leave over ten days, but I don’t get that much. The captain has to stick around, or thinks he has.”

  “Probably do the ship a world of good if he didn’t,” she said. “You’d better bring them down to me at Berwick, and stay a couple of nights. Can you drive a bullock?”

  “I’ve never driven one,” he said. “I could try.”

  She eyed him speculatively. “I suppose you’d be all right. If you can command a submarine you probably can’t do much harm to one of our bullocks. Daddy’s got a cart horse now called Prince, but I don’t suppose he’d let you touch that. He’d probably let you drive one of the bullocks.”

  “That’s all right with me,” he said meekly. “What am I supposed to do with the bullock?”

  “Spread the dung,” she said. “The cow pats. It has a harness that pulls a chain harrow over the grass. You walk beside it, leading it with a halter. You have a stick to tap it with as well. It’s a very restful occupation. Good for the nerves.”

  “I’m sure it is,” he said. “What’s it for? I mean, why do you do it?”

  “It makes a good pasture,” she said. “If you just leave the droppings where they are, the grass comes up in rank tufts and the animals won’t eat it. Then the pasture isn’t half as good next year as if you’d harrowed it. Daddy’s very particular about harrowing each pasture after the beasts come out. We used to do it with a tractor. Now we do it with a bullock.”

  “This is all so that he’d get a better pasture next year?”

  “Yes, it is,” she said firmly. “All right, you needn’t say it. It’s good farming to harrow the paddocks, and Daddy’s a good farmer.”

  “I wasn’t going to say it. How many acres does he farm?”

  “About five hundred. We do Angus beef cattle and sheep.”

  “You shear the sheep for the wool?”

  “That’s right.”

  “When do you do that?” he asked. “I’ve never seen a shearing.”

  “Usually we shear in October,” she said. “Daddy’s a bit worried that if we leave it till October this year it won’t get done. He’s talking of putting it forward and shearing in August.”

  “That makes sense,” he observed gravely. He bent forward to put on his shoes. “It’s a long time since I was on a farm,” he said. “I’d like to come and spend a day or two, if you can put up with me. I expect I can make myself useful, one way or another.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” she said. “Daddy’ll see you make yourself useful. It’s going to be a godsend to him, having another man on the place.”

  He smiled. “And you’d really like me to bring all the mending with me?”

  “I’ll never forgive you if you just turn up with a couple of pairs of socks and say that your pyjamas are all right. Besides, Lady Hartman’s looking forward to doing your pants. She doesn’t know it, but she is.”

  “I’ll take your word for it.”

  She drove him down to the station that evening in the Abbott buggy. As he got down from the vehicle she said, “I’ll expect you on Tuesday, at Berwick station, in the afternoon. Give me a ring about the time of your train if you can. Otherwise I’ll be there at about four o’clock, and wait.”

  He nodded. “I’ll call you. You really mean that about bringing all the mending?”

  “I’ll never forgive you if you don’t.”

  “Okay.” He hesitated. “It’ll be dark by the time you get home,” he said. “Look after yourself.”

  She smiled at him. “I’ll be all right. See you on Tuesday. Good night, Dwight.”

  “Good night,” he said a little thickly. She drove off. He stood watching her until the buggy turned a corner and was out of sight.

  It was ten o’clock at night when she drove into the yard outside the homestead. Her father heard the horse and came out in the darkness to help her unharness and put the buggy in the shed. In the dim light as they eased the vehicle back under cover, she said, “I asked Dwight Towers down here for a couple of days. He’s coming on Tuesday.”

  “Coming here?” he asked, surprised.

  “Yes. They’ve got leave before they go off on some other trip. You don’t mind, do you?”

  “Of course not. I hope it’s not going to be dull for him, though. What are you going to do with him all day?”

  “I told him he could drive the bullock round the paddocks. He’s very practical.”

  “I could do with somebody to help feed out the silage,” her father said.

  “Well, I expect he could do that. After all, if he commands a nuclear-powered submarine he ought to be able to learn to shovel silage.”

  They went into the house. Later that night he told her mother about their visitor. She was properly impressed. “Do you think there’s anything in it?�
��

  “I don’t know,” he said. “She must like him all right.”

  “She hasn’t had a man to stay since that Forrest boy, before the war.”

  He nodded. “I remember. Never thought much of him. I’m glad that came to an end.”

  “It was his Austin-Healey,” her mother remarked. “I don’t think she ever cared for him, not really.”

  “This one’s got a submarine,” her father said helpfully. “It’s probably the same thing.”

  “He can’t take her down the road in that at ninety miles an hour.” She paused, and then she said, “Of course, he must be a widower now.”

  He nodded. “Everybody says that he’s a very decent sort of chap.”

  Her mother said, “I do hope something comes of it. I would like to see her settled down, and happily married with some children.”

  “She’ll have to be quick about it, if you’re going to see that,” remarked her father.

  “Oh dear, I keep forgetting. But you know what I mean.”

  He came to her on Tuesday afternoon; she met him with the horse and buggy. He got out of the train and looked around, sniffing the warm country air. “Say,” he said, “you’ve got some pretty nice country around here. Which way is your place?”

  She pointed to the north. “Over there, about three miles.”

  “Up on that range of hills?”

  “Not right up,” she said. “Just a bit of the way up.”

  He was carrying a suitcase, and swung it up into the buggy, pushing it under the seat. “Is that all you’ve got?” she demanded.

  “That’s right. It’s full of mending.”

  “It doesn’t look much. I’m sure you must have more than that.”

  “I haven’t. I brought everything there was. Honest.”

  “I hope you’re telling me the truth.” They got up into the driving seat and started off towards the village. Almost immediately he said, “That’s a beech tree! There’s another!”

  She glanced at him curiously. “They grow round here. I suppose it’s cooler on the hills.”

  He looked at the avenue, entranced. “That’s an oak tree, but it’s a mighty big one. I don’t know that I ever saw an oak tree grow so big. And there’s some maples!” He turned to her. “Say, this is just like an avenue in a small town in the States!”