The Touch of Death Read online

  “Neil, leave it to us. Neil!”

  Banister was at the door. The dog was looking towards a dozen people all pressed against the wall, the men trying to shield the women. Terror had petrified their faces; there was no movement, just the glare of horror in eyes which a few minutes before had been soft and misty and contented. If the dog leapt at them, one or two would die; perhaps all of them. If it ran amok—

  “Neil, leave it to us!” Palfrey cried.

  “Neil!” Rita screamed.

  Banister ran into the room, and snapped: “Pip, come here!” The dog recognised the name, and turned. “Pip, sit down,” Banister ordered, and wondered with despairing hope whether it had been trained to obedience. “Sit—”

  It leapt at him.

  One woman screamed.

  It flew at his throat. He thrust out his hands to grab its neck. He felt a sharp shock, but it was probably the wiry body smacked against his tensed arms. The dog wriggled and snapped at him, but he clutched it tightly with his free hand, shifted the other and got a grip on its neck.

  He squeezed.

  He knew that Rita was behind him, and heard Palfrey, just outside. He hardly noticed them. He kept up the pressure. He knew that everyone there was staring, but he heard no sound except the wheezy yelping of the killer dog; the only movement was its writhing body. Legs seemed to leap up and down convulsively, and it kept yapping at him, but the yapping grew fainter and the movements less vigorous.

  Everyone seemed frozen into immobility.

  The dog stopped moving. Banister held it for a few seconds, then put it carefully down on the dance-floor. It didn’t move for he had broken its neck.

  A woman gasped, and fell sideways; a man jerked out of his trance to catch her. Then others moved, and men and women began to talk in a high-pitched, frightened voice, and the men as shrill as the women.

  The dog lay with its broken neck, and four people lay near it.

  Suddenly, Palfrey was beside Banister.

  “Now you’ve gone this far you’d better finish the job.” There was a hostile note in his voice, different from anything that Banister had heard before. “Pick it up and come with me.”

  It was an order, and Banister picked the dog up.

  “Take her away, I’ll see her later.” Palfrey spoke to some of his men, and two ranged alongside Rita. She was obviously terrified of touching the dog, so it would retain its death-dealing horror for some time. How long?

  The men took Rita out of the room.

  Palfrey walked on one side of Banister, and another of Palfrey’s men, Mike, on the other. More men appeared at the French windows, as if to make sure that no one could follow them.

  Palfrey said: “We’ll go round to the front and take my car, Mike.”

  Banister did exactly what he was told. He climbed into the back of the car, with the dog on his lap. They started off. Except for the bright clarity of the stars and the yellow light at the windows, there was darkness; the lake and the beauty about it was hidden. The car’s headlights shot out, suddenly, and lit up the trees at the side of the road and another house, not far away.

  Banister looked at the back of Palfrey’s head.

  On his lap was the dead dog – which had killed four, and could have killed many more. He could lift it and press it against Palfrey’s neck, and Palfrey would die; Mike would die, too. Even Rita had been terrified of contact with the body. It gave him a strange feeling of power, of supremacy, yet there was horror, too. It made him feel as if he were beyond death; immortal.

  For the killer dog lay helplessly on his knees.

  They stopped.

  Palfrey told him when to get out; Palfrey produced a torch, and opened the boot of the car.

  “Put it in there, and we’ll stand a guard over it,” he said. “We’ll check with mice or insects to see how long it holds the stuff. Then we’ll bury it.”

  His voice was clipped, harsh and hostile. Why hostile?

  Banister put the dog inside, and the lid slammed; Mike locked it. Mike and two other men who had driven behind the first car stood guard. Palfrey moved away, expecting Banister to follow him.

  Banister followed.

  They went into a house near the lake; and when they were in a small, book-lined room, with pleasant furnishings and subdued lights from huge parchment shades, Palfrey turned to look at him. Palfrey’s eyes had that penetrating glow, but with a difference, there was rage in him. It showed in his voice and his look, in his words.

  “You blundering fool, what are you trying to do? Ruin every chance we’ve got? Do you want more villages to be wiped out, more helpless victims slaughtered?”

  Banister could only stare . . .

  “Because that’s what you seem to want,” Palfrey went on savagely. “To save a few people whose lives don’t count, you took a chance of killing yourself. You’ve never touched an infected dog, you don’t know whether it could kill you – you just took a blind chance. What do you use for a mind? Why do you think we’ve done all we have to save you? Why do you think we’ve worked and planned and schemed and had men die to give you a chance of finding out the truth? So that you can show what a hero you are, so that you—”

  “Shut up,” Banister rasped.

  “It’s time you realised how much depends on you. You puff yourself up with the satisfaction of saving a few people who don’t matter – make yourself a hero, and—”

  Banister clenched his right hand, and raised it. He saw Palfrey’s face very close to him. He wanted to smash his fist into Palfrey’s face. He gritted his teeth until his jaws hurt. Then he saw fishes rising to the surface of a pool, their colours fading; and as they died, saw the faces of men, women and children taking the place of the silly vacant faces of fish.

  He saw what Palfrey meant, and he knew that Palfrey was right.

  He dropped his hand.

  “All right,” he said emptily, drearily. “I shouldn’t have done it. But it didn’t do any harm, and now we know that the dog’s no more dangerous than a man.”

  Palfrey took out a cigarette, thrust it between his lips and rolled it from one side to the other, without lighting it. He was very pale. His lips were drawn when they weren’t moving the cigarette. His eyes had a peculiar, glassy brightness.

  “I say I’m sorry!” Banister burst out. “What more do you want? What in hell can I do to make up for it?”

  Palfrey raised his right hand in a quick, compelling little gesture.

  “Nothing more, Neil. I’m sorry. First Monk-Gilbert and then me.” Palfrey’s lips curved a little, but Banister sensed something of his inner conflict; and of his weariness. “Mutual apologies, offered and accepted. If you see me losing my head like that again, kick me in the pants.” He grinned. “To mix a metaphor. Or have I?” He lit the cigarette. “Have a drink.”

  He turned to a cabinet, took out whisky and glasses.

  “Not too much,” he said, as he poured out, “or I shall get rolling drunk, and that wouldn’t do.” He mixed the whisky with plenty of soda, and sipped. “Health. Luck. Success.” He put the glass down. “I’ve held Rita Morrell.”

  “So I gathered.”

  “What did she say to you?”

  “Not really a lot.” It was only an hour or so since Banister had danced with Rita, strolled out into the grounds with her; it seemed as if it had happened in a different age. “More or less as before. She wants me to go with her. More talk of conversion! There was one thing—”

  He broke off.

  “Yes?” Palfrey was much more himself.

  “She seemed really—distressed—that the dog was let loose.”

  “So it seemed,” Palfrey agreed. “I wonder why. Distressed because of the harm it might do to others, or distressed because it had got loose?” He drew hard at the cigarette. �
�I think we’ll look round at the house, then tackle Rita. I had the place sealed off, no one’s been allowed to go in or out. If the dog belonged there—” He broke off. “Stefan’s making the preliminary inquiries, let’s go and see if he’s discovered anything.”

  “Right.”

  “Neil,” Palfrey said, “I think it was one of the lucky nights when you ran into Monk-Gilbert.”

  Rita was sitting in a small cocktail lounge, smoking.

  Palfrey said: “Well, I hope you’re happy.”

  She didn’t answer, but looked at Banister as if appealing for help, for understanding. She looked shocked and shaken, but her beauty remained, a strange and calming loveliness. Banister associated her with death, and yet in her manner there was a kind of peace.

  “Where did you keep the dog?” Palfrey asked.

  “It was in my room tonight,” Rita said. “It had been brought to me earlier, because it was contaminated. We had been experimenting with it—”

  “We?” Palfrey asked.

  “There were others, but they’ve gone. We thought that the dog was immune – but there must have been a delayed action. I’d no idea this would happen.”

  It was easy to believe her; as easy to think that she might be lying.

  “How long have you and your friends had the dog?”

  “For a few days.”

  “Where did you get it from?”

  “It was—sent to us. There were some manifestations of fatalis activity in the hills near here, and it was noticed in some fish. We’ve known there was fatalis activity in uranium ore here—and in other places. We wanted to find out more about it, whether the deposits were extensive.”

  “Are they?”

  “We don’t know,” Rita said.

  After a pause, Palfrey asked: “Who sent you the dog?”

  She didn’t answer.

  Palfrey looked at her steadily, gave Banister the impression that he was going to try to force an answer; instead, he asked a different question in the same mild voice; but it was enforced mildness; Banister knew that Palfrey was holding himself on a tight leash.

  “What were you going to do with the dog?”

  “Let it go, once I was sure it was free of infection.”

  “Then what were you going to do?”

  “I don’t know,” Rita said.

  “Do you mean you were waiting for instructions?”

  “Yes.”

  Palfrey said softly: “Who would give you them?”

  She didn’t answer.

  She didn’t look at Banister now, only at Palfrey. Banister felt a strange remoteness, even from them. There was the beauty of Rita, and in Palfrey something he hadn’t seen before; a steely strength. It was hard to believe that this was the man who had raged at him, who had hardly been able to get words out because of his temper.

  Palfrey broke the silence.

  “I don’t know whether you quite understand what’s happening, Rita.” His use of her Christian name made the whole scene more bizarre. “You seem to have some idea that you can justify what you’re doing. I don’t think you’ll find many people who will agree with you on that. As far as I’m concerned, you’re deadly to everything that I think matters. You killed Monk-Gilbert, you’ve killed others, you killed these boys and girls tonight. You’ve the power of death in you. It’s got to be broken. When villages get wiped out like the one in Malpore, whenever you give us a clear indication of how deadly you and your friends can be, we just have to find out who is doing it, and we have to stop it. Do you understand what I mean?”

  “Yes,” she said without expression.

  “Good,” said Palfrey. “It will help you to understand this: we can’t work on ordinary rules and regulations. You will have to talk. We hoped that you would lead us to someone or somewhere else – you know that, of course. It hasn’t come off. Now we can’t wait any longer. You will have to talk.”

  He paused.

  She shook her head; and there was a strange regality about her, a queenliness. Did Palfrey see and understand that? Or did she cast some spell over him so that he saw a beauty which others would not recognise?

  “Nothing will make me talk,” she said.

  Palfrey began to play with a few strands of hair.

  “That’s what you think now.” The quietness of his voice made it more impressive. “I don’t want to torture you. I simply have to make you talk. Over the years I’ve learned a lot of different methods. Some work with men, and some with women. Rita, I have to be absolutely ruthless. I don’t see you as a human being, as an attractive woman, I just see you as—” He paused, and Banister saw him draw in his breath, saw his eyelids droop for a moment. Then: “As an angel of death.”

  That hurt her.

  It hurt Banister, too, because it was so apt.

  An angel of death . . .

  “If you should scream, I shouldn’t hear,” Palfrey said. “I should hear only the piteous cries of innocent people. If you should look as if you couldn’t stand another twist of the screw, another brand of burning – I shouldn’t see you, I should see the shocked faces of people whose loved ones have been killed – or a dead village – or a flash of bright flame with death as its carrier. Do you understand what I mean?”

  Banister found himself, clenching his fists, grating his teeth so that his jaws ached. Palfrey’s words came so quietly, so emphatically. He meant everything; he had to mean everything. If Rita would not talk, he would have to do what he threatened.

  “Nothing will make me talk,” she said.

  After a long silence, Palfrey said: “I shall give you an hour to change your mind.”

  Dr. Scott seemed unaware of what was happening, when questioned, but soon facts were discovered. Men had been working in the great forests beyond Rotorua – men who had disappeared, doubtless Rita’s colleagues. Everything seemed to come out, then. Fatalis activity was found in a small stream rising from the hills in the forest. So much news came in that the hour Palfrey had promised Rita was stretched to two; nearly three.

  Then Palfrey finished studying the reports.

  The guests were allowed to go home. An official statement, that the dog had been “charged with static electricity”, was issued to the Press.

  Palfrey went back to see Rita. This time Andromovitch was with him.

  “Rita,” Palfrey said in his mildest voice, “who sent that dog to you, and who was going to give you instructions about it?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Neil,” Palfrey said, “leave this to Stefan and me, will you?”

  Banister went out.

  Chapter 11

  There was a light at the window of the little cocktail lounge.

  Banister stood in the garden, overlooking the lake, with the room’s light behind him. A pretty, fair-haired security girl was by his side. She had followed him out into the garden, and seemed to be interested only in the lake and the reflection of the stars and the dark shadows that lay upon it and upon the earth.

  From a house not far away there came the sound of radio music, light and lively; a sacrilege.

  From the room with the lighted window, there came a scream. It broke a silence which had lasted for five minutes; or ten minutes; or fifteen. Banister didn’t know. As he stood staring into the star-littered darkness, he could see Rita’s face and the gloss of her dark hair, the lambent glow of her lovely eyes. He could see her lips moving; he could feel the touch of her lips.

  She screamed again.

  He stiffened; he felt the touch of the girl’s hand on his arm, without realising what it was.

  The radio music, some silly, lilting nonsense tune, went on and on. The stars made the shape of Rita’s face, her body, her beauty.

  The radio music stopped.

  There was
silence.

  Banister waited for another scream, was sure that it would come, tried not to see the hideous picture of Rita’s face, distorted in pain, tried not to guess what Palfrey and Andromovitch were doing; tried not to curse them.

  She screamed!

  He swung round.

  The girl said sharply: “No.” She held his arm, and he pulled himself free. “Neil, don’t!” She moved swiftly, and in a moment she was in front of him, with her arms round him, and the softness of her breasts pressed against him. “Don’t go, don’t let him down.”

  Let “him” down!

  “Get out of my way,” Banister said viciously, and tried to prise her away from him. His voice rose when he failed. “Get out of my way, or—”

  “Neil, don’t let Sap down now, don’t help her, this might be the first crack. It might break open after this.” How desperately she pleaded. “Think of what she’s done, just think, Neil – and think of what might happen. One dog in a crowd of shoppers, in a cinema, in—”

  Rita screamed.

  Banister didn’t move, but no longer strained against the girl. His mind told him that she was right, but logic hardly mattered, emotions whirled him round and round in an angry vortex—

  A car turned into the street, its headlights very bright. They seemed to flash. That tore Banister’s thoughts away from the vortex, put dread into him again. He heard the girl’s intake of breath.

  “Was that—?”

  “I don’t know.”

  They watched the headlights swaying up and down. Against the glow they could see the silhouettes of Palfrey’s men. The tyres crunched on the gravel road, and the engine purred. The car slowed down. There was no other flash; perhaps the one they had seen had been at the moment when the headlights had been switched on.

  The car stopped.

  A man got out of the driving-seat, while Palfrey’s men closed in on him. He showed dark against the headlights, which were still on, but Banister couldn’t see his face. His footsteps sounded, but Palfrey’s men walked on grass.