Scorpion [Scorpions 01] (4 page)

    The tests had revealed that Mason’s blood contained heavy traces of an extremely powerful neurotoxin. As far as Allan could determine, it was far stronger than anything likely to be injected by a bee or a wasp. He had also confirmed that the venom was hemolytic in its action in that it attacked and destroyed the red blood corpuscles. If he had been called upon to express an opinion Allan would have agreed with Fergus McFee’s suggestion - that Les Mason had suffered some kind of snakebite. Even so, Allan found himself puzzled by the characteristics of the venom; it was a strain he hadn’t come across before. The venom was far more potent than the native adder. It was, of course, always possible that a foreign reptile could have somehow got itself loose in the countryside - dangerous pets had escaped before.

    Allan took his report to Camperly’s office. As usual the office was empty. That was typical of Camperly; he would chase everyone around, raising the roof over some report, which, according to him, was vital to the survival of the country; he would bully everyone to get the work done, and then as soon as it was delivered he would vanish and the report would sit on his desk for days. Allan left the report in the centre of Camperly’s unmarked blotter and closed the door of the office. He returned to his own work, picking up where he’d left off earlier when he had accompanied Camperly to see Renshaw’s patient. Allan wondered how Les Mason was doing. He hoped that the man recovered. Not that there was anything Allan could do. Camperly would handle the case in his usual manner: he would assume complete control and allow no further involvement on the part of his staff. Allan’s part in the matter had ended when he placed the report on Camperly’s desk.

    

    

    Maurice Jenkins drained the last of the tea from his tin mug, smacked his lips in satisfaction, and lay back in the grass, staring up into the star-filled sky. He drew in a breath of the fresh night air and wished he could spend the rest of his life in this ideal condition.

    He had pitched his small tent on gently sloping ground where he could look out over the cliffs to the sea beyond. Before darkness had fallen he had set up his campsite, lit his primus-stove, and cooked himself a meal. Afterwards he had settled back with a large mug of freshly brewed tea, contentedly watching the daylight slip away and the mantle of night cloak the land and the sea.

    Maurice lived in London, in the same house where he’d been born forty-three years ago. He ran a small newsagents in the Mile End Road. It didn’t make a lot of money but there was enough for Maurice. He had never married so there was only himself to support - apart from Rex, his black and white terrier-cum-collie dog. Maurice and Rex existed in close harmony, each dependent upon the other, satisfied with their ordered, routine lives. And one of their routines came round each August. In the first week of the month Maurice closed the small shop for two weeks, exchanged his shiny worn suit for a pair of baggy shorts and an old jacket, packed up his haversack, and with Rex alongside took a train down to Kent. There he spent his fortnight’s holiday hiking along the coast, enjoying the lush scenery and the invigorating climate, which was a world apart from the fume-ridden air of the city.

    Each year Maurice took with him a favorite volume from his treasured collection of books. He was a devotee of the classics, his ultimate choice, Dickens. This year, being no exception, he had brought along a leather-bound copy of
David Copperfield
. He had read the book a number of times, yet with each new journey through the pages he discovered fresh joys, saw deeper into Dickens’s intricate characterization. Every evening, after his meal was over, he would finally retire to his tent and spend an hour slowly reliving the experiences of one of Dickens’s wonderful creations.

    He glanced at his watch. It was almost nine. Time to retire, Maurice thought. He sat up. Sweat beaded his face, trickling down his neck. If only it weren’t so close, he thought. From the moment he had stepped off the train three days ago the weather had been beautiful - ideal for hiking. But it had changed that morning; the heat had closed in, saturating the very air. It was that cloying, muggy sort of heat, the kind you couldn’t escape from.

    Maurice stood up, pulling his damp shirt away from his lean body. Even his shorts were clinging stickily to his flesh. He made sure that the primus was extinguished before he walked to the small tent. Unzipping the flap he got down on his hands and knees and crawled inside. The inside of the tent was like an oven. Maurice grumbled softly to himself, realizing he’d made a mistake in closing the flap earlier. He switched on the battered little radio he’d brought along; soft music filled the tent. Maurice undressed and pulled on his pajamas, neatly folding his clothes and placing them beside his sleeping bag ready for morning. He lit the small gas-lamp and adjusted the flame so there was enough illumination for him to read, then crawled into his sleeping bag. He lay for a while listening to the radio, then turned it low and reached for his book.

    He had been reading for almost half an hour when a faint rustle of sound reached him from outside the tent. Maurice lowered the book and listened. A smile crossed his face. Good old Rex was back. Part of Rex’s enjoyment of the holiday was to be able to go off on his own for a few hours and have a good roam around. Maurice didn’t worry. He knew that Rex would come back. Nor was he concerned about what Rex might get up to. The dog, though part collie, was a pet right down to the tip of his tail. He would go off and sniff his way through the grass and over the green fields, ignoring all forms of wildlife, and when he’d had enough he would return to where his master was waiting and curl up at the foot of Maurice’s sleeping bag.

    ‘Come on, Rex,’ Maurice called, and carried on reading. He glanced up after a few moments when the dog failed to appear. That was unusual. Rex always waited for that command and then he would dart inside the tent. Maurice sat up, his head forward as he listened to the sound of the dog prowling restlessly around the campsite. ‘Here, Rex!’ he called sharply. The dog stayed outside - but it made a low, throaty grumble. Maurice frowned. He hadn’t heard Rex make a sound like that for a long time.

    The rumbling increased as the dog neared the tent. Maurice, faintly aware of something not quite right, unzipped his sleeping bag and drew his legs out.

    Rex’s head appeared in the open tent flap. At first Maurice didn’t notice anything different. Then the animal eased forward, light from the lamp falling across the head and neck.

    A sharp cry escaped from Maurice’s lips, and he drew back with a sudden movement.

    The dog snarled, lips peeling back from glistening teeth. Frothy saliva dribbled out over the swollen tongue. Rex swung his head from side to side, as if trying to dislodge something from his fur. The light fell across the left side of the dog’s head. The eye was lost in a puffy, swollen mass of discolored flesh. Maurice was able to see other swollen mounds under the dog’s fur, along the neck and the body. And now, as the animal stepped further into the tent, Maurice could distinguish dark objects in the tangled fur. Abruptly the dog lunged forward into the tent, moving past him to cower in the dark rear corner.

    ‘Rex!’ Maurice called, holding out a hand. ‘What happened, boy? Are you hurt? Come here! Here!’

    The dog remained where it was. Its eye gleamed as it caught the light from the lamp.

    Maurice leaned forward, stretching out his hand. ‘Come on, old pal. Surely you’re not frightened of me.’

    The low rumbling in Rex’s throat rose to a wild, slobbering snarl. As Maurice’s gentle hand reached out to touch it the dog darted forward, jaws opening wide. There was a moment of frantic confusion, and Maurice cried out in agony as Rex’s teeth tore into the flesh of his outstretched hand. He wrenched his hand back, lacerating it as he freed it from Rex’s jaw. Blood welled up from the wounds as Maurice scrambled away from the dog. His heel caught in the folds of the sleeping bag and he fell, sprawling on his back. He threw his hands up in front of his face as the dark shape of the dog rose above him. It landed on his stomach and chest, digging in its claws as it struggled to maintain its balance. He saw the frothing jaws coming down at his face and tried to push the dog away. Sharp teeth tore at his hands, tearing, ripping the flesh. Blood spurted from the ragged gashes, spattering Maurice’s face. Resistance was futile. Rex was in a paroxysm of fury, oblivious to the fact that he was attacking the one person in the world who cared for him. There was a single, brief moment when man and dog stared deep into each other’s eyes. And then it was past, gone, and Rex gave a chilling snarl as he lunged forward, sinking his teeth into the soft flesh of Maurice’s throat. He gave a single, despairing scream before Rex’s bloody teeth tore out his throat. Blood spurted out in scarlet fountains, soaking the dog’s fur, yet it continued to savage the man’s flesh. Even as Maurice Jenkins was dying, ruined hands twitching, legs jerking in final spasms, Rex was still snapping and clawing, opening more wounds in the quivering flesh.

    Gradually the dog’s fury abated. It crawled off the mutilated, blood-spattered body and stood motionless, head hanging, blood drooling from its mouth. It moved across the tent and paused at the open flap. Every so often its body twitched. It began to whine, shake itself, snap its teeth at its own body. Suddenly it gave a long howl of misery and darted out of the tent. Twisting, writhing, leaping, it flopped over on its side and rolled over and over on the ground. On its feet again it shook its bloody head.

    Something moved in the fur of the dog’s back. A dark body, eight legs and a long, up-curved tail. The creature was about five inches long, and it moved with an unsure, almost hesitant action. Three more of the creatures disentangled themselves from the dog’s matted fur, dropping to the ground. They behaved as though they were unable to locate themselves, often colliding with each other and clicking the curved, pincer-like claws that protruded forward of the head.

    The dog became aware of the creatures. It started to whine, backing away from them. Suddenly it turned and streaked into the darkness.

    The creatures themselves huddled together for a time, until one of them began to crawl off through the deep grass. The others followed, keeping close together, the sound of their passing concealed by the soft sound of music playing.

    The music came from the radio lying on its side underneath the tangled sleeping bag inside Maurice Jenkins’s tent. The small lamp had been overturned, too, but it still burned, throwing a pale glow over the interior. There was no movement inside the tent. No sound except the radio playing on. Just beyond Maurice Jenkins’s outstretched and mutilated left hand lay the leather-bound copy of David
Copperfield.
It had fallen open at the page he had been reading. Blood that had pulsed strongly from Maurice’s throat had pooled on the ground beside the book, and now it was slowly soaking into the fine paper, darkening as it stained the pages, slowly obliterating the neat black printing…

    

    

    Les Mason lived for two more days.

    He died in the late afternoon of his third day in hospital, still suffering in great agony, despite the close attention of Doctor Renshaw and his staff, and the repeated attempts by Andrew Camperly to diagnose an effective antivenin, which might counteract the poison in his body.

    ‘Well, we did what we could,’ Renshaw said. He stood aside as Les Mason’s corpse was wheeled out of the room.

    Andrew Camperly nodded. ‘I don’t like being beaten, Renshaw. It doesn’t look good for the department.’

    Renshaw’s features hardened but he kept his thoughts to himself. He followed Camperly out of the room and they paused for a moment.

    ‘Thank you for trying anyway,’ Renshaw said.

    ‘There will have to be a post mortem, of course.’

    Renshaw nodded. ‘Yes. Probably tomorrow.’

    Td like one of my people to be there,’ Camperly said. ‘That is all right I suppose?’

    ‘Of course,’ Renshaw said, while inside he thought: you know damn well there wouldn’t be any objection.

    Camperly walked away, returning to his office. He noticed Allan Brady and called him over.

    ‘I thought you might be interested,’ Camperly said as Allan followed him inside the office. ‘That patient of Renshaw’s - the one with the sting-reaction.’ Camperly flicked through some papers on his desk. ‘He died a short while ago.’

    ‘You mean none of our treatments worked?’

    Camperly looked up, almost amused. ‘Don’t sound so surprised. We can’t save them all.’

    ‘Have you diagnosed the final cause?’

    ‘Of course I haven’t,’ Camperly snapped. ‘Good God, he only died twenty minutes ago!’

    ‘Yes, but what about my report on the blood…’

    ‘I meant to have a word with you about that,’ Camperly said. ‘May I remind you that all I asked for was a routine blood test report, not a flight of fancy.’

    ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Allan protested.

    Camperly leaned back in his chair, smiling gently, like an indulgent father being confronted by a hysterical child. ‘When I want a thesis written on the possible, probable, and the unlikely causes and effects of neurotoxaemia, I’ll prepare it myself.’

    ‘Doctor Camperly, I don’t think that’s fair!’

    ‘Frankly I don’t give a damn about your opinion, Doctor Brady!’ Camperly sat upright suddenly, his face hard. ‘Let us get something straight. Until you hear otherwise, just remember that I am in charge of this research unit, and I decide what is right and what is wrong!’

    ‘The conclusions I reached in that report were in no way distorted, Doctor Camperly,’ Allan protested.