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somewhat similar to this  if only from a limited and perhaps paleontological viewpoint,
that of someone examining fossils  but at least the tortured figures at Pompeii had
remained recognisably human. Not twisted, compressed, elongated... or even reversed,
with all of their organs visible on the outside!
But such were the moulds in the magmass. At which point the Duty Officer had
had enough...
Seated upright behind his desk, Grieve snapped back in his chair, cut himself
free from Jake's mind like a piece of suddenly released elastic. And:
'Jesus!' he said. 'Jesus!' And no sign of the ex-Army Officer, the oh-so-
phlegmatic, English gentleman now. 'You... you... you know that place!' he said.
And returned to the present of his own accord, Jake nodded. 'Yes,' he answered
wonderingly, his eyes wide and staring. 'Yes, I do. And I know the coordinates, too.'
'Was it in the files?' Grieve pulled himself together. 'It must have been in those
files.'
'Something of it,' Jake answered. 'But not like that. That was the real thing. Little
by little, I seem to be remembering, that's all.'
'Remembering what Harry knew?'
'It has to be,' said Jake. And then he, too, pulled himself together. 'Don't waste
your time trying to figure it out, John. Myself, I gave up on that a long time ago. Anyway,
you said you wanted me to see something that came in overnight?'
At which the Duty Officer opened a drawer and handed Jake a decoded copy of
the Minister Responsible's memo to Ben Trask...
22
NEWS FROM PORTON DOWN  THE END
OF THINGS  JAKE: REMEMBERING...
At a Bulgarian service station-cum-restaurant-and-rest-rooms midway between
Topolovgrad and Jambol, still following the Tundza in a direction due north, Ben Trask
and his task force had paused to take refreshment and dust themselves off. The sun
was high in a blue sky and the day had turned quite warm. It was Trask's best
opportunity to read the Minister Responsible's deciphered message without the constant
interruptions of the minibus's jarring motion  or so he had reckoned. But as for
interruptions:
As his party sat down at a wooden table with a sun umbrella in the restaurant's
beer garden overlooking the river, a waiter bustled into view and inquired, 'Do we having
a Mr Trask?'
Trask answered, 'I'm Trask. Is there something?'
'Telephone,' said the other, smiling. 'I having the number. You should please be
calling, er, a Mr Burdur?'
Trask looked at the others and said, 'Ali Bey. It could be important. Order
something for me, will you?' And then he followed the waiter indoors to the telephone.
Burdur was waiting for the call. The phone at the other end was snatched from its
cradle at the first ring, and: 'Mr Trask? Ben, is it you?' Burdur's voice; Trask sensed his
excitement.
'Yes, what is it?' he said.
'Ben, last night another vehicle stolen. Being seen heading toward border post. I
thinking this your, er, quarry?'
'Good!' said Trask. 'Do we have the make and number?'
'The number, yes,' said Burdur, and Trask quickly scribbled it down. 'As for the
make... it is unmistakable. Forgetting the make, my friend, because you are certainly
knowing this vehicle when you seeing it. Knowing it at once, immediately. It is the big
black hearse!'
'A hearse?' Trask repeated the Inspector, and pictured the vehicle in his mind's
eye. A long, broad black car  indeed a limo  with benchlike seats in the back for the
pall bearers, and windows curtained in black velvet. Such a conveyance would be
ideally suited, certainly to the needs of Malinari, Vavara, and Szwart. And it would be
just spacious enough if a little cramped  for their recent recruits, the girls from the
vampirised cruise ship. Then again, if that troupe had been in any way diminished...
there would be more than sufficient room.
'Ben?' Burdur's voice came again. 'Ben Trask, did you hearing me? It is the
funeral vehicle, this stolen car.'
'I heard you,' Trask nodded, if only to himself. 'A hearse, and very much in
keeping, too.'
'I wishing you luck, my friend,' said Burdur then. 'And I hoping my problems are
going with ' and here his voice sank low, almost to a whisper, ' going with the
vampires!'
'I hope so, too,' said Trask. 'Goodbye.'
'Goodbye,' Burdur answered, and Trask heard his telephone handset go down...
_
_
Back at the table in the beer garden, after Trask had told the others about his
conversation with Burdur, finally he was able to read the Minister Responsible's
message.
And at E-Branch HQ in London, Jake Cutter, Necroscope, was reading it at
almost the same time:
_
Trask
Just in from Porton Down, where they have had every available
microbiologist working on it since square one, the following information:
(1) Their initial assessment was only partly correct. Large doses of
plague bacteria will destroy these creatures, but only after an extended
period. The first tests were carried out on incomplete samples  such as
the one you obtained from the Eve. Star  and that was where the error
occurred. Tissue separated from a carrier (ergo, without will) succumbs
much more readily and totally.
(2) The sleepers we saw at Bleakstone: one of them was a lawyer,
and rather than suffer his threatened lawsuit the idiot psychiatrists let him
go! He is still at large. The other sleeper, when he began to react to our
recommended agents, was sent to Porton Down, making him the perfect
test medium. Sorry if I sound less than sympathetic toward him. He is in [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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