Purification (30 page)

In common with the basic reactions of the thousands upon thousands of other bodies which had previously dragged themselves up from the ground and begun to move in this way, the shell that had once been Harcourt turned and tried to walk away. But it couldn’t move. It was trapped, held tightly from behind by the grabbing hands of numerous rotting bodies on the other side of the fence.

Already agitated by the noise of the plane and the helicopter flying low overhead minutes earlier, the resurrection of the dead soldier had provoked more basic, brutal reactions. The most dexterous of the vicious creatures managed to poke their decaying fingers through the wire mesh and held onto the cadaver’s hair, clothing and whatever else they could grab onto. The bodies pulled relentlessly at Harcourt’s remains, trying hopelessly to drag them back through the fence, not understanding that the wire barrier was stopping them. Eventually the numb fingers lost their grip and slipped away, allowing the corpse to stumble off again in the opposite direction.

On the other side of the fence, just to the right of where Harcourt’s body had been momentarily trapped, another body was reacting in a different way. Eight weeks ago this creature had been a young, intelligent and attractive clothing store manager with a bright future ahead of it.

Now it was a mud-splattered, half-naked, emaciated collection of brittle bone and rotting flesh. Unlike the majority of the huge, seething crowd, however, this one was beginning to exhibit signs of real control and determination. Unlike those which simply stood there vacantly or those which ripped and tore at the other corpses immediately around them, this body was beginning to think. Pressed hard against the fence and surrounded by many thousands of creatures on either side and a similar number behind, it knew that it needed to move to survive.

On the other side of the mesh it could just about make out the dark blur of Harcourt’s body tripping away with relative freedom and it decided that was what it needed to do. It grabbed the wire with cold, bony hands and began to shake it. Other bodies began to do the same.

36

With Danvers Lye now almost completely cleared and the majority of Cormansey’s dead population destroyed, the group on the island set about moving from building to building, removing the last remaining corpses and beginning to try and clean and disinfect the various isolated houses and other buildings which were dotted around the bleak landscape.

Michael, Danny Talbot and Bruce Fry had taken the jeep down to the southernmost tip of the island and were beginning to slowly make their way back north along the simple road network. They had cleared and emptied one house already and were now getting ready to start work on the second. In comparison to the gloom of the previous day this morning was bright, dry and relatively warm.

Conditions were good and they could see the next building from a fair distance away as they approached. Its red-bricked frontage contrasted obviously and starkly with the rest of the predominantly green, brown and grey land surrounding.

Michael stopped the jeep outside the house. The three men crossed the road and walked the short length of the garden path up to the front door. They paused, partly because they wanted to assess the situation before they barged inside, partly because they were apprehensive about what they might find there. It didn’t matter how many corpses they had previously found and disposed of, each new discovery was different to the last and was almost always unsettling. Michael found it especially difficult dealing with those bodies he found in their own homes.

Perhaps it was because the corpses they came across in the streets had a peculiar anonymity and detachment from their surroundings. Conversely, when he came across a body which had died in its own environment and surrounded by its own belongings, he instinctively tried to piece together the details of their lives before they had been so brutally cut down. Seeing what these people had once been made it immeasurably more difficult to think of them just as lumps of cold, dead flesh. Whatever the reason for his feelings, they left him uncomfortable and nervous.

‘Listen,’ he whispered as they stood at the door. Talbot moved a little closer. They could hear something moving inside the house. They’d always known they’d find many places like this. The germ had originally attacked so quickly and so early in the morning that they had always expected to find the occasional building where the occupants had been trapped inside when it had caught and killed them. Fry peered through the windows at the front of the building, first the kitchen and then the living room. He could see the remains of a motionless body lying on the ground next to an armchair. He could also see shadows and faint signs of movement in the doorway. If it was a corpse moving through the house, then it was in the hallway, no doubt attracted there by the sudden noisy arrival of the three survivors at the front of the building.

‘Can’t see a lot, Mike,’ Fry said from a short distance away. ‘Might as well just go for it.’

Michael pushed the door and it opened inwards with ease. Instinctively he took a step back as the single moving occupant of the house shuffled and tripped out of the shadows and lurched towards him. His heart sank. This was one of those devastating occasions when he found it impossible to think of the bodies as objects. Sometimes the scale of the tragedy still took him by surprise. Sometimes it still hurt. He stood to one side as the emaciated remains of a small child stumbled towards him. Half his height, the poor kid could only have been five or six when they’d died.

The deterioration of the body was such that he wasn’t even sure whether it had been a boy or a girl. It continued to move closer with the familiar awkward gait and pointless intent of the dead. It fixed him with its cold, vacant eyes.

Funny, he thought, how death had stripped away all individuality from the remains of the population. This thing looked and behaved no differently to the bodies which were twice its size and many more years older.

Danny Talbot stepped forward and, with a sudden grunt of effort, chopped angrily at the body’s slender neck with a hand axe. It took five good, hard swipes before the head and spinal cord had been sufficiently damaged to stop the corpse from moving. It fell at Michael’s feet and he knelt down next to it.

‘Okay?’ asked Fry.

Michael nodded. Holding his breath and trying hard to ignore the suffocating smell of the insect-infested body, he picked it up in gloved hands and carried it gently out of the garden and over to the roadside. He placed it down on the grass verge as they’d agreed with the others. Their job today was purely to concentrate on emptying the properties.

Others would drive around the island again later, pick up all the bodies in the truck and transport them to a single disposal point. That was all this poor child had left now, he thought sadly as he stared into what was left of its face. No school. No adolescence. No first kiss. No leaving home. No getting a job. No successes. No failures. Nothing.

By the time Michael had stood up again and turned round Fry and Talbot had already disappeared inside. He followed them indoors.

‘Anything else in here?’ he asked. The smell in the house was typically obnoxious and overpowering.

‘Just this one, I think,’ answered Fry. He was pointing into the living room at the body on the carpet that he’d seen from outside. Talbot could be heard upstairs checking out the bedrooms. A few seconds later and he came crashing back down, his face flushed red with the sudden effort.

‘Clear,’ he gasped.

Fry grabbed hold of the bony wrists of the corpse in the living room and dragged it out into the hall. Presumably the mother of the dead child, it had been comparatively well preserved having been maintained in a dry and relatively constant environment. It left behind a dark and sticky stain of decomposition on the dust-covered carpet.

The cold, echoing house was modest and traditional and in many ways it reminded Michael of Penn Farm. The way Fry was disposing of the cadaver was also reminiscent of the way that he and Carl Henshawe had removed the remains of the farmer Arthur Jones from the farmhouse living room several weeks earlier. The musty smell and lack of fresh air gave the building an antique, museum-like atmosphere.

‘You sure you’re okay?’ Fry mumbled as he came back indoors after dumping the body on the grass verge by the road. ‘You seem miles away this morning.’

Michael was still standing in the hallway, looking around at the interior of the house.

‘I’m fine,’ he replied quickly. Fry had picked up on the fact that Michael seemed distant and preoccupied but, until that moment when it had been pointed out to him, he’d been oblivious to it himself. He did feel different today though, there was no denying it. As well as continuing to worry constantly about Emma and the other survivors back on the mainland, he was also having to contend with a bewildering combination of a number of other unexpected emotions. He felt a strange and unpleasant sense of anti-climax - almost disappointment - and he couldn’t initially understand why. He wondered whether it was because he was gradually becoming aware of the limitations of the island. As safe and protected a place as it would no doubt eventually prove to be, he could also see it becoming a restricted and stifling environment. Their isolation and remote location would inevitably make it difficult for them to grow and expand their small community easily. It was already obvious that Cormansey was not going to be the haven that he and the others had naively dreamed it would be. Nothing was going to be easy here, that much was for sure. Michael wondered whether it was what had happened yesterday that was making today so difficult? Was it because he’d suddenly had to face up to aspects of the life he’d lost that was now causing him to feel so much confusion and doubt?

Their brief this morning had been simply to clear the bodies from the homes they visited. Looking around this particular small and unimposing property, however, it was obvious that there was going to be much more work to do to make each building inhabitable again. In the kitchen Michael found that the fridge and cupboards were filled with rotten food. Dust, mould and decay was everywhere.

Nothing was salvageable. There were numerous traces of insect and rodent infestations. Some of the taps and the pipe work running through the house were exhibiting signs of severe corrosion. An open window in one of the bedrooms, as well as letting in a supply of relatively fresh air, had also allowed several nesting birds and two month’s worth of rainwater into the room. Damp was spreading across the bedroom walls.

The implications of what he saw around him, although he chose not to share them with the others, were immense and humbling in their scale. What he saw today was a world slowly being reclaimed. No doubt the arrival of the survivors on Cormansey would prolong the life and usefulness of this building and others on the island but elsewhere, back on the mainland, the process of decay and deterioration would continue unchecked. The disappearance of man from the face of the planet was inevitably going to cause a massive change and imbalance to the ecosystem. Crops would no longer be grown or harvested. Vermin would be allowed to breed and consume.

The decay of millions of bodies would inevitably result in a huge increase in the numbers of insects, germs and disease.

The ramifications were endless.

When he’d arrived on the island he’d felt strong, determined and full of hope. Today, however, those feelings had started to fade. In comparison to the almost unimaginable scale of the changes the infection had bought to the entire planet, the minor achievements of this small group of survivors meant nothing.

Unquestionably disheartened, Michael dragged himself back out to the jeep with the other two men.

‘Where to next?’ he asked.

‘Road splits in a while,’ Fry replied. ‘We’ll keep going west. Harper said he was sticking to the east side.’

‘Okay.’

Michael sat back in the driver’s seat and readied himself for the next building. He stared into the wing mirror and watched the bodies of the child and its mother for a couple of long, thoughtful seconds before turning the key in the ignition and starting the engine. He accelerated away quickly.

‘Did that kid bother you?’ Talbot asked from the back seat. The way he had asked his question illustrated the level of his comparative immaturity. Nevertheless Michael was surprised that he had even noticed the change in his mood.

‘Everything’s bothering me today,’ he grunted, abruptly and honestly.

‘Decent weather,’ Fry said cheerfully, doing his best to lighten the increasingly dark and sombre mood. ‘Just imagine what this place is going to be like in the summer.

Plenty of coastline, good fishing waters…’

‘Got to get through the winter first,’ Talbot reminded him.

‘I know, but that doesn’t…’

‘What’s that?’ Michael interrupted. He leant forward and peered up into the sky.

‘What?’ asked Fry.

‘Up there. Look, Lawrence is back.’

He slowed the jeep and pointed up into the clear sky.

The helicopter could clearly be seen now, scurrying across the deep blue like a small black spider.

‘Bloody brilliant,’ Fry sighed with relief. ‘Some help at last. Wonder who he’s brought with him? Hope it’s someone who’s going to pull their weight. The last thing we need here is…’

‘The plane,’ Talbot announced.

All eyes switched from staring at the helicopter to scouring the sky, looking for the plane. Fry spotted it first and pointed it out to Michael. It seemed to be following the exact same course the helicopter had taken. Suddenly feeling more alive and invigorated than he had done at any part of the day so far, he put his foot down and accelerated again.

‘Where you going?’ Fry asked as they sped past the front of the next house and carried on down the narrow road.

‘Just want to see who’s here,’ Michael muttered, his pulse racing with sudden nervousness and anticipation.

By the time the jeep had reached the airstrip both the plane and the helicopter had already landed. The passengers were quickly being unloaded from the back of the plane. They staggered onto the tarmac strip and wandered towards Brigid and Spencer who approached on foot from the far end of the runway. The new arrivals looked around in awe at their surroundings like tourists arriving at some long awaited and much anticipated holiday destination. Gary Keele ran in the opposite direction and stopped when he reached a patch of long grass. He bent over double, put his hands on his knees and threw up into the clump of weeds at his feet. Landing the plane had proved to be even more nerve-wracking than taking-off.