The column snaked forward through the ruined city, the passengers flanked by the armed crewmen. The passengers, many of them labouring for breath, thought the crewmen were going too fast; the crewmen, anxiously eyeing the surrounding buildings, thought they were going too slow. Jeffers was at the front with Jonas Jones; Dr Hill stayed at the back, encouraging those who were finding the going tough.
Claire moved back, and forth: sometimes at the front, aware of the tension; sometimes at the back, using her telescopic camera lens to scan the way they'd come.
Ty shadowed her all the way, aware that she was jittery. 'What's Jeffers so scared of? Monkey enslavement?'
Claire grinned at him. 'Something like that.'
But when he looked away the grin faded and her eyes flitted up the sides of the concrete valley they were passing through.
The devastation was immense. The plague must have struck New York very suddenly — so many cars were crashed off the road; hundreds of skeletons lay on the sidewalk and in stores, as if they had just dropped down dead rather than becoming ill and lingering for days the way they had on the Titanic. It reminded Claire of the many tourists they'd found dead on their deckchairs on the beach in St. Thomas, but on a hugely greater scale. Millions of people had died in this city, but some had survived — and apparently the only way they'd been able to feed themselves was by . . .
She could barely contemplate it.
Cannibals.
When Dr Hill had shown her the bone her immediate reaction was to laugh. Surely they were just cremating the bodies to cut down on disease? But then he'd shown her the grooves and chips in the bone where the meat and flesh had been cut away.
'OK,' she'd argued, 'so a couple of people went mad. It doesn't mean that every survivor is—'
'Claire,' Dr Hill said gravely, 'I've checked all of the bonfires and there are hundreds of bones, maybe thousands. This is cannibalism on a massive scale . . .'
Jeffers nodded beside him. 'Presuming that they've now developed some kind of a taste for human flesh, and if they're not eating each other, then they're going to be constantly on the lookout for fresh meat.'
'That's us,' said Jonas Jones.
Now they were walking through the ruined city, getting further and further away from harbour, the inflatables and the safety of the Titanic.
'I get the feeling we're being watched,' said Dr Hill, as Claire fell into step beside him.
'Me too,' said Claire. 'I wonder what human flesh tastes like?'
'Chicken. I'm told it tastes like chicken.'
Claire grimaced.
Five minutes later, First Officer Jeffers called a rest halt. Bottles of water were passed. As the crewmen formed a loose perimeter, guns ready, Jeffers warned everyone else not to wander off; despite this some poked into stores on either side of the broad avenue. Jeffers then checked in with Captain Smith. When he was finished Claire asked to use the radio and was patched through to Andy in the newsroom.
'Has Brian turned up yet?' she asked.
'No,' said Andy.
Claire tutted. 'I should have given the story to someone else. He may have an IQ off the scale, but it doesn't mean he knows how to write a decent—'
'Claire. We found his cell-phone. He was using it to tape his interview with that minister guy.'
'What do you mean you found it? Did he lose it or . . .' There were several long moments of speechless radio static. 'Andy?'
'We found it on the top deck at the very back of the ship by the rails. It was smashed to pieces. We've searched every inch of the ship, Claire. There's no other sign of him. If we found it there, then maybe he . . . you know, fell . . .'
Claire was momentarily stunned.
I sent a shy kid to interview someone who might be a killer, and now he's disappeared. I should have confronted Cleaver myself, not sent some green kid to do it.
But then she thought, no, that's jumping to conclusions. There could be a dozen reasons why Brian had disappeared. Maybe he'd dropped the phone by mistake, realised he'd lost the interview, and was too embarrassed to show his face in the office. Andy might well have claimed to have mounted a thorough search, but that was impossible in the short time that had passed — the ship was massive. It would take an organised team weeks to check every nook and cranny. Brian could quite easily just be hiding out. Or, if by some chance he had gone overboard, it didn't mean he'd been murdered. He might have been in some kind of freak accident — or he might even have killed himself. It wasn't unheard of for people to throw themselves off the Titanic. Losing loved ones, your home: even losing treasured mementoes had been known to drive people to suicide. There was no way of knowing if Brian was 'the type' to kill himself, because there was no type. It could affect anyone. One moment they were there, the next they were gone.
Claire sighed. 'OK — look, we need to keep looking. Inform Captain Smith, he'll organise a proper search.'
'Will do. What's it like out there?'
'Interesting,' said Claire.
She talked for a few more minutes, while Andy wrote her observations down. It looked like they were going to be ashore for several days, and there was still a daily paper to produce, so she would have to take opportunities like this to file her reports. When she was finished she handed the radio back to Jeffers, grabbed a bottle of water for herself, and was just turning to look for Ty when she jumped suddenly.
The Rev. Calvin Cleaver was right beside her. Centimetres away.
'Sorry,' he said, his voice a cold rasp. 'I didn't mean to frighten you.'
'You — you didn't. . .' Claire took a step back. She glanced around to make sure someone was watching.
'We haven't been introduced . . . apparently I shot you.'
His eyes were pale and tinged with red, his teeth sharp and crooked. Claire had time and again counselled herself not to judge a book by its cover, but it was impossible. Cleaver might as well have had evil bad guy printed on his head. It just seemed that nobody else was aware of it.
'Yes. . . yes . . . you . . .'
She found herself involuntarily rubbing at her arm. It ached. Like it knew that the monster responsible was right there.
'I'm really dreadfully sorry.'
He reached out, and before she could do anything, he had taken hold of her hand. He clasped it between his own. His flesh was cold and clammy.
'I wish I could make it up to you.'
'No . . . no . . . it's quite . . .'
She wanted to run, but he wouldn't let go.
'I couldn't help but overhear . . . has something happened to that little fellow sent to interview me?'
She was trying to read his eyes. Were they cold and gloating, or were they just like that?
'We're . . . not sure — he seems to have disappeared.' She took a step back, and in so doing managed to free her hand from his grasp. It just slipped out. 'The interview — you did it with him?'
'Oh, yes. He asked all sorts of interesting questions. He was really awfully smart. Nervous, but intelligent, I thought.'
'His cell-phone was found on the top deck, smashed.'
'Really? How odd. He interviewed me in the restaurant on the eleventh. Do you really think something has . . . happened to him?'
'I . . . don't know.'
At that moment Cleaver was distracted by First Officer Jeffers calling on them all to get ready to move out again. There were groans from some of the older passengers as they got to their feet. Claire hurried towards the front of the column. She felt odd — unclean. The hand he had held was moist with her cold sweat and his. She wiped it on her jeans. He had acted pious and innocent, but he knew something, she was sure of it. But again, it was just a feeling — intuition, no cold hard facts.
They were just about to move when one of the passengers cried out: 'Not yet — my wife isn't here.'
Jeffers shook his head impatiently and hurried down the column. 'Well where is she? We haven't time to hang around.'
The passenger, a bald man with a paunchy belly was wearing a Hawaiian shirt, and standing in the doorway of an optician's store. 'She was looking for a new pair of sunglasses. She was thirsty, I went to get her another bottle of water . . . I only left her for a minute . . .'
Jeffers studied the store for a moment, before moving past the passenger and into the interior, removing his pistol as he did so. Two crewmen followed him in. Claire peered through the front window at display cabinets full of designer glasses caked with thin layers of dust, before following the passenger inside. She immediately noticed a slight breeze coming from the rear of the store where a door lay open. Jeffers cautiously approached this and looked out into the alley beyond. It was empty. He bent and lifted something from the ground. He held up a pair of glasses, with one cracked lens. The passenger hurried up and examined them.
'These are Mary's! These are her glasses . . .' He looked about him, his eyes full of panic and desperation. 'I don't understand — I was only gone for a minute! Where is she?'
Jeffers moved back into the store, closing the door behind him.
'What're you doing?' the passenger demanded. 'She must be out there — she's—'
'She's gone.' Jeffers' voice was as hard and cold as Claire had ever heard it.
'What do you mean she's . . . ? She must have just popped to the next store — she's . . .'
Jeffers led the way out of the optician's. 'We're leaving, we're leaving now!' he cried. He strode straight up to the head of the column, geeing people up along the way. 'C'mon, let's go!'
Claire stepped into the column about halfway along, beside Ty and a little way behind Cleaver.
The passenger whose wife had disappeared remained in the store doorway. 'We can't just leave her!' he cried.
But that's what was happening. As the column moved out, passengers and crew alike avoided eye contact with him.
'Please!'
They kept going.
'What do you think happened?' Ty whispered, glancing back.
'Don't know,' said Claire.
'Jeffers looks spooked.'
Claire nodded.
'Those damn monkeys,' said Ty.