When the house lights were switched on there came the usual ironical cheers and slow handclaps of an audience confronted with a breakdown at the crucial point in the film.
There was a further cheer from the audience as a spotlight came on and the manager appeared from the wings, carrying a stand-microphone to the centre of the stage. He waited patiently and good humouredly for the noise to die down. Then he said: ‘I must ask for complete silence.’
‘It looks as if we’ve got it!’ shouted someone in the front stalls. There was laughter.
‘What I have to say,’ said the manager, ‘is a matter of life and death. Your life and death.’ They were quiet this time. ‘But before I explain anything further, it is essential for your own safety that any of you who are eating sweets, ice-creams or nuts — anyone drinking lemonade, anyone smoking a cigarette… don’t. Put it down. Put it on the floor by your feet — it may be lethal.’ He saw someone get up and make as if to leave the theatre. ‘No one leave, please, until I have finished speaking. There is no danger in this building which you won’t meet outside. Now, I’ll explain…’
‘And so,’ said the Great Man, looking hard and square into the lens of the television camera, ‘a national emergency has arisen. A new kind of emergency. And because it is new, new measures must be taken against it. Otherwise we will all be in great danger — you, me, your wives, your children, your friends. Most of you, by now, will have read the evening papers, and will have learned the truth about the tins. “Why,” you will ask, “why weren’t we told the truth before?” Well, the answer to that, my friends, is that we didn’t know the truth. We know more of it now, and soon, I promise you, we will know the whole truth — no one and nothing will be spared in that endeavour…’
While the Prime Minister spoke, John and Julia sat before their television set, tense and appalled, not fully able to digest the magnitude of the situation. To them, it had never grown beyond the single can and the printing paper and the stricken child that they loved, and who now lay in a hospital bed…
In his Mayfair apartment Sydney Spigett, the man who for a time had loved success more than anything else, sat transfixed in front of the biggest and best television set that money could buy. And he knew the only thing that really mattered was that the woman he loved should survive his own act of negligence…
And at Morley’s preparatory school, Morningways sat in the headmaster’s study, watching the dimly lit screen of the ancient thing the Head called a television set, thinking of a fat little boy who was much too fond of chocolate. While the Prime Minister, impersonal, aloof yet somehow intimately, deeply concerned, spoke on…
‘…So this is what we have to do. Between now and tomorrow evening as much food as can be tested in the time will be sent to centres in each district — you will be told where they are over the radio and on television. Meanwhile, try to eat and drink as little as possible. By tomorrow morning, most of the water supplies will have been tested, but the more remote districts will take longer. Until then, use as little as you can, especially for drinking purposes…’
The telephone rang in the library. Sophie Tripling turned down the sound of the TV and picked up the receiver. ‘This is Dick,’ said a somewhat distant voice. ‘Dick Simmel.’
‘Hallo, Dick. Where are you? You sound an awful long way away.’
‘I’m in Scotland. Glennaverley. I went up in one of the helicopters. We’re doing a search here first thing tomorrow.’
Sophie raised her voice to compensate for the bad line. ‘Well, it’s nice to hear your voice.’
‘What?’
‘I said, it’s nice to hear your voice!’
‘Same here, plus!’ A pause. ‘Look, can I speak to your father?’
‘He’s not here. He’s at a War Office conference.’
‘Oh, damn!’
‘Anything I can do?’
‘Well, I don’t know. I can’t seem to get hold of anybody tonight — it’s absolutely verboten to disturb them at my Department — they’re still talking, and I should think they’ll be at it all night. But I discovered something rather interesting up here, and I think I ought to look into it. The trouble is I need a helicopter and I have no authority to take one up. I’ve got a pilot here beside me who’s perfectly willing, but he says he can’t do night flying without special permission. Of course, it’s especially dangerous in hilly country like this.’
‘Can’t it wait till morning?’
‘In view of the general panic, no. The Prime Minister has just made a statement on radio and television, and the whole thing’s pretty grim.’
‘Yes, I heard him.’
‘Besides, there’s practically a full moon tonight, and we’ll be able to see all we want to see.’
‘What is it exactly that you hope to find out?’
‘Sorry; I didn’t get that.’
‘What do you hope to find out, if you take the helicopter up?’
‘It’s a bit complicated to explain over the phone, and this is such a lousy line. But I think it’s important enough to take a chance.’
‘All right, Dick. I’ll call Daddy and he will call you. What’s the number?’
‘I’m at the airstrip — Glennaverley 59.’
She repeated the number back to him. Then she said: ‘If Papa says you can go up, you will take care, won’t you?’
‘I will; and thanks!’
Two minutes later Sophie had her father on the line. ‘You will make it quick, dear, won’t you? I’m in the middle of a most urgent meeting.’
She came straight to the point. ‘Dick Simmel wants to take up a chopper tonight. He needs your authority.’
‘Why didn’t he phone the Commission?’
‘I gather they’re not taking any calls.’
Sir Horace sounded grim. ‘I’m not surprised! I suppose you don’t know what he wants it for?’
‘No. It was a bad line, so he didn’t give me any details. But he did say it was very important and has a direct bearing on the crisis. I told him you’d phone the authority through if you agreed.’
‘All right,’ said General Tripling gruffly. ‘But I hope he knows what he’s doing. If he fouls a blade on one of those escarpments up there, he won’t know what hit him. I’ll get my G-One to phone through. Anything else?’
Sophie bit her lip. ‘When the colonel phones through, will you ask him to insist that the helicopter stays on the radio all the time? Just in case anything happens?’
‘I get your point, Sophie. But don’t worry too much; I’m sure he knows what he’s doing. What’s the number?’
A few minutes before 10 p.m. Major Pentecue revved up the engine of the helicopter. He smiled ruefully at Dick. ‘What goes up must come down,’ he said. ‘But I hope we come down when we mean to, and with three blades still left on the rotor!’
‘So do I, Major.’ He added, as an afterthought: ‘I’ve got a very good reason for staying alive.’
The plane took off, swiftly and vertically. Pentecue had to shout. ‘A girl?’
‘How did you guess?’
‘What’s she like?’
Dick gave the thumbs-up sign, and the pilot grinned. ‘In that case,’ he yelled, ‘I’ll try not to make this a suicide mission! Is that your river?’
Simmel looked down at the dark landscape below, then at the map he had across his knee. ‘I think so,’ he agreed. ‘Can you keep this altitude for a bit? Then we can get a general picture of the layout before we go in.’