"Yeah, so I gather. I'm a reporter by trade, a stringer for the nationals. 'Course, when the phone lines went down, that put paid to that career. Thank God for the food-sharing system we've got going. Anyway, journalism, you know, it's in your blood. I wanted to know what was happening, and I wanted to let everybody else know. So we set up a jungle drums news service, passing information to the next village along, and they would pass it along to the next, and so on." He shrugged in embarrassment. "It was the best we could do. We had to know."
"I admire your ingenuity," Ruth said. "Getting it set up so quickly. Most people wouldn't have bothered."
"Information is power. I've had that drummed into me ever since I started on a local rag." He seemed warmed by the praise. "We've managed to stretch from Appleby to Durham so far. And you wouldn't believe how much trouble we had setting that up. Some bloody civil servant or council twat stumbled across it at some point and tried to stop it. Can you believe it? He was ranting on about D Notices and not causing a panic. Then he set out to the next village in his car at twilight and we never heard from him again." There was a long pause while he sipped his beer. "You've got to adapt, haven't you? Nothing makes sense, but if you don't get your head round it you're just…" He searched for the right words. "Driving in a car to the next village, thinking it's a normal trip."
"You've done a good job here," Ruth said. He seemed to need the comfort; when he relaxed the strain was evident on his face.
"So tell me what you know," he said, suddenly excited. "Anything will help. Any little thing."
"Any little thing," Church repeated with an amused expression.
They didn't see anything wrong with filling Max in on many of the things they'd experienced since they'd got together. A hour and a half had passed before they'd finished and Max looked shellshocked. "That's amazing. Stupendous." He eyed them suspiciously for a moment, but it was obvious from their expressions that they weren't spinning him a yarn. "So you're some kind of heroes. Basic, day-to-day people standing up against unimaginable odds. This is just what people have been waiting to hear!"
"You've got it all wrong," Church said with a dismissive laugh. "From our perspective it looks very different."
"You're right there," Laura added grumpily.
"No, don't you see! This is something I can do! Tell the world about what you're doing-or at least the world as far as I can reach. Give people hope. You know, war reporting. Because that's what it is."
Veitch shook his head with irritation. "We don't need that. A bloody spotlight shining on us all the time! No way. Anyway, we wouldn't even recognise ourselves once you've finished. I know what bleedin' reporters are like."
"You owe this to the people. It's part of your job-"
"We don't owe anybody anything." There was an unpleasant harshness to Witch's voice.
"We were thinking about camping in the village somewhere," Ruth said to change the subject.
"You can't do that."
"No, you're probably right there. How about getting some rooms here?"
Max glanced over at the barman. "I'll have to ask Geordie. I don't know… In the current climate I'm not sure how keen he'll be to have strangers in the place." He sighed. "But we can't send you out into the night either, so he'll have to."
Tom leaned across the table to catch his attention. "You haven't told us what's going on here."
"Yes, of course." He scrubbed the hair at the nape of his neck, suddenly uneasy. "Well, it's not like we really know. We've all glimpsed things out there in the fields, but what they truly are-"
"What do they look like?" Ruth asked.
"We've only seen flashes, but we pieced things together from different accounts. When they move they're like sheets blowing in the wind. They seem to change and twist all the time, so they look, you know, not really solid, like they're not quite there. But they are." He took another swig of beer to moisten his drying mouth. "They've got teeth. One of the farmers saw them go through a sheep like it was a threshing machine. Turned the poor beast into chunks. That was the start of it."
"But not the end," Church said.
Max shook his head. "While they were out in the fields they were terrifying, but we could deal with it. They weren't here, you know? We were safe in our castles."
"But once they'd found their footing they began to come into the village." Tom nodded at the familiar pattern. "More prey, and easier to catch."
"They came into town one night like a storm blowing in, sweeping up the High Street, swirling around all the houses. Everyone knew what was out there in the fields, so they didn't really venture out that much at night. Anyway, they found their victim. Mrs. Ransom. She lived on her own in the big house at the top of the High Street. Quite well-to-do, but everyone got on with her, I suppose. There was a lot of blood, and…" His words dried up. As he stared blankly into the dregs of his pint, the awful strain was apparent on his face. "After that the place just shut down. It was hard to go anywhere during the day. A farm hand, Eric Rogers, went missing in the fields. They found him. Part of him. Some people thought they'd try to drive away to the city… some did, but most were afraid even to go anywhere in their cars. We were virtually prisoners in our houses. Every night we barricaded ourselves in, and every morning we'd run out to meet here."
"It's a wonder you managed to carry on living your lives," Veitch said.
"We didn't, at first. But we began to get an idea of their patterns. They'd be in the village every night after dark, but we didn't actually see them in the environs during the day. Just on the outskirts, in the fields and the roads. Then we realised something. After Mrs. Ransom, they hadn't taken anybody else from their house, even though a lot of the barricades were pretty flimsy things. But one night Jimmy Oldfield, who was this old lush from Recton Close, he got a bit funny in the head from all the pressure. He'd been in here drinking all day, telling everybody he'd had enough, that he was going to make a stand. Everybody thought it was just the booze talking." A guilty expression crossed his face.
"Anyway, that night they seemed to know Jimmy had the least defences because they hovered all around his door for ages, but they couldn't get in, didn't even try, really. That's what the people holed up across the road said. But Jimmy…" Max shook his head slowly. "I reckon he'd pickled his brain with all the whisky he'd drunk. He came to the door with his shotgun. All those awful things were gathered on his front garden, poised, like. Ready to attack. Jimmy opened the door just a crack to shove the shotgun out and that was it. They were in. There wasn't anything left of him the next day." He sighed, finished his beer. "So the upshot is, they only come into the village at night, and however dangerous they are, they can't get into your place if the door's shut tight."
Veitch shrugged. "It's a bit of a bastard not to be able to go out at night, but it shouldn't be too much trouble to keep everyone safe."
"You'd think, wouldn't you?" Max waved his glass for the barman to pour him another pint. "Anyway, after somebody got killed they never bothered us for a while so we could pretty much go about our lives as normal. We used the time to tell everybody in the village what we knew and to make sure all the old folk had good defences. They all got the rule: nobody opens their door after sunset."
They could all see what was coming. "But somebody else died," Church said.
"Not just one, three people. It doesn't make any sense! The things can't get inside if the house is shut up. And everybody knows they have to keep their doors locked at all times. So tell me how people are dying?" He took his drink from the barman and drained half of it too quickly.
"People do silly, dangerous things even when they know they shouldn't," Ruth suggested.