I tried to console her a little.
“They can scarcely have known it, either of them,” I told her. “When it is strong enough to kill, it’s mercifully quick.”
We did not see any other triffid in hiding there. Possibly the same one had attacked them both. Together we crossed the path and got into the house by the side door. Josella called. There was no answer. She called again. We both listened in the complete silence that wrapped the house. She turned to look at me. Neither of us said anything. Quietly she led the way along a passage to a baize-covered door. As she opened it there was a swish, and something slapped across the door and frame, an inch or so above her head. Hurriedly she pulled the door shut again and turned wide-eyed to me.
“There’s one in the hall,” she said.
She spoke in a frightened half whisper, as though it might be listening.
We went back to the outer door, and into the garden once more. Keeping to the grass for silence, we made our way round the house until we could look into the lounge hall. The French window which led from the garden was open, and the glass of one side was shattered. A trail of muddy blobs led over the step and across the carpet. At the end of it a triffid stood in the middle of the room. The top of its stem almost bushed the ceiling, and it was swaying ever so slightly. Close beside its damp, shaggy bole lay the body of an elderly man clad in a bright silk dressing gown. I took hold of Josella’s arm, afraid she might rush in there.
“Is it—your father?” I asked, though I knew it must be.
“Yes,” she said, and put her hands over her face. She was trembling a little.
I stood still, keeping an eye on the triffid inside lest it should move our way. Then I thought of a handkerchief and handed her mine. There wasn’t much anyone could do. After a little while she took more control of herself. Remembering the people we had seen that day, I said:
“You know, I think I would rather that had happened to me than to be like those others.”
“Yes,” she said, after a pause.
She looked up into the sky. It was a soft, depthless blue, with a few little clouds floating like white feathers.
“Oh yes,” she repeated with more conviction. “Poor Daddy. He couldn’t have stood blindness. He loved all this too much.” She glanced inside the room again. “What shall we do? I can’t leave——”
At that moment I caught the reflection of movement in the remaining windowpane. I looked behind us quickly to see a triffid break clear of the bushes and start across the lawn. It was lurching on a line that led straight toward us. I could hear the leathery leaves rustling as the stem whipped back and forth.
There was no time for delay. I had no idea how many more there might be round the place. I grabbed Josella’s arm again and ran her back by the way we had come. As we scrambled safely into the car, she burst into real tears at last.
She would be the better for having her cry out. I lit a cigarette and considered the next move. Naturally she was not going to care for the idea of leaving her father as we had found him. She would wish that he should have a proper burial—and, by the looks of it, that would be a matter of the pair of us digging the grave and effecting the whole business. And before that could even be attempted it would be necessary to fetch the means to deal with the triffids that were already there and keep off any more that might appear. On the whole, I would be in favor of dropping the whole thing—but then it was not my father…
The more I considered this new aspect of things, the less I liked it. I had no idea how many triffids there might be in London. Every park had a few at least. Usually they kept some docked ones that were allowed to roam about as they would; often there were others, with stings intact, either staked or safely behind wire netting. Thinking of those we had seen crossing Regent’s Park, I wondered just how many they had been in the habit of keeping in the pens by the zoo and how many had escaped. There’d be a number in private gardens too; you’d expect all those to be safely docked—but you never can tell what fool carelessness may go on. And then there were several nurseries of things and experimental stations a little farther out…