While I sat there pondering I was aware of something nudging at the back of my mind, some association of ideas that didn’t quite join up. I sought it for a moment or two, then, suddenly, it came. I could almost hear Walter’s voice speaking, saying:
“I tell you, a triffid’s in a damn sight better position to survive than a blind man.”
Of course he had been talking about a man who had been blinded by a triffid sting. All the same, it was a jolt. More than a jolt. It scared me a bit.
I thought back. No, it had just arisen out of general speculation—nevertheless, it seemed a bit uncanny now…
“Take away our sight,” he had said, “and our superiority to them is gone.”
Of course coincidences are happening all the time—but it’s just now and then you happen to notice them…
A crunch on the gravel brought me back to the present. A triffid came swaying down the drive toward the gate. I leaned across and screwed up the window.
“Drive on! Drive on!” said Josella hysterically.
“We’re all right here,” I told her. “I want to see what it does.”
Simultaneously I realized that one of my questions was solved. Being accustomed to triffids, I had forgotten how most people felt about an undocked one. I suddenly understood that there would be no question of coming back here. Josella’s feeling about an armed triffid was the general one—get well away from it, and stay away.
The thing paused by the gatepost. One could have sworn that it was listening. We sat perfectly still and quiet, Josella staring at it with horror. I expected it to lash out at the car, but it didn’t. Probably the muffling of our voices inside had misled it into thinking we were out of range.
The little bare stalks began abruptly to clatter against its stem. It swayed, lumbered clumsily off to the right, and disappeared into the next driveway.
Josella gave a sigh of relief.
“Oh, let’s get away before it comes back,” she implored.
I started the car, turned it round, and we drove off Londonward again.
A LIGHT IN THE NIGHT
Josella began to recover her self-possession. With the deliberate and obvious intention of taking her mind off what lay behind us, she asked:
“Where are we going now?”
“Clerkenwell first,” I told her. “After that we’ll see about getting you some more clothes. Bond Street for them, if you like, but Clerkenwell first.”
“But why Clerkenwell——？ Good heavens!”
She might well exclaim. We had turned a corner to see the street seventy yards ahead of us filled with people. They were coming toward us at a stumbling run, with their arms outstretched before them. A mingled crying and screaming came from them. Even as we came into sight of them a woman at the front tripped and fell; others tumbled over her, and she disappeared beneath a kicking, struggling heap. Beyond the mob we had a glimpse of the cause of it all: three dark-leaved stems swaying beyond the panic-stricken heads. I accelerated and swung off into a byroad.
Josella turned a terrified face.
“Did—did you see what that was? They were driving them.”
“Yes,” I said. “That’s why we are going to Clerkenwell. There’s a place there that makes the best triffid guns and masks in the world.”
We worked back again and picked up our intended route, but we did not find the clear run I had hoped for. Near King’s Cross Station there were many more people on the streets. Even with a hand on the horn it grew increasingly difficult to get along. In front of the station itself it became impossible. Why there should have been such crowds in that place, I don’t know. All the people in the district seemed to have converged upon it. We could not get through them, and a glance behind showed that it would be almost as hopeless to try to go back. Those we had passed had already closed in on our track.