“？’Ullo, cock,” it said, amiably enough. “So you’ve come to, ’ave yer? ’Ang on a bit, an’ I’ll get you a cup o’ char.” And it vanished again.
The instruction to hang on was superfluous, but I did not have to wait long. In a few minutes he returned, carrying a wire-handled can with some tea in it.
“Where are yer?” he said.
“Straight ahead of you, on the bed,” I told him.
He groped forward with his left hand until he found the foot of the bed, then he felt his way round it and held out the can.
“？’Ere y’are, chum. It’ll taste a bit funny-like, ’cause ol’ Charlie put a shot of rum in it, but I reckon you’ll not mind that.”
I took it from him, holding it with some difficulty between my bound hands. It was strong and sweet, and the rum hadn’t been stinted. The taste might be queer, but it worked like the elixir of life itself.
“Thanks,” I said. “You’re a miracle worker. My name’s Bill.” His, it seemed, was Alf.
“What’s the line, Alf? What goes on here?” I asked him.
He sat down on the side of the bed and held out a packet of cigarettes with a box of matches. I took one, lit the first, then my own, and gave him back the box.
“It’s this way, mate,” he said. “You know there was a bit of a shindy up at the university yesterday morning—maybe you was there?”
I told him I’d seen it.
“Well, after that lark, Coker—he’s the chap what did the talking—he got kinda peeved. ‘Hokay,’ ’e says, nasty-like. ‘The ——s’ve asked for it. I put it to ’em fair and square in the first place. Now they can take what’s comin’ to them.’ Well, we’d met up with a couple of other fellers and one old girl what can still see, an’ they fixed it all up between them. He’s a lad, that Coker.”
“You mean—he framed the whole business—there wasn’t any fire or anything?” I asked.
“Fire—my aunt Fanny! What they done was fix up a trip wire or two, light a lot of papers and sticks in the hall, an’ start in ringing the ol’ bell. We reckoned that them as could see ’ud be the first along, on account of there bein’ a bit o’ light still from the moon. And sure enough they was. Coker an’ another chap was givin’ them the k.o. as they tripped, an’ passin’ them along to some of us chaps to carry out to the truck. Simple as kiss your ’and.”
“H’m,” I said ruefully. “Sounds efficient, that Coker. How many of us mugs fell into that little trap?”
“I’d say we got a couple of dozen—though it turned out as five or six of ’em was blinded. When we’d loaded up about all we’d room for in the truck, we beat it an’ left the rest to sort theirselves out.”
Whatever view Coker took of us, it was clear that Alf bore us no animosity. He appeared to regard the whole affair as a bit of sport. I found it a little too painful to class it so, but I mentally raised my hat to Alf. I’d a pretty good idea that in his position I’d be lacking the spirit to think of anything as a bit of sport. I finished the tea and accepted another cigarette from him.
“And what’s the program now?” I asked him.
“Coker’s idea is to make us all up into parties, an’ put one of you with each party. You to look after the scrounging, and kind of act as the eyes of the rest, like. Your job’ll be to help us keep goin’ until somebody comes along to straighten this perishin’ lot out.”
“I see,” I said.
He cocked his head toward me. There weren’t any flies on Alf. He had caught more in my tone than I had realized was there.