Inside, the creatures had already set about their supper. One, he saw, was plucking the blue sweet morsel of a woman’s eye out of the socket. Another had a hand in its mouth. At Kaufman’s feet lay the Butcher’s headless corpse, still bleeding profusely from where its neck had been bitten through.
The little father who had spoken earlier stood in front of Kaufman.
‘Serve us?’ it asked, gently, as you might ask a cow to follow you.
Kaufman was staring at the cleaver, the Butcher’s symbol of office. The creatures were leaving the car now, dragging the half-eaten bodies after them. As the torches were taken out of the car, darkness was returning.
But before the lights had completely disappeared the father reached out and took hold of Kaufman’s face, thrusting him round to look at himself in the filthy glass of the car window.
It was a thin reflection, but Kaufman could see quite well enough how changed he was. Whiter than any living man should be, covered in grime and blood.
The father’s hand still gripped Kaufman’s face, and its forefinger hooked into his mouth and down his gullet, the nail scoring the back of his throat. Kaufman gagged on the intruder, but had no will left to repel the attack.
‘Serve,’ said the creature. ‘In silence.’
Too late, Kaufman realized the intention of the fingers —
Suddenly his tongue was seized tight and twisted on the root. Kaufman, in shock, dropped the cleaver. He tried to scream, but no sound came. Blood was in his throat, he heard his flesh tearing, and agonies convulsed him.
Then the hand was out of his mouth and the scarlet, spittle-covered fingers were in front of his face, with his tongue, held between thumb and forefinger.
Kaufman was speechless.
‘Serve,’ said the father, and stuffed the tongue into his own mouth, chewing on it with evident satisfaction. Kaufman fell to his knees, spewing up his sandwich.
The father was already shuffling away into the dark; the rest of the ancients had disappeared into their warren for another night.
The tannoy crackled.
‘Home,’ said the driver.
The doors hissed closed and the sound of power surged through the train. The lights flickered on, then off again, then on.
The train began to move.
Kaufman lay on the floor, tears pouring down his face, tears of discomfiture and of resignation. He would bleed to death, he decided, where he lay. It wouldn’t matter if he died. It was a foul world anyway.
The driver woke him. He opened his eyes. The face that was looking down at him was black, and not unfriendly. It grinned. Kaufman tried to say something, but his mouth was sealed up with dried blood. He jerked his head around like a driveller trying to spit out a word. Nothing came but grunts.
He wasn’t dead. He hadn’t bled to death.
The driver pulled him to his knees, talking to him as though he were a three-year-old.
‘You got a job to do, my man: they’re very pleased with you.’
The driver had licked his fingers, and was rubbing Kaufman’s swollen lips, trying to part them.
‘Lots to learn before tomorrow night. . .‘
Lots to learn. Lots to learn.
He led Kaufman out of the train. They were in no station he had ever seen before. It was white-tiled and absolutely pristine; a station-keeper’s Nirvana. No graffiti disfigured the walls. There were no token-booths, but then there were no gates and no passengers either. This was a line that provided only one service: The Meat Train.
A morning shift of cleaners were already busy hosing the blood off the seats and the floor of the train. Somebody was stripping the Butcher’s body, in preparation for dispatch to New Jersey. All around Kaufman people were at work.
A rain of dawn light was pouring through a grating in the roof of the station. Motes of dust hung in the beams, turning over and over. Kaufman watched them, entranced. He hadn’t seen such a beautiful thing since he was a child. Lovely dust. Over and over, and over and over.
The driver had managed to separate Kaufman’s lips. His mouth was too wounded for him to move it, but at least he could breathe easily. And the pain was already beginning to subside.