In the entrance hall, he met the orderly named Norton. “Where can I find Fred Lamson?”
“He’ll be on Ward Two at this time. Hold on and I’ll fetch him for you.”
Lamson came downstairs a few minutes later. Carlsen said: “I need another dose of that hypnoid solution.”
Lamson looked startled. “Are you sure? You know how strong it is?”
“I know. But I’d be glad if you could get it for me.”
“Okay. I’ll bring it to you.”
Carlsen waited in the hall; from the surgery, he could hear the voice continuing. At this distance, its quality reminded him of voices manufactured on a computer. It also struck him that its strength had increased.
Lamson came down the stairs and held out the small cardboard box. “There’s another syringe in there. But be careful. An overdose could kill him.”
“Don’t worry.”
Lamson said: “What’s he been up to?”
Carlsen slapped him lightly on the shoulder. “If I told you, you wouldn’t believe me. But you’ll learn all about it later. Thanks for your help.”
He opened the surgery door quietly. There was a silence. Heseltine glanced around at him, then looked away. Apparently someone had asked a question. The curiously flat voice sounded as if it was reading from a script.
“It was necessary to adopt human bodies to make contact with your race. If you examine them closely, you will discover that they contain silicon instead of carbon.”
Heseltine said: “In that case, why didn’t you try to make contact with us, instead of disappearing?”
The answer came sooner than Carlsen expected. “You know the answer to that. I was caught unawares and killed before I could prevent myself.”
Fallada said: “What are you doing?” Carlsen was standing beside the couch, the hypodermic syringe poised over the naked arm. The creature stopped speaking, puzzled by the question. Carlsen drove in the needle and pressed the plunger. He withdrew the needle, leaving a drop of blood on the skin. After a silence, the creature’s voice said: “I do not understand . . .”
It trailed off. Fallada said: “Neither do I. Why did you want to do that?”
Carlsen was silent for a moment, watching Armstrong’s breathing. Then he said: “Because we’ve got to hurry. We’ve got to get back to London.”
Heseltine said: “But was that necessary? Don’t you trust him?”
Carlsen snorted. “No, of course I don’t.”
Fallada asked with astonishment: “Why not?”
“Because it told us only half the truth. I’ll explain when we’re in the Grasshopper. Now we’d better go. Help me lift him.”
“What do you want to do with him?”
“Take him back with us.” He depressed the capsule-release switch of the recorder and dropped the capsule into his pocket.
Sergeant Parker was dozing on the lawn, his shirt open to the waist. He sat up and stared with astonishment at the slumped figure in the wheelchair. Heseltine said: “Help us lift him. We’ve got to get back to London as quickly as possible. How soon can we do it?”
“Half an hour, if we push it.”
It took them five minutes to manoeuvre the heavy body onto the rear bench seat of the Grasshopper. Less than a minute later, they were airborne. Lamson, who had come out onto the front steps, waved to them as they rose vertically from the lawn.
Heseltine, still breathing heavily, said: “I didn’t notice any contradictions in his story.”
“It was full of contradictions. You noticed one yourself. If they assumed human bodies in order to make contact with us, why didn’t they do it?”
“Surely he explained that? He killed young Adams without premeditation, then panicked –”
“Creatures like that don’t panic. They calculate. Did he explain why they were all in a state of suspended animation when we found them?”
“To make the journey pass more quickly — for the same reason we sleep on aeroplanes.”
“In that case, why was it so difficult to wake them up?”
“We didn’t have time to ask that. You knocked him out again.”
Carlsen said: “There’s no need to ask. The reason’s obvious. They wanted us to bring them all back to earth. And when we’d got them here, they’d all die off, one by one. . . and we wouldn’t even suspect we’d brought vampires back to earth. All we’d notice is the sudden rise in crimes of violence, sadistic murders, and so on.”
Heseltine shook his head. “I don’t know whether I’m unusually gullible, or you’re unusually mistrustful.” The question was an implied reproach.
Carlsen said: “Look at his story again. First of all, he explains how his race helped our race to evolve. That could be true, although we have to take his word for it. Then he describes their accident. That could be true too. It was after that I began to notice the contradictions. They became parasites on other living creatures. They stole the bodies of some squidlike creatures on another planet. And then, according to him, they tried the experiment of living off natural foods, to see what happened. That made them begin to age, so they went back to living off other intelligent creatures.”
Fallada said: “But without destroying them. You remember, he compared their method to dairy farming –”
Carlsen said: “You forget we eat cows as well as milk them. He was trying to convince us that they treated their victims as fellow creatures. I don’t believe it. Why do you suppose they move from planet to planet? Because they’re natural predators, and they can’t resist the urge to destroy their victims. When they’ve destroyed all the life on one planet, they move to another.”
Fallada said: “But you’ve no evidence for that. It might be true, but we don’t know.”
“I’ve got an instinct about it. Nothing in their behaviour leads me to trust them. The rest of these creatures are out there in space, slowly dying of hunger. Why should they be dying of hunger if they’ve learned this art of dairy farming? They’d make sure they brought enough food with them, as we do when we take a nine-month trip to Jupiter. They couldn’t take enough food with them, because they’ve eaten the larder bare. And the earth’s intended to be their next larder.”
Fallada and Heseltine were obviously impressed by his reasoning, yet neither was entirely convinced. They turned to look at the prostrate body, as if this could provide an answer. Fallada said: “I still feel we owe them something. After all, they landed in this predicament after they’d been trying to help us evolve into real human beings. And according to him, they taught us about agriculture. Or do you think that was a lie too?”
“Not necessarily. Of course they wanted us to evolve. When they returned to earth twenty thousand years ago, there probably weren’t more than a million human beings altogether. Even those who were little better than animals. They left us to breed and evolve, so they could come back when we’d multiplied. And now they’ve got a larder that could last them for ten thousand years. I’ll tell you something else. He says they came to earth hoping to meet some of their own kind –”
“But surely that’s common sense?”
“Is it? What do you suppose their own kind could have done for them? They couldn’t help them to get back to Orion. They don’t use spaceships. They convert themselves into some higher form of energy that can travel faster than light. And these creatures lost that power after they became vampires.”
“How do you know?”
“Surely it’s obvious. If they hadn’t lost it, they’d go back home. That’s why they need a spaceship to move around now.”
“But their own people might be able to help them.”
“Do you think that likely? They’ve turned into galactic criminals. They probably left the earth to avoid their own people. They’ve become lepers.”
Fallada said musingly: “It’s an interesting thought. A kind of Fall.”
Sergeant Parker pointed below. “That’s Bedford, sir. We should be back in ten minutes. Shall I go to the Yard?”
Heseltine looked at Carlsen. Carlsen said: “It might be better to go to the Ismeer Building. We could leave Armstrong there. We’ve got to keep him knocked out.” He asked Falllada: “Does that suit you?”
“Of course. My assistant Grey can take care of that.”
Heseltine said: “And then what?”
Carlsen said: “If I’m not mistaken, you’ll find a message from the Prime Minister waiting for you. He’ll be anxious to know what you’re doing.”
Heseltine said: “There is a message. I rang my wife this morning. The P.M. wants to see all three of us as soon as possible.”
“Good. Then we’ll go and see him.”
Heseltine said doubtfully: “He’ll be more difficult to handle than Armstrong. What do you intend to do?”
“I don’t know. But I’m certain of one thing. We’ve got to see him face to face. There’s no other way.”