The Satan Bug

'You saw the incident that Corporal Muirfield here has described?'

' 'Course I saw it.'

'Lie number one, Ferguson. Lie number two and you'll be returned to your regiment before the day is out.'

'I'm not lying.' His face was suddenly ugly. 'And you can't talk to me like that, Mister Cavell. You can't threaten me any more. Don't think we don't all know you were sacked from here!'

I turned to the orderly. 'Ask Colonel Weybridge to come here. At once, please.'

The orderly turned to go, but a big sergeant rose to his feet and stopped him.

'It's not necessary, sir. Ferguson's a fool. It's bound to come out. He was at the switchboard having a smoke and a cup of cocoa with the gatehouse communications number. I was in charge. Never saw him there, but I knew about it and didn't worry about it. Ferguson always left Rollo in number one — and that dog's a killer, sir. It was safe enough.'

'It wasn't, but thanks. You've been in the habit of doing this for some time, haven't you, Ferguson?'

'I haven't.' He was scowling, sullen. 'Last night was the first—'

'If there was a rank lower than private,' I interrupted wearily, 'you'd stay in it till the end of your days. Use what little sense you have. Do you think whoever arranged this decoy move and was standing by with his pliers ready to break in did it unless he knew for certain you wouldn't be on patrol at that particular time? Probably after Mr. Clandon finished his 11 p.m. rounds visit to the main gate every night you went straight into the gatehouse for your smoke and cocoa. Isn't that it?'

He stood staring down at the floor in stubborn silence until the sergeant said sharply, 'For God's sake, Fergie, use your loaf. Everybody else here can see it. So can you.'

Again silence, but this time a sullen nod of defeat.

'We're getting someplace. When you came here you left your dog — Rollo — behind?'

'Yes, sir.' Ferguson's days of truculent defiance were over.

'What's he like?'

'He'd tear the throat out of any man alive, from the general downwards,' Ferguson said with satisfaction. 'Except me, of course.'

'He didn't tear out any throats last night,' I pointed out. 'I wonder why?'

'He must have been got at,' Ferguson said defensively.

'What do you mean 'got at'? Did you have a look at him before you turned him into his compound last night?'

'Look at him? 'Course not. Why should I? When we saw the cut outer fence we thought whoever done it must have caught sight of Rollo and run for his life. That's what I would have bloody well done. If—'

'Fetch the dog here,' I said. 'But for God's sake muzzle him first.' He left and while he was away Hardanger returned. I told him what I'd learned, and that I'd sent for the dog.

Hardanger asked, 'What do you expect to find? Nothing, I think. A chloroform pad or something like that would leave no mark. Same if some sort of dart or sharply tipped weapon with one of those funny poisons had been chucked at him. Just a pinprick, that's all there would be.'

'From what I hear of our canine pal,' I said, 'I wouldn't try to hold a chloroform pad against his head if you gave me the crown jewels. As for those funny poisons, as you call them, I don't suppose one person in a hundred thousand could lay hands on one of them or know how to use them even if they did. Besides, throwing or firing any sharp-tipped weapon against a fast-moving, thick-coated target in the dark would be a very dicey proposition indeed. Our friend of last night doesn't go in for dicey propositions, only for certainties.'

Ferguson was back in ten minutes, fighting to restrain a wolf-like animal that lunged out madly at anyone who came near him. Rollo had a muzzle on but even that didn't make me feel too confident. I didn't need any persuasion to accept the sergeant's word that the dog was a killer.

'Does that hound always act like this?' I demanded.

'Not usually.' Ferguson was puzzled. 'In fact, never. Usually perfectly behaved until I let him off the leash — then he'll go for the nearest person no matter who he is. But he even had a go at me this afternoon — half-hearted, like, but nasty.'

It didn't take long to discover the source of Rollo's irritation. Rollo was suffering from what must have been a very severe headache indeed. The skin on the forehead, just above eye-level, had a swollen pulpy feeling to it and it took four men all their time to hold the dog down when I touched this area with the tips of my forefingers. We turned him over, and I parted the thick fur on the throat till I found what I was looking for — two triangular jagged tears, deep and very unpleasant looking, about three inches apart.

'You'd better give your pal here a couple of days off,' 1 said to Ferguson, 'and some disinfectant for those gashes on his neck. I wish you luck when you're putting it on. You can take him away.'

'No chloroform, no fancy poisons,' Hardanger admitted when we were alone. 'Those gashes — barbed wire, hey?'

'What else? Just the right distance apart. Somebody pads his forearm, sticks it between a couple of strands of barbed wire and Rollo grabs it. He wouldn't bark — those dogs are trained never to bark. As soon as he grabs he's pulled through and down onto the barbed wire and can't pull himself free unless he tears his throat out. And then someone clouts him at his leisure with something heavy and hard. Simple, old-fashioned, direct and very very effective. Whoever the character we're after, he's no fool.'

'He's smarter than Rollo, anyway,' Hardanger conceded heavily.

CHAPTER THREE

When we went up to 'E' block, accompanied by two of Hardanger's assistants newly arrived from London, we found Cliveden, Weybridge, Gregori and Wilkinson waiting for us. Wilkinson produced the key to the heavy wooden door.

'No one been inside since you locked the place after seeing Clandon?' Hardanger asked.

'I can guarantee that, sir. Guards posted all the time.'

'But Cavell here asked for the ventilation system to be switched on. How could that be done without someone going inside?'

'Duplicate switches on the roof, sir. All fuse-boxes, junctions and electrical terminals are also housed on the roof. Means that the repair and maintenance electricians don't even have to enter the main building.'

'You people don't miss much,' Hardanger admitted. 'Open up, please.'

The door swung back, we all filed through and turned down the long corridor to our left. Number one lab was right at the far end of the corridor, as least two hundred yards away, but that was the way we had to go: there was only the one entrance to the entire block. Security was all. On the way we had to pass through half a dozen doors, some opened by photo-electric cells, others by handles fifteen inches long. Elbow handles. Considering the nature of the burdens that some of the Mordon scientists carried from time to time, it was advisable to have both hands free all the time.

We came to number one lab — and Clandon. Clandon was lying just outside the massive steel door of the laboratory, but he wasn't any more the Neil Clandon I used to know— the big, tough, kindly, humorous Irishman who'd been my friend over too many years. He looked curiously small now, small and huddled and defenceless, another man altogether. Not Neil Clandon any more. Even his face was the face of another man, eyes abnormally wide and starting as one who had passed far beyond the realms of sanity into a total and terror-induced madness, the lips strained cruelly back over clenched teeth in the appalling rictus of his dying agony. And no man who looked at that face, at the convulsively contorted limbs could doubt that Neil Clandon had died as terribly as man ever could.

They were all watching me, that I was vaguely aware of, but I was pretty good at telling my face what to do. I went forward and stooped low over him, sniffing, and found myself apologising to the dead man for the involuntary wrinkling distaste of nose and mouth. No fault of Neil's. I glanced at Colonel Weybridge and he came forward and bent beside me for a moment before straightening. He looked at Wilkinson and said, 'You were right, my boy.