on them without stepping out into the killing sun.
The troglodytes would not come out until nightfall. But Ball wouldn't be able to make any distance in the daytime. He was shaking, containing an explosion by force of will. Winthrop had a vision of the vampire bursting. He was so close to Ball that his body would be riddled with shrapnel-like bone fragments. That would, at least, be mercifully swift.
Nearby was an isolated patch of wall, remnant of an unidentifiable building. In the lea of the wall was a deep, cool pool of dark. Winthrop gathered his strength and determination, then dragged Ball across the ground. Ball missed his footing but did not become a dead weight.
The wall would afford a shield against fire from the tunnel mouth, but they had to dash across the open to get there. Mellors fired again, with a countryman's accuracy. A red gobbet exploded in Ball's burned-black side. It was a plain lead bullet, for the wound did not slow the pilot.
Before the troglodyte chieftain could draw a bead on the living man, Winthrop was behind the wall, back slammed to shaking bricks. Darkness cloaked around and Ball collapsed. He tried to reach his wound with his remaining hand, but his elbow would not bend as required. Winthrop looked at the mawlike gape. Flesh and skin swarmed actively over shattered ribs. A tiny twig of new growth sprouted from the stump of Ball's lost arm, ending with a bud which might in time be a fresh hand. His healing faculties were exerted, but his wounds were too many and profound.
Having made it behind the wall, it was hard to feel the situation much improved. They had to wait for nightfall to move on. The troglodytes would then be able to bear down on them with despatch. It was unthinkable that Winthrop leave Ball here.
Shots thwacked against the wall, shaking the loose bricks. A few well-placed bullets and the wall would collapse on their heads. Winthrop dug out his cigarette case. He stuck two cigarettes in his mouth, lit them from his last-but-one match, and eased one between Ball's broken teeth. They sucked smoke and shook their heads.
'Really, this is foolish. You pop off home and send back for me.'
Winthrop coughed.
'Not likely help would arrive in time, I admit,' Ball said. Slabs of burned face had chipped away from his soot- blackened skull. One of his eyes was burst and congealed.
Slumped, Winthrop was overcome with weariness. He slid down the wall and hung his head. He wasn't sure he could even continue under his own steam. He had lost blood and been battered extensively. And, discounting his period of hung-up- to-dry unconsciousness, he'd not slept in nearly two days. It was also over a day since he had eaten anything.
'I always intended to have children-in-darkness. I wanted to pass on the gift.'
In his current state, Ball was not a good advertisement for the gift of vampirism. One of his legs was dead, broken in several places, slowly resolving itself to skin flakes, flesh dust and bone chips.
'If I hadn't accepted the Dark Kiss, I'd have been done for when Lothar von Richthofen shot me down. I've stayed on well past my time. Now it's over.'
Winthrop tried to contradict the pilot.
'No, old thing. I can tell I'm done for. There's less and less of me to save, and what's left is not much worth saving.'
'I can't go on either. I'm about done in.'
A shot ricocheted off bricks and spanged across the crater.
The pilot reached down to his leg and crumbled his thigh in his fingers. The skin came apart like burned paper, the muscle wafted to dust and the bone snapped into fragments like a length of chalk. A breeze scattered the dust.
'I'm finished, Winthrop.'
His jaw was loose at the hinges. Blood leaked from his mouth.
'Who turned you?'
Slug-like muscles over Ball's cheekbones twitched. Winthrop realised his lipless, fleshless face was trying to smile.
'A girl on Brighton pier.'
'Was she an elder?'
He was thinking of the centuried Isolde.
Ball shook his head. His scalp and helmet were fused into a loose, fragile covering. 'Just a new-born. An 'artist's model'. She said her name was Mildred.'
Winthrop could imagine a Mildred.
'Some vampires can regenerate entirely after decapitation.'
Ball's larynx clicked in an approximation of laughter.
'You're welcome to give it a bash, but I doubt you'd have much joy. I've an indifferent bloodline, I think.'
The dying vampire sat up, crinkling his stomach. Winthrop bent his ear to listen. Ball reached out and got a grip on Winthrop's shoulder. He still had strength in his wrist.
'There's only one way I can go on,' Ball whispered.
Thinking he understood, Winthrop loosened his collar. He would not mind Ball drinking his blood.
'It's too late for that.'
Ball's teeth were loose. One or two had slipped out of their holes. His purple tongue was swollen. He let go of Winthrop's shoulder and drew a sharp, thick nail across his throat, stabbing the jugular vein. Viscid blood oozed out. It was more like a jelly than a liquid.
Take my strength, Winthrop. What's left of it.'
His throat rebelled at the thought. The vampire blood was strong-smelling. In shadow, it caught the sun and shone a pulsing mauve.
'You'll be stronger. You'll take a part of me with you.'
A cloud passed across the sun.
'Evening draws on, my boys,' shouted Mellors.
Ball's eye glowed. 'Winthrop, do it quickly.'
The decision was made for him. He held up the insubstantial Ball, feeling bones dissolving inside him, and touched his tongue to the snake trickle of blood. It was not the familiar, salt tang he knew. It was not human blood. A sherbet-prickle numbed his tongue, and he found himself lapping thirstily at the wound, swallowing ropy, sweet liquid.
Ball shivered in Winthrop's embrace but his slow blood continued to flow. Then, he came apart completely. A bad taste hit Winthrop's mouth at the instant of true death. Ashes fell away from his face.
He coughed, trying hard to keep the lumpy stuff in his stomach. His mind was cleared as if by a dose of salts. His eyes quickened, catching dozens of tiny movements. It was a sensation he associated with the early, pleasant stages of being drunk on champagne.
Ball looked as if he had been dead and forgotten for years. He decomposed drily. His head shrivelled to a thinly parchmented skull. It was detached from the body.
To turn vampire, you have to drink vampire blood at the same time as a vampire is drinking your blood. What he had done with Ball would not make a new-born of him. He was just like those old fools who dose themselves with vampire bloodsalts to retain their vigour. But he did feel changed. His knee ceased to trouble him, and the wire-gouges on his wrists healed over. His weariness was washed away and his hunger soothed.
'Come, civil night, thou sober-suited matron, all in black,' quoted Mellors.
'Which of you said that?'
It was strange: as if Albert Ball had spoken through Edwin Winthrop. In his mind, Winthrop remembered flying. Not his own memories, but those of the vampire.
'Both of us, Mellors, and a very good day to you.'
Winthrop stood up and stepped out of the shadow, keeping the wall still between him and the cave mouth. Sunlight did not hurt him, though his face tingled as if he had the beginnings of a tan.
'Ah, it's Winthrop, the observer. Do you plan to run off and leave your comrade. Surely, that's not cricket, not the school spirit.'
'Ball is dead,' he said, not sure.
