With this closing of the avenues of communication, the problem of food-supply became acute. The rations remaining in each centre were distributed hurriedly and inefficiently among the population; and then the end was in sight.
I have no wish to dwell upon that side of the story. I saw glimpses of it, as I shall tell in due course, but all I need do here is to indicate certain results which flowed naturally from the condition of things.
When the coal- and food-shortage became acute, the population divided itself naturally into two classes. On the one hand were those who, moved either by timidity of new conditions or a fear of the Plague, fortified themselves in their dwellings and ceased to stir beyond their doors until the end overtook them; whilst, on the other, a second section of the population driven either by despair or adventurousness, quitted the districts in which it knew there was no hope of survival and went forth into the unknown to seek better conditions.
Thus in the ultimate stages of the debacle, the country resembled a group of armed camps through which wandered a floating population of many thousand souls, growing more and more desperate as they journeyed onward in search of an unattainable goal. In the movements of this migratory horde, two main streams could be perceived. Those who had set forth from the cities knew that no food remained in the large aggregations of population; and they therefore wandered ever outward from their starting-point; the country legions, knowing that the land was barren, fixed their eyes upon the great centres in the hope that there the stores of food would still be unexhausted. Both were doomed to disappointment, but despair drove them on from point to point.
Of all the centres of attraction, London formed the greatest magnet to draw to itself these floating and isolated particles of humanity. Like fragments of flotsam in a whirlpool, they were attracted into its confines; and once within that labyrinth, they emerged no more. Lost in its unfamiliar mazes, they wandered here and there, unable to escape even if they had wished to do so; and no Ariadne waited on them with her clue. Perhaps I overrate the strangeness of the spectacle and lay more stress upon it than it deserves. It may be that in the depths of the country even weirder things were done. But London I saw with my own eyes in the last stages of its career; and I cannot shake myself free from the impression made upon me by that uncanny shadow-show beneath the moon.
Gradually but surely the tide of human existence ebbed in Britain outside the Nitrogen Area. Here and there in the central districts there might be isolated patches whereon some living creatures remained by accident with food sufficient to prolong their vitality for a little longer; but after a few months even these were obliterated and the last survivors of the race of men were to be found clinging to the coasts of the island where food was still to be procured from the sea. Some of them struggled through the Famine period under these conditions; but most of them perished eventually from starvation; for even in the marine areas conditions were changing and the old abundant harvest of sea-creatures had passed away. The herring and other edible fish were driven to new feeding-grounds. The supply brought in by the fishing-boats diminished steadily, until at last men ceased to go out upon the waters and gave up the struggle. The winter was an exceptionally bitter one—possibly the change in the surface conditions produced by B. diazotans affected the world-climate, though that is still a moot point—and the cold completed the work. Long before the spring came, Britain was a mere Raft of the Medusa lying upon the waters and peopled by a handful of survivors out of what had once been a mighty company.
XI
Fata Morgana
To explain how I came to witness the spectacle of London in its extremity, I must go back to the evening at Nordenholt’s which I have already described. He persisted in his project of forcing us into the fresh air, often twice or thrice a week if the weather was favourable; and to tell the truth, I was nothing loath. Over a hundred hours of my week were spent in concentrated mental activity under conditions which removed me more and more from direct contact with human affairs as time went on; and I looked forward with pleasure to these brief interludes during which I could take up once more the threads of my old life and its interests.
Nordenholt himself contributed but little to the conversation on these excursions. Sometimes he brought with him one of his numerous experts and spent the time in technical discussions; but usually he occupied the back seat of the car alone, lost in his thoughts and plans, while I drove and Miss Huntingtower sat beside me.
As our time was limited, and we wished to avoid the city as much as possible, our routes were mainly those to the west, by the Kilpatrick Hills or the Campsies. We never pushed farther afield, as Nordenholt had forbidden me to go outside the boundaries of the Nitrogen Area. I think he was afraid of what she might see by the roadside if we passed the frontier.
Even during these few short afternoons, I came to know her better. Somehow I had got the impression that she was graver than her years justified; but I found that in this estimate I was mistaken. She was sobered by the responsibility of her work, but
