'If I mixed you a hot brandy and lemon?' he suggested. 'Could you manage that?'
She thought for a moment. 'I could try.' She wrapped her dressing gown around her. 'I'm so cold…'
The fire was roaring in the grate. 'I'll go out and get some more wood,' he said. 'Then I'll get you a hot drink.' He went out to the woodpile in the gathering darkness, and took the opportunity to open the boot of the car and eat three beef sandwiches. He came back presently to the living room with a basket of wood, and found her standing by the cot. 'You've been so long,' she said. 'Whatever were you doing?'
'I had a bit of trouble,' he told her. 'Must be the meat pies again.'
Her face softened. 'Poor old Peter. We're all of us in trouble…' She stooped over the cot, and stroked the baby's forehead; she lay inert now, too weak apparently to cry. 'Peter, I believe she's dying…'
He put his arm around her shoulder. 'So am I,' he said quietly, 'and so are you. We've none of us got very long to go. I've got the kettle here. Let's have that drink.'
He led her from the cot to the warmth of the huge fire that he had made. She sat down on the floor before it and he gave her the hot drink of brandy and water with a little lemon squeezed in it. She sat sipping it and staring into the fire, and it made her feel a little better. He mixed one for himself, and they sat in silence for a few minutes.
Presently she said, 'Peter, why did all this happen to us? Was it because Russia and China started fighting each other?'
He nodded. 'That's about the size of it,' he said. 'But there was more to it than that. America and England and Russia started bombing for destruction first. The whole thing started with Albania.'
'But we didn't have anything to do with it all, did we-here in Australia?'
'We gave England moral support,' he told her. 'I don't think we had time to give her any other kind. The whole thing was over in a month.'
'Couldn't anyone have stopped it?'
'I don't know… Some kinds of silliness you just can't stop,' he said. 'I mean, if a couple of hundred million people all decide that their national honour requires them to drop cobalt bombs upon their neighbour, well, there's not much that you or I can do about it. The only possible hope would have been to educate them out of their silliness.'
'But how could you have done that, Peter? I mean, they'd all left school.'
'Newspapers,' he said. 'You could have done something with newspapers. We didn't do it. No nation did, because we were all too silly. We liked our newspapers with pictures of beach girls and headlines about cases of indecent assault, and no government was wise enough to stop us having them that way. But something might have been done with newspapers, if we'd been wise enough.'
She did not fully comprehend his reasoning. 'I'm glad we haven't got newspapers now,' she said. 'It's been much nicer without them.'
A spasm shook her, and he helped her to the bathroom. While she was in there he came back to the sitting room and stood looking at his baby. It was in a bad way, and there was nothing he could do to help it; he doubted now if it would live through the night. Mary was in a bad way, too, though not quite so bad as that. The only one of them who was healthy was himself, and that he must not show.
The thought of living on after Mary appalled him. He could not stay in the flat; in the few days that would be left to him he would have nowhere to go, nothing to do. The thought crossed his mind that if Scorpion were still in Williamstown he might go with Dwight Towers and have it at sea, the sea that had been his life's work. But why do that? He didn't want the extra time that some strange quirk of his metabolism had given to him. He wanted to stay with his family.
She called him from the bathroom, and he went to help her. He brought her back to the great fire that he had made; she was cold and trembling. He gave her another hot brandy and water, and covered her with the eiderdown around her shoulders. She sat holding the glass in both hands to still the tremors that were shaking her.
Presently she said, 'Peter, how is Jennifer?'
He got up and crossed to the cot, and then came back to her. 'She's quiet now,' he said. 'I think she's much the same.'
'How are you, yourself?' she asked.
'Awful,' he said. He stopped by her, and took her hand. 'I think you're worse than I am,' he told her, for she must know that. 'I think I may be a day or so behind you, but not more. Perhaps that's because I'm physically stronger.'
She nodded slowly. Then she said, 'There's no hope at all, is there? For any of us?'
He shook his head. 'Nobody gets over this one, dear.'
She said, 'I don't believe I'll be able to get to the bathroom tomorrow. Peter dear, I think I'd like to have it tonight, and take Jennifer with me. Would you think that beastly?'
He kissed her. 'I think it's sensible,' he said. 'I’ll come too.'
She said weakly, 'You're not so ill as we are.'
'I shall be tomorrow,' he said. 'It's no good going on.'
She pressed his hand. 'What do we do, Peter?'
He thought for a moment. 'I'll go and fill the hot-water bags and put them in the bed,' he said. 'Then you put on a clean nightie and go to bed and keep warm. I'll bring Jennifer in there. Then I'll shut up the house and bring you a hot drink, and we'll have it in bed, together, with the pill.'
'Remember to turn off the electricity at the main,' she said. 'I mean, mice can chew through a cable and set the house on fire.'
'I'll do that,' he said.
She looked up at him with tears in her eyes. 'Will you do what has to be done for Jennifer?'
He stroked her hak. 'Don't worry,' he said gently. 'I'll do that.'
He filled the hot-water bags and put them in the bed, tidying it and malting it look fresh as he did so. Then he helped her into the bedroom. He went into the kitchen and put the kettle on for the last time, and while it boiled he read the directions on the three red cartons again very carefully.
He filled a thermos jug with the boiling water, and put it neatly on a tray with the two glasses, the brandy, and half a lemon, and took it into the bedroom. Then he wheeled the cot back and put it by the bedside. Mary was in bed looking clean and fresh; she sat up weakly as he wheeled the cot to her.
He said, 'Shall I pick her up?' He thought that she might like to hold the baby for a little.
She shook her head. 'She's too ill.' She sat looking down at the child for a minute, and then lay back wearily. 'I'd rather think about her like she was, when we were all well. Give her the thing, Peter, and let's get this over.'
She was right, he thought; it was better to do things quickly and not agonize about them. He gave the baby the injection in the arm. Then he undressed himself and put on clean pyjamas, turned out all the lights in the flat except their bedside light, put up the fire screen in the sitting room, and lit a candle that they kept in case of a blackout of the electricity. He put that on the table by their bed and turned off the current at the main.
He got into bed with Mary, mixed the drinks, and took the tablets out of the red cartons. 'I've had a lovely time since we got married,' she said quietly. 'Thank you for everything, Peter.'
He drew her to him and kissed her. 'I've had a grand time, too,' he said. 'Let's end on that.'
They put the tablets in their mouths, and drank.
That evening Dwight Towers rang up Moira Davidson at Harkaway. He doubted when he dialled if he would get through, or if he did, whether there would be an answer from the other end. But the automatic telephone was still functioning, and Moira answered him almost at once.
'Say,' he said, 'I wasn't sure I'd get an answer. How are things with you, honey?'
'Bad,' she said. 'I think Mummy and Daddy are just about through.'
'And you?'
'I'm just about through, too, Dwight. How are you?'
'I'd say I'm much the same,' he said. 'I rang to say good-bye for the time being, honey. We're taking Scorpion out tomorrow morning to sink her.'
'You won't be coming back?' she asked.
'No, honey. We shan't be coming back. We've just got this last job to do, and then we've finished.' He paused. 'I called to say thank you for the last six months,' he said. 'It's meant a lot to me, having you near.'
