Necroscope II Wamphyri(Vampyri) - By Brian Lumley Page 0,155

to be sick.

'God?' the thing in the shower croaked, like a voice from the abyss. 'What god? You bloody black bastards!'

Impossibly she came erect, took a blind, stumbling, groping step forward.

Layard torched her again, but more out of mercy than from fear. He let his flame-thrower roar until fire belched out of the shower and threatened to burn him, too. Then he switched off, backed away down the corridor to where Jordan stood retching over the stair's balustrade.

From below, Roberts's voice reached anxiously up to them: 'Ken? Trevor? What is it?'

Layard wiped his forehead. 'We... we got the girl,' he whispered, then shouted, 'We got the girl!'

'We got her mother,' Roberts answered, 'and Bodescu's dog. That leaves Bodescu himself, and his mother.'

'There's a door up here, locked,' Layard called back. 'I thought I heard someone in there.'

'Can't you break it in?'

'No, it's oak, old and heavy. I could burn it. .

'No time for that. And if there is anyone in there, they're finished anyway. The cellars are mined by now.

You'd better come down - and quickly! We have to get out of here.'

Layard dragged Jordan after him down the stairs, calling ahead, 'Guy, where the hell have you been?'

'I'm on my own,' Roberts responded. 'Trask's out of it for now - but he's OK. Where've I been? I've been checking this place through downstairs.'

'A waste of time,' Jordan groaned, half to himself.

'What?' Roberts raised his voice more yet.

'I said, we'd already done it!' Jordan yelled, but needlessly for they were down the stairs, with Roberts propelling them towards the entrance hall and the open door...

Simon Gower and Harvey Newton had gone down into the cellars via the outbuilding with its narrow steps and central ramp. Loaded down with almost two hundred pounds of explosives between them, they had found the lights out of order, and so been obliged to use pocket torches. The vaults under the house were black and silent as a tomb, seemed extensive as a catacomb. They stuck close together, dumping thermite and plastic explosive packages wherever they found support walls or buttressed archways, and even though they went with something of caution, still they managed rapidly to fairly well saturate the place with their load. Newton carried a small can of petrol with which he left a trail from one dump to the next, until the whole place reeked of highly volatile fuel.

Finally they were satisfied that they'd explored and mined every part - and likewise pleased that they'd come across nothing dangerous - and so turned back and retraced their tracks to the exit. At a place they both agreed to be approximately central under the house, they set down the last of their load. Then Newton splashed what was left of his petrol all the way to the foot of the out building steps, while Gower double-checked the charges they'd planted, making sure they were all amply primed. - At the steps Newton tossed down his empty can, turned

and looked back into the gloom. From a little way back, round a corner, he could hear Gower's hoarse breathing and he knew that the other man worked furiously at his task. Gower's torch made flickering patches of light back there, its beam swinging this way and that as he worked.

Roberts appeared at the top of the steps, called down, 'Newton, Gower? You can come up out of there as quick as you like. We're all set if you are. The others are spread out round the house, just waiting. The mist has cleared. So if anything tries to break loose, we'll - '

'Harvey?' Gower's tremulous voice came out of the darkness, several notes higher up the scale than it should be. 'Harvey, was that you just then?'

Newton called back, 'No, it's Roberts. Hurry up, will you?'

'No, not Roberts,' Gower was breathless, almost whispering. 'Something else . .

Roberts and Newton looked at each other round-eyed. The ground gave itself a shake, a very definite tremor. From inside the cellars, Gower screamed.

Roberts came half-way down the steps, stumbling and yelling: 'Simon, get out of there! Hurry, man!'

Gower screamed again, the cry of a trapped animal. 'It's here, Guy! Oh, God - it's here! Under the ground!'

Newton made to go in after him but Roberts reached down and grabbed his collar. The ground was shaking now, dust billowing out of the yawning mouth of the old cellars. There were rending sounds, and other noises which might or might not be Gower choking his life out. Bricks started to