stepped out into the gloom towards the man.
The man’s eyes remained on the food.
‘There you go, mate. This is for you and the others out there,’ he said, placing it on the road in front of him. Only when he’d backed up a few steps did the man come forward.
‘Thanks,’ he uttered quickly before reaching for each hoof and dragging the haunches off into the gloom, leaving a glistening trail of grease on the road.
They returned to their own meal and ate in sombre silence, listening to the faint sounds further down the motorway; murmuring and cries, the occasional sound of garbled half-words exchanged between them.
‘We better try and get some sleep,’ said Adam.
‘You’re kidding, right?’ said Bushey. ‘With them wild people out there?’
‘I think they’re harmless. All the same, we probably ought to take turns keeping an eye open.’
Adam sorted them into three watches. Leona and Walfield took the first watch, keeping the fire ticking over and listening to the noises the people were making. A couple of hours later, when Bushey and Harry relieved them, there was nothing to be heard but somebody moving far off down the slip road and amongst the dark streets of Chigwell. It could have been the children, it could have been dogs, it could have been that small herd of deer.
Chapter 73
10 years AC
Southend-On-Sea, Essex
Maxwell watched his boys messing around on the dodgems. They’d teamed up into groups of three; one in each car and two to push. Howls of delight and good-natured banter filled the deserted seaside fairground as they bounced heavily off each other.
Southend-on-Sea was the first obvious stop. They were more or less out of the Thames Estuary. Looking east along the coastline past Canvey Island was the North Sea. The tugboat had chugged and juddered slowly as it hugged the estuary shoreline. They’d travelled about forty miles today which was further than he thought they’d make. But it had made a significant dent in the boat’s supply of diesel, according to Jeff.
Tomorrow, if they were lucky enough to have the sea as flat as they’d had today, the pilot assured him there was enough fuel to get them as far as Felixstowe where there was a large container port. With a bit of luck they’d be able to locate some more fuel, perhaps even stay a day or two and forage through all those containers and warehouses for anything that might be useful.
Felixstowe being a big container port was going to be a very useful stop. Southend, on the other hand, had nothing . . . except apparently endless unpowered fairground rides. The shops and cafés had been comprehensively picked clean over the years. A number of the once fine buildings along the seafront Marine Parade had caught fire; the blackened carcasses sandwiched between amusement arcades and banks of those ‘claw’ vending machines that still held hundreds of sun-bleached soft toys prisoner. And along the kerbside several brown husks that had once been recreational trucks sat rusting on stubs of melted tyre rubber and blackened wire. No doubt set aflame the same night as the buildings when the town’s chavs came out onto the street to celebrate the lights going out and the promise of unpoliced fun and games.
‘Sir? Mr Maxwell?’
He turned away from the boy-powered dodgems to see Nathan standing a couple of yards away.
‘What is it?’
The lad looked uncomfortable.
‘What’s the matter, Nathan?’
‘You . . . you said we was just going to visit them.’
‘Your old home, yes, that’s right. To pay them a visit.’
‘But . . . but you’ve brought everything with you.’
Maxwell sighed and then smiled. There was no point bullshitting him. ‘Yes, Nathan, you’re right. It’s not just a visit.’
The lad shook his head. ‘Then what—?’
‘We had to move, Nathan. This has been on the cards for months and months.’ Maxwell waved the boy over to join him leaning against the rail. He did so and they both turned to watch the dodgems being pushed around by the guffawing boys.
‘As Edward’s second in command, I guess I should bring you into my confidence.’ Maxwell lowered his voice ever so slightly. He was quiet for a moment, thinking how to proceed.
‘Nathan, we couldn’t have lasted another winter in the Zone. There just wasn’t enough food being grown and we were supplementing every meal with a rapidly vanishing supply of tinned stuff. Just too many of us there. So that’s why we’re on the move. I had to split us up. Those we left behind will