Interrupted Journey

Chapter 8 - Ashley arrives

It was late, at least by our standards. We were in the habit of going to bed at nightfall - almost unavoidable in a world of no electric light - but, tonight, four days after the visit to the feed store, Mike, Laura and I were sitting around the kitchen table after our evening meal discussing, without much success, where we could find more food. I had done some initial calculations and we were still significantly short of what we would need for the first year. I also suspected that Mike and Laura were simply postponing going out into the horrible weather.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door.

I've mentioned Mike's transition into combat mode before. Before I had even thought about the possibility of a threat, he was on his feet, behind the door with his pistol in his hands. I went to the window. Three people were standing on the porch. They looked familiar though it was hard to make anything out through the streaming rain.

Alice had come into the kitchen too and was standing by the door. "Who is it," she called.

"It's me, Alice," came a familiar voice. It was Ben and his family. For a moment I saw a wave of relief flash across Alice's face before it sprang back into its familiar steely cast.

I gave a sigh and opened the door. He was some sort of cousin and he and I did not see eye to eye on the subject of child rearing. In fact, Mary had tried to keep us away from the farm whenever they were about.

"Eh up!" Mam said as a teenage girl barged inside. She ignored us, threw her soaking coat on the floor and made her way into the living room without even taking off her muddy shoes. She was clearly in a strop of monstrous proportions.

Ben and Margaret followed her in. Margret gave a slightly contemptuous glance round the room then took off her own coat - something entirely unsuitable for the mountains and the weather and probably with a designer label - and sat down at the kitchen table.

"We had to walk all the way out here!" she said, clearly still outraged by the indignity. "Walk!"

"I thought you had bikes." I said. I had helped them get themselves set up with mountain bikes a couple of years before.

"Ash had got a flat tire and hadn't told us," Ben explained. "And there was nobody about to fix it."

I managed, but only just, to avoid banging my head on the table.

I briefly made introductions and let them know that Mike and Laura had been in the army and were organising the defence of the valley.

"The army!" Margret replied with a contemptuous tone. "Shouldn't you be in town, handing out relief supplies and keeping order? The supermarkets are closed and the place has just gone mad."

"If you can tell me where to find emergency supplies, I'd be happy to hand them out, Ma'am." Mike responded coldly. I could tell from the 'Ma'am' that he was going into his professional military mode. "As for order, there really isn't any out there for us to keep. We might just manage to keep most of the people in the valley alive until this time next year - that is if we're really lucky and if everybody works together."

"You're not serious," she said but her tone indicated she had started to grasp the scale of the problem.

I glanced across at Alice and got the briefest of nods of permission then looked across to Ben who was picking up Ashley's coat.

"Ben, would you come and sit down, please," I said. "I've got a couple of things to tell you."

Ben must have picked up on my tone. He did as he was asked, still holding Ashley's soaking coat.

"Ben, Margret, I'm afraid I have to tell you that Tom and Ken were killed a couple of days ago."

The two sat in silence for several seconds. I noticed that Susan had gone across to stand next to Alice.