The Map of the Sky (54 page)

“Are you joking?” the inspector declared. “God only knows what’s waiting out there. I don’t intend to let you go alone.”

“We’ll all go with you, George,” said Murray, rising to his feet. “Isn’t that so, Emma?”

“Of course, Mr. Wells,” said the girl. “We’ll all help you find your beloved.”

Wells gazed at them in astonishment. Very seldom in his life had he been on the receiving end of such a touching and selfless display of friendship, and it must be said he had not practiced it much himself either. So, was it true that the worst situations brought out the best in people? No, this sentiment couldn’t be genuine, he told himself. If he delved a little deeper, he would discover the real reason why each of them was willing to risk his or her life to accompany him. And there had to be another reason, he reflected, otherwise it made no sense, for it was inconceivable to Wells that someone could be capable of such an unselfish act, above all because he himself could never do so. But what if he was mistaken? What if they truly wanted to help him? Wells considered them one by one. He contemplated the arrogant Inspector Cornelius Clayton, who was willing to protect his makeshift flock with his life. He looked at Emma Harlow, who was confronting the situation with admirable fortitude: her eyes seemed to sparkle with a special intensity, like those dewdrops that sit patiently on leaves, waiting for the sun to make them glisten. Finally he contemplated Gilliam Murray, the Master of Time, the person he despised most in the world, whom a woman’s love had changed so utterly that even that man was now prepared to help him. Or perhaps he was right, he reflected. Perhaps none of them really cared whether he found Jane or not, but was it not wonderful to think they might?

“T-thank you,” he stammered, a catch in his voice.

At that moment, Cornelius Clayton collapsed on the floor. They all looked with irritation at the crumpled figure lying at their feet.

“I hate it when he does that,” said Murray.

XXX

D
AWN MATERIALIZED WITH EXASPERATING SLOWNESS
. And beneath its fitful light, London awoke confused and in pain, like a dog after its first beating. The tripods had marched down the Euston Road, demolishing buildings as they went, including Clayton’s house, although happily the debris had not buried the trapdoor. Around them, all was devastation: many of the buildings had been reduced to mounds of smoking rubble, and all over the place lay half-crushed or upturned carriages. The only one that seemed to have survived miraculously intact was Murray’s, his horses standing obligingly where he had left them, planted amid this orgy of destruction. But what convinced them this was the beginning of the end were the bodies strewn about, cinder dolls that looked vaguely human, gradually dispersed by the breeze. They were forced to step around them on their way to the carriage with the ornate “G” as they carried the unconscious Clayton, whom they had scarcely managed to get through the trapdoor.

The decision as to what to do with the inspector had been hastened by the approaching dawn. It seemed most practical to leave him behind in the safety of his lair, comfortably stretched out on a couch, with a note beside him explaining that he had fainted and promising to return for him once they had resolved the matter of Wells’s potential widowerhood. But the few hours they had spent together, each moment of which seemed to conceal an unexpected turn of events that changed the course of their lives, had made nonsense of their ideas about what was practical. They had no notion what might become of them during their excursion
to Primrose Hill, and whether or not they would be able to return to Clayton’s cellar, and so they finally resolved to take the inspector with them. It was perfectly clear to them: they were in this together. And so, eschewing the common sense with which most of them had led their lives until the arrival of the Martians, they hauled the inspector from his refuge, even remembering to bring his hat.

Although the tripods had already passed through, and a strange calm had settled over the street, they could still hear shots and blasts coming from the surrounding neighborhoods, which made them realize the invasion was far from over. With Murray once more grasping the reins, they set off for Regent’s Park. Wells gave an anguished sigh. In a few moments—the time it took to cross the park—they would find out whether or not Jane had survived the invasion. Whenever their eyes met, Emma, who had the air of a weary, worldly Madonna as she sat opposite Wells cradling the inspector’s head in her lap, gave him a reassuring look. But it was obvious she knew as well as he did that the likelihood of Jane still being alive was slight. Jane could have been dead for hours, Wells told himself, she could be lying under a mound of rubble or have been transformed into one of those baleful cinder figures strewn up and down the Euston Road, and he had not yet shed a single tear for her. Yes, perhaps she was dead and he still believed her alive. But could that have happened without his somehow knowing it? How could she have died without his sensing it physically, or without the universe having made him aware of it? And shouldn’t sacred love be like a spider’s web that not only encircled them but, with a tremor of its threads, informed each of them when the other had abandoned the web? The author took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying to ignore the rattle of the coach in order to concentrate on the inner music of his being, lest with a discordant note it had been trying to inform him for hours that Jane was dead. Yet his body did not appear to feel her death, and perhaps that was the strongest proof that she was still alive, for it was inconceivable to Wells that the person he most loved in the world had stopped existing without his perceiving it, or that he had not, out of solidarity, died seconds later
from a heart attack, with a synchronicity more sophisticated than that evinced between twins. From the moment he found the note pinned to the Garfields’ door, Wells feared Jane might have been killed or fatally injured in the invasion, but he had forced himself not to think about it. And he must continue that strategy, sealing off the wellspring of pain until he had actually confirmed her death.

The uneasy veneer of calm that lay over the Euston Road had spread to Regent’s Park. There was no one around, and in the park itself, everything appeared in order. Every tree, stone, and blade of grass was unharmed, doggedly clinging to the planet. If a tripod had passed that way, it must have been sufficiently moved by this oasis of vegetation in the heart of London to spare it. The only reminder that they were in the throes of a Martian invasion was a dog, which crossed in front of the coach carrying a severed arm in its mouth. At least someone was benefiting from this, Wells reflected, while Emma averted her gaze with a look of revulsion. But besides this macabre detail, the journey proceeded uneventfully until they glimpsed the contours of Primrose Hill.

They came to a halt at the foot of the rise and then, not daring to abandon Clayton in the carriage, carried him to the top of the hill, where they propped him against a tree. From there, they were able to get a more precise idea of the total and utter destruction that was spreading across the city. London was expiring before them, wounded and in flames. To the north, the houses of Kilburn and Hampstead had been reduced to jagged heaps of rubble among which three or four tripods moved languidly. To the south, beyond the green waves of Regent’s Park, Soho was in flames, and through its streets, moving with the ungainly elegance of herons, a handful of tripods opened fire from time to time. Far off in the distance, they could make out what had once been the magnificent mansions of the Brompton Road, almost all razed to the ground. Westminster Abbey was reduced to a ruin. Farther off, through a veil of smoke, St. Paul’s Cathedral was still standing, although a Martian ray had perforated its dome. Wells contemplated the devastation before him
with a feeling of humiliation more than of fear. It had taken so much time to build this vast city, this anthill where millions of souls lived out their lives without realizing they meant nothing to the universe, and only a single day to reduce it to ashes.

A woman’s sudden cry broke the desolate silence.

“Bertie!”

Wells wheeled round toward where the voice was coming from. And then he saw her running across the hill toward him, flushed, bedraggled, hysterical, and alive, above all, alive. Jane had survived all this destruction, she had defied death, and even though she might soon perish, now she was alive, like him, she was still alive. Seeing her running toward him, Wells thought of doing the same to fuse in a passionate embrace, yielding to the sentimentality that the scene required. His pragmatism had always made him resist such gestures. Particularly when Jane had insisted on them in their daily life, where he felt these actions so characteristic of romantic literature were silly, out of tune with the everyday routine of domesticity. But now appeared to be the only moment in his life when such a gesture would be completely appropriate, de rigueur even, not to mention that he also found himself before an audience that would be let down if the scene ended any other way. And so, wary of disappointing everyone, Wells began trotting stiffly toward Jane, his wife, the person who meant more to him than anyone in the world. Jane gave a shriek of joy as the distance between them narrowed and flew across the grass, delighted to find him alive, for his wife had also been forced to endure the anguish of imagining her husband dead while she was still breathing. And this, the author reflected, was true love, this selfless, irrepressible joy, the perplexing knowledge that one meant more to someone than one’s own life, and the acceptance that someone else meant more to one than oneself. Wells and Jane, husband and wife, writer and muse, embraced amid all this cruel destruction, this planet on its knees awaiting the final death blow.

“Bertie, you’re alive! You’re alive!” Jane cried between sobs.

“Yes, Jane,” he said. “We’re alive.”

“Melvin and Norah are dead, Bertie,” she told him between gasps. “It was horrible.”

And Wells realized that Jane, too, had suffered. That, like him, she had her own tale to tell, an exciting adventure he would listen to with a tender smile, in the calm knowledge that, although at times it had seemed impossible, these perilous events had ended happily, in each other’s arms. Next to them, Murray and Emma beamed, moved by this miraculous reunion. The sun shone on the grass with the sweetness of dawn, and everything was so unequivocally beautiful that all of a sudden Wells felt euphoric, immortal, invincible, capable of kicking the Martians out all on his own. Yet one glance at the devastated city told him they were doomed: it was only a matter of time before the Martians gave the last knife thrust to this brick dragon and went around on foot killing anyone who had escaped the tripods. Yes, his euphoria was simply the final splendor of the wilting rose before it disintegrated in a shower of petals on the grass. But what the devil did it matter. He felt it and was happy, happier than ever before.

Just then, someone began to applaud. Startled, the group turned as one toward the sound of the clapping. A few yards away, propped against a tree, they discovered a young man, apparently moved by the tender scene.

“I’m beginning to think love is man’s greatest invention,” he said, doffing his hat. “Don’t you remember me? I’m Charles Winslow.”

Wells recognized him instantly. Winslow was the young dandy who had burst into his house brandishing a pistol in the belief that he possessed a time machine like the one he wrote about in his novel. And despite the young man’s present dishevelment (his hair was tousled and his jacket soiled and torn), the author had to admit he had not lost his stunning good looks.

“Of course, Mr. Winslow,” he said, going over to shake Charles’s hand.

After greeting Wells, the young man noticed the millionaire and suddenly turned pale.

“Mr. Winslow, you look as if you’ve seen a ghost,” chuckled Murray.

“Perhaps I have,” Charles said hesitantly.

“Shake my hand and you’ll see you’re mistaken,” the millionaire said, stretching out his great paw. The two men shook hands warmly. “But we can discuss my resurrection another time. Allow me to introduce you to Miss Harlow.”

“Pleased to meet you, Miss Harlow,” Charles said, kissing her hand and dazzling her with his mischievously angelic smile. “Under other circumstances I would have asked you to dine with me, but I’m afraid there are no restaurants open in London. Or at least none that are worthy of you.”

“I’m glad to find you in such good spirits despite the invasion,” said the author, stepping in before Murray had a chance to fly off the handle.

“Well, I don’t think we need worry too much, Mr. Wells,” the young man replied, signaling the surrounding destruction with a wave of his hand. “Clearly we’re going to survive.”

“Do you really think so?” the author said, not trying to conceal his disbelief.

“Of course,” Charles assured him. “We already know that in the year 2000 our problem will be the automatons, not the Martians. This situation will clearly resolve itself.”

“I see.” Wells gave a resigned sigh. “And what are we supposed to do?”

“Leave it to the heroes, of course,” the young man replied.

“To the heroes?” Murray chortled. “You mean you?”

“Oh, no, Mr. Murray. You flatter me, but I wasn’t referring to myself. I was referring to a real hero,” said Charles, beckoning to a man standing a few yards from the group. “To someone who has come from the future to save us.”

The young man approached timidly and gave them a smile that was meant to be reassuring.

“Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce the brave Captain Shackleton.”

D
EAR READER, OUR EXCITING ADVENTURE IS DRAWING TO A CLOSE.

C
AN OUR HEROES DEFEAT THE
M
ARTIANS, OR DOES THIS TASK SEEM AS IMPOSSIBLE TO YOU AS WINNING A PROUD LADY’S HEART
? I
TRUST YOU HAVE ENJOYED OUR CURIOUS TALE, THOUGH IT IS FILLED WITH INCIDENTS SO ALIEN TO OUR HUMAN EXPERIENCE THAT IT MAY HAVE OBLIGED YOU ON MORE THAN ONE OCCASION TO RAISE AN EYEBROW.
I
DO NOT BLAME YOU, ALTHOUGH
I
FEAR THAT WITH THE PASSAGE OF TIME THESE EVENTS WILL, ALAS, BE ROBBED OF THEIR STRANGENESS.