'Am I to take it that you believe my daughter to be under some sort of unnatural influence?' Stobbold asked. He had to shout to make himself heard above the sound of the wind and the rain. It was the emptiness of her expression that had unsettled him and brought him chasing out after the Doctor. Her wide, dead eyes.
The Doctor seemed not to notice the inclement weather. He was standing in the middle of the driveway, amongst the diminishing islands of grey slush that were even now washing away. He was already drenched. 'Don't you?' he shouted back.
There was a fierce storm coming, Stobbold could feel the heady atmosphere that often preceded the worst of them. He staggered through the rain towards the Doctor, holding his jacket closed, fumbling for the button. He was soaked through before he had taken five steps. 'No,' he retorted. 'No, of course I don't. The idea is absurd.'
'Yet you were willing to entertain the notion that Lord Urton that your friend might be possessed.'
Stobbold slipped on the wet gravel, stumbled, caught his balance by clutching at the Doctor's arm. 'Yes, but that... That was different.'
'Oh? How?'
'You saw you said. And Dobbs,' Stobbold blustered. 'But Betty has done nothing.'
'Really?' Still the Doctor ignored the rain, though it was running in streams down his face, dripping from the end of his nose.
'Really.' Stobbold stepped back. 'She is seventeen, Doctor. Adolescent. Alone.'
He said nothing.
'Her mother is long dead, God rest her soul. She's had nobody but her old father most of her life. She looks after me, keeps house, does the cooking, all the work I cannot afford to have anyone else do for us.' His mouth was racing ahead of his brain. He had never thought it through before. He had never had to.
He had never wanted to.
'So of course she's quiet, withdrawn,' Stobbold shouted. 'Of course she is introspective and saturnine. She has nobody to talk to, nobody to confide in, nobody to trust. Nobody but me.' He looked down at his feet, at the rain splashing into the deepening puddles. 'She is scared of growing up, of becoming a woman. She is scared of leaving me, and she is terrified of never never leaving me.' leaving me.'
He looked back up, and saw genuine sympathy in the Doctor's expression, though his gaze seemed focused beyond Stobbold, on the doorway.
'I must make time to speak to her, to be with her.' he said as he turned to look. 'I should have done so long ago.'
He felt the Doctor's hand on his shoulder as he turned and stared back at Betty, standing in the doorway. Her long hair was untied, hanging down almost to her waist. She was under the light in the porch, so that even through the driving rain he could see her freckles, her mouth slightly open, her face devoid of expression.
'Yes,' the Doctor said quietly, close to his ear. 'You should have. It's too late now.'
She started towards them, taking quick, confident steps. The rain spat and hissed round her. He stood, unable to move, unwilling to believe.
'Oh Matthew, Matthew, Matthew,' the Doctor said. 'Can't you see what is so obvious? Won't you admit to yourself what is happening?'
For an instant, Stobbold felt like Jephthah, the Old Testament judge of Israel. He would give anything to be spared this. Like Jephthah, he would willingly sacrifice the first thing he saw on his return if only he was brought home safely.
The Doctor stepped round him and approached her. 'Nice weather for the time of year, don't you think?' the Doctor called into the rain.
'Thank you. It's lovely.' Her words seemed to carry despite the quietness of her voice.
'Yes,' the Doctor said, keeping his distance. 'I've been thinking about that. It's become a favourite phrase of yours hasn't it. An automatic response, something to say. Just being polite.'
He took a step back again, and turned quickly to see where Stobbold was. 'It also happens to be what you said when you put on the pendant, the statuette of the fire god, of Agni.'
Her hand was immediately at her throat. Still she stepped towards them through the steaming rain. The pendant was glowing deep red, casting a diffuse light across her throat and illuminating her face eerily from below.
'Your final words, I'm sorry to say. No wonder they come back so easily, so often. To haunt you.'
The Doctor was standing beside Stobbold once more.
Betty halted several steps in front of them. And now Stobbold could see the drops of rain hissing and evaporating as they struck her hot form. He could see how she had walked through the rain without getting wet. He could hear the spitting and hissing of the water boiling away the instant it touched her, and a sob of anger and pity and grief broke from him.
'Betty,' he sobbed. 'Oh Betty, tell me it isn't true. Tell me it's still you.'
She smiled then. Her mouth widened, her cheek bones and eyebrows lifted.
'I don't think she has been consumed, like Urton,' the Doctor murmured. 'It's more in the nature of a possession.'
She raised her hand, bringing her other hand underneath as if reaching out for the sacrament.
'Not that it makes much difference now,' the Doctor added.
Cradled in her palm was a glowing coal plucked from the fire. Red and orange flickered within the dusty black lump. Her hand was a blackened, scorched mess beneath. As the Doctor and Stobbold stood watching, a mass of flame spouted violently from her hands towards them, erupting from the glowing coal. A moment later, her forearms erupted, the fire spreading out from her palms, over her entire torso. Only her legs were still visible beneath the roaring, rolling sea of flame. She stepped towards them.
Stobbold stood his ground, shouting at her, pleading, begging. He was thinking again of Jephthah, of how he must have felt when the first thing he saw on his safe return home, running to greet him, was his own daughter.
Until the Doctor dragged him back.
'It's no use, can't you see?'
They continued to back away. Stobbold could feel the heat from the flames as Betty continued to advance towards him. He could feel the difference in texture beneath his feet as they stepped from the gravel of the drive on to the sodden grass of the front lawn. The roaring of the fire blotted out the sound of the gathering storm.
His foot slipped from under him and Stobbold fell backwards. He pushed himself away from her on his back. The Doctor had his hands under Stobbold's shoulders and lifted him, dragged him away. The ground was awash, a mass of slippery mud. Stobbold's feet sank into it as they had in the snow, except that they stuck. It was an effort to lift them, to move, to back away. And if they went much further they would reach the bank at the end of the lawn, rising to the boundary wall. They might slip and slide and climb the one, but never the other. Not in time.
He fell again, and this time found himself sitting at the base of the embankment. He could feel the ground squirming, running, washing away behind his back as the rainwater poured off it. Again the Doctor dragged him up.
For the first time he took his eyes off the fiery swirling pillar that was his daughter, and he glanced behind him. The rain was blowing so that it hit the wall. Narrow rivers were forming on the stone and running down to the ground with such force that they were eating into the top of the bank. As he looked, a section of the wall sagged towards them, the ground around its foundations washed away in the torrent.
A glance. Then he looked back at Betty. He saw the flames running, pouring out of her as she increased speed, racing towards them now, sensing that she had them.
The Doctor was dragging him up the steep slope. They slipped and fell. Tried again, scrabbling desperately at the liquid ground. Somehow they were at the top of the bank.
She was coming up after them. The mud exploded round her feet. The fire engulfed her legs now, dried and cracked the ground as she walked. The flames seemed to gather themselves, then the whole blazing mass hurled itself at them. Stobbold had his back to the wall, felt his feet slipping from under him, could only watch the fire growing until it filled his vision, his world, his life.
Suddenly he was tumbling down the muddy slope the Doctor had knocked him sideways, winding him. The clergyman rasped in great gulps of rain*filled air as he fell. He landed on his back, saw the Doctor disappear past him. And he saw the ball of fire that had pitched towards him strike the wall with such force that he heard the explosion of heat*cracked stone.
Sparks flew from the centre of the fire. Acrid smoke billowed out. The wall was getting bigger as he watched. No it was moving, coming towards him, falling forwards knocked off its crumbling, exposed foundations.
Stobbold rolled aside as the stonework shattered into the ground close by. The fiery shape of his daughter rolled molten towards him again, driven down the bank by the falling masonry. He saw her face coming at him, fire exploding from her mouth, her nostrils, the sockets of her eyes. Then she pitched downwards within the fire, a mass of stone and mortar crashing on top of her, crushing her into the sodden, muddy ground.
The mud exploded into smoke and steam. The sound of the hissing fire and of the falling wall almost blotted out the near*human screams. Then, the noise died. There was just the rain, and the bursting bubbles of boiling mud as the ground settled back down over her.
How long he stood there, watching the ground bubble and heave and eventually come to rest, he did not know. He was aware of the Doctor standing close by, hands folded in front of him, head bowed, like a graveside mourner. He was aware of the hot rain on his face mingling with the tears. He was aware of nothing else.
Until the eruption.
They both looked up at once. It was the loudest thing Stobbold had ever heard. A terrific explosion echoing across from the moors. At the same moment the ground beneath them shook with such force that Stobbold was sent staggering. He collided with the Doctor who was also struggling to stay upright. They held each other, braced themselves, feet apart until the tremor ceased.
'What the devil was that?' he breathed.
'The devil is perhaps right,' the Doctor answered as he stepped away. He pointed across Stobbold's shoulder, out on to the moor. Towards the fissure.
The whole sky was alight. A curtain of flame was shooting up towards a blood red moon. Sparks and dust spun and twisted out from it and they could feel the raw heat, the nascent power of the blast before the flames settled back and the sky began to clear.
'Hellfire, would you say?' the Doctor asked.
'Or a volcano.'
The rain was solid now. Hot particles of dust and ash that settled on their wet clothes and caked their faces like powder. There was a sulphurous, clammy stench to the acrid air.
The Doctor raised a hand to his face, and pinched at the bridge of his nose. 'I am so sorry,' he said. 'So very sorry.'
Stobbold looked down again at the patch of broken ground where his daughter was buried. Entombed. It was already dusted with ash, like a sprinkling of grey snow.
'I should have realised long ago,' the Doctor went on, and it occurred to Stobbold that he was apologising for something quite different. When the Doctor looked across at him, his face seemed drained of colour. A late drop of rain traced a path through the dust and down his cheek. 'I should have seen it at once. As soon as I saw the fissure.'
'Seen what?'
'Even the place names are a clue.' He appeared not to have heard. 'Branscombe*sub*Edge, don't you see?'
Stobbold shook his head. His stomach was heaving and he ached all over. One side of his face felt stiff and sore.
'It's on the rim, lower than the old river bed. The whole of the moor is lower than the surrounding countryside. And Middletown is right in the centre, at the bottom of the basin.'
'The ground dips,' Stobbold agreed. His voice was calm and controlled, though his whole body was shaking. 'We all know that. It's to do with the water table, the moorland.' He shrugged. 'The composition of the rocks.'
But the Doctor was shaking his head. 'It's nothing of the sort. It's a caldera.'
'A what?' He was fighting to stop his teeth from chattering despite the heat of the air.
The Doctor turned back towards the fissure. The sky was no longer burning, but there was a glow, as if the ground beneath it were on fire. 'The basin formed by a volcanic eruption. By the flow of magma, of molten lava.'
Stobbold's mouth was open. But his brain was numb. He said nothing.
'Like a flood plain,' the Doctor went on. 'Only we know what it will soon be flooded with.'
They stared at each other in the firelit night. 'Oh my God in Heaven,' Stobbold breathed.
Chapter Sixteen.
A Death in the Family There was an abandoned warehouse at the edge of Middletown. Lord Urton had acquired it recently and now it contained the forge and machinery to produce Sir William Grant's field guns. The first batch of six was ready for collection, and Colonel Wilson watched as they were fastened to the teams of horses that stood patiently outside the huge warehouse doors.
They had been waiting since early evening for the final adjustments to be made, and he had considered more than once going back to Ambleton to return the next day. But every time he asked, the foreman assured him they were almost ready now. just a few more minutes. Really.
Wilson was facing across town, towards the distant moorland, when the abyss erupted. He saw it before he heard it, glancing across at Captain Brookes, satisfying himself that Brookes had seen it too. Then the sound reached them. At first it was rumble. then it built rapidly to a roaring explosive thunderclap that made them cover their ears as they staggered to keep their balance. But they could not look away.
The dark sky was split by the rising column of flame. It rose slowly, majestically through the night before the top of the column began to tilt and bend as if buckling under its own weight. As it fell back, clouds of white hot steam rose to join the flames, racing across the sky behind the spreading fire, as if driven by the wind. Before long the whole of the night sky was a swirling mass of steam and fire. Then the ash began to fall.
The streets began to fill with people as well as ash and dust. They came out of their houses, mostly still in their nightclothes, staring up at the firelit sky. With the noise and the flickering orange glow in the heavens, many of them believed it was the end of the world.
The sound died back to a low roar. Wilson found he was running along the street, shouting for his men to follow, shouting for people to stay in their houses and not to worry. Brookes was close beside him, also shouting, though Wilson could not hear his voice. Whether this was because the noise was still too loud or because their ears were numbed by the initial blast, he could not tell.
The eruption lasted almost an hour. It faded far more slowly than it had begun, the sky glowing a deep orange that lit the smoky streets with a dull, diffuse light. The people seemed to calm as the noise dropped. Wilson and his men were able to reassure them, to guide them back to their homes.
Looking along the streets, Wilson saw that everything was once again coated, as it had been earlier. But this was not snow and slush, this was a powdery ash, fine and grey. It rose in puffs where you trod, it clogged the nostrils and the mouth and clung to the back of the throat. It smelled of sulphur and it dusted Wilson's uniform so that he was clothed in nondescript grey. His rank, his status, his profession were all masked by the fine powder. Everyone became the same, even their greyed faces looked similar. All individuality taken away by the ash.
As soon as he could spare someone, he sent a runner back to Ambleton to check on the situation there. They had no way of telling how far the eruption had reached, but if Ambleton was relatively unaffected, then he could get reinforcements. Or if not, then Ambleton would still need to know the situation in Middletown. Perhaps the whole of this part of the country was affected.
It was impossible to tell when dawn arrived. But the sun was visible now through the thick air, burning weakly above the horizon.
Other than keeping people calm, it was difficult to know quite what was to be done. Wilson and his men made their way through the streets, reassuring people and trying to seem knowledgeable about what was going on. It was not the Apocalypse, they told them; hell was not coming to Middletown; the end was nothing like nigh.
So it was with a sense of relief that Wilson saw a familiar figure emerge from the Post Office ahead of him. The Reverend Stobbold. With him was the Doctor, whom Wilson had met at the dam.
'Reverend, sir!' Wilson called as he run up. Clouds of dust erupted from his feet as he ran. 'We're trying to keep people calm. sir,' he said breathlessly as he reached them. 'But perhaps some words from yourself? A meeting of some sort to reassure people that this isn't the fires of hell breaking loose?'
Stobbold seemed drawn, old. He seemed grey even beneath the dust, Wilson saw. And there was a deep sadness in his eyes as he looked at the soldiers.
It was the Doctor who spoke. 'There isn't time to arrange a meeting,' he said. His voice was quiet but authoritative. 'If we're lucky, there may be time to evacuate the town.'
'Evacuate?' Brookes said in surprise.
'Explain please, Doctor,' Wilson said.
The Doctor took his jacket off and shook it. A dust storm swirled in the air, choking and dry. When he put his jacket back on, the Doctor was the only person in sight who was not uniformly grey a splash of individual colour in the drab world of Middletown.
'That was a minor eruption,' he said.
'Minor?!'
'A precursor to the main event.'
'You mean,' Wilson asked slowly, 'that there is more to come?'
'Oh much more. This is just the beginning.' He turned to look at Stobbold, as if to get his agreement with what he was about to say. 'Colonel Wilson, despite your reassurances, it may well be that the fires of hell are indeed breaking loose. And I emphatically suggest that you get everyone you can away from here before they consume us all.'