The Legacy

ring, about the Missing, about the attacks; about his suspicion that Sheila sent the message to him asking for the ring. And Peter told him about his journey, about the crowd he’d thought was chasing him but which trampled over him as they ran towards their real target, a doctor’s surgery. A dealer in sabotaged drugs, they’d shouted. A murderer.
    Then they stopped for a moment.
    ‘You shouldn’t have come,’ Jude said, ‘but I’m glad you did. It’s lonely. Down here, I mean. Boring too.’
    Peter looked at him in surprise. ‘Boring?’ he asked. ‘Really?’ He managed a rueful smile. ‘I thought you were having all the fun.’
    ‘Fun?’ Jude raised an eyebrow. ‘Sure. I suppose you could call this fun.’ He caught Peter’s expression and shrugged. ‘I thought you’d got the good deal, that’s all. Pip’s favourite. Hero of the Underground.’
    ‘Farmer, you mean,’ Peter said wryly. ‘And I left it to get trampled on by a hysterical crowd torching houses. Great plan, right?’
    Jude grinned sheepishly. ‘You are an idiot,’ he said. ‘But you’re here now, so . . . This way.’ They ducked down and inched towards a busier road. People were scurrying along it faster than usual, their faces slightly pinched, their eyes averted, some of them wearing masks. Jude pulled Peter round the corner, then they darted past a health-food shop with posters in the window promoting vitamins that boosted the immune system and into a narrow passageway. On a tram stop poster, someone had scrawled ‘Kill the Murderers. Destroy the Underground.’
    Suddenly a woman appeared in front of them. ‘My husband!’ she screamed. ‘They’ve taken my husband. They’ve taken him –’ Jude pulled Peter away. She didn’t seem to have noticed that they were young, but she would soon enough.
    ‘Look!’ the woman called after them. ‘My blisters. He had them too. They took him away. Will they come for me now?’
    Jude saw Peter turn round, saw his eyes widen as he caught sight of the woman’s pustules. The same pustules that had covered the dead bodies in the doorways, the same pustules that Jude had seen on the bodies in the Pincent lorry. ‘Don’t look,’ he said, dragging Peter towards a grate in the pavement, heaving it open and jumping down. As Peter followed him they heard a van pull up and police leaping out, followed by the woman’s screams as she was dragged away.
    ‘Down here,’ Jude said, pulling Peter along a cramped tunnel. ‘It used to be a sewer,’ he added as they heaved open a trapdoor. ‘We can go north from here.’
    Peter gulped. ‘A sewer?’
    Jude looked at him archly. ‘What do you prefer? The sewer or the police? Come on, it doesn’t even smell. Not really, anyway.’
    ‘Fine, the sewer,’ Peter said grimly, jumping down after him.
    It was 10 a.m. by the time they got to the address Sheila had written down, slipping into the front garden and hiding between the wall and a hedge. It was an ordinary terraced house on a residential street, the little garden well cared for with plots for vegetables and fruit.
    ‘You sure this is the right place?’ Peter asked nervously.
    Jude nodded. ‘Look,’ he said. Through the reflective double glazing, a girl could be seen, her long red hair framing her face. It was unmistakably Sheila.
    Jude stood up. ‘I’m going in,’ he said. ‘You go back to the sewer and wait.’
    ‘I’ll wait here,’ Peter replied.
    ‘No.’ Jude shook his head. ‘It’s too dangerous. If I don’t get out, you have to go to Pincent Pharma.’
    Peter met his eyes, then nodded and ran off. Jude walked up to the front door and rang the bell, then slunk back and hid. A man came to the door and opened it a little. He looked old – very old, Jude realised with a start. His hair was grey, nearly white, his eyes watery and pale. He had a slight stoop. ‘Hello?’
    The man looked from left to right then quickly closed the door. Immediately Jude slid out and rang the bell again. This time the man called out from behind the half-open door, ‘Who’s there?’
    Jude looked around then ran out. Grabbing the man, he pulled his hands behind his back and pushed him back into the house before shutting the door again.
    ‘I’ve come for Sheila.’
    The man didn’t say anything, but Jude wasn’t waiting for a reply. He pushed the man down the corridor towards the stairs. ‘I know she’s here,’ he said, taking the stairs two at a time and pulling the man up