J. Ballard - Concrete island

On all sides of the island the traffic moved along the motorways. Steadying himself, Maitland fixed his eyes on the distant cars. He climbed to his feet, hanging himself from the crutch like a carcass on a butcher's hook. High above him, the illuminated surface of the route indicator shone like a burning sword in the dark sky.

Maitland found a last rubber marker in his jacket pocket. On the drying concrete he scrawled: CATHERINE HELP TOO FAST The letters wound up and down the slope. Maitland concentrated on the spelling, but ten minutes later, when he returned after an unsuccessful attempt to reach the Jaguar, they had been rubbed out as if by some dissatisfied examiner.

MOTHER DONT HURT POLICE

He waited in the long grass beside the embankment, but his eyes closed. When he opened them, the message had vanished.

He gave up, unable to decipher his own writing. The grass swayed reassuringly, beckoning this fever-racked scarecrow into its interior. The blades swirled around him, opening a dozen pathways, each of which would carry him to some paradisial arbour. Knowing that unless he reached the shelter of the Jaguar he would not survive the night, Maitland set his course for the breaker's yard, but after a few minutes he followed the grass passively as it wove its spiral patterns around him.

To his surprise, it carried him up a slope of steeper and more difficult ground, over the roof of the largest of the air-raid shelters. Maitland laboured along, listening to the grass seethe around him. A stony ridge marked the west wall of the shelter. Maitland paused there. The curving roof fell away on either side, disappearing into the dense undergrowth that sprang from the floor of the pit.

The grass was silent now, as if waiting for Maitland to make some significant move. Wondering why he had climbed on to the shelter, Maitland caught sight of the overturned taxi in the breaker's yard. He turned with his last strength to reach the Jaguar. Before he could catch himself he slipped on the rain-damp roof. He fell heavily, and slid down the rounded slope into the grass and nettles, plunging through them like a diver vanishing into the deeps of an underground cavern.

Submerged in this green bower, Maitland lay for some time in a hammock of crushed nettles. The dense grass and the foliage of a stunted elder sealed off all but a faint glow of the late afternoon sunlight, and he could almost believe that he was lying at the bottom of a calm and peaceful sea, through which a few bars of faint light penetrated the pelagic quiet. This silence and the reassuring organic smell of decaying vegetation soothed his fever.

A small, sharp-footed creature moved across his left leg, its claws clutching for purchase in the worn fabric of his trousers. It darted in brief scurries, reaching up his thigh to his groin. Opening his eyes, Maitland peered through the dim light, recognizing the long muzzle and nervous eyes of a brown rat drawn to him by the scent of the blood leaking from his hip. An open wound disfigured the creature's head, exposing the skull, as if it had recently torn itself from a trap.

'Get out – aah!' Maitland leapt forward, seizing the metal crutch in the elder branches above his head. He thrashed wildly at the foliage, beating back the walls of his green cell.

The rat had gone. Maitland forced his left leg through the branches to the ground below and stepped out into the fading evening light. He was standing in a sunken passage that ran along the western wall of the shelter. Here the vegetation had been cut back, forming a rough slope that ran down the bank to the doorway of the shelter.

'Tools…!'

Fumbling excitedly with the crutch, Maitland lurched down the passage, his fever and injured leg forgotten. When he reached the door he wiped away the sweat that soaked his face and forehead. A chromium padlock and chain locked the door. Maitland forced the crutch inside the chain and jerked it from its mountings.

Kicking back the door, Maitland hobbled forward into the shelter. A sweet but not unpleasant smell greeted him, as if he were stepping into the lair of some large and docile creature. In the fading light he could see that the shelter was an abandoned beggar's hovel. A line of faded quilts hung from the ceiling and covered the walls and floor. A pile of blankets formed a small bed, and the sole pieces of furniture were a wooden chair and table. From the back of the chair hung a ragged leotard, the faded costume of some pre-war circus acrobat.

Maitland leaned against the curving wall, deciding that he would pass the night in this deserted lair. On the wooden table a number of metal objects were arranged in a circle like ornaments on an altar. All had been taken from motor-car bodies – a wing mirror, strips of chromium window trim, pieces of broken headlamp.

'Jaguar…?' Maitland recognized the manufacturer's medallion, of the same type as that on his own car.

As he picked up the medallion to examine it he was unaware of the broad, thick chested figure who was watching him from the doorway, head lowered like a bull's between swaying shoulders.

Before Maitland could raise the medallion to the light a heavy fist knocked it from his hands. The crutch was snatched away and flung into the open air. Powerful hands seized him by the arms and hurled him backwards through the door. During the next seconds, as he was flung to the ground, Maitland was only aware of the panting, bull-like figure dragging him up the slope into the last light of the day. The headlamps of the distant traffic moved with an almost dream-like calm as the man's face gasped into his own, gusting out a hot breath of rancid wine. Slapping Maitland with his fists, his attacker rolled him backwards and forwards across the damp ground, grunting to himself as if trying to discover some secret hidden on Maitland's injured body.

As he lost consciousness Maitland caught a last glimpse of the passing traffic on the motorway. Between his attacker's swinging arms he saw a red-haired young woman in a camouflage-patterned combat jacket running towards them with the metal crutch lifted in her strong hands.

'Rest – try not to move. We've sent for help.'

The young woman's quiet voice soothed Maitland. Her hands bathed his face with a tampon of cotton wool. He lay back as the hot water stung his bruised skin, aware of the fever burning through his bones. As the young woman lifted his head the water trickled through his beard. He opened his swollen mouth, trying to catch the scalding drops.

I'll give you a drink – you must be thirsty.' She gestured with her elbow at the plastic mug standing on the packing-case beside the bed, but made no effort to pass it to Maitland. Her firm hands moved around his neck and down to his chest. Maitland was no longer wearing the dinner-jacket, and the damp dress-shirt was black with oil.

An unshaded paraffin lamp standing on the floor by the doorway glared into his eyes when he tried to look at the young woman's face. As he stirred fretfully, aware of the pain in his leg, she drew the red blanket around his shoulders.

'Relax, Mr Maitland. We've called for help. Catherine -is that your wife's name?'

Maitland nodded weakly. He felt numbed by his relief at being rescued. When she placed her left arm under his head and lifted the mug to his mouth he could smell her warm, strong body, a medley of scents and odours that made his mind reel.

He was lying in a small room, little more than ten feet by ten and almost filled by the metal double bed and mattress on which he was lying. A blocked-off ventilation shaft rose from the centre of the ceiling, but the room was windowless. Beyond the open doorway a flight of semi-circular steps led to the floor above. A faded cinema poster hung from the wall at the foot of the bed, advertising a Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire musical. On either side were several more up-to-date prints taken from underground magazines – a psychedelic poster in the Beardsley manner, a grainy close-up of the dead Che Guevara, a Black Power manifesto, and Charles Manson at his trial, psychotic eyes staring out beneath a bald skull. Apart from the packing case beside the bed the only piece of furniture in the room was a card-table stacked with cosmetic jars and scent bottles, mascara sticks and scruffed-up tissues. An expensive leather suitcase was propped against the wall. A skirt and sweater, and various pieces of underwear, were strung on hangers from the lid.