Louise Welsh - Death is a Welcome Guest

They set out in an open-topped truck, Jacob at the wheel, Magnus and Will squeezed into the cab beside him. Belle sat in the back, her face shaded from the sun by a wide-brimmed straw hat Father Wingate said the abbot would have wanted her to have. Raisha had not appeared and they had left without her.

‘She goes off on her own,’ Belle said as they walked across the yard of a farm Magnus knew was too industrial in scale for them to manage, but which might have some useful equipment smaller farms could not have afforded to invest in. ‘She misses her children.’

Will and Jacob were a little ahead, both of them with rifles slung across their backs. Magnus had been musing on the weapons Jacob had confiscated at the scene of the crash and had not yet returned. He wished Belle would leave him alone, but he said, ‘Of course she does.’

He and Raisha had not used any protection. The sweats had made HIV look like a joke, but there were other reasons why people did not use contraception.

Jacob glanced back at them. ‘What do you think?’ Even when he was asking a question the priest’s voice held an edge of command.

‘It’s big enough to have its own combine. We should check these sheds.’ Magnus pointed to a series of flat-roofed buildings that looked more suited to a factory than a farm.

Jacob nodded. The day was warm, but he was still wearing his combat jacket. ‘Stay close. You don’t know who might be around.’

Now was the moment to ask for his gun back. Magnus tried to frame the words. The sun seared his eyes, blinding him for a moment.

Belle said, ‘She goes into empty houses looking for children.’

Magnus glanced at her. The girl had tucked her hair inside the hat, which lent her a Huck Finn prepubescent look. Her nose was freckled and she might have been a boy.

Magnus said, ‘Raisha?’

Belle nodded. Her features were lost and revealed again, as the shadows thrown by the hat brim advanced and then receded.

‘At first she thought she would find one alive. There must have been children who survived.’ Belle looked up at him again, her eyes wide with the horror of it. ‘But they might have been too little to manage on their own.’

Magnus had not been able to forget the body of the toddler that had somehow fallen to its death. It had looked unmarked, like a large doll abandoned on the pavement, except for the bloom of blood around its head.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It must have happened.’

‘Raisha was obsessed by the idea. She started off by looking for her sons’ friends. She knew where they lived and so she drove to their houses.’

Raisha had not told him any of this, only of her thwarted search for her relatives and her husband’s family.

‘They were all either dead or had left town.’ Belle’s voice was matter-of-fact. ‘And so she started to check likely-looking houses, places with a trampoline, or a swing in the garden. Raisha says it’s easy to spot homes with children.’

Magnus said, ‘It’s been too long now. If a child was locked in somewhere, or was too young to look after itself, it would be dead.’

‘She buries them.’ Belle’s eyes met his, the hat brim a halo around her face. ‘She wraps them in a sheet, digs a hole in the garden, puts them in it and says a prayer over the grave. I’ve told her she should stop. Things have got beyond burying.’

Beyond burying , a voice in Magnus’s head whispered.

‘What does she say?’

‘She says—’

A deep-throated growl interrupted Belle’s answer. They turned and saw a Jack Russell crouching on the other side of the yard. Belle said, ‘Hello, sweetheart,’ in a soft baby voice and sank to her haunches, holding out a hand for the dog to sniff. The terrier bared its teeth in a white slavering snarl.

Magnus put a hand on her shoulder. ‘I don’t—’

Jacob shouted, ‘Get away from it.’

‘The poor thing’s scared,’ Belle said, in the same silly voice.

‘It’s rabid.’ The priest took his gun from its holster just as the dog began to edge towards them.

‘Leave it alone.’ Belle made kissy noises towards the dog.

Magnus grabbed Belle by the arm and yanked her to her feet. The girl resisted, but he pulled her to him. He looked the dog in the eye and said, ‘Sit,’ in the commanding voice he had saved for the farm dogs. He saw a look of comprehension in the dog’s eyes. Its steps faltered and though it gave a low, exploratory growl, Magnus knew that it wanted to obey him. ‘Sit!’

He felt Belle stiffen. ‘Don’t!’ Her yell was lost beneath the crack of Jacob’s bullet. The shot hit the dog in its flank and it fell whimpering to the ground.

The girl shuddered in Magnus’s arms. ‘You fuckers! You fucking fuckers!’ She punched Magnus in the chest and he let her go. The abbot’s hat tumbled from her head, releasing a coil of blonde hair, and she ran to where Jacob was already standing over the small white body. The dog’s ribs were moving up and down; quick and sharp and not quite final.

‘At least finish the poor beast off,’ Magnus shouted and Jacob squatted and put a bullet into the dog’s head.

A splash of blood spattered all three of them and Belle screamed again. She put a hand to her face and shouted at Jacob, ‘Why do you have to kill every fucking thing?’

The priest’s face was pale. ‘I don’t…’

But the girl had turned her back on him and was running across the yard. Magnus made to follow her, but Jacob caught his arm. ‘Let Will go after her.’ And Magnus saw that the tall man had already left the corner of the yard, where he had stood silent while the drama played itself out, and was jogging to catch up with her.

Magnus bunched his fists. His biceps were tight with the urge to punch the priest in the face. ‘Why did you shoot it?’

Jacob touched the creature with his foot. It was the same gesture he had made after he shot the Audi driver. ‘It was about to attack.’

‘It was entitled to. We were on its territory. The dog wasn’t rabid, Belle was right, it was frightened.’ Magnus felt an urge to bury the thing, the way Raisha buried the children she found.

Jacob looked at him. ‘How do you think it’s been living since its owners died?’

A horrible realisation dawned on Magnus but he said, ‘There are plenty of rabbits in the fields, sheep even.’

The priest touched the dead dog’s belly again with the toe of his boot. ‘I had a family too: a wife, two girls and a boy. The children wanted a dog and so eventually we bought them one. Spot, the not very originally named Dalmatian. Annie and the children didn’t make it. Spot did.’ The priest looked at Magnus, his features tight and bone-white. ‘I would be a Herod to dogs. I would kill a whole generation of them if I could.’

‘I’m sorry.’

The words were nothing, but the priest acknowledged them with a small nod. He turned and walked towards the barns, his gun still in his hand, and after a moment Magnus followed him.

They were cowsheds, as large as a car plant and full of death. Magnus and Jacob smelled them from yards away. Magnus would have turned back, but the priest was resolute and so he followed him inside, pulling the neck of his T-shirt up over his mouth and nose in the vain hope that it would help protect him from the stench. To his relief they did not venture deep into the buzz of flies, just stood in the doorway of each outhouse taking in the swollen bellies, the exploded innards and dead, infected eyes.

Jacob said, ‘I only had six months to go. I was a career soldier, I’d expected to retire in uniform, but I’d seen too much of this kind of thing. Replace those cows with people and you’ll get the idea.’ He nodded towards the yard where he had shot the dog. ‘I saw some petrol up there. We should burn these sheds.’