4
Growing rather tired and footsore they made their way to Piccadilly Circus, and so on to the Strand. Everywhere they found the same conditions: a few skeletons, a few deserted vehicles, young vegetation taking hold wherever a pinch of soil had found an abiding place, and over all a great silence. But food there was none that they were able to find, though it is probable that a careful investigation of cellars and underground places might have furnished some results. The more salient resources of London had been effectively pillaged so far as the West-end was concerned. They were too late.
In Trafalgar Square, Millie sat down and cried. Blanche made no attempt to comfort her, but sat wide eyed and wondering. Her mind was opening to new ideas. She was beginning to understand that London was incapable of supporting even the lives of three women; she was wrestling with the problem of existence. Every one had gone. Many had died; but many more, surely, must have fled into the country. She began to understand that she and her family must also fly into the country.
Millie still sobbed convulsively now and again.
“Oh! Chuck it, Mill,” said Blanche at last. “We’d better be getting home.”
Millie dabbed her eyes. “I’m starving,” she blubbered.
“Well, so am I,” returned Blanche. “That’s why I said we’d better get home. There’s nothing to eat here.”
“Is—is every one dead?”
“No, they’ve gone off into the country, and that’s what we’ve got to do.”
The younger girl sat up, put her hat straight, and blew her nose. “Isn’t it awful, B.?” she said.
Blanche pinched her lips together. “What are you putting your hat straight for?” she asked. “There’s no one to see you.”
“Well, you needn’t make it any worse,” retorted Millie on the verge of a fresh outburst of tears.
“Oh! come on!” said Blanche, getting to her feet.
“I don’t believe I can walk home,” complained Millie; “my feet ache so.”
“You’ll have to wait a long time if you’re going to find a bus,” returned Blanche.
Three empty taxicabs stood in the rank a few feet away from them, but it never occurred to either of the two young women to attempt any experiment with these mechanisms. If the thought had crossed their minds they would have deemed it absurd.
“Let’s go down by Victoria,” suggested Blanche. “I believe it’s nearer.”
In Parliament Square they disturbed a flock of rooks, birds which had partly changed their natural habits during the past few months and, owing to the superabundance of one kind of food, were preying on carrion.
“Crows,” commented Blanche. “Beastly things.”
“I wonder if we could get some water to drink,” was Millie’s reply.
“Well, there’s the river,” suggested Blanche, and they turned up towards Westminster Bridge.
In one of the tall buildings facing the river Blanche’s attention was caught by an open door.
“Look here, Mill,” she said, “we’ve only been looking for shops. Let’s try one of these houses. We might find something to eat in there.”
“I’m afraid,” said Millie.
“What of?” sneered Blanche. “At the worst it’s skeletons, and we can come out again.”
Millie shuddered. “You go,” she suggested.
“Not by myself, I won’t,” returned Blanche.
“There you are, you see,” said Millie.
“Well, it’s different by yourself.”
“I hate it,” returned Millie with emphasis.
“So do I, in a way, only I’m fair starving,” said Blanche. “Come on.”
The building was solidly furnished, and the ground floor, although somewhat disordered, still suggested a complacent luxury. On the floor lay a copy of the Evening Chronicle, dated May 10; possibly one of the last issues of a London journal. Two of the pages were quite blank, and almost the only advertisement was one hastily-set announcement of a patent medicine guaranteed as a sure protection against the plague. The remainder of the paper was filled with reports of the devastation that was being wrought, reports which were nevertheless marked by a faint spirit of simulated confidence. Between the lines could be read the story of desperate men clinging to hope with splendid courage. There were no signs of panic here. Groves had come out well at the last.
The two girls hovered over this piece of ancient history for a few minutes.
“You see,” said Blanche triumphantly, “even then, more’n two months ago, every one was making for the country. We shall have to go, too. I told you we should.”
“I never said we shouldn’t,” returned Millie. “Anyhow there’s nothing to eat here.”
“Not in this room, there isn’t,” said Blanche, “but there might be in the kitchens. Do you know what this place has been?”
Millie shook her head.
“It’s been a man’s club,” announced Blanche. “First time you’ve been in one, old dear.”
“Come on, let’s have a look downstairs, then,” returned Millie, careless of her achievement.
In the first kitchen they found havoc: broken china and glass, empty bottles, empty tins, cooking utensils on the floor, one table upset, everywhere devastation and the marks of struggle; but in none of the empty tins was there the least particle of food. Everything had been completely cleaned out. The rats had been there, and had gone.
Exploring deeper, however, they were at last rewarded. On a table stood a whole array of unopened tins and in one of them was plunged a tin-opener, a single stab had been given, and then, possibly, another of these common tragedies had begun. Had he been alone, that plunderer, or had his companions fled from him in terror?
Here the two girls made a sufficient meal, and discovered, moreover, a large store of unopened beer-bottles. They shared the contents of one between them, and then, feeling greatly reinvigorated, they sought for and found two baskets, which they filled with tinned foods. They only took away one bottle of beer—a special treat for their mother—on account of the weight. They remembered that they had a long walk before them; and they were not over-elated by their discovery; they were sick to death of tinned meats.
In looking for the baskets they came across a single potato that the rats had left. From it had sprung a long, thin, etiolated shoot which had crept under the door of the cupboard and was making its way across the floor to the light of the window. Already that shoot was several feet in length.
“Funny how they grow,” commented Millie.
“Making for the country, I expect,” replied Blanche, “same as we shall have to do.”
It was a relief to them to find their way into the sunlight once more. Those cold, forsaken houses held some suggestion of horror, of old activities so abruptly ended by tragedy. From these interiors Nature was still shut off. That ghostly tendril aching towards the light had no chance for life and reproduction....