Kindling by Nevil Shute Read Free Book Online Page A

rupture. He found nothing wrong and came to the conclusion that his pain was muscular alone. He sat for a time in bed studying his maps by the light of a flickering candle. It might well be that he was taking things too hard, bearing in mind that he had taken little exercise for years. To-morrow he would not go on the hills. The coast was not so far; he would go gently down to the sea and strike northwards up the coast; then on the following day he could turn north-westwards to the hills again.
    Moreover, there were towns down there. He could buy a razor, or perhaps get shaved.
    He turned to sleep. Already London and his house seemed infinitely distant to him; his troubles had sunk deep into the background of his mind, things that had happened to him very long ago, that could not touch him now. If anything were needed to expunge them from his mind the little pain that he had had done it; he rested for the first time in some months with an easy mind, only concerned about the physical circumstances of his present life. He slept.
    The morning dawned wet and chilly again. He paid his bill and turned towards the east, tramping in a windy, drizzling rain. The road ran downhill into farming land, a change from the rough moors that he hadtraversed for the last few days. Although he kept to the road and it was easy walking he was curiously tired; he went slowly with an ache and heaviness where he had had the muscular pain the night before. He began to have his doubts about that muscular pain.
    By the middle of the day his doubts were doubts no longer.
    He was perhaps five miles from the coast. Tired, he sat down for a few minutes at a cross-roads to smoke a cigarette, when suddenly the pain flared up and pierced him through. He clutched himself and bent up double on the grass; the cigarette fell from his mouth and lay there smouldering beside him.
    “God,” he whispered, white to the lips. “It’ll pass off in a minute.”
    But it did not pass off. It continued and grew worse, with a throbbing deep down in his abdomen that could not be merely muscular. He lay there for a quarter of an hour in great pain; one or two cars passed by without stopping.
    “Better get going somewhere,” he muttered to himself at last. “It’s no good stopping here.”
    He struggled to his feet and set himself to walk a quarter of a mile back to a house that he had passed. He covered about a hundred yards, and then he fell by the edge of the road. He heard a rumbling behind him and struggled to a sitting posture, raising one hand.
    The lorry drew up to a standstill. The driver remained sitting at his wheel, looking down upon him curiously.
    “What’s up with you, chum?” he enquired.
    Warren said something unintelligible. The driverclimbed down and took him by the shoulder, turning him to look into his face. “Hey, what’s the matter, chum?” he said. “You got it bad?”
    “Hell of a pain,” gasped Warren. “In my guts. Be a good sort. Get me to a doctor.”
    The driver paused, irresolute. “Don’t know about a doctor—I’m a stranger in these parts.” And then he said, “Buck up, chum. I’ll see you right.”
    Two cars, following each other close, had drawn up at the lorry blocking the road; one of them was full of men. In a minute there was a little crowd around. “Bloke taken sick,” said the lorry driver. “Give us a hand with him, an’ put him up in the back. I’ll take him somewhere.”
    The lorry was half full of sacks of cattle food, with a strange, sweet smell. There was a bustling about, letting down the tail-board, and adjusting sacks; somebody bent over Warren and removed his collar, which was cutting deep into his neck. Then there were many hands about him and he was lifted shoulder-high in a wild blur of pain, passed into the hands of other men standing in the lorry, and deposited on the sacks. The lorry driver made him as comfortable as possible.
    “Won’t be long now,” he said. “I’ll see you right. That