Quicksand by John Brunner Read Free Book Online

suggested doubtfully. "It's

only a two-seater, but -- "
     
     
"I'd rather you didn't," Hofford interrupted. "She can obviously be

a handful, no matter how harmless she seems at the moment. Constable

Edwards over there is a class A driver; suppose he brings your car in

and you ride with us?"
     
     
There was a brief disturbance caused by the angry departure of

Mrs Weddenhall, the Bentley's engine roaring and both dogs barking

frantically. Hofford sighed.
     
     
"That's a relief! You know, for a moment I thought I was going to have

to arrest a justice of the peace for obstructing me in the execution of

my duty. . . . Right, let's get going."
     
     
Having to urge her on at every step, they persuaded the girl towards

Hofford's car.
     
     
"You'd think she'd never seen a car before, wouldn't you?" he muttered

to Paul as he opened the rear door. "Get in first, please -- it may

reassure her."
     
     
Paul slid across the back seat and extended a hand to the girl. Taking it

like a shipwrecked passenger clutching a lifebelt, she crept in beside him.
     
     
-- Like a wild animal being lured into a cage, terrified beyond reason

but equally afraid to fight back against enemies it doesn't understand.

I hope it's not a symptom of claustrophobia; she's bound to have to go

into a security cell until she's been properly examined.
     
     
She gasped wben the engine started. Then, paradoxically, she craned

forward to watch the driver's movements at the controls as be engaged

reverse and swung the car to face the other way. She followed every

action, fascinated.
     
     
Paul glanced at Hofford and read on the inspector's face puzzlement as

great as his own.
     
     
-- What's the good of guessing? We'll find out soon enough. People

don't just drop out of nowhere into a strange country, without clothes,

without a word of the language. A girl like this, tiny and lovely:

someone's bound to have noticed her and will remember.
     
     
Facile jargon seeped up in his mind.
     
     
-- Hysteria, perhaps. The effect of attempted rape on sensitive

personalities is . . . But there were no clothes to be seen bar that

tweed cap, and with his arm broken Faberdown couldn't have got rid of

them. . . . Oh, stop it. As Hofford said, people are damnably complicated

and it's ridiculous to expect solutions with a snap of the fingers.
     
     
At least she seemed to have relaxed a bit. She was gazing first out of

one window, then another, as though desperate not to miss anything the

car went past. He caught her attention and tapped his chest with his

free hand.
     
     
"Paul!" he said.
     
     
"Pol," she echoed docilely. The vowel was wrong, but then the sounds she

had uttered earlier had been wholly alien to English. He turned his hand

and pointed at her.
     
     
"Arrzheen," she said.
     
     
"Did she say 'urchin?'" Hofford chuckled. 'That's appropriate enough.

I thought 'gamin' myself when I first saw her."
     
     
-- All right. "Urchin." It does fit.
     
     
Paul smiled, and after a short pause she tried to smile back, but the

expression wouldn't come.
     
     
     
     
     
     
*7*
     
     
"Evening, Doc! What have you got for us?"
     
     
The speaker emerged from the porter's office: deputy charge nurse Oliphant

wearing his forehead scar like a campaign medal, relic of a pub fight in

which a drunk broke a bottle on his head. He was given to letting people

assume that one of the patients had done it. Paul disliked him for that.
     
     
-- But it's my own sin: "letting people assume." Maybe that accounts

for my strong reaction against it in others.
     
     
"An emergency admission, I suppose," he answered wearily. "Where's Dr Rudge?"
     
     
"Coming, Paul!" Natalie hurried down the last few steps of the staircase

leading to the staff quarters. "Just went to see if Phil had come back,

but you'll do just as well."
     
     
She saw the girl for the first time, and stopped dead.
     
     
"Her?"
     
     
"Apparently. Oh -- this is