The Day of the Triffids(4)

You’ll find it in the records that on Tuesday, May 7, the Earth’s orbit passed through a cloud of comet debris. You can even believe it, if you like—millions did. Maybe it was so. I can’t prove anything either way. I was in no state to see what happened myself; but I do have my own ideas. All that I actually know of the occasion is that I had to spend the evening in my bed listening to eyewitness accounts of what was constantly claimed to be the most remarkable celestial spectacle on record.

And yet, until the thing actually began, nobody had ever heard a word about this supposed comet, or its debris….

Why they broadcast it, considering that everyone who could walk, hobble, or be carried was either out of doors or at windows enjoying the greatest free firework display ever, I don’t know. But they did, and it helped to impress on me still more heavily what it meant to be sightless. I got around to feeling that if the treatment had not been successful I’d rather end the whole thing than go on that way.

It was reported in the news bulletins during the day that mysterious bright green flashes had been seen in the Californian skies the previous night. However, such a lot of things did happen in California that no one could be expected to get greatly worked up over that, but as further reports came in, this comet-debris motif made its appearance, and it stuck.

Accounts arrived from all over the Pacific of a night made brilliant by green meteors said to be “sometimes in such numerous showers that the whole sky appeared to be wheeling about us.” And so it was, when you come to think of it.

As the night line moved westward the brilliance of the display was in no way decreased. Occasional green flashes became visible even before darkness fell. The announcer, giving an account of the phenomenon in the six o’clock news, advised everyone that it was an amazing scene and one not to be missed. He mentioned also that it seemed to be interfering seriously with short-wave reception at long distances, but that the medium waves on which there would be a running commentary were unaffected, as, at present, was television. He need not have troubled with the advice. By the way everyone in the hospital got excited about it, it seemed to me that there was not the least likelihood of anybody missing it—except myself.

And as if the radio’s comments were not enough, the nurse who brought me my supper had to tell me all about it.

“The sky’s simply full of shooting stars,” she said. “All bright green. They make people’s faces look frightfully ghastly. Everybody’s out watching them, and sometimes it’s almost as light as day—only all the wrong color. Every now and then there’s a big one so bright that it hurts to look at it. It’s a marvelous sight. They say there’s never been anything like it before. It is such a pity you can’t see it, isn’t it?”

“It is,” I agreed somewhat shortly.

“We’ve drawn back the curtains in the wards so that they can all see it,” she went on. “If only you hadn’t those bandages you’d have a wonderful view of it from here.”

“Oh,” I said.

“But it must be better still outside, though. They say thousands of people are out in the parks and on the heath watching it all. And on all the flat roofs you can see people standing and looking up.”

“How long do they expect it to go on?” I asked patiently.

“I don’t know, but they say it’s not so bright now as it was in other places. Still, even if you’d had your bandages off today, I don’t expect they’d have let you watch it. You’ll have to take things gently at first, and some of the flashes are very bright. They——Ooooh!”

“Why ‘oooh’?” I inquired.

“That was such a brilliant one then—it made the whole room look green. What a pity you couldn’t see it.”

“Isn’t it?” I agreed. “Now do go away, there’s a good girl.”

I tried listening to the radio, but it was making the same “ooohs” and “aaahs,” helped out by gentlemanly tones which blathered about this “magnificent spectacle” and “unique phenomenon” until I began to feel that there was a party for all the world going on, with me as the only person not invited.

I didn’t have any choice of entertainment, for the hospital radio system gave only one program, take it or leave it. After a bit I gathered that the show had begun to wane. The announcer advised everyone who had not yet seen it to hurry up and do so, or regret all his life that he had missed it.

The general idea seemed to be to convince me that I was passing up the very thing I was born for. In the end I got sick of it and switched off. The last thing I heard was that the display was diminishing fast now and that we’d probably be out of the debris area in a few hours.

There could be no doubt in my mind that all this had taken place the previous evening—for one thing, I should have been a great deal hungrier even than I was had it been longer ago. Very well, what was this, then? Had the whole hospital, the whole city made such a night of it that they’d not pulled round yet?

About which point I was interrupted as the chorus of clocks, near and far, started announcing nine.

For the third time I played hell with the bell. As I lay waiting I could hear a sort of murmurousness beyond the door. It seemed composed of whimperings, slitherings, and shufflings, punctuated occasionally by a raised voice in the distance.