Doctor Who_ The Algebra of Ice - Lloyd Rose [58]
‘Are they likely to break through?’
The Doctor went quiet for a few minutes, leaning back with his hands clasped, watching the flames. ‘I wouldn’t think any time soon. The computations from our end are extraordinarily difficult. People can take decades solving Chapter Fourteen
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mathematical problems. Some were posed centuries ago and remain unsolved today. Even on Gallifrey, there are things that, so far, are beyond us. To use an Earth phrase, they exist only in the mind of God.’
This was getting too mystical for the Brigadier. ‘So – what can I do?’
‘Oh, nothing, I would think,’ the Doctor shrugged, eyes still on the fire.
‘There’s no military solution at this point. And if they get through, there probably won’t be a military solution either.’
‘Nice to be needed,’ said Lethbridge-Stewart, but he didn’t smile. Neither did the Doctor.
‘I thought there would be more snow.’
‘It doesn’t necessarily snow a great deal in the Swiss winter – sometimes it’s too cold.’
‘ I’m bloody cold,’ said Unwin. ‘Couldn’t you have found somewhere warmer?’
‘It’s supposed to have central heating, and I’m quite comfortable. It’s only you, Pat. Go over by the Stove.’
The stove was a rectangular one, almost as tall as Unwin and covered with Delft tiles. Unwin drew a chair close to it and sat down sullenly. Brett was gazing out the window at the night.
‘I can’t work out how he escaped,’ Unwin said.
‘He had help.’
‘From whom?’
‘Presumably the elusive Doctor. What a pity we missed him.’
Unwin touched one of his cold fingers to a tile and jerked it back quickly. ‘I still don’t see the point of our coming here.’
‘I’ve told you,’ Brett said patiently, still looking out. ‘Kent was the first choice, this is the second. The membrane, so to speak, is not quite as thin here, but it’s passable. If you can finish those equations. . . ’ He turned, eyes bright. ‘And can you, without our little friend?’
‘In time,’ said Unwin miserably. He hated the blond-wood-panelled room.
He hated Swiss austerity.
‘The boundary is at its most penetrable now. It won’t be for much longer.’
‘It’s not my fault!’ Unwin shouted. ‘The problem is fiendish. It’s the sort of thing that takes people years.’
‘I just told you, they don’t have years.’
‘So what? If I fail, I fail. There’s nothing they can do about it.’
‘If you fail,’ said Brett softly, ‘I will be very disappointed with you.’
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The Algebra of Ice
Unwin avoided his eyes. ‘Well, where are they going to enter? They need a more or less flat place, and we’re in the middle of the bloody Alps.’
‘I should think that would be obvious, young Pat.’ Brett turned his hungry gaze back to the darkness and the hidden, ice-topped peaks. ‘They’ll come through on the top of a glacier.’
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Ethan didn’t remember much of his journey with Ace. Pain and exhaustion had caught up with him and he was hardly conscious. At some point, Ace pulled into a lay-by and brought him up front to be nearer the heater. She also pulled her jacket around him. He was aware of being led up a walk, then up a stair, then he wasn’t aware of anything until he woke up in a soft bed under a pile of blankets. The window was dark, a little mica-shaded lamp glowed on the bed table, and the Doctor was looking down at him with concern:
‘How are you feeling?’
‘Better.’ Ethan looked around the room. Old wardrobe. Pier glass mirror.
Chest-of-drawers. Armchair. Fireplace with fire in it. A comfortable little bedroom. Somehow his glasses, or glasses indistinguishable from them, had made it to the bedside table. ‘Where is this?’
‘This is my house in Kent.’
‘You have a house? I thought you lived in –’
‘– a spaceship. Not all the time. Do you mind if I look at your face?’ The Doctor lifted the lamp and bent closer. ‘Not as bad as it was. How do they feel?’
Ethan touched one of the burns on his throat. ‘It’s hardly. . . What did you do?’
‘Spaceman medicine.’ The Doctor pointed to a capped tube on the bed table.
‘Any time you think you need more, there it is. Are you all right otherwise?