The Fog - James Herbert [102]
But he’d made it. The joy of once again emerging into the daylight, grey though it was, was immense and made him feel quite light headed. The fog seemed sightly less dense, but he wasn’t sure if it wasn’t because he’d come from the blackness of the tunnels and the contrast between total darkness and murky grey was deceiving his eyes.
He paused for a moment to get his bearings, switching the torch off and placing it on the ground. He became aware of a puzzling sound off to his right, a curious cooing noise echoing from the mists, continuous and monotonous and, somehow, haunting. He realized its source: pigeons. The thousands of pigeons that belonged to Trafalgar Square. Would they be affected by the fog? Their unified call was strange and hypnotic and aroused his curiosity. Forgetting his instructions to avoid any trouble, he walked towards the compulsive ululation, keeping a wary eye out for any sudden shadows that might appear. He crossed the broad road and reached the inner square where he stopped and peered into the mist.
The pigeons were spread like a deep grey carpet before him, disappearing into the mist, but giving the impression that the mass of small bodies covered the rest of the square completely. Occasionally, one would flutter a few feet into the air but would soon settle on to the backs of the others and snuggle its way in between them. Although they huddled together, they did not seem afraid; there was no nervousness about them, no sudden movements among them except for those that were squeezed from their positions and had to manoeuvre their way in again. And all the while, the deep-throated cooing penetrating the poisoned air, sinister and compelling. Holman suddenly noticed there were taller shadows rising from them, the ghostly shapes of people, quite motionless, silent and inhuman.
He backed away. Something was going to happen. He could sense it.
His eyes never left the birds until they had been obscured from his vision by the other enemy, the fog, and only then did he turn and begin to walk away at a brisk pace. He knew that a sudden movement from any of the people who stood among them – and there must have been many others for he had counted at least five within range of himself – and the pigeons would be galvanized into action. Whether or not they would attack he did not know for sure, but instinct had told him to get away, the menace that pervaded from them was an almost tangible thing.
Hoping he was headed in the right direction, he hurried on. The fact that he now appeared to be in a sort of no man’s land, without a kerb or building to guide him, caused him even more anxiety. If his sense of direction was correct, Whitehall would be ahead of him, the Strand to the left and the Mall just off to the right, he was at the junction of all the roads.
He heard the car before he saw it. Its engine was roaring, the tyres screeching which, fortunately for Holman, gave him plenty of warning of its approach. Standing perfectly still, he tried to judge with his ears exactly where the car would appear. The noise was coming from the direction of the Strand, but seemed to be alternating from left to right; the screeching of tyres told him the driver was weaving some crazy pattern from one side of the road to the other. And then it was no more than twenty yards from him, sweeping through the mist like a demon from hell.
He was rigid from the shock of it for even though he had been expecting its emergence from the fog, the suddenness