"Smith, Guy N - Bats Out of Hell" - читать интересную книгу автора (Smith Guy N)

'Oh, so you went drinking, did you?'

'And that wasn't all,' his voice was raised. 'I was with a bird. And I was going to screw her only you stopped me! You put me off my stroke!'

'Me?'

'Yes, you. Out on a snooping trip. Well, I don't blame you, but I can't stand liars.'

'Neither can I, Professor. And just lately you've been telling quite a few yourself.' Her self-control began to snap, and she added savagely, 'You think you're God's gift to women, don't you, Brian Newman? Well, let me tell you this. All you're trying to do is prove something to yourself, though God knows what. Maybe 'conquer and move on' is your motto. Well, I'm not standing for it. You thought you could drive me off, didn't you? That I'd pack and run? Well, I'm not leaving the Centre. 'I'm not giving up a good job because of you. I'll move out of your bungalow so you can have her in the bed all to yourself, but I'm staying right here in this very lab as far as work goes. I'm not going to give you the satisfaction of seeing me go to Haynes and ask for a transfer to Rickers's lab. The pair of you would love that, in your own warped ways, but I'm staying put, bats and all. But lay one finger on me again, try to get familiar with me, and I'll be lodging an official complaint that will really put paid to your career. You've got me with you all the time in an official capacity, and nothing more, whether you like it or not!'

'You bitch!' His left hand went back, and before he could stop himself he had struck her across the face with a resounding slap.

She staggered back, tears filling her eyes, gasping with pain. He stood aghast, mouth opening to voice an apology.

Suddenly everything seemed to explode inside her, and she was hurling herself at him, beating at his body with clenched fists, tearing, scratching, biting, kicking. He staggered back, Susan Wylie clinging on to him, screaming insults at him,

'Damn your he yelled. 'I'll teach you a lesson you won't forget. I'll.. .' His words trailed off as his back met with something solid but movable. The table. He felt the nearside legs being lifted clear of the floor, objects sliding, crashing, splintering, fragments of glass tinkling. In desperation he pushed her away from him, and even as he turned he saw guinea-pigs and other rodents scampering about, frightened, bewildered by their unexpected freedom,

'Oh, God!' he gasped.

Something flew past his face, a rush of air from tiny wings fanning him. Another. And another.

'The bats!' he cried, his face turning a deathly white. 'The bats have escaped!'

Susan Wylie backed away. It was true. The cage of death was lying in splinters, the bats which had died from the mutated virus spilled beneath it. Yet it was the living ones which brought a cry of terror to her lips. They were flying crazily about the room, cannoning into walls, getting up again, jinking, swerving. One hit a row of test-tubes and sent them showering to the floor.

'Under the table!' Brian Newman grabbed her around the waist, dragging her down beneath the long table with him. 'Keep still! They're not after us. It's just that their radars are damaged and they've no sense of direction.'

The high-pitched squeaking was much louder now that the tiny creatures were free of their cage. Newman and Susan heard them striking against the windows. Sooner or later they must find the open one. More breaking glass.

'The window's gone. The big one!' Brian Newman gasped. 'The pane must have been cracked or faulty. They'd never break it otherwise.'

The incoming fresh air seemed to attract the bats. Whereas their disturbed radars had previously forced them to fly aimlessly, panic-stricken, now they scented freedom. In a matter of seconds they had gone, speeding across the Chase like jet-propelled butterflies, lost to the view of the two people who stared after them through the shattered window of the laboratory.

'Well, they're gone,' Brian Newman slipped an arm around Susan, and this time she made no attempt to squirm from his grasp. 'I'm sorry,' she said weakly. 'It wasn't your fault. I shouldn't have hit you.' 'What are we going to do now?'

Newman looked around the lab, noting the slivers of broken glass on the floor, the smashed cages, mice and guinea-pigs scuttling fearfully to and fro.

'Well, I guess we'll have to tell Haynes the whole truth now,' he said, 'and we can only pray that the virus died in those victims, and that the bats which escaped are neither infected nor carriers. Otherwise . . . ' He shook his head slowly, and his expression was grave. If the virus had been carried from the Biological Research Centre, then the possible consequences did not bear thinking about. Voices in the corridor outside interrupted them. Someone was banging on the door.

'What's happening in there? Are you all right, New-man?' It was Haynes's voice.

Brian Newman strode to the door and unlocked it. Haynes, Professor Rickers - a tall, balding man with rimless spectacles - and the night-porter, who had been just on the point of going off duty, crowded into the small laboratory.

'What the hell,' Haynes's face took on a deep flush as he surveyed the wreckage,

'There's been an accident,' Newman said. 'I slipped and overturned the table.'

'You'd better get these rodents caught quickly,' Haynes snapped, noting two or three white mice running around the perimeter of the room.