He might have been a century too late, the inhabitants dead and gone. A cat jumped off a stone wall and fled at his approach. A mongrel dog barked at him from a distance then turned and ran with its tail between its legs. Apart from that there was no sign of life.
He pulled up by the triangle of rough unmown grass that was fondly termed 'the Green' and saw at a glance that the telephone in the kiosk had been vandalised; the receiver and dialling mechanism were torn away, left smashed and bent on the floor.
He sighed his despair, glanced at the Mazda's petrol gauge. Almost empty, just about enough juice to get him back to the farm. And he was only going back there because it had once been his home.
He made it to the yard gates before the engine stuttered and died, free-wheeled the last few yards. It was only later that he asked himself why he hadn't tried some of those parked cars in the village; almost surely he would have found one with the keys in and some petrol in the tank. But he hadn't and that was that. He wasn't going back there again.
Days stretched into weeks and still he hung around the farm doing nothing. When the fridge was empty he started on the freezer; the generator out by the buildings would keep it going for some time yet because it was not running anything else. When he ran out of food he would think of something but not until. His parents would not be coming back, the sheep were still in the barley and there wasn't a goddamned thing he could do about it. For the time being he would sit it out.
The initial terror had numbed him but gradually it was wearing off. Acceptance came in stages but reasoning was a different matter. The eternal 'why'. Why had everybody just up and gone? It was some sort of nuclear attack, of course. He had escaped because he had been down the mine but soon radiation would take its toll of him. When he felt really ill and started throwing up he would know that he had radiation sickness, the beginning of the end. Cancer, really. And once he was sure, he would do something about it; he'd read somewhere that it could take you months, even years, to die depending upon how exposed to it you had been. He wasn't going to wait and suffer that long.
What he needed to do, he decided, was to get away from this place, move further afield and maybe meet up with some other survivors—if there were any.
And it was on his very first trek beyond the boundary stile on the bridle-path that he met up with that party of hunters from the hills. They must have heard him coming, had lain in wait for him along that overgrown path, some of them up in the trees above.
Something hit him. Ape actors in a jungle movie coming right out of the screen, sending him sprawling, surrounding him, jabbering. Breathless, he looked up, found the twin prongs of a pitchfork only an inch or so from his throat. He tried to swallow but couldn't make it, let his eyes roll because he couldn't move his head. There were a lot of them, maybe twenty or more, others standing just outside his range of vision. And every one of them bore a strong resemblance to how his parents had looked the last time he had seen them.
His captors forced him to his feet. He read the malevolence in their expressions, the curiosity as they fingered his clothing, stroked his smooth skin with their rough hands, chattered in low tones. What creature is this with soft flesh and clothes that stifle his body?
The pitchfork remained at Phil's throat, the threat of impalement more real than ever. They pulled his hands behind his back and he felt the roughness of a rope beginning to bind his wrists, pulled tight, thrown around his arms so that they were pinioned to his body. A dog on a leash, being dragged along, prodded from behind with those devilish prongs.
He didn't know where they were taking him, didn't care, wished he had died of radioactive poisoning or anything that would spare him this. Wondering if his parents were amongst this band of barely human beings, claiming their son for their own. No, they wouldn't see him treated this way.
So in due course they arrived at the encampment in the hills, the women streaming out to greet them, gazing in awe at the live prey which their menfolk had brought home from a hunting trip.
Phil's lips were blistered, his throat crying out for water. A blinding thumping headache like wild horses cantering around inside his brain. Now they were all fingering him, ripping at his shirt, tearing it away from his body, pointing in amazement at the hairless flesh beneath.
Oh God, they were shredding his corduroy trousers now. Embarrassment mingled with his terror, his natural inhibitions screaming at him that there were women here. Closing his eyes; if he could have backed away he would have when they began feeling at his flaccid genitals and laughing in that frightening monkey-like whickering, squeezing him so that he was doubled up in agony, the pain stabbing right into his guts.
A grunted command and they fell back. Kuz has demonstrated his prize exhibit and now there was work to be done. Phil Winder opened his eyes, saw the female who was obviously their leader's woman by the way she stood close to him. By any standards she was beautiful, her features still retaining a civilised look about them. Her gaze centred on the prisoner for a second and in her eyes Phil read compassion, pity. If I had my way you would be set free. You have done us no harm. But I dare not speak out.
A guttural snarl from Kuz and those behind Phil began pushing him forward again, digging the points of the pitchfork into his buttocks so that he gasped with pain. It was difficult to walk, the remnants of his trousers having fallen to his ankles and restricting his movements. Yet he had to keep moving for at the slightest hesitation his nearest captor jabbed him again, gave vent to sadistic delight by sucking in his breath and expelling it noisily every time he thrust with the pitchfork.
Through the cluster of buildings, along a hard-trodden track which was these people's main village street, crude stone dwellings constructed of uneven stones giving them an unstable look, the roofs cut tree boughs with heavy boulders preventing the elements from dislodging them. So primitive but none the less effective.
Winder did not see the hole in the ground until he was a yard or two from it, a huge yawning grave with a rickety ladder protruding from it. The sweat on his body went icy cold as those behind him slashed through his bonds. There was no misunderstanding what was expected of him as they shoved him forward. That is your prison, stranger. Go to it!
He was prodded again even as he reached for the ladder, saw down into the hole for the first time. Just a hole, not even squared sides; twenty feet deep at least, soil and rock, nothing else. His hands were numb, he could not grasp the rungs, relying on his feet and his body to maintain his balance. He tried to kick the remnants of his trousers free but they caught, twisted.
That pikle threatened him again. Hurry. For Christ's sake I can't go any faster! Faces peering down at him, grinning. They were enjoying this, every damned one of them; except maybe that pretty girl who looked out of place here.
Suddenly Phil Winder felt himself start to totter, the ragged trouser bottoms tearing at his foothold. Flailing the air with hands that had no feeling, were just starting to tingle painfully.
Toppling backwards; he couldn't check his scream. His body hit the side, seemed to bounce off it, hands scraping the sheer wall, a futile grab for a hold. It was like being in an elevator that had gone out of control, a snapped cable plunging it down the shaft, the walls hurtling by, giving you an optical illusion so that you had the crazy feeling you were shooting back upwards. Dizziness, your guts turning over, any second you would spew them out. Anticipating the awful bone-shattering impact . . .