Bar None Read Free Page A

standing out in the hallway beyond the kitchen, worrying at a loose quarry tile with his heavy boots. He has a knife strapped to his belt, but his hand strays nowhere close.
    I run past him and pelt into the living room. It stinks of old books. "Cordell!" I say again, pausing, leaning over and resting my hands on my knees. I look up and see him standing by the window, shotgun resting in the crook of his left arm.
    "One man on a bike," he says. "Not wearing a helmet. Long blonde hair." He glances back briefly, and I'm comforted by the control in his eyes. He's not likely to blow the man from his bike without provocation.
    "Jacqueline?" I ask.
    "In the sitting room. She's got the .22."
    I nod. The air rifle is an old single shot model, primed by pumping the barrel. We use it for hunting pigeons and ducks, and none of us are a very good shot. If she does use it, she'll have to get him in the eye to cause any real damage.
    "I've told her to follow my lead." Cordell sees my concern, hears it in my laboured breathing.
    The bike circles the dry fountain in front of the Manor. The rider takes it slow, showing that he is not a threat, and also that he's unafraid. His hair is indeed long and blonde, tied back in several places with what look like metal bands. He rides in shirtsleeves, and his heavy forearms are dark with exposure to the sun, ridged with prominent veins. No tattoos. No piercings that I can see. No sunglasses. It's an old model motorbike, a real antique, and I find the grumbling engine strangely comforting. Everything is very quiet nowadays. It's good to hear this. It's almost normal, and yet this man is so far from normal that I feel cold.
    "What is it?" I ask, and my strange wording provokes no comment from Cordell.
    We stand together and watch the biker come to a halt. He silences the bike and kicks down its stand. Then he dismounts, stretches, twists the discomfort from his back, yawns, and turns to look at the Manor for the first time.
    We lock eyes. He knows exactly where we are, and he probably knew the second he drove in between the open gates.
    Maybe he saw me seeing him from the tower , I think, but it's a crazy idea. He'd been a mile away at least, and I was the one hidden away.
    "He's looking right at me," Cordell says, and from across the hallway I hear Jacqueline gasp out loud.
    "Where's he been?" I say. "I thought we were the only ones."
    "We've talked about that," Cordell says, and we have. About how we cannot be the only ones left, how there must be other survivors, why we did not die, why we were spared. And yet we have heard or seen nothing on the airwaves for months, no sign of life from the dead city beyond the river, and the sky is clear and blue, unhazed by smoke or the exhaust from aircraft. The idea that we're the last ones left is faintly ridiculous, but much of the time it's also the only thing I can believe.
    If there are others, why haven't we met them by now?
    "He's not one of them ," I say. "One of those flying things. From above the city."
    "I've never seen them." He's sticking to his usual story, though I'm certain he's lying.
    The man approaches the front door and I hear Jacqueline dash into the hall. I rush out to be with her—I can never quite tell what mood she's in, how dangerous she can be—but she is already reaching for the door locks. Jessica stands just behind her, and the Irishman is back in the shadows beneath the staircase. The most optimistic of all of us, he seems to be the most afraid.
    Jacqueline has left the air rifle leaning against the timber wall panelling and I snatch it up. It wouldn't do any good , I think, but I try to ignore the idea.
    Cordell is beside me, still cradling the shotgun.
    "Do you really think we should do that?" the Irishman whispers from under the stairs, and the door opens inward.
    The man stands there for a while, letting the sun spill in around him. His shadow leans out before him, stretching across the timber floor and pooling around my feet.