The noise of birds was filling his head. He hauledhimself to the edge of the bed and pulled back themosquito net. The crude weave of the net seemedto scour the palm of his hand as he gripped it. Hedisengaged his hold, and cursed to himself. Therewas again today an itch of tenderness in his skinthat he'd suffered since coming to the post. Eventhe soles of his feet, pressed on to the floor by theweight of his body, seemed to suffer each knot andsplinter. He wanted to be away from this place, andbadly.

\ warm trickle across his wrist caught his attention,and he was startled to see a rivulet of blood movingdown his arm from his hand. There was a cut in thecushion of his thumb, where the mosquito net hadapparently nicked his flesh. It was bleeding, thoughnot copiously. He sucked at the cut, feeling again thatpeculiar sensitivity to touch that only drink, and thatin abundance, dulled. Spitting out blood, he began todress.

The clothes he put on were a scourge to his back.His sweat-stiffened shirt rubbed against his shouldersand neck; he seemed to feel every thread chafing hisnerve-endings. The shirt might have been sackcloth,the way it abraded him.

Next door, he heard Locke moving around. Gingerlyfinishing his dressing, Cherrick went through to joinhim. Locke was sitting at the table by the window. Hewas poring over a map of Tetelman's, and drinking acup of the bitter coffee Dancy was so fond of brewing,which he drank with a dollop of condensed milk. Thetwo men had little to say to each other. Since the incidentin the village all pretence to respect or friendship haddisappeared. Locke now showed undisguised contemptfor his sometime companion. The only fact that keptthem together was the contract they and Stumpf hadsigned. Rather than breakfast on whisky, which he knewLocke would take as a further sign of his decay, Cherrickpoured himself a slug of Dancy's emetic and went out tolook at the morning.

He felt strange. There was something about thisdawning day which made him profoundly uneasy. Heknew the dangers of courting unfounded fears, and hetried to forbid them, but they were incontestable.

Was it simply exhaustion that made him so painfullyconscious of his many discomforts this morning? Whyelse did he feel the pressure of his stinking clothes soacutely? The rasp of his boot collar against the juttingbone of his ankle, the rhythmical chafing of his trousersagainst his inside leg as he walked, even the grazing airthat eddied around his exposed face and arms. The worldwas pressing on him - at least that was the sensation -pressing as though it wanted him out.

A large dragonfly, whining towards him on iridescentwings, collided with his arm. The pain of the collisioncaused him to drop his mug. It didn't break, but rolledoff the verandah and was lost in the undergrowth.Angered, Cherrick slapped the insect off, leaving asmear of blood on his tattooed forearm to mark thedragonfly's demise. He wiped it off. It welled up againon the same spot, full and dark.

It wasn't the blood of the insect, he realised, but hisown. The dragonfly had cut him somehow, though hehad felt nothing. Irritated, he peered more closely at hispunctured skin. The wound was not significant, but itwas painful.

From inside he could hear Locke talking. Hewas loudly describing the inadequacy of his fellowadventures to Tetelman.

'Stumpf s not fit for this kind of work,' he was saying.'And Cherrick -'

'What about me?'

Cherrick stepped into the shabby interior, wiping anew flow of blood from his arm.

Locke didn't even bother to look up at him.'You're paranoid,' he said plainly. 'Paranoid andunreliable.'

Cherrick was in no mood for taking Locke's foul-mouthing. 'Just because I killed some Indian brat,' hesaid. The more he brushed blood from his bitten arm,the more the place stung. 'You just didn't have the ballsto do it yourself.'

Locke still didn't bother to look up from hisperusal of the map. Cherrick moved across to thetable.

'Are you listening to me?' he demanded, and addedforce to his question by slamming his fist down onto the table. On impact his hand simply burst open.Blood spurted out in every direction, spattering themap.

Cherrick howled, and reeled backwards from thetable with blood pouring from a yawning split inthe side of his hand. The bone showed. Throughthe din of pain in his head he could hear a quietvoice. The words were inaudible, but he knew whosethey were.

'I won't hear!' he said, shaking his head like a dog witha flea in its ear. He staggered back against the wall, butthe briefest of contacts was another agony. 7 won't hear,damn you!'

'What the hell's he talking about?' Dancy hadappeared in the doorway, woken by the cries, stillclutching the Complete Works of Shelley Tetelman hadsaid he could not sleep without.

Locke re-addressed the question to Cherrick, who wasstanding, wild-eyed, in the corner of the room, bloodspitting from between his fingers as he attempted tostaunch his wounded hand. 'What are you saying?'

'He spoke to me,' Cherrick replied. 'The old man.'

'What old man?' Tetelman asked.

'He means at the village,' Locke said. Then, toCherrick, 'Is that what you mean?'

'He wants us out. Exiles. Like them. Like them!'Cherrick's panic was rapidly rising out of anyone'scontrol, least of all his own.

'The man's got heat-stroke,' Dancy said, ever thediagnostician. Locke knew better.

'Your hand needs bandaging ...' he said, slowlyapproaching Cherrick.

'I heard him ...' Cherrick muttered.

'I believe you. Just slow down. We can sort itout.'

'No,' the other man replied. 'It's pushing us out.Everything we touch. Everything we touch.'

He looked as though he was about to topple over, andLocke reached for him. As his hands made contact withCherrick's shoulders the flesh beneath the shirt split,and Locke's hands were instantly soaked in scarlet. Hewithdrew them, appalled. Cherrick fell to his knees,which in their turn became new wounds. He stared downas his shirt and trousers darkened. 'What's happening tome?' he wept.

Dancy moved towards him. 'Let me help.'

'No! Don't touch me!' Cherrick pleaded, but Dancywasn't to be denied his nursing.

'It's all right,' he said in his best bedside manner.

It wasn't. Dancy's grip, intended only to lift the manfrom his bleeding knees, opened new cuts wherever hetook hold. Dancy felt the blood sprout beneath his hand,felt the flesh slip away from the bone. The sensationbested even his taste for agony. Like Locke, he forsookthe lost man.

'He's rotting,' he murmured.

Cherrick's body had split now in a dozen or moreplaces. He tried to stand, half staggering to his feet onlyto collapse again, his flesh breaking open whenever hetouched wall or chair or floor. There was no help forhim. All the others could do was stand around likespectators at an execution, awaiting the final throes.Even Stumpf had roused himself from his bed and comethrough to see what all the shouting was about. He stoodleaning against the door-lintel, his disease-thinned faceall disbelief.

Another minute, and blood-loss defeated Cherrick.He keeled over and sprawled, face down, across thefloor. Dancy crossed back to him and crouched on hishaunches beside his head.

'Is he dead?' Locke asked.

'Almost,' Dancy replied.

'Rotted,' said Tetelman, as though the word explainedthe atrocity they had just witnessed. He had a crucifix inhis hand, large and crudely carved. It looked like Indianhandiwork, Locke thought. The Messiah impaled on thetree was sloe-eyed and indecently naked. He smiled,despite nail and thorn.

Dancy touched Cherrick's body, letting the bloodcome with his touch, and turned the man over, thenleaned in towards Cherrick's jittering face. The dyingman's lips were moving, oh so slightly.