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press clippings collected by Helen, and he turned them over again for the thousandth time. Two or three days’ hysteria, and then the topic was elbowed off the front pages by revelations of a politician’s homosexual love life. Anything to boost the circulation figures.
    As for TV, someone had planned a documentary special on the worms, but that was dropped after the woman managing director had received a gift of half-a-dozen of the smaller variety sent to her in a fancy chocolate box. In its place they’d screened a full-length interview with Professor Cledwyn Jones, the well-known herpetologist. According to one clipping – Matt’d been too ill to watch TV himself that evening – he’d assured the populace that ‘they’re no more dangerous than ferrets.’
    But then, Matt excused him, the Professor had never encountered any alive. That was the point. Otherwise he’d have known they were vicious, ruthless, and regarded human beings solely as convenience food.
    There was nothing like being eaten alive to concentrate the mind.
    It didn’t do to talk about it too much, though. Once, when Matt was trying to get his thoughts straight, he’d risked confiding in a fellow patient. For the next few days he’d been aware of amused, pitying glances in his direction, till the hospital psychiatrist had called him in for a chat. Since then he’d kept quiet about them.
    Helen and Jenny arrived early, as he’d hoped they would. The longer they spent talking together before the bandages were removed the better. It was desperately important to him that Jenny should be sure the man behind the strange new face was the same person she’d known all her life. He noticed she wasn’t in jeans today but had allowed her mother to talk herinto wearing a neat summer dress. Dolled up for the great occasion!
    ‘New?’ he asked.
    ‘Yeah.’ She shook the long, blonde hair back from her shoulders. ‘Daddy, what are you going to look like when they take the bandages off?’
    ‘Much the same as before, with any luck.’
    ‘I can’t really remember before,’ she commented. With her forefinger she was tracing the veins over the back of his hand. ‘Does it hurt not having those two fingers?’
    ‘No, not any more.’
    Helen pulled her hand away. ‘Of course you can remember what Daddy looks like,’ she scolded nervously. ‘She’s just saying that, Matt. Your picture’s on my bedside table.’
    ‘I think I’ve forgotten myself,’ Matt joked, trying to ease the tension. ‘Jenny, what have you been up to since I saw you last? Haven’t your holidays started yet?’
    ‘Ages ago, and I’ve been playing out with Sandra and Barney and…’
    As Jenny chattered on, Matt looked across at Helen. She’d had her hair done, he noted; still bright blonde, but the darkness at the roots had gone. It was much shorter, hardly reaching the lobes of her ears, and fluffed out elaborately like a wig. Must’ve cost her a bomb, though he couldn’t say he cared for it much. If the doctors were satisfied when they removed the bandages, they’d be discharging him soon. A matter of days now. Going home, trying to live together…
    For a second her eyes rested on his and he knew she feared it as much as he did.
    ‘And then we went swimming,’ Jenny was going on happily, ‘all of us together—’
    ‘Swimming?’ His voice was sharp. Anxious. ‘Not in the river?’
    ‘No, in the baths!’ Jenny defended herself hotly. ‘I never said the river, Mummy, did I?’
    ‘She’s a very good swimmer,’ Helen snapped. ‘If you’d spent more time with her last summer, you’d know that.’
    ‘I’m sorry,’ he apologized, relieved. ‘Sorry, Jenny. Going to the baths is fine, but not in the river. Not even paddling in astream. Just keep away from those places.’
    ‘Why?’
    The nurse came to fetch him before he could answer.
    But, hell, he had to warn them somehow. All over the country schools were beginning their holidays. Kids would be playing