From ten-seventeen that night, information about Midwich becomes episodic. Its telephones remained dead. The bus that should have passed through it failed to reach Stouch, and a truck that went to look for the bus did not return. A notification from the R.A.F. was received in Trayne of some unidentified flying object, not, repeat not, a service machine, detected by radar in the Midwich area, possibly making a forced landing. Someone in Oppley reported a house on fire in Midwich, with, apparently, nothing being done about it. The Trayne fire appliance turned out-and thereafter failed to make any reports. The Trayne police despatched a car to find out what had happened to the fire-engine, and that, too, vanished into silence. Oppley reported a second fire, and still, seemingly, nothing being done, Constable Gobby, in Stouch, was rung up, and sent off on his bicycle to Midwich; and no more was heard of him, either….
***
The dawn of the 27th was an affair of slatternly rags soaking in a dishwater sky, with a grey light weakly filtering through. Nevertheless, in Oppley and in Stouch cocks crowed, and other birds welcomed it more melodiously. In Midwich, however, no birds sang.
In Oppley and Stouch, too, as in other places, hands were soon reaching out to silence alarm clocks, but in Midwich the clocks rattled on till they ran down.
In other villages sleepy-eyed men left their cottages and encountered their work-mates with sleepy good mornings; in Midwich no one encountered anyone.
For Midwich lay entranced….
While the rest of the world began to fill the day with clamour, Midwich slept on…. Its men and women, its horses, cows, and sheep; its pigs, its poultry, its larks, moles, and mice all lay still. There was a pocket of silence in Midwich, broken only by the frouing of the leaves, the chiming of the church clock, and the gurgle of the Opple as it slid over the weir beside the mill….
And while the dawn was still a poor, weak thing an olive-green van, with the words 'Post Office Telephones' just discernible upon it, set out from Trayne with the object of putting the rest of the world into touch with Midwich again.
In Stouch it paused at the village call box to inquire whether Midwich had yet shown any signs of life. Midwich had not; it was still as deeply incommunicado as it had been since 22.17 hrs. The van restarted and rattled on through the uncertainly gathering daylight.
'Cor!' said the lineman to his driver companion. 'Cor! That there Miss Ogle ain't 'alf goin' to cop 'erself a basinful of 'Er Majesty's displeasure over this little lot.'
'I don't get it,' complained the driver. ' 'Fyou'd asked me I'd of said the old girl was always listenin' when there was anyone on the blower, day or night. Jest goes to show,' he added, vaguely.
A little out of Stouch, the van swung sharply to the right, and bounced along the by-road to Midwich for half a mile or so. Then it rounded a corner to encounter a situation which called for all the driver's presence of mind.
He had a sudden view of a fire-engine, half heeled over, with its near-side wheels in the ditch, and a black saloon car which had climbed half-way up the bank on the other side a few yards further on, with a man and a bicycle lying half in the ditch behind it. He pulled hard over, attempting an S turn which would avoid both vehicles, but before he could complete it his own van ran on to the narrow verge, bumped along for a few more yards, then ploughed to a stop, with its side in the hedge.
Half an hour later the first bus of the day, proceeding at a light-hearted speed, since it never had a passenger before it picked up the Midwich children for school in Oppley, rattled round the same corner to jamb itself neatly into the gap between the fire-engine and the van, and block the road completely.
On Midwich's other road-that connecting it with Oppley-a similar tangle of vehicles gave at first sight the impression that the highway had, overnight become a dump. And on that side the mail-van was the first vehicle to stop without becoming involved.
One of its occupants got out, and walked forward to investigate the disorder. He was just approaching the rear of the stationary bus when, without any warning, he quietly folded up, and dropped to the ground. The driver's jaw fell open, and he stared. Then, looking beyond his fallen companion, he saw the heads of some of the bus passengers, all quite motionless. He reversed hastily, turned, and made for Oppley and the nearest telephone.
Meanwhile the similar state of affairs on the Stouch side had been discovered by the driver of a baker's van, and twenty minutes later almost identical action was taking place on both the approaches to Midwich. Ambulances swept up with something of the air of mechanized Galahads. Their rear doors opened. Uniformed men emerged, fastening their tunic buttons, and providently pinching the embers from half-smoked cigarettes. They surveyed the pile-ups in a knowledgeable, confidence-inspiring way, unrolled stretchers, and prepared to advance.
On the Oppley road the two leading bearers approached the prone postman competently, but then, as the one in the lead drew level with the body, he wilted, sagged, and subsided across the last casualty's legs. The hind bearer goggled. Out of a babble behind him his ears picked up the word 'Gas!' he dropped the stretcher-handles as if they had turned hot, and stepped hastily back.
There was a pause for consultation. Presently the ambulance driver delivered a verdict, shaking his head.
'Not our kind of job,' he said, with the air of one recalling a useful Union decision. 'More like the fire chaps' pigeon, I'd say.'
'The army's, I reckon,' said the bearer. 'Gas masks, not just smoke masks, is what's wanted here.'
