Part 4 (1/2)

”That's where our objective is; said the Doctor, with a wry nod. 'See that hole there?'

'Who put her down there?' asked Sam.

'The dogs,' hissed Gila, with a nasty smile.

The Doctor could see it all now. Great brindled creatures, matted fur grown over the steel of their bodies, they had taken their orders and wouldn't be called off. Their commands had come straight from their master and, between them, they had carried the distraught, bleating Iris into this bleak stretch of desert. The rim of the dustbowl. In that graveyard they had rounded her up, snarling, and tossed her up in the air like a bundle of rags.

'They're yours, aren't they?' he said to Gila.'You set them on to her.'

Gila pulled a face, shrugged nonchalantly.

'Call off your hounds, Gila,' the Doctor's voice went hard. 'She's an old woman.' Even older than he was, he reflected. She called him 'my boy'.

'She held me at gunpoint!'

'She must have had her reasons.'

'I'd like to hear them.'

'If she's still alive, maybe she'll tell you.'

'All right.'

Gila ran down the slope to his dogs. He ploughed deep furrows in the sand as he hurried The half-mile.

'You know,'said Sam.'I wouldn't trust him the slightest bit.'Sometimes she thought the Doctor was just a bit too f.e.c.kless.

'He's all right,'said the Doctor.'Shall we follow?You just have to know how to handle these people...'

Gila was calling out to his hounds. They turned their vast, red eyes on him. 'You can leave off now - go home!' His pale body seemed tiny and spindly next to theirs. They weren't listening to him.

The Doctor shouted,'What's the matter? Why won't they -'

One of the three, the largest, broke away and came bounding across the sand towards him.

'Uh, Doctor...' said Sam. 'Get back.' Sam got back.

The dog let out a howl of rage as it came hurtling up towards him. He stood in its path and, at the last moment, flung himself to the ground.

The beast was too clumsy to turn and it pelted past. The other two came running to take its place. They set up a great noise, baiting him. They were playing a game, Sam thought, with the Doctor as their toy.

She ran to him and found that his head had connected with a large, flat rock when he fell. He was stunned, and there was a dribble of blood at his temple. His cravat had come undone. She shook him. They'll rip us to shreds!' she yelled.

'What's Gila doing?' asked the Doctor Wearily 'Nothing much,' she said, looking round.

All three dogs were advancing upon the pair from their separate directions.

'Down, boys,' the Doctor muttered feebly. Then he bellowed, 'Gila! Call them off! If I die you'll never know what Iris is up to.'

'Do I even care?' came Gila's mocking reply.

'Yes you do!' said the Doctor. 'And if I or Sam get the slightest scratch...

then you'll never know.'

'Hold,' said Gila to his dogs, and ran towards them. In the moonlight his scales gleamed.

'Iris is rich,' said the Doctor.

'How rich?'

'Rich as Croesus. Richer than you can imagine.'

'I don't know. I can imagine quite a bit.'

There was a pause.

The Doctor said to Sam,'He'll get his comeuppance. They always do, wretches like that.'

'Do they?'

'All right.' Gila bellowed some kind of command at his dogs. They growled in protest, in disappointment, but they listened to him. Their hackles went down, they stopped glaring and pacing the ground. They turned and fled, full pelt, back to Hyspero.

Sam brushed herself down. 'Well. Attacked by giant devil dogs. The days are just packed, aren't they? How's your head?'

'Oh, all right. My ankle still hurts, though.'

She tutted and turned on Gila. 'Why didn't you call them off sooner?'

He shrugged. She felt like spitting in his eye.

The Doctor didn't bother with recriminations. He always said there wasn't time.'Let's fetch Iris up; he said with a grin.

He ran back to the boot of the bus and hunted around in her tool chest.

Minutes later he was back with a long rope ladder. ”The poor old thing will have to climb.'

They sent it down, unrolling it with a triumphant flourish. From deep down the well they heard a shout of pleasure. So it was long enough to reach its target.

'Iris?' the Doctor called, making his hands into a megaphone.

'Is that who I think it is?' Her voice came out distant and ghostly.

'I don't know - who do you think it is?'

And then she was silent for a full ten minutes, during which she concentrated her energies on strenuous handover-hand climbing. They peered into the darkness, holding their breaths. Her grunts and oaths were getting louder.

She emerged looking filthy, frail, battered and deliriously happy. Her wide-brimmed hat hung at a jaunty angle. She fell into the Doctor's arms without even looking at his face.