The Princess Bride

'I thought you were supposed to be so strong!' the Sicilian shouted. 'I thought you were this great mighty thing and yet he gains.'

'I'm carrying three people,' Fezzik explained. 'He has only himself and—'

'Excuses are the refuge of cowards,' the Sicilian interrupted. He looked down again. The man in black had gained another hundred feet. He looked up now. The cliff tops were beginning to come into view. Perhaps a hundred and fifty feet more and they were safe.

Tied hand and foot, sick with fear, Buttercup wasn't sure what she wanted to happen. Except this much she knew: she didn't want to go through anything like it again.

'Fly, Fezzik!' the Sicilian screamed. 'A hundred feet to go.'

Fezzik flew. He cleared his mind of everything but ropes and arms and fingers, and his arms pulled and his fingers gripped and the rope held taut and—

'He's over halfway,' the Spaniard said.

'Halfway to doom is where he is,' the Sicilian said. 'We're fifty feet from safety, and once we're there and I untie the rope...' He allowed himself to laugh.

Forty feet.

Fezzik pulled.

Twenty.

Ten.

It was over. Fezzik had done it. They had reached the top of the Cliffs, and first the Sicilian jumped off and then the Turk removed the Princess, and as the Spaniard untied himself, he looked back over the Cliffs.

The man in black was no more than three hundred feet away.

'It seems a shame,' the Turk said, looking down alongside the Spaniard. 'Such a climber deserves better than—' He stopped talking then.

The Sicilian had untied the rope from its knots around an oak. The rope seemed almost alive, the greatest of all water serpents heading at last for home. It whipped across the cliff tops, spiraled into the moonlit Channel.

The Sicilian was roaring now, and he kept at it until the Spaniard said, 'He did it.'

'Did what?' The humpback came scurrying to the cliff edge.

'Released the rope in time,' the Spaniard said. 'See?' He pointed down.

The man in black was hanging in space, clinging to the sheer rock face, seven hundred feet above the water.

The Sicilian watched, fascinated. 'You know,' he said, 'since I've made a study of death and dying and am a great expert, it might interest you to know that he will be dead long before he hits the water. The fall will do it, not the crash.'

The man in black dangled helpless in space, clinging to the Cliffs with both hands.

'Oh, how rude we're being,' the Sicilian said then, turning to Buttercup. 'I'm sure you'd like to watch.' He went to her and brought her, still tied hand and foot, so that she could watch the final pathetic struggle of the man in black three hundred feet below.

Buttercup closed her eyes, turned away.

'Shouldn't we be going?' the Spaniard asked. 'I thought you were telling us how important time was.'

'It is, it is,' the Sicilian nodded. 'But I just can't miss a death like this. I could stage one of these every week and sell tickets. I could get out of the assassination business entirely. Look at him—do you think his life is passing before his eyes? That's what the books say.'

'He has very strong arms,' Fezzik commented. 'To hold on so long.'

'He can't hold on much longer,' the Sicilian said. 'He has to fall soon.'

It was at that moment that the man in black began to climb. Not quickly, of course. And not without great effort. But still, there was no doubt that he was, in spite of the sheerness of the Cliffs, heading in an upward direction.

'Inconceivable!' the Sicilian cried.

The Spaniard whirled on him. 'Stop saying that word. It was inconceivable that anyone could follow us, but when we looked behind, there was the man in black. It was inconceivable that anyone could sail as fast as we could sail, and yet he gained on us. Now this too is inconceivable, but look—look—' and the Spaniard pointed down through the night. 'See how he rises.'

The man in black was, indeed, rising. Somehow, in some almost miraculous way, his fingers were finding holds in the crevices, and he was now perhaps fifteen feet closer to the top, farther from death.

The Sicilian advanced on the Spaniard now, his wild eyes glittering at the insubordination. 'I have the keenest mind that has ever been turned to unlawful pursuits,' he began, 'so when I tell you something, it is not guesswork; it is fact! And the fact is that the man in black is not following us. A more logical explanation would be that he is simply an ordinary sailor who dabbles in mountain climbing as a hobby who happens to have the same general final destination as we do. That certainly satisfies me and I hope it satisfies you. In any case, we cannot take the risk of his seeing us with the Princess, and therefore one of you must kill him.'

'Shall I do it?' the Turk wondered.

The Sicilian shook his head. 'No, Fezzik,' he said finally. 'I need your strength to carry the girl. Pick her up now and let us hurry along.' He turned to the Spaniard. 'We'll be heading directly for the frontier of Guilder. Catch up as quickly as you can once he's dead.'

The Spaniard nodded.

The Sicilian hobbled away.

The Turk hoisted the Princess, began following the humpback. Just before he lost sight of the Spaniard he turned and hollered, 'Catch up quickly.'

'Don't I always?' The Spaniard waved. 'Farewell, Fezzik.'

'Farewell, Inigo,' the Turk replied. And then he was gone, and the Spaniard was alone.

Inigo moved to the cliff edge and knelt with his customary quick grace. Two hundred and fifty feet below him now, the man in black continued his painful climb. Inigo lay flat, staring down, trying to pierce the moonlight and find the climber's secret. For a long while, Inigo did not move. He was a good learner, but not a particularly fast one, so he had to study. Finally, he realized that somehow, by some mystery, the man in black was making fists and jamming them into the rocks, and using them for support. Then he would reach up with his other hand, until he found a high split in the rock, and make another fist and jam it in. Whenever he could find support for his feet, he would use it, but mostly it was the jammed fists that made the climbing possible.

Inigo marveled. What a truly extraordinary adventurer this man in black must be. He was close enough now for Inigo to realize that the man was masked, a black hood covering all but his features. Another outlaw? Perhaps. Then why should they have to fight and for what? Inigo shook his head. It was a shame that such a fellow must die, but he had his orders, so there it was. Sometimes he did not like the Sicilian's commands, but what could he do? Without the brains of the Sicilian, he, Inigo, would never be able to command jobs of this caliber. The Sicilian was a master planner. Inigo was a creature of the moment. The Sicilian said 'kill him,' so why waste sympathy on the man in black. Someday someone would kill Inigo, and the world would not stop to mourn.

He stood now, quickly jumping to his feet, his blade-thin body ready. For action. Only, the man in black was still many feet away. There was nothing to do but wait for him. Inigo hated waiting. So to make the time more pleasant, he pulled from the scabbard his great, his only, love:

The six-fingered sword.

How it danced in the moonlight. How glorious and true. Inigo brought it to his lips and with all the fervor in his great Spanish heart kissed the metal....

Inigo

IN THE MOUNTAINS of Central Spain, set high in the hills above Toledo, was the village of Arabella. It was very small and the air was always clear. That was all you could say that was good about Arabella: terrific air—you could see for miles.

But there was no work, the dogs overran the streets and there was never enough food. The air, clear enough, was also too hot in daylight, freezing at night. As to Inigo's personal life, he was always just a trifle hungry, he had no brothers or sisters, and his mother had died in childbirth.

He was fantastically happy.

Because of his father. Domingo Montoya was funny-looking and crotchety and impatient and absent-minded