to his feet, felt a jarring pain in his right knee. It almost buckled beneath him as he hobbled forwards, uncertain now of his direction.
He could hear the roar of the sea deep in the folds of the Trou de l’enfer, a hundred feet below. But the noise seemed to be all around him. He was stunned, confused, but scared to stop. With no idea now where his pursuer was, he turned toward where he thought the gate might be. Light cascaded over the cliffs once more as the wind tugged at his jacket, and he saw the deep, dark slash of the trou immediately ahead. Almost at the same moment, the ground beneath his feet slipped away. Frozen mud and rock crumbling and tumbling into darkness, and Enzo felt himself falling through space, down into this crack in the earth that led straight to hell. The call of the devil below filled his ears. And in that moment he knew that his life was over, that whatever Charlotte might have meant by her parting words, it no longer made any difference. His unborn son would never know his father.
For the third time, a hammer blow knocked all the wind from his lungs, and pain filled his world. Arms, legs, head, chest, back. But he was no long falling. He was lying prostrate, in an odd, twisted position, the wind whipping around him, his ears filled with the sound of the sea venting its anger on unyielding gneiss. By the light of the moon he could see it far below, frothing, phosphorescent, furious that it had failed to claim him.
He lay perfectly still, breathing hard, screwing up his eyes against the pain, frightened to move in case he couldn’t. Finally he removed a glove and lifted a hand to his head. He felt warm blood on his temple, then raised himself on to one elbow and bent each leg at the knee. Miraculously, it seemed that there was nothing broken. He tilted his head to look up toward the sky. The lip of the gorge hung ten to fifteen feet above, a wedge of black that cut hard across the sky. He couldn’t see any way of getting back up there, and knew that none of the ground around him could be trusted to take his weight.
He seemed to be on a narrow ledge of some sort that ran across the sheer wall of the rock. He let his head fall back, and lay breathing in short, stertorous bursts. If he lay here for long enough he would die of exposure. If he tried to climb back up, the chances are he would fall to his death.
The line of black above him was broken, suddenly, by a shadow leaning over to peer down into the chasm. Enzo must have been plainly visible, lying twisted on this shelf of rock, and he wondered why his attacker would risk coming so close to the edge. Perhaps to be certain that Enzo was dead and to finish him off if he wasn’t. He lay perfectly still, looking up at the silhouette looking down, and both remained like that for some minutes, until finally Enzo could stand it no longer. “Help!” he shouted. “Help me!” Though he had no expectation whatsoever that any help would be forthcoming.
Almost immediately, the figure above withdrew from sight, and Enzo was left staring at an unbroken sky, the moon flitting in and out of the clouds, its light switching off and on, like the flickering filament of a dying light bulb. He closed his eyes and listened to the roar of the sea, aware of the light and dark that washed over him, breathing slower now, and feeling his bruised and bleeding body stiffen with the cold.
Finally, he decided that he would risk the exposure rather than the fall, hoping to survive till daybreak and the chance of someone coming by, someone who might hear him calling for help. But even as he thought it, he realised how unlikely it was that anyone would be out along the cliffs in the early morning light. In the season, there was every chance he would be discovered by the dozens of randonneurs who trekked around the coastal footpaths. But they were into November now, and tourists to the island were few and far between. He felt the mantle of despair settle on him, like the darkness that fell as the moon vanished yet again.
He was not sure how long he lay, shivering, semicomatose, before becoming aware of a sound like someone hammering. The repeated smack of metal on metal. Regular strikes, sharp enough to be heard above the constant commotion of the sea. It came from above, and did not sound that far away.
“Hello!” he shouted into the night. “Is there anyone there?”
And the hammering stopped.
He held his breath. Nothing. No response. The hammering did not restart, as if he had chased it away with his calls. He felt despair settle on him like dust. Maybe he had simply imagined it. He lay listening intently for several minutes, but there was no further sound.
Then suddenly something fell on him, tumbling over him, heavy and rough, and he yelled out in fear and surprise. He sat up, supporting himself on one arm, trying to make sense of it. His fingers closed around something coarse and thick, and he realised it was a rope. Someone had thrown a rope over the edge of the cliff. Long enough that it had coiled around him on the ledge, the end of it falling away from his grasp now and dropping into the darkness below.
He held on to it with both his hands and pulled hard. There was no give whatsoever. It seemed firmly anchored to something up on the clifftops. And yet, he realised, if he was to use it to haul himself up to safety, he would have to trust it completely. With his full weight. The very thought sent shivers of apprehension through him. He could picture himself only too clearly, almost at the top when it gave way, sending him tumbling backward through fresh air to his death.
Who had thrown him this lifeline, and why? Why didn’t he show himself and call out to see if Enzo was all right?
“Hello!” Enzo shouted again into the night. “Goddamnit! Who are you?”
But only the wind replied, moaning through the fissures in the rock and wrapping itself around him, cold fingers robbing him of strength. Even if he decided to trust his life to the rope, he was not certain he had the power left to pull himself out.
Slowly he managed to get to his feet, balancing precariously, forced now to trust the rope. He yanked hard, several times, and still it remain rock solid. He stood for several moments, teeth clenched, eyes closed, summoning the courage and the strength to give it a try.
He pulled up the end of the rope, and wrapped it several times around his waist before knotting it securely. If he fell, and the rope held, he would survive. If the roped failed to hold, he was dead. He reached up as far as he could, grasping the rope with gloved hands, and braced his legs against the face of the rock, pushing himself out. Fully committed now, he knew that his life was in the hands of whoever had secured the other end. It was not so much a question of trust, as of blind faith.
Inch by painful inch, Enzo worked himself up the cliff face, feet searching for footholds to brace him as he moved his hands up the rope, one over the other. His arms began to ache, his legs trembling, his strength ebbing away, slowly but surely. Desperation clutched his heart with icy fingers. He gritted his teeth against the pain and kept going, never once looking up until the very last, when he felt his hand crushed between the rope and the rock, and realised he was almost there. Rock and earth was crumbling all around him, sending showers of debris down into the black. He threw an arm over the top and grasped the rope, pulling with all his might, kicking a leg over the lip of it to give himself extra purchase.
And then he was up on the high crest of the cliffs, fully in the open, shadow and light racing to greet him as he rolled himself over and over until he was sufficiently clear of the edge to feel safe.
He lay on his back looking up at the moon, arms and legs spread wide. And with relief, came an urge to weep. So he closed his eyes and took deep, steady breaths to calm himself, before finally getting stiffly, painfully, to his feet and untying the rope from his waist. He looked around and saw that the rope was tethered to a stout metal crowbar driven at an angle deep into a crack in the rock. It could hardly have been more secure.
He stood shakily, the wind whipping around him, and looked all along the line of the cliffs and back toward the woods. There was no sign of either his attacker or his rescuer. And he wondered if they were one and same person, and if so, why? All he knew was that by some miracle he was still alive, and he was grateful for that.
He stepped over the rope that delineated the supposedly safe walking area and started stiffly back toward the car park.
It was with an enormous sense of relief that he slipped into the driver’s seat and pulled the door shut. He started the engine, turned the heater up full, and laid his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes. Every muscle in his body ached. He waited until the engine had warmed up and he felt the heat coming through, before slipping the Jeep into reverse gear and accelerating backward to turn. The whole vehicle shuddered and he almost stalled it. He braked, slipped into first, and tried to go forward. The same thing.
Enzo opened the door and jumped out to see what was wrong. The offside front tyre was flat. He cursed out loud and raised his eyes to the heavens. To have to change a wheel now, after all he had been through, was the final straw. With anger fuelling determination, he stalked around to where the spare wheel was bolted to the back of the vehicle. Which is when he noticed that the rear offside tyre was flat as well. And the rear nearside tyre.
