Angus’s face was white. Jack didn’t look much better.
“Fun isn’t it?” said the professor enthusiastically.
Angus nodded in the direction of the professor, “Where did you get him from, Jack?”
The professor ignored him, “Right. I apply the brakes. Then you go. Then it’s my turn. Then Jack, you wait a little, and then you go.” The on-coming car was closing in on them fast. They waited, poised above the open trapdoor, the air still rushing in and the earth racing by, way below. They gripped their friction devices anxiously. The professor held his hand over the red emergency stop lever. And waited.
“OK…?”
Jack and Angus nodded. They were getting so close to the approaching car now, that they could see the whites of the VIGIL guards’ eyes. The professor pulled up the lever. The cable above their heads decelerated. As it did so, the cable driving the other car also slowed. Their forward momentum caused their whole car to arc upwards alarmingly as they held on tight. The car swung back on its pivot point. Out of the window, they could see that the men in the other car had all tumbled over — unbalanced by the surprise halt of the cable cars.
“Go!” The professor shouted.
Angus froze. Unable to move. He just stared blankly into the abyss.
“Go!” the professor shouted again.
But he still couldn’t move. The professor gave him a sharp kick up the backside. One moment he was there. The next he was gone. He just had enough presence of mind to apply the friction device to control his descent.
“Sorry about that,” the professor called after him. “Right — my turn.” He leaped through the hatch with what Jack thought was an unnatural degree of enthusiasm and slid down the rope, just as Angus had done seconds before. The car continued to sway as it slowed and it was all Jack could do to remain on his feet. Both cars were nearly side by side. Peering down, he could just see the white smudge of Angus’s face as it craned upwards to the two cable cars way above. He had made it.
Suddenly, Jack noticed that the roof hatch in the opposite car had been flicked open. A VIGIL guard was crawling up onto the roof with a grappling iron. In a moment, he had tossed the device over to Jack’s car before crawling, monkey like, across the precipitous divide that separated them. There was a loud scraping on the roof hatch of Jack’s car, as the guard started to prise it open.
Jack wasn’t about to find out what would happen next. Swallowing hard, he plunged out through the floor hatch, just as the others had done moments before. Initially, he closed the friction device too hard, so he barely moved on the rope. By gradually loosening it he gained speed. He glanced downwards. The professor and Angus had made it to the ground and both seemed to be safe.
Suddenly the speed of the rope through the friction device accelerated. It didn’t feel right. Instinctively, Jack locked the device and waited, swaying in the light wind, suspended from the rope, the Austrian Alps all around. And then, slowly, he felt himself being pulled… up. There was no doubt about it… he was being pulled back towards the cable car. He felt a wave of panic as he realised what was happening. The guard above had started to yank the rope up… with Jack suspended on the end.
He had to make a decision. Angus and the professor had made it to the upper bank of the river that meandered down the valley, but as the cable car had continued to move before finally coming to rest, Jack was now suspended directly over the river. It was quite wide and he could spot one or two black pools that might cushion a fall. But there were also rocks, and he had no idea how deep the water was. He felt another violent tug on the rope as he was dragged upwards. The adrenaline gave him a moment of clarity. It was all he needed. As the rope was tugged up once more, he took a deep breath and flicked open the friction device.
Fishing for answers
Jack was staggered at how fast he accelerated. He closed his eyes — tight. If he was about to be splattered onto some piece of granite — he didn’t want to know about it. Three seconds later, he hit the river, feet first, and the freezing water exploded around him in a plume of spray. His speed forced him down. Finally, his feet hit the bottom. It took an eternity for him to rise but then he broke the surface with nearly the same speed as he had entered. He gulped down air. He’d made it. But then the cold from the river hit him like the left hook of a heavy- weight boxer, and took his breath away a second time. He started to swim, desperately, to the bank. Soon his breast stroke disintegrated into a flailing doggy paddle. Exhausted, he pulled himself up onto the grassy bank and collapsed in a soggy heap.
From the other side of the riverbank he heard the voices of Angus and the professor. The professor was waving and jumping up and down excitedly, a broad grin on his face.
“Bravo! Bravo!” he shouted. The professor had clearly been impressed by Jack’s decision to jump. Jack pulled himself up onto his feet, still breathing heavily. It was at this point that it dawned on him. It was bizarre. As he gulped down air, his lungs were… working. He felt no wheezy emptiness, no panic that he was about to suffocate, no familiar craving for his puffer. He took deep breaths and it felt — completely normal. He began to feel stronger and stronger and soon this feeling grew into a tingling elation.
He looked at his friends and noticed that to their left, on the far riverbank, was a small cabin built right on the edge of the water. It was dilapidated and overgrown — well camouflaged, unless you were actually viewing it from the river itself. He waved, pointing out the cabin to Angus and the professor. They followed Jack’s line of sight. When the professor spotted the small wooden building he became even more excited. It was a boat house.
From the opposite bank, Jack saw Angus and the professor clamber up to the rear of the boat house where they disappeared from view. They had been gone for a few minutes when two wooden doors at water level gradually opened out on to the river. Soon, Angus and the professor emerged triumphantly with a rather dishevelled-looking boat. They boarded the boat and with the professor at the twin oars, it glided across the water towards him. It looked like they might have an escape route. Soon the boat had nosed onto the bank where Jack stood shivering.
Angus beamed smugly from the bows. “All aboard! All aboard!” he shouted. “Next stop, er, down there somewhere!” He thumbed in a general downriver direction. Jack jumped onto the boat. The professor reversed and then pointed the craft downstream.
They were off.
*
Jack shifted into the rear of the boat in front of the professor, who gingerly manoeuvred the craft back into the centre of the river where they soon caught the best of the downstream current. It was larger than a standard rowing boat, and in the back it had a low metal frame attached to each side. It looked as if you could assemble a canvas sheet on the frame and maybe even sleep in it.
The professor concentrated on the rowing, but it took a bit of getting used to and initially, they zigzagged uneasily.
“Any sign of them?” asked the professor. Nervously, they scanned each riverbank. There was no movement and all they could hear was the lapping of the water and the late afternoon chirrup of birdlife rising from the dense woodland. Way above, they could still see the gossamer thin threads of the cable car — but both cars had vanished.
“Seems quiet. But it won’t take them long to catch up.”
The river narrowed and they could feel the current speed up a notch beneath them. Up ahead, perhaps a half kilometre away, they saw that the banks heightened dramatically as the river passed through a deep mountain gorge.
“We may have a chance — the river will be the quickest way down — and we have a good head start. Soon it will be dark too…” the professor said. “Jack — you need to get out of those things — otherwise you’ll die of cold. The professor nodded towards a compartment behind Jack’s legs at the back of the boat. “Anything useful in there?”
Jack rummaged, “I don’t think this boat has been used for a while…”
There were a couple of dusty blankets and also the canvas sheeting that fitted over the metal awning. He shook out one of the blankets. It was dry enough but smelt dusty and moth-eaten.
“I’ve got some spare bits and pieces with me.” Angus opened his small rucksack, pulled out a T-shirt and
