you?”
I always knew that mouth of his would get us in trouble. Dieter risked a quick glance over his shoulder. Apparently he didn’t like what he saw. His next move caught John off guard; he turned and pelted back toward me, leaving John beating the empty air with his remaining ski pole.
Dieter was after the gun. The snow was wet and heavy; the hole where it had sunk out of sight was clearly visible to him as it was to me. I had marked the spot, since I meant to head straight for it as soon as I was free. Dieter got off one shot before John tackled him. He wasn’t aiming at John; the bullet hit the ground less than a foot from my shoulder.
They went rolling and tumbling across the graveyard, Dieter trying to escape his opponent’s grasp long enough to aim and fire, John trying to prevent just that. Dieter squeezed off a few more shots; I gathered that they missed, since John continued to press him back. The echoes rolled from hill to hill, and as they faded I heard another sound, the sound of distant thunder. That was strange, I thought. The skies were clear, there wasn’t a cloud in sight….
Looking up, I saw it begin—a small puff of white, so innocent and harmless, at the barren summit of the Witches’ Hat. It wasn’t a cloud. It was a mass of snow. By the time it reached the bottom of the slope, it would be studded with boulders like raisins in a pudding, with snapped-off branches and whole trees.
The cloud expanded. It was coming straight down the ski slope, the path of least resistance, but it would not follow the curve of the slope. By the time it reached that point, it would have gained enough momentum and mass to continue straight on down—into the cemetery. Perhaps the trees would stop it or minimize its impact; perhaps they wouldn’t. All these years the surrounding forest had protected the church, but the ski run had changed that. Herr Muller had been so right—fools, tampering with God’s work for their sport….
One of the pegs came out, but I was still tethered, like a goat, by one foot. The two men were perilously close to the edge of the drop, on their feet, clinging like lovers. Dieter’s raised rigid arm strained to free itself from John’s desperate grip. I don’t know whether Dieter was even aware of the dreadful thing roaring down toward him. John was; but he couldn’t run for cover unless he let go of Dieter, whereupon Dieter would probably shoot him in the back, or else lie low until the avalanche had passed—and then shoot both of us.
It happened so fast. John’s taut body gathered itself for a final effort. Dieter’s feet went out from under him. The small of his back hit the top of the low wall, and for a split second he hung there. I heard him scream, even over the mounting roar from the slope; but it was a scream of rage, not terror, and he never let go his hold on John or on the gun, though if his hands had been free, he might have saved himself. They went over together.
I had about six seconds in which to decide what to do. That’s longer than it sounds. It didn’t take any time at all. I found myself on my feet and running like a madwoman, the broken stake flopping. On the top of the wall, I could see two pale patches that weren’t snow. Slowly a head rose up between the grasping hands. I was close enough to see every detail; in fact, I felt as if I were looking through binoculars, everything was abnormally clear and sharp. His eyes opened so wide the pupils looked like cabochon sapphires set in milky mother-of-pearl, and his lips shaped words. I couldn’t hear him but I knew what he was saying. Good advice, but I went on running, throwing myself flat when I reached the wall and reaching out with both hands. My fingers weren’t broken, they worked just fine; all ten of them clamped around John’s left wrist.
I didn’t look over my shoulder. I figured the sight would just depress me. It sounded like an express train, rushing toward the heroine tied to the tracks; but there wouldn’t be a hero galloping up on his great white horse this time. A couple of skull-sized rocks, the precursors of the main mass, bounced off the ground and flew over the edge. “Duck,” I yelled. I knew he couldn’t hear me, though our faces were only inches apart.
In the final seconds, the agonized lines of his face relaxed. His eyelids dropped, veiling his eyes, and he said something—not the expletives, orders, and insults he had been hurling at me—something quite different. It surprised me so that I almost let go of his wrist. “What?” I screamed. “What did you say?”
Then it was on us.
I pushed my face down into the snow.
The only good thing about it was that it didn’t last long, though the howling assault seemed to go on forever. A couple of rocks bounced off my back, but I didn’t feel them at the time because all the nerve endings in my body were focused on my hands and the cold, limp thing they held in a death grip. I was still holding it when the echoes faded into silence and I dared to raise my head.
The brunt of the avalanche had been broken by the trees above the cemetery. If the full force had struck, it would have swept both of us away with it. It was bad enough, however. I think the noise was the worst. My ears were ringing even after the thunder died, and I felt lightheaded and dizzy. My eyes wouldn’t focus at first. Then I saw that most of the wall was gone. Only a few tumbled courses remained. There was no sign of John—no face, no white-knuckled hands.
He was still down there, though. I could feel his weight—his entire, dead weight, pulling at my arms. I must not have been thinking very clearly. Instead of calling his name, I croaked, “What was that you said?”
I do not know how the hell I ever got him back up. At first he was no help, he kept passing out. Finally, he got one toe into a crevice and I was able to grasp the back of his jacket. When at last he was sprawled on the ground at my feet, I looked over the edge.
Fifty feet below, the road was blocked by snow and fallen stone. Nobody would be coming that way for a while. The section of cliff above the road was almost perpendicular, a sheer drop of broken, jagged stone. A single blotch of color broke the gray-white monotony of the background—a patch of bright turquoise, unmoving and crumpled.
I bent over John and shook him. He groaned and tried to burrow deeper into the snow.
“Come on,” I said briskly. “Let’s hope the horses didn’t bolt during all that pandemonium. You’ll have to walk or crawl or something; I can’t drag you, my arms feel as if they’re about to fall out of the sockets.”
When I returned to my room, he was still lying across the bed, booted feet dangling and dripping, stained jacket soaking the spread. I put the tray down on the table and bent over him. His lashes were stuck together in starry points. They lay quiet in the bruised and sunken sockets.
“John,” I whispered.
There was no reply. I said, “Kitty, kitty. Here, nice Kitty.”
His eyes popped open. “If you let that damned cat—”
“She’s not here. I just said that to tease you.”
“Oh, God,” said John. He closed his eyes again. “To think I once praised your sense of humor.”
“Just rest easy.”
“I intend to. I don’t intend to move for at least three days. I may die here, quietly and peacefully—”
His voice faded.
“Hang in there,” I said soothingly. “You can die later, after I’m through with you.”
I had to cut the laces of his boots, they were so sodden and twisted. Midway through the ensuing process, he revived sufficiently to sit up so that I could ease his jacket off. Surveying my preparations, he remarked, “I do admire a well-organized person. But I don’t see any thumb-screws or cat-o’-nine tails or—”
“I have everything I need. I wanted to make sure we weren’t interrupted.”
“I see,” John said warily.
“You’ll have to stand up for a minute. I want to change the bed.”
He did so, without comment, clinging to the bedpost for support; I scooped the whole soggy mess of ribbons, papers, and wet spread into my arms and tossed it aside before replacing it with the blankets I had taken from Tony’s bed. The sight of his bruised, lacerated body almost shattered my resolution, but I was determined he wasn’t going to get away with it this time.
After I had tended the scars of battle, I propped him up with a couple of pillows. “Now,” I said encouragingly. “The worst is yet to come. What about a glass of wine to stiffen your nerve? Come on, don’t be so suspicious. I haven’t added anything to it. You don’t think I would poison you, do you?”
He wouldn’t take the glass until I had drunk from it. “This has been very pleasant,” he said politely. “But I wouldn’t want to keep you from your other obligations. Shouldn’t you—”
I smiled brightly at him. “You aren’t keeping me from a thing. Tony is still in Garmisch, Schmidt is sound asleep—Clara is sleeping on his stomach—and everything else can wait.”
“Vicky,” John began nervously. “I honestly didn’t intend—”
“Never mind that.” I put my hands on his shoulders. “What was it you said, just before the avalanche hit? No,
