other marks, in different places, these are places my father found. This is what he was going to report. Now, this isn’t enough evidence, I know that, but it’s all we have right now. My father had been in all these places because of this….” He showed the hydrology map. “He found what was killing your people. And maybe there’s a lot more we don’t know about. And I know he must have other evidence hidden somewhere, real evidence, something really concrete that can’t be disputed, but I have to find him first and you have to go.” He gazed down at the vertical drop. “I reckon I can free-climb down to that entrance, then in a few hours I’ll be under the fort.!Koga, don’t give me a hard time on this, I need you to take Dad’s map to the police.”
“Police?”
“You said there was a police post, a few days from here. Get to them, don’t give them the map, give them this.” Max undid his watch strap. The old stainless-steel chronograph was his dad’s when he’d climbed Everest, twenty years ago, and he’d given it to Max for his twelfth birthday when he enrolled at Dartmoor High. Engraved on the back plate were the words
He fastened the watch around!Koga’s wrist. “Give the cops this watch, it’ll prove you’ve been with me. Tell them you know where the son of the missing white man is. But don’t tell them where I am. You have to get them to contact Kallie van Reenen. Give her the map. You tell her what we’ve discovered. She’ll know what to do. You have to do this,!Koga-to save us all.”
Max was well aware that this was almost a replay of what his father had done with!Koga’s father. He had sent the Bushman on a mission to van Reenen’s farm, knowing that he had to get his field notes out while he went on searching. Fate had twisted events like a noose around a sack-Max,!Koga and Kallie van Reenen: drawn together, trapped in the same danger.
But Max felt strong. He was getting closer to his father now-he knew it-and that would drive him on. “I’ll make a start when the sun shifts a bit, that’ll give me some shade down there. I reckon it’s going to be a bit of a climb.” A bit? It was going to take everything he had, by the look of it. He would have to choose his route with all his skill.
They agreed that!Koga would wait until nightfall, then he could travel faster, with virtually no chance of detection. But the night was not the time Bushmen felt comfortable. Their lives centered around the fire. This was where they cooked and ate, danced and told stories of great hunts and of gods who were animals and stars that were lovers. The warmth and comfort of the fire was as much a part of their life as the sun rising and the moon taking it away. Alone,!Koga would have to travel across predators’ natural habitats. Memory maps were all he had to guide him, but the night sky would show him the way, and moonlight would warn him of shadows that moved. He would do this thing so that Max Gordon, the boy from the ancient cave drawings, could help save his people.
And because the white boy was his friend.
Max began his descent a couple of hours later, as!Koga sat nestled in the low boulders around the rim. He could watch Max’s progress from there, and when he finally crawled into the cave he would return to the low plateau where they had slept the previous night. There was shade there and he would rest, before beginning his own journey into darkness.
Max was already twenty meters down, his right hand jammed into a narrow crevice above his head as he tried to find a toehold below. His weight stretched ligaments and tendons in his shoulder, but he reached out with his left hand, clawed his fingers against the uneven surface and shifted his body slightly. A sliver of rock took his weight as he swung precariously half a meter to his left; his fingers slipped as his right hand came free and the sudden, sickening drop churned his stomach as he plunged down.
“Max!”!Koga couldn’t help crying out.
Max had scraped his knees and the inside of his arm when he fell, but the drop was barely the distance from his ankle to his knee-it just felt a lot more scary than it was. Without looking back, he managed a reassuring shout to!Koga. “OK! I’m all right!”
Controlling his breathing, he muttered encouragement to himself. “It’s fine. It happens. Nothing to worry about. Just a little slip. Nothing to get het up about. Clumsy sod.”
As often happens on a climb-or, in this case, a descent-a rhythm developed, and now Max found a steady pace. The rock face was kind to him for the next ten meters as he gripped, swung, twisted and wedged his way down. The scrapes and cuts were stinging, but adrenaline pushed the pain to the back of his mind. Now he was feeling good, he could see his way down; spurs of rock as wicked as razor blades shafted downwards, but their edges were sufficiently ragged to allow purchase. And behind each sheet of rock, the moss and lichen offered a small comfort zone for his back and shoulders as he wedged himself in to support the next downwards movement. A wet sheen covered everything, reminding him of home. Clambering down quarry walls in Devon or practicing for the bigger climbs in Scotland usually meant the rock surfaces were wet, but when he did that, he reminded himself, he was attached to a safety line. A lifeline is really important when you’re climbing in a rock-strewn quarry. Nothing too serious to worry about here then, he kidded himself. If he fell, he’d only fall a few hundred meters into the water, though that’d be like landing on a concrete floor. The shock of falling that far would probably kill him anyway.
Time condensed into seconds, that was what his attention span demanded-attention focused on every centimeter of the way-but a small voice in his head told him that he must have been on the rock face for an hour, probably more. The sun had shifted and was almost overhead now, and he still had another thirty meters to go. He jammed his hand into a letter-box slit in the rock and rested. With his free hand he wiped the sweat and grime from his eyes.
The bow and arrows were proving difficult, getting in the way when he tried to wedge his back into the crevices. He swore. He should have left them with!Koga. No matter. Another hour-tops-at this rate, and he’d be able to swing into that entrance. But now he was stuck. He couldn’t turn from his back to his front, allowing a swing across the rock to grab another hold. The bow, jutting above his shoulder, was snagging. He had to get rid of it. His wrist burned as the skin was forced to tolerate more torsion with him twisting around so that he faced the rock wall. His cheekbone pressed hard against the stone; he gulped air, his free arm reached over his shoulder, grabbed the slender bow and eased it, like a contortionist, over his head and shoulder.
A small triumph, and much as he cherished the handmade weapon, he reached out into space to let it drop. As his weight shifted slightly, the crevice that held his hand crumbled. Loose, wet, shinglelike stone gave way and he fell.
He had barely time to shout. Reflexes shot into high gear and a zillion mental calculations made his arm shoot out to slam his hand, which held the bow, against the rocks. The bow string hooked over a rock and stopped his fall.
He hung, suspended from the wall, crunching his back against the boulders. Pain shafted through him and for a moment he thought he was going to fall again. The sinew on the bow flexed and the shaft bent, the supple wild raisin wood allowing a lot of give. He had to trust that the bow would hold his weight for a few more seconds. Grabbing it with both hands, he pulled himself in to the rock face. He’d definitely pulled a muscle, or maybe even bruised or cracked a rib; the pain knifed into him and took his breath away. Hanging on as best he could, he gave one last pull on the bow to help gain a foothold, and as the bow finally yielded and snapped, he managed to hold on. He could feel his nerve slipping away as quickly as the bow falling into the silent void. He clung desperately, eyes tightly shut, willing himself to carry on. No flippant humor now; no kidding with the terrified voice in his mind. This felt like the end of the world and he was frozen. Rigid.
The fall had taken him to within ten meters of the tunnel entrance. A battle raged in his head, demanding that he think. He must have dropped about five meters, no, probably more, but he had suffered no serious injuries- plenty of pain, but he was alive.
Someone was calling, a distant whisper that his ears refused to hear.
!Koga, who had watched him fall almost out of sight into the black shadows, screamed his name. A slow- motion acrobat act showed Max twisting and turning, grabbing for support, falling further and further, whipping an
