very nice boy.'
‚What?'
‚It was just a game, Alex. Just a bit of fun.'
And that was it. Fiona had smiled as if everything had been explained and then gone to have a swim. Alex had spent the rest of the evening with the files. He was trying to take in a fake history that spanned fourteen years. There were uncles and aunts, friends at Eton, a whole crowd of people he had to know without ever having met any of them. More than that, he was trying to get the feel of this luxurious lifestyle. That was why he was here now, out riding with Fiona—she upright in her riding jacket and breeches, he bumping along behind.
They had ridden for about an hour and a half when they came to a tunnel. Fiona had tried to teach Alex a bit of technique—the difference, for example, between walking, trotting, and cantering. But this was one sport he had already decided he would never take up. Every bone in his body had been rattled out of shape, and his bottom was so bruised he wondered if he would ever be able to sit down again. Fiona seemed to be enjoying his torment. He even wondered if she had chosen a particularly bumpy route to add to his bruises. Or maybe it was just a particularly bumpy horse.
There was a single railway line ahead of them, crossed by a tiny lane with an automatic gate crossing equipped with a bell and flashing lights to warn motorists of any approaching train.
Fiona steered her horse—a smaller gray—toward it. Alex’s horse automatically followed. He assumed they were going to cross the line, but when she reached the barrier, Fiona stopped.
‚There’s a shortcut we can take if you want to get home,' she said.
‚A shortcut would be good,' Alex admitted.
‚It’s that way.'
Fiona pointed up the line toward a tunnel, a gaping black hole in the side of a hill, surrounded by dark red brick. Alex looked at her to see if she was joking. She was obviously quite serious. He turned back to the tunnel. It was like the barrel of a gun, pointing at him, warning him to keep away. He could almost imagine the giant finger on the trigger, somewhere behind the hill. How long was it? Looking more carefully, he could see a pinprick of light at the other end, perhaps half a mile away.
‚You’re not serious,' he said.
‚Actually, Alex, I don’t usually tell jokes. When I say something, I mean it. I’m just like my father.'
‚Except your father isn’t completely crazy,' Alex muttered.
Fiona pretended not to hear him. ‚The tunnel is about one mile long,' she explained.
‚There’s a bridge on the other side, then another gate crossing. If we go that way, we can be home in thirty minutes. Otherwise it’s an hour and a half back the way we came.'
‚Then let’s go the way we came.'
‚Oh, Alex, don’t be such a scaredy-cat!' Fiona pouted at him. ‚There’s only one train an hour on this line and the next one isn’t due for…' She looked at her watch. ‚…twenty minutes.
I’ve been through the tunnel a hundred times and it never takes more than five minutes. Less if you canter.'
‚It’s still crazy to ride on a railway line.'
‚Well, you’ll have to find your own way home if you turn back.' She kicked with her heels and her horse jerked forward, past the barrier and onto the line. ‚I’ll see you later.'
But Alex followed her. He would never have been able to ride back to the house on his own.
He didn’t know the way, and he could barely control his horse. Even now it was following Fiona with no prompting from him. Would the two animals really enter the darkness of the tunnel? It seemed incredible, but Fiona had said they had done it before, and sure enough, the horses walked into the side of the hill without even hesitating.
Alex shivered as the light was suddenly cut off behind him. It was cold and clammy inside.
The air smelled of soot and diesel. The tunnel was a natural echo chamber. The horses’ hooves rattled all around them as they struck against the gravel between the ties. What if his horse stumbled? Alex put the thought out of his mind. The leather saddles creaked. Slowly his eyes got used to the dark. A certain amount of sunshine was filtering in from behind. More comfortingly, the way out was clearly visible straight ahead, the circle of light widening with every step. He tried to relax. Perhaps this wasn’t going to be so bad after all.
And then Fiona spoke. She had slowed down, allowing his horse to catch up with hers. ‚Are you still worried about the train, Alex?' she said scornfully. ‚Perhaps you’d like to go faster.'
He heard the riding crop whistle through the air and felt his horse jerk as Fiona whipped it hard on the rear. The horse whinnied and leapt forward. Alex was almost thrown backward off the saddle. Digging in with his legs, he just managed to cling on, but the whole top of his body was at a crazy angle, the reins tearing into the horse’s mouth. Fiona laughed. And then Alex was aware only of the wind rushing past him, the thick blackness spinning around his face and the horses’ hooves striking heavily at the gravel as the animal careened forward. Soot blew into his eyes, blinding him. He thought he was going to fall. Minutes seemed to pass in mere seconds.
But then, miraculously, they burst out into the light. Alex fought for his balance and then brought the horse back under control, pulling back with the reins and squeezing the horse’s flanks with his knees. He took a deep breath and waited for Fiona to appear.
His horse had come to rest on the bridge that she had mentioned. The bridge was fashioned out of thick iron girders and spanned a river. There had been a lot of rain that month and, about fifty feet below him, the water was racing past, dark green and deep. Carefully, he turned around to face the tunnel. If he lost control here, it would be easy to fall over the edge. The sides of the bridge couldn’t have been more than three feet high.
He could hear Fiona approaching. She had been cantering after him, probably laughing the entire way. He gazed into the tunnel, and that was when Fiona’s gray horse burst out, raced past him, and disappeared through the gate crossing on the other side of the bridge.
But Fiona wasn’t on it.
The horse had come out alone.
It took Alex a few seconds to work it out. His head was reeling. She must have fallen off.
Perhaps her horse had stumbled. She could be lying inside the tunnel. On the track. How long was there until the next train? Twenty minutes, she had said. But at least five of those minutes had gone, and she might have been exaggerating to begin with.
Alex swore. Damn this wretched girl with her spoiled brat behavior and her almost suicidal games. But he couldn’t leave her. He seized hold of the reins. Somehow he would get this horse to obey him. He had to get her out, and he had to do it fast.
Perhaps his desperation managed to communicate itself to the horse’s brain. The animal wheeled around and tried to back away, but when Alex kicked with his heels, it stumbled forward and reluctantly entered the darkness of the tunnel for a second time. Alex kicked again.
He didn’t want to hurt it, but he could think of no other way to make it obey him.
The horse trotted on. Alex searched ahead. ‚Fiona!' he called out. There was no reply. He had hoped that she would be walking toward him, but he couldn’t hear any footsteps. If only there were more light!
The horse stopped and there she was, right in front of him, lying on the ground, her arms and chest actually on the line. If a train came now, it would cut her in half. It was too dark to see her face, but when she spoke he heard the pain in her voice.
‚Alex…,' she said. ‚I think I’ve broken my ankle.'
‚What happened?'
‚There was a cobweb or something. I was trying to keep up with you. It went in my face and I lost my balance.'
She’d been trying to keep up with him! She almost sounded as if she were blaming him—as if she had forgotten that she was the one who had whipped his horse on in the first place.
‚Can you get up?' Alex asked.
‚I don’t think so.'
Alex sighed. Keeping a tight hold on the reins, he slid off his horse. Fiona had fallen right in the middle of the tunnel. He forced himself not to panic. If what she had told him was true, the next train must still be at least ten
