The Cave (2 page)

Freddie heard a rumble of thunder in the distance. It echoed in the valley between the mountains. Then, a second growl of thunder sounded. Without further warning, a single fork of lightning split the grey sky.

Freddie felt a violent gust of wind hit the car. Then a single large drop of rain fell, the size of a penny, then another and another, faster, faster. Within seconds, the rain was drumming on the roof of the car. It bounced off the bonnet and splattered against the windows. Freddie turned the wipers on. Back and forward, back and forward, they made no difference.

There was more thunder. A second snap of lightning lit the entire sky. Freddie slowed right down, gripping the wheel tighter. He could see no more than a few feet ahead. The tyres struggled to keep their hold on the slippery, steep road.

The sky was suddenly dark, black and threatening. Freddie turned on his headlights. Now the car was misting up. He wound down
the window a little and felt a blast of cold, wet air. It made little difference. He leaned forward and wiped the inside of the windscreen with his sleeve. All the while, the sound of the wipers echoed in his head, back and forth, back and forth.

The crash of thunder came, the sound roaring through the valley. Then, a flash of lightning struck the road right ahead. Freddie slammed on the brakes, pulse jumping, heart thumping.

He counted, trying to work out how far away the storm was.

One, two, three . . . Seven seconds between the thunder and the lightning.

So the storm was still seven, maybe eight, miles away.

Freddie hit the accelerator pedal. He felt exposed out on this mountain road. He needed to find shelter.

The little car lurched forward into the raging head wind. Freddie told himself he wasn’t really in any danger. The storm sounded worse than it was. The chances of the car being struck by lightning were small. Surely? There were too many tall trees around.

But he didn’t convince himself. Besides, Freddie knew the real danger was the rain not
the storm itself. If it kept up like this the road would become impassable. Already, rain was racing down the mountainside like a waterfall, cutting across the switchback bends in the road. Everywhere, there was swirling black flood-water.

There was another fierce crack of thunder directly overhead and a snap of lightning, sharp as a whip. Freddie braked and, to his horror, felt the car slide. He fought to keep on course. He dragged down hard on the wheel, but too hard. It was too much, too late. The car skidded, gliding sideways across the road, towards the sheer drop on the left hand side. He shouted. Then, there was a sharp crack. The offside wing caught on a border of stones marking the tree line at the edge of the road. Desperate, Freddie pulled at the wheel the opposite way. There was nothing he could do. He was going to crash.

The car twisted round 180 degrees, spinning like a child’s top.

Instinct took over. Freddie threw up his hands to protect his face. He felt the engine cut out, then a thud. Glass shattered into his lap. This was it. Any second now he would feel nothing but air beneath him as the car went over into the abyss.

He thought of his parents, his gentle mother and his stern father. How would they cope with the death of another son? He thought of his brother. Had George seen death coming to meet him? Did he know, in that last split second before the bullet found him, that his time was up?

Then the present rushed back. Freddie was thrown back in his seat. He heard a crack of metal and the car hit something. Freddie’s head jerked forward and hit the dashboard. Pain, sharp and complete.

After that, he felt nothing.

Freddie was out cold. It felt like hours, but was probably only minutes. Then he felt a tingling in his toes, his fingers. He was aware that his whole body hurt.

For a moment, he thought he was dreaming. Then, in a rush, it came back to him - the storm, the car hurtling across the road, the crash. He opened his eyes. His head was thumping loudly enough to wake the dead. The world came back into focus.

Freddie laughed out loud first with relief and then the luck of his narrow escape. The car was balanced on the edge of the cliff. The nearside wheels were over the edge, but the body of the car was still on the road.

He was facing the opposite way down the hill, but he was all right. He was alive.

Bit by bit, he worked out what had happened. The car had skidded, spun around and run into the marker stones at the side of the
road. It was the trees, though, that stopped him heading straight over the edge.

Freddie let his head fall back against the seat. His heart was thudding like a drum. He could feel shards of glass in his lap. The thought of how close he had come gave him a sick, cold feeling in the pit of his stomach. He wiped his face. When he looked down, there was red blood, bright red, on the tips of his brown leather gloves.

The minutes passed. Still Freddie could not move. His legs had turned to jelly and his pulse was jumping still. The wind whistled around the car. The rain was still hammering down on the roof. He was soaking wet. But he was safe.

The moment of relief passed. Freddie knew he had to find help. Slowly, carefully, he reached out and opened the door. A violent gust of wind set the door flying back against the side. The car tipped dangerously.

Very slowly, Freddie put out first one leg, then the other. The wind was threatening to knock him off balance and made his ears ring. Inch by inch, he eased himself out of the car and managed to stand up.

Freddie closed the door, stepped back, then looked at the damage. The good news was that the body of the car was still on the road. Only
the nearside wheels were overhanging the ravine. The bad news was that the front axle looked broken and the windscreen was gone. One thing was certain, he could not get the car back on the road on his own.

Freddie wasn’t sure he could risk getting his overnight pack from the boot. He might send the car right over. He carefully opened his door and reached across to take the map book from the seat. Fighting to hold the pages steady in the wind, he saw there was a small village marked lower down the mountain, slightly off the main track.

Freddie locked the car. He put the keys in his pocket then headed back down the road to where a footpath was marked on the map.

Head down, collar pulled up, Freddie trudged down the hill. The wind boxed his ears. The rain drove into the back of his neck, his back, his knees. His tweed trousers were soaking wet and flapped against his legs. The world seemed to have turned to water. Everything shimmered silver, with not a dry patch of land or tree in sight. Although the wind was easing a little and Freddie had not heard thunder for some minutes, the rain was still falling, fast and furious. It bounced over the surface of the road like sparks from a firework.

Freddie sighed. His troubles were far from over. But, the truth was, he was glad to be alive.

Apart from the odd trail of smoke from the valley below, there were no signs of human life at all. Nothing but trees and rocks and the sound of the rain.

After a while, Freddie found the path that appeared to lead off down through the woods. It was steep and overgrown, but wide enough for two people to walk side by side.

The rain was still falling but the branches of the trees gave him some shelter. As he walked, he could make out ruts left by the wheels of a cart and the hooves of a donkey or maybe an ox. His spirits lifted a little more. At least someone had passed this way before.

Soon, he found himself standing at the cross-roads of two paths. To the left, there was a feeling of neglect and stillness. The trees and evergreen bushes dripped with rain. Everything smelled sodden, wet. Oak leaves lay on the ground. The sharp needles of the fir trees bowed low over it.

The right-hand path was much steeper, but
more direct. It plunged straight down the mountainside rather than running in a zigzag.

Freddie looked down at his leather shoes. The tips were stained dark and water was seeping in through the soles. He thought of his sturdy hiking boots left in his little car, then sighed. There was nothing to be done.

He took the right hand path. It had a lonely feel to it. There were no fresh wheel tracks. There was no sign that the leaves on the ground had been disturbed, no sense that anyone had recently passed this way. Even the air seemed colder. The going got rougher. Stones, uneven earth and fallen branches tumbled from the overgrown bushes on either side.

Freddie felt as if the mountain was closing in upon him. Shock had set in and his relief had faded. Now, the woods seemed strangely silent. No birds sang, no rabbits or foxes or mice moved in the undergrowth.

‘A place of ghosts,’ he muttered.

An April mist was now setting in, creeping up without warning. Freddie sped up. He started to imagine shapes, outlines, behind every tree. Once or twice he even turned round, sure that someone or something was watching him from the dark forest around him.

There was nothing there. No one.

Finally, the land levelled out. Freddie found himself standing on a patch of flat ground that looked down over a picture-postcard village. His eye was caught by a twist of grey smoke. He narrowed his gaze and looked more closely. Houses, dwellings, fires burning. Freddie gave a sigh of relief. He had made it.

Now he could pick out a cluster of red-tiled roofs, half shrouded in the mist. Freddie was cold and hungry and his legs felt as if they might give way under him at any moment. But now he was almost there, he felt a burst of energy and picked up his pace. In his mind he could already hear the comforting clatter of the cafés and bars, the rattling of plates in the kitchens, the sound of human voices.

Freddie walked fast across the wet ground towards a small stone bridge in the far corner of the field. As he crossed over, Freddie glanced down to the stream below. The water was racing, lapping against the underside of the bridge and splashing up over the banks.

Then, in the distance, Freddie heard the thin tolling of a church bell. The mournful single note was carried on the wind to where he stood listening. He counted the chimes.

He raised his eyebrows. Four o’clock. The last
he remembered, the clock on the dashboard of the car was at two. Freddie listened until the last echo of the bell had died away then carried on across a second field covered with tiny blue and pink mountain flowers, like confetti scattered in a churchyard after a wedding. Around the edge of the field, poppies grew tall and bright red, like splashes of blood.

At last, Freddie reached the outskirts of the village. A white mist hung like a veil over everything, skimming the tops of the houses and buildings. The grass under his feet gave way to a track wide enough for a cart to pass along. The surface was muddy after the rain, the colour of gingerbread.

He came to a small wooden sign set at the side of the road.

He read the name of the village out loud. ‘Larzat.’

Freddie walked slowly into the village. He passed a few low buildings that looked like stores or animal pens. Then, as he got closer to the centre, the houses began.

Even allowing for the storm, the village seemed oddly empty. Nothing seemed to be open. Once he thought he heard footsteps in the distance, muffled by the mist. Once he thought he heard the bleating of sheep. But when he listened again, all was quiet.

The state of the road got better, the buildings more grand, the further he went. The larger houses had laurel trees in wide wooden planters outside their doors. But, still, he saw no one. No signs of day-to-day life. All the shops were boarded up and the wooden shutters firmly bolted.

Heavy, metal-framed gas lamps were set into the walls. The flames cast a weak yellow glow. But although the mist had lifted a little, there was something about the dusk, the stillness and the lack of life that made Freddie feel as if he
had stepped into an old-fashioned photograph. He half expected to see gentlemen in old-fashioned coats and top hats walking past. Or nursemaids pushing babies in prams. Or little girls with their hair in ribbons and boys in sailor suits playing with wooden spinning tops.

Without warning, a memory of a family photograph came into his mind. It was the last one taken of them all together. His mother was seated, her long skirts spread out around her. He, a boy of ten, stood next to her. Their father, smart in his wing collar and black moustache, stood behind her with his hand on her shoulder. George, fine in his uniform, stood on the other side of his mother.

They were all smiling.

Freddie took a deep breath. George. It was more than ten years since his brother had gone missing. Freddie’s dreams were still haunted by him, but he thought of George less often as the years went by. It was odd his brother was so much on his mind this afternoon.

‘A place of ghosts,’ he said again under his breath.

Freddie arrived at the small square in the centre of the village. It was bordered on three sides by buildings and lined by trees with silver
bark. In the centre there was a stone well with high sides and, in one corner, a water trough for animals. Beside it he saw a small café with a yellow and white striped awning. It, too, was shut, the chairs were tipped forward against the round metal tables. A small church occupied most of the southern side of the square, with a single bell set high in the wall.

As his gaze moved around the square, Freddie found what he was looking for: a modest guest house, plain but respectable-looking. He walked over and up the three stone steps leading to a wide wooden door. A board above the door gave the names of the owners, Mr and Mrs Galy. Another sign stuck in the window, this one handwritten, said there were vacancies.

A brass bell hung on the wall. Freddie raised his hand to pull the rope when, suddenly, something made him pause. He had a prickling feeling on the back of his neck. He felt as if hidden eyes were watching him from behind the shutters and windows, the same feeling he’d had in the woods.