The Fall (19 page)

She felt a sudden spurt of panic, standing there below the slab, with him at the top and nothing between them but the thin
line of rope. “You mean I won’t be able to
see
you?”

“You’ll be all right. You saw the way I went. Just follow my line.”

“But I won’t see you.”

“It’s all right, Diana. You don’t need to see me. You have your own instincts to follow.” And with that he had disappeared
around the corner and a moment later was calling to her that he was tied on, and the rope was hissing through her hands and
up the slab. She scrabbled to undo her anchor as the rope came tight. “That’s me!” she called.

“Okay!” He sounded distant, detached, like someone going far away for a long time. “Climb when you’re ready.”

She began. She climbed up easily enough at first, and then paused at the bollard and surveyed the next passage. The rope ran
diagonally away from her toward the far corner where Guy had vanished. Surely this was the hardest thing she had done, and
yet, so he said, it was not hard. This was merely Very Difficult; but not “hard.” Hard was Severe, or even — whisper it — Very
Severe, and she certainly wasn’t ready for anything like that yet.

“How are you doing?” he called.

Up to now there had been holds to grab and steps where you could place your foot, or at least part of your foot: hand and
foot, you felt that you were secure. And now there was this stretch of cracked and lined rock without any of those things,
just ripples and unevenness, and a thin slick of grease on them. “I’m looking.”

“You don’t climb by looking. Give it a go.”

She felt a small start of anger. “Don’t rush me!”

“I’m not. You just take your time.”

She moved. Her heart was in her mouth. Never had she felt the meaning of the expression so vividly. If not her heart, then
something else organic: something thick and pulsating up there in her throat trying to force its way up into her mouth.

His voice came from beyond the edge: “Remember, don’t lean into the rock. Stay in balance on your feet.”

“I don’t need bloody instructions!” she shouted, and heard his distant, infuriating laughter in reply. “Damn him,” she muttered.
There were fingerholds. Her fingers hurt on them, taking her weight, taking the load off her feet, which were clumsy and heavy
and would surely slip. Don’t lean inwards, she thought; whatever you do,
don’t lean inward.
She glanced down to check her footholds, and as she looked, the clouds opened up and there was air below her, hundreds of
feet of cool, damp air. She knew both fear and elation, those two sensations that were the Janus-faces of climbing. She pulled
on her fingers and stepped up, reached out her right boot onto a sloping ledge and eased her weight across onto it. The rope
shifted until it was almost tight again, not pulling her, but there like a ready hand. Except that it went up and across in
a diagonal, and she felt that if something came unstuck, if one of her feet slipped on this greasy slope, she would swing
across the slab and disappear around the edge.

“You’re doing well,” his voice called.

“You don’t know how I’m damn well doing,” she shouted back. “You can’t even
see
me.”

“But I
can feel
you. It’s like playing a fish.” The line gave a little twitch so that it tugged gently at her waist. “You see?”

“Let me be.”

“Like a fish. A whiting. ‘Will you walk a little faster? said a whiting to a snail —’”

“For God’s sake, shut up!”

He shut up. She stepped up and across again and discovered the same side pull that he had used, and went on without a skid,
with the rope just moving up in front of her, with the edge of the slab coming nearer and the angle easing off slightly so
that suddenly she no longer felt uneasy but instead felt confident and relaxed. And as though it were an echo of her mood,
the sun shone through a break in the clouds, threw bright light onto the gray rock, and kissed the back of her neck with a
moment’s fleeting warmth.

“‘There’s a porpoise close behind us,’” he called out, nearer to hand now, “‘and he’s treading on my tail.’”

She reached the edge, and there he was around the corner taking in the rope as she moved onto his exiguous ledge. He was smiling
at her as though he were as proud of her as she was of herself. “And here’s my little porpoise,” he said. She came right up
to where he was belayed, and he reached out his right hand and brushed the damp hair from her eyes and there was a moment
of sudden, startling intimacy. “Did I make you cross?”

“A bit. I’m sorry I swore.”

“You’re a marvel.”

“Was it all right?”

“You were wonderful.” They stood on that tiny sloping ledge and looked at each other. It was one of those difficult moments
when you are afraid to be the first to move your eyes, like playing a childhood game but playing it seriously, playing it
as though it really matters. His eyes, she noticed, were an indeterminate green-brown color, paler toward the pupils.

It was he who glanced away first. “You haven’t noticed the view.”

It was only then that she looked around. The cloud base had lifted to discover a great ocean of space below their tiny perch.
The glimpse of sunshine had left them and gone chasing across the far hills. She watched it go, picking out a slope of grass,
a brown patch of heather, a gray outcrop of rock, lighting on things as if by intention, as if to show her what was of interest.
The wind battered at her ears. Everything was below; the whole world was below. “Wonderful,” she said. “Language doesn’t do
it justice.”

“Then don’t say anything.”

So they stood there together in silence, and it was natural that his arm was around her shoulders as it had been the day before
when she had reached the top of the first climb. What was that called? Flying Buttress. A mere scramble compared with this.
And his arm had been around her then.

They reached the top by three o’clock. By that time the cloud had come down again, and the day was suddenly dark. They struggled
up onto the twin blocks — Adam and Eve — that mark the summit of the mountain and afterward ate their sandwiches sheltering in
the lee of them, but when they set off down the North Ridge back to the valley, their luck deserted them and the rain came
down, real rain, hard and cold. Guy pulled a waterproof cape out of his rucksack. “Will this help?”

“But that’s yours.”

“And I’m offering it to you.”

“We’ll share it.”

So they did, and the thing was ridiculous really, for neither of them kept dry and it was almost impossible to descend over
the rocky ground together with the cape like a tent over the two of them, and by the time they reached the motorcycle, they
were both soaking wet, shivering with cold and laughter.

“What Miss Sheridan needs is a hot bath and a decent afternoon tea,” he said.

“But she’s unlikely to get either.”

“Then get a change of clothes, and I’ll take you to the hotel where you most certainly can get both.”

“Oh, I couldn’t.”

He wiped the saddle of the bike and climbed astride it. “Why on earth not? Hop on.”

Why on earth not? It was difficult to formulate an answer really. There were many reasons, but they all seemed paltry as she
thought of them. He started the engine and maneuvered around to face down the valley toward the youth hostel. “Well, what’s
keeping you?”

So she climbed on behind him, and the racket of the engine drowned any answer she may have had.

The hostel was deserted, the rooms silent and cool. She breathed a sigh of relief. Thank God Meg wasn’t there. Even the warden
seemed to have gone somewhere. She went to the dormitory to fetch some dry clothes and then scribbled a note and pinned it
to the board by the desk.

Meg. Climbed our mountain and safely down. Be back later. Diana

Guy was waiting on the gravel outside, the engine of the bike idling. She ran across and swung her leg over the pillion seat
and settled into the familiar position behind him. Gravel skittered out from under the wheel of the bike, and they roared
away up to the road. The deed, if it was a deed, was done.
Fait accompli.
Which she had long thought to be something to do with
fate
until she had looked it up in the dictionary.

Tea in the lounge of the Royal Hotel, Capel Curig, looking down on the twin lakes of the Dyffryn Valley toward the pall of
cloud that covered the mountains. She had bathed in the bathroom just down the corridor from his bedroom and changed into
dry clothes, and now they sat in wicker chairs, facing the view. There were other guests. One or two were in uniform, but
most were people who had moved out of the suburbs of Manchester or Liverpool in order to avoid the bombing that everyone expected.
Conversation was subdued, as though they were all shocked by the enforced move, by the whole damned inconvenient war. The
tinkle of teacups provided a percussion accompaniment to tales of reduced services and unobtainable foods.

“What do you do?” she asked him. She knew nothing much about him at all, and now they had shared two days together. Shared
and not shared: separated often by a hundred feet of rope, sometimes out of sight of each other, sometimes as close together
on a stance as though they were dancing.

He looked awkward. “There’s a family business,” he said. “Shoes. Not very glamorous, I’m afraid.”

“What, the shoes?”

“No, you goose. Having a factory.”

She laughed. It was so easy to laugh. “At least it’s useful. And they’ll want lots of shoes now, won’t they? Boots.”

He shrugged. “That’s a problem, isn’t it? Should the family firm contribute to the war effort if one of the directors refuses
to fight?”

She’d quite forgotten about his being a conscientious objector. “Will you resign?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know what I’ll do. My main concern is the tribunal, though.”

“When’s that?”

“This autumn. The date is not decided. Perhaps I’ll volunteer for something — the fire service, maybe. Perhaps they can use
my skills.” He looked at her. “And you?”

“I’m a nurse. Only an auxiliary, but it’s better than nothing. There’ll be a need for nurses one way or another. I was going
up to the university, Liverpool University, to read English. But —”

“You could still do that.”

“Not with the war on, I couldn’t. So I trained as a nurse. I’m going down to London next week. I’ll be working in Clerken-well.”

He nodded. She felt self-conscious. Perhaps she should be away from here, back in the hostel down the valley with her friends.
“Will you have more tea?” he asked, and the question seemed to her hugely important, laden with significance quite beyond
any matter of thirst, as though
no
meant leaving immediately and going back to the hostel and
yes
meant staying; as though
no
meant never seeing him again and
yes
meant the opposite, whatever the opposite might be. “Yes, please,” she said.

He leaned forward. As he lifted the pot, one of the other guests, a tweed-jacketed, gray-haired gentleman, came over. “Excuse
my disturbing you,” he said. “But aren’t you Guy Matthewson?”

Guy half rose from his chair. “That’s right.”

“Struthwick. I was on the twenty-eight Everest expedition.”

“Of course.” Guy carefully replaced the pot and shook the man’s hand. “This is a friend of mine. Miss Sheridan. Diana Sheridan.”

Struthwick raised his eyebrows. “Not the actress?”

She blushed. “I’m afraid not. She’s Dinah. It’s quite close, though, isn’t it?”

“Just as charming,” the man said, bowing toward her and taking her hand. He turned back to Guy. “Gather you were planning
to go to Everest yourself when this nonsense all blew up.”

“There was talk. With Shipton.”

“D’you know the German expedition to Nanga Parbat got trapped by the outbreak? Did you hear about that? The whole lot of them
interned in India.” The two men laughed at the absurdity of it all and talked of mountains for a while. “Be a while before
anyone can get back to the Himalaya,” the man said regretfully. “I hear you’ve registered as a CO.”

Guy seemed to brace himself. She saw the flesh tighten around his mouth, the skin go white. “As a matter of fact I have.”

Struthwick grunted. “Can’t be through lack of guts, can it? Not in your case.”

“It’s a matter of conviction.”

The man didn’t look persuaded. “I fought in the Great War. Don’t imagine you did. Can’t say I found it a very edifying experience.
But still, there’s a matter of duty, isn’t there? Duty to one’s countrymen, I mean; not to the bloody politicians.”

“Perhaps we see our duty in different ways.”

“Perhaps.” Struthwick nodded toward Diana. “Well, I must leave you to your tête-à-tête. Delighted, I’m sure.”

The man moved back to his table, and Guy relaxed. It was as though he had been holding his breath throughout the encounter
and now he could breathe. His voice was low and angry. “You know what’s happened, don’t you? You know what this bloody war’s
done? It’s made me frightened of people, that’s what.”