Medusa

In the end I found it up in the top level, lying under a chest. He must have kicked it there just before we left. I grabbed it up and ran back with it down the stairs, back into that cellar, fastening it to the bottle rack as we had done before. In a moment my foot was in the first of Lennie’s loops and I had dropped through the hole and was in the water-worn rock passage below shouting her name again. And when there was no reply, I followed my nose, the blood pounding in my veins as I turned a bend, the blowhole passageway narrowing to finish abruptly in the pale yellow of the matchboarding where we had heard the sound of their voices and the truck’s engine as it backed up to the garage doors.

One of the lengths of boarding was splintered now. It had clearly been prised off and then nailed roughly back into place. But it wasn’t the splintered boarding that held my gaze. It was Miguel’s body.

He was lying just as he had fallen after being stuffed through the hole in the boarding, his eyes open and staring and the back of his head smashed in. There was blood mingled with the rock dust of the floor, smears of it on the fresh wood of the boarding, and his eyes reflected dully the light of my torch. The sight of him, and the smell … I turned away, feeling suddenly sick. And then I was hurrying back along the blowhole passage, doubt mingled with dread, wondering what they would have done with her. If they had killed her, then no point in bringing the body here. A weight tied to the feet, then overboard and the Balearic lobsters would do the rest.

I ducked past the rope and when I reached the second expansion chamber and could see the water-worn passage falling away and the scaffold poles rigged over the blowhole, I stopped. There was nobody there. I was shouting her name again, but it was a futile gesture, only sepulchral echoes answering me and the slop of the sea loud in my ears.

I was turning away when I thought I heard something. It was a high sound, like the scream of a gull. I stood there for a moment, listening. But all I heard was the sea, and nobody would go down into the cave itself without diving gear, for the entrance to it was deep under water and in a gale … And then it came again, high and quavering.

I flung myself down the slope, slamming into the scaffold poles and gripping tight as I leaned out over the hole, the beam of my torch almost lost in the expanse of water that flooded the cavern below. The tide seemed higher than when Lennie and I had looked down at it, the beach no more than a narrow strip and only the upper fluke of the rusty anchor above water. I didn’t see her at first. She had retreated to the far end of the beach, her body pressed back against the rock wall of the cavern, so that all I could see of her was a vague shadow in the yellowing beam.

‘Soo! Is that you?’

She was too far away and she had her hands up to her face. I couldn’t be sure. I called again, but she shrank back, scared that one of the men who had held her captive had returned. It wasn’t until I called my own name several times that she finally moved. She came across the beach very slowly, her face growing clearer and whiter as she approached, her black hair turned almost grey with rock dust, her eyes large and wild-looking. She wouldn’t believe it was really me till I shone the torch on my face, and then she suddenly collapsed.

There was nothing for it but to go down to her. Fortunately the rope on the pulley was a long one, so that I was able to fasten one end of it round my body and use the other part to lower myself to the beach. She had passed out completely, her body limp, her eyes closed. There was a nasty bruise on her cheek and a gash on the back of her right wrist that had left the whole hand tacky with half-congealed blood. I bathed her face in sea water, the hand too, but it only caused the bleeding to start again.

The sting of it must have brought her round, for when I had scooped up some more water in my cupped hands, I came back to find her staring up at me. ‘Who are you?’ The words were barely audible, her body stiff and trembling uncontrollably.

‘It’s Mike,’ I said and reached out for the torch, shining it on my face again.

‘Oh, my God!’ She reached out, gripping hold of me, her fingers digging into my flesh so violently they hurt.

I don’t know how long I sat there on that wet uncomfortable beach holding her in my arms, trying to comfort her. Not long I suppose, but long enough for my mind to try to grapple with the future and what this meant to us. ‘I love you.’ She said that twice, like an incantation, her voice very quiet as though the words meant a great deal to her, and holding her tight, I thought, well, maybe we could try again.