The force of the impact sent the Honda veering to the left, out of control, ploughing into the rear of the ice-cream van.
Grace felt himself hurtling, weightlessly, through the air. Air that was a cacophony of booming, echoing metallic noises.
He landed with a thump that winded him, jarring every bone in his body, and with a force that rolled him over several times, helplessly, as if he had been ejected from some freakish funfair ride. Then, finally, he came to a halt face down in wet grass, with his mouth jammed into mud.
For an instant he was not sure if he was alive or dead. His ears popped. There was a brief moment of silence. The wind howled. Then he heard a terrible scream, but he had no idea where it came from.
He scrambled to his feet and immediately fell over again. It was as if someone had picked up the entire headland and tilted it sideways. He stood up again, swaying giddily, surveying the scene. The bonnet of the Honda, which was lurched over at a strange angle, was embedded in the destroyed rear end of the ice-cream van. The driver of the Honda appeared to be in a daze, pushing at his door, while two police officers in stab vests were pulling on it. Smoke was coming out of the underside of the van. Several more police officers were running towards it.
Then he heard the scream again.
Where the hell was his car?
And he was suddenly filled with a terrible, sickening dread.
No! Oh, Jesus, no!
He heard the scream again.
Then again.
Coming from below the cliff-top.
He staggered to the edge, then took a sharp step back. All his life he had suffered from vertigo and the sheer drop to the sea below was more than he could look at.
‘Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelp!’
He dropped on to all fours and began to crawl, aware of pains all over his body. He ignored them and made it to the edge, where he found himself looking down into the underside of his car, which was tangled up in several small trees, nose into the cliff, its tail out, balanced like a diving board. Two wheels were still spinning.
The first part of this drop was a short, steeply wooded slope. It ended in a grassy lip, about twenty feet below, and then dropped sheer for several hundred feet, down on to rocks and water. It freaked Grace out and he pulled back to where he felt safer. Then heard the scream again.
‘Help me! Oh, God, help me! Please help me!’
It was Cassian Pewe, he realized. But he couldn’t see the man.
Fighting back his fear, he crawled to the edge again, looked down and shouted, ‘Cassian? Where are you?’
‘Oh, help me. Please help me. Roy, please help me.’
Grace shot a desperate glance over his shoulder. But everyone behind him seemed occupied with the van and the Honda, which looked like it was going to go up in flames.
He peered down again.
‘I’m going! Oh, for God’s sake, I’m going.’
The sheer terror in the man’s voice jolted him into action. Taking a deep breath, he leaned down, gripped a branch and tested it, hoping to hell it would hold. Then he swung himself over the edge. Immediately his leather shoes slid down the wet grass and his arm, holding on to the branch, jerked painfully in its socket. And he realized in that instant that the only thing stopping him from sliding all the way down the sharp slope to the lip, then straight over into oblivion, was this one branch he was holding with his right hand.
It was starting to come loose now. He could feel it pulling free.
He was truly terrified.
‘Please help me! I’m going!’ Pewe screamed again.
Panicking himself, Roy quickly found another branch, then, clinging on to it while the wind blasted at him, as if it was trying to prise him off the cliff, he dropped further.
Don’t look down, he thought to himself.
He kicked his toe into the side of the hill and got a small, slippery purchase. Then he found another branch. He was level with the grimy, partly buckled chassis of his car now. The wheels had stopped spinning and the car was rocking like a see-saw.
‘Cassian, where the hell are you?’ he shouted, trying not to look down below the car.
The wind instantly ripped his words away.
Pewe’s voice was muffled with terror. ‘Underneath. I can see you. Please hurry!’
Suddenly, to Roy’s shock, the branch he was holding on to gave way. For one terrible moment he thought he was going to tumble backwards. Frantically he lunged out for another branch and grabbed it, but it snapped. He was falling, sliding down past the car. Sliding towards the grassy lip and the sheer drop. He grabbed another branch, which was covered in sharp leaves that slid through the palm of his hand, burning it, but it was young, springy and tough. It held, almost jerking his arm off. Then he found another one with his left hand and clung to it for dear life. To his relief, it was sturdier.
He heard Pewe screaming again.
Saw a massive shadow above him. It was his car. Perched twenty feet above him, like a platform. Rocking precariously. And Pewe was suspended upside down from the passenger door, his feet entangled in the webbing of his seat belt, which was all that prevented him from falling.
Grace glanced down and immediately wished he hadn’t. He was right on the edge of the sheer drop. He stared for an instant at the water pounding the rocks. Felt the deadweight pull of gravity on his arms and the savage, relentless wind tearing at him. One slip. Just one slip.
Panting, terrified, he started to kick out a toehold with his right foot. The branch in his right hand suddenly moved a fraction. He kicked harder at the wet, chalky soil and after some moments he had made a space big enough to jam his foot in and take his weight.
Pewe screamed again.
He would try to help him in a moment. But first he had to try to save his own life. He wasn’t going to be of any help to either of them dead.
‘Royyyyyyyyyyyyyy!’
He kicked with his left foot, digging that in too. After a short while, with both feet planted, he felt a little better, though not exactly secure.
‘I’m falling. Royyyyyyyy! Oh, God, get me out of here. Please don’t let me fall. Don’t let me die.’
Roy craned his neck up, taking his time on every movement, until he could see Pewe’s face about ten feet above him.
‘Keep calm!’ he called out. ‘Try not to move.’
He heard a loud crack as a branch gave way. His eyes shot up and he saw the car lurch. It dropped several inches, swaying even more precariously now. Shit. The whole fucking thing was going to crash down on top of him.
Gingerly, inch by careful inch, he pulled his radio out, terrified of dropping it, and called for assistance. He was given reassurance that it was already on its way, that a rescue helicopter was being crewed up.
Jesus. That will take an age.
‘Please don’t let me die!’ Pewe sobbed.
He looked up again, carefully studying the webbing as best he could. It appeared well tangled around his colleague’s feet. The wind held the buckled passenger door open. Then he looked at the way the car was rocking. It was too much. The branches were straining, cracking, breaking. It was a terrible sound. How much longer would they hold? When they gave, the car would toboggan on its roof down the slope, which was as steep as a ski-jump ramp, and straight over the sheer drop.
Pewe was making it worse by bending his body every few moments, trying to reach upwards, but he had no chance.
‘Cassian, stop wriggling,’ he yelled, his voice nearly hoarse. ‘Try to keep still. I need help to lift you. I daren’t do it myself. I don’t want to risk dislodging the car.’
‘Please don’t let me die, Roy!’ Pewe cried, squirming like a hooked fish.
Another fierce gust blew. Grace clung to the branches, his jacket filling with wind, pulling like a sail, making it even harder for him. For several moments, until the gust eased, he didn’t dare move a muscle.