II
The look on Rafiel's face was all the confirmation Mikhail needed that the fleece was his ticket to the presidential palace.
'Is that…?' he asked in awe, reaching out to touch it.
'Keep your hands to yourself.' The helicopter blades were slowing down, but he still had to shout to make himself heard. He nodded to the second man, who was holding Gaille with his arm around her throat and his gun against her side. 'Who are you?'
'Nukri, sir,' replied the man, clicking his heels as best he could.
'You're a soldier?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Good.' He turned back to Rafiel. 'Where's the boat?'
Rafiel gestured south. 'We were about twenty-five knots southeast when we set off. She'll be closer now. But we need to get moving. There were police on the slopes when we were coming in.'
'We're dealing with Knox first.'
'Yes, but if they call in their Air Force-'
Mikhail turned to him. 'Don't ever question my orders again,' he said. 'Do you understand?'
'Yes, sir. I'm sorry, sir.'
Mikhail nodded emphatically; but the man was right, they needed to be quick. He grabbed Gaille by her hair, pressed his knife against her throat and dragged her over to the gorse. 'Give yourself up,' he shouted out to Knox. 'Give yourself up now or she dies. You have five seconds. Four. Three.' He watched intently for movement as he finished the countdown, but saw nothing. What a coward that man was! He turned his knife around in his hand to make it easier to slash her throat, but then he paused, inspired by a better idea.
III
The rotor blades had been slowing down, but now they started speeding up once more, the copter preparing for take off. Knox crept closer to the edge of the gorse and peered out. To his exquisite relief, he saw Gaille standing on this side of the helicopter; and he could also see, through the cabin window, the pilot and Mikhail and the two other Georgians all safely inside. They were about to take off, and they were leaving Gaille behind.
The helicopter began to rise; it was only a couple of metres off the ground when Gaille began to rise with it, kicking and thrashing like a fish on a hook. Only now did Knox understand. Mikhail hadn't let her go after all; he was hanging her instead from a black cord like a dog's leash he'd slung out the cabin window. Her face was already red, her mouth gaping as though screaming, though he couldn't hear a thing over the din of the copter as it hovered there just above the ground. The cabin window now slid open, and Mikhail showed himself, the fleece still buckled around his throat. He reached out his hand, waved his hunting knife back and forth for Knox to see, then he tossed it down onto the ground in a clear challenge: cut down your woman or watch her hang.
Fear welled in Knox, but love did too. He jumped to his feet and burst out of the gorse and sprinted towards her, weaving left and right, keeping his eyes on the fallen knife. He heard the expected cracks of gunfire even over the roar of the blades, dived into a roll, snatching for the knife as he came up, but missing. And now the helicopter was turning away and beginning to rise, taking Gaille with it. He had no time. He leapt for and grabbed one of the sled-skis of its landing gear. The downdraft from the rotor-blades, the slickness of the black composite material, it took everything he had to hold on. But he tightened his grip and swung a leg up and over the sled-ski, then the other, hauling himself up, grabbing one of the struts holding the sled-ski to the copter's undercarriage. They were rising fast now, Gaille dangling from its other side, her face purple, her legs thrashing, her tongue protruding. He anchored himself as best he could, then reached out beneath the copter's belly to the other sled-ski. His fingertips brushed it. He tried again, straining every bone and sinew, caught enough of it to commit himself to the transfer. The helicopter tipped as he swung from one side to the other, then hauled himself up. He put an arm around Gaille's hips and lifted her to relieve the pressure on her throat. She was still thrashing, desperate for something to stand on. Her heel clipped the sled-ski but then she had her feet upon it. He held her there as best he could while picking loose the knots around her wrists with his fingernails. She pulled a hand free and then the other, the coil of rope dropping away to the earth far below as she frantically loosened the noose around her throat and gulped in breath. But, even at that moment, she started to topple and fall outwards. It took Knox a bare microsecond to realise that Mikhail had let go of the leash, the only thing that had been anchoring her against the helicopter's side. She looked up at him as she fell, reaching for him with her freed hands, imploring him with her eyes. Without thinking, he wrapped his legs around the strut and crossed his ankles and let himself drop, catching her by her calf, her cotton trousers slithering through his fingers, but grabbing her ankle and holding it tight as they surged even higher, the rocky plain now a good two or three hundred metres below, far too far for her to survive a fall.
He tried to lift her back up, but he wasn't strong enough, it was all he could do to hang on. She reached up for him from her waist in an effort to grab his forearm, but she couldn't quite manage that either, beaten back by the downdraft of the rotor-blades. They crested the escarpment, headed south towards the sea. Still he clung on, but he was tiring fast, his joints screaming. He looked up, praying that someone inside the helicopter would take pity on them, only to see Mikhail leaning out the cabin window, watching raptly as he waited for Knox to drop her.
FORTY-SIX
I
The land plunged away beneath the helicopter, a series of cliffs and bluffs almost sheer down to the coast two thousand feet below, where waves broke white against the rocks. Knox felt Gaille slipping from him; he cried out in his effort to hold her. She must have realised her time was short, for she swung a couple of times then gave it everything, bending upwards from her waist, grabbing his wrist for a moment but unable to hold on, dislodged by the juddering of the helicopter and the blast of its blades. She tried again, and clung on this time, then climbed her hands up his arms to his hair and his nostrils and chin, grabbing his shirt and trousers and then hauling herself up him and back onto the sled-ski, taking the weight gloriously off him, allowing him to lift himself up to safety too.
Mikhail had been watching all this from the cabin window. He smiled as he reached out his handgun and aimed down at Gaille. From point blank range, he pulled the trigger three times. The first round caught Gaille in her forehead, the second in her chest as she was already falling. But there was no third shot, his clip was already empty.
Knox watched in disbelief as Gaille fell, her out-flung limbs describing silent slow spirals, passing through a wisp of cloud before vanishing from view. Then he looked up at Mikhail, who was still leaning out the cabin window, watching him rather than Gaille, savouring every detail of his pain. Then he turned his gun on him and pulled the trigger twice more, evidently unaware that he'd run out of bullets. He shrugged indifferently when he realised, withdrew back inside the cabin, and closed the window.
Knox sat slumped on the sled-ski in numb despair, his heart and guts ripped out, taken by Gaille as she'd fallen. He didn't know how long he sat there before the rage began, lapping at him at first, but then coming in giant waves. He stood up on the sled-ski, holding himself against the cabin door by its outside latch, trying to open it; but it was locked from inside, as was the window. He glared in through the glass, but Mikhail only winked at him, relishing Knox's powerlessness and grief, while the others looked away, pretending to themselves that this wasn't happening, that they hadn't just abetted in the murder of an innocent young woman. He pounded on the glass, but it did no good; and it was galling to have his rage so impotent, to have it sneered at like this, and his fingers grew cold from the wind and altitude, making his hold on the door-latch uncertain, so he sat back down upon the sled-ski before he fell. He anchored an arm around the strut, and the red mist gradually dissipated, leaving only the most exquisite anguish and the dull necessity of revenge.