This had been a stolen weekend. A school friend of his—James Hale—had an incredibly rich uncle and aunt with a villa perched on the rock face: a couple of living rooms, three bedrooms, and a series of terraces, one above the other, with a circular swimming pool at the bottom and a vertical drop to the Mediterranean far below. James had been invited out and he had taken Alex with him—five days of luxury and a welcome break from school.
Andrew and Celestine Hale were pleasant enough, elderly with no children of their own. He was English. She was French. The two of them had made their money running a chain of luxury hotels. The Royale in Nice, the St. Anton in Cannes . . . A few years back they’d sold the whole lot and now they were living in considerable luxury themselves. If there had been one fly in the ointment, it was that Celestine was always worrying about the boys. She had watched in horror as they jumped off the terrace and into the pool. She didn’t want them to go out on their own—she was afraid they’d get lost. When they went snorkeling near the old port, she had been hunched up on the beach, certain they’d be run over by one of the ferries heading out to Corsica. She was a real tantine, Alex thought. Not so much an aunt as an auntie, with a touch of granny thrown in too.
But she was also a wonderful cook, and in the evenings, after a few glasses of wine, she seemed more relaxed. Most nights they’d eaten at the villa. Andrew Hale insisted that the restaurants in Nice were mainly overpriced and strictly for tourists. And with the views from the balcony—the sea glowing red and the city ablaze with pinpricks of light—there was nowhere else that Alex would rather have been.
“So what are you doing this morning?” Alex hadn’t heard Andrew Hale step out onto the terrace behind him. James’s uncle was wearing a white jacket and a Panama hat. He was on his way to visit a relative at Villefranche, just down the coast, and for some reason James had to go with him. Until lunchtime, Alex would be on his own.
“I’m happy staying here,” Alex said. “I can hang out by the pool.”
“Nonsense!” Andrew came over and stood beside him. “This is your last day. You ought to do something memorable.” He thought for a moment, then a gleam came into his eyes. “Have you ever been parasailing?”
“No.”
“Well, it’s great fun. You’re not scared of heights, are you?”
“Not really.”
“Then you should give it a go.” He called back into the kitchen, “Celestine! Why don’t you take Alex down to the Blue Beach?” Celestine appeared in the doorway. She was holding a plate, wiping it dry. “He wants to go parasailing,” Andrew explained.
This wasn’t quite true. But that was the way with Andrew Hale. Once he had an idea in his head, he always assumed that everyone would agree.
Celestine frowned. “Why do you always have to suggest these dangerous sports?” she scolded. She spoke perfect English but with an accent.
“It’s not dangerous. It’ll give him a laugh—if it doesn’t scare the socks off him first.”
Somehow, Alex didn’t think that being dragged behind a motorboat while attached to a half-sized parachute would be particularly frightening . . . not after what he had been through just a couple of months before. He had been forced to launch himself out of a cargo plane, twenty thousand feet above London, crash-landing through the glass roof of the Science Museum. And there had been a second parachute jump here in France—storming the Point Blanc Academy high up in the Alps, near Grenoble. Not that he could tell Andrew or Celestine Hale anything about it, of course. He hadn’t even told James . . . or anyone else at Brookland School, for that matter.
At eleven o’clock that morning, Andrew set off with a grumpy-looking James (“Visiting old people I don’t even know isn’t my idea of a vacation”), and a few minutes later, Celestine drove Alex down the steeply winding Boulevard Carnot that led into the old port of Nice and then around the headland into the city itself. The beaches were already busy. The season had barely begun, but this was a Saturday and the water was unusually warm and clear enough to be inviting.
They parked near the Opera House and crossed the main road with the sea in front of them. Alex had noticed two or three facilities offering parasailing and other water sports. From his balcony, he had watched the miniature figures dangling underneath the wisps of brightly colored silk as they were towed up and down the bay. He was actually looking forward to trying it. It looked fun and he imagined how peaceful it would be, hanging over the water in his own little space between the sea and the sky. At least nobody would be trying to machine-gun him.
It was also going to be expensive—sixty euros for around ten minutes. But Jack had given him plenty of money before he left, and so far the Hales hadn’t let him pay for anything. He and Celestine reached a makeshift hut on the beach where two slim and permanently suntanned Australians were getting everything ready while a third man, on a speedboat, waited to launch the ride. The parachute that would lift Alex into the air was already spread out on the shingle. A narrow strip of carpet led down to the edge of the water. The runway.
“You gonna give it a try, mate?” The Australian had somehow guessed that he was English.
“Sure. Why not?” Alex handed over three twenty-euro notes.
“Okay. My name’s Jake.” He pointed at the other man. “That’s Gary. Who are you?”
“Alex.”
“Good to meet you, Alex. Let’s get you set up.”
Celestine watched suspiciously as Alex was given a life jacket, which he buckled across his chest. Gary, the younger and quieter of the two men, held up a sort of harness . . . It was nothing more than a strong canvas belt, shaped like a figure eight, with two industrial hooks like the ones used by mountain climbers—carabiners—one on each side. The harness was fastened around his waist.
“This way, Alex.” Jake led him across to the carpet. At the same time, Celestine came over to him.
“Alex, you will not mind if I do not watch? This makes me . . . très nerveuse . . . you understand?” She searched for the English. “Very nervous! If you like, I will buy you an ice cream for when you come down.” She nodded at some shops on the other side of the Promenade des Anglais.
“Thank you.” It made no difference to Alex if she was there or not.
“What flavor would you prefer?”
“Lemon.”
“Very good.” Celestine took one last glance at the tangle of ropes, the waiting parachute. “Enjoy yourself,” she said, but without much conviction.
Jake was in a hurry to get Alex airborne. The sooner he was finished, the sooner he might be able to sell another ride. “When the boat starts, you take three or four steps,” he explained as he handed Alex a black metal bar with about a dozen different cords leading back to the parachute. He snapped the two carabiners into place. The parachute was now securely attached to Alex’s waist. When he took off, the metal bar would be pulled above his head. A long rope led from the bar to a pole in the motorboat, just behind the driver’s seat.
Alex noticed that the driver of the motorboat was smoking. It seemed slightly odd and out-of-sorts with what was meant to be a healthy outdoor activity. The driver was old and overweight. He was hunched over the steering wheel and didn’t seem happy at all.
Jake must have seen the look in Alex’s eyes. “That’s Kristof,” he said. “The usual guy’s got the day off. But don’t worry. He’ll give you a good ride.” Jake stepped back and took hold of one corner of the parachute. The other Australian, Gary, did the same, the two of them holding it up so that it would catch the wind. Jake gave a signal. Kristof sat down and gunned the engine. Alex saw the boat move forward and the rope began to go taut.
He took three steps and rose effortlessly off the beach. He could barely even feel the parachute pulling him—all the strain was taken by the harness and divided equally between his thighs. As the boat picked up speed, he climbed faster until he was about sixty feet abov
e the water. He noticed the various swimmers watching him go. There must have been forty or fifty people in the sea and maybe a couple of hundred more, some of them spread out on towels on the public beach, others lying sardine-like on the blue-and-white sun loungers on the private Plage Neptune next door. There were children building sand castles and paddling. A couple of them waved at him as he soared above them.
The speedboat was an American-built Tige 21V Fox Racer, twenty feet, six inches long, with a single 315 horsepower outboard engine. It was speeding down a narrow channel between two lines of buoys with the open sea ahead. Alex was quite surprised by how high up he was. From this height, even Kristof seemed to be doll-sized. Alex watched as the driver flicked his cigarette into the slipstream. That surprised him too. The butt of a cigarette is made of cellulose acetate, a type of plastic, and would take years to biodegrade. It would also leak tiny amounts of lead, formaldehyde, cadmium, and arsenic straight into the Mediterranean. As if dumping plastic in the sea wasn’t bad enough!
He put it out of his mind. He was actually enjoying this. They were still heading out to sea, leaving Nice behind them, and Alex felt a strange sense of both calm and exhilaration. He was too high up to hear the Tige’s engine. The sun was sparkling off the sea, the wind rushing through his hair. He would be sorry when Kristof turned around and headed back, but he knew that the ride would last ten minutes at most.
And then Kristof stood up. Alex wondered what he was doing. It was as if he had been stung by a wasp. Still standing, he turned as if about to shout out to Alex. Then he clutched at his chest and toppled sideways, landing on the steering wheel.
He lay still. The boat surged on toward the horizon. Dangling high above, Alex couldn’t quite believe what he had just seen. From the look of it, Kristof had just suffered some sort of stroke or heart attack. It was hard to say if he was dead or alive, but he certainly wasn’t moving. His whole body was crumpled, his hands hanging limply above the deck. Alex almost wanted to laugh. This could only happen to him! Well, it looked as if he was going to get a rather longer ride than he had bargained for.
He waited a few moments for Kristof to wake up.
Kristof didn’t wake up.
Alex took stock of the situation. He was in no real danger. Provided the Tige kept moving forward, he would continue to fly behind it. It wouldn’t take very long for the two Australians to realize that something had gone wrong. They would raise the alarm and send another boat after him. Somehow they would have to climb on to the Tige and bring it back to shore, slowing it down so that Alex could descend. Then they would call an ambulance for the unfortunate Kristof. Perhaps, after this, he would think of quitting cigarettes.
The boat, left to itself, was still speeding in a more or less straight line. Alex glanced back. Nice was now a long way away, the sun glinting off the long row of apartment buildings and hotels that were all packed together, facing the sea with the mountains behind. Despite his first thoughts, Alex was getting a little uneasy. He didn’t like being out of control, and right now there was absolutely nothing he could do. He really was a puppet on a string.
Should he unhook the carabiners? It might be possible if he shifted some of his weight onto the metal bar, which was now above his head. Then he would be able to let go and drop down into the water. But that would do no good at all. From this height, he would probably break both his legs.
And then the speedboat must have been hit by a little wave. Kristof slid off the steering wheel and fell back, slumping against the rope that connected Alex to the boat. The movement caused the wheel to turn. The Tige cut a complete circle in the water and began to head back the way it had come. Alex felt himself being pulled around. Suddenly he was facing Nice and saw, with a jolt of horror, exactly what was going to happen next.
Unless Kristof recovered consciousness, which seemed unlikely, the boat would keep going until it hit the beach, slamming its way through any swimmers who happened to be in the way. Alex would be all right—he was safe so long as he was up in the air—but other people would be injured or even killed. And what about the dozens of sunbathers on their beach towels? Unless the boat was stopped, it would plow across the shingle and into them too. Alex was four or maybe five minutes away from a bloody catastrophe. Perhaps the most horrible part of it was that he had been given a grandstand seat.
And there was nothing he could do.
Or was there? If Alex could get into the boat, he could take over the controls . . . slow down and stop. But how was that possible when he was sixty feet up in the air? The carabiners! Alex reached up and grasped the metal bar, using both arms to drag his weight upward. That took the strain off the hooks connecting him to the parachute, and with great difficulty, he managed to free one of them, contorting his body and reaching back with one hand. Then he did the same on the other side. This was more difficult because the moment the second hook was unfastened, he would be hanging free, with all his weight transferred to his wrists and hands. If he let go, he would fall.
The beach was getting closer. The boat seemed to be rushing gleefully toward it. Why couldn’t another wave hit the damned thing and turn it back again?
The second hook came free. Now Alex was clinging to the bar with the harness hanging uselessly off his thighs. He could imagine the crushing impact if he let go and fell. Even if he managed to save himself, it would be at the expense of everyone else. He would be responsible for the carnage as the boat smashed into the beach.
He had to get down to the level of the water. That was the only reason he had unhooked the carabiners. And he had worked out how to do it. On his first mission, he had been given parachute training by the SAS in the Brecon Beacons, and part of it had involved emergency procedures. He remembered what he had been taught. If he could fold the edge of the parachute in against the wind, he would be able to force a controlled descent. He looked up and caught sight of two colored cords. That was what he was looking for.
It wasn’t easy. Having unhooked himself, he was now supporting himself with both hands. He let go with one and immediately felt the strain as his entire body weight transferred itself to the other. There was no time to rest. No time to hesitate. Nice was looming ahead of him. He could already see the swimmers—dots in the distance—bobbing up and down in the water, close to the shingle. The Tige was heading straight for them, almost deliberately, as if it wanted to do as much harm as possible before it crashed into the beach. Alex still hoped that Kristof would regain consciousness, get up, and see what was happening. But he wasn’t moving. He was as still as a corpse.
Somehow, Alex’s flailing hand caught hold of the rope. With the breeze beating at his face, he transferred some of his weight and pulled with all his strength, expecting the parachute to fold in on itself and then flutter down. But it didn’t work. With a sense of dismay, he realized that, as the boat plowed forward, the rush of the wind was too great. He couldn’t fight it. He was stuck in midair. He could still save himself. All he had to do was let go and he would fall. He might break a few bones, but the life jacket wouldn’t let him drown. The people on the beach would be less fortunate. Alex remembered the two young children he had seen in the water. What if they were hit?
Ahead of him, the buildings were getting closer and closer. He could make out the improbable pink-and-green roof of the exclusive Negresco Hotel . . . He could even read the letters of its name. How much longer did he have? A couple of minutes. Not more. He pulled again. The cord didn’t give an inch.
He was saved by the unlikely help of an EasyJet airbus coming in to land at Nice airport. All the parasailing companies were aware of the blowback from the jet engines and the danger they could pose to their clients, but it was far too high up to be any threat to him. In fact, Alex never even saw the plane, but he felt the blast as it hit the parachute. He knew it was now or never and pulled one last time, using all his strength. The silk folded and suddenly he was plunging down, the w
ater rushing up.
He hit it with two feet, not hard enough to do himself damage. Even so, he was shocked by the impact. One moment he had been floating in the air, the next he was soaking wet, being dragged at speed through the sea, salt water lashing into his face. He was blinded. He could barely keep his eyes open. At the very last moment he had let go of the parachute, which had been instantly dragged away behind him, and transferred his grip to the tow rope. This was the critical moment. Time was running out. He only had a few seconds left.
He forced his eyes open. The Tige was in front of him. Fighting against the rush of the water, he began to pull himself forward, one hand over the other, desperately seizing hold of the rope. He was being bounced violently up and down, the water pounding into him. He could hardly breathe. His arms were being torn out of their sockets. He was being tortured a dozen different ways.
He was getting nearer to the boat. Alex didn’t have time to congratulate himself. He had become aware of a new, last danger. The Tige’s propeller was chopping up the water, turning it into a vicious white froth. If he tried to drag himself over it, his hands and then his arms would be chopped up. Gasping for breath, he hoisted himself above the surface, peering through the curtain of water that hammered into his face.
He’d had one piece of luck. When Kristof had fallen, he had snagged the rope, carrying it slightly over to one side. As Alex drew himself toward the back of the boat, the propeller was horribly close. He could feel it churning inches from his stomach and legs. But it wasn’t directly in front of him. By twisting his body to one side, he was just able to avoid it.
There was a duckboard at the back of the boat. Alex reached it and caught hold of a stanchion at the very corner. He had used up almost all his strength. He was choking. He felt he had swallowed half the Mediterranean and the salt water was burning the back of his throat. The roar of the engine was in his ears. He cried out and pulled himself up. Somehow his body came clear. He felt the wooden deck under the life jacket across his chest. He wriggled forward. He was on board!
Alex Rider--Secret Weapon Page 14
