by Jo Bannister
Her strong jaw rose till she was literally looking down her nose at him. “Did you ask him to cut the rope? Did you ask him to take his knife out and cut himself free? Did you put it to him sensibly, rationally, pointing out that you’d done your best but there was no way off the mountain for both of you? And when he couldn’t bring himself to do it, did you get angry and shout at him? Cut the rope. You know what you have to do. Cut the fucking rope! Cut the rope, or I will—”
“For God’s sake!” The words came from Nicky Horn as if wrung out by torture. “You don’t know. You can’t know—how it was, what it was like. He fell. I tried to pull him up but I couldn’t. That high, and that cold, you haven’t the same strength. It was all I could do to hold on to him. For three hours we just stayed there, him hanging in midair, me hanging on to the mountain. I carved steps in the snow, to brace my feet against, but they kept giving way under the weight. After half an hour I knew I was weakening—I wasn’t suddenly going to start getting stronger. Something that was beyond me at the start wasn’t going to become possible as I got colder and more exhausted. Half an hour in we both knew how it was going to end. That there was no chance of help coming however long we waited. But the decision was his to take. After three hours he took it.”
Beth tossed her chestnut braid like an impatient horse. “Do you know something, Horn? I’d almost be tempted to believe you. Patrick was a brave man. He was a kind, brave man and I could believe he’d cut his own rope rather than see you die trying to save him after all hope was gone. I’d have no trouble believing that, except for one thing. You. You’re not even a good liar. Every word you say, every lie you tell, makes it perfectly clear what happened up there.
“It was Patrick’s decision. But you couldn’t wait for him to make it, could you? You thought you could die waiting. You already had your knife out, to carve steps in the snow. And there was the rope right in front of you. It didn’t even need a conscious action, just a slip of the hand. And then he was falling.”
When she looked in Horn’s eyes, it was almost possible to believe she could see what had happened mirrored there—the big man dangling helplessly on the taut rope, the smaller one fighting to hold it, the wink of sunshine on steel. Then Horn blinked and tears were on his face.
Beth McKendrick didn’t care about his pain. After four years she was still too wrapped up in her own. She drove on relentlessly. “Maybe, for a split second, he misunderstood. He thought he’d pulled you off the mountain, and as he fell he’d see you come crashing over the cornice. But all he saw was the end of the rope. And in that moment he knew what you’d done. The last seconds of his life were filled with the knowledge that his best friend had killed him.
“Did he curse you as he fell? Did he damn you to hell? I would have done,” she assured him earnestly. “But this was Patrick. Maybe he used his last breath to forgive you. Is that the terrible secret you’ve been carrying round for four years? That with his last breath Patrick forgave you for killing him? Is that why you had to lie and say he was dead on the rope when anyone who’s seen a picture of Anarchy Ridge would know he couldn’t have been? And why you had to stick with the lie even if it meant Tommy Hanratty putting a price on your head? Because if Patrick was alive and conscious, people would ask what you said to one another.”
“No,” whispered Nicky Horn.
“Then what? You’ve admitted he was conscious. You say he knew what he was doing and did what he had to. He must have said something. What were his last words?”
“Nothing,” mumbled Horn.
“Oh, come on! He knew he was going to die. If this is finally the truth, he knew he was going to die a hero. He’d three hours to work out what he wanted to say, what he wanted people to remember him by. To make any explanations he felt necessary. So what did he say? After he fell, and before he fell to his death. What did he say to you?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Of course you bloody remember! The words must be seared into your brain like the brand on a beef steer’s bum. Tell me what he said.”
Once again she’d pushed him to the point where something inside Horn changed. Where he stopped backing away from his problems and turned on them with bared teeth. Where his manner went from secretive and defensive to belligerent, almost in the blink of an eye. He spun the chair in front of the monitors, rounding on her, and his voice was terse and barred with anger.
“You want to know what he said? His famous last words? You’re sure? Then I’ll tell you. Don’t expect to like them. I don’t think Patrick Hanratty was entirely the man you took him for.
“He worried about that. He knew he was going to end up disappointing you—hurting you. Oh yes, we talked about you. There’s a lot of hours on a climb when you’re not actually climbing, when it’s dark outside or there’s a blizzard keeping you inside the tent, and you huddle together for a bit of warmth and you talk. About mountains and girls.” He cast her a tight, savage little grin. “Mostly about mountains. But when you’ve relived every ascent you’ve ever made, together and separately, finally the conversation turns to sex. Who you’ve had. Who you’ve wanted but couldn’t have. Who wanted you.
“And yes, your name came up. He cared for you, he really did, but not how you cared for him. That’s what bothered him. He knew that, however lightly he tried to let you down, you were going to feel betrayed. He wanted to keep your friendship, but he didn’t think he was going to be able to. Things had gone too far. Friendship was never going to be enough for you. Patrick agonized over how he was going to tell you that the way you felt about him, he felt about someone else.”
Beth recoiled as if he’d hit her. Her cheek was white. She’d known, of course—somewhere in her heart she’d known. She hadn’t wanted to admit it to herself, and after Patrick died she never had to. She certainly hadn’t expected it to be used against her by someone with whom she was locked in a kind of mortal combat. All she could find to say was what she’d been saying all along—“I don’t believe you!”—and all she could find to say it with was a breathless ghost of a voice.
“Yes, you do,” retorted Horn fiercely. “You know you and Patrick were never going to settle down and raise two-point-four children and a cocker spaniel. You knew it long before we went to Alaska. You just didn’t want to face it. His death saved you from having to. And—be honest—there was just a little bit of relief mixed in with the sadness, wasn’t there? Because now you could live the fantasy and there was no one, there was never going to be anyone, to call you a liar.”
She slapped his face, as hard as she could. But though he rocked, his eyes barely left hers. They burned with a kind of bitter victory. Beth would have given her right arm to believe that this too was a lie, but she knew better. Mainly because he was right—none of it came as a surprise to her. She’d locked it away where she’d never expected to revisit it, but she’d known before Patrick died that they were in trouble. That he was being kind when he should have been honest. She’d known he wasn’t happy. Like a coward, she’d hoped he’d never summon up the courage to tell her. That it was over between them; or rather, it had never been what she wanted, but she’d blinded herself to the facts because she wanted it so much.
If Patrick had lived, sooner or later they’d have had to confront it. That would have been the end, not only of the future Beth had wanted for them but also of the one Patrick hoped for. She’d loved him too much to remain friends, to meet up for the occasional drink after work and send christening cards to one another’s children. If he’d lived, she’d have lost him. His death had spared her that.
“Except that there was. Me. I knew everything about you and Patrick,” said Horn, “because he told me. Those cold windy nights in the mountains, after we’d talked about the really important stuff like overhangs and traverses, he told me what was going on in his life. I really wasn’t that interested. I nodded and agreed with him from time to time, but mostly I was planning the next day’s climb or sorting out my ropes or whatever.
I liked the guy, I had a lot of time for him as a climber and he was good company in a bivouac, but I can’t honestly say I was riveted by his love life. I listened with half an ear, to be polite.”
He managed a little smile. “Looking back, I think maybe I was a bit dim. I’m not good at social chitchat, mainly because if it doesn’t involve ropes and pitons I can’t work up much interest. But I should have paid more attention. Maybe then I’d have put it together. Maybe what he said that last night in the tent wouldn’t have come as such a goddamned shock.”
His eyes still hadn’t shifted from her face, and Beth felt somehow helpless to break their hold. She didn’t know what was coming. She was pretty sure she wasn’t going to like it. There seemed no possible way now to avoid it.
“You want me to tell you his famous last words? What he said as he cut the rope? You’re sure—you really want to know? We can keep the genie in the bottle: we can’t put it back once it’s out. Do you want me to tell you what Patrick said before he fell?”
She whispered, “Yes.”
Between the bruises Horn’s weather-darkened face was the gray of old leather, but his eyes blazed like a hawk’s. There was no longer any kind of victory there, though, only grief and excoriating remembrance. The words came thick in his throat. “He said he loved me.”
CHAPTER 10
“YOU’RE LYING.”
Beth couldn’t imagine who’d spoken. It didn’t sound like her voice; and in fact it wasn’t saying what she believed. She’d have given anything to think that this was the lie and one of the other stories he’d told—any of them—was the truth. But it explained things for which she’d never had an explanation before. She’d known things weren’t right between them. At the same time she’d known Patrick cared for her, wouldn’t want to hurt her. She’d known, somewhere in her heart, that there was someone else. But she’d told herself that Patrick Hanratty wasn’t the kind of man to play away—that if he was in love with someone else, or just didn’t like her enough anymore, he’d have been honest with her. He wouldn’t have let her go on thinking there was a future for them.
But what if it wasn’t another girl he’d fallen in love with? Maybe he hadn’t known how to tell her, or even what to tell her. Maybe he hadn’t known himself whether this was a passing madness or the way his life was turning. Maybe he didn’t want to say anything about it, not even to her, until he understood better himself what was going on. Didn’t want to lose her, and shock and alienate his family—including his thug of a father—until he could still the turmoil in his brain enough to work out what he wanted and what he could reasonably expect to have.
He’d never expected to die on Anarchy Ridge, leaving her with so much unfinished business she’d been unable to move on with her life.
Horn grinned savagely. “Of course I’m lying. The trick is knowing which are the lies and which is the truth.”
“This is a lie.” It was Beth’s voice, but she knew as she said it that she was lying too.
“If that’s what you want to believe.”
“Patrick loved me…”
“I know he did. But it wasn’t your name he was yelling as he fell into the blizzard.”
“You bastard.” The whole of her body was shaking cold, except for the hot tears that spilled onto her cheeks. “You took him from me. You?”
Horn forced a dismissive laugh. “I didn’t want him. Except on my rope; except for a friend. I’d never thought of Patrick that way. I didn’t know he was thinking of me that way. When he talked about you and someone else, I thought he meant another girl. I’d have paid a bit more attention if I’d thought he meant me!”
“You didn’t even want him? I loved him!”
Horn shrugged. He may have hoped to convey nonchalance, lack of concern, even a little man-of-the-world amusement. But he wasn’t a man of the world—not in that sense, anyway. He was a joiner and a climber. He was a practical man, no good at nuances, bothered by complications. His casual shrug came across as awkward, gauche and uncouth. “But it wasn’t about either of us, was it? Either you or me. It was about Patrick and what he wanted. How he saw his life shaping up.
“I damn near fell off the mountain when he told me. This was earlier, in the tent. The night before.” Horn didn’t have to specify what datum he was using. “I told him he was backing the wrong horse—that he was a great climber and a terrific all-round guy, but he wasn’t my idea of a good lay.” He swallowed. “In fact, I said rather more than that. Things I shouldn’t have said—things I wouldn’t have said if I’d had a bit more warning. Hurtful things.
“He apologized, said he understood—he was just telling me how he felt, he wasn’t expecting anything from me in return. I think he was pretty shocked himself that he’d come out and said it. I don’t know how long he’d been working up to it—if he’d always meant to come clean while we were in Alaska, or if it got away from him in an unguarded moment. I’d no idea it was anywhere in his mind until he said the words.
“And after he did, we never really got the chance to talk about it. He’d said all he wanted to, and so had I—too much. We avoided looking at one another for the rest of the night. Maybe if the next day had ended differently, we’d have got round to talking. We’d have had to if we wanted to keep climbing together. Or maybe we’d have got home and gone our separate ways—I don’t know. We’re never going to know, now.”
Tell a woman that the man she was in love with loved another man and you do more than just set the record straight. You turn her view of the world, and her own place within it, on end.
Being left for another woman is upsetting, offensive, demeaning—however kind the man is, however gently he tries to let her down, the cold, hard, inescapable fact is that, whatever attracted him to her in the first place, she doesn’t have enough of it and he’s met someone who has more. It’s worse than being the kid who’s never picked for team games. It’s like being picked, tried out, and then sent back to mind the pullovers.
Now imagine being the kid who’s given a tryout, then told he played so badly that not only is he not getting a place on the team but the team’s out of the league and the owner of the ball is going to go play with it in another park.
Every emotion in the lexicon flickered across Beth McKendrick’s face, but none of them settled for more than a moment. There was of course shock. There was outrage, and disbelief. There was ridicule. Then incredulity lifted a corner of its petticoats to give a glimpse of the mental turmoil beneath, as if she was at least trying to acknowledge the possibility. But it was too hard a truth to face, and she slammed back into the comfort of her default position, which was anger. It stiffened her sinews and suffused her cheeks with blood, but it didn’t reach all the way up to her eyes. Her eyes were appalled, and terribly wounded, and they believed.
Beth McKendrick and Nicky Horn stared at one another across the unbearable truth—the young woman who’d have been willing to die for Patrick Hanratty’s love and the young man who wasn’t, both their lives blighted by a biological quirk that should barely have been worth comment except that a lack of honesty about it had woven filaments of kindness and misunderstanding, and the desperate attempt to avoid causing pain had trapped them all as surely as a gill net traps fish.
“He told you that?” Beth was struggling for the words. “That I loved him, and he loved you?”
“Yes.”
She went on staring at him, humiliation rising to join the maelstrom in her eyes. “What did you do? Laugh?”
“No.” He wasn’t laughing now either. “There was nothing to laugh about. What he said—the way he was feeling—it knocked me sideways. Multiply what you’re feeling now by about three and you’re still not close. I thought I knew him, and it turned out I hardly knew him at all. And the thing about being in a tent in a snowstorm halfway up a mountain is, you can’t stalk out and slam the door and be on your own until you’ve got your head together. We were going to be sleeping within reach of one another. Other times o
n other mountains we’d shared a sleeping bag to stay warm. You can imagine how that was going through my mind.”
“You mean, you really didn’t know? Until that trip—that night under Anarchy Ridge?”
Horn nodded grimly. “I had no idea. Maybe there were clues, but I was never any good at picking up what people aren’t actually telling me. I thought we were talking about him and you. I’d no idea we were talking about him and you, and me.”
“And when you did?”
He looked away. His voice was almost inaudible. “I called him a freak.”
Most everyone who ever met him liked Patrick Hanratty. There was a gentleness about him, a sensitivity, a native inborn kindness, that made it hard not to. Everyone who knew about his background marveled that his father had managed first to sire such a son, then to raise him without trampling all that tenderness underfoot. The truth was, of course, that Patrick carried the imprint of his father’s boots on his soul every day of his short life. He was afraid of his father every day. University had been the best time of his life because it was the longest time he was beyond the old thug’s reach. He took to climbing for the same reason. Halfway up a mountain he had only the wind and the ice and the possibility of avalanches to worry about.
If he’d lived long enough he’d have got away, got far away with a woman, or a man, that he cared about, and the towering terror of his childhood would have faded to a mere distant shadow. But he was only twenty-three when he died. There hadn’t been time for him to fulfill any of his potentials. The abiding love of old friends was the only memorial he left.
As it turned out, Beth McKendrick hadn’t known him as well as she’d thought either, but she was still probably the one who knew him best. And if he hadn’t loved her as she’d hoped, she was probably the one who loved him best. The pain of losing him had never faded. Partly because she’d never talked about it to anyone. A little to her father—not, even at the time, going so far as to share the depth of her grieving—and not at all to anyone else. Someone with a more critical self-awareness might have been struck by the similarities between Patrick’s life and hers—the secrets, the internalizing—but Beth had never put herself, her own feelings, under the microscope. Perhaps because of that, she hadn’t the tools to manage them when they ran out of control.
