Free The Risk of Darkness by Susan Hill Page B

cliff. Thinking. Looking at him. Thinking.
    “OK.”
    “What?”
    “OK, I said.”
    He hesitated. He had to go with it. Trust her. Jesus. He called Chapman.
    “Can you get the pilot to talk to me?”
    “Disconnect. I’ll ask.”
    The rain came in a squall, battering at the side of the cliff and drenching them.
    It was several minutes before the phone rang.
    “Flight Sergeant Cuff, RAF 202 Squadron.”
    “DCI Serrailler. I understand your concerns, Sergeant. It’ll be fine.”
    “Do you take full responsibility? It’s your call, Chief Inspector.”
    “Yes.”
    “You don’t see any threat to my crew?”
    “No.”
    A split second. Then, “OK, we’re coming back in. The winchman will be on his way down. But I can’t get closer than fifteen feet in to the cliff and conditions are difficult. It may take some time. He will come on to the ledge and you will be strapped together—we can’t risk taking the prisoner separately. Any injuries?”
    “Minor.”
    “OK. Hang on.”
    Serrailler had known it before. Once a rescue was under way, once safety was almost his, the tension increased rather than slackened. The time it took for the chopper to get close enough to the cliff to send down the winchman seemed to be far greater than the time they had already been stranded on the ledge. The helicopter hovered above, driving cold air on to them, then pulled up and away, before coming in again at a different angle, swerved, backed off. Now Serrailler and the woman were crouching and he had hold of her wrist. Her arm was limp, her expression flat and tired. The rain had plastered her short hair to her head like a cap.
    “They can’t get us, can they?”
    “They’ll get us.”
    The helicopter came in again slightly lower, and swung round against the wind. It hovered. Steadied. Then the door slid open. The winchman stepped on to the ledge and raised his arm as he swung. The winch went slack. He bent forward and gestured. The wind blew in a wild gust and almost knocked him off his feet, and it was several more minutes before he had reached Serrailler and Sleightholme and lashed them securely together.
    Minutes later, they were being hauled over the ledge into the body of the chopper. Simon remembered how large the RAF rescue helicopters were inside, with room enough for a dozen stretcher cases as well as paramedics and crew. It was noisy, and the tilting and swaying unnerving.
    Edwina Sleightholme slumped, head down, staring at the floor.
    The winchman was back and the doors were closed and secured.
    “We’re taking you to the hospital. You’ll meet up with DCS Chapman there. ETA four minutes.”
    “Thanks. God, I mean it.”
    “No probs. Wondered if we’d get close enough for a minute. Let’s see your hand.”
    “I’m fine.”
    They both looked at the woman, sitting hunched forwards. Simon shook his head, then, in a moment of revulsion, turned away from Sleightholme, to stare out of the helicopter window at the churning sea and sky.

Thirteen
    “I’m fine,” Cat Deerbon said, “I’m fine. I ought to be able to see off a young thug like that …”
    Sister Noakes took the cup of tea from her before Cat’s shaking hand sent it on to the floor.
    Something had happened as she had stepped through the doors of Imogen House into the nighttime quietness. The muscles and bones inside her legs felt as if they had dissolved, and she had been saved by one of the nurses as she had started to crumple. Now, she sat in Penny Noakes’s room, feeling a fool.
    “What’s wrong with me for goodness’ sake? I’ve coped with a hell of a lot worse than that.”
    “Funny thing, shock.”
    “I’m tough.”
    “Aren’t we all? Then out of the blue, we’re felled by something small. Happens to me. Death after death,all the difficult ones, young people, pain we can’t control, someone’s fear … and I’m very calm. I get home and there’s a dead mouse on the mat and I’m in tears. Try this tea again.”
    Cat’s hand was