looked for lights or other signs of habitation, but then the road began to bend to the right and the verge on his left gave way to trees with a dark area below them that the snow had not managed to penetrate.
‘It’s got to go somewhere,’ he muttered, looking for a clutch of cottages or a farm. What he really hoped for was a hamlet with a pub, a glass of Scotch and a warm fire, a haven in fact. He admitted to being scared and out of his depth in something that he didn’t understand.
The road was still going around a long bend and his neck felt stiff with the tension of peering forward. Still trees on his left and the high bank on his right, with no sign of life anywhere. He glanced in his mirror and with a lurch of his heartbeat he saw the other car coming up fast without lights. It didn’t slow at all and suddenly he was thrown forward against his seat-belt as it rammed him. His car went into a skid that he managed to control but then the other car was coming again. This time he was tense with the expectation of it and the shock of the collision jolted his neck.
They were no longer asking him to pull over, they were ordering him to stop or else, but the choice was no longer his to make.
The last collision had caught the rear of his car at an angle and it was now swinging slowly out of control towards the dark area under the trees. He hit a tree which stopped the skid with a sickening jolt, but now he was going over a drop backwards and it was like being swallowed as the bonnet came up and the back end fell into space. The sound of crumbling metal was still in his ears when he bounced off another tree and he flung his arms up around his head.
They couldn’t have meant this to happen, John was thinking illogically. They had wanted his wallet, not his death; more muscle than brain, damn them whoever they were. His body was jerked savagely as he bounced off trees and he felt his teeth bite into his lip and tasted blood. The noise was of screeching metal, branches being torn from trees, and the thud of his heartbeat was in his throat and threatening to choke him. Something came loose in the car and struck him on the forehead but he felt no pain. His main concern was how far would he fall? Would he survive?
He lost all sense of direction as the car was buffeted from one direction to another at the whim of the trees in its path. His jaw was clenched tight as were his eyes, and his face ached with the grimace of terror.
There was a pause and the car began to move forward now, angled steeply downwards, and he knew he had to see what lay ahead. He looked through his arms and saw that, incredibly, his headlights were still working. Then he wished he hadn’t looked, because dead ahead was the branch of a tree, coming at the windscreen like a spear.
‘Oh, fuck …’
He was only half conscious when strong arms lifted him into a vehicle up on the road.
‘Watch it, Tim, we don’t know if he’s broken anything.’
‘Can’t help that. He’ll die of cold if we don’t get him back to the pub soon.’
The next John knew, he was lying on a hard sofa that smelled of wet dogs and stale beer and a fat lady was wrapping him in blankets he was aware of other people in the background and the heat coming from a fire but most of all he was glad he was still alive.
‘Thank you,’ he said and then a tall man in a tweed jacket bent over him, smelling of whisky and tobacco.
‘I’m Patrick Robertson. I’m a vet but I could do some stitches in that cut if you like … stitching’s the same for man or beast. Can you move all your bits?’
John flexed his arms and legs and although he ached as if he’d been badly beaten, nothing seemed to be broken.
‘I think my bits are all right,’ he said. There was a general sigh of relief from the spectators standing in the doorway with pints of their hands and they stayed on to watch the surgery.
‘You won’t need a local—you’re still in shock, shouldn’t feel a thing.’
But he did. Not only did he feel every stab of the curved needle but also the skin of his forehead being pulled together as the knots were tied, and all the time the vet gave a commentary about how lucky he’d been.
‘If that tree hadn’t hooked your car as neatly as a salmon on a gaff you’d have gone fifty feet over the drop right into the river. Fellow did that last year. It didn’t kill him outright, but he drowned—isn’t that right, Betty?’ The fat lady made a face behind the vet’s back as he cleaned away dried blood with a swab and then pressed on a dressing. ‘Now then,’ the man went on. ‘How many fingers do you see?’ And he held up two in a rude gesture. John grinned and told him exactly what he saw. ‘And do you know who you are?’
‘John Leith.’
‘He’ll do. You can bring him a Scotch and top up my glass as well.’
The fat lady pushed him aside. ‘I’ll do no such thing. He’ll have soup.’
And she sat down on the edge of the sofa and reached to help him sit up in stages, so that he found his head resting on her bosom which was as soft as a cushion and that allowed him to swing his legs to the floor. He pushed aside the blankets because the fire was sending out a fierce heat and saw that he’d lost his shoes and his jeans and sweater were torn and bloodstained. The crowd in the doorway drifted off now that the interesting business of stitching was over and soon he heard the thud of darts hitting a dart board.
The vet had moved to stand with his back to the fire, with one hand holding a glass of Scotch and the other spread behind him to catch the heat of the fire. He had sandy hair that was receding, a ruddy complexion, and the bluest eyes that John had ever seen.
‘No point in calling out a doctor tonight but you should have a proper check done tomorrow. No double vision, I suppose.’
John shook his head and that was a mistake. A wave of pain gripped his head in a vice and he shut his eyes until it eased. When he opened them the vet was wincing in sympathy.
‘I’ll leave you a couple of painkillers. Betty will give you a bed for the night.’
‘Where am I—I don’t know this area, and what time is it?’ John asked.
‘Altford and it’s just after ten.’
Rees would be worried … and he’d promised to phone Gwen.
‘Can I use the phone?’
‘Soup first,’ Betty said at his elbow.
He didn’t argue. And it was wonderfully hot and full of vegetables, the best he’d ever tasted although it stung his swollen lip. ‘How did anyone know I was down there?’ he asked when she took the bowl away.
‘Ian from the farm was across the river. He saw the headlights as your car went over but it took him some time to get back here to raise the alarm. Luckily our Tim is daft on climbing so he has the ropes and things.’
So he’d been lucky not to have been trapped in the car all night.
‘I’m very grateful to them,’ he said quietly. Words weren’t really enough.
‘Now you can phone your friends,’ Betty said with a smile. She wanted
