Page 80 of Villa of Secrets

After such a long ride across country, the atmosphere in the tunnel was dank and stilted. But then the air freshened again as the distant light grew stronger. My feet were cold, and I shivered as I walked into the shaft of light. How long before someone turned up?

The vent, round and built of stone, had a rusting metal ladder that reached up to the cobalt sky.

‘Hello! Anyone there?’ I yelled.

A head, silhouetted in the brilliant sunlight, hung over the top.

‘Oy! Dora Cohen?’

Tilting back to shout up the well, I nearly lost my balance. ‘Yes, that’s me.’

‘Climb the ladder,’ he shouted.

Oh!

The rusty old rungs reached twenty metres up, and were half a metre apart. Was I capable of this mammoth feat? I grasped the rails and climbed the first few steps. The corroded iron cut into my hands and pain stabbed from my broken wrist with each pull.

‘Good! Keep coming!’

By the time I’d reached the three-quarter point, I was gasping for breath and my arms and shoulders burned. One more step, I kept telling myself, forcing my legs to push on, fighting the pain in my arm.

A bar snapped away, clattering and ringing in the shaft until it splashed into the water below. My hands scraped down the blistered metal, and soft skin was grated from my palms. My bare knees hit the next rung and before I could stop myself, I shrieked in pain. The sound amplified in the cavernous space, and the voice above me yelled, ‘Hang on!’

I gripped the rail with all my strength while my legs flailed to find a foothold below. Sweat stung my eyes. Hardly able to breathe for the panic gripping my chest, I thought I’d plunge down into the aqueduct below and break my neck. Blood oozed into my stinging palms making my hands sticky. I started to slide down, then my feet found a rung and I put my weight on it. Oh, the relief!

My breath came in gasps. How would I climb over the gap? I rested until the pain eased a little and my heart slowed.

‘You all right?’ the voice called down. ‘Can you move it? We need to go.’

I wanted to punch the idiot!

The effort to get to the top was almost too much. I spanned the broken rung by stepping onto the joints where it met the uprights but without putting all my weight on them.

At the top, I found a thin young man with a sharp nose and frizzy black hair. ‘I’m Tassos,’ he said. ‘Come on, we’re late.’ He gracelessly hauled me over the wall.

His dilapidated motorbike made a dreadful noise. My body ached and my bleeding hands and knees were whipped by the wind.

We rode a track above the coast, turned inland and followed the valleys and ravines, until we came to a shallow river and a rocky enclave.

‘This is where I leave you. You’ll find a cave behind the boulders. Wait there.’

Less than ten minutes later, a short man with a miserable face, silver shoulder-length hair and vivid green eyes joined me. ‘Dora Cohen?’ he said.

I nodded.

‘I’m Kapitanos Nikos. Follow me and stay close.’

We continued into a dense bamboo grove that grew from a knee-high delta. We sloshed through water, squeezing between seemingly impenetrable wetlands of bamboo. A small clearing appeared where three string hammocks hung in the vegetation. A rocky area supported a charcoal pit and various cooking and eating utensils.

‘Choose a hammock, dump your backpack, and give me your gun. Are you hungry?’

I nodded quickly and he smiled.

‘Fish casserole in the big pan. Help yourself. We’ll talk once you’ve eaten.’

While he examined my weapon, I found an enamel dish, filled it with stew, and ate greedily.

‘Nice pistol. Just been fired?’ he enquired.