THE NIGHT was beautiful and still.
Daniel was at the eastern end of the valley, crossing the bridge. On the right-hand side the water flowed as sluggishly as an old river. To the left it threw itself down steep rocks and carried on its course deep down between the walls of a narrow, impenetrable ravine, dramatically lit up by moonlight as if in some nineteenth-century Romantic painting.
He followed the road on the other side of the rapids and now had the vertical wall of the mountain with its water stains to his left.
On the other side of the valley he could see the village with its church tower and, higher up the slope, the clinic. Above him the sky hung like a dark-blue semitransparent canvas strung up between the two mountainsides. There was a smell of earth and grass and water.
He had realized that the road for vehicle traffic followed the oblong shape of the valley in an elliptical, closed circuit. Like a loop. A noose.
But the loop wasn’t entirely closed. It joined another road, it must, because how else would anyone ever get into the valley?
His plan was to avoid the road on the north side of the river where the village and clinic were. Instead he would stick to the south side and follow the road along the vertical cliff he called the Wall. The way the taxi had come when he arrived. Unfortunately he had been asleep for the last part of the drive, so didn’t know exactly where they had entered the valley and joined the loop. Probably either just before or after they had been stopped by the guards with the metal detector. Where the mountain was covered with ferns. Or had the ferns been part of his dream? Oh well, sooner or later he had to reach a junction where one of the roads would lead out of the valley.
He was better prepared this time and had packed his rucksack for a long hike. His plan was to get as far as he could under cover of darkness. If a vehicle approached he would take cover until the coast was clear. When he got tired he would rest in an old barn or under a tree, maybe get a few hours’ sleep. Then he would continue his hike. He wouldn’t try to get help from anyone, or ask for directions. He couldn’t expect anything from the villagers; they were all in the pocket of the clinic one way or another, even the lovely Corinne. The amount of respect she had for the doctors was frankly absurd. It made him think of old Swedish spa resorts with their complicated, double-edged loyalties.
The valley broadened out and he could see fields and small clumps of deciduous trees between the road and the mountainside. He couldn’t see any animals in the fields. Maybe they sought shelter amongst the trees at night. If there were any there at all. Because what animals would allow themselves to be penned in by such a ridiculously simple barrier—a length of wire strung up scarcely three feet above the ground?
There were signs hanging from the wire at regular intervals. They swayed gently in the night wind. When the moon peered out he grabbed hold of one of them and read “Zone 1.” The next one said “Warning” in three different languages. Every other sign said “Zone 1” interspersed with those that said “Warning.”
Daniel looked at the grassy slope on the other side of the barrier. He could see nothing to suggest the need for any warning. No shooting range, no building site, no sign of human activity at all. Just grass and trees and the rock face.
He heard an engine in the distance. The vehicle was coming toward him from behind, from the direction of the clinic. He ducked quickly under the wire and hurried across the meadow toward a clump of trees. He wondered about the warning, but the approaching vehicle constituted a clear and immediate danger, whereas the warning was incomprehensible and vague, and possibly no longer even accurate. He stood still in the darkness between some thickets of hazel, waiting for the vehicle to pass. But instead of going past, it pulled up and stopped. Two clinic guards got out.
The next moment a car approached at speed from the other direction and stopped next to the first one. Two more guards got out, and after a brief exchange all four of them ducked under the wire and spread out across the meadow. Two of them hurried off toward the rock face and two made their way toward the clump of trees where Daniel was hiding.
He pulled back deeper into the trees, well aware that he couldn’t go more than about a hundred and fifty feet. After that the mountain got in the way. Then he was forced to carry on westward along the rock face, hoping that the trees would continue, protecting and concealing him.
Now he could see the far side of the meadow; the signs hanging from the wire fluttered like big white moths in the darkness.
The uniformed men were behind him. The cones of light from their powerful flashlights exposed the tree trunks, signs, and rock face in brief, incoherent flashes.
“Can you see him?” one of them called.
“No, but he’s got to be here.”
He quickly ducked under the wire.
The next moment something terrible leapt up from the grass and hit him, cutting through his skin and muscle.