Stranded

by Sarah Goodwin

  ‘You burned down my tipi.’

  ‘You weren’t in it, were you? We were blowing off steam. You really pissed us off. What did you expect? Being so difficult. So selfish.’

  He sounded so sure, so casually amused. Was he right? Had I just read too much into their actions, seen murderous intent where there was just anger, scared myself with my own paranoia? I thought of the sounds I heard when I was alone, sounds of the mainland. I thought of the voice that had come to me in the cave. Was I losing my mind? My theory about the mainland catastrophe, some kind of event or series of disasters that had wiped out our production team as well as any who cared for us and left us stranded. Was that really something a sane person would come up with? I felt dizzy and sick. The exhaustion from the chase was crashing down on me. For the first time I wasn’t sure of my decisions, my course of action.

  ‘Why don’t you come out and talk to me properly?’ Duncan said softly, like I was a frightened cat to be coaxed from under an armchair. ‘This is just silly, isn’t it? We can go back to the camp and get some tea, talk about this like adults.’

  I reached forwards, shifting my weight and inching closer to the cave entrance. It was almost involuntary. I felt hypnotised, calm for the first time in weeks, months. In my head I saw Duncan as he’d been on that first day, clean and ordinary and sparkling with adventure and excitement. Everything had been all right then. Perhaps it was all right now.

  The arrival of the others broke the spell. One moment it was just me and Duncan and his voice, the next came shouts and swearing and Zoe’s sobbing voice screaming.

  ‘Maddy! Where are you? Get out here and look what you did, look what you did to him!’ She dissolved into noisy wails.

  At that moment Duncan’s hand appeared in the darkness, snatching at my ankle. I screamed and slashed at it with the knife, felt the blade meet flesh. He swore and snatched his hand away.

  ‘Fucking mad bitch! Gill was right – we should’ve knocked you out and dumped you in the sea!’

  I backed up and held the knife ready. I guessed that Gill had run back for the others as soon as she saw Shaun and they’d met Andrew on the way back. He hadn’t been gone long enough to make it all the way to camp. If they’d taken longer, I might have listened to Duncan. I might have left the cave.

  ‘Go away!’ I screamed.

  ‘You murdered him!’ Zoe wailed, choking and spluttering on tears and snot. ‘You killed him. Oh God, oh my God, he’s gone …’

  I heard Maxine muttering something, probably trying to comfort her. Then Gill piped up with a voice sharp and cold as the night.

  ‘How do we get her out of there, Duncan? She needs to pay for this.’

  ‘Could dig her out,’ came Frank’s voice, too loud and slurred. ‘Dig her out like a stump.’ He laughed.

  ‘What do we do with her then?’ This was Maxine. The words might have made me hope for a rational voice, but she sounded speculative, excited. ‘If she killed Shaun we can’t just let her walk around free.’

  Frightened tears welled in my eyes and I put my hand over my mouth to muffle any sounds that might escape me. What were they going to do to me? An image came to me of a rope slung over a tree branch, my body swaying and twitching as they cheered and drank below. I started to shake uncontrollably.

  ‘Get over there, she’s listening,’ Duncan said.

  I heard their footsteps retreating and then the low murmur of indistinct discussion. If hearing them had been frightening, not knowing what they were planning filled me with terror. I was blinded with it.

  Casting about for a way to defend myself I started pushing my rucksack through the gap into the inner cave. My hatchet was in there as well as the larger knife I used for cooking. The opening was smaller. The wall made of stone. I could hold them at bay in there. I was shaking so much that I knocked my head on the wall as I groped my way inside. Once in the inner cave I snatched up my kitchen knife and brought the hatchet close to me. If they wanted to hunt me like a cornered animal I would fight like one.

  I heard them return. There was a sound like something being dragged along the ground. Something heavy. I had only a few seconds to wonder what that could mean before a bale of burning weeds was thrust into the cave, filling it with smoke.

  Panic ripped at me as my eyes watered and I started to cough. Were they trying to smoke me out? The weeds started to burn and crackle merrily. I had to put them out or risk the fire reaching me and my wood store. I fumbled for a blanket. Getting back into the outer cave the rock scraped my face and arm, I was too afraid to go carefully. I threw the blanket and started slapping at it, smothering the flames. There were sounds outside, voices shouting. I’d dropped my knife in the darkness. Fear flared as the fire died out. I was defenceless.

  Then came an impact, right outside the entrance. I jumped, skittering back. My hands were like blind spiders as I clawed around for something, anything, to use as a weapon. I found nothing.

  More sounds from outside, thumping and scraping. Were they digging their way inside? I shrank back against the wall, frozen. Any thought of finding my knife or hiding away had flown. I stared into the pitch black and waited for the stars to replace the earth above me.

  Then, all at once, the noises stopped. Outside there were voices, curiously muffled. Zoe was still crying but there was also shouting and cheers. They were pleased about something. Duncan’s voice suddenly came out of the darkness. It was muffled, like the others.

  ‘Well, Maddy, I hope you feel safe now.’

  There was laughter, even as Zoe wailed in grief.

  ‘Everyone back to camp,’ Duncan said. ‘Frank, come help me with Shaun.’

  ‘What about her?’ Gill said.

  ‘Andrew?’ Duncan asked.

  ‘Fine. If someone brings me some breakfast and a flask first thing.’

  ‘Maxine, bring Andrew his breakfast when it gets light.’ Duncan yawned. ‘Let’s get to fucking bed.’

  Their footsteps moved away. As soon as they did I shot forwards, feeling for the entrance to the cave. I had to know what they’d done. My hands met rotting wood and soil where there should have been only air. I scrabbled at it, feeling for a space but there was none. With fear choking me I forced myself to feel around the blockage. Most of the barrier was wood. It felt like a log or stump that had been dragged over, pushed into the entryway. Around it was soil. They must have banked dirt over the barrier to hold it in place and seal me in.

  I was trapped.

  My breathing came quick and shallow. I realised I was hyperventilating and threw myself at the barrier, tearing at it. I had to get out. I’d only been digging with my hands for a few seconds before I heard Andrew’s laugh and stopped dead.

  ‘Come on out then. Give me an excuse to bash your skull in.’

  I shrank away, covered my mouth with both hands and started to cry. With my back to the wall I laid down, suddenly boneless. The taste of damp, living earth got into my mouth along with the salt of my tears.

  They’d buried me alive. I was trapped in the cave, the acrid smoke still lingering around me, burning my throat as it slowly oozed out through the crack into the inner caves I couldn’t reach. Even if I could dig my way out, Andrew was there, waiting. There was no escape.

  The events of the night pressed down on me like so much rock and soil. The stars, the chase and Shaun, poor Shaun. He was really dead. Dead because of me. If I’d only kept my wits about me he never would have seen me. He never would have chased me off that ledge.

  Zoe’s heartbroken wails echoed in my mind. At the time I’d been so afraid I couldn’t look past my own immediate survival but in the darkness those cries came to me again and again. I was the reason she’d lost him. I had taken her partner and protector. She was alone now. Endangered by my careless stupidity.

  Lying on the ground I felt lower than a worm. Had I not almost given in and gone to Duncan? All this time I’d thought myself capable and strong, but I was weak, weaker than all of them. They were th
e survivors. They had supplies, shelter and strength in numbers. I was the one lying in a filthy den with snot dripping down my dirty face. They’d beaten me, locked me away and now I was helpless.

  I started to sob and dropped my filthy hands from my face. The sounds of my despair filled the cave but if I had hoped for mercy, none was forthcoming. Andrew did not speak again and I wept until I exhausted myself into sleep.

  Chapter 33

  ‘How good are you in a crisis?’ Sasha had asked. ‘How do you manage?’

  ‘I’m not sure I understand,’ I’d said, stumped for the first time by one of Sasha’s endless questions. ‘You mean … an emergency? What kind?’

  ‘Well … let’s say, one of the group gets hurt. You’re the only one with them. What would you do?’

  ‘I suppose I’d make sure they weren’t in immediate danger and go get some help,’ I’d said, remembering a first-aid course I’d attended years before, long since out of date. Sasha had said they were going to send me on a refresher, but parts of it still stuck with me. ‘Or, if I can’t leave them, I could shout until one of the others came looking.’

  Sasha had nodded vaguely. ‘OK, now, what if it’s you that’s hurt? And you’re all on your own. What would you do?’

  I’d thought about it. I already lived alone, though obviously there was always an ambulance on the other end of the phone if I needed one. But what about those nights when I wasn’t injured, but still hurt? When I came in from work feeling so beaten down, so filled with self-loathing that I could only crawl into bed and cry. Who was there to help me when I was hurt, but myself?

  ‘I’d have to rely on myself,’ I’d said. ‘The things I know how to do, the skills I have. I’d keep myself calm, maybe talk to myself if that helped – and I would get through it.’

  ‘Sounds like you have some experience with life-or-death situations,’ Sasha had said.

  ‘Not really,’ I’d said, remembering the stilted voice of an anonymous police officer telling me he was very sorry. It was a bad road, icy. That far into the countryside they never gritted, never repaired. The car was old. My parents likely died on impact, didn’t suffer. He’d asked if I needed him to contact anyone else. I said no, held myself afterwards and cried out for a mother I was never going to see again.

  ‘I just have a good imagination.’

  *

  I woke with the taste of mud and smoke in my mouth. Without lifting my head I knew where I was. I wasn’t blessed with even a moment of unreality. This was my reality now.

  Sitting up, I felt every part of me protest. The chase both up and down hill, followed by the scuffle and a night on the ground in the cold, had stiffened me up. I felt like a wooden dummy. My fingers were raw from clawing my way up slopes and digging at packed soil. One of my nails was torn and hanging off, I felt it trailing on my cheek as I wiped at my sticky eyes. My face was stiff and sore, plastered in dried tears, dirt and mucus. I felt pitiful.

  With wakefulness, however, came an awareness of hunger and cold. My body forced me to focus on the present. My situation was no longer new and terrible, merely terrible. I still needed to eat, to warm myself.

  Without the small amount of daylight let in by the panel, both caves were now equally dark. At least it wasn’t airtight; a faint breeze came from both the smoke hole and through the dirt at the door. I’d let my fire die before venturing out the previous night. Now I struggled to get it going in the pitch blackness. My torch was somewhere but finding it in the chaos I’d made while snatching up weapons and blankets was a task I wasn’t equal to. I dragged the half-burnt bale of weeds to my fire hole and got them going again, adding splinters of wood until a merry blaze rose up. With its light I put my living space to rights, found my torch and breakfasted on a half-full tin of plum tomatoes, warmed in the flames.

  With some food in me I stripped off the camera harness and found that the lens had indeed been caved in as I crawled into the cave. A stone or something had been forced through by my weight. It was useless now, but then, it had been useless since that day on the beach. I just hadn’t known it then; how little a record mattered if we were never found.

  With a spare sock and some water, I made the best attempt I could at cleaning my face and hands. My clothes were filthy, but I didn’t have the energy to change. My hair, already tangled from doing without a hairbrush for weeks, was matted with twigs and leaves. I scraped the mass up into the semblance of a bun, secured it with an elastic band and picked out the worst of the debris.

  That done I was out of distractions. It was time to face my situation, starting with the water. Like wood and foraged food it had to be brought in from outside. Unlike wood and forage, I would die within days if I ran out. In my collapsible water container I had roughly two litres of filtered and boiled water. The collecting bucket I’d brought in yesterday evening had about two inches of rainwater in the bottom. I was not in immediate danger of running out. Still, I was worried. How would I get water now that I was trapped inside? There was no way I could dig down far enough to get at the groundwater.

  Wood was less of an issue. I’d been collecting nightly and, counting last night’s haul, I had enough to last a while. Hopefully the weather would be getting warmer and I’d not need to have the fire so built up. I laughed, making myself jump; now that the entrance was sealed up the cave would be easier to heat.

  The food issue was second to water. I had a bit of food from the portacabin, but my stocks of dried and smoked forage were long gone. Without access to the outside I was stuck eating what I had on hand. Dropping my bag of spruce had been a mistake. I didn’t have another source of vitamin C. I would just have to hope I could get by until …

  I stopped short, mental calculations faltering. Until what? Rescue? Was rescue even coming? If it did how would they ever find me in a hole underground? I tried to picture the boat finally turning up, Adrian skidding on the beach in his ludicrous shoes. The image didn’t ring true. No, I couldn’t see that happening. I knew deep down that something had gone very wrong. If we were going to be rescued it would be by strangers. Strangers who wouldn’t know I was one of the islanders. Would the others tell them about me if help came? No, of course they wouldn’t. That would mean admitting that they’d shut me in to starve to death.

  Panic started to build in my chest. No one was going to find me if I stayed in the cave. Yet if I could somehow escape the others would get me. They had left Andrew to stand guard, perhaps he’d since been relieved by someone else. I had no idea what time it was or if it was day or night outside. If I dug my way out I would be seen immediately. I couldn’t be rescued while in the cave but equally, I couldn’t be beaten or murdered either. After last night I had no doubts about what being captured meant. If they could seal me up and leave me to starve, they could kill me directly just as easily.

  The cave then was the only option, but I had limited food and water. What happened when that ran out? I would die, obviously. I forced myself to take deep breaths in an attempt to control my rising panic. There seemed to be no way forward, no way out of the mess I was in. I was being watched, escape was impossible, but staying in the cave indefinitely wasn’t possible either. I needed a plan as much for my own sanity as anything else. I had to have a course of action to follow, to give me something to hope for.

  They’d given up looking for me before. I’d heard them searching for a week or so after I moved into the cave. After that there had been next to nothing. The occasional movement in the woods as someone passed by, nothing at all for a while. They had lost interest. Concerns like hunger and the cold, not to mention looking for rescue, had taken precedence.

  Perhaps the same thing would happen again. I couldn’t imagine anyone volunteering to spend days out in the woods, keeping watch over a dirt hill in the cold and spring rains. It would be lonely, dull and uncomfortable. Sooner or later they’d decide I wasn’t worth guarding and leave me for dead. I just had to outlast their attention.

  My panicked heart
rate eased. I could do that. All I had to do was make the food I had last and find some way to get a bit of water. A few weeks, that’s all it would take. Then I could dig a new way out of the cave and come and go as before. By then spring would be in full swing and forage readily available. I just had to last a few more weeks.

  I didn’t let myself think further than getting out of the cave. There was no point in considering rescue or my theories about the mainland. I looked only as far as my next action. I couldn’t bear to look further.

  I had two immediate concerns; water and what to do with the rabbits. Shortly after I’d cleaned myself I discovered a third problem – the slop bucket. I’d emptied it the night before but now I had nowhere to dispose of the contents of my bucket latrine.

  I had enough water for a few days at least so I got started on the latrine issue first. I would have to bury it inside. I lived in the inner cave so the outer cave would have to be my toilet area. With my folding shovel I dug a hole into the matted roots of the floor. The shovel was more suited to hobbyist metal detecting and not very sturdy. Using it for months in the allotment and latrine digging had blunted it. I gouged at the dirt with the dull blade anyway. It took ages but eventually the hole was about two feet deep. The soil went into the toilet bucket, to be dumped on top of the hole after use. Disgusting, but effective.

  I tried not to think about how long it would take me to dig my way out of the cave.

  Next, the rabbits. I had managed to hang on to both of the ones I’d taken from Shaun, somehow. One was slightly flattened from being under me as I crawled. Both were dirty. They’d still been warm when I’d taken them so I guessed they were fresh enough to eat if I did so quickly.

  With my dynamo torch propped up I moved close to the fire so I could see more clearly. Maxine and Shaun had always been the ones to prepare the rabbits for cooking. My only experience with skinning was cutting the stuff off of chicken thighs. I’d only ever gutted a fish before. Once.