At last they were on the ledge. With a lot of pulling, pushing and agonised cries every time the man put any pressure on his ankle, she’d got him up there.
A vision of Ross, warm and comfortable in the study he’d made for himself above the surgery, came to mind. He would be going through his mother’s papers and tying up any loose ends that her death had left.
He would be thinking that she was busy at the cottage, doing the housework that she’d promised herself, and would be enjoying having some time to himself after the events of recent days. Little did he know that unless someone soon came to their rescue, they were going to drown.
* * *
As Ross and the experienced caver eased themselves and a folded stretcher along the narrow tunnel that his guide had warned him of, Ross was thinking grimly that Izzy had gone this way before them, on her own, with no back-up to assist. She was some woman. But why, oh, why, he thought frantically, did she have to do this at the very time he was going to ask her to marry him?
Would they ever be together in this world? he wondered grimly. He’d told the waiting crowd at the entrance to the cave that he was going to marry her, that nothing was going to stop him, but it had been wild talk. He was a doctor in a country practice, not Superman.
‘How much further?’ he called to the man at the front end of the stretcher as the claustrophobic nightmare continued.
‘Shush,’ the man whispered. ‘Even voice vibrations can cause rock movement. We’re almost there. I can see the rubble ahead of me, about six feet away from the end of the tunnel.’
When they stood on the floor of the cavern it was dry, but they could hear water thundering along at the other side of the boulders and his companion said, ‘Thankfully the stream veers away at this point, otherwise it could flood the tunnel.’
Ross was observing the pile of stone in front of them in bleak dismay.
‘So they are on the other side of this?’
‘Yes, if they’ve not been swept away. It’s no use trying to attract their attention. They won’t be able to hear us above the noise of the water.’
Ross nodded grimly. This fellow who was so capable and cool was adding to his fears with every word he spoke. Yet he knew that what he said would be correct. The man had the authority of someone with the experience and knowhow to get them out of this if anybody could.
Why had he waited so long to tell Izzy that he loved her? he thought wretchedly as his mind veered from one desperate thought to another.
‘We have to pick our way through this lot,’ the caver was saying. ‘It won’t be easy and it won’t be fast.’
‘So we’re not going to try to move the blockage?’
‘Can’t risk it. We might bring the whole roof down on us, and them. Follow me and tread carefully.’
As they moved painstakingly across the boulder-strewn floor of the cave, the space for movement was getting less as the piled rubble became higher and Ross couldn’t see how they were going to get past it without moving it. But incredibly the man in front had found an opening, a narrow cleft between the stones, and as they squeezed through it they saw a faint chink of light ahead of them.
A few seconds more of careful manoeuvring and they’d squeezed themselves through and could see the swirling dark waters only feet away. Looking down at him in blank astonishment was Izzy.
‘Hello, there,’ he said as calm descended on him. In that moment it was sufficient to know that she was alive, and if anything did happen to them at least they would be together. He hadn’t been at his best on the arduous journey to the cave, but now he was coming into his own as a doctor. Being acutely aware that it was not the moment for a blissful reunion, he switched his glance to the injured man and asked, ‘What’s the score with our friend here, Izzy?’
‘James tripped over the rubble on the floor and knocked himself out. He was unconscious when I got here but breathing satisfactorily. While I was treating his head wound the boulder choke occurred and where I might have been able to find a way out myself, there was no way I could have managed to move him on my own, so we stayed put and hoped that soon someone would appear.’
She’d been calm enough while explaining the circumstances that had brought about this eerie meeting in what had once been an old mine, but her voice broke as she told him, ‘I never dreamt that the someone would be you.’
Ross didn’t reply. There were a thousand things he wanted to say to her, but not now. He was feeling the man’s pulse and shining a torch in his eyes and at the same time watching his companion, weighing up the force of the water that was still mercifully veering away from them.
‘Would you say it’s still rising?’ the experienced caver asked Isabel.
‘No,’ she told him. ‘I’ve thought a few times in the last quarter of an hour that the water level was beginning to drop, but it’s so dark in here I could be wrong.’
He nodded and, turning to Ross, said, ‘Let’s get the party under way. We’ve got about three feet of space to get this guy onto the stretcher without any of us falling into the water. Once he’s on it I’ll take the front end, Dr West can take the back, and you can crawl underneath it for support when we get to tricky corners and suchlike.’
‘I’d rather Dr West was at the front,’ Ross told him, ‘so that she won’t be separated from us if there are any more boulder chokes.’
‘All right,’ he replied tightly, ‘but let’s get moving, and remember to put your weight on your forearms rather than your wrists. That way you’ll do less damage to your hands while you’re crawling over rubble.’
The way back, with the stretcher to manipulate, was painfully slow, making the journey inwards seem like child’s play. But at last they had climbed through and over the fallen stone and were in the tunnel, moving towards the entrance to the first cavern and from there to safety, with Izzy just a few feet away at the front of the stretcher, grave and silent but alive.
When they appeared at the lighted entrance to the caves a cheer went up and someone in the crowd shouted, ‘So when’s the wedding, Doc?’
Ross flashed them a muddy smile.
‘Soon, I hope!’ he said with meaning, and as laughter followed his reply he saw the question in Izzy’s eyes. But before he could say anything the police, paramedics, media and the rescue team, who had only recently arrived after their Land Rover had broken down up on the moors, were surrounding them.
When the injured caver had been taken to hospital and the fuss had died down, Ross looked around him for the man who had been there for him during one of the most terrifying experiences of his life, but he was nowhere to be seen and when he asked if anyone knew where he was he drew a blank.
‘He was with us when we came out of the cave,’ Ross insisted. ‘An experienced caver, he knew exactly what he was doing and guided me to Dr West.’
But everyone he asked said that they hadn’t seen him. Finally he sought out the policeman he’d talked to when he’d first arrived. ‘You saw me with the man who took me down into the cave, didn’t you?’ he begged.
‘Yes. Why?’ he asked.
‘I want to thank him for what he did. Without him I would have been useless.’
He nodded. ‘The fellow certainly seemed to know what he was doing, but since you all came up to ground level there’s been a lot going on and I haven’t seen him anywhere around. I’ll give you a shout if I do, but he might be camera-shy. The press are all over the place and they’ve been after him, too. You know, hero of the day sort of thing.’
He certainly was that, Ross thought as he turned away and found Isabel by his side, and Izzy, tired and muddied but beautiful to him, had been the heroine of the day. A day that he was never going to forget.
‘What’s wrong?’ she asked.
‘I want to thank the fellow who helped us,’ he told her, ‘but he’s disappeared and no one seems to have seen him. If it hadn’t been for the police officer remembering him, I might be thinking I imagined him taking me down into the depths.
You saw him, didn’t you?’
‘Yes, of course I did!’ she exclaimed. ‘He was heaven-sent. Confident, cool and knowledgeable. He’s probably gone on his way now that all the panic is over, not wanting any fuss.’
One of the rescue team standing nearby had heard the conversation and said with a smile, ‘It sounds as if you’ve met Jack Benedict. Describe him to me.’
‘Sixtyish,’ Ross told him. ‘Lean and long with grey eyes and a beard. I couldn’t see his hair because of his helmet, but he had a scar down the side of his face.’
‘That’s him,’ the man said. ‘Jack got the scar from a rockfall some years ago. He used to be in the rescue team with us until he retired a couple of years back, but he still goes caving. It’s his life, and there is no one more capable. He’s a bit of a recluse and would run a mile if he thought the press were after him.’
‘Where can we find him?’ Isabel asked.
‘I don’t know. He has a cottage somewhere high amongst the peaks and if you found it he wouldn’t thank you for calling.’
As they observed him uncertainly he smiled. ‘He’ll know you’re grateful, and if you want to show him how much, leave him in peace.’
* * *
‘I’m driving you home, ‘ Ross said when the other man had gone to join the rest of the rescue team. ‘We’ll pick up your car tomorrow.’
When he’d settled Isabel into the passenger seat he tucked a rug around her legs and smiled down at her, but she didn’t look up.
‘I have questions to ask,’ she told him sombrely.
‘Fire away then,’ he said easily.
‘First of all, when are you going to tell me how you happened to be at the caves?’
‘I’d been trying to get in touch with you ever since midday,’ he explained. ‘I went round to the cottage and when you weren’t there I kept phoning. Early this evening Sophie told me what was happening in Castleton and, remembering what you’d once said about being involved in cave rescue, I thought you might be there. I was praying that you wouldn’t be putting yourself in such danger, but as soon as I arrived I knew it was a vain hope.’
‘Why were you trying to get in touch with me?’
Why indeed? he thought. He’d been so full of his plans, with the table booked and the flowers ready for the special moment, and what had happened? He’d ended up in a state of complete horror at the thought of losing the woman he loved, to the extent that he’d gone scrabbling about in the bowels of the earth to find her. And now, thankfully, here she was beside him, asking innocently why he’d called round to see her.
‘I came round because there was something I wanted to say to you,’ he said gently.
‘What was it?’
‘The time isn’t right, Izzy. I want to get you home so that you can get into a hot bath and have a meal.’
‘I’m not hungry.’
‘You should be after all that exertion.’
‘Something I heard outside the caves took away my appetite.’
‘And what was that?’
‘Somebody asked you when the wedding was, and you said that you hoped it would be soon. Are you getting married?’
‘Maybe. It’s not settled yet.’
He watched as a single tear rolled down her cheek and couldn’t hold out any longer.
‘You are amazing, Izzy,’ he said with the same gentleness as he pulled up at the side of the road. ‘You went into those caves full of confidence, without giving it a second thought. Yet when it comes to us, you are so unsure of yourself it just isn’t true. It is you I want to marry. I was coming round today to ask you to be my wife but, unpredictable woman that you are, you weren’t there.
‘The table I’d booked for tonight will have stood unused, the flowers that Sam Shuttleworth’s daughter made up for me this morning will be past their best, but one thing won’t have suffered in the process. I checked to make sure when I replaced my jacket after taking off the caving gear.’ Putting his hand into his pocket, he pulled out the box that he’d been carrying around all day.
‘Will you marry me, Izzy?’ he asked softly, lifting the lid to show a solitaire diamond ring. As it sparkled up at her he continued, ‘I never realised how much I loved you until I came back to the village and found that the tearful teenager I’d left behind had turned into a dedicated young doctor who made me want to make love to her every time I saw her.’
‘Really?’ she breathed. ‘Are you sure you’ve got the right person?’
‘Very sure, and if we weren’t cramped inside the car I would show you just how sure I am. But you haven’t given me an answer.’
‘I feel as if I’ve loved you for ever,’ she whispered, ‘but I never expected you to love me.’
‘Which just goes to show how wrong one can be,’ he said laughingly.
‘Of course I’ll marry you, Ross,’ she said chokily. ‘Any time you like. But how did those people at the caves know about us?’
‘As I was preparing to go down, I told them that I was going to marry you and nothing was going to stop me, so they had better pray that the rain would stop and the rescue team arrive.’
‘That was the strangest thing, wasn’t it?’ she said dreamily, after he’d slid the ring on to her finger. ‘That such an experienced caver happened to be in the right place at the right time, and once he’d done his bit he went, not wanting any fuss.’
She straightened up suddenly in the passenger seat and turned towards him, her face full of dismay.
‘What is it?’ he asked.
‘My father!’ she exclaimed. ‘When he knows we’re going to be married, he will think he’s still pulling my strings.’
‘In that case, I think he should be the first one to know,’ Ross suggested, ‘so that we can make sure he understands that those days are over.’
‘Yes,’ she agreed immediately.
* * *
They’d showered together at the cottage, kissing, laughing, adoring each other, as a pearly dawn crept over the sky, and now they were seated at the kitchen table, having their first breakfast together.
‘Should we be so happy?’ Isabel said. ‘So soon after you losing your mother?’
Ross smiled.
‘Yes. I think so.’ He took a crumpled piece of paper out of his pocket and passed it to her. ‘That was her last message to me. I think that my mother had always known where my heart lay, maybe before I knew myself, and this is what she wanted for us, Izzy.’
He looked across the table at the sweet, scrubbed cleanliness of her and said softly, ‘You have no idea how much I want to make love to you, but I’ve waited a long time for you, Izzy, and, that being so, I can wait a little longer. Let’s set a date for the wedding and then go and get your father up, if he isn’t up already.’
Paul was up. He didn’t sleep much these days. Whether it was due to a guilty conscience or old age, he wasn’t sure, but he was well and truly awake when he opened the door to Isabel and Ross.
‘You folks are up early,’ he said with a dry smile as he stepped back to let them in. ‘To what do I owe the honour of a visit from my daughter?’
‘We’ve come to tell you that we are getting married,’ Isabel told him without preamble.
‘Ah!’
‘And to let you know that although you might think you’ve manipulated us, you haven’t. I have always wanted Ross and now have my heart’s desire.’
‘Yes, of course you have,’ her father said calmly. ‘That is why I finally admitted to myself that I’d made a mistake separating you from him. That if I hadn’t interfered you would probably still have gone to medical school and been a much happier student.
‘So I asked him to come back to take over the practice. It was true when I said that I wanted it to go to someone I could trust and Ross was the best GP I had ever worked with. But the main reason was to see if you two really did want each other and now, when the time comes, I will die with my conscience appeased.’
As Isabel observed him goggle-eyed, tryi
ng to take in the fact that her father was almost apologising and professing to have a conscience into the bargain, Ross spoke for the first time.
‘Are you saying that from now on you’re going to be the father you should have been to Izzy?’
The dry smile was there again.
‘It’s a bit late to try to teach an old dog new tricks but, yes, I’m going to try. I wouldn’t want to miss out on my grandchildren like I missed out on my daughter.’
* * *
They had finally managed to dine at the restaurant up on the moors and as they’d enjoyed good food and wine Ross had said, ‘This is my third attempt to bring you here and I’ve finally succeeded.’
‘It’s very nice,’ Isabel had told him, ‘but why this place especially?’
‘I’ll show you when we’ve finished eating,’ he’d promised, and had taken her through a moonlit garden to where a big black stone stood.
‘It’s the Kissing Stone!’ she’d exclaimed. ‘They say that lovers who kiss while touching it will be together for ever.’
‘Exactly,’ he’d said as he’d placed their hands side by side on the smooth surface of the stone, and as she’d lifted her mouth for his kiss he’d murmured, ‘We already know that nothing will ever separate us, but we couldn’t let this old stone not work its magic, could we?’
* * *
Once again the Riverside Tea Shop was going to be crowded with village folk. In recent months there’d been a homecoming buffet set out there, then a short time ago a funeral tea, and today it was to be a wedding banquet for the two village doctors.
Isabel West, who most of them had known since she’d been small, and Ross Templeton, Sally’s son, who had followed his heart and found the love of his life, were going to make their vows in a packed village church. Flanked by the father of the bride on the one side, and on the other the best man, a farmer from up on the tops called Brian Derwent, who was looking surprisingly happy and content for once.
ISBN-13: 9781460376331
© Abigail Gordon 2005
COMING BACK FOR HIS BRIDE
The publisher acknowledges the copyright holders of the individual works as follows:
Coming Back For His Bride Page 15