‘Why do you look so content?’ I groaned. ‘They nearly hit us!’
‘Yes.’ With a soft click, he rotated the cylinder of his revolver. The next bullet was in place. ‘But only twice. The third man wasn’t shooting.’
The meaning of his words came to me in a rush - the man had to be gravely wounded - or dead. For a long moment, I wondered if that should bother me. It probably should. I knew that Ella would be weeping or screaming in terror in my place. But all I felt was… excitement.
‘Can you teach me to shoot like that?’
Mr Ambrose’s hand, resting on the wall of the metal container again, jerked, and his next shot flew wide of the mark.
‘What?’ he hissed.
‘Can you teach me to shoot? I’d like to learn.’
A shot hit the metal wall of the draisine, which reverberated like a church bell. Mr Ambrose ducked, as a second shot raced over his head.
‘You cannot be serious!’ he hissed.
‘Of course I am, Sir. Wouldn’t it be useful to have some more firepower right now?’
‘But you… you are a…’
‘Yes?’
‘Nothing, Mr Linton.’
My eyes sparked.
‘You were about to admit that I am female!’
‘Nothing of the kind, Mr Linton.’
‘Stop with the Mister already! I am a girl! And girls could use guns just as well as men, if somebody took the trouble to teach them.’
Another shot hit the draisine. And another.
‘This is hardly the right time to discuss gender politics, Mr Linton.’ Mr Ambrose glared at me with a cold intensity that would have sent a pack of lions running for the hills. I didn’t back down an inch.
‘Indeed? And why not, Sir?’
‘Because,’ he said in a deliberate voice, ‘we are about to reach the end of the tunnel. And when we do, we need to run.’
My head whirled around - and light stung my eyes.
He was right! I had been so focused on him and the men who were after us that I hadn’t noticed how the tunnel around us had become steadily brighter and brighter. It took my eyes a few seconds to adjust. When they had, I could make out a patch of bright blue. Sky? No, it glittered. The sea! The Mediterranean. Dear God, the tunnel didn’t open onto the sea, did it? I had a brief flash of Mr Ambrose and me plunging three hundred feet to our deaths, to provide a meal for the lobsters of the island, eager to take revenge on humans for the massacre the cooks of France had committed among their people. Not a jolly thought. Especially since I hadn’t eaten a single lobster in my life.
Suddenly, though, there was brown and green mixed in with the blue. I caught the blurred forms of bushes and grass. Grass didn’t grow on the Mediterranean. Huzzah!
Behind me, another shot from Mr Ambrose’s revolver ripped the air apart. Quickly, I pressed my hands to my ears. My head was beginning to hurt.
‘Why don't you take your own advice, Sir, and do that more quietly?’
‘I am afraid nobody has yet invented a noiseless gun, Mr Linton.’
‘How disappointing!’
He didn’t even glance at me, which, under the circumstances, I suppose I could understand. His eyes were firmly trained on our pursuers. ‘Back to the matter at hand, Mr Linton. Do you see the exit?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is it far ahead?’
‘No, I don't think so.’ I growled. ‘These aren’t the best circumstances to judge distances, though. I don't have a yardstick, and I’ve never sat on a draisine racing downhill in a mining tunnel with shooting maniacs right behind me, before.’
‘You don't say. What do you see outside?’
‘Why don't you look yourself, Sir?’
‘There’s this small matter of me trying to shoot our pursuers before they shoot us; it is distracting me slightly. Now - what do you see?’
I squinted in the direction of the opening again. The light outside was still so bright in comparison with the tunnel’s gloom that I could hardly make out anything.
‘Some bushes, I think. Grass.’
‘Good. As soon as we leave the tunnel, we are going to throw ourselves into those bushes.’
‘To disrupt the nests of innocent nightingales, Sir?’
‘To cushion our fall, Mr Linton. Cover your face with your arms so your eyes won’t be stabbed by a branch. And… be careful.’
I had just opened my mouth for a witty comeback, but closed it again. Had I heard right? Mr Rikkard Ambrose had just wasted valuable time and breath telling me to be careful? Not only that, but he had sounded genuinely concerned. Could it be that he…?
Another gunshot sheared through my half-finished thought. Hurriedly, I turned my gaze from Mr Ambrose to the approaching exit. I had to keep an eye on it. He was guarding our backs, making sure those sons of bachelors didn’t get us. I had to do my part.
‘We’re getting close,’ I announced. Sweat had started to bead on my forehead again, although the air in the tunnel was still icy, and I was just sitting, doing nothing, only watching. ‘On the count of three we have to jump.’
He gave a grunt, and fired again. I took a deep breath.
‘One,’ I called.
Two more shots burst from his revolver, and the enemy answered.
‘Two.’
He slowly pulled back his revolver and crouched lower, preparing to jump.
‘Um… two and a half.’
‘What? Mr Linton, what is that supposed to mean?’
‘I misjudged the distance, all right? Two and three quarters!’
‘Your version of a countdown is not very reliable, Mr Linton!’
‘Why? I said on the count of three, and on the count of three it'll be. Two and four fifths!’
‘Mr Linton…!’
‘Three!’
I snatched his arm and hurled myself sideways, into free air.
Rising Waves
Mr Ambrose had suggested that the bushes would cushion our fall. I didn’t know what kind of cushion he preferred, but the landing in the bushes gave me a pretty good idea. Basalt, maybe? Sandstone?
By the time I came to a stop at the bottom of the hill on which the bushes were perched, I felt as though I had been squeezed through a meat-grinder. A strangled moan escaped from my throat.
‘You should have rolled,’ a cool voice commented from above me.