The boys pushed on through dense stands of spruce, oak, and beech, some of the trees rising to a prodigious height. After a mile or so, they emerged onto a flower-stippled meadow fringing a wide but shallow stream. Beyond the far bank towered a cliff of whitish rock, mottled with dark green where vegetation had taken root in cracks and ledges.
‘There she is, Raudie,’ proudly announced Atawulf, pointing to a winking point of light high up on the cliff-face.
After wading through the stream, they approached the base of the cliff from where they were afforded a clearer view of the object in question, which was wedged in the upper branches of a bush. Surmounted by a scarlet horsehair crest, and complete with brow reinforcement, cheek-pieces, and neck-guard, the helmet — fashioned of bronze — glittered like gold in the strong noonday sunshine. (Presumably it had been dropped by a careless soldier from the roadway far above, Uprauda thought.) A rare prize indeed, one that would make them the envy of all the other boys in Tauresium — if it could be recovered. And that would not be easy, realized Uprauda, staring at that beetling precipice, the ascent of which must surely call for nerves of steel and practised skill.
‘Let me try, Raudie,’ entreated Atawulf. ‘I’m a good climber.’
Uprauda hesitated. Atawulf indeed had an unrivalled reputation for scaling heights. Scarcely a tree of any size around Tauresium had not been climbed by ‘Spiderboy’, as had (inevitably) the baptistery of the local church, and the ramparts of a nearby abandoned Roman fortress. Nevertheless, any attempt to scale the cliff could prove suicidally risky, Uprauda felt: definitely not something he himself would care to try.
But still. . In his imagination, Uprauda saw himself (along with Atawulf and Wamba) returning to the village in triumph with the trophy, the focus of excited admiration on the part of his peers. To be the owner of such a glorious find (for his two fellow adventurers would, he knew, insist on presenting the helmet to him) would confer enormous status. Such a helmet Perseus might have worn when he slew the Gorgon, he fantasized, or Alexander when he set out to conquer Asia. (From his earliest years, an ancient local of Hellenic descent had told him stirring tales from Greek and Roman legend and history: of Jason and the Argonauts, the ten-year war of Troy, Horatius who held the bridge against an army, Leonidas and his valiant Three Hundred, of Alexander, of Caesar and of Spartacus’ doomed heroic struggle against the might of Rome. Such stories had aroused in him a vague but powerful longing to achieve great things, beyond the stifling restrictions of a backwoods village life.)
‘All right, Wulfie,’ he heard himself say, ‘give it a go. But come back down if it gets too dangerous.’
‘Thanks, Raudie — I’ll get that helmet; you’ll see.’ Atawulf cast Uprauda a grateful look. Far more important than retrieving the thing itself was the fact that in doing so he would earn Raudie’s approval. He scanned the cliff, looking for possible routes to his objective. What at first glance seemed a sheer rock face, so smooth as to be unclimbable, on closer inspection revealed that it was textured by tiny cracks and wrinkles — just sufficient to afford purchase. Higher up, a long fissure or ‘chimney’ led up to a pitch not far below the ledge where grew the bush in which the helmet was lodged. ‘Es geht,’ he told himself — it could be done.
Combining caution with speed, for he dared not trust any of those minute finger- and toe-holds to support his weight for long, Atawulf began to climb. Establishing a rhythm, he moved upwards steadily and with increasing confidence, seeming almost to flow over the rock as he ascended, displaying all the grace and assurance of the born climber. Arriving at the base of the chimney, he wedged himself in and proceeded to push himself up by alternating thrusts of back and feet against the opposite walls.
All went well until, to his dismay, he encountered an obstacle which he had failed to notice when surveying the route from below. The upper part of the chimney was blocked by a chockstone! Peering upwards, he could see light between the chockstone and the back of the chimney. He tried to squeeze through the gap, but was forced to give up after the third attempt; it was just too narrow. Which left him with but one alternative: he would have to climb up and over the outside of the chockstone — a difficult and probably dangerous challenge. For the huge boulder projected proud of the cliff face, its bulging contours presenting Atawulf with the problem of having to surmount an overhang. Would the chockstone’s upper surface, which the bulge prevented him from seeing, provide holds? If it didn’t. .
Well, there was only one way to find out, he thought, grimly. Reaching up, his groping hands encountered cracks and roughnesses — enough to provide a grip. Face against the rock, he began to haul himself up, holding himself to the chockstone partly by hand- and foot-holds, partly by the friction of his tunic against the rough stone. Now his eyes were almost level with the outermost bulge of the boulder. This was the moment when he must commit — or abandon the climb. But to disappoint Raudie, and return to Tauresium empty-handed? That was unthinkable. Firmly, he pushed the temptation to give up to the back of his mind.
His scrabbling left hand found a knob of rock, providing a secure anchor. Letting go his hold with his right hand, Atawulf groped upwards — above the bulge. There was only smooth stone. Desperately, he moved his hand to right and left to the limit of his reach; still no hold. He began to retract his right hand — and made an appalling discovery. He could not bring it down again without losing his balance! Fighting panic, he froze against the boulder.
‘Wulfie’s stuck!’ Wamba cried, pointing to where, high above them, Atawulf’s immobile form was spreadeagled against the cliff. He turned a worried face to Uprauda. ‘What are we going to do, Raudie?’
Uprauda made to answer, found he could not think; his brain seemed paralyzed. The moments crept past. Faint with distance, a cry for help floated down from above.
‘Raudie?’ Wamba’s voice now held a note of desperation.
Uprauda’s mind suddenly seemed to unblock itself. He must form a plan — and quickly. He studied the cliff. Not far above Atawulf’s position, a ledge (the same whence sprouted the bush supporting the helmet) ran along the cliff face. If he or Wamba could somehow reach that ledge and lower an improvized line to Atawulf. . One look at Wamba’s ashen face and trembling lip told Uprauda that he, not the other, would have to meet the challenge. The prospect was terrifying. Uprauda was no cragsman. Any attempt to scale the cliff in the stretch that he could see was out of the question; it was far too steep — a recipe for disaster. He would have to move along its base and hope to find a point at which the incline sloped sufficiently for him to climb it — assuming that the ledge above extended that far.
‘Give me your belt and sling,’ he told Wamba. ‘Bring men with ropes from the village. Hurry!’
‘Try to hold on,’ Uprauda shouted up as Wamba set off at a run. ‘Help’s on its way; I’ll try to reach you from above.’ It was unlikely that Atawulf could make out his actual words, but just to be able to hear him call would provide some reassurance. But for how long could Atawulf maintain his precarious hold?
After running at his top speed for perhaps a quarter of a mile, Uprauda noticed that the cliff face was beginning to slope back. Within a further hundred yards, to his huge relief, the angle had lessened to the extent that grass grew on what had now become no more than a steep incline — mercifully looking as though it needed no special mountaineering skills to climb. While regaining his breath, Uprauda tied his own sling to Wamba’s then joined them to both their belts secured end to end. Now he had a stout line, hopefully of sufficient length and strength to reach Atawulf from the ledge (which still ran above the point now reached by Uprauda), and help him to safety.