Now that he had inched his way out of the atrium, the crashing noise of Purgatory was somewhat muffled. "HELP!" he shouted, his voice echoing in the rocky ravine. There was no answering cry. The sky, glimpsed between the lofty treetops, was now overcast. The rain was coming. If he had to spend the night in the woods, wearing cold, wet clothing and lying on the drenched ground, covering himself with wet leaves like a woodland animal, he would be ready for an oxygen tent in the morning . . . that is, if anyone found him in the morning. They might not find him until the weekend.
"HELP!"
Then a chilling thought occurred to him. The Taters may have intended him to disappear in the Purgatory abyss. If so, they could have only one motive; they suspected his purpose in visiting their precious mountain. They may have mistaken him for a federal agent. What were they growing in the hidden coves and hollows? What was stockpiled in those caves? Beechum's banter about bears and bats and poisonous snakes may have been something more than mountain humor.
"HELP!"
Did he hear a reply, or was it an echo?
He tried again. "HELP!"
"Hallo," came a distant cry.
"HELP!"
"Coming! Coming!" The voices were getting closer. "Hold on!" Soon he could see movement in the woods, screened by the underbrush, then heads bobbing along the trail. Two men were coming up the slope, and they broke into a run when he waved an arm in a wide arc.
"For God's sake! What happened?" the baker shouted, seeing the tattered, mud-caked figure leaning against a boulder. "What happened to your ankle?"
"You look like you been through a cement mixer!'rthe blacksmith said.
"I sprained my ankle, and I was trying to drag myself back to the cove," Qwilleran said shortly. He was in no mood to describe his ordeal or confess to the careless misstep that sent him sliding ignominiously into the pit.
They hoisted him to a standing position, with his weight on his right foot, and made a human crutch, unmindful of the mud being smeared on their own clothes. Then slowly they started down the precarious slope to Potato Cove. Qwilleran was in too much pain to talk, and his rescuers were aware of it.
At the end of the trail a group of concerned Taters waited with comments and advice:
"Never see'd nobody in such a mess!" said one.
"Better hose him down, Yates." That was the baker's wife.
"Give 'im a slug o' corn,-Vance. Looks like he needs it."
"Somebody send for Maw Beechum! She's got healin' hands."
Qwilleran's rescuers stripped off his rags behind the bakery and turned the hose on the caked blood and dirt, the icy water from a local well acting like a local anesthetic. Then, draped in a couple of bakery towels, he was assisted into a backroom and placed on a cot among cartons of wheatberries and yeast. Kate, serving hot coffee and another Danish, explained that Mrs. Beechum had gone home to get some of her homemade medicines.
When the silent woman arrived, she went to work with downcast eyes, making an icepack for the ankle and tearing up an old sheet for bandages. Then she poured antiseptic from a jelly jar onto the wounds and larded them with ointment.
Yates said, "With that stuff you'll never get an infection, that's for sure. When you feel up to it, we'll fix you up with pants and a coat and drive you home. You can say goodbye to those shoes, too. What size do you take? . . . Hey, Vance, get some sandals from the leather shop, size twelve." He appraised the bandaging. "Man, you look like a mummy!"
The wrappings on Qwilleran's hands, elbows, and knees restricted his movement considerably, but the ankle torture was somewhat relieved after the icepack and tight bandaging. He wanted to thank Mrs. Beechum, but she had slipped away from the bakery without so much as a nod in his direction, leaving him a jar of liniment.
Kate said, "You should use ice again tonight and keep your foot up, Mr. ..."
"Qwilleran."
Yates buckled on the sandals, and Wesley brought him a carved walking stick, which looked more like a cudgel. "I don't know how to thank you people," he said.
"We aim to be good neighbors," said Kate.
The three men drove away, Yates driving Qwilleran in his newly repaired car, and Vance following in his pickup. Qwilleran was abnormally quiet, still dazed by his experience. He felt that his precipitous slide into the black hole had never happened. Yet, if it were true and if he had not survived, would anyone ever know his fate? What would have happened to Koko and Yum Yum, penned up in a house that no one had reason to visit?
The baker respected his silence for a while but threw curious glances at him repeatedly. Finally he said, "What really happened at Purgatory, man?"
Qwilleran was jolted out of his reverie. "What do you mean?"
"You don't wind up in that condition just by twisting your ankle."
"I told you I was trying to drag myself back to the cove. The path was muddy and full of sharp rocks."
"You were soaking wet from head to foot."
"There's a lot of mist at the falls. You should know that."
Yates grunted, and no more was said for a few minutes. When they reached Hawk's Nest Drive, he tried again. "See anybody in the woods?"
"No. It was just as your wife said: no one around on Tuesday. This is Tuesday, isn't it? I feel as if I've been on that trail a week!"
"Did you hear anything unusual?"
"Not with the water roaring! I couldn't hear myself think!"
"See anything strange?"
"What are you getting at?" Qwilleran said with slight annoyance. "I saw the creek, boulders, fallen trees, mud, large and small waterfalls, flowers, more mud . . ."
"Okay, okay, I'll shut up. You had a rough time."
"Sorry if I barked at you. I'm feeling edgy."
"You should be! You've been through hell!"
At Tiptop his rescuers helped him up the twenty-five steps, and the sight of Qwilleran dressed in baker's whites and supported by two strangers sent the Siamese flying upstairs, where they watched from a safe elevation. He offered the men a beer and was glad when they declined; he needed a period of rest in which to find himself again. There were moments when he was still in the abyss, clinging to a slippery wall of rock.
"I'll bring up your baked goods," Yates said. "Anything more we can do? Be glad to do it."
"There's a burl bowl in the trunk of my car that you could bring up. And again, I don't know how to thank you fellas."
When they had gone and Qwilleran had dropped on the gray velvet sofa with his ankle elevated on one of Sabri-na's pillows, the Siamese walked questioningly into the room.
"You'll have to bear with me awhile," he told them. "You almost lost your chief cook."
They huddled close to his body, playing the nursing role instinctive with cats, and made no demands, although it was past their normal dinnertime. At intervals Koko ran his nose over the white uniform and grimaced as if he smelled something rotten.
When the telephone rang, Qwilleran was undecided whether to answer, but it persisted until he grabbed his walking staff and moved to the foyer with halting steps.
"I thought you were going to drop in this afternoon," said Colin Carmichael.
"I dropped into a waterfall instead," Qwilleran said, recovering some of his spirit.
"Where?"
"At Potato Cove. I'm lucky I got out alive."
"Are you all right?"
"Except for a sprained ankle. Do you happen to have an elastic bandage?"
"I could pick one up at the drug store easily enough and run it up the mountain in no time. Anything else you need?"
"Perhaps one of those cold compresses that can be chilled in the freezer."
"No problem. Be right there."
"The front door's unlocked, Colin. Just walk in."
Having maneuvered successfully to the foyer, Qwilleran hobbled to the kitchen to feed the cats. They were used to dodging his long strides and found his new slow-motion toddle with a stick perplexing. He was back on the sofa when the editor arrived.