Splinter

73

It was quite deliberate. Benny vaulted the balustrade like an exhausted hurdler, right leg leading and arms waving as if bidding farewell to the leafless weeping willow in the hospital grounds, which topped the three-storey block by several metres. He flung out his chest and arched his back, looking for a moment like a skydiver just before his parachute opens. Then his left foot caught in the rail.

The ice-sheathed metal uprights trembled. Benny appeared to have tried to turn in mid-air and reach back with his right arm. Marc’s suspicion was confirmed: it was no accident. Benny had checked his progress in an attempt to prevent himself from falling and clutched the handrail at the last moment.

But why?

Stars danced before Marc’s eyes as he tottered out into the sleet-filled darkness.

Benny’s hand had slipped off the handrail, but he had at least caught hold of an upright. He was now hanging by one arm, legs kicking. He tried to get another handhold, but the metal uprights were so icy his hands kept losing their grip.

He wants to haul himself up again. He’s had second thoughts.

Marc hurried to his aid, slithering rather than walking in his rubber-soled trainers. Meanwhile, Benny’s fingers had completely lost their grip on the upright. He was now clinging to a narrow ledge with both hands.

By the time Marc reached him, he was hanging by his fingertips.

Marc leant over the balustrade. Looking down, he realized why Benny had checked his fall.

It’s too high.

He had picked the wrong place to jump.

‘Brain-dead, but the heart must go on beating. Do it the way I showed you.’

It was doubtful if his organs would have survived intact, even after a fall from three floors up, but here the drop was far greater. In front of this east wing Constantin had had a pit excavated for an annexe, an underground garage or a swimming pool for convalescent patients. Its exact purpose was unclear from up here, but not the effect of a fall from this height.

Benny will smash himself to pieces.

Especially as the bottom of the pit was sheathed in steel mats. No shrubs, no grass, no soil. There was nothing down there to break his fall.

‘Shit,’ Benny hissed between his teeth. He made no attempt to move for fear of slipping off. His fingers were numb and bloodless. He wouldn’t be able to hang on for much longer.

‘I’ll help you,’ said Marc. He couldn’t do anything from his side of the balustrade, so he climbed over the handrail and balanced on the narrow ledge Benny was clinging to. His rubber soles could get little purchase on the wet stone.

‘Okay,’ he said, grabbing hold of his brother’s sleeve with one hand and hanging on to an upright with the other. ‘I’ve got you,’ he lied. He was weak and exhausted and aching all over. He could scarcely hang on himself, let alone haul his brother back over the balustrade.

‘Shit,’ said Benny. ‘I’m too stupid even to die.’ Marc gave him an agonized smile. ‘I’ll manage,’ he lied again.

‘Forget it.’

‘Fuck that.’

‘Let go of me or we’ll both be done for.’

Marc’s fingers slipped on the smooth material of the wet bomber jacket, but he quickly recovered his grip. For the moment.

He looked down in search of help, but the hospital grounds were deserted in this weather. An ambulance with a red cross on its white roof was uselessly parked fifty metres away.

‘I’m sorry,’ he heard his brother say as he continued to stare at the roof of the ambulance. A sudden thought occurred to him. It was so absurd and so utterly inappropriate he couldn’t help laughing.

‘Cross!’

‘What?’ said Benny.

‘The radio oracle. The singer’s name was Christopher Cross.’

Benny looked up with a feeble smile. All at once he ceased to look like someone clinging to a ledge for dear life. Although every muscle in his body was taut as a bowstring, he seemed to be at peace – resigned to the inevitable.

‘Let go of me,’ he asked for the last time.

All right.

Marc nodded.

Then, summoning up all his strength, he gripped his brother by both arms. Although he himself was now unsupported, he managed to raise him at least a few centimetres. Not as much as he would have liked, but he simply couldn’t do any better – he didn’t have the strength left.

It wasn’t ideal, nor did it eliminate every element of risk, but in the end, at the very last moment, just as he thrust himself and his brother away from the ledge and plunged to the ground, an inner voice told him that his plan would work.