23

The professor stiffened.

"I feel…" He exhaled. "… the stairs shifting."

Creak.

Hesitant, he took another step upward.

Creak.

"Definitely shifting."

"Don't move." Balenger watched the staircase begin to sway.

"I suddenly feel as if I'm on a boat," Conklin said.

Crack. The staircase swayed more discernibly.

"No!"

"Try to take my hand." Rick braced himself at the top of the stairs and reached down. "Cora. Vinnie." His voice was stark. "Grab me from behind so I don't get pulled onto the stairs."

Crack.

"If I reach up," Conklin said, "that'll shift my weight and make the staircase-"

As if anticipating his next words, the staircase wobbled.

Rick extended his arm farther, straining. "Damn it, I can't quite-"

Crack.

"It sounds like it's going to…" Vinnie held Rick tighter. Rick leaned farther down the stairs.

"Even if I stretch my arm, I'm not close enough." Conklin's voice trembled.

Crack.

"We can't just let him…" Cora held Rick with all her might.

"The rope," Balenger demanded. "Who's got it?"

"I do," Vinnie said.

Balenger rushed to him, unzipped his pack, and tugged out the rope. It was bundled in a figure eight. Thin. Made of twisted strands of blue nylon. Climber's rope.

Urgent, Balenger made a loop at one end and tied a slipknot. He hurried next to Rick, his headlamp revealing the professor's frightened features.

"I'm going to throw a loop around you," Balenger told him.

Behind his spectacles, Conklin's eyes were huge with apprehension.

"Raise your arms through the loop," Balenger ordered. "Adjust the rope so it's under your arms."

CRACK.

The professor flinched as the stairs jerked.

"When the rope's under your arms, tighten the slipknot. Make the rope as secure around your chest as possible."

No reply.

"Professor, do you understand me?"

CRACK.

The stairs swayed out of control.

"No!" Balenger swung the rope above his head and hurled it toward Conklin. It fell past the heavy man's shoulders. He swung the rope again, threw it, and felt his heart speed as the loop dropped over the professor's head, catching on his left shoulder.

"Reach through it!"

Conklin pushed his hands under the loop and enfolded it with his arms.

"Under your arms! The slipknot! Tighten it!"

Barely able to control his movements, the professor obeyed.

"Rick! Cora! Vinnie! Grab the rope! We need to anchor it!"

"This post on the balustrade," Rick said. "Wrap the e around it."

"Might not hold. Wrap the rope around each of you!" Balenger said. "Lean back! Hang on! There's going to be a hell of a jolt!" He secured the rope around his chest in a belaying position and braced himself. "Professor, try to walk up!"

"Walk?" Conklin tried to keep his balance on the swaying stairs.

"Maybe they'll hold!"

The professor swallowed. He took a step upward.

The stairway collapsed.

24

Balenger was almost jerked off his feet. The noise was overwhelming. He felt most of the force through his legs and arms. Even so, the sudden pressure of the rope around his chest took his breath away. Clutching the rope with his gloves, leaning back against the dropping force of the professor's weight, he groaned. His feet slid.

"Pull!" he shouted to Rick, Cora, and Vinnie.

The pressure around Balenger's chest tightened as the others stopped him from going over the edge. If not for his Windbreaker, he'd have suffered rope burns. Struggling to breathe, he suddenly felt the professor quit falling. The light from a headlamp bobbed below the edge of the fallen staircase. Balenger stared at the rope where it dug tautly into the remnants of broken wood.

"Professor?" Balenger managed to draw a breath.

No answer.

"For God's sake, can you hear me?"

A faint murmur.

"Talk to me," Balenger said. "Are you hurt?"

"Uh."

Sweat slicked Balenger's face. "Professor?"

"Feel… suffocated."

"That's the pressure of the rope around your chest."

"Can't breathe."

Christ, is he having a heart attack? Balenger wondered. "Take slow, shallow breaths. Slow," he emphasized. "If you hyperventilate, you'll throw yourself into a panic."

"Panic's an understatement."

The rope creaked.

Balenger looked behind him. "Rick, Cora, keep holding the rope. Vinnie, get over here and help me pull him up."

Vinnie hurried next to him and grabbed the section of rope that led to Conklin.

"Hurt," the professor said as the rope shifted upward.

"We'll soon free your chest."

"Not the rope." ' "What?"

"Leg."

Balenger and Vinnie strained to raise him. Conklin's headlamp came into view, a chin strap securing it. Then his anguished face appeared, paler than before. His spectacles were gone. Without them, his eyes looked vulnerable. Fear made them wide.

Balenger and Vinnie pulled him higher.

The professor gasped. "Stuck on something."

Balenger was conscious of Rick and Cora behind him pulling on the rope, preventing him from being dragged over. He heard the effort in their breathing.

"Vinnie." Balenger's voice sounded as if he'd swallowed sand. "Let go of the rope and tug him onto the balcony."

Vinnie gradually released his grip. As soon as the professor's weight was fully transferred to Balenger, Vinnie eased toward the edge. He grabbed the professor's arm and pulled.

The professor winced but didn't move.

"I see it," Vinnie said. "The front of his jacket's caught on a board."

"You know what to do. The knife. That's what you brought it for. Cut the jacket."

Vinnie seemed to suddenly remember that he had it. He unclipped it from the inside of his jeans pocket, opened it, and sliced at Conklin's jacket. For a brief moment, he looked in terror at the abyss into which the stairs had collapsed.

"Done." He rushed back to Balenger and grabbed the rope.

This time, when they pulled, the professor moved. Slowly, painfully, the elderly man was able to help them. Bracing his elbows on the edge of the balcony, he squirmed his right knee over the edge. With an inward shout of triumph, Balenger moved along the rope, grabbed the professor, and helped Vinnie drag him to safety.

Rick and Cora were suddenly with him as well. The professor lay on his back, gasping as Balenger freed the slipknot and pulled the rope from him.

"Can you breathe now?" Balenger frantically checked the professor's pulse.

Conklin's chest heaved as he sucked in air.

Balenger counted a pulse of 140, the equivalent of an athlete's heart rate after running several miles. For an overweight, out-of-condition man, it was far too high. "Does your chest still hurt?"

"Better. It feels better. I can catch my breath."

"Oh, shit," Rick said.

"His left leg." Cora pointed.

Balenger registered the strong smell of copper. Lowering his gaze toward the professor's pantleg, he saw that it was soaked with blood all the way from his thigh to his shoe.

Conklin moaned.