Previously: Pauline started out angry at Al for trying to sabotage her plan to apply for a university nursing course and depressed after being held hostage and threatened by Crazy Jonathan. Her feelings about Al changed after she saw how heroic he could be in dangerous situations. Now Al is starting to reconsider what he wants from life after all he's been through lately.

Chapter 49: Al Thinks Back

Friday Afternoon

Al drove home from Joan's farm and parked the van. He sat a moment, thinking things over, then got out and walked along Fore Street up the hill to Pauline's house. As he walked he thought about how quickly things had changed between them in the past few weeks.

ooOOOOOoo

He had acted on impulse, hiding Pauline's application to the nursing program instead of posting it as promised, and once she discovered his deception he was sincerely ashamed of himself. She rejected his flowers and apology, but he couldn't stay away from her. So, fortified with a pint or three, he knocked on the surgery door that day and demanded to be let in.

When a strange Irishman opened the door and pointed a shotgun at him, Al didn't know what to think at first. It was all so bizarre. Hustled into the office, only to see Pauline and Louisa tied up, and the Doc putting a sling on Terry Glasson's arm, he still couldn't quite understand what was going on.

It was only when the nutter threatened to shoot Pauline, and then let loose a warning blast, that Al really grasped that something was very, very wrong here. He agreed to get his dad's boat, follow the directions to find a Spanish trawler off Nelson's Point, and memorize the Spanish phrase to repeat to the trawler crew. Anything to placate the madman. Al was very alarmed to leave Pauline behind in this predicament but he consoled himself that at least the Doc was there to try to keep some level of sanity.

He went down to the dock and unlocked the motor dinghy. He zoomed it out past the sea wall and into the open water, repeating to himself the phrase "Terry mi manda a por el paquete," or was it "la paquete" as the Doc insisted. It seemed to take hours to get out to the location and once he spotted the trawler the phrase went right out of his head.

He pulled the dinghy up alongside and stumbled over the words. "All right. Uh, Terry mi manda por, uh… Terry mi manda… uh, Terry Glasson sent me."

A man looked over the side and lowered a bag to him, shouting something incomprehensible.

"Don't speak Spanish, mate," Al told him.

The man continued to shout at him as Al motored away. He was intent only on getting back to the surgery as soon as possible, but out of the corner of his eye he couldn't help but see a figure climbing up the cliff. He tried to ignore it but when the man slipped and fell Al hesitated, then with a resigned groan headed over to see what had happened. He anchored the dinghy and strained to see up to the ledge, where the man lay unmoving.

Al took out his mobile, relieved to see there was a signal, and called the surgery. The madman answered. "You got the package?"

"Yeah, I got it, yeah. Pauline OK?"

"Pauline is fine. Pauline's great," the nutter replied.

Al could hear some commotion on the other end, and Pauline shouted for him to be careful. The nutter was insisting the package be brought back but Al was firm with him. "You'll get your package. Just let me speak to the doctor."

Al could hear the nutter mumbling. "He said someone's fallen off a cliff."

More confusion, but Al managed to convey the message. "I think he's hurt badly, Doc. I can't see him moving."

"Call the Coast Guard," the Doc said.

Al could hear more arguing, then the nutter was back on the line. "Um, OK. Plumber Boy? We're coming there." Click.

Al could only handle one crisis at a time. He sized up the distance from the dinghy to the ledge where the man lay, then looked farther up to the edge of the cliff. It was shorter from the ledge to the water but there was no way he would be able to get the unconscious man to the dinghy. Up was the only way. He took out his mobile again and rang another number.

"Yeah Dad, it's me. No the flowers didn't work. Uh listen, we're gonna need some help."

Al explained what he needed. Then he slung the mystery bag over his back and was able to step out into just a few inches of water (luckily the tide was out) and scramble up the rocks to the ledge. It was Ted Hammett the Baker, lying beside a bird nest, groaning and mumbling incoherently. Al could see the Colonel looking down from the cliff and shouting something but he couldn't make out the words over the sound of the waves crashing below. Al put his jacket under the man's head and tried to take his pulse but he wasn't sure if he could feel anything. He waited for what seemed like hours before he could hear a commotion up above. At that moment, Ted's limbs began to stiffen up and his back arched painfully.

"Help! I think he's havin' a fit!" Al shouted.

The Doc had joined the Colonel, looking down at him. "Cushion his head, he may be haemorrhaging!"

There was more commotion, then the Doc appeared at the edge with his medical bag and a harness strapped around him, slowly and nervously inching his way down the cliff with a taut line keeping him from falling. Al knew his Dad must have arrived with the winch attached to the harness.

The Doc gradually descended to just a few feet above the ledge when the line stopped lowering him, leaving him dangling helplessly. Then suddenly the line gave and he fell the rest of the way down, toppling on top of Ted. Al feared for a moment he would have two injured men to deal with, but the Doc regained his composure, and examined the baker's eyes with a pen torch.

"Doc, I think he's on his way out."

"That's your diagnosis, is it."

"Yeah. What's he doin' up here anyway?"

"Uh, stealing chough eggs," he said, handing Al the pen torch to hold. "And contracting a bacterial infection from bird faeces."

"He'll be all right though, won't he."

The Doc was clearly concerned. "His uh, optic nerve is swollen due to the increased intracranial pressure. Means that your first diagnosis could well be right. He's not going to make it…unless… I need to… relieve the pressure… on his brain."

The Doc took some deep breaths and took out what Al recognized as his father's drill and put some antiseptic on the drill bit to sterilize it.

Al was confused. "How are you gonna do that?" Suddenly he realized with horror what the Doc planned to do. "Ohh, oh Doc! How do you know if you drill far enough?!"

"His eyes will open."

The Doc carefully positioned the drill and switched on the bit to penetrate a short distance. Just as he predicted, Ted's eyes popped open. The Doc applied antiseptic and bandaged the hole. Al was impressed with the Doc's calm demeanour throughout the whole surreal procedure.

Then the Doc had to be winched back up the cliff, hanging on to the still unconscious patient the whole way up. Al had to free climb behind them, with the bag still slung over his back, only to be confronted at the top with the nutter demanding the bag at gun point.

"Ohhh, you're kidding right?!" Al exclaimed.

Fortunately, the Doc grabbed managed to grab the shotgun away and ordered Pauline to call an ambulance for the poor Baker, "accompanied by a really annoying man who needs sectioning under the Mental Health Act!"

Pauline was too upset to do anything, so Louisa took her mobile from her and made the 999 call.

"Al? Lock those explosives in the boot of my car before someone gets blown up." The Doc handed Al the keys and the mystery bag.

"Explosives?!"

"Oh come on, Al. You carried them up a cliff, you'll survive the trip to the car."

Over the Colonel's objections, the Doc handed Al the shotgun to lock up too.

As Al secured the bag and the gun in the car, Pauline took his arm. He put his arm around her and gave her a kiss.

"Action Man," she said, grinning up at him.

"No." He was embarrassed.

"Yeah. Totally. Climbing up the cliff and all that." She couldn't stop smiling.

"Well, it was quite excitin' yeah. You OK?"

"Yeah. The shaking stopped. Don't think I'll be settin' foot outside the house again. Well, Portwenn anyway. Not for a while."

"I dunno," Al replied, as they walked back. "I think you're onto somethin' there. It's a big world out there." He laughed at her surprised reaction. "What? You know I'll always come back to you. Don't you? OK."

The Doc was finishing up examining Ted as the nutter showed up carrying the bag again and a crowbar, acting like there were no hard feelings. "So uh, I gotta take off then folks," he said.

"Where did you get that bag from?" the Doc demanded.

"I just got the crowbar from Big Plumber Man's van and pried your car door open. So thanks for that. Thanks for all your help." He threw the bag on top of poor Ted and held out his hand to shake the Doc's hand.

The Doc grabbed the bag, they scuffled, and the Doc hurled it over the cliff to the ledge where they had just been.

KABOOM!

Everyone was shocked into silence. In the distance sirens began rapidly approaching.

"Excuse me," the Doc said. He took his medical bag and stalked away.

The ambulance came and took away Ted and the nutter. The police tried to sort out exactly what had happened, but with everyone talking excitedly at once they insisted the whole lot of them come down to the Delabole station. There they brought everyone in one by one to give their statement to sort out exactly who was going to be charged with what.

Al was one of the first in the interview room. He finally managed to convince them he wasn't an accomplice to the smugglers, that he had no idea what was in the bag, and he was only cooperating under duress as his girlfriend and others were being held hostage. It helped that Pauline was able to corroborate his version of what happened.

After they were done, it was his Dad's turn to be interviewed, only for the officers to inform him that his van had an expired MOT sticker and he appeared to be behind on the Vehicle Excise Tax. "Better go on home and don't wait for me, Boy," he told Al. "This could take a while."

Al and Pauline got a ride from the Colonel, who dropped them off at the Large house. Once safely inside the front door, all the tension from the terrible day suddenly dropped away.

"You know, I just realized," Pauline said. "This is the first time we've had a house to ourselves, either your place or mine, in like ever. We don't have to go out to our special rock, or fumble around in the van, or worry about my Mum or your Dad walking in on us."

In reply, Al pulled her close to him and they kissed. What had been the worst day of their lives was about to become their best night ever.

ooOOOOOoo

At this point, Al had reached the front door of the Lamb house. He didn't want to think about that night any longer. He had made up his mind about what he had to do. He sighed and knocked.

To be continued…

Note: An MOT sticker shows that a vehicle has passed the Ministry of Transport's annual safety and emissions inspection.