A dim light shines in Hathaway's eyes. He has shifted, moved away from Lewis, and the torch is directly above him. He needs warmth, needs to exercise and get his limbs moving. Stumbling to his feet, he tries running in place but his wet trousers have frozen stiff in front and he can't manage more than a slow plod. It's not enough. He rallies his legs and arms to do more jumping jacks. He starts slowly, but after the first few his arms and legs loosen up a little, and soon he is snapping them open and closed, his heart rate increasing and his breath warming. He'll do forty, he decides, and then lie down with Lewis again and share his body heat.
In the middle of number twenty-six, his right foot lands on the small, extinguished torch lying almost invisible on the floor. It shoots away and Hathaway's ankle twists out from under him. He pitches to the floor with a gasp of pain. It feels as though a spike has been driven into his leg.
Lying on the floor, clutching his throbbing ankle, he realizes the significance of his injury. He struggles to regain his feet so he can keep moving, but the ankle won't support him and he sags back to the floor. No more exercise. No more warmth. Hathaway's blood, having returned to his extremities with his effort, cools rapidly before his body can draw it back to his core. The ankle soon stops hurting. His temperature drops precipitously, and he sinks into oblivion in a few minutes. He no longer shivers. His body has given up trying to warm itself.
.
.
.
Later, Hathaway opens his eyes. He is in the semi-dark, but the shadows reveal not boxes and hanging sides of beef in a freezer, but the warm radiance of firelight. He is on the floor of a cottage, a wood fire crackles nearby. Relief floods his being, they have been rescued. He is warmed; he can feel his skin glowing with the reflected heat. But then it is hot—too hot—it is searing him, and he realizes with sudden alarm that his clothes have caught fire. Burning and in a panic, he strips off his jacket and shirt, pulling on the cuffs until the buttons burst off, and flinging the garments away. As he claws at his trousers, he is struck with a sudden clarity of thought:
There's no fireplace, no fire, no rescue. James has made another serious mistake. He is lying on the frigid floor of a freezer. The torch is failing, like a life about to expire. But there is enough light to see that there is another body on the floor near him. A man James does not recognize. He also appears to be dying, or maybe is already dead. As he slides back into unconsciousness, Hathaway wonders who the man might be.
.
.
.
There's a faint sound of jingling. Bells, perhaps. Then a voice—a female voice—melodious, soft. Familiar.
"Robbie?"
Lewis blinks himself awake and smiles when he recognizes the blue eyes that meet his.
"Laura! I'm so glad you're here. There's something I have to tell you." He can feel heat as she takes his hand in hers. He knows from this that what he is experiencing is real. Not a hallucination.
"I want to thank you for being my best friend. I'd hoped we could have maybe been something more, y'know? I should have said something, done something, a long time ago. And now it's almost too late. You have to help us, Laura. Or we'll be in here forever, and we won't see you again. I need to tell you I love you."
But she fades, dissipating into the darkness without an answer. Lewis raises himself up, trying to follow her, but she is gone. All he can see in the darkness is the shape of a man lying on the floor next to him. Or maybe it's a statue, the smooth chest and arms appear to be carved out of white marble. It reminds him of the Shelley memorial in University College. He has the vague idea that the man should not be bare like that, though he himself does not feel cold. He sees a heap of cloth nearby; it looks like a man's jacket. He tries to grab hold of it to cover the man, but his hands are claws, unable to grip. Still, he manages to hook a fold of the jacket and he drags it nearer and drapes it over the man. He wonders who the man is and whether he should know him.
Then there is jingling again, and this time he can see it comes from thin bangle bracelets on a woman's arm. The woman draws near, her brown eyes alight with pleasure at seeing him.
"Robbie!"
"Val!" He nearly laughs in joy and relief. And he feels as though his entire being is warmed when she wraps her arms around him.
"Robbie, I've missed you so."
"I missed you too, Pet. It's so good to see you." He kisses her, her lips warm and soft compared to his. It occurs to him that she hasn't aged at all since he last saw her, and he wonders how old he must look to her.
"Would you like to come with me, Robbie? We could be together forever."
Lewis has wanted this very thing for so long, believing he would never be happy until he could be with his one true love. But recently it has occurred to him he might not be ready to leave the living world behind. That he might have a chance at love again, to warm him in his remaining years.
He hesitates, his smile faltering. "Does . . . does this mean I'm dead?"
.
.
.
Hathaway surfaces to a semblance of consciousness one last time. So many wrong decisions, so many little mistakes, adding up to one inescapable, awful sum. He has lost his clothes, his friends, possibly his mind. And now he will lose his life. It's as though a candle flame has gone out, leaving only the charred wick. And he can do nothing more than let go of that wick. All he wants is a small, dark place to bury his own body. He can see such a refuge, very near. It is the dark space between a dead man's chin and knees, only inches away. He propels himself toward the cavity, burrowing his head into the man's belly as far as he can. He wants to ask forgiveness, but he can't remember how. Wants to pray for divine intervention. He used to know how to do all that, how to couch a petition for God's help amid a humble declaration of unworthiness. Divine intervention is his best bet for getting out of here. In fact, it may be his only way out.
Hathaway scours his fogged brain, struggling to raise the memories of his training. How to properly beseech the Lord to intervene on his behalf, how to posit his own humility and at the same time laud the omnipotence of the Creator. It evades him. The only thing he can remember is the first prayer he ever learned, and this he recites by rote:
Now I lay me down to sleep;
I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take.
As consciousness fades, he remembers how it should end:
Amen.