When, a while later, he turned around to climb back up, Gordon couldn’t find those ladder-like corrugations in the rock, which had grown slippery with the spray from the rising surf. The sky had darkened suddenly, and a squall of rain was blowing in. It all looked different from below. He knew he couldn’t call out for help to any of the tourists hurrying back to their cars on the clifftop above—Owen would kill him—so he took some deep breaths, told himself to be calm, and sat on the lower ledge to wait.

The minutes dripped by. He began to grow scared that Owen and Sam had forgotten him, would never come back, or that he would have to alert the surf lifesavers or scream out to passing adults. Either way, he was going to be in a world of strife.

He paused at the higher ledge. Forty-two years. Where had his life gone? Fuck’s sake, his father was right. They did get the wrong one back.

It didn’t feel right to be here without Sam. Whenever they had come here together, Sam was the leader, resuming his older boy’s stance. Sam was his big brother. He’d never trusted Gordon to be here on his own.

‘Gordon.’

He turned to see Kelly and Ben following him, stepping decisively across the sandstone bridge. They were holding hands. Funny how a new perspective changes things. As a kid, and even as an adult coming here with Sam, Gordon had perceived that bridge to be as narrow as a tightrope. It fell away sharply on both sides. Now, he saw Ben and Kelly walking across it with relative ease.

The afternoon was gorgeous, the sky beginning to flare in bronze, the swell still running, surfers in the water, the breeze offshore. Still that bell-ringer.

Kelly and Ben were across the rock bridge. Gordon had nowhere to run, even if he had wanted to. Maybe it needed to come to this, the physical entrapment as well as the emotional. He could tell the truth or step off, after Owen, right here. He looked over the ledge. A whump of sea hit the hollow base of the cliff, and a jet of water spouted, falling on him like a heavy rain.

‘Blowhole’s working,’ he said.

Kelly smiled, in spite of herself. She swept her wet hair out of her eyes.

‘This is where your uncle Owen died,’ she said to Ben. ‘Your dad was only a little boy. Sam was with them. Afterwards they lied about it. They’ve been lying about it ever since. Haven’t you, Gordon?’

Gordon shook his head. ‘It’s not what you think.’