Flight 79. The Telegraph’s travel editor, Alice Davanti, has released a first-person exclusive of scenes inside the hijacked aircraft.
I’m so flooded with relief that the plane hasn’t crashed that I miss the first few words of Davanti’s statement, my focus snapping back when I hear Mina’s name.
“Mummy!”
…many people will condemn her for putting her own family’s safety above the lives of the hundreds of passengers on Flight 79. As I write this, I am surrounded by parents, grandparents, children. The families of these passengers will no doubt struggle to understand why their loved ones’ lives should be worth less than that of one woman’s child.
The radio cuts back to the presenter, who promises more on this very soon, and Sophia struggles to sit up.
“Daddy, what’s that woman saying about Mummy?”
Rage surges through my veins. I am not putting this on Sophia. I won’t let her feel guilty; I won’t let her think badly of her mother, when Mina did what any parent I know would have done.
“She’s saying—” I stop, just long enough that what follows isn’t swallowed by a sob. “She’s saying Mummy loves you more than anything else in the whole world.”
The sound of a car engine cuts through the night air. The farm track doesn’t lead anywhere: no one comes down here unless they live here, and no one lives here except us, Mo, and the woman who comes a few weekends a year. Is the car hers? Why would she arrive at this hour? I’ve lost track of time, but it can’t be far off dawn now.
For a second, I feel a rush of hope. Perhaps Becca had a change of heart. Maybe my words struck home and she realized the police would catch up with her sooner or later, so she—
Except that the engine I can hear isn’t diesel, which means it’s unlikely to be a police car.
Becca’s parents? Or one of the other activists perhaps. If they’ve come to move us somewhere they think will be safer, we’ll have a chance to escape. They’ll have to release one of my hands to free the cuffs from the pipes. I need to be ready. I picture myself swinging at whoever comes—right hook, left hook, whichever is freed first—knocking them out cold and pulling Sophia up the steps, into the kitchen, through the hall, and out.
There are footsteps outside. Quiet ones. Careful, thoughtful. Pacing the width of the house. Peering into windows maybe, to make sure no one’s in, that it’s just us, locked in the cellar. No one to hear us scream.
Where will we go when we escape?
Becca used my car keys to get the EpiPen. If she dropped them back where they were, I can snatch them up as we run through the house, drive to the central police station—where I work—where teams operate around the clock.
But she could have put them anywhere. She might even still have them, stuffed in a pocket. Hunting for them could cost valuable time. Better to run. The back door, perhaps, where they won’t be expecting. Over the fence and across the park, where we can’t be followed in a car. Maybe that’s the best way to go anyway: not waste time looking for keys. Just get out.
I start flexing the fingers on each hand. They’ve been held in this position for hours now, and I can hardly feel the tips of each one. I straighten, then curl each in turn, and slowly the numbness becomes the tingle of pins and needles. I roll my shoulders—backward, then forward—flex, then point my toes, pull my knees up to my chest.
“What are you doing, Daddy?”
“Exercising. Want to join me?”
Sophia shuffles her bottom so her back is against the wall. She puts her hands behind her back, into invisible cuffs, and together we lift our legs and tilt our heads from side to side. In her haste, Becca didn’t replace the paving stone over the entrance to the coal chute, and I’m grateful for the light from the porch and for the breeze, despite the cold. The air down here feels stale and overused, and even though I know it couldn’t have been airtight before, it still felt as though we could run out.
“Now we’re going to make a sort of triangle, okay? Move your bottom forward, that’s it, then straighten your legs and lift them up, and see if you can touch your toes. Keep your back straight—that’s it.” I form two sides of my triangle, while Sophia forms three,