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Perhaps he could show Carly he wasn’t the enemy somehow; that she didn’t need to get him out of the way. It was worth a shot.

‘I think I understand,’ he said, the words rasping in his dry throat.

‘You wanted Hannah to know the impact of her work on Robyn – you wanted her to stop telling people to avoid proper medication.’ Carly nodded; she looked relieved that he’d understood her.

‘And then Hannah’s death was a kind of tragic accident. ’

He paused, then forced himself to make eye contact with her, trying to get across as much of an air of compassion as he could. ‘It must have been really hard to know what to do after we found her body...’

‘I’m glad Ben found it, to be honest. I thought I’d dropped it somewhere. Hannah must have been holding it in her fist – I didn’t realize she still had it when she fell, and then when I noticed it was gone, it was too late to go back for it.’

Scott swallowed. ‘I see. And if Ben had that photo on him when the rescuers came – well, the police would have figured it all out, wouldn’t they? And you couldn’t let that happen.’

The satellite phone, still in Carly’s hand, started to ring again, giving Scott a quick rush of hope – but it was quickly extinguished as she pressed a button to silence it.

‘I never meant for all this,’ she said softly.

‘But after we’d found Hannah, I thought if I could just get the rest of you to be injured or weakened in some way, I could get out of here without you following me.

Then when you were navigating earlier, just before we saw that snake, I told you we were still lost so we’d stop going in the right direction.

.. and then – I’m sorry about doing that to your ankle, by the way. ’

‘Ah... that was you?’ She tripped me up.

‘It was me,’ she whispered. Scott thought he saw regret in her expression as she said that.

But her eyes stayed rooted to the jungle floor, as another cold wave of realization washed over him.

The snake that almost bit him – hadn’t she edged him towards its lair?

Could she have seen it – done that on purpose?

And Naya – no, not Naya. He had to know.

‘Did you push Naya in the stream?’ He almost choked on his words.

Carly’s eyes shifted; she dipped her head slightly, then said: ‘No, but I could see she was too close to the edge, and I didn’t warn her.

’ She at least had the decency to look shame-faced about that.

But does she feel bad about the rest of it? Does she wish she hadn’t done this – to Hannah, to me, to Ben?

As if on cue, Scott sensed, rather than heard, a whimper from Ben, lying behind him, shielded from Carly’s sight.

Scott had done his best to stem the bleeding from the side of Ben’s chest with a tourniquet he’d made from the swimming towel in his bag, wrapping it around the top of his shoulder – but in his own weakened state, Scott wasn’t optimistic that he’d done much to help.

Ben must be only minutes away from bleeding out.

‘None of this was part of the plan,’ she said.

‘I thought we’d just go to the waterfall that first full day, make our way back in the afternoon, and then I’d make a bolt for it later on, once the road out wasn’t flooded.

I only had to resort to all this because we found her.

But you have to admit, there was something odd going on with Ben.

He knew Hannah somehow, I’m sure of it. And he ran off with that satellite phone and somehow managed to call for help for himself. ’

Scott shook his head. ‘So that was enough of a reason to shove a knife into him?’

‘I had no choice. He had that photo – if he’d given it to the rescuers, they’d have pieced everything together in no time.

’ She sighed, brushed a strand of filth-encrusted hair from her forehead.

‘And now you know too – so much more than Ben did. I thought I’d be able to just disappear, leave you and Mira here in the jungle to fend for yourselves – you’d have hours left, at the most, with both of you so weak now and no water to drink.

Naya’s almost certainly already dead. I wouldn’t have needed to do anything else – and I don’t want to, really I don’t – but you’ve found Ben now, and rescuers are on their way, they’ll be here any minute, so. ..’

Scott swallowed. He knew what that meant.

He would be next. In his usual state, at full strength, with his size and bulk, he’d have no issue fighting Carly off.

But he was a long way from that. His ankle was twice its usual size; he was exhausted, and had hardly drunk a drop of water for over a day in the raging heat.

He’d barely be able to fight off a toucan at this point. She had the advantage.

This is hopeless. You might as well just give up now.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Carly, walking closer to him.

‘If there was any other way, I wouldn’t do this.

I know you’re a good person. None of this was your fault.

’ Carly’s mouth was turned downwards, and Scott thought he saw genuine sadness in her expression.

‘But I can’t risk you getting away and telling other people what happened here. ’

‘But you said it was an accident, right?’ he said, panting now, his voice sounding unlike his own. ‘You didn’t mean to hurt Hannah. I’m sure if you tell the police that, they’ll understand.’

Carly shook her head. ‘Understand? The police – here? I don’t think so – I can barely explain it in English, let alone Spanish. Besides, how would I make them understand everything afterwards – not coming forward sooner, not getting help for Hannah – and what I did to Ben?’

She was getting closer, one foot after the other, towards him. Scott was forcing himself to move now too; he found himself crawling backwards, away from her – but he was too slow, his ankle far too painful.

‘There’s no other way – I wish there were, but this is it. Naya’s drowned, Mira’s at death’s door, Ben’s got a couple of minutes left, if that. It’s only you that stands in the way of me getting out of here.’

Scott could barely breathe; any second, he was going to pass out or vomit.

Just try to keep her talking.

‘But what are you going to tell them – the police, I mean? How will you explain it?’

‘I’ve thought about that,’ Carly said. ‘I’ve come up with a decent story – that we got lost, and Ben confessed to murdering Hannah after we found her body – then the two of you got into a fight and ended up stabbing each other with the knife.

I tried desperately to find Naya and Mira – but they were lost and weak, and in the end, I was so weak too, I had to make my own way out of here. ’

The world started to swim in front of Scott’s eyes. So she was planning on stabbing him too, if she wanted her story to stack up.

‘But look at me,’ he said. ‘I’m injured, I’m lost – I’ve got no food or water and I’ve not drunk anything for nearly an entire day. You leave me here, and I’ll be as good as dead by tomorrow – you don’t even need to finish this yourself. The jungle will do it for you.’

Those words had the right effect; Carly paused, cocked her head to one side, thoughtful. Then, slowly, she nodded. ‘That’s true – but think of it another way for a minute. That’s a horrible, slow way to go. I can make it quicker for you.’

Shit, shit, shit.

Carly stepped forward again; she was almost in front of him now, close enough that he could make out the muscles twitching close to her jawline, see the flecks of mud and dirt – and something else, something dark, encrusted on her cheeks, her chin.

He could see the grief in her eyes; the fear, but also a sad resolution, a solid determination.

Could this really be it – was this how he was going to die?

Carly’s eyes flickered away from his face, then back to him. ‘I’m truly sorry,’ she said, as she lifted the knife, held it towards Scott’s neck.

He squeezed his eyes shut and braced himself for the blow – he only hoped it would be quick, that she’d hit him in an artery or something, somewhere he wouldn’t bleed out slowly.

And then, close to him, only a few feet away – a voice, hoarse but full of feeling, yelling ‘NOW!’, and the thundering crash of bodies – two of them, so much smaller than his but possessing a wild kind of strength, bursting out of the trees behind him.

He caught the wide-mouthed expression of shock on Carly’s face as the knife was knocked out of her hand, and a small, thin body rushed towards him, made herself a shield between him and Carly, while someone else – someone half-naked and bleeding, a fierce rage in her expression – grabbed at Carly, yanked her backwards.

Carly shrugged herself free, eyes ranging across the three of them, measuring them. For one insane, terrifying moment, Scott thought she was going to come at him again, to launch herself towards them, to try to take on all three of them at once.

But then Mira – tiny, frail Mira – launched herself at Carly, winding her, and managing in the shock of it to push her down to the ground. Mira wasn’t heavy enough to hold Carly for long, though, and Naya rushed forward to help, Scott lumbering behind her, slowed by his bad ankle.

In her haste, the rock fell out of Naya’s grasp, landing close to Carly’s foot, and Carly sprang forward, gazelle-like – dropping the satellite phone that she still gripped in her hand – grabbed the small boulder, and drew back her arm.

And then, too fast, before either Scott or Naya could get to her, Carly slammed the rock into the back of Mira’s head, then turned and bolted past them into the nearest thicket of trees, vanishing into the wilderness before Mira’s crumpled body had even hit the ground.