Stopnišče in zgodba o njem

Z vrha so bile stopnice videti slabe. S prve stopnice navzdol so videti še slabše. Spuščajo se približno pod enakim kotom kot lestev, prislonjena ob zid, in pravzaprav sploh niso stopnišče. So žleb, vsekan v skalo, ponekod širok približno kot vrata, drugod ožji, na dnu reže pa se bledo zeleno sveti morje. Polly skoči po prvih nekaj navzdol in ugotovi, da so neenakomerne. Vsaka stopnica je malo drugačne višine.

From the top the steps looked bad. From the first one down, they look worse. They fall away at about the same angle as a ladder leaned against a wall, and they are not really a staircase at all. They are a groove cut into the rock, roughly as wide as a doorway in places and narrower in others, with the sea showing pale green at the bottom of the gap. Polly hops down the first few and finds them uneven. Every step is a slightly different height.

O tem kraju obstaja zgodba in pripoveduje jo vsak. Leta tisoč štiristo dvajset je aragonska vojska oblegala mesto, njeni vojaki pa naj bi celotno stopnišče vklesali v pečino v eni sami noči, na skrivaj, da bi se povzpeli gor in s presenečenjem zavzeli citadelo.

There is a story about this place, and everyone tells it. In the year fourteen twenty, an army from Aragon laid siege to the town, and its soldiers are said to have carved this entire staircase into the cliff in one single night, in secret, in order to climb up and take the citadel by surprise.

Čudovita zgodba je. In skoraj zagotovo ni resnična. Neki raziskovalec je pred več kot sto leti natančno preučil to vprašanje in opozoril na dve težavi. Prvič: skoraj dvesto stopnic nihče ne more v eni noči vklesati v trden apnenec. Drugič: ob tem delu obzidja so stali stražni stolpi, moške, ki vso noč tolčejo po skali, pa je težko preslišati.

It is a wonderful story. It is also almost certainly not true. A researcher looked at the problem carefully more than a hundred years ago and pointed out two difficulties. First, nearly two hundred steps cannot be cut into solid limestone in one night by anybody. Second, there were guard towers along this stretch of wall, and men hammering at rock all night are not easy to miss.

Polly sede na stopnico približno na tretjini poti do morja. Pod njo vzdolž pečine prijadra velika morska ptica, tako nizko, da se s konico peruti skoraj dotakne vode, in vso pot mimo niti enkrat ne zamahne. Pravi odgovor na vprašanje, kdo je vsekal te stopnice in zakaj, je nekje globlje spodaj.

Polly sits down on a step about a third of the way toward the sea. Below her a large seabird comes gliding along the cliff, so low that its wingtip nearly touches the water, and it does not flap once the whole way past. The real answer to who cut these steps, and why, is somewhere further down.