THE CLIMB.

NOTES

SETTING

On an island not far from the coast of Greece. It was a popular place with people who
wanted a quiet holiday. There weren´t many bars and no nightclubs. It was a place for
people who liked to walk, swim or just sit in a small café.

CHARACTERS.

MR. HOLLAND

He was a fair-haired man who arrived at the island of Crete. He told the people he was a
writer, who came from England to stay in the Villa for 2 weeks.

His face looked familiar to Costas, he knew he had seen him before. Later, Costas realized
that this familiar face belonged to David Ashken a great and experienced climber who had
suffered an accident, and since then he had never climbed again. He just told stories in his
books about mountain climbing.

The accident had happened in Austria, 5 years ago. When Costas and another man who was
climbing with him, had a bad fall. The other man was killed, and since then Ashken had
been too frightened to climb up again. Costas thought that at first he was his HERO, but
now he had become a COWARD

*MR KAZAKOU

He lived in another part on the island with his sons Costas and Eleni. Mr Kazakou owned a
holiday villa and some holiday flats. Costas and Eleni were at home, on holidays

*COSTAS.

He was Mr. Kazakou´s son. He had a sister, Eleni. Costas was studying at University. He
wanted to be a doctor. He liked climbing cliffs around the island. The cliffs were very
high, steep and were shaped like the letter C. And there was a cliff with the shape of a
bird, a large eagle with a sharp-looking beak.

One of his hobby was to get up early and climb rocks above the beach. His aim was to climb
the Eagle´s Rock, he wanted to be the 1 st man to get to the top. At the top of Eagle´s
Rock there was a large white house with a long garden. It was the Eagle´s House, whose
owner was Mr. Vitalis.

*ELENI.

She was Mr. Kazakou´s daughter. She had a brother, Costas. Eleni was still at school, but
she was working at an Art shop as a summer job. This shop, which belonged to Mr. Papas,
sold books, postcards and paintings. The artists of these paintings used to live on the
island. Many tourists visited the shop.
Eleni liked swimming. She knew her brother wanted to climb Eagle´s Rock; so she insisted
on not doing this because it could be very dangerous. Some people who had tried before,
were dead.

MR. VITALIS

He lived alone at Eagle´s house. He owned a computer company on the island. Almost on
the island knew him.

He liked buying paintings for his house. Many of his paintings were from famous artists.
Mr. Vitalis was very rich, he could buy all he wanted. But now, he was worried about his
computer company.

His house was very famous, everybody knew it. It was the biggest house on the island, it
had an electric fence around 3 sides of the garden. The fence had a special burglar alarm
(when someone climbed over the fence, the alarm rang in the police station. There was NO
fence on the cliff´s side. Only the person who could climb Eagle´s Rock could get into the
house.

PLOT

This is the story of a rich man called Mr. Vitalis who used to have a computer company, and
he made a lot of money. But in the last years, he had economic problems in his company and
so he had a great plan to get money.

Mr. Vitalis had many paintings in his house which were from very important and famous
artists who lived on the island, they were very valuable and very expensive. So Mr. Vitalis
plan was to pretend that a burglar stole some paintings from his house and then he would
ask the insurance company to give back the money. So Mr. Vitalis convinced Mr. Holland (an
experienced and great climber) to do that job as a burglar.

As Mr. Vitalis ´house was so well protected with electric fence, the only way to get into it,
was climbing the Eagle ´s Rock. So he needed to get an experienced and brave man who
could do it, David Ashken. (Mr Holland)

Mr Holland and Mr. Vitalis made an arrangement, Mr. Vitalis offered an important amount
of money to Mr. Holland to do the job. At first, Mr. Holland accepted half the money and
went to the place to watch and prepare the plan. However, when he was there he
regretted about this.

Meanwhile, Costas was always interested in climbing rocks, he was very anxious about Eagle
´s Rock. He wanted to be the first person on doing this. And one morning, Costas felt he
was ready for this adventure. He went to climb Eagle´s Rock, but suddenly he had a
problem and he couldn´t continue doing. Eleni, who saw him, ran immediately to look for
Mr. Holland (David Ashkem) to help and rescue him. At first Mr. Holland refused to climb
again but when he remembered that his friend had died climbing as Costas was doing now;
he determined to go and help him. Finally, Mr. Holland rescued Costas with a rope, and
then Costas and Eleni told him that they knew Mr. Vitalis ´plan and that Mr Holland would
steal those paintings for him. But Mr. Holland decided that he wouldn´t do it. After
climbing to help Costas, he convinced himself. He was not a burglar or thief. He was just a
climber.

QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT THE STORY

*Why did Mr. Holland accept Mr. Vitalis proposal?

* If you were Mr. Vitalis and your plan didn´t work, what would do now?

*If a rich man offered you a lot of money, would you climb Eagle´s Rock?

*Imagine you were watching the moment when Costas was falling from the rock, who would
you have asked for help?