They crawled behind the bar, following Sheila.
She paused in front of Shelby. “I quit.”
“Me too.”
They crawled all the way to the end of the bar, the firefight still flaring in spurts out front. Sheila stood and dashed for a side door. Bill and Mortimer followed. Mortimer paused, looked back. A handful of men lay dead behind the overturned tables. A pile of dead Red Stripes choked the doorway. Others fired in through the broken window.
Mortimer went through the door, found himself on the other side with Bill and Sheila in some kind of vestibule. They followed Sheila through another door, down a hall and then into the kitchen.
Bill said, “We can’t go this way. Shelby says it just leads to an alley and the street.”
“I know a way,” Sheila said.
As they went past stoves and refrigerators, Sheila grabbed a string of uncooked linked sausages and hung them around her neck. They found the old crone sitting on a stool near the back door. The door was metal and barred. It shook with thuds, men on the other side trying to knock it down.
“Will you be okay, Edith?” Sheila asked.
The old woman patted the MAC- 10 in her lap. “I have a full clip. And anyway, it’ll take a bulldozer to knock down that door.”
“We’re leaving through the pantry. Can you close it behind us?”
The old woman nodded.
Sheila flung open the pantry door, motioned for Bill and Mortimer to follow. Inside, shelves were lined with various canned goods and foodstuffs. A canvas bag hung on a nail just inside the door. Sheila grabbed it, tossed it to Bill. “Fill it up.”
Bill didn’t hesitate, began scooping random items into the sack.
Sheila reached to the back of one of the middle shelves, knocking off cans. “Come on, come on. Where is it? Ah!”
An audible click, and the back of the pantry swung open. Stone stairs on the other side spiraled down. She lit a candle. “This way.”
They went down the stairs. The door thudded closed behind them, and the little candle was the only light. The sound of the outside world had been cut off. The stairs ended at the mouth of a tunnel, which was dank and tomblike.
They followed Sheila into the tunnel. She picked her way carefully, watching her steps in the dim candlelight. The ground was uneven, the ceiling low enough in places that Mortimer had to hunch over.
“They used to smuggle slaves through here during the Civil War.” Sheila’s voice was barely above a whisper. “Edith said the pastor had been an abolitionist and part of the Underground Railroad. When she was a schoolteacher, they brought kids on field trips here.”
They walked for a while, maybe twenty minutes, until they arrived at a wooden door made of heavy planks and iron hinges. Sheila grabbed an iron ring and pulled. “Help me.”
Mortimer grabbed the ring too, pulled, his muscles straining. Finally the door swung open. They stepped into fresh air and darkness. Mortimer blinked, letting his eyes adjust. They’d come out under an unused railroad bridge, a small creek flowing in front of them.
“We can follow the tracks,” Bill suggested.
“No,” Sheila said. “If we go along the creek a mile or so, we’ll cross a dirt road that takes us south. Nobody will see us. Come on.” She didn’t look back to see if they followed.
They hesitated only a moment before running after her.
The stars were brilliant in the night sky, the moon a crescent of glowing silver. The night was cold but not bitterly so. Mortimer slung the Nike tote over his shoulder, fixed the Maxfli cap firmly on his head.
“Where’s she taking us?” Bill asked.
“Away.”
Behind them, the scattered shots sounded like popcorn. Like a string of firecrackers on the Fourth of July.
HIKING AND CAMPING
XXV
Sheila led them farther and for longer than Mortimer would have hiked if it were up to him. The creek twisted past houses and into the forest. After a long time it hit a dirt road.
“The logging trucks used to come through here,” Sheila said.
Mortimer expected her to stop and make camp, but she climbed up the embankment to the road and kept going.
Bill finally spoke up. “Any time you want to s-stop is f-fine with me. I wouldn’t say no to a fire.” He didn’t have a coat and shivered.
