place—that maze I was in—but never mind that.”
Ruth settled Brewster back in her lap, caressed his soft ears, and stared at the brisk fire in the fireplace. Dix leaned forward. “You okay, Ruth?”
“Yes, I’m sorry, I just spaced out for a moment. Everything that’s happened since Friday—it’s a little overwhelming.” She dashed tears out of her eyes, then took on a defiant look. “I’m going to shut up about that now. I’m a hard-ass, I’m going to begin acting like it.”
“You can howl at the moon if you want to.” Dix laughed. “What you’ve been through, Ruth, it’s enough to make my macho socks shake off my feet.”
“The important thing is that we’re all here and we’ll get to the bottom of this,” Sherlock said. She gathered Ruth in her arms and hugged her tight as Brewster pushed his nose between them. “You are a hard-ass, and don’t forget it. Now, I want you to tell me caving isn’t that hard. Neither Dillon nor I have ever been off the beaten tourist track in a public cave.”
Ruth pulled herself together. “You have to be real careful. I didn’t find many really tough spots to navigate in Winkel’s Cave, even in the unmapped parts, and that’s probably why the soldiers used the cave to stash their gold bars. The thing is, you’re never supposed to cave alone, so I guess I’m an idiot. I was so excited about this, I told myself I didn’t need to have Luther with me.”
“Yeah,” Dix said, nodding, “that about covers it. You were an idiot. I’m a rank amateur and you couldn’t pay me to go into an uncharted part of a cave by myself, even armed with million-watt searchlights.”
“Thank you, Professor Noble,” Ruth said. She turned to Sherlock. “I love it when a man agrees with me. In any case, I’ll guide you—even though I don’t have the map, I pretty much remember the route I took through the cave. It won’t be too bad, I promise. I’ve been in much tougher caves, like having to belly-crawl through cold water or rappelling down sheer walls and not knowing what’s waiting for you at the bottom—praying there will be a bottom—or shimmying through passages that are too small for a twelve-year-old.
“There aren’t even any real claustrophobic spots in Winkel’s Cave that make your skin crawl, at least that I saw. I didn’t see any bats or cave animals, and there are supposed to be Virginia big-eared bats in the caves around here. It will be chilly, fifty-four degrees is the average temperature, but we won’t have to wade through any streams. We won’t be down there long enough to worry about hypothermia. We’ll need plenty of light, that’s the most important thing.”
She paused. “I have to know what I ran into when I was in that cavern. I wish I could remember. Was there something I wasn’t supposed to see? Did someone pull me out of there? But if they wanted to help me, why did they hit me over the head and leave me lying unconscious in the sheriff’s woods? Fact is, I probably would have died if Brewster hadn’t found me. And then those two men tried to break into the house and shot at me. If they wanted me dead, why did they leave me alive in the first place?”
“Stop worrying so much, Ruth, we’ll find out,” Dix told her. “Hey, Madonna, we already found out what your name is.”
It was lovely to laugh a bit, to let the terror of Winkel’s Cave fade for a few moments at least. Ruth asked Savich, “How did you find me?”
Savich laughed. “Trust me, Ruth, lots of people know the sheriff found a woman in his woods. And everyone knows all about that high-speed chase on the interstate in the blizzard last night and how those two yahoos tried to kill the woman who was staying at the sheriff’s house.”
Sherlock added, “They even sent your picture out over the wires for identification.” She patted Ruth’s hand. “And now we’re staying here until we figure everything out.”
“But, Dillon, I’m the lead on the Tiller case.”
Savich said easily, “I’ll give Dane a call. He can handle it. Don’t worry.”
“But he’s getting married in two weeks.”
Sherlock said, “Then he’ll be motivated to get it cleaned up, now won’t he?”
Dix asked, “The Tiller case?”
Sherlock said, “A farmer in Maryland was tilling a new parcel of land he’d just bought and plowed up some human remains. We’re just getting our bearings on what happened.”
Dix said slowly, “I heard on the radio about you guys finding a kidnap victim dead and buried in a Korean War soldier’s grave at Arlington National Cemetery. What’s that all about?”
Sherlock and Savich exchanged glances. Savich shrugged. “Okay, maybe it’s time we told you about Moses Grace and Claudia, Ruth. You know how you left your cell phone with Connie? Well, she got a call from your snitch Rolly.”
He went on to tell Ruth and the sheriff about the fiasco at Hooter’s Motel, finding Pinky’s body in Arlington National Cemetery, Connie getting shot. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, Ruth, but Moses Grace also intimated he’d murdered Rolly.
“We don’t know much about who Moses Grace or Claudia are. We found out he used Pinky’s cell phone to call me. The phone carrier confirmed the call was received through a cell tower in Arlington. We left the account open, in case he uses the phone to call me again. If he even turns it on again, we’ll be able to track him. Despite the drawl he talks in, and all the bad grammar, I think he’s pretty smart. He’s probably dumped Pinky’s phone already.”
“He really tried to shoot Sherlock?”
Savich said, “He wants both me and Sherlock. We left Sean at his grandmother’s before we drove here to Maestro.” He added to Dix, “We’ve been through something like this before.”
“I should have been there, Dillon. You should have called me.”
“Nah, we screwed up things well enough on our own.”
Ruth jumped to her feet and began to pace, Brewster straining in her arms. “I can’t believe you guys came out here looking for me with all this going on back in Washington.”
“Family is family, Ruth. Let it go. You’re right, Moses Grace is a very scary man, I’m quite sure of that from our short acquaintance. He’s targeted me for some reason we don’t know yet—maybe revenge—
so we’ve started a good deal of spade work into my past cases. He’s pretty old, I think, and he sounds sick —hacks a lot, really wet gravel in his voice.”
Sherlock picked it up. “Claudia is young, draws hearts over her i’s, that sort of thing. He calls her his sweetheart. Maybe she’s his daughter, granddaughter, we’re not sure, or maybe she’s a runaway teenager. Sit down, Ruth, you’re making me dizzy.”
Ruth sat, aware that Dix was looking at her. He was realizing he was going to have to adjust to this matter- of-fact cop talk coming out of Ruth’s mouth. Not at all like Madonna. He said, “We’re still trying to find Ruth’s Beemer. I’ll call in the license plate later, but at this point we know it’s been hidden somewhere, or taken out of the area.”
“Her SAV,” Sherlock said, grinning.
Savich turned to the sheriff, who’d been studying each of them for the past few minutes. “I can’t tell you how grateful we are that you found Ruth and kept her safe.”
Dix waved it away. He was studying Savich closely. “I think I recognize your name, Ruth. A couple of months ago you were written up in the Washington Post, weren’t you? You helped locate a math teacher before he was killed by some jealous old nutcase?”
“Good heavens, you remember that?” Ruth grinned. “That was Jimbo Marple. One of my boys saw this old guy take Jimbo right out of a shopping mall parking lot. He called me right away. Savich was so mad when one of the sharpshooters killed the old guy. You’ve got quite a memory.”
“A whole lot of people are involved in every case we’ve handled,” Savich said easily. “Ruth here is known for her snitches. She gathered them all when she was with the D.C. Police Department before she joined the FBI.”
Sherlock said, “And shoots like a champ, Dix. Tells either her SIG or her Glock what she wants to hit and the next instant, it’s dead center.”
“I hid behind a dresser while he was out on that high-speed chase.”
“Well,” Sherlock said easily, “now you’re back with us.”
“A hard-ass,” Ruth agreed, pleased.
Dix smiled a perfunctory smile that didn’t show at all in his stiff voice. “So is the FBI going to take over here?”
