his head back at his partner standing behind him. “No titles, just Mike and Jimmy.”
Jimmy was mid-twenties, a little over six feet tall, and lean. He smiled and squinted his blue eyes quickly at Mike’s comment. He had a faded Minnesota Wild baseball hat on his head. It looked like it had fallen in the sewer more than once. He stood behind Mike and held rolls of yellowed paper in his arms.
“What’s going on?” Mike asked.
“Those are maps of the sewers?” Jack asked in response.
Jimmy nodded.
“Put them on this table and we’ll tell you what we need.”
They stood around the table looking down at the maps of the sewers that Mike and Jimmy had brought. The corners of the paper were held down with salt and pepper shakers to keep the map from curling closed. “This one covers most of the area around here on this side of the river,” Mike said.
“So we found them somewhere around here.” Jack pointed to a spot on the map where the three diggers had been working their way towards the vault when the explosion happened. “It wasn’t a sewer, but more of a tunnel. Those aren’t on the maps?”
Mike placed his palms down on the maps and leaned in with his unlit cigarette held in his right hand between his pointer and middle fingers. “No, but we’ve got notes or know about most of the tunnels under the city here. The sewers and tunnels are all tied together one way or another.” He flipped his thumb at his partner. “Jimmy is the one that knows what it’s like down there. I used to go down, but now I’m senior so I stay up and operate the truck and equipment and Jimmy goes down for inspections.”
“If a guy was down there and knew his way around, where could he come out?” Jack asked.
“And he doesn’t want to be noticed,” Ross added.
Mike leaned over the drawings. He put the cigarette between his lips and put on a pair of reading glasses. “I’ve got a couple of ideas.”
Jimmy spun the baseball hat around backwards on his head. “Here, here,” he stabbed at the map. “Maybe here.”
“Fuck, Jimmy.” Mike looked at Jimmy with a look of frustration. Then he looked at Jack. “Pardon my French. I don’t know what Jimmy’s thinking.” He stabbed the cigarette at the paper. “He started here. He could go three ways from there.”
“He’d go one of two ways,” Jimmy interrupted.
“Like I was saying, he could go three ways.”
“But he wouldn’t head towards downtown, would he?”
Mike inhaled deeply. “Jimmy, just shut up. We’ll work through this.”
“You just need a smoke.”
Mike looked at Jack. “He’s young.”
Jack nodded towards Ross. “I know how it goes. Do you want a smoke while we talk through this?”
Granowski interjected. “He can’t smoke in here.”
“Just one,” Jack answered.
“Everybody smokes now?”
“Light ‘er up, Mike,” Jack said while he looked at Granowski. Then he leaned back over the map. “We need to hurry, guys. If the man we’re after is still down there, where should we look? Give me your three best guesses on his route and where he could get to in, what?” Jack looked at his watch. “Ninety minutes.”
Mike inhaled deeply and blew the smoke towards the ceiling. “OK, I’m thinking here by the Stone Arch Bridge,” his stubby finger jabbed at the map, “or north of the train bridge here, there’s a sewer that empties into the river.”
“That’s it?” Jack asked.
“Where else do you think?” Mike asked, looking at Jimmy.
“Those two are the easiest, most direct paths.” Jimmy put his dirty finger on the map at the point they’d found the tunnelers. “If they said he went this way, he came to here.” He traced the path on the map. “From here he could go three ways to start with and then depending on which way he went it branches out multiple ways from there. Your guess would be as good as mine.”
“So it sounds like we need to start there,” Jack said.
“Maybe if we get down there we can tell which way he went,” Ross said.
“Junior, you’re in no shape to go down there with one arm in a sling.”
“Who’s going? You?” Ross asked.
“There’s nobody else,” Jack said.
Chapter 52
“Here, put these on.” Jimmy stood at the back of the panel truck and set a pair of faded, blue coveralls on the bumper along with a pair of knee-high, green rubber boots and a yellow hard hat with a light attached to the front. Everything was filthy.
The rain was still coming down, but not as hard. Mike was setting up a barricade around the open manhole. His raincoat was wet and shiny. Jack sat on the bumper of the truck and pulled the coveralls on. He stood up, pulled the bottoms up past his waist, and struggled to get one arm in, then the other. He pulled the zipper up to his chin and swung his arms around to get the coveralls to sit right on his frame. They fit, but they smelled; a combination of sweat, long-wet cloth, and whatever was in the sewer.
“You’ll get used to the smell,” Jimmy said. “They look like they fit. The main thing is to keep you dry and warm. It’s damp down there and always cool. The boots are the most important part. They’ll keep your feet dry, as long as you don’t fall down.”
Jack pulled the boots on and fastened the chin strap for the hard hat. The rain drops echoed off of the shell like rim shots on a drum. He sat on the bumper and waited for Jimmy and tried not to think about what they were going to do. He told himself that he could do it. He had to do it. The Governor had to still be down below ground and they were going to find him. If they could find a clue at the tee that Jimmy described, they would catch him. He was trying not to think about going in the sewer, but that wasn’t working.
“You don’t look so good,” Jimmy said.
Jack just peered up at him.
“There’s nothing to be nervous about. It’s actually kind of neat. There’s all sorts of history down there and if we go outside of the sewers into some of the caves there’s flowstone and stuff. It’s pretty.”
Jack stood up and faced Jimmy. “I’ll be all right. One thing I’m worried about is you.” Jack tugged at the seam on the shoulder of the coveralls to adjust them a bit. “I don’t want to put you in any danger. But this guy we’re after? I have to catch him and he’s dangerous. And I can’t go down there alone. I don’t know my way around.”
“Hey, you’re not forcing me to go down there. I know my way around better than anybody. Once we get down there he won’t be able to hear us and if we go with low lights he shouldn’t see us coming either.”
Hearing “low lights,” Jack’s chest tightened and his throat constricted, making it hard to breathe. He closed his eyes and tried to force a deep breath into his lungs. He got a small amount of air in. He tilted his head back and looked at the sky in attempt to open his airway further. He still couldn’t breathe.
“Hey, you OK?”
Jack looked at Jimmy, almost panting to get a small amount of air in and out of his lungs.
“Here, sit down and try to relax.” Jimmy lightly grabbed Jack’s upper arm and guided him back a couple of steps to the bumper of the truck. “You need to relax.”
Jack leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. He focused on a spot on the ground between his feet and slowed his breathing. He felt his chest start to relax and he worked on taking larger breaths.
“You sure you want to do this?” Jimmy asked.
“I have to get this guy.” Jack took another deep breath. “I’ll be OK in a minute. Then we have to go.”
“All right. Don’t hyperventilate. Just sit here and relax. Long, deep breaths.” Jimmy climbed into the truck. “We’ll give her a shot in a second!” he called from inside the truck.
