He fought, then. And lost the flashlamp, watched it laze away from him tumbling, flooding his world with hard light and bitter cold black as he elapsed twenty kilos of nuclear weapon to him against the pitiless pull of the current on the now-billowing ribbon chute.
He did not panic, not yet, not when he knew there was a hope that whatever held him might give, or that he might be able to unsnap the harness. But he could not do it while hugging that canister, no matter how incalculable its importance. When he tried to draw his knees up to capture and hold the canister so that he might free his hands, he underestimated the pull of the current. And then the canister slithered away, perhaps to be seen by the others or perhaps not, and now Quantrill was tearing away his fingernails as he fought to find harness disconnects; then to rip away the harness webbing; and when both failed, finally to find purchase for his feet so that he might somehow burst the bonds that held him. The last thing he knew was after he tried to breathe, after his disastrous coughing spasm, after his efforts to clamp his hands over his mouth and nose. That last thing was a paradoxical sense of tingling warmth, and of lassitude.
CHAPTER 67
Lufo knew, the instant he saw the swirling beacon of light come sliding from the tunnel, that Quantrill was in trouble. But Lufo was no aquatic mammal, and watched the flashlamp's progress on the clear bottom of the watercourse until it fell from their sight behind a stone undercrop downstream.
There was no need to say anything to Sandy who keened with worry, playing her own lamp upstream as she braced herself knee-deep in water. 'It's the parachute,' she squealed then, spying the ribbon pattern that nearly filled the channel, rotating slowly underwater as it approached. 'Lufo, here he comes!'
Lufo splashed into the shallow verge of the pool, cursed as his lunge fell short, then grasped a nylon strip and scrambled to safety. Sandy held her lamp beam on the suspension lines, saw the canister slide into view; knew a hideous glacial paralysis when Ted Quantrill did not come with it.
Lufo hauled the chute out and pulled on the lines, hand over hand, until he saw the canister slide out of the water. He could not believe that their luck had held so long; that everything Sandy claimed was true.
And then he remembered that their luck was not
'Lufo, oh Lufo, he's not signaling and he's not coming and
Lufo's teeth on edge. Bubbles frothed at the tunnel's exit. Quantrill's breath.
Lufo did not commit his insanity until he saw that Sandy was preparing to dive. Then he flung her back, took a deep breath, grasped the anchored safety line and dropped feet-first into the water without his lamp, fully clothed, the hand-line his only guide.
He found that his best pace was face-up, hauling himself blindly hand-over-hand in terrifying blackness along the ceiling of the drowned tunnel, groping ahead to be sure he did not knock his brains out against a protrusion. He could swear he had traversed half a hundred meters when his flailing boot kicked something fleshy, and then both questing feet told him of an inert human body just behind and below him, and for a fraction of a second after releasing that handline he felt stark terror. Lufo did not swim.
Quantrill hung limp in his harness, and by the time Lufo found the pinioned harness ring he was nearing panic himself and knew that Quantrill had drowned.
But his gringa, Sandy, — really never his but wait! perhaps his after all now, — would never leave until they recovered the body. Lufo at last found the harness latches, stripped the inert form from the webbing in brute frenzy, then felt himself rolling backward in the current with Quantrill's body and found that he did, indeed know how to swim as the light of Sandy's lamp grew stronger.
He burst to the surface gasping, eyes wide; felt Quantrill brush his thigh, reached a hand back and caught one ankle. A moment later Sandy and Lufo pulled Ted Quantrill’s blood-streaked body from the water.
As she grasped Quantrill under the arms to pull him further away, Lufo could only sit and gasp,
'Sorry — he was — hung up. Too late.'
But Sandy worked furiously over the body. 'Two or three minutes aren't that long,' she said, and hauled Quantrill's legs up a gypsum slope, rolling him onto his back. 'Come help,' she cried in frustration.
Together they placed Quantrill's body so that Sandy could press on his ribcage while Lufo held his head to one side. They could hear a muffled liquid slosh as Sandy applied sudden pressure, and then, so startling Lufo that he almost released Quantrill's head, an abrupt flow of water, at least half a liter of it, from the open mouth. But he was not breathing.
Sandy continued to force the ribcage bellows. Perhaps another cupful of water trickled out. 'Now, you,'
she panted, and gestured for Lufo to take her place.
Lufo's ministrations brought forth another trickle. Then, pulling Quantrill's chin forward, pinching his nostrils shut, Sandy Grange placed her mouth over his for the first time.
No response. She made Lufo stop, took another breath, force-exhaled again into Quantrill's throat. This time she heard a plopping burble, let more water trickle from the throat, exhaled again into his mouth.
Finally she felt the stilled lungs inflate; let him exhale, force-fed him again. And again, and again. She could hear Lufo repeating the only prayer he remembered: Hail, Mary.
Presently the body coughed, gasped, coughed again, and Sandy fed life to her first love for another two minutes before she was sure his breathing was steady and strong. Then she wept.
Ten minutes later, Ted Quantrill lay wrapped in his dry clothes, shaking, while Sandy rubbed him down with her jacket. He was alert enough to refuse Lufo's offer of a fireman's carry. 'I guess this is what mild shock is like,' he said through chattering teeth.
Sandy wiped her nose and cheeks, sat back on her haunches in the reflection of fantastic shapes of amber and pink. 'You'll be warmer if you can get your clothes on,' she said, her tears of relief ebbing.
He managed, with help. But it was another hour before he regained enough strength to climb up from a cavern that an eleven-year-old girl had navigated, once upon a time.
CHAPTER 68
By microwave scrambler, Lufo contacted the Indy base with news of their success while Sandy robbed his 'cycle's first-aid kit to cover the various rents in Quantrill's hide. The afternoon sun was bright, the breeze soft, yet Quantrill shivered and grunted as Sandy's deft fingertips applied synthoderm and butterfly closures.
Lufo soon found himself patched directly to el jefe, old Jim Street. His companions listened shamelessly to his end of the conversation. At one point Lufo turned to Quantrill. 'Think you can handle your 'cycle as far as the soddy today?'
Quantrill moved his arms and legs, judged the stiffness and the pain; made a face as eloquent as any sigh of resignation.
'I tol' you he's a tough little hombre, jefe. We'll be there in three hours. Uh — can the chopper take us and both 'cycles?' Pause. 'Well, I wouldn' worry about it. I can stay overnight and bring it—'. Longer pause.
Then with some reluctance: 'Oh, I guess he could but I don' see why.' After a moment he glanced at Quantrill, laughed, nodded. 'You could always tie him up, jefe. And you might have to.' Perhaps a minute of silence before, 'Bueno, see you tonight then.' Lufo flicked toggles and removed his headset.
Talking through mouthfuls of sandwich and jerky, Lufo passed his orders on. The Governor's tech crew were antsy to get their hands on the little nuke; several timetables depended on how soon they could inspect and, if necessary, repair it. A late-model surveillance chopper, one of the few stealth craft in Indy hands, would rendezvous at Sandy's place to pick up the canister, Lufo, and one hovercycle.
Quantrill ate slowly and little, heeding the queasiness in his belly. 'So who gets tied up?'
'Ah. Nobody does. You go to Schreiner Ranch tomorrow and tell the safari manager who you are. He's one of us. Seems that a lot of Feds have been searching the area for a necklace that woman lost somewhere. Don' ask me why, but el jefe got word that the Lion of Zion will do almost anything to get his hands on it. And if it's numero uno
