Wilier sucked in a lungful. 'Not possible. They've logged all the vehicles coming over the pass and Biler's wasn't one of them. It hasn't gone through the roadblock south of Espanola either.'
'He could've ditched the car in some back lot in Espanola and gone to ground in a motel.'
'He could've, but he didn't.' Wilier gave the car a little more pedal. The speedometer inched up from 110 to 120, the car rocking back and forth, the darkness rushing past.
'So what do you think he did?'
'I think he went to that so-called monastery, Christ in the Desert, to see that monk. Which is where we're going.'
'What makes you think that?'
Wilier sucked again. Usually he appreciated Hernandez's persistent questions- they helped him think things through-but this time he felt only irritation. 'I don't know why I think it but I think it,' he snapped. 'Broadbent and his wife are mixed up in it, the monk's in on it, and there's a third party out there-the killer - who's also up to his ass in it. They've found something in those canyons and they're locked in a life or death struggle over it. Whatever it is, it's big-so hie that Broadbent blew off the police and stole a truck over it. I mean, Jesus, Hernandez, you got to ask yourself what's so important that a guy like that would risk ten years in Santa Fe Correctional. Here's a guy who's already got everything.'
'Yeah.'
'Even if Broadbent's not at the monastery, I want to have a little chat with that so-called monk.'
23
TOM RECOGNIZED, W!TH a freezing sense of disbelief, that the scream came from Sally. He pressed his mouth to the crack. 'Sally!'
A gasp. 'Tom?'
'Sally! What's happening? Are you all right?'
'My God, Tom! It's you-' She could hardly speak. 'I'm stuck. He's shooting at me.' Another sobbing gasp.
'Sally, I'm here, it's okay.' Tom shone the feeble light down and was shocked to see Sally's face wedged in the crack not two feet below him.
Another boom! from the gun, and Tom heard the zing and rattle of a bullet in the rocks beneath.
'He's shooting into the crack, but he can't see me. Tom, I'm trapped-!'
'I'm going to get you out of here.' He shone the light around. The rock was fractured already and it would just be a matter of breaking up and prying out the pieces. He cast around with the light, shining it up and down the tunnel, looking for a tool. In one corner was a pile of rotting crates and ropes.
'I'll be right back.'
Another shot.
Tom ran to the pile, threw off a rotten coil of rope, searched through a heap of rotting sacks of burlap. Underneath was a broken piece of miner's hand-steel. He grabbed it, ran back.
'Tom!'
'I'm here. I'm going to get you out.'
Another shot. Sally screamed. 'I'm hit! He hit me!'
'My God, where-?'
'In the leg. Oh, my God, get me out.'
'Close your eyes.'
Tom jammed the steel wedge into the crack, picked up a loose rock and slammed it down on the wedge, slammed it again and again. The fractured rock began to loosen. He dropped to his knees and began scrabbling and pulling out the pieces with his hands. The rock was rotten and now that one piece had been removed the work went a lot quicker. All the while he talked to Sally, telling her over and over that she was okay, that she'd be out of there momentarily.
Another shot.
'Tom!'
' You bitch! You 're dead as soon as I reload.'
Tom pried a piece of rock out, threw it aside, pried out another and another, cutting his hands on the sharp edges, working furiously. 'Sally, where did he hit you-?'
'My leg. I don't think it's bad. Just keep going!'
Another shot. Tom hammered the rock, slamming the hand-steel in again and again, prying out more rocks and enlarging the hole. He could see her face.
Now the rock was coming out fast.
Crack! Sally jumped.
'For God's sake keep going!'
The tip broke off the wedge and he swore, turning it around and prying with the other side.
'It's big enough!' Sally cried.
Tom reached down, took her hand, and pulled as she pushed from below, scraping up through the broken rock, more buttons popping off her shirt. It wasn't enough; her hips stuck.
'You 're dead meat!'
Tom drove the hand-steel into the rock, splitting off a chunk of brittle quartz. With complete indifference he noted he had exposed a vein of gold the miners had somehow missed. He tossed it away, pried out another.
'Now!'
He grabbed her under the arms and pulled her free. Another shot sounded from below.
She lay on the ground, filthy, wet, her clothes torn.
'Where are you hit?' He searched her frantically.
'My leg.'
Tom ripped off his own shirt and wiped away the blood, finding a series of
shallow cuts on her calf. He picked out some fragments of stone from a ricochet.
'Sally, it's okay. You'll be fine.'
'That's what I thought.'
'Bitch!' The scream sounded hysterical, unbalanced.
Another pair of shots. A stray bullet ricocheted through the crack and imbedded itself in the ceiling.
'We've got to block this hole,' Sally said.
But Tom was already rolling rocks over. They jammed them into the crack, hammering them down. In five minutes it was blocked.
Suddenly his arms were around her, squeezing tightly.
'God, I thought I'd never see you again,' said Sally with a sob. 'I can't believe it, I can't believe you found me.'
He held her again, hardly believing it himself. He could feel her heart beating wildly. 'Let's go.'
He helped her up and they ran back down through the tunnels, Tom shaking the flashlight from time to time to keep it alive. They climbed up the shaft and in another five minutes had exited the shaft house.
'He'll be coming out the other shaft,' said Sally.
Tom nodded. 'We'll go around the long way.'
Instead of going back over the ridge, they ran into the darkness of the trees at the bottom of the ravine, and there they stopped to catch their breath.
'How's your leg? Okay with walking?'
'Not bad. Is that a gun in your belt?'
'Yeah. A .22 with one round.' Tom looked back over the silvered hillside, his arm supporting Sally.
'My truck's at the gate.'
'He'll be ahead of us,' said Sally.
They set off down the ravine. It was dark in the tall pines, and the carpet of needles under their feet was soft and crackled only slightly, the sounds of their passage covered up by a night breeze sighing through the treetops. Tom paused from time to time to listen and see if the kidnapper was following, but all was silent.
After ten minutes the gulch leveled out into a broad dry wash. Ahead and slightly below shone the lights of the cabin. All seemed quiet, except that the kidnapper's Range Rover was gone.
