Just then, Sam motioned behind his back for Bambi and me to move closer. When we’d closed ranks, Sam glanced over his shoulder at me—and he winked! What in God’s name was that supposed to mean?
About thirty paces ahead, Wolfgang was wading down into the water in his shoes and stockings, without bothering to roll his pants. He held Olivier in front of him, gun to his head, as a shield. The Pod followed just behind, holding a gun in one hand, his knife in the other. I had to hand it to Wolfgang: he must be well acquainted with his kid sister Bettina’s flair with a pistol, and was taking no chances. But I couldn’t help being depressed over Olivier, and not only because I liked him. If we three did try to jump the others, whom we outnumbered by two to one, it might cost Olivier’s life, since he couldn’t swim.
Though it was hard to be cheery in such circumstances, I tried to focus on what Sam might have meant by that wink. It was clear there was something up his sleeve. Knowing Sam, I knew the moment he decided to act we’d all have to think on our feet and take quick action too. But when it happened, it wasn’t what I would have thought of.
Wolfgang and the Pod moved cautiously along the rope, on the upstream side, as we were, using it as a buffer—which would soon prove their big mistake. I could witness their progress by craning left, as Bambi just behind Sam leaned right for a better view.
When they reached midstream, Wolfgang, still with a throttlehold on Olivier, stepped aside from the rope in the rushing waters so the Pod could get past to reach Sam. As Wolfgang moved slightly upstream, holding the white and sick-looking Olivier at gunpoint, Dart inched forward toward Sam’s load of cylinders, still foolishly wielding his knife and gun.
Then casually, almost as if providing assistance to the Pod, Sam lightly flirted the rope that secured his tight parcel of tubes to his back—and before anyone grasped what he was about to do, he’d spilled the buntline hitch and snapped his securing rope free. The haul of hollow lucite tubes started to slip swiftly downstream, headed for the falls.
If memory serves, it was just about then that all hell broke loose.
Pastor Dart dropped his knife in the water and lurched forward across the waist-level rope to grab at the iceberg floating away. But at that instant, Sam shoved the rope deep into the water so the Pod, expecting it higher, lost his balance and flipped forward on his face into the ever rushing waters. Then Sam yanked the rope back up with a snap so it snagged the Pod, hanging him up like a bundle of wet laundry.
As the Pod floundered trying to get off the rope, Wolfgang shoved Olivier to one side for a clean shot at the swiftly retreating mass before it went over the side. But just as he did, an angry black bundle of fur, too long restrained in Olivier’s backpack, exploded right in Wolfgang’s face! I never knew Jason had that many claws, or could deploy them with such rapid-fire, razor-sharp precision.
When Wolfgang threw up his arms to cover his face, Jason track-cleated over them, then over his head, and disappeared behind him. Wolfgang’s gun flew into midair—thanks to a fast-acting Browning and a very resourceful Bambi. Wolfgang screamed curses over the rush of falls, but it didn’t stop him. Holding his bleeding hand, he leapt over the heavy rope to tear after the disappearing mass of tubes, just as Sam barreled into him sideways and they went down together. I glanced around fast, trying to reconnoiter for Olivier—but he’d vanished as swiftly as my cat:
All this happened in seconds. I finally wrestled free my own incapacitating pack of tubes and quickly lashed them to the strong, thick rope to secure them. Then I grabbed the Pod, whose gun had vanished, too, as he was pulling himself upright in the churning waters. As Bambi covered him with her weapon, I stripped off his necktie and tied him tightly by his wrists to the hefty rope, alongside the pack.
Bambi was pulling free her own pack as I climbed across the rope and moved toward Wolfgang and Sam, still churning together in the water. Over my shoulder, Bambi let out a piercing scream. I whipped around to follow her gaze, and I saw Olivier’s body, partly submerged and thrashing but well downstream of us—maybe sixty feet—headed straight for the falls.
I was trying to figure out what in God’s name to do, when just up ahead I saw Wolfgang drag Sam from the water, slug him hard in the jaw, drop him back in the drink again, and plunge off on foot toward the swiftly vanishing object of his desire.
Sam clambered upright, took one look downstream, and caught sight of Olivier. Before I had time to think, he’d dived into the same fast water that was swiftly dragging Olivier toward the falls. Some distance beyond him, Wolfgang—still on his feet and nearly within reach of the iceberg—made a grab for it, missed, lost balance. He went down, and the water grabbed him too.
Bambi had managed to get her pack off and lashed down, while keeping her powder dry. Still holding the gun, she picked her way the short distance to where I stood, a few yards downstream beyond the rope, and she hollered in my ear:
“My God!
