They flew by a small school and entered the first grove of trees, then dropped to flatland pastures. Towns ended abruptly in these sparsely settled regions. Maria knew this road well. Along this area the coast rivers and streams had deposited silt for millennia, making a narrow band of grassy bogs. Behind this lush green ribbon were towering foothills, redwood country that butted up against the mixed conifer forests of the coastal range of northern California. The two-lane road on which they drove meandered along the coastal lowlands at the toe of the hills. Mountain roads spurred off it. One in particular led to a maze of graveled ranch and logging roads that cut deeply into the mountains to the east. This was the route to the backside of the Highlands Forest.
They passed a pickup as though it were standing still. Its blaring horn was lost in the wind.
'Slow down-' Then the car rounded a gentle turn, hit some loose gravel, and began a slide. She saw the white guardrail approaching. 'Jesus.' She stiffened her legs and tensed every muscle, anticipating the crash. By some quirk of spinning tires and centrifugal force, the car came completely around, missing the white steel railing by inches. 'You're gonna kill us,' she said as the car straightened out after the 360.
''Who gave you this money?'' she asked as they fishtailed past a slow-moving van. She didn't really expect an answer. 'The thief knew exactly what he was doing.' Realizing that she was half-yelling, she told herself to talk calmly. Maybe it would help slow him down. 'That guy knows you're back here.'
'That was no guy. And if they were thinking about us, they wouldn't be doing this. They'd be weaving around town.'
''Not necessarily-there are cops back there. In the mountains there are no police. Maybe they want us to follow.'
She studied him, wondering if he'd thought of that. His hands were clenched around the wheel, his expression all grim determination.
'You lost the mustache so I wouldn't recognize you?'
'At least for a few minutes.'
'What exactly is going on here?'
'I was giving you money for a worthy cause. Somebody stole it. That's it.'
Now they were maintaining an even distance of a few hundred yards behind the black sedan and traveling at about eighty miles per hour.
'You're not being straight with me. Tell me who you work for and what they really want. Then maybe I can figure this out.'
'I can't, all right?'
'Fine,' she said.
But of course it wasn't fine.
Ahead, the black car had disappeared from sight. For a few moments neither said anything as Dan increased then-speed around the tree-lined curves, squealing the tires and keeping her knuckles white.
'They're up there. As soon as we get around this bend, we should see them.' She was hoping that would slow him down.
As they rounded the hill, she saw the black sedan take a smoking-tire right up into the mountains. The road followed the Wintoon River Canyon to thousands of square miles of rugged wilderness owned primarily by the government, some by ranchers, some by timber companies, and some by the Hoopa, Yurok, and Tilok tribes.
They drove in near silence up the canyon, the country getting steeper as they went. They passed the first major ridges near the coast and a gorge where hundreds of feet below them there was a series of waterfalls.
'I figure the best way to identify these people is to see where they're going,' he said. 'Fortunately, you started with almost a full tank.'
'It's a rental car. My Cherokee's in the shop.'
'There are no gas stations until you get to Johnson City. On these back roads that's over one hundred twenty miles.'
'Maybe they live up there.'
He didn't reply or say what he thought, but he was obviously planning something.
'So what do we do if we follow them to a house?'
'I stay and watch the place while you tell the clients where the money is.'
Ahead she saw the dark sedan pull to the shoulder. They had entered an isolated stretch of road high on the mountainside. The last mailbox was about two miles behind them.
Dan slowed to normal highway speed. They both peered forward. Barely two cars wide, the asphalt was old and intermittently striped down the center. Narrow gravel shoulders dropped off steeply into a stand of young- growth redwood maybe twenty feet high.
'Oh God,' he breathed. 'They're-'
Maria saw two figures crouched near the back of the sedan when an explosive sound startled her. The bullet hit their right front tire. The car shuddered; another thundering report rang out. The car veered, and Dan's mouth remained unwavering in a determined line, his elbows locked. The outside tire hit the gravel shoulder; rocks shot into the wheel well, creating a clamorous racket. Then over the bank they went, horrible jolts as the car pitched and yawed as if riding a sea of concrete waves.
Instinctively, Maria planted her feet firmly to the floor so that the car's violent shuddering rippled through her body. Flung forward and back despite the bracing posture, her body felt bisected as the seat belt bit into her chest. Small trees disappeared under the front end, but others rose to replace them. Then everything rolled to the right, and she was hurled against the door. One crash was like an explosion as they were knocked around; the car was plunging forward; then a crash was followed by a jolt that felt like it ripped out her ribs. Then silence.
Maria hung from her seat belt and knew they were on their nose. Dust swirled in the partly crushed car, blinding and choking her. Dan's hand on hers pulled her, but she was held in place by her seat belt. Stinging eyes sent tears down her face. Her body felt heavy and began to ache, just now awakening to the bruising.
Above her head was a large tree trunk or branch. Glancing down, she saw a breathtaking abyss whose bottom was a ribbon of deep blue-the river.
'Oh my God,' she whispered. They hung in space at least 200 feet above the river rocks.
An oak branch had speared the windshield and come out the back end as though a giant rapier had run the car through.
The spread of torn and buckled roof from which they hung stretched like a spring, giving bounce to the car as it dangled in the wind.
'Don't move,' he said in a low voice, as if even a small noise might break the ribbon of sheet metal. An eerie mountain wind blew through the twisted openings in the car and made a sound like sighing. The tree was rooted in a tiny shelf on a nearly vertical cliff. The main trunk grew out away from the cliff for a distance of twenty feet or so before curving up to rise nearly parallel to the steep rock face. If the car had slid another three feet down the branch, the front end would have hit the main trunk.
'Maybe we can go out the side window over the roof and into the tree,' he said.
Maria noticed her knee shaking through her tattered nylons and quickly took inventory of her body. Everything was painful, but nothing excruciating.
'We're gonna get out of this,' he said.
Wham! A bullet from a high-powered rifle slammed into the car. There was a creak as the metal stretched.
'God, no,' she heard herself saying.
She froze. She looked at his face and found him appraising her.
'I'm OK,' she muttered.
Another bang shuddered the car. Neither said anything, waiting, feeling the agony of their own mortality.
Looking down at the gray rocks and green river below, with the twisted metal groaning, Maria imagined the long free fall superimposed over the sound of her pounding heart.
'Please let them stop shooting,' she prayed.
'We gotta get out of here. Any second this thing could bust free of the tree.'
But they waited, in the coolness of the wind, their minds searching for a way to free them from the anticipation of being about to fall and yet not falling. Two or three minutes seemed like ten. The leaves were life green; the sky was a hopeful blue; the ants on the luxuriant bark looked busy, unaffected. The chill-was it death or
