The Spanish Kidnapping Disaster

by Mary Downing Hahn

  "What are you doing?" Amy pulled Phillip away. "Even if you got inside, you can't drive."

  "Sh!" I whispered. "Someone's coming."

  We ducked out of sight as a stone rolled out from under a shoe, bounced toward the bus, and pinged against a hubcap. Then Señora Perez came into view, clutching one of her little net grocery bags and muttering to herself.

  Thinking she'd lead us to a village, we let her get a safe distance ahead and then inched down the trail behind her. After following her for at least two miles, we saw lights. It wasn't the village we had hoped for but a farmhouse, clinging all by itself to the side of the mountain. Silently, we watched Señora Perez open a gate, quiet the dogs who greeted her by barking, and vanish into the house.

  Amy sat down on a rock and started crying. Like her, I was cold, hungry, and scared. The only thing that kept me from crying too was my pride. Biting my lip hard, I forced myself to act brave.

  "Come on," I whispered. "We have to keep going. Sooner or later we'll come to the village."

  Cautiously, we crept past the farmhouse, trying not to alert the dogs, but it was hard to be quiet on the dark road. Our shoes slipped on the gravel, and soon the dogs, all three of them, were barking and hurling themselves at the stone wall separating them from us. The farmhouse door opened, and Señora Perez shouted something in Spanish.

  We ran, plummeting down the steep road, skidding on the loose rocks, breathless with fear. Back up the mountainside we scrambled, seeking a hiding place in the boulders. Even after the sound of the dogs faded away behind us, we kept running.

  I paused for breath halfway up a steep hill, and Amy clambered past with Phillip at her heels.

  "Wait, Amy," he called. "Wait."

  She looked back at him from the top of the hill. "Hurry," she yelled.

  Hastily Phillip grabbed at a rock to pull himself up, but it came away in his hand. Before I could catch him, Phillip hurtled backward and tumbled down the hill. By the time I reached him, he was lying on the ground and moaning.

  "Are you hurt?" I dropped to my knees beside him and peered at his pale face.

  "My ankle," he sobbed. "It twisted when I fell. I think it's broken."

  Amy skidded down the hillside and crouched beside her brother. "Are you okay, Phillip?"

  He shook his head. "Why didn't you wait? You just kept running and running. I thought you were going to leave me here."

  "I'm sorry." Now Amy was crying too. "I didn't think you'd fall, I just wanted you to run faster."

  While Amy apologized, I looked behind me, down the mountainside we'd just climbed. Far, far away, I saw the lights of Señora Perez's farmhouse. As I watched, they went out, one by one. The night seemed darker without them. And colder.

  "Help me get him on his feet, Felix," Amy said.

  Between the two of us we hoisted Phillip up. He put one arm over Amy's shoulder and the other over mine, but the inequality of our heights kept us from making much progress on the rough, uneven ground.

  Soon Amy and I were breathing hard, and Phillip was whimpering with pain. Every time we jostled him, he cried out. "Stop," he sobbed at last. "I can't go any farther."

  We eased Phillip down on a grassy mound sheltered by a group of boulders. He leaned against a rock and looked at Amy and me.

  "You're going to have to leave me here and get help," he said.

  "No, Phillip." Amy shook her head hard. "I promised Daddy I'd take care of you."

  "You have to." Phillip's face was ashy white, and his voice shook. "I can't walk, and you can't carry me."

  "How can we leave you here all by yourself?" I looked around at the mountains, dappled with moonlight and sharp, dark shadows. It made me shiver just to think about being alone in such a desolate place.

  "Suppose wild animals come?" Amy asked.

  "Or Orlando?" I would have preferred to face a pack of wolves than the Spaniard. At least animals don't carry guns. And sometimes you can scare them off with rocks.

  Phillip scowled at us. "I'm not scared of wild animals," he said. "And Orlando won't find me this far away. I'll be perfectly safe."

  I bit my lip and considered the situation. If the three of us stayed here, Orlando would find us eventually—alive or dead. We didn't have food or water, and our clothes weren't warm enough for the night air. How long could we expect to survive?

  Then I realized something else. Turning to Phillip, I said, "But you're the only one who knows Spanish. How will we get help without you? How can we explain who we are or what's happened?"

  "You'll just have to find someone who speaks English," Phillip said.

  "Out here, in the middle of nowhere?" I stared at him. "If you were a Spanish person lost in the mountains of West Virginia, would you expect to find somebody who spoke your language?"

  "I told you to listen to my tape." Phillip sounded a bit more like his ordinary self. "But no, all you two did on the plane was read dumb books and magazines."

  Frowning, he reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out his little Spanish phrase book. "Here," he said. "Maybe this will help."

  As I took the book, Amy and I stared at each other. Over our heads, the stars shone and a half moon gazed down at us. Never had I felt so helpless.

  "Go on," Phillip said.

  "Are you sure you'll be okay?" I asked him.

  He nodded. "Just get me some stones before you go," he said, "so I'll have something to throw if a bear or a wolf comes along."

  For several minutes, Amy and I gathered stones and silently piled them up around Phillip. When he told us he had enough, I turned away slowly, clutching the book.

  While Amy hesitated, Phillip said, "Will you just go? The sooner you leave, the sooner you'll get some help for me."

  Without saying anything to each other, Amy and I walked down the hillside, leaving Phillip behind. I looked back once, and he waved. The moonlight shining on his glasses made it impossible to tell if he were crying or not. But even if he were, he had a lot more courage than I'd thought.

  15

  It was the first time Amy and I had been alone together since the fateful day we'd met Grace in Toledo. Every now and then, as we stumbled down the rough slope, I'd clear my throat, trying to think of something to say, but the words wouldn't come. For some reason, I just couldn't bring myself to apologize.

  Finally Amy broke the silence. "I can't believe this is happening," she said. "It's like a nightmare I can't wake up from."

  Glancing at her, I was amazed at the expression on her face. We were lost on a rocky hillside in the mountains of Spain, but, instead of trying to find a way out, Amy was frowning at me as if I were responsible for the entire situation.

  "Will you quit blaming me?" The wind was cutting right through my tee-shirt and whipping my hair into my eyes. "I'm sorry, okay? I'm sorry!" I was shouting but I didn't care. "You were right. I shouldn't have told Grace all that stuff."

  Amy's hair had fallen out of its barrettes long ago, and the wind had snarled it into a tangled mass. Her face was streaked with dirt and tears, and she was missing one sandal, something I hadn't noticed before.

  "If I ever see Daddy again, I'm going to tell him this was all your fault," Amy said.

  "I don't care what you tell him, you goody-goody little tattletale," I said. "At least Phillip and I got us out of that cave. If we'd stayed there like you wanted to, we'd probably be dead now."

  "Thanks to you, we're probably going to die anyhow." Amy looked back up the mountain as if she were searching for Phillip's hiding place. "I might never see my brother again or Daddy or anybody I care about!"

  When Amy started sobbing, I grabbed her arms and shook her. "Stop it," I said, "stop it! Crying isn't going to get us out of here!"

  She pulled away from me and stumbled backward uphill. "I hate you," Amy screamed, "I loathe and despise you, Felicia Flanagan!"

  "Same here!" I screamed back.

  "I hope my father divorces your mother and I never see you again!"

 
"Same here!"

  "If Daddy doesn't get a divorce, I'll go live with my mother!"

  "And I'll go live with my father!"

  Out of breath and shivering in the cold, we glared at each other. Then I turned and ran down the mountain, hoping I was heading toward the road. As far as I was concerned, Amy could stay in the mountains forever. I'd apologized and look how she'd acted. Just as nasty as ever.

  While I was thinking up insults to hurl at Amy, a rock spun out from under my shoe. Flapping my arms wildly, I tried to keep my balance, but I fell anyway and slid several feet downhill on my side.

  As I crashed into a boulder, Amy called, "I hope you broke your leg! It would serve you right!"

  Ignoring her, I sat up and looked at myself. My jeans were ripped and the skin on my thigh was scraped and raw. Even in the moonlight, I could see blood welling up, black against the whiteness of my flesh. Gritting my teeth, I got to my feet. It hurt, but I could walk.

  As I hobbled along, I heard Amy behind me. Wheeling around, I said, "If you hate me so much, how come you're following me?"

  Amy gave me a fierce look. "Hating you doesn't have anything to do with it!" she yelled. "I'm scared and I'd rather be with you than nobody!"

  Well, I was scared too. In fact, I was just about dead from terror, but I didn't want to admit it to Amy. I stood there, slightly below her on the hillside, listening to my heart thumping hard in my chest. Fighting my desire to throw myself down on the rocks and cry like a baby, I tried to think about our situation sensibly. Here we were, lost in Spain with kidnappers hunting us, and what were we doing? Fighting like little kids.

  Swallowing my pride, I forced myself to say, "Maybe we should quit arguing, Amy, and try to figure out what to do."

  She rubbed her eyes with her fists and stared at me. "Do you know where you're going?"

  "No," I confessed.

  "I didn't think so," she muttered.

  Without looking at each other, we sat down on a rocky outcropping. For a while neither of us spoke. My leg hurt, and I was cold, tired, and hungry—goat stew, porridge, anything would have tasted good at this point. Finally, my stomach growled so loudly Amy looked at me.

  "I've got some cheese crackers," she said. "You can have half." Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out a smashed pack and gave me two crackers.

  "I was saving them for Phillip and me," she admitted as I bit into one.

  I shrugged and glanced at her, but the wind was blowing so hard her hair hid her face.

  "I hope he's okay," she said.

  "Me too."

  "He must be hungry though. And cold."

  I nodded, but I didn't look at Amy. What could I say? I was worried about Phillip too. "We'll find somebody to help us," I said after a while.

  Swallowing the last of my crackers, I surveyed the landscape spread out below me. Way off to the right, I thought I saw a cluster of lights. Then very faintly I made out the thin winding line of the road curving around the hills far below.

  Nudging Amy, I said, "I think that's the road."

  Slowly we got to our feet and began climbing down the hillside. Because my leg was stiffening up, I couldn't race ahead of Amy. By the time we reached the road, I was several yards behind her and limping.

  ***

  After we'd walked for about an hour without seeing a single house, we stopped to rest on a low stone wall. A breeze blew through the olive trees behind us and we shivered.

  "I wonder what time it is," Amy said.

  I squinted at my watch, trying to make out the numbers. "I think it's around midnight."

  "I'm so tired," Amy said. "If only we could sleep for a while."

  "Maybe if we walk a little farther, we'll come to a barn or something," I said.

  I eased myself off the wall, and Amy and I trudged down the road. We passed a field where a herd of sheep slept as still and white as boulders in the moonlight and another field where cows slumbered—or were they bulls? Finally under a tall tree I saw a small stone stable, far enough from the road to make me feel sure Orlando wouldn't find us there.

  We climbed over a wall and crept through the damp grass. Ahead I could see more sleeping cattle, but we edged past without disturbing them and slipped into the stable.

  Although its door was gone, it had a roof, and in one corner I saw a pile of burlap sacks. Ignoring their old barnyard odor, we made a nest of them and snuggled down, warmer than we had been before.

  "I hope Phillip doesn't freeze up there," Amy whispered after a while.

  "The rocks will shelter him," I said. "And the bushes."

  Amy was silent, but when I was almost asleep, she turned toward me and asked, "Do you really hope our parents divorce each other?"

  I frowned into the darkness. Much as I hated to admit it, my mother loved Don. She'd been so happy when he asked her to marry him. Uncomfortably, I remembered her telling me I was going to have a real family now, a father, a brother, and a sister. But all I'd wanted was Mom. And my own true father, the one who'd gone away when I was three and married someone else. The one who didn't want me anymore.

  "Well?" Amy asked when I didn't answer her question.

  "What about you?" I stared into the darkness, trying to see her face. I wanted her to answer first, not me. "If they stay together, are you going to live with your mother?"

  Amy shook her head. "I'd never leave my father," she said. "Not even if my mother wanted me to."

  Amy's voice shook a little, and, after a pause, she added, "My father is the one I love, not my mother. After what she did to Daddy, how could I ever trust her?"

  "But your father lives with my mother, and that includes me because I'm certainly not going to leave." Like Amy, I hesitated before I added, "My father doesn't need me. He has a new wife and a new baby now. What would he want with me? I'm just his old kid."

  "So I'm stuck with you, is that what you're saying?" Amy asked me.

  "And I'm stuck with you and Phillip."

  There was a little silence. I guess, like me, Amy was thinking about the implications of what we'd just confessed. Then her burlap sacks rustled as she propped herself up to see me better.

  Staring directly at me, she asked, "Do you hate my father?"

  I thought about Don. He was quiet and shy, kind of like Phillip. Not handsome like my real father, not rich, but not really boring. And Mom was happier now that he was around, I couldn't deny that. Maybe by the time we got back home—if we ever did—I'd be used to sharing Mom with him. I sighed and rearranged my burlap sacks.

  "No," I said to Amy, "I don't hate your dad. He's okay most of the time, I guess."

  I paused and looked at her. "How about you? Do you hate my mother?"

  Amy shook her head. "Actually I kind of like her," she said. "Even if she can't cook."

  "It's just me you don't like." I was sitting up now, ready to get mad again if I had to.

  "Well, you don't like me," she said. "Or Phillip. So why should I like you?"

  It was a good question but one I didn't want to answer at the moment. In the first place, I'd changed my mind about Phillip. He wasn't so bad after all. And, in the second place, I was even beginning to relent a little about Amy, but she obviously disliked me, so why give myself away? To use her own words, I was a showoff, know-it-all idiot.

  Snuggling up in my burlap sacks, I said, "We better get some sleep."

  I closed my eyes and waited for Amy to say something else, but all I heard from her was a sigh. As I lay there, trying to ignore the musty reek of the burlap, I realized I was hoping Amy would come up with some excuse for liking me anyway.

  For a few minutes, I thought about telling her I was willing to be friends, but by the time I got the words together it was too late. Amy was sound asleep.

  16

  When I woke up, it was barely light. For a moment I was so confused I thought I was still in the cave. Amy was shaking me, her hair tickling my face.

  "Felix," she whispered urgently, "Felix! Somebody's outsid
e!"

  "Huh? What?" I sat up and pushed aside the evil-smelling burlap sacks.

  Amy pointed at the doorway. As it was yesterday, the air was foggy gray. Hidden in the mist, someone was definitely approaching the stable. I could hear shuffling footsteps and soft breathing.

  "It must be Charles and Orlando," Amy told me. "What should we do?"

  "Stay still," I warned her. "Maybe they won't see us."

  But the footsteps came closer. From the sound of them squish-squashing through the damp grass, I was sure it was a lot more than two people. Had Charles and Orlando recruited a whole gang of kidnappers to find us?

  Amy and I huddled together, expecting to be recaptured at any moment. Then I heard it—a low mooing sound. Opening my eyes, I saw a cow staring through the stable door.

  At the sight of its big tan head, Amy and I burst into laughter.

  "Cows," Amy giggled. "We've been surrounded by cows!"

  "Oh, no," I said, "it's a herd of cownappers. They're trying to horn in on the action." I collapsed on the floor, practically hysterical over my own joke. "Horn in —get it?"

  Despite the pain in my sore leg, I was laughing so hard tears were running down my cheeks. "They've mined the pasture with their secret weapon—cow plops!"

  "Mooooo," the cow said loudly.

  "Oh, I'm so sorry, Madame Cow," I said, staring up at its brown eyes. "Did I butt into your private business?"

  Right in the middle of a loud guffaw from Amy, I had a thought so terrible that it left me weak in the knees and dry in the mouth.

  "Amy," I plucked at her sleeve, afraid to take my eyes off the horned head poking into the shed. "Suppose it's not a cow? Suppose it's a bull?"

  Her eyes widening, Amy scrambled away from the door and flattened herself against the back wall. "How can you tell which it is?" she asked me.

  I was right beside her, as far from the beast as I could get. "If we could see the rest of its body, we'd know," I whispered, "but all that's showing is its head. Cows' horns aren't that long, are they?"