Jack took Melinda's hand. “Some job,” he whispered.
“I know,” Melinda whispered back in a scared voice.
Outside, the storm grew in power. Underneath the town, a woman began planting charges of dynamite deep in the darkness of the caves.
Sam walked into his apartment, went to his old recliner, sat down, placed his hands over his face and began crying. Momma Peach stood in the doorway to the apartment and watched Sam cry. Tears began falling from her eyes, too.
“I’m gonna help you, Sam,” Momma Peach promised without realizing that Old Mac was standing right beside her right foot. Old Mac wasn't in the mood to scare Momma Peach and wandered away.
Chapter Eight
“What now, Momma Peach?” Sam asked. He wiped away his tears after a long time and cleared his voice.
“Now we do what hurts the most,” Momma Peach told Sam and gently rubbed his shoulder. “I sure am sorry. If we were back in Georgia, why, I’d serve you up a slice from one of my famous peach pies.”
Sam looked up into Momma Peach's caring eyes. “I guess I knew...somehow...all along. I just didn't want to admit the truth to myself...admit I've been a fool all of these years,” he explained in a hurt voice. “You know, when Stephanie found out her womb was barren, she blamed me. I understood her anger and let it roll off my back. It's hard on a woman when she is told she will never bear and nurture a child of her own. Yet...somehow...in the end, Stephanie seemed relieved that she couldn't have children. It was almost like, well, the good in her was happy that the evil in her couldn't have children...yet, the good was still angry and hurt. Does that make sense?”
“Yes,” Momma Peach promised Sam, “it sure does.”
Sam stood up from his recliner and walked over to the television. “I remember when I bought this old set,” he told Momma Peach in a sad voice. “Stephanie fussed and complained because she wanted a newer model, but something about this old fashioned one appealed to me. This old set reminded me of myself.” Sam smiled a hurt smile and shook his head. “I guess when this storm passes, I'll pack up what I can and move on. I reckon I can't stay in Gold Dust anymore...not after this.”
Momma Peach walked over to Sam and patted his shoulder. “I wish you’d come and live in my town in Georgia.”
Before Sam could answer her kind offer, Michelle thrust open the apartment door. Her face was panicked. “Michael and William,” she started to say.
George burst past Michelle into the apartment. His face was filled with fear and desperation. “My kids...someone took my kids,” he screamed at Sam. “I was in Henry's room with my wife discussing the storm. I didn't want the children hearing. Henry was in our room, watching the boys...he said they were standing beside the window looking out into the rain and—”
Henry pushed himself into the apartment. His face was pale. “I went to the bathroom for a second, that's it,” he promised in a shaking voice. “When I came out of the bathroom…the window in the room was open. The rain was pouring in...and Michael and William were gone... I just went into the bathroom for a second, I promise.” He dropped his face into his hands.
George reached out and grabbed Henry by his shoulder. “It's okay, son,” he said, “this isn't your fault.” George looked at Sam. “I'm holding you personally responsible if anything happens to my boys, do I make myself clear? Now you figure out a way to call the State Patrol office and you do it now!”
Sam felt guilt grab his chest. “You crossed the line, Stephanie,” he whispered as he looked into the face of a terrified father. “I know where your kids are and I'm going to go get them and put an end to this.”
“I'm coming with you,” George snapped.
“No, sir,” Sam said, “you're not. I'm going down into a very deadly cave. I'm not risking your life. I'll bring your kids back and after that, you can sue me for every penny I have. I sure wouldn't blame you.”
“Oh, give me strength,” Momma Peach said and threw a glance at Michelle. “Baby, I might not fit down into the ground, but I’m sure gonna try.”
“No,” Michelle begged. “Sam and I will go.”
“I’m going to squeeze down into the earth, too,” Momma Peach said and focused on Sam. “Sam, go get them ropes folks use to lower themselves down the sides of rocks. We're going spelunking.”
Michelle disappeared. Seconds later, she reappeared at the door, holding Andy by the back of his shirt. “Tell Sam where the second entrance is located,” she demanded. “Two innocent kids have been taken. Now talk!”
“Left room in the courthouse...right when you walk through the front door,” Andy told Sam, struggling in Michelle’s grip. “The entrance is in the far right back corner.”
Sam rubbed the back of his neck. “I didn't replace any boards in that room,” he admitted in an angry voice. “The boards were steady enough for my liking.”
“A small tunnel is under the floor in that room and runs down at an angle into the main cave,” Andy explained. “It's a tight fit, too. But you concreted over the main entrance. Your wife wasn't interested in breaking through any more concrete. She'll be using the smaller entrance and waiting for you to worm your way into her spider web. Why do you think she took those two kids?”
“It’s a trap,” Sam said.
Andy nodded his head. “Sam, I know what everyone standing here thinks of me, and that's cool. I could care less. A week from now, you people won't matter to me. But tonight, I'm sticking with the good guys because if I don't, your wife will kill me and stuff my body into a dark corner down in one of those tunnels. I'm pretty sure I'm a dead man walking anyway. Mendez isn't going to like that I ran my mouth, but at least I still have a few more days to live.”
“What's your point?” Sam snapped.
“Your wife isn't going to let anyone in this town live,” Andy snapped back. “She has crates loaded with dynamite down there. She's going to blow the bottom out from under this town, you idiot.”
“Watch your mouth, boy,” Momma Peach growled at Andy.
“Yeah, sure,” Andy said and rolled his eyes. “I'm through talking.” And with those words, Andy Dannity never spoke another word.
“Dynamite?” George asked. He looked at Henry with scared eyes. “Son, go get your mother and drive her east and—”
“The flood will kill them before they drive half a mile,” Sam warned George.
“They'll die in this miserable hole if they stay!” George yelled at Sam.
Momma Peach glanced down at the floor and began thinking. There was no way a woman Mr. Sam's age could snatch two children alone. There was no way Mrs. Sam's daddy could carry a child down into the caves who most likely would be kicking and fighting, never mind two. Mrs. Sam, Momma Peach thought, had someone helping her. But who? “Go get the ropes, Sam,” she said in a low whisper. “Trap or not, we're not leaving two sweet babies to die down in a dark hole.”
“My rappelling gear is in the back room over at the general store,” Sam told Momma Peach. He walked over to Michelle and put his hands on her left shoulder. “You're in charge, Detective Chan. I trust your judgment. So tell me what to do.”
Michelle stared into Sam's eyes. “Two children have been taken,” Michelle said in a steady voice. “I have a duty to perform, not just as a cop, but as a human being. Let's go get your gear.” Michelle turned to Henry. “Henry, take your dad back to your room and stay there with your mom. Jack and Melinda will watch Andy. If we're not back in three hours, leave this place...flood or no flood.”
Henry let his eyes rest on Michelle's beautiful face. Michelle's eyes told him what it meant to be a man. “Come on, dad,” he said and walked George out of the apartment.
“You, go sit back down,” Michelle ordered Andy. Andy did as ordered. Jack and Melinda positioned themselves in front of Andy. Andy wasn't in the mood to tangle with two people who were wired up enough to argue with a grizzly bear.
“Let's go,” Michelle said. “Momma Peach, I—”
“Let's go,”
Momma Peach interrupted Michelle. She walked out of the apartment, straight into the lobby, yanked open the front door, and stepped out into the dark storm. Howling winds and angry rainwater slapped her in the face. “Give me strength,” she prayed and stepped off the front porch into the flooding street. A dark figure was standing in front of the courthouse. When Momma Peach walked out into the storm, the figure vanished back into the courthouse. “Don't make any sense,” Momma Peach told herself. And then, she remembered the broom. “Of course,” she said and spun around just in time to see Michelle and Sam appear.
“What is it?” Michelle asked.
“Remember the broom sitting outside the kitchen behind the restaurant?” Momma Peach asked and slapped at the falling rain like each droplet was an annoying fly.
“Yes.”
“Someone used the broom to erase their tracks,” Momma Peach explained.
Michelle wasn't sure what direction Momma Peach was going in. “Momma Peach, help me out.”
“A third entrance,” Momma Peach said in a low voice. “Michelle, the broom marks on the ground were walking away from the back door, not to the side. If Mrs. Milkson's body...oh, rest her poor soul...had been taken to the entrance up there in that old courthouse, the broom tracks would have been walking up the side of the building. The broom marks wouldn't have walked straight out into the desert.”
Thunder exploded overhead and rattled the ground. Sam looked down at his feet and studied the flooded street. “Current has stopped,” he said worriedly. “Water over our ankles now. We better hurry and make a plan, ladies.”
“I have a plan,” Momma Peach told Sam and pointed at the courthouse. “We're being watched,” she said and quickly covered her head when a bright blue and white flash of lightning zigzagged down from the dark sky and struck the hanging tree sitting in front of the courthouse. The tree let out a furious crack as fire exploded through the rain-soaked wood. “Give me strength,” Momma Peach begged. “Baby,” she told Michelle, “you and Sam go get his gear and come back to this exact spot and act like you're getting ready to go mess with a rowdy horse with them ropes. I'm going back to the hotel and out the back. In exactly thirty minutes you two walk over to the courthouse and stand guard in the room with the second entrance in it. Shoot anyone who comes out of that hole that isn't me. Oh, give me strength,” Momma Peach said again and hurried back to the hotel before Michelle could object.
“What do we do?” Sam asked as he watched Momma Peach vanish. “If there is a third entrance, Momma Peach will need rope to get down.”
Michelle drew in a deep breath of rainwater. “Sam, I've come to trust Momma Peach with my life. She knows the deal. Let's go get your gear and do what Momma Peach asked us to do.”
“Yeah, but—” Sam said worriedly.
“Arguing with Momma Peach gets you nowhere,” Michelle interrupted Sam and offered a kind smile. “Momma Peach is a clever woman, Sam. Her brain doesn't work like ours. She thinks in a way that runs me into a corner sometimes, to be honest. In the end, though, Momma Peach always catches her man and goes back to baking her peach pie. How? I don't know. She's just...Momma Peach.”
Sam studied the front door of the hotel. “Okay, I trust you,” he said. “Stay here and keep watch. I'll go get my gear.” Sam knew as he walked over to the general store that he had to act alone. Gold Dust was his town and he was responsible for every life in the town, including Momma Peach.
Michelle watched Sam walk through the storm. Inside the hotel, Momma Peach rushed through the lobby. “No time to talk,” she waved at Jack and Melinda and ran down the hallway. Jack and Melinda watched Momma Peach force the back door open and race out into the storm.
“What was that all about?” Melinda asked.
“I'm sure we'll find out,” Jack replied. “I'm sure by the time this storm passes we'll have all the answers we need.”
Outside in the darkness, Momma Peach began carefully making her way down the back of the hotel toward the restaurant. Her eyes focused on the dangerously flooding desert in the distance. “I’m going spelunking,” she told the storm, “and I ain't coming back until I have a dead spider.” What Momma Peach didn't know was that Old Mac was hitching a ride on the back of her dress. Momma Peach wasn't after Old Mac though. The spider she was after was much deadlier.
Lightning flickered again out in the distance, throwing a glowing mask over the desert floor.
“Okay, Mr. Sam, teach me how to find a hole,” Momma Peach said and grabbed the broom leaning against the back side of the restaurant and slowly began walking out into the desert. The rainwater was lower in the back of the buildings than out in the street, but the water still covered Momma Peach's feet. The ground beneath her feet felt muddy and uncertain in places, but Momma Peach kept walking, keeping her eyes on the water, trying to decode which way the current in the water was moving. The current, as far as Momma Peach could tell, seemed to be flowing in a strange pattern, as if the current was fighting to go one way but was being forced to flow in another direction. “Now, if there was a hole in the ground somewhere out here,” Momma Peach said using the handle of the broom as a walking stick, “pulling the water into it, would this here current be acting this erratic? Well, there's only one way for me to find out.”
Momma Peach continued to walk straight out into the desert. Open, wet land stood before her. The old buildings behind her started to distance themselves and she could feel them watch her as if with worried eyes pleading for Momma Peach to come back to shore. Momma Peach kept walking. Then, over the sounds of the rushing rain and howling winds, she heard the sound of falling water. “Bingo!” Momma Peach smiled. She cautiously changed her direction and began moving straight east. Ten yards later, she stopped at a large, dark hole standing wide open. Momma Peach tossed the broom to the side and dropped down to her knees. The rainwater was flooding into the dark hole, forming a very powerful waterfall. But the waterfall wasn't the only thing Momma Peach saw. Her right hand felt downward until it struck the edge of a board. “What is this?” With great difficulty, she lifted a hand-built wooden covering out of the rainwater. The wooden covering had desert style camouflage nailed to the top of it. “Clever way to hide a hole in the ground,” Momma Peach said and dropped the wooden covering back down into the rainwater, peering her head over the edge of the dark hole. “Ain't no one going to lower a dead body down into this here hole with a rope. Too risky and too time-consuming.” Momma Peach slapped rainwater away from her eyes. “No one would want to be seen standing out here by this hole with a dead body, either. I know this here hole has to have a ladder to it. Ladders are quick and convenient.”
Momma Peach drew in a deep, scared breath, leaned her body over the edge of the hole, and reached her right arm down into the darkness to feel around. At first, all she felt was a wet, slippery rock wall. But then her right hand struck the side of a metal ladder that had been fastened securely into the side of the rock wall. “Bingo!” Momma Peach felt fear and excitement rush through her soaking wet body. “If I survive this, I’m going to soak in a hot bath for the rest of my life, yes sir and yes ma’am, oh give me the strength,” Momma Peach whispered. With great courage and a whispered prayer for grace, she drew in a deep breath and began the difficult task of sliding her body down into the dark hole and onto the metal ladder. Her right foot slipped once and she nearly crashed all the way down to the bottom of the hole. Old Mac held on for dear life. “Be still my beating heart,” Momma Peach said as she held onto the metal ladder with wide, scared eyes. “I don't want to fall and be a pancake.”
Momma Peach steadied her nerves and let her eyes look down. From the sound of the falling rainwater, the bottom of the hole seemed a long way down to Momma Peach. “Get moving,” she fussed at her hands and feet, “ain't no sense in hanging around being rained on like some poor old donkey standing out in a field.”
With trembling hands, Momma Peach began to climb down the metal ladder. Inch by inch and step by step, she climbed dow
n into the earth. The deeper she climbed into the earth, the more she became aware of a faint light at the bottom of the hole. “Now what is that light?” Momma Peach asked herself. When she reached the bottom of the hole, she stepped off the ladder with shaky legs into a rocky chamber of a cave that was no bigger than a walk-in closet. A narrow tunnel branched off from the room, heading back toward town. Old rusty kerosene lanterns were mounted to the walls of the tunnel, casting out beautiful, welcoming light. That was curious – who had lit the lanterns? The only problem was, the rainwater was flooding the tunnel. Momma Peach was standing up to her waist in water. Old Mac crawled up onto her shoulder. Momma Peach looked down and saw Old Mac on her shoulder as if he wanted to say hello. “Oh...my…” Momma Peach said in a terrified whisper and nearly took off running down the tunnel. “Be calm...be calm...just walk... Old Mac won't hurt you...he's a friendly little guy...yes ma’am and yes...sir...friendly little spider...just walk...walk...” Momma Peach waded gingerly through the water over to the entrance to the tunnel, stuck her head in, and examined the wet rock walls. The kerosene lanterns were burning bright, set at twenty feet from one another. “Old Mac...be kind to me,” Momma Peach begged and started making her way down the narrow tunnel. Old Mac got comfortable.
As Momma Peach eased down the tunnel, she was forced to hold onto the sides of the tunnel in order to keep the strong current from sweeping her away. Ten minutes later, the tunnel opened up into a small room. Two tunnels branched off from the small room. The flood waters were being dragged downhill into the far-left tunnel, leaving the right tunnel somewhat dry. Momma Peach moved over to the right tunnel, grateful to wade out of the rushing waters, and peered down the right tunnel to see what she could see. As she did, a voice cried out: “Leave us alone!”
“Shut up you brat,” a bitter voice yelled back.
A Peachy Mess Page 12
