Captive!

by Gary Paulsen

  “This doesn’t make sense,” Woody said. “Ripper told Miss Bently he was taking us to the desert.”

  “He lied, stupid.” Jeff bounced in the air and came down hard. “Ouch! What do you think, he’s gonna give away the location of his hideout so she can run and tell the police?”

  “We could be anywhere.” Mitch sighed and tried to find something to hold on to. “They’ll never find us.”

  Suddenly the truck plunged downward and stopped. They could hear the two men get out and slam the doors but couldn’t see anything. It was silent for a few minutes and then they heard Ripper yelling.

  “Hurry and get it covered up. It’ll be daylight soon and we don’t want no nosy neighbors seeing anything.”

  Something loud crashed over their heads, and they could hear dirt and bits of gravel hitting the top of the truck. It happened again and again. The last sound they heard was the scrape of a shovel picking up more dirt. Then it was quiet.

  “I don’t like it,” Mitch said. “Something’s wrong. Real wrong.”

  Roman moved to the windows. Nothing was visible. He tried the door. It was locked.

  “Where do you think we are?” Woody asked. “It’s really getting cold in here.”

  Roman hit the back door with his fist. “I’ll tell you where we are. We’re buried alive!”

  CHAPTER 6

  Jeff kicked the door. It didn’t budge. He sat down in disgust. “What’s the big plan now, smart guy? Thanks to you, we’re all gonna die down here in this makeshift coffin.”

  “My dad always said when you’re in trouble, take stock of everything you have.” Roman took his knife out. “Let’s take inventory. We’ve got my knife—”

  “What good is a lousy knife going to do us?” Jeff sneered. “You think you’re going to cut your way out of this metal can?”

  “Shut up, Jeff!” Mitch yelled. “If you’re not going to be part of the solution then just keep your mouth shut.”

  “I haven’t heard a solution yet.” Jeff folded his arms. “And anytime you think you’re big enough to make me—”

  “This isn’t getting us anywhere.” Woody sat on the floor near Roman. “The best I can figure, if the authorities go for Ripper’s demands we’ll be down here a couple of days. If they don’t, then Ripper probably intends to leave us down here permanently. Either way he’s not going to feed us or check on us.”

  Mitch rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “So what you’re saying is, since they’re not going to check on us we’re free to do whatever we can to get out of here.”

  Woody nodded. “They probably dug this hole large enough for the school bus to fit in. So once we’re out of the truck we’ll have some room to move around.”

  Roman stood up and felt around one of the windows in the back of the truck. “If I can loosen this rubber seal maybe one of us could get through here.”

  Carefully he cut the seal with his knife. It was slow going because he couldn’t see and had to feel his way around it.

  “I think I’ve got it. Mitch, see if you can lift one of those bread racks down. We’ll try to ram it through the window.”

  Mitch reached up and felt for the closest rack. “It comes loose. I think I can …”

  Jeff moved over to help him. Mitch smiled in the darkness. “It’s about time you learned to be a team player.”

  “Shut up and pick up your end.”

  When they got it down, Roman grabbed a side. “Woody, you get around on the other side. Okay, everybody back up a few steps. We’ll run for the window on three. One … two … three …”

  They made a wild charge. The heavy rack hit the little window and shattered it into a thousand pieces.

  “Yes!” Woody shouted. “We did it.”

  Roman took off his coat and used it to clear away the sharp pieces of glass around the edges. “Come here, Worm. You’re the smallest so you get to go through.”

  Roman lifted him up to the window. “Watch out for broken glass.”

  Woody crawled through headfirst and tumbled to the ground. He stood up and brushed himself off. “I’m out. Now what?”

  “First let’s have some light. I’m tired of being a mole.”

  Woody ran to the front seat and turned on the truck’s inside light. The three boys in the back grinned at each other. Roman yelled, “Now the headlights!”

  Woody put the headlights on and the underground cavern lit up. There was a space of about ten feet in front of the truck and only about two feet on either side. The roof of the hole was made of wooden planks covered with dirt.

  Woody shook his head. “Man, if they’d driven the school bus in here it would have been a tight fit.”

  Mitch put his face in the window. “Say, Worm, how about letting us out?”

  Woody found the keys Spoon had carelessly left in the ashtray and moved around to the back of the truck.

  Jeff stepped out first. “Man, am I glad to be out of there. I honestly thought I’d never get out of this tin box.”

  Roman looked at his watch in the headlights. “It’s gonna be daylight soon. If we want to get away from here, we better start moving.”

  He looked at the walls of the pit. They were all straight up and down except for the way they had driven in. Roman ran back to the driveway and climbed up the sloping dirt entrance. He pushed with all his might on the planks at the top, but they were too heavy for him to move.

  “They must have piled a lot of dirt on top of us,” Roman said. “We’ll have to dig our way out. Look in the truck and get anything you can find to dig with.”

  In the glove compartment Woody found a screwdriver. Mitch pulled off the rearview mirror, and Jeff found a coffee mug under the front seat. Roman used Woody’s screwdriver to loosen the license plate.

  They climbed the slope and dug in a frenzy near the edge of the last plank. It was easy digging because the dirt was soft and already loose. It wasn’t long until they had scooped out a small hole.

  Roman nudged Woody and whispered, “Go back to the truck and turn off the lights. Grab your pack and anything else out of the front you think might be useful.”

  One at a time they inched out of the hole. Woody was the last one out. He handed up his pack and then climbed out after it.

  It was too dark to tell anything about their location. Roman thought he could make out the shape of a house nearby, but he couldn’t be sure. And for all they knew it could be the kidnappers’ hideout.

  “What I wouldn’t give for a flashlight right about now,” Roman whispered.

  “No flashlight.” Woody reached in his pack and brought out a small white package. “But I did find some matches.”

  “Great. Come on.” Roman headed for some nearby trees. “Let’s find some cover and decide what our next move is.”

  CHAPTER 7

  “We’ve been walking for hours.” Mitch stopped to catch his breath. “The sun’s up and we’re going nowhere. I think I’ve seen these same stupid trees three times.”

  Roman sat down on a rock. “You’re right. None of us knows anything about traveling in the mountains. If we’re not careful, we’ll wind up lost and in worse shape than we were before.”

  “I’m pretty sure we should keep heading downhill,” Woody said. “I read somewhere that you should do that if you ever got lost.”

  “We’ve been heading downhill, Worm.” Jeff fell to the ground beside Roman. “We just keep running into more trees.”

  Woody wiped his face with the back of his dirty hand. “All I know is we better keep moving, or those guys are going to find us.”

  “Shoot, they don’t even know we’re gone.” Jeff put his hands behind his head and relaxed against the trunk of a tree. “We went back and covered up the hole, remember? Those dummies think we’re safe and sound buried underneath the ground.”

  “Did you hear that?” Woody strained to listen. “It sounded like an engine.”

  Roman jumped up. “It’s a car. And that means there’s a road nearby. Come on.”


  They crashed through the trees and oak brush right on Roman’s heels, racing toward the noise. In a few seconds they were standing at the edge of a dirt road.

  “You did it, Worm!” Jeff shouted. “Now all we have to do is wait for that car to get here.”

  “Just to be on the safe side, I’ll wait for the car,” Roman said. “We wouldn’t want to run into those creeps again. You guys stay in the bushes until I give you the signal.”

  Roman stood in the shadows next to a tree and watched the others scramble into the bushes. The car was coming closer, moving slowly. It was an older model, rust-colored, with four doors. Finally it rounded the corner and Roman could see the driver, a young woman with long black hair.

  Roman stepped out from behind the tree and waved furiously for the driver to stop. She slammed on the brakes and rolled down her window.

  “You gave me quite a start. I didn’t expect to see anyone way out here.”

  Roman leaned down. “You’ve got to help us, ma’am. My friends and I were kidnapped. We escaped and now we have to get in touch with the police.”

  “I’d be glad to help you in any way I can.” The woman looked around. “Did you say you were with friends?”

  “Oh yeah.” Roman motioned for the others to come out of the bushes. “We were afraid you might turn out to be the kidnappers, so they hid until we were sure.”

  The woman watched Mitch and Jeff crawl out of the oak brush. Woody hung back. She turned to Roman. “Why don’t you and your friends get in, and I’ll take you to my house. I live right up the road. You can call the police from there.”

  Roman opened the back door, and Mitch and Jeff climbed in. Woody grabbed Roman’s sleeve. “I really need to talk to you.”

  “Not now, Worm. This lady’s taking us to a phone. Get in.”

  “But Roman—”

  “Get in, Worm. We don’t have all day.”

  Woody sighed and climbed in beside Jeff. Roman went around and got in on the passenger side. “We sure appreciate this, ma’am. We were just about ready to give up on ever finding our way out of these mountains.”

  “I’m glad to help.” The woman looked in her rearview mirror at the other boys. “You guys look like you could use a hot meal.”

  “Could we ever.” A grin spread across Jeff’s face. “My stomach feels like my throat’s been cut.”

  Roman looked back at Woody. The boy seemed nervous. “You okay, Worm? You don’t look so good.”

  Woody slowly shook his head and pointed at the woman in front of him. Roman frowned. “I don’t get it.”

  “Don’t get what?” the woman asked.

  “Oh, nothing.” Roman glared at Woody. “My friend is still a little upset from what we just went through.”

  The woman pulled off on a side road. It was rough, and they bounced up and down on the seats.

  Woody leaned close to Jeff and whispered, “Does this remind you of anything?”

  “Yeah, it’s kinda like the road we were on last—” He clapped his hand over his mouth and his eyes grew wide.

  The woman pulled to a stop in front of a run-down wooden house. “Here we are, boys. Go right on in and make yourselves at home.”

  The screen door opened and two men with guns stepped out on the porch. The short blond one walked around the car.

  “Thanks, Madge. Good thing you were supposed to report in today or our little hostages might have gotten clean away.”

  CHAPTER 8

  The woman stood on the porch, talking to the two men. They were laughing and pointing at the car.

  Roman leaned over the backseat. “If you knew she was one of them, why didn’t you say so?”

  “At first I didn’t know.” Woody looked miserably down at the floorboard. “There was just something about the car that seemed familiar. Then I remembered where I had seen it before. It was in the school parking lot the day we were kidnapped.”

  “What a bunch of chumps we are,” Jeff said. “Of all the people in the world, we have to flag down their accomplice.”

  “What do we do now?” Mitch whispered.

  “Doesn’t look like they’re planning on giving us much of a choice.” Jeff pointed in front of them. Ripper and Spoon were coming toward the car.

  “All right, you punks,” Ripper growled. “Get out of there.”

  The boys reluctantly climbed out of the car, and Ripper pushed them toward the old house. “This time we’re gonna make sure you runts ain’t goin’ nowhere.” He followed them through the front door. “Everybody down on the floor. Find something to tie ’em up with, Spoon.” Ripper picked up a ball of twine from the table and threw it at the large man. “Here, use this, and make it tight.” He turned and went back out to the porch to talk to the woman.

  Roman looked around the room. It was sparsely furnished. A rickety table and two chairs stood near the door, and there were a couple of army cots under an open window near the back wall. There was a shortwave radio on a wooden shelf above the table.

  “You’re the last one. Get your hands out, kid.” Spoon knelt down in front of Roman. Roman stuck out his hands with his wrists crossed. It was the oldest trick in the book, but it was worth a try.

  Spoon fell for it. He pulled the twine tight, then ran it down to Roman’s feet, tied them together, and cut the end of the rope with a butcher knife.

  Spoon stood up and grinned. “Now you boys just make yourselves comfortable, ’cause you’re gonna be here awhile.” The big man tossed what was left of the twine into the corner of the room and headed out the door.

  “Man, these ropes are tight.” Woody squirmed, trying to find relief. “I think they’re cutting off my circulation.”

  Roman uncrossed his wrists and easily pulled his hands out of the cords. Quickly he reached into his pocket for his knife and cut the twine around his feet. He moved to Woody and had started to cut him free when he heard someone coming.

  “I’ll be back,” Roman whispered. He ran to the first cot, made a flying jump, and leaped out the open window headfirst. He hit the dirt in a tight little ball, scrambled to his feet, and ran as hard as he could for the bushes.

  The door opened and the three kidnappers walked in, still talking and laughing.

  The woman stopped when she saw the boys. “Wait a minute. One’s missing.”

  “Spoon, you idiot! Can’t I trust you with anything?” Ripper stormed across the room to the boys and slapped Woody hard, knocking him sideways. “Where did he go?”

  Woody struggled to sit up. Blood was dripping from his nose. He set his jaw and glared at Ripper.

  Ripper had drawn his hand back to strike again when Madge spoke up. “That big kid will be halfway to town if you and Spoon don’t quit fooling around and go after him.”

  “She’s right, Ripper—” Spoon started.

  “Shut up, you moron. If it wasn’t for you he wouldn’t be loose.” Ripper took his gun out of his belt and checked the clip. “Madge, you stay here and keep an eye on the rest of them.” He pointed the gun at Spoon. “You better hope we find that kid.”

  CHAPTER 9

  Roman burrowed his way into a thick section of oak brush and tried to lie as still as possible. His heart was pounding. He couldn’t see anything but he could hear the two men yelling back and forth.

  Then it was quiet. Spoon had found some tennis shoe tracks the boys had made the night before and was following them deeper and deeper into the woods. Ripper had taken the car and was checking the roads.

  Roman sat up. His mind raced. They must have left the woman behind to watch the others. If he was going to try anything, it would have to be now, while the two men were gone.

  He took a deep breath, inched out of the oak brush, and looked around. There was no sign of anyone. Quietly he made his way to the window, edged up to one corner, and peeked in. The woman was sitting at the table with her back to him, reading a newspaper. She was tapping the table over and over with her long red fingernails.

  Carefully
he moved toward the middle of the window until he caught Jeff’s eye. Jeff nodded. Roman took the knife out of his pocket and tossed it lightly onto the end of the cot.

  Roman moved back and watched Jeff working his way over to it. He had to scoot along the floor, trying not to attract any attention. Once he reached the cot, he had to reach up quickly to grab the knife before Madge turned and saw what he was trying to do.

  She looked up just as he snatched it. “What are you doing over there?” She stood up and took a step toward him. “If you think you’re going out that window, think again. Get away from there.” She marched over to the window and slammed it shut as Roman ducked around the side of the building.

  Jeff kept his fist tightly closed over the knife and moved back to Woody and Mitch.

  The woman folded her arms and walked around the three boys. “You squirts better not be planning anything. It won’t do you any good. I had a talk with Ripper earlier. I told him I thought there were too many of you. He wouldn’t object to getting rid of one or two of you. All I have to do is give the word.”

  She gave them a long, disgusted look and then went back to the table to read her paper. But this time she turned her chair toward them and looked up every few seconds.

  With as little movement as he could manage, Jeff opened the blade and sawed at the twine on his hands. It was difficult work since his hands were tied, but in minutes the twine snapped. He kept his hands close together and silently worked on his feet.

  Roman heard the faint sound of a car engine coming from somewhere down the road. He knew it wouldn’t be long until Ripper was back. His choices were getting narrower.

  He took a breath, centered himself, and ran to the front door, shoving it open. Madge stood up so fast her chair fell backward. She reached into her purse, pulled out a small gun, and pointed it at Roman.

  “You get over there with your friends, kid, and I won’t hurt you.”