Phantom Limb

by Dennis Palumbo

  I took a couple of deep breaths, tinged with the smell of wet dirt and old moss. It was time to move. To climb out of this earthen womb and—

  Suddenly, the ground shifted under my feet. Fell away. Gasping, I grabbed for some roots protruding from the dirt wall.

  Too late. I was falling, legs churning empty air. Tumbling down a deep, widening hole in the earth…

  ***

  The impact was jarring, but I didn’t lose consciousness. The wind knocked out of me, I was momentarily light-headed. Disoriented. Then, carefully reaching with outstretched fingers, I felt cold, moist dirt. Below and on either side of me.

  I took a couple swallows of dank, musty air. Then, limbs still unreliably shaky, I craned my neck to look above me. Given the darkness, it was hard to judge accurately, but I guessed I’d fallen about fifteen feet through what appeared to be a sinkhole. I must have been hiding from Griffin in an indentation at the mouth of the hole. Then, when I tried to climb out, the shifting of my weight sent me plummeting.

  But plummeting where? Brushing dirt and leaves from my face, I swiveled on my heels, trying to get my bearings.

  It didn’t take long. I’d no sooner turned than I saw a squared edging of light. It outlined what looked to be a small door of some kind, slightly ajar, and not twenty feet away.

  Breathing more easily now, I collected my thoughts. I seemed to have fallen into some kind of access tunnel. Maybe, behind me, it once led to a larger tunnel. Perhaps a mine shaft, long abandoned since the collapse of the mining industry.

  But then what was in front of me, at the end of that narrow tunnel? On the other side of that slightly open door?

  Whatever it was, I’d have to find out. If only because there was no getting out of here by climbing back up the slippery, loosely packed earthen walls of the sinkhole.

  Resigned, I began crawling slowly down the short length of tunnel. Even on my hands and knees, the low ceiling of dirt and rotting leaves brushed the top of my head.

  I quickly reached the small door, then bent close against the rough wood, listening for any sounds from within. Nothing.

  As quietly as I could, I took hold of the exposed edge of the door and pulled it toward me. Once it was fully open, I could see the source of the light. A high-wattage bare bulb, encased in a metal cage, suspended from a wooden ceiling beam.

  I blinked, eyes adjusting to the sudden brightness. The room was small, some kind of cellar, with walls of damp earth reinforced by upright, weathered two-by-fours.

  Sitting on an old crate beneath the hanging bulb, his arms crossed, was a bald, stocky man in jeans and a t-shirt. Of indeterminate age, his exposed arms and neck were covered with tattoos. Horned skulls, flaming swords, swastikas. An upside-down cross, dripping blood.

  But then my gaze was drawn by what lay beside the sleeping man. Huddled in a fetal position on the rough dirt floor.

  Her hands and feet were bound with thick, oily rope. Mouth cruelly banded with duct tape. Wearing the same trendy designer clothes—now torn and mud-spattered—as the last time I’d seen her.

  Eyes closed, but breathing.

  Unconscious, but alive.

  Lisa Campbell.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  I crossed the tiny room in a couple of strides. Awakened by the rush of movement, the tattooed man roused himself enough to clamber to his feet. About half a second too late.

  The roundhouse he threw was so telegraphed I had no trouble ducking under it. Then I clipped him with my forearm, snapping his head back. For good measure, I grabbed his shoulders with both hands and slammed his head against one of the standing two-by-fours. He collapsed in a heap.

  I stood with feet apart, breathing hard. While my old pugilistic instincts had served me, my no-longer-young body protested. My forearm stung from the blow, and my legs felt wobbly. Still aching from my tumble down the sinkhole, my back was threatening to seize up.

  All of which I barely registered. My only thought at the moment concerned the unconscious woman on the floor. Thankfully, and somewhat surprisingly, alive.

  I crouched by Lisa’s side and carefully removed the duct tape from her mouth. She stirred, but didn’t open her eyes. As I leaned in closer, I noted the bruises on her cheeks and chin. Her lips were cracked, bone-white.

  I could also smell the ketones on her breath. Lisa was dehydrated. We’d have to get some water into her, and soon.

  I’d untied her hands and was struggling with the ropes binding her ankles when she came to. Finally, I freed her legs and scrambled back up, so that our eyes could meet.

  Blinking in the harsh light from above, I saw recognition slowly dawn.

  “Doctor?…Jesus, Rinaldi, is that you?…”

  Her voice feeble, a hollow croak.

  “It’s me, Lisa. Are you okay?”

  “Define your terms.”

  She tried to stretch her limbs where she lay, and winced in pain. Let her head droop back to the ground.

  “You’re safe now, Lisa.” I gently pushed her hair back from her forehead. Exposing another ugly bruise.

  “Safe?” Her dry lips curled. “I’ve had the shit kicked outta me and I’m in a hole in the ground. I don’t feel safe….”

  I slipped my arm under her head.

  “We’ve got to get moving, understand? Before Sykes and Griffin show up. They’re probably heading here now….”

  She lolled, limp as a rag doll. “I’m fine where I am, Doc. My arms and legs don’t work anyway…”

  “They will, soon enough. Now here, let me help you…”

  Putting my hands under her armpits, I more or less hauled her to her feet. She was obviously still dazed, exhausted. Stumbling on rubbery legs.

  “You remind me of a punch-drunk fighter,” I said.

  “You should see the other guy…”

  I smiled, encouraged by her attempt at banter. As though she were summoning from her deepest core the old, resilient Lisa. Good thing, too. Given the trauma of her ordeal, that sly, rueful humor could be a powerful ally in her recovery.

  Straightening, I put my arm around her waist, even as I felt her taking most of her weight on her own legs.

  “Looks like you’re able to stand.”

  “Theoretically.”

  I glanced around the small, cold cellar. “How did they bring you here? That tunnel?”

  She shook her head, then pointed up at something in the shadows. Attached by a kind of peg-and-pulley system to the ceiling. An aluminum ladder.

  I risked letting go of her and reached my hand up, grasping the ladder by the bottom rung. When I pulled it down, its length extended to about a foot off the cellar floor.

  “What’s up top?” I asked her.

  “Trapdoor. The way out.”

  I glanced up again. Now I could see the trapdoor, its outlines blurred by the hanging bulb’s relentless glare.

  “Let me go up first,” I said. “Just in case.”

  “My fucking hero.”

  The old Lisa was coming back, all right.

  I took hold of the ladder and quickly climbed up to the trapdoor. When I pushed, it opened easily, with the merest squeak of its hinges. Poking my head through, I found myself looking at a much larger room. Bare-bricked walls, two broad shuttered windows. Fluorescents hanging from the waffled tin ceiling.

  But it was what filled the room that caught my attention. A long metal table, on which were arrayed a half-dozen monitor screens. Now blackened, I had no doubt they’d once been connected wirelessly to the security cameras in the Harland residence. As was the phone, in its cradle next to some kind of communications console. Probably the device used to digitally alter the speaker’s voice. There were also two computers, one of whose screens displayed a map of Western Pennsylvania.

  I climbed the rest of the way up and stood on the hardwood floor.
This was the room from which Julian—Raymond Sykes—contacted the residence, making his ransom demands. All these hundreds of miles away.

  Not exactly convenient to that abandoned print factory in the Hill District. But then again, Sykes had said that his human trafficking operation was located elsewhere, too.

  I considered this. Sykes may just be a big fish in a small pond, as Gloria Reese had put it, but he was a fish who knew how to diversify. Regardless, it couldn’t be easy for him to keep tabs on everything himself. Which got me wondering how exactly he did it.

  “Hey!” Lisa’s voice, calling from below. I could hear her footsteps slowly ascending the ladder. “You wanna lend me a hand, Doc? Before Tattoo Man wakes up?”

  “Sorry. Just checking things over.” I bent and extended my hand, helping to hoist her up into the room.

  “I wonder what this place is,” I said.

  She let out a breath. “Abandoned ranger station, I think. Or maybe some field office from when the mines were working.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I saw it from the outside. It has some old-fashioned antennas and stuff on the roof. I remember things like that from when I was a kid. Back in the Stone Age, God help me.”

  “But when did you see it?”

  “When I escaped. Or tried to, anyway.” She sighed. “Christ, I see I’m gonna have to get you up to speed.”

  “You sure are. But not now. Now we get some help.”

  I went over to the table and snatched up the cordless phone. Tried, but failed, to get a dial tone.

  I turned the phone over. A tangle of unhooked wires.

  “They took the guts out of it. Probably did this every time they left here. In case you got free and came up the ladder. So you couldn’t use the phone to call for help.”

  Besides, I thought, once they had the second ransom money, there’d be only one reason to come back here. To kill Lisa.

  Meanwhile, she’d crossed the room to peer over my shoulder at the disabled phone. “Son of a bitch. Now what—?”

  I put my finger to my lips. I’d just heard the tattooed man stirring down below. Quickly, I went back and closed the trapdoor. As I’d hoped, it had a bolt lock. I slid it home.

  “That’ll keep him for a while. But we still have the others to worry about. Sykes, Griffin.”

  She nodded soberly. “Two scary bastards…”

  This time, her tone lacked its usual sturdy humor. She looked genuinely afraid. Perhaps recalling a painful memory, some recent terrifying encounter with her captors.

  Then, just as quickly, she seemed to shake it off. Survival instincts trumping everything. Even fear.

  I gripped her hand and led us to the sole exit door. On the way, I noticed a portable refrigerator in a corner. I stooped and opened it, happy to find what I’d been hoping to.

  “Here.” I offered her a bottled water, then put another two bottles in my jacket pockets. “You need to hydrate. Drink that whole bottle.”

  “Yes, sir.” She took a long, grateful swallow from the bottle. “But just ’cause you rescued me, that doesn’t mean you get to boss me around.”

  “Point taken. Now keep drinking.”

  Frowning theatrically, she managed to finish the bottle before following me through the door.

  We stepped out into a cold, clear night, undergirded by a ceaseless wind. I took a quick look at our surroundings. The building was fronted by a compact clearing, studded with gravel. A makeshift parking area, served by a fire road that meandered into the hills to our right. To our left was the expanse of trees through which I’d fled, pursued by Griffin. I could only hope he was still in there, trampling the underbrush, pushing his way past stubborn foliage.

  It was a false hope. Two lights suddenly flared at the edge of the trees. Flashlight beams, bobbing. Two men, walking steadily out of the grove.

  Griffin and someone else. Sykes, maybe. Or that long-haired guy from the printing factory. It was too dark to see at this distance, and I wasn’t going to stick around to find out.

  “Come on!” I whispered, pulling Lisa again by the hand. She didn’t resist. Instead, she pushed herself to keep up with me.

  At a good run, I led us past the trees and toward the east, the rounded shoulders of the nearby hills. As long as we hewed to the shadowed awning thrown by the bank of trees, I figured we had a chance of reaching the foothills unseen. If we strayed too far from its protective shroud, we’d risk being silhouetted against the moon’s light, brighter now in the cloudless sky.

  The wind rose and fell around us as we ran, as though the night itself was breathing. Co-mingling with our own labored exhalations, Lisa and I now both gasping. Legs weakening, as we stumbled over exposed roots, tufts of brush, unseen divots in the black earth.

  The whole time expecting to hear gunfire erupt behind us, feel the stinging heat of a bullet tearing through my flesh.

  Any moment now, any moment…

  ***

  We’d just reached the first stone-pitted slope, a knoll rising like a set of stairs to the hills, when Lisa abruptly stopped, her grasp pulling me back. I whirled, as angry as I was puzzled. But before I could speak, she pointed back the way we’d come. All the way back, to the old brick building.

  “Look! They’re going inside.”

  She was right. The two men were crunching across the gravel to the entrance, their flashlights lowered.

  Lisa struggled to catch her breath. “Maybe they think we’re still there. Maybe they never saw us running away.”

  “Whatever, it buys us time. But we have to keep moving.”

  Allowing ourselves to resume at a slower pace, we headed up the mild incline of craggy boulders, hillocks of grass and dirt. Soon enough, though, we were climbing a steeper, unbroken path of shrubs and thick brush, using handholds for balance. It was hard, slow going, and I didn’t like how exposed we were without the grove’s shadow to cloak our movements.

  Moreover, Lisa’s fear had been replaced by a growing irritation. With the steep hill, the wind, her aching feet.

  And with me.

  “Great escape plan, MacGyver. We’re either gonna die of exposure or get eaten by mountain lions.”

  “I doubt it. And didn’t you call me your hero back there?”

  “That was then, this is now. Besides, shouldn’t you have arranged for a goddamn helicopter or something to pick us up? A crapload of Marines? The Boy Scouts?”

  “It’s not like I had a plan. So cut me some slack, okay?”

  “Sure. I guess I can look at this as some kinda bonding exercise.” A deliberate beat. “But I’m sure as shit not paying for this session!”

  I managed a quiet laugh. By now, we’d reached an elevated cleft in the hill. A broad stretch of rock, like a stone table without legs. Beyond lay another, steeper mound. A somber, treeless shape whose rounded hump was glazed by moonlight.

  Lisa stood gasping at my shoulder.

  “Fuck it. This is as far as I go, Rinaldi.”

  I nodded, aware that our pursuers could have long since left the old building and might even be heading this way. Swiveling slowly left and right, I searched for someplace safe to hide.

  And found it.

  ***

  “Nice.” Lisa took a seat on a small boulder. “I love what you’ve done with the place.”

  I found another rock opposite her and gratefully sat down myself. We were in a cave, hewn out of a rockface adjoining the crest to which we’d climbed. At my urging, we’d crawled to the very back, far enough from the mouth to avoid detection.

  The downside, of course, was that except for a sliver of moon glinting off a huge rock halfway between us and the cave opening, we were in total darkness.

  At least, I thought, we were out of the wind.

  “Maybe it’s a good thing you can’t see my face,” Lisa
was saying, “’cause I’m staring daggers at you.”

  “Yeah, I’m sorry to miss that.”

  A heavy, not unwelcome silence settled between us. Broken only by the rhythmic sound of our twinned breathing, slowing at last to a normal pace. And growing quieter.

  Finally, Lisa spoke.

  “How long do you think we should stay here? I mean, when do we go and try to find some help?”

  “It’s not safe to move now. Not with those men out there. Especially since I don’t even know where we are. I figure if we wait here till daylight, at least maybe we can get our bearings. For all we know, there could be a town right over the hill.”

  Another silence.

  “Okay.” She took a breath. “If we’re stuck here all night, I guess there’s time to tell you my story. The whole story…”

  Chapter Twenty-five

  It was strange, listening to Lisa talk as we sat opposite each other in the dark. Unlike in a therapy session, I didn’t have visual cues to guide me in my responses. Nor did she get to see what was on my face. My reactions, my own body language.

  If anything, I was reminded of my childhood years in the Church. The hallowed darkness of the confessional, speaking my youthful sins into the hushed stillness, unable to see the priest’s expression behind his little screen. To see empathy, or sorrow. Or, as I feared, disgust.

  Now, as an adult, I’ve come to realize I merely replaced my faith in one institution with faith in another. Both burdened with dogma, with rigorous rules of behavior. Both susceptible to doubt. Heresy. Renunciation.

  But, at the moment, Lisa was neither patient nor penitent. I don’t know how to describe what was transpiring in that absurd cave, other than words being spoken by one unseen person for the benefit of another, equally unseen. Like two ghosts, talking.

  ***

  “It all started with me and Mike Payton,” she began. “The company’s head of security.”

  “What started?”

  “Our affair.” A beat. “Bet you didn’t see that one coming, did you, Doc?”