The Sam Reilly Collection Volume 3

by Christopher Cartwright

  Jenn cast her eyes downward. Brody recognized she’d conceded. He was as sure of his assumption as he was his own first name. And equally sure Ben wouldn’t be interested in messing around in that sipapu, either. Malcom or no Malcom.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  “That’s quite a story.” Ben Whitecloud gave Brody an appraising stare. “You weren’t drinking at the time, were you, Brody?”

  Insulted, Brody clenched both fists.

  Jenn stepped between them. “Ben, you know my brother does not do that. He’s telling the truth. We have been to Ignacio to report it, but the authorities want nothing to do with it.”

  “What makes you think I do?” he retorted.

  “The way I see it, it can go one of two ways. You can continue to let criminals use your land for drug running, or you can gather your employees and clean out that sipapu to show them they are not welcome. And by the way, have you forgotten we do not know what has become of Malcom, your employee? Don’t you feel any responsibility toward him? What’s it going to be?”

  Jenn challenged him with flashing eyes. She didn’t care if Brody learned she and Ben had once been an item, or that she had broken it off because Ben couldn’t stand her independent spirit. He’d have fired her if she hadn’t been indispensable to his business. Of that she was certain. Out of respect for a man she’d once loved, she tried not to challenge him often. Out of concern for her brother and the right thing to do, she did now.

  Ben blew air forcibly from his cheeks through pursed lips. “All right, Jenn. What do you suggest we do?”

  Jenn smiled sweetly. She’d won. “At first light, we take everyone we can arm and go there to see if the drugs are still there. If so, we take them and deliver them to the Ignacio police. They can decide what to do with them. Some will continue to look for Malcom and bring him or his remains out. If the drugs are not there, we’ll do the same, but leave some men to guard the entrance in case a new delivery of drugs shows up.

  “After that, we should post lookouts to see who brings them, and how often.”

  Ben sighed. “Is that all?”

  Ben couldn’t help being sarcastic, Jenn knew well. And she had handed him a tall order. There were no more than a dozen hands on the ranch. All of them were needed for ranch duties.

  “Almost. Once we have evidence, you need to contact the FBI. Our tribal police are not willing to get involved.”

  “Me?” he yelped.

  She crossed her arms.

  “All right. Tell the others to be ready.”

  Jenn smiled as she left Ben’s study. He’d be slamming things down on his desk as soon as he thought she was out of earshot. But he’d do what she asked.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Brody led the way over the edge and down the red sandstone cliffside. If he had to do this very often, he’d be cured of his fear of heights, which would not be a bad thing. Behind him, Jenn and six of Ben’s ranch hands made their way carefully, hunting rifles strapped to their backs. All wore stoic expressions.

  When they reached the ruins, Jenn took over. “Watch your step, and do as little damage to this sacred place as possible. Who will stay with me and stand guard?”

  The men shuffled their feet, until one volunteered. Brody suspected none of them wanted to go with him, but offering to stay with Jenn would make the others think the volunteer feared the spirits of the sipapu. It was a no-win situation. Jenn nodded her acceptance of the volunteer and turned to Brody.

  “Be safe, my brother.” She waved the man who would stand guard with her to a spot where the two of them could set up crossfire but be safe from each other’s shots, then sank to her knees behind an outcrop.

  Brody took one look back before leading the others to the kiva. His sister was braver than he was, and it shamed him.

  Reaching the kiva, he asked for volunteers to go further into the sipapu with him, two to carry out the drugs, if they were still there, and three to go with him and carry out Malcom’s body if they could find it. Once again, feet shuffled, but it didn’t take long for four to step forward. “One more,” he said. “We must be able to split into twos if the sipapu leads to a cave system.” The three remaining men stared each other down until one dropped his eyes and stepped forward. Brody hoped they wouldn’t find splitting up necessary. Whoever paired with that one would not have a good partner.

  He led the way up the ladder and into the wide hole.

  “This isn’t a sipapu,” one of the men remarked. “It’s a cave.”

  “Do you see another sipapu?” Brody responded with heat. “And a strange wind was being drawn into it. Don’t forget that Malcom was sucked in against his will.”

  “So you say,” the same man answered. “How are we to know you didn’t kill him for violating the kiva?”

  It didn’t deserve an answer, but Brody answered anyway. “If I’d done that, why would I have led you all here to bear witness to murder?”

  The others nodded and murmured, and the first man backed down. “Lead the way, then.”

  The entrance required the men to crawl in, but immediately opened up tall enough for every man to stand at full height, and wide enough to go two abreast. They went in single file anyway. Brody conceded that the one who’d challenged him had the right of it. It did look more like a cave than a sipapu. Maybe it really was the Great Sipapu that his childhood friend had believed in. There were more practical matters to consider for now. He switched on his flashlight as he entered. The light at the bottom of the kiva wasn’t strong enough to penetrate the sipapu for more than a few feet.

  As before, he found the stash of drugs within a few yards of the entrance, but no sign of Malcom. After a short consultation with the others, they decided to move all the drugs out into the kiva proper before going on. Then the two who were supposed to get them out could help find Malcom before finishing the job.

  That task complete, Brody again led the way in. As the group of men went farther, what was clearly a cave system opened into a larger room. Here they found sleeping bags, food supplies, and other evidence that people stayed here on occasion. Brody and his party paused to ready their weapons.

  Everyone seemed nervous, and Brody was no exception. He was the only one who had just a handgun, a Heritage Rough Rider .22 caliber revolver that had caught his eye in a pawn shop in Ignacio. It looked like the revolvers all men in old Western movies carried, with a six-inch barrel, a grip finished with wood, and weighing nearly a pound. It was no weapon with which to challenge a drug cartel. The six-shot cylinder would be entirely inadequate in a gunfight, but it was the only one he had.

  For the first time, Brody wanted one of the others to lead, but they all hung back until he reluctantly pushed on, circling the cave counterclockwise until he found an opening that led out the back. He motioned the man behind him to come with him, and sent the others to continue around the room.

  “If you find another opening, two take it, and the other two keep going. If not, follow us when you come to this one again.”

  Brody had to duck to walk through the opening, but the passage soon opened wider again, with more head room and the space for Brody and his partner to walk abreast. They’d walked for maybe a couple of miles before he thought to cast his light at their feet. The cave floor was covered in soft sand, and there were thousands of impressions in it, as if it had been used as a passage from here to somewhere for many years.

  He shined his flashlight onto it. “Look at that. Where do you think they were all going?” he asked. It was rhetorical, but his partner took it as literal.

  “How would I know?”

  “Never mind.” Brody continued walking, now and then pointing the flashlight down to see if the footprints continued.

  “There’s something weird about this cave,” his partner remarked.

  “What?”

  “It’s more like a tunnel. I’ve never been in a cave that was so long and narrow. And if I’m right, It’s pretty straight.”

  Brod
y had to agree. It was strange. A sudden noise behind him made him crouch and point his revolver down the tunnel. But then he recognized the shout. “Ho! Where are you guys?”

  “Here,” he called. “How many are you?”

  “Two.”

  Brody stopped and sat down on the soft sand to wait. When the others approached, he asked if the other two were exploring a different cave.

  “No. They found the end of their tunnel, and we found the end of ours. They’re heading out to finish with the drugs. We just came to tell you.”

  Brody hung his head. He and his companion must have walked for an hour. It didn’t seem likely they’d find Malcom or his body this far inside the tunnel. Maybe the drug dealers had done something with it, or maybe they’d captured him.

  He looked around the group and told them what he was thinking. “Should we go back? If they’re in here, they probably have guns.”

  “This is a weird cave, man,” one of the newcomers answered. “I’d like to know where it goes.”

  “Where it goes is none of our business. Have you forgotten the drugs? Do you want to be in here when whoever put them there comes back?” He pointed his flashlight down. “Look.”

  As the others examined the impressions, Brody stood impatiently. “I’m leaving,” he said finally. “Use your own flashlights if you want to go on.”

  He began walking back toward the entrance, not looking back. This cave, or tunnel—whatever it was—gave him the creeps. He couldn’t wait to get out of it, back into fresh air and safety. He’d gone perhaps half the way back to the large room when a change in the air made him reach for his revolver. He was too late.

  A dark shape emerged from an alcove in the cave wall, and before he could bring his revolver up, Brody felt a blow to his shoulder. He cried out, but the next blow was to his head, and he blacked out.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Cathedral Grotto, Somewhere Beneath the Bering Strait

  Sam stared at the wreckage of the Gordoye Dostizheniye. More than a dozen shipping containers were strewn throughout the sandy beach at the opposite end of the volcanic grotto, previously concealed by the boring machine. The golden sand was a direct contrast to the jet-black obsidian that surrounded it. No more than thirty feet into the shallow waters were the undamaged remains of the giant boring machine.

  It looked perfectly at home in the grotto, like some sort of unworldly machine of the future. It’s massive Archimedean screw jutted out from behind, like something one would expect to find on the set of Journey to the Center of the Earth.

  Tom swept the entire cavern with his flashlight. “It might take some time to find that container.”

  Sam said, “Especially since we’re not looking for the container to begin with.”

  “We’re not?”

  “No. The Secretary of Defense might still think the priority is the retrieval of her shipping container, but I’d still like to place the value of any of those machine operator’s life at the top of our priority list.”

  “All right, let’s see what’s inside the boring machine.”

  Sam followed Tom to the back edge of the boring machine. It looked like an enormous sewage pipe sticking out of the subterranean lake.

  Sam flashed his light inside. “Anyone in there?”

  No response.

  Tom said, “The heat alone would have killed them.”

  “We don’t know that for certain. I’ve seen the specs. That drilling head’s more than a foot thick of reinforced steel, and the cylindrical tail of the machine is surrounded by concrete. It might have acted as a significant shield.”

  Sam gripped the curved side of the tunneling machine and climbed the gap of roughly two feet to get inside. A high-water line extended three feet above the flooring, suggesting that when the Big Bertha machine first entered the grotto, the lake was much higher but had since receded.

  He shined his flashlight across the floor. There were deep shoeprints imbedded in the muddy silt where the now receded water once settled. On second examination, they were unlikely to be shoes, but more heavy workmen boots. Whatever they were, there was no doubt in Sam’s mind that they revealed the movements of someone who found the boring machine in the lake and climbed inside to see what was inside, before returning again – and not from any survivors.

  Tom said, “Any chance they belong to one of the surviving machine operators?”

  “No way in the world.” Sam followed the imprints with his flashlight. They started at the end of the boring machine, went inside beyond his sight, and then came out again. “All this black volcanic silt occurred after Big Bertha struck the lake, not before.”

  “So, who the hell’s been down here before us?”

  “Didn’t Gallagher say that another rescue team went into the sinkhole before us?”

  “Yeah, and he said all three of them were killed under unusual, albeit natural circumstances.” Tom smiled. “Didn’t he blame it on some sort of wraith or something?”

  “Skinwalkers,” Sam corrected him. “Once powerful Navajo medicine men and women who allegedly turned into evil witches, and took the form of any number of wild animals in order to murder people. It’s said that in more present-day civilizations, they have been forced to retreat into subterranean cave systems to hide.”

  “So how did some sort of ancient superstition from the Four Corners part of the U.S. find its way this far north?”

  “No idea. I once heard that the Yupik people, the native inhabitants of the regions of modern day Canada, Alaska, the Aleutian Islands and Eastern Siberia, all shared surprising similarities with the Navajo people in terms of spiritual beliefs and ancient myths.”

  Tom climbed up into the boring machine, next to Sam. “Was there ever any hypothesis for it?”

  “No, none.”

  “All right.” Tom shrugged, indifferently. “Let’s forget the ancient history lesson and go see what we have.”

  Sam followed the steps all the way to the inside end of the boring machine and the back of the giant drill head. There was no one there. And no sign of anyone getting injured or killed there. He spotted the operators’ chairs. They appeared intact. Sam and Tom both flashed their lights around the tunneling machine, searching for any of the machine operators.

  There was nothing.

  No bodies.

  No blood.

  And no sign anyone was ever injured inside the boring machine.

  Sam said, “If they didn’t die here, where did they go?”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Sam stepped out of the boring machine and back into the open grotto. He shined his flashlight around the outer edge of the subterranean lake. The water reached the obsidian walls throughout the entire area, with the exception of a golden beach of sand rising from the glossy black obsidian at the eastern end. The grotto was large enough that he still couldn’t make out where the lake ended. As he scanned the area as far as he could see, he decided that lake was a poor description of what they’d found. Instead, it was much more like a subterranean sea.

  “Is there anybody out there?” he yelled.

  The sound echoed for a few seconds before the grotto became once again lost in total silence.

  Tom asked, “Do you want to check the other side of the lake, see if we can find the missing crew?”

  “Yes, but not now.” Sam checked his watch. It was getting late. “It could take an hour or more to reach the other side. We still need to get back to the Humvee. Now that we know it’s safe to drive down here, I think we’re better off returning to the surface and getting an entire team down here to help search.”

  “All right, sounds like a plan. What about the ship?”

  Sam fixed his eyes on the Gordoye Dostizheniye. “Let’s go climb on board. We’ll get a better idea what we have to work with and what we’re going to need to get from the Maria Helena to access the main hold.”

  Tom nodded his agreement and they both waded toward the ship.

  She looked lik
e a modern cargo ship, with a flat deck forward, and a tower-bridge aft. The bow rose high out of the water. A significant section of her aft section remained underwater, suggesting the otherwise shallow lake eventually became deep in the middle. The ship was listing at a forty-degree angle to her portside. A large gash had ruptured her hull two thirds of the way along – through which, nearly a hundred or so shipping containers had been expelled and now lay strewn throughout the lake and sandy beach.

  Along her hull were the words, GORDOYE DOSTIZHENIYE.

  “At least we know we found the right one!” Tom said.

  Sam laughed. “How many ships were you expecting there to be down here?”

  “Not many, but we’ve been having a bad run lately. I thought we might have come across the wrong one.” Tom ran his eyes across the ship. Mostly out of the water, it appeared bigger than he was expecting. “Where do you want to start?”

  “The bridge,” Sam said, without hesitation. “According to the schematics the Secretary of Defense sent me, the Gordoye Dostizheniye is divided into six separate cargo compartments below decks. We need to find the ship’s manifest if we’re to have any hope of locating container numbered 404.”

  Tom looked at the gash in the hull. “I guess that’s our entrance.”

  Sam nodded. “Looks like it.”

  The shallow bottom of the lake dropped sharply as they approached the opening, until they needed to swim the final twenty or so feet.

  Tom pointed his flashlight at the razor-sharp protruding edge of the hull, where the thick steel had been torn open. Sam nodded, recognizing what was potentially the most lethal part of boarding the ship. They carefully checked the other side for similar risks and moved toward the middle of the opening.

  Confident they could enter the ship, Sam carefully swam along the surface toward the center of the opening. He stopped for a moment and swept his flashlight around the gash, and then inside. He then slowly swam through, and into the hull.