by Bill Hopkins
Chapter 39
Monday Night, continued
Rosswell high-fived Ollie, both letting out a low whoop. One could never tell when Nathaniel Dahlbert or one of his minions lurked within earshot.
Alessandra stepped away from the men. "Have you two gone nuts?"
Ollie scrambled over a huge log, then stuck his hand underneath it, drawing out the tote bag from Discovered Treasures.
Rosswell stepped back. "I hope that's not covered with ants." But since it was in the burned area, he doubted that critters of any kind survived nearby. The slight breeze stirred enough ashes to stink up the place even more and give Rosswell's allergies a reason to explode.
Ollie dipped into the tote, splitting the three monster LED flashlights and three more Colt 1911s among them. Ollie patted his pistol. "Alessandra, can you fire one of these?"
"I can hit the middle of a dime with any pistol you give me." Alessandra checked the gun, then held it at her side. "You brought five weapons out here, but only showed Jim Bill two?"
Rosswell said, "Play honest. No more Brazil crap."
Alessandra saluted. "Yes, sir."
Rosswell breathed deeply. The clean smell of a well-oiled pistol helped him center. And he didn't tell Alessandra that they'd brought more than five weapons.
Ollie explained his deception. "I counted on him searching us to make sure we weren't armed. He's a good cop." Ollie coughed. "If any cop can be good."
"Judge, are we using stolen weapons?"
Rosswell hefted his pistol and rubbed the barrel. "These are one hundred percent legal."
"What was all that game's afoot stuff? Who is the Gold King?"
"Ollie's a huge Sherlock Holmes fan. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a short story called 'The Problem of Thor Bridge.' One of the characters called the Gold King had a big collection of guns."
"Code talk." Ollie puffed out his chest. "We're like spies."
"When I talked to Ollie on the phone, it was a signal to bring all the guns he could round up. If we gave Jim Bill a couple of them that would satisfy him. But we'd have a few more in reserve."
Alessandra examined the tote bag. "You got the guns at that antique store downtown?"
"Not exactly." Ollie's answer also skirted the question. "There are a couple of more things in here." He drew out several rolls of duct tape, three rolls of clothesline, ten feet of orange plastic rope, and a bag of cotton balls. "There's more stuff. This is a sampling."
"What's all that for?"
Ollie substituted Alessandra's question with one of his own. "Are you ready?"
She said, "I'm rough and tough and used to hard candy."
Rosswell saluted them both. "Ollie comes prepared. I credit the Boy Scout training he had as an innocent youth."
Ollie addressed Alessandra. "You want to carry this stuff?" He surveyed her from top to toe. Then, careful as Ollie was, he gave her a second survey. "Nowhere to stash them. I'll carry everything."
Rosswell added his camera and binoculars to the tote.
Alessandra put her hand on Ollie's arm. "I'll do whatever you say, and if I don't make it, I love your purple tattoo."
"We should talk about that more."
"That's a grand idea."
Ollie said, "Do you mean grand in the traditional sense of meaning-"
Rosswell broke up the burgeoning flirtation. "Cut the mush. Here's what we've got to do." He laid out a plan that he hoped and prayed would rescue Tina.
If she was in River Heights Villa.
When Rosswell guided Alessandra and Ollie to the mouth of the cave, they found it as dark as the night surrounding them.
Rosswell whispered, "Get ready. I'm going to turn on the flashlight." After a sharp click, light flooded the cave. Nothing stirred. There was no one or no thing in the cave. Or at least that he could see. Rosswell never discounted the fact that little critters were profuse in caves. Other than the slight burbling of the small stream running from the cave, there was no sound. "I'm going to find Tina."
Rosswell's skin raised gooseflesh the moment he crossed the threshold of the cave. Ollie and Alessandra's skin was bumpy, too. Must be the chill of the cave. Or fear of critters. Bats. Salamanders. Snakes. Bears. Lions. Or fear of death.
Center, Rosswell, center.
About fifty feet inside the mouth of the cave, the passageway branched.
Rosswell spoke in a low voice. "I don't know which way to go." He checked his phone. "It's after nine."
Rosswell had the presence of mind to cut off the phone's ringer, although he also realized that the noise of the three walking through the cave would be enough to warn an alert sentry with good hearing. Or set off an electronic burglar alarm with the slightest intrusion.
There was no disturbance or noise when he again examined both of the tunnels with the aid of his superbright flashlight. He'd already passed the spot where the dead woman was laid out. The passageways didn't look featureless. They both looked like passageways in a cave with cave features. Here and there were smaller passageways that were only three or four feet deep. The roof of the cave was higher or lower in some places. Nothing dramatic. The cave looked ordinary.
Into Ollie's ear, Rosswell said softly, "Everything looks the same in both tunnels."
Ollie and Alessandra following in silence, Rosswell shined his light on the floor of the cave, then knelt. The floors in both passages looked the same. He ran his hands along the dirt, first in one passage, then in the other. There was no difference in the feel or the smell in either passage. If one tunnel was a dead end, then the other-the one that gained entrance to the house-should show signs of traffic. That is, if anyone used this cave all that much.
The dead woman. Mary Donna Helperen from Piggott, Arkansas. Why did they bring her down here? Obviously, to hide her. Why did they have her on the ferry in the first place? She wasn't dead when she got on the ferry and had somehow managed not to drown when she went in the water, then later died in childbirth. Who brought her down here? Charlie Heckle and Turk Malone. Not two of the crispier rocket surgeons in the harbor. Would they have carried her? No.
Rosswell again kneeled on the floor and again shined his light. He tried to force himself to see what he was really looking at. He tamped down his fright at the thought of going up against a bad guy. The worst guy he knew.
Rosswell repeated aloud one of his favorite quotes. " 'Fear is pain arising from the anticipation of evil.' " Was Aristotle a saint? Rosswell thought he should be.
Then, in the pool of light cast by his flashlight, there it was. When they had found her, Mary Donna's heels were muddy. He remembered that now. In the dirt of the tunnel to his left were faint traces of what he suspected were heel marks along with other indentations that looked like shoe prints. He hoped they were faint traces of heel marks and shoe prints. Because if they were, then that meant that Charlie and Turk had dragged the woman from somewhere up in the house and had come through the left passageway.
"Left it is," Rosswell said. "And Tina's at the end of this tunnel."
Someone tapped on Rosswell's shoulder. He whirled around, his gun pointed at Ollie and Alessandra. They each put a finger to their lips. Rosswell nodded, ashamed of himself for speaking too loudly.
Rosswell signaled for them to head through the left passageway.
All three of them froze when they heard a door open. Someone humming off-key waltzed through.
