Blood Money

28

As soon as Jane had hurried the others past the blind, she paused again to look back. There were now several silhouettes making their way toward the doors of the house. Some of them walked with one arm held straight toward the ground, as though they were carrying pistols. Then she saw movement in the foliage near the parked cars and felt a growing alarm. There were men there too, moving into the brush carrying long-barreled weapons. She tried to count them, but the darkness and the bushes near the road made them difficult to make out. One would be visible, but then she would lose sight of him. She would see another movement, but not be sure whether it was a man or the wind.

Finally she saw two men carrying rifles step out of the brush behind the house. When she saw them break into a trot toward the low stubble she had just crossed, she sucked in a breath. They were heading toward the blind.

She spun and trotted to catch up with Rita and Bernie. “We’ve got to get away from here.”

“What does it look like we’re doing?” asked Bernie. “Figure eights?”

She took him by the hand and pulled him along. “Once we’re away from the blind, we’ll be behind them.”

Bernie moved more quickly, but Jane could tell that the additional effort was costing him. He was beyond attempting to disguise his heavy breathing now. His jaw hung slack to keep his mouth open, and his breath came out in huffs. His feet seemed to slap the ground, not push off it. Jane knew he was going to have to rest soon, and for the next hundred yards she searched her memory of the trail for places where they could hide. As the minutes went by, she gradually conceded to herself that he wasn’t going to make it.

She stopped and held Rita’s arm. “Here,” she said. “You take this.” She held out the shotgun, and Rita accepted it, doubtfully.

Jane squatted. “Help Bernie up on my back.”

Bernie was horrified. “What?” He gasped. “You can’t carry me.”

“I can try,” said Jane.

“I’m not dead yet,” he puffed. It took a moment for him to get enough breath to say, “I can walk.”

“Not fast enough. Do it.” Jane’s voice was quiet, but Rita could hear in it something hard that reminded her this wasn’t a game. She guided Bernie up behind Jane. Bernie brought his arms around Jane’s neck and clasped his hands, and Jane slipped her arms under Bernie’s knees. Rita pushed Bernie upward to help Jane straighten.

Jane said to Rita, “You lead the way, and I’ll follow. Go as fast as you can without tripping or backtracking, and I’ll try to keep you in sight.”

Jane took a last look back. The two men with rifles were nearly across the burned stubble. As soon as they reached their post at the blind and got their rifles comfortably sighted in, she knew, they would give some kind of signal for the assault to begin.

Jane set off again, making her way through the dry chaparral and spiky plants, threading between rocks and along gravelly inclines, straining to see Rita’s shape ahead of her. She could feel the effect of the extra weight on her feet, calves, and knees, but if she kept her hands clasped at her belly and her back straight, she found she could move at a good walking pace.

In ten minutes, her shoulders and neck were tight and painful, and when she heard hard, sharp gasps, they were her own. The sweat had begun to run down into her eyes and sting them, then fall in drops from her nose and chin.

When Jane reached the dry arroyo, Rita was waiting for her, staring at her in horror. Jane stopped, bent her knees, and let Bernie down. Rita whispered, “How can you do that?”

Jane sank to the ground and lay there. She answered in a strained and winded voice, “I kept reminding myself of what would happen if I didn’t.” After a minute, her voice was stronger. “How do you feel now, Bernie?”

“Better.”

“Good,” said Jane. “Rita, give me the shotgun. I’ll go ahead for a bit. Walk with Bernie at his pace. If there’s a problem, run ahead and get me. Don’t call out.”

“Okay,” said Rita.

Jane got to her feet. “Watch your step here. There’s a slope.” She went down into the arroyo and came up on the other side, then slowly increased her speed to a trot.

Far behind, Jane heard the sound of glass breaking, then a loud creak and bang, as though the front door had just burst inward, the dead bolt wrenching the frame off with it. She kept moving until she thought she heard distant shouts. She glanced over her shoulder.

She could see Bernie and Rita walking toward her. Bernie had his head down, but he seemed to be moving steadily. It looked as though Rita was leaning close to his ear, whispering to him. But far behind them, the lights were going on in the house.

Jane set off again, watching the path ahead and trying to pick out easy, smooth stretches where the others could move quickly. She held the shotgun close to her chest, with her left hand on the foregrip and the right on the stock just behind the trigger guard. A few minutes later, she heard car doors slam, and an engine turn over and start. She turned to see one of the cars pull up the long driveway to stop beside the lighted rectangle of the kitchen door. A man appeared in the doorway, blocking some of the light, then moved and was replaced by another. They appeared to be carrying bulky objects. Were they loading the computers into the car?

Jane hesitated, feeling the impulse to take the disk drives out of her pockets and bury them in the dirt, but resisted. She knew that she couldn’t take the time to do it, and she had a fear that the men would come out here in the daylight and be able to see the hiding place that had seemed invisible to her in the darkness. She could hear Bernie’s and Rita’s footsteps much closer to her now, so she set off again. She heard Bernie stumble, but when she took a step back toward him, she saw he was already coming ahead again, with Rita’s hand on his arm.

Jane went on, and after a time she began to see configurations of plants and rocks that she didn’t quite dare feel sure about, but then she saw distant lights, and she knew that they were approaching Apodaca Hill Road. She stopped and turned back.

She could see the faces of Rita and Bernie. Bernie’s forehead was wet with sweat, and his neck and cheeks had a darker shade, which she knew would be red in the light. She moved closer to look at him.

Bernie saw that she was staring at him, and he rasped, “What are you looking at?”

Jane said, “Sit down and rest.” She turned away from them and crept closer to the edge of Apodaca Hill Road. She went to her belly and slithered forward a few more feet to stop between thick bushes, then peered up the road. It was empty highway as far as she could see. She looked down the road in the other direction. She could see a car parked a few hundred feet away, on the other side of the intersection with Canyon Road. The night was too dark and the car too far away for her to be certain. She couldn’t see people inside, but why else would anyone park there, where there was no building?

She thought about the men at the house, and tried to reproduce their thoughts in sequence. When they had discovered that the house was empty, and the car was in the garage, they had guessed that the occupants had left on foot. It would have been reasonable to assume that they would head for the city, and to get there, they would have to cross this road.

A big truck appeared on the highway to her left, and Jane pushed her face down into the dirt to be sure its headlights fell on her hair rather than her skin. As soon as she felt the sudden gust of wind from its passing, she lifted her head to watch it go on down the road. When it drew near the parked car, its headlights shone on the windshield and illuminated the heads of four men inside.

Jane began to ease herself backward away from the road, but when she turned to head back, she saw more headlights, this time coming along Canyon Road from the direction of the house. The car appeared, turned right, and drove up to the car that was parked on Apodaca Hill Road, and paused for a moment beside it. Then the car turned around and went back along Canyon Road toward the house. As it turned, she could see heads in the back seat as well as the front.

Jane pondered for a moment. That was eight men so far. They had one car waiting here at the cutoff, and one car driving up and down the road searching. She had begun to move again when she heard another car. She stopped and watched it follow the same routine. When it came to Apodaca Hill Road it paused beside the parked car, turned around and went back out Canyon Road. This one had only two men in it. She waited, and then the fourth car appeared. As it turned, she saw that this one carried two men also.

The empty seats in the last two cars worried her. There could be as many as four men coming on foot across country the way she and Rita and Bernie had. She knew that trying to cross the road in front of the cutoff car would be like jumping into a grave, and it seemed that going back would be no better.

Jane crawled back and lay down beside Bernie in the weeds. “There’s a cutoff car with four men in it just down the road, facing this way. The other three cars are driving up and down Canyon Road, one after another.”

“Could we stay here and wait them out?” asked Bernie.

“Some of the seats in the cars are empty,” said Jane. “I think there might be men following us from the house on foot.”

Bernie held out his hand. “Give me the shotgun.”

“What for?”

“I’ll go down to the cutoff car, blow the windshield out on the driver’s side. It’ll take them a minute to get over it, and another minute to haul him out of the way so they can drive. By then we could all be in town.”

Jane looked at him, trying to make out his features in the darkness. “Tell me, Bernie. Have you done this kind of thing before?”

“Well, no,” said Bernie. “But anybody can see it’s the sensible thing to do, and anything I get on my conscience now, I’m not going to be burdened with it for long.”

“I don’t think so,” said Jane.

“Why not?”

“Too much noise,” said Jane. “I’d rather have the rest of them searching the road and the brush back there than up here in our faces.”

“When Frank Delfina is taking the skin off your back with a lemon peeler, I hope you remember that I offered,” he snapped. “So what’s your idea?”

“Figure out what they know, and make it not true anymore.”

“Christ,” he muttered. “What do they know?”

“It looks as though they’re sure we’re here, south of Canyon Road, and the cars going back and forth will keep us here. They just have to wait until the men on foot catch up or it gets light enough to see us.”

“How do you know that?”

“The cutoff car is facing this way on the other side of the intersection. All the men are still in their seats, facing this way. If they thought there was a chance we were on the other side, one or two would be out of the car, looking in that direction. They’re not. So that’s where we go.”

“Ever hear of a rearview mirror?”

Jane patted his shoulder and stood. “No plan is perfect.”

Bernie raised himself painfully and set off. Rita moved close and put her hand on his arm, but he removed it. “I’ve had plenty of time to rest,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”

Rita whispered, “I’m not sure I will.” Jane was intrigued. She waited to see whether Bernie would overlook the lie and accept the help.

Bernie set Rita’s hand on his arm and said, “That’s okay, then.”

Jane moved ahead, then angled away from Apodaca Hill Road so they would meet Canyon Road five hundred feet from the intersection. When she was fifty feet from Canyon Road, she stopped in the thick brush, sat down, and waited.

“What are you waiting for?” asked Bernie.

“The cars. I want to know where they are.”

The first car’s headlights appeared to their right a few seconds later, and they lay down to stay out of sight. Jane could see four men in the car. When it had passed and turned to come back, the second car with two men in it came by, then the third. Just after it had passed, Jane tapped Bernie’s shoulder. “You first. Get across the road and keep moving. Bear left toward the other road. Don’t stop until you’re there, then stay out of sight until we catch up.”

Jane lifted the shotgun to her shoulder and waited while Bernie hurried across the road and disappeared into the brush on the other side. “Now you.”

Rita stood and stepped onto the road. She had taken two steps when she seemed to realize that something was wrong. She stopped, and turned her head to the left.

Jane could see that Rita’s features were becoming clearer, brighter, as the distant glow of headlights came closer. Jane glanced in that direction. The car that had been parked on Apodaca Hill Road had come around the corner, and it was moving up Canyon Road toward them.

Jane looked at Rita again. She stared into the bright light as though she were considering waiting for it. Jane saw her chest expand and contract in quick little half breaths: she was going to try to trade her life for Jane’s and Bernie’s.

“Run!” Jane hissed.

Rita seemed like a sleepwalker awakened. She looked around her anxiously, then decided. She ran back to crouch in the brush beside Jane.

Jane lay still and watched the lights grow brighter until they illuminated the dust above the road and made the air glow. As the car coasted to a stop in front of her, Jane pumped the foregrip of the shotgun to bring a shell into the chamber, and pushed off the safety with her finger.

The passenger door swung open and the two men in the back seat got out. They walked to the edge of the road and looked in the general direction of Jane and Rita, but to Jane it looked as though their heads were both held too high. They were looking into the distance. She remained still and waited.

The two men moved a few paces to the front of the car, craning their necks to see if the headlights revealed anything in the dark fields ahead. She could see them more clearly now with the lighted road beyond them, craning their necks and sidestepping to stare at the field. One man pulled a gun out of his belt at the small of his back and held it at his thigh.

Jane slowly raised the shotgun and gripped it tightly against her shoulder to fight the recoil. She looked down the groove along the top of the receiver, held the bead in the center, and let it settle on the man with the gun. He would be the first, then his companion, before they could dive out of the light. If the driver had the presence of mind to accelerate away, she would put a shot through the back window on his side, and one on the other side before she ran.

The man with the gun raised his free hand above his head and made a quick circular motion. The taillights of the car went dim as the driver took his foot off the brake. Jane lowered the shotgun, pulled Rita to the ground with her and held her there. “Don’t move.”

The driver pulled to the wrong side of the road and swung the car in a tight half circle, the left tires bumping on the shoulder as the headlights swept across empty brush, over Jane and Rita’s hiding place, then settled on the road again. The two men climbed into the back seat, and the car moved up the road the way it had come.

Jane tapped Rita. “There’s another way. Come on.”

Jane rose and began to trot into the field, making her way farther from the road and back toward the house.

Jane could hear Rita’s footsteps behind her, but suddenly they stopped. Rita’s voice reached her from twenty feet back. “Wait,” she said. “I’m not leaving Bernie out there to die.”

Jane stepped close to her. “Keep your voice down,” she whispered. “If Bernie did what I told him to, he’ll be fine until we catch up with him. If he didn’t, nothing we do is going to help him.”

“Where are we going?”

“Remember the arroyo?”

“What’s an arroyo?”

“That dry streambed where I set Bernie down. It runs north-south. The road runs east-west. Water doesn’t stop just because there’s a road. It has to cross.”

Headlights appeared on the road again, and Jane and Rita had to drop to the ground until the car passed. Then Jane was up and trotting again, and Rita had to trot too, to keep her in sight. Almost as soon as the road went dark, the lights from the next car appeared.

Rita stopped and crouched as they had before, but Jane pulled her on. “They’ve got their intervals figured out now. There’s not enough time between cars to wait for them.”

When they reached the arroyo, Jane stepped down into it. When Rita joined her, she said, “See? It’s deep. When it rains, there must be a lot of water.”

“But which direction does it run?”

“It doesn’t matter. It has to cross the road.” Jane bent low and hurried along the bottom of the arroyo toward the road.

As they came closer to the road, Rita could see that Jane had been right about the cars. They were moving faster now, and the intervals between them were even.

When they were a hundred feet from the road, Jane stopped and waited. When Rita caught up, Jane pointed at the road. “See?”

Rita strained to see what Jane was pointing at. There was the road. It went across the arroyo, but it didn’t dip down and go up again. It was level. From here it looked as though the road had been built on a pile of big rocks. Did the water seep through between the rocks?

The next car approached and Jane turned her face away from the road and said, “Get ready. As soon as it goes past, we move.”

The car flashed past; Jane rose to her feet and ran. Rita felt an instant of panic. Jane seemed to be on her way, but Rita had no idea of what she was running to. It wasn’t until Jane was at the edge of the road that Rita could see her stop. Jane was below the level of the road on her hands and knees beside a set of low, thick plants. Jane pushed the plants aside and bent lower, then disappeared.

Rita came to the spot and knelt in front of the plants, then fought them aside with her forearms to see. Beyond the plants, she touched something hard and cool like rock, but it was a perfect circle. She reached farther in. It was a big cement pipe. Rita felt relief, and embarrassment at the same time. This was what Jane had meant. Jane had known there would be a big pipe—what did they call it?—a culvert. Otherwise, the arroyo would fill up after a rain and the water would wash out the road. That’s why the plants were so thick here. This was where there was the most water.

Rita could hear hollow, echoing scraping sounds from inside the culvert. She felt a swelling in her chest as she dropped to her belly and slithered into the round, dark hole. It was dirty, and the cement scraped her elbows and knees. Moving was hard and painful, but she was crossing the road by going under it, so she ignored the pain and moved.

Jane’s echoing sounds ahead of her suddenly stopped. Rita waited, and heard a low hum, then felt a sharp vibration as a car passed over her head. Then Jane began to move again, and Rita struggled to keep close to her.

A moment later, Jane’s sounds simply faded and were gone. Rita knew that Jane must have made it to the end. Rita struggled and strained to go faster, and finally she felt a fresh, cool breeze on her cheek. Jane’s whisper came from close to her ear. “You did a great job, Rita. Stay still for a second.”

This time Rita could see the glow of the headlights on the plants on the left slope of the arroyo twenty feet ahead of her. The lights brightened, and the engine sound got louder and lower. Then there was darkness and the engine sound went up the register until it was a distant whine. “Time to move on,” said Jane.

She helped Rita out of the culvert and pulled her to her feet, then set off again. This side of the road seemed to be the same random arrangement of rocks and bushes and plants as the other side, but Jane appeared to know where she wanted to go. After what seemed to be a long run, Rita could see the other road that they had been afraid to cross.

Jane stopped fifty feet from the road, then began to walk along it in a parallel course, staying low and staring at the rocks and bushes ahead of her. Suddenly she turned and hurried toward the road, and knelt down as though to pick something up. When Jane stood up again, Rita could see that what she had bent to grasp was Bernie’s arm. She was pulling him to his feet.

Rita trotted to catch up, then watched Jane set the shotgun on the ground and kick dirt over it.

Jane said, “We cross the road here, and make our way two blocks straight ahead before we get back on Canyon. The car is a black Ford Explorer, parked on the right about three blocks farther on.”

Jane hurried them to the shoulder of the road. Rita could see the car that had stopped to look for them parked in its spot a few hundred feet away. “You and Bernie go first,” Rita said. “If they see you, I can still pick up the—” and Jane’s hand grasped her wrist and yanked her onto the road. They ran a few steps and they were across, moving into the shadows of buildings and trees.

They were on a road parallel to Canyon Road, walking fast. After a few minutes of walking, Jane turned to the left, and then right. Jane said, “There. See it?”

They walked on until they came to the black shape Jane had pointed to. Jane swung the door open, climbed up into the driver’s seat, and started the engine. Seconds later, Rita had pushed Bernie into the back seat and was beside Jane, closing the passenger door. Jane pulled out, moved up the street, and took the first turn before she switched on the lights.

It seemed to Rita that it took a terribly long time for Jane to drive across town. At each intersection, Jane would look into the mirror over her head before she brought the Explorer to a stop. But then she accelerated, took a turn, and they were moving up the ramp onto the freeway. They passed under a sign that said ALBUQUERQUE.

Jane drove, and they sat in silence for a long time. Finally, Rita spoke. “I’m sorry.”

“What?” asked Bernie.

“This was my fault,” Rita said, louder. “I did this. Jane made us safe, and I threw it away.”

Jane waited for Rita to speak again for a minute, then another minute. Finally she said, “It was not a smart thing to do. It also wasn’t an evil thing, or a selfish thing, or a cowardly thing. You made a mistake, you did everything you could to fix it, and it’s over. We’re all alive, and they don’t know where we went.”

“Where did we go?” asked Rita.

“Good question,” said Jane. “I don’t know yet. I guess we’ll have to do some thinking. We’ll pick a place, and I’ll try to start getting you settled: rent a house, buy clothes—”

Bernie interrupted. “Honey, where were you when you found out about Rita’s letter and came back for us?”

“Toledo, Ohio,” said Jane. “Why?”

“Just at the north end of Albuquerque we meet Interstate 40. Go east on it.”

Jane hesitated. “You can’t possibly want—”

“It’s this truck, or whatever it is. It’s full of letters back here. The damned things take up so much space, I can hardly move my arms or legs, lie down, or sit up. Let’s go mail them.”

“I don’t know,” said Jane doubtfully. She found herself turning her eyes toward Rita.

The girl was hunched down in her seat, looking very young, thin, and dirty. Her eyes were glistening, and she was staring at Jane. “Please,” she said. “Just give us this much. We can hide for the rest of our lives.”