The Devil_s Workshop

Chapter 29

They had turned off the highway and were moving too fast along a rutted dirt road that Stacy remembered would cut several miles off the distance around the lake.

"Are you seriously trying to catch them?" Buddy yelled.

"They have to be heading for the rails." She looked over at Cris, but he said nothing.

"Let's slow down and think this out," Buddy yelled from the back seat. "We screw this up, we'll never get the toothpaste back in the tube."

Neither Cris nor Stacy answered him.

"We're just three people. They're armed lunatics. This is nuts." Buddy was more or less shrieking now. "Isn't that right, Cris?"

Again, Cris didn't say anything. He just sat in the passenger seat of the Blazer with his eyes on the road and a grim look on his face.

The headlights swept the darkened road ahead of them each time they rounded the frequent and sharp switchback curves. Several times, Stacy had to reach down and shift into four-wheel drive as they climbed steep or sandy sections of the firebreak. Then she would shift out of four-wheel and rocket dangerously along on the narrow rain-rutted path.

Suddenly, they heard the low, mournful whistle on the eleven-fifteen unit train.

"Shit," Stacy said. "There's a train coming. We'll never get there in time."

"Turn right up ahead and shoot across the meadow," Cris said. "It's a shorter way to get to the tracks." It was the first thing he'd said since they got in the car.

"Can we fuckin' please slow down and discuss this a minute?"

Nobody answered Buddy. Cris could feel a heavy fatigue settling over him, like a fatal shroud.

"We need to have a plan!" Buddy yelled. "Fer Chrissake, you're just gonna drive up and fuckin' yell at 'em? We're gonna all get killed!"

"Do you wanna get out?" Stacy yelled back, as she geared down and stopped the Blazer. "You can walk back." She glared at the movie producer with fire in her eyes.

He had never seen a woman look so dangerous. "All I said was, I wanta know how we're gonna do this."

"We'll think of something. My husband died trying to stop these killers. If DeMille has this Prion and I can get my hands on it, I can prove what went on here. Without it, I can't prove shit. I'm going to get the bastards who killed Max, so either stay in the car and shut up, or get out and walk. But make up your mind, and stop whining!"

In the back seat, Buddy was jerking slightly, little conflicting reflex movements, as if one second he was starting to get out, the next instant some invisible cord was holding him there. Then the low moan of the train whistle drifted across the night.

"Shit," she said, still looking at Buddy, who nodded his head weakly.

She put the Blazer in gear and gunned it, throwing stones and gravel as she shot up the next hill, then cut right off the dirt firebreak they were on and headed across the two-mile-wide meadow as Cris had suggested.

The car was first bogging, then accelerating as it hit mud and then hardpack. Occasionally a wheel would go into a hole, so she would hit four-wheel drive and blast out. The progress was slow, but a mile up ahead and to the left, she could see the train headlights wigwagging on the engine's nose, cutting figure eights over the steel rails in front of it. "Cris," she said, and he looked over at her. "Are you okay with this?"

He said nothing.

"The train's coming. You need to tell us what to do," she said. "They're going to get away." He just sat there with his shoulders slumped, looking out the windshield as the Blazer bounced along. "What the fuck is wrong with you?" she yelled.

"I don't know what to do," he said.

Cris had told Stacy about the man he had killed at the lake; after that, Stacy thought, he had stopped functioning. She put the Blazer in low and started powering up the hill, trying to head off the train. As they got to the rise, in the moonlight they could see forty men and women crouching down in a ravine about four hundred yards away, waiting for the train to pass. One of the men saw the Blazer and pointed at them.

"Turn off the lights," Cris said softly.

"Huh?"

"Turn off the headlights and move the car. You're about to take fire."

Then the Blazer rocked, and they heard the shrill whine of ricocheting metal. A second later they heard the report of the gun.

"We're taking rounds," Cris blurted. She finally flipped off the headlights and turned left, exposing Cris as she started to drive along the top of the hill.

Several more shots rang out. Then the right front tire blew and they were riding on the rim, swerving badly until they plowed to a jarring stop.

"Out of the car," Cris ordered.

He and Stacy scrambled out. Buddy decided to stay huddled down on the back floor. Cris came back and snatched open the door. "Get the fuck outta there," he yelled.

"Safer in here."

"This thing is gonna draw fire parked up here. Those are armor-piercing slugs! Get out." Then he grabbed Buddy and dragged him. They ran along the hill, although visible in the moonlight, so Cris found cover behind some rocks and pulled them out of danger.

The Southern Pacific locomotive flashed past the place where the Christian Choir lay in the low ditch, trying to stay out of view of the engineer.

"They're getting away," Stacy said, as she stuck her head up and watched.

Cris was sitting with his back against the rock; his hands were shaking, his muscles twitching. He was done and he knew it. Then he rolled over and vomited bile onto the ground.

"What're you doing?" Buddy asked, appalled. "This sucks! You're puking 'cause you're scared?"

" 'Cause I'm sick," Cris said softly. "I'm an alcoholic. My body is fucked up. Nothing's working right."

"Great," Buddy whined. "Just great."

Stacy was looking at the F. T. R. A. S, who were beginning to make their parallel run up the embankment toward the slow-moving train. In twos and threes, they boarded the cars. "Dammit! We've gotta do something."

"Whatta you wanna do?" Buddy snarled. "We can't make it over there in time."

Off across the meadow one of Fannon's men was facing her, his hand out in front of him.

"Why's he pointing at us?" she said, as a bullet hit the rocks by her head and zinged off into the night.

Cris reached up, grabbed her, and pulled her down hard. "He's not pointing at you, he's shooting at you."

She sat beside him, her back against the boulder, until the train was gone. Then she stood and looked at the spot four hundred yards away where the hobos had been. "Where're they going?" she asked.

"Waco," he answered. "There's a big switching yard there. It's a hub. From there they could catch out to anywhere."

"What're we gonna do?" she said, her voice frail with distress.

He sat there in silence, so Buddy threw in his opinion. "I think we need to go to the authorities," he said. "Let them handle this."

"And what if the authorities are in on it?" Stacy shot back. "The Pentagon, the CIA, a lotta people had to be fronting this, and they'll want to see it covered up. We can't prove anything. We need evidence." Then she looked at Cris. "What do you think?"

"I need a drink, that's what I think." After a long moment, he stood. "Why don't we put on a new tire, go down to the lake, and see if we can find their boat. Maybe they left something behind."