The Footprints of God

CHAPTER 16

As the Audi roared eastward toward the turn, I scanned the highway behind us. The nearest vehicle was two hun¬dred yards back. It looked like a pickup truck. I doubted it was NSA, but you never knew. With aerial surveil¬lance, ground units wouldn't have to follow closely to stay up with us. They could even drive ahead of us. There was simply no way to know who or where our pursuers were. If we were lucky, whatever aircraft was up there had acquired us only minutes before I saw the laser.

Rachel reached out and pulled me close enough to whisper. "I think I see the turn. Is it Highway 45?"

I checked the map. "Yes, but it's no highway. Take it."

She slowed to fifty, then screeched left onto 45.

"Punch it," I said.

She hit the accelerator and shot down the two-lane blacktop at seventy miles per hour. I put the goggles up to my face and looked for the laser. It had lost us at the turn, but it quickly tracked back onto our rear wind¬shield. I leaned over to Rachel's ear.

"We're going to cross a bridge over the Cashie River where it flows into Albemarle Sound. Take the next left after that."

"Just tell me when to turn."

The A8 devoured the road like a starving tiger, racing up and over the high bridge that arced across the Cashie. I leaned far enough out the window to look skyward. A small plane was flying over the road at about five thou¬sand feet. A wave of relief went through me. My fear was a helicopter that could set down on the road and deploy a SWAT team armed with submachine guns. A fixed-wing aircraft could land on a highway, but not on the twisting road we would soon be driving.

Rachel pointed at an intersection ahead. I nodded. She slowed just enough to make the turn, then whipped onto a much smaller road that was heavily forested on both sides.

"Look at those trees," I said, bracing my hands on the dash.

A hundred yards ahead, towering oaks closed over the road, turning it into a shadowy tunnel. When we entered it, I rolled down my window and leaned out again. First I saw nothing but branches. Then I caught a silver gleam as the plane swooped over the road behind us at about two thousand feet.

"Go!" I yelled. "We're losing them!"

"If I go any faster, I'll lose control."

"You're doing fine."

Law enforcement used fixed-wing aircraft for surveil¬lance because they could stay on station much longer than helicopters. Today they would pay a heavy price for that strategy. A plane couldn't crisscross the sky in tight enough patterns to maintain contact on a twisting road with heavy cover.

The Audi's big tires squealed as Rachel took another tight curve at seventy-plus. My right shoulder com¬pressed against the door. Struggling to hold the map steady, I searched for an escape route. If we took the next tiny rural road to the left, we would quickly recross the Cashie River, but not by bridge. The Cashie looked scarcely wider than a creek at that point, and an italic legend said, Ferry. That could mean anything from a free-floating vessel to a cable barge.

I picked up the goggles and scanned the road ahead. The laser was dancing erratically about seventy yards in front of the car, breaking and re-forming as the operator in the plane tried to contend with the branches shielding us from above.

"There's a ferry up ahead," I said. "If we can get over to it, we may be able to cut off ground pursuit."

"All right."

"You've got a left turn any second."

"Okay."

"There!"

Rachel stepped on the brake. I thought we were going to spin out, but the all-wheel drive held the car to the pavement, and she just managed the turn. As the tunnel of oaks thickened, the one-lane road quickly petered out into gravel and mud, dropping at a shallow angle that told me we were nearing water.

"Careful," I said, dreading the scrape of gravel against the undercarriage.

With the car listing to starboard, we rounded the last curve and came to rest behind an ancient green Chevy Nova parked in the middle of the track. Beyond the car I saw a dark, slow-moving river about eighty yards across.

"I don't see a ferry," Rachel said.

A beat-up aluminum canoe was tied to the roof of the Nova, but I saw no people. I covered my gun with my shirttail, then got out and walked toward the river.

The sound of an acoustic guitar floated back to me, reminding me of Deliverance. When I rounded the Nova, I saw not two inbred hillbillies but a pair of college-age boys sitting on the ground. One was blond and wore a bandanna as a headband. The other was dark-haired and fingerpicking a beat-up dreadnought Martin guitar. I waved casually and walked past them to the river's edge.

A ferry built to hold three or four cars was making its way across the water from the opposite bank, a dark column of exhaust rising from its rumbling engine. A house trailer stood on the far bank. Beside it was a small ramp, and a road that disappeared into the woods.

"We already called the ferry," said one of the boys behind me.

I turned and smiled at them. The blond with the ban¬danna wore a UNC T-shirt and had quick green eyes. The guitar player looked stoned and had a bad sunburn across his shoulders. I smelled the unmistakable odor of marijuana.

"You guys been running the rivers around here?"

The blond laughed. "We take it pretty slow. We floated the Chowan this morning. We're headed home now. Tarboro. We just wanted a look at the Cashie here."

I put my hand over my eyes and looked skyward. The surveillance plane droned out of a cumulus cloud and flew across the river.

"Sounds good," I said to the guitar player, who was still picking softly. Then I walked back to the Audi and got inside.

"The ferry's on the way."

"Is the plane still up there?" Rachel asked.

"Yes."

She looked as though she'd endured about all she could in one day. As I stared morosely at the Nova's rear end, an idea hit me.

"I'll be right back."

I got out and walked around the Nova, then squatted in front of the college boys. "I've got a proposition for you guys."

"What kind of proposition?" asked the blond.

"My wife's never done any canoeing. She saw your boat and got a wild idea. She'd like to float down the river to the sound."

The guitar player stopped picking. "We're on our way home, man."

"I remember. Tarboro. But I was thinking… how much do you figure your canoe is worth? It looks like an old Grumman to me."

"That's right," said the blond. "Used to be my uncle's. I guess she's worth about four hundred bucks."

We all turned as the ferry's deck hit the ramp on our side of the river.

I reached up and twanged the inverted V of rope that bound the bow of the canoe to the car's front bumper. "Two hundred would be closer," I said with a laugh. "But I like to keep my wife happy. How about five?"

The blond swallowed hard. He was calculating how much weed he could buy with five hundred in cash.

"The thing is, I don't want to leave my car here. I'd like you to drive it up the road a ways."

"Where to?" asked the blond.

"How about Tarboro?"

He looked confused. "But how will you get there to pick up your car?"

"Get aboard!" shouted the ferryman, a white-haired beanpole in faded overalls.

I took out my wallet and counted out ten $100 bills. "For a thousand bucks, what do you care?"

"Shit," said the guitar player, getting to his feet. He looked over the Nova at the Audi. Rachel's face was a blur behind the sun's reflection. "Is that your car?"

"That's it."

"What's the deal, man?"

"The deal is a thousand bucks for the canoe and a quick drive. You up for it?"

Both boys looked at the Audi, then at each other. "Fifteen hundred," said the blond, turning to me. "For fif¬teen hundred I'll drive it to Tarboro. Call it hazard pay."

I smiled. "Fifteen hundred it is. But here's how we have to do it."

We loaded the cars on the ferry, and the old man guided the shuddering vessel back into the slow current. As agreed, the boys sat in their Nova during the crossing. Rachel and I stayed in the Audi. The NSA plane remained on station, flying a tight circle over the river. I could almost feel Geli Bauer's security teams converging on this little corner of North Carolina.

When the ferry reached the far bank, the Nova drove slowly off the deck and down the ramp onto the road. Rachel followed. Then suddenly she swerved around the Nova and raced into the woods like a woman pursued by demons. As soon as the oak branches closed over us, she braked and waited for the Nova to catch up. Twenty seconds later, the old Chevy rounded a curve and pulled up behind us.

"Move fast!" I yelled to the boys as they got out.

Their canoe sat on yellow foam squares that protected the car's roof from the metal gunwales. I started to untie the bow ropes, but the blond whipped a knife out of his pocket and cut the lines at both ends of the canoe. I took hold of the bow, the guitar player took the stern, and together we slid the boat off the roof, inverting it as we lowered it to the ground. At the last minute we lost hold and the canoe hit the gravel with a ringing blang.

The blond reached into the backseat, took out two long wooden paddles, and dropped them into the canoe. When he looked up, his eyes focused on something behind me, and he blushed. I turned and saw Rachel standing behind me in her jeans and white button-down.

"Hey," she said. "I appreciate this." Then she smiled in a way I'd never seen her smile before.

"Uh, no problem," said the blond.

The guitar player waved at Rachel but said nothing, and I saw that even at thirty-five, Rachel Weiss still impressed boys in their twenties.

"We've got to get going," I said. "So do you guys."

I handed the blond fifteen $100 bills.

"You're either paying me too much or not enough," he said. "But it's cool." He pointed into the trees. "If you carry the canoe through there, you should hit the river after fifty yards or so."

"Thanks."

He trotted back to the Audi and slid behind the wheel. As I got Fielding's box from the backseat, I touched the kid on the shoulder. "If anyone stops you in this car, tell them exactly what happened. The money, everything. You'll be fine."

He nodded. "No sweat."

The Audi roared to life and tore off down through the tunnel of oaks. The guitar player in the Nova laughed, shook his head, and slowly followed. I tossed Fielding's box into the canoe, wrapped the bow line around my right hand, and started dragging the boat toward the trees.

"Should I push?" asked Rachel

"I've got it. You watch for snakes."

From that moment forward her eyes never left the ground.

The trees grew almost too close together to pull the canoe between them, and I was soon dripping sweat. But the blond kid was right. Before long, I smelled decaying plants, and then I sighted a yellow flash of sunlight on water. Fifty more feet and I was shoving the canoe between two cypress knees and into the river.

"Get in," I told Rachel. "All the way to the front."

She climbed into the stern and made her way care¬fully to the bow seat. I shoved the canoe into deeper water, then jumped into the stern as it arrowed away from the shore. Settling on the hard seat, I picked up a paddle and propelled the boat along the snaky-looking bank.

"I'm going to keep us under the trees," I said. "Watch for the plane."

Rachel looked up and squinted. I listened hard as I paddled, but I heard only the frothy whisper of wood cutting water.

"See anything?"

She shook her head.

I looked down the long, dark bend of river, bounded on both sides by thick stands of cypress and pine. At this moment, the vast resources of the NSA were focused on finding us. But here, those resources were largely useless. For the first time in many hours, I felt some peace.

"Any idea where we're going?" Rachel asked.

"No. But I'll know when we get there."