The Lions Of Lucerne

34

There was no telling how long he had been lying on the cold concrete floor of Senator Snyder’s basement. What he did know was that he ached all over and couldn’t stop shivering from the waves of cold that tortured his naked body.

André had always considered himself to be in very good shape. Being a junior associate D.C. lawyer who specialized in international finance didn’t exactly require a hard body, but being in superlative health had always been his choice. To balance his regime of weight lifting and cardiovascular exercise, and also to give his mind something positive to focus on during the bleak D.C. winters, he had taken up yoga two years ago. It was a nice way to get his heart rate up when he couldn’t get to the club or it was too dreadful outside to run. He’d never had any idea that it would one day save his life.

The hog-tie position Snyder had left him in would have immobilized most, but not André. From the beginning, his focus had been on controlling his mind and his breathing, trying not to let fear overtake him. The cords around his ankles and wrists tore into his skin, but he put the pain out of his mind and tried to focus on staying calm. The rag stuffed in his mouth threatened to gag him with every breath, but he knew, on a logical as well as a very primal level, that he couldn’t give in to the urge to vomit.

With his arms drawn so tightly behind his back, any movement hurt. After struggling against his bonds several times, only to have his mind race uncontrollably ahead to what lay in store for him when the senator returned, André lay still. He assessed the situation. In his opinion, the greatest thing he had going for him, besides that he was still alive, was that he wasn’t bound even more restrictively. Despite the pain, he could move if he really wanted to. And he did.

He realized that he didn’t need his arms, legs, or his wrists to move. If he used only his pelvis and his chest, he could shuffle in a two-step inchworm process. First, lift my chest and slide it to the right, and then lift my pelvis and follow.

It took André almost three hours to cross the basement floor and get to the washer-and-dryer area on the other side of the room. It has been necessary to stop repeatedly to catch his breath. The exertion increased his respiration, which was already impaired by the gag and the strong odor of shoe polish that filled his nostrils whenever he tried to breathe deeply.

When he reached the laundry area, he rolled onto his side so that the cord on his wrists and ankles faced the metal leg of an old washbasin between the washer and dryer. As he couldn’t stand upright, this was his only chance. He began rocking back and forth, dragging the laundry cord across the leg of the washbasin. The process was agonizingly slow.

A warm, sticky, wet feeling began to spread across his hands, and he knew that he was bleeding, but he pressed on. There was no telling when the senator would return to finish the job, and therefore nothing mattered but getting free. An animal instinct took over, and André rocked harder, sawing his wrists and ankles against the metal. All control he had over his mind had vanished. He kept thinking about wolves caught in traps who chew their own legs off to escape as he swung his body and sawed faster.

Finally there was a muffled snap and the tension on his wrists and ankles let up ever so slightly. The cord was fraying. He closed his eyes to try to shut out the pain. He resumed the fevered pitch of his rocking while he applied outward pressure on the cord from his hands and feet. Another snap. He was almost there. André rocked his body for all he was worth and was greeted finally with the sweet sensation of release. The cord ripped the rest of the way away. His feet fell backward and his arms went limp at his sides. Though he knew he needed to work on getting more circulation to his extremities, he just lay on the floor and wept for several minutes, allowing exhaustion to sweep through him. The only movement he made was to remove the gag. As he spat it out, he saw that Snyder had indeed used a shoeshine rag. He seethed with anger but was too tired to allow it to overtake him. He had won, at least so far, and he took his time savoring the small victory as he lay motionless on the floor.

After giving himself a short rest, André gathered enough momentum for the painful roll onto his back. He held his wrists in front of his face and examined the bleeding from the gashes in his raw, burned skin. Contracting his stomach muscles, he leaned upward and looked down at his ankles, which were not much better. The left side of his body looked as if he had been dragged down three miles of a highway covered in loose gravel and broken glass. It was all painful, but he would live. What was he saying? He wasn’t out of harm’s way yet.

Okay, Mr. Travolta, he said to himself, if the key words here are “staying alive,” then we need to get you out of here. André continued to crunch upward until he was in a sitting position. He rolled his shoulders back and forth and also twisted his ankles in painful circles, helping to improve the blood flow. Stripping off the remaining cord that was clinging to him, he blessed the Lightness of Being Yoga Center for the flexibility he now enjoyed and made a mental note to make a donation when and if he was completely out of this situation.

André pulled himself to a standing position. Twisting the faucet handle, he waited for the washbasin’s rusty brown water to turn clear before submerging his wrists in the cascade. The water burned at first and then felt numbingly sweet. As much as he wanted to stand and let the water run over his wrists for hours, he knew he had to get moving.

As in many of Georgetown’s ritzier town homes, a laundry chute fed from the top floor of the building, where the bedrooms were, down into the basement. Not far from the washer and dryer, André saw the laundry basket used to catch whatever came down. Mingled with the senator’s clothes were the brown corduroys and turtleneck sweater he had shot down the chute just yesterday. He rummaged further and found a pair of dirty sweat socks and began to get dressed.

As he finished pulling on his socks, he looked down at a bloodied piece of cord. André wasn’t stupid. He knew if he brought any charges against the senator, it would be his word against Snyder’s. For a good part of the time that he had lain naked, cold, and scared on the moldy concrete floor, he had wondered who would ever believe his story. Knowing the senator would do everything in his power to stop it from becoming public, André needed some sort of proof that he had been there. He looked down at the piece of bloody cord again and kicked it as hard as he could under the dryer.

He could no longer control the urge to run, and he moved quickly toward the back of the basement, where a small utility door led up a short flight of steps to the garden. Not wanting to even attempt to use the front door, for fear of bumping into Snyder, André rushed the garden door. He grabbed the cold metal handle and turned. Locked!

He tried again, but no luck. The door was dead-bolted with a lock that needed a key from either side. The glass was no better, as it was covered with a thick wire security mesh. A wave of nausea began to grow in the pit of his stomach. André fought to keep it down. Think. There has got to be a way. He knew that all of the windows in the basement were covered with the exact same security mesh. It seemed hopeless.

Looking up, as if imploring heaven for some sort of aid, he saw his salvation. Above the right-hand corner of the doorframe was a rusted nail with a key hanging from it. Please, let this be the one.

André took down the key and slid it into the lock, his hand trembling. It fit. But as he turned the key to the left it wouldn’t budge. The same thing happened when he turned it to the right. Shit. It’s the wrong key!

Taking a deep breath, he told himself to calm down. The senator could arrive home at any moment; André needed to keep his wits about him. He tried the key again, harder. Careful, don’t break it. Nothing.

Remembering his own trouble with the fifth-generation key for the condo he and Mitch had shared, André applied a little English. He pulled slightly as he twisted. Joyous relief flooded his body as the key finally turned all of the way, drawing back the dead bolt and releasing the door. The moist smell of clean outside air flowed into his nose and mouth.

A steady rain was falling, and a large puddle sat at the base of the concrete steps. While trying to work the lock, he had noticed a set of gardening tools off to his right, including a pair of green Wellington boots. By the looks of them, they were Snyder’s. André had bigger feet, but didn’t think twice as he grabbed a pair of shears and cut the toes off of each boot. He quickly pulled them on and crept cautiously from the basement. The garden was cold and the night air was heavy with the mist of the steadily falling shower. He still had no idea what time it was and didn’t care. Snyder obviously thought he could come back and finish him at any point. He had no reason to suspect André would have been able to get away.

Creeping slowly, using the large trees for cover, he made his way to the end of the garden. The stone rococo fountain gave him enough of a foothold to climb up to the top of the wall. As he pushed with his left leg to get the final thrust he needed, a stone cherub’s head dislodged and clattered down with a roaring splash into the pool of water below.

It made no difference. André Martin landed effortlessly in the neighbor’s yard and was off like a shot, the knowledge of what the senator would do to him if he caught up pushing him forward.