Bitter Recoil

by Steven F Havill

  “It’s a deal.” His spirits sounded upbeat, but I knew he was working at it. I followed him to the door, my shuffle just about as fast as his.

  “And by the way…remember Nolan Parris?” Francis asked.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “He’s downstairs in one of the reading rooms. They won’t let him up. He spent the night, I guess. But Tate set some tight rules on this one. Takes an act of Congress to see anyone or find out anything. You want to see him?”

  “I don’t know if I do or not.”

  “As I said, he spent the night. He must be pretty worried. Nobody’s talking and he’s concerned about the little girl. He means well, I think.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Finally, he’s worried. We all are. But I don’t know what it would accomplish to see him or…” and I stopped. My brain was beginning to work. I shrugged like I was making a hell of a concession. “Yeah. Send him up. No, wait. Forget it. I’ll take care of it. I’ve got a phone.”

  Francis nodded. “I’ll try to drop in on you later this evening. Behave yourself.” He smiled.

  “And you get some rest, kid. You look like shit.” It felt good to be able to tell someone else that for a change.

  Dr. Francis Guzman left, and I called the hospital gestapo to ask them if they’d let Father Nolan Parris enter the “R” zone. I had no desire to hash over his problems or his guilt that was no doubt rampaging after what had happened. It was simpler than that. I needed wheels, and Parris had access to a station wagon.

  Age sixty-two is too late to worry about growing up and following the rules. There wasn’t anything wrong with me that wouldn’t heal as well elsewhere…where I might be more useful.

  Nolan Parris hadn’t found his way through the multilevel labyrinth to my room when the telephone rang. I grabbed it. It was Tate. The old bastard must have been a mind reader.

  “Bill, are you dressed?”

  “Hell, no. I’m sitting here in a goddamn robe pretending I’m a nursing home patient. What’s up?”

  “We got a break. A private pilot who was going to fly over and look at the forest fire says he saw Finn’s Blazer on one of the back roads of the reservation.”

  “It’s not Finn’s goddamned Blazer and where was this? Which reservation?”

  “Northwest of Grants somewhere…over by Haystack Mesa, they called it. He’s cornered at an old wildcat uranium mine. There’s dozens of them out that way. We’ve got it pinpointed on the map. A chopper is going to pick me up here in a minute.”

  I was about to interrupt him and tell him that if I got left out of this one I’d curse his firstborn for generations. But there was a light knock on my door, and Nolan Parris stepped into the room. He was wearing his clerical suit, complete with white collar. I turned my attention back to the telephone.

  “You have to pick me up, Pat.”

  “That’s why I called. I cleared it with the hospital already. You need to get your old ass in gear, get dressed, and be at the helipad on the roof in about thirty minutes.”

  “You got it.”

  “And, Bill…”

  “Yep?” I was already impatient to be off the phone.

  “I’m not doing this as a favor to you. I want you to know that from the start. If it was up to me, you’d be locked in that hospital room for a week or so. I’m doing it because I was told to do it.”

  I slammed on the brakes. I couldn’t imagine Pat Tate taking orders from anyone. “This is your case, Pat.”

  “Damn right it’s my case. And it’s going to stay that way. But he’s got the child and this may be our only chance.” I heard the steady whup-whup of a helicopter in the background, and someone shouted at Tate. “I’ll talk with you in a few minutes. Finn must know he’s not going to slip through the net. He’s cornered, Bill. And he knows it. Now he wants to talk to you.”

  “Finn wants to talk to…”

  “Thirty minutes, Bill. Don’t make us wait.” Tate hung up and I stared out the window, the phone still in my hand. If the media had pried enough information out of Tate to know that the hospital was treating two survivors from the war on the mountain, Finn would have heard the news on any radio station. He knew my face. If he’d rifled through the glove compartment of the Blazer, he knew my name. The bastard wanted to negotiate.

  I had forgotten that anyone else was in the room. Nolan Parris had heard enough though.

  “Sheriff,” he said, and I turned around to look at him.

  “You have to let me go along.” Parris limped across the room and touched my arm. He repeated his request, and I hung up the phone and pushed myself out of the chair.

  “Why the hell not,” I said. If another passenger on the helicopter was all right with Pat Tate, it was fine with me. I didn’t know how they’d managed to corner the son of a bitch, but the rules had changed. Maybe the services of a priest would be useful.

  Chapter 29

  Floyd’s Number Two was a vertical shaft sunk into the bleak, tan desert just off one corner of the Navajo reservation. The boneyard around the mine was littered with three decades of rusting hardware and trash.

  By the time our helicopter arrived, there were five cops for every lizard.

  H. T. Finn had taken the wrong turn. The two-track had swerved around an abrupt rise and then dead-ended at the mine headframe. My Blazer had been spotted earlier by a private pilot as the truck kicked up a plume of dust, heading west. The pilot had called the cops. A customs helicopter had given chase then ran out of fuel. They’d skipped back to Gallup, figuring it was either that or walk. If they’d stuck on Finn’s ass another minute, they’d have had him.

  “In a day and a half, Finn could have been deep in Mexico, if he’d dodged all the right roadblocks!” I shouted at Tate over the noise of the chopper. “This is only a hundred miles from San Estevan, as the crow flies!”

  Tate pointed at my Blazer and I had my answer. A long, jagged rent tore the bodywork from the driver’s door back to the bumper. From where I stood I could see that Finn had had to mount the spare tire, a ratty summer tread two sizes smaller than the rest.

  He’d tangled with something. Too bad it hadn’t ripped his goddamn arms off. If Daisy had been hurt, I’d rip his arms off.

  We made our way through the flying dirt and dust to the old headframe. I ignored all the curious faces except one.

  I knew Sheriff Edwin Sterns from days gone by—felons rarely bother to observe county lines, and over the years a cop meets his compadres from other agencies. This county was Sterns’s—and it fitted him, big, lazy, and all but empty.

  He was a tall, gangly man with a potbelly that looked like he was carrying a bedpan under his shirt. He’d been a state trooper years before but had found their military bearing too much trouble to imitate.

  “How’d you rope this one, Gastner?” he asked as we shook hands. “And what the hell brings you all the way north into God’s country?”

  “Just lucky.”

  Tate said, “He’s on vacation.”

  Sterns shook his head in wonder. “Hell of a vacation.” He turned and motioned us over to the headframe.

  The mine shaft gaped, the opening ten feet square. The damn hole went straight down into the earth. The shaft’s edges were heavily timbered, and a thin grating of woven steel like the troops used to make runways over soggy ground in Vietnam covered the opening. The mesh rested on an H-frame of two-inch angle iron. At one time a barbed-wire fence had enclosed the area, but now that was broken and scattered. I shuffled carefully to the edge and looked down. The shaft was bottomless black.

  Directly across from where I stood, a corner of the mesh had been pried up. Below the torn mesh, a steel ladder disappeared into the depths. The ladder hugged the wall of the shaft, the rungs no more than four inches from the timbers to which the ladder frame was bolted. There was no safety cage around the ladder. Once a man was on his way down, there was no other support if his hands should slip from the rust-covered, half-inch-diameter rungs…just a lot of empty
space. It gave me the willies.

  “And he’s down in there? With the child?”

  “Sure as hell,” Sterns said.

  I wasn’t a bit surprised that no one had followed Finn down inside that hole.

  “We’ve got to get Daisy out of there,” Parris said. His eyes were wild, and I took him by the arm. He looked like he wanted to step out on the mesh.

  “Shit,” I said and looked westward. “If it was me, I’d rather take my chances walking out across the desert than sliding down in that hole. And he had my Blazer, for God’s sakes. He could have kept going, road or no road.”

  “Maybe he figured he was cornered,” Tate said. “Maybe he didn’t know the chopper had to call it off.”

  Sterns shoved his hands in his pockets. “He asked for you, Gastner. My guess is that he thinks you’re his ticket. And while he waits, he’s sure as hell safe here. Nobody’s going to sneak up behind him.”

  I turned away from the hole. I kept my grip on Parris’s arm, pulling him with me like a wayward child. “How the hell deep is that thing?”

  Sterns stepped right to the edge and looked down through the wire mesh. “I’d guess five, six hundred feet. Maybe more. We’re lookin’ to find Stubby Begay. He’s a Navajo who lives in these parts. He used to work for Simon-Yates, and one of the deputies said he thinks Begay was on the crew that used to work this hole.”

  Chances were nil anyone would have a blueprint of the mine… and if they did, it’d take a week to get it. “Let’s check the truck,” I said. “See what the son of a bitch took. Maybe he took the hand-held radio down into the shaft with him.” I turned to one of the deputies. “Stay with this man,” I told him and hauled Parris around within reach of the deputy.

  The Blazer wasn’t locked and the keys were in the ignition. I glanced in the back. “The bastard went camping,” I said. “He took my sleeping bag.” I peered under the driver’s seat. “And the radio.” I rummaged some more. “And a .45 automatic I kept stowed here.”

  I straightened up and rested my forearms on the seat cushion. Lying on the passenger seat was the wad of newspaper that had been under the seat, serving as a cushion for the radio. I frowned. I was not an overly neat individual when it came to housekeeping—but now the newspapers had been folded with care. The two-week-old Albuquerque paper was on top, with a quarter of the front page torn off. The tear went through the middle of some notes I’d scribbled in the margin.

  I remained motionless, lost in thought. What the son of a bitch was up to was a mystery to me. Hell, I had no idea whether a hand-held radio even worked underground…or for that matter if the batteries in mine were charged.

  I reached over and snapped open the glove compartment. I couldn’t tell if my mess in there had been rearranged, but nothing appeared to be missing. I shook my head.

  The Blazer’s two-way radio was an old-fashioned Motorola, and when I turned on the ignition I saw it still worked. So did the gas gauge. The needle rested below “E.”

  The Motorola was set on channel one, car-to-car. I hefted the mike. “Finn, do you hear me?” Pat Tate had walked around to the other side of the Blazer, and he leaned against the door. I repeated the call. A short burst of static crackled over the speaker, sounding faint. A try on the other channels produced nothing.

  “He either don’t have the radio on or it don’t work underground,” Tate said.

  “I’ve never been down in a mine. I don’t know.” I hung up the microphone and switched off the ignition. “Finn doesn’t know me from a hole in the head,” I said. “He met me that first time Estelle and I walked up to the camp.” That seemed years before. “If he drove your deputy’s car to the Guzman’s house and took my truck, then he was planning ahead. How the hell did he know about the Blazer?”

  A deputy started to walk toward us and Tate waved him off. “Maybe he didn’t. He knew who Estelle was and without a doubt knew who Francis was…especially if the Burgess girl had occasion to visit the clinic. Hell, if you live in a dinky town like San Estevan, you know everybody sooner or later. Maybe he knew about Dr. Guzman’s Isuzu four by four and was after that. Guzman wasn’t home so he settles for yours. And you got to figure, the way things went down, yours was about the only one he’d be able to take without worrying about the owner showing up.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Another possibility is that the night Osuna was shot Arajanian followed him to the Guzmans’, hoping for another try. He sees you and spooks.” He shrugged. “So he tells Finn about it when he gets back. He had the time. If Arajanian watched you load Osuna into the Blazer, it makes sense he’d tell Finn about that, too.”

  I didn’t much like the notion that while Estelle and I had been helping the wounded Osuna the creep with the silenced Beretta had been lounging around outside the adobe house, watching our every move—with his finger itching on the trigger.

  If that had been the case, he could have taken us all out, then and there. Whatever he’d been, maybe he hadn’t been a creative little bastard. He’d needed instructions from his boss.

  As we walked back toward the shaft, I saw that the crowd was growing. I gestured at Sterns, and he broke away from a powwow he was having with a couple of men in business suits.

  “You have a bullhorn? A hailer?” I asked.

  “Sure. I mean, I’m sure somebody does.” Sterns turned and shouted at one of his deputies. The kid produced one of those little battery-powered amplifiers that track coaches love. I took it and walked to the shaft. Another helicopter roared overhead, and I glanced up. It was one of the television stations.

  “Sheriff, you need to rope this place off before the crowd gets so thick someone knocks me into the mine shaft,” I told Sterns, and the sheriff assigned that project to three of the deputies who were underfoot.

  They charged off, one of them with his M-16 at high port like he’d been ordered to take a hill.

  I took my time. I dug the bell of the bullhorn into the sand and lowered myself to my knees. I could smell the stale air of the mine as I leaned over the mesh. I knew my head and shoulders were silhouetted against the sky if Finn should be down in the shaft looking up.

  I switched on the horn and pressed the trigger.

  “Finn…are you listening?”

  “I have to talk with Daisy,” Parris said, again at my elbow. I ignored him, trying to hear some response from down under.

  “Finn!” I yelled. My words bounced around the guts of the mine shaft. He was going to have to shout to be heard over the cars, helicopters, and yakking that was going on behind me, but I was sure there’d been no response.

  I was lifting the bullhorn for a third try when I heard his voice, distant but clear as crystal.

  “Send Gastner.”

  I glanced at Tate then triggered the hailer. “This is Gastner. I’m listening.”

  “I want to talk to you.”

  “So talk.”

  I didn’t understand what he said next and I turned to Sterns and snapped, “If those sons a bitches can’t keep quiet, arrest ’em, goddamn it. We’re trying to conduct some business here.”

  “Finn, I didn’t understand you.”

  He exaggerated each word with a pause between each. “Face…to…face.”

  “Come on up and we’ll do that.”

  “Down…here.”

  “Oh, sure,” I said without turning on the bullhorn. I triggered it and added, “That’s not possible.”

  “Make…it…possible.”

  Parris was fidgeting and I said, “Do you have the little girl with you?”

  “And…she…will…remain…with…me.”

  “He can’t do that,” Parris said and his voice shook.

  “Be quiet,” I said and then keyed the hailer. “Is she safe?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then let us bring her up. You won’t be harmed.”

  A sound that could have been a laugh floated up. “There… is…only…one…choice. You…meet…me…face…to…face… down�
�here.”

  “Don’t be a fool. I can’t climb down the ladder.”

  Tate leaned over a little, looking down. He said quietly, “If he gets on that ladder with the kid, there’s no way he can defend himself.”

  I had visions of Daisy pinwheeling like a broken doll down into the depths of the old mine. “He’ll use the girl as a shield.”

  “Sure,” Sterns said. “And when he gets up here and steps away from the edge, one rifle bullet through the head, he’s dead, and the girl’s safe.”

  I didn’t like the sound of that either. I hefted the hailer again. “Finn—you have to let the girl go. Let us send an unarmed deputy down to bring her up.”

  “No. Ruth…is…the…answer. She…remains…with…me.”

  “What the hell is he talking about?”

  “I don’t know. He calls her Ruth. Who the hell knows why.” I hefted the bullhorn. “Finn, nobody is going to hurt either you or the girl if you give yourself up.”

  “Tell…Robert…that.”

  “He means Arajanian,” I said to Tate. “That’s over, Finn. Come on up.”

  “No. Face…to…face…with…you.” There was a pause. “And… you…know…why.”

  I looked at Tate and said, “I do?”

  The sheriff shrugged. “This guy’s a fruitcake.”

  Apparently we hadn’t responded promptly enough, because Finn’s voice floated up.

  “Don’t…play…games…Mister…Sheriff.”

  “Finn, if you don’t send the girl up, we’re going to have to come down and get her. You know what that means.”

  He knew I was bluffing. There wasn’t a drop of concern in his tone when he said, “Don’t…be…a…fool.” That calm, detached voice floating up out of the ground was enough to raise goosebumps. I sat back on my haunches. My shoulder hurt. My right ankle throbbed. I eyed the ladder. There was no way I could climb down that with only one good arm. Hell, if nothing else, my belly would throw me off balance and there I’d go.

  “Any ideas?” I asked Tate.

  “You want to go down?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. There’s no way I can climb down there.”

  Sterns was eager. “We can lower you somehow. Use one of those ass slings like the search and rescue uses. One of my deputies is up on that stuff.”