Beyond the Great Snow Mountains (Ss) (1999)

by L'amour, Louis

  The light held still.

  Look at the roof, I said. The top of the stope.

  The light lifted and pointed up, showing those ugly cracks and the great bulge of rocks.

  If you fire that gun, the whole roof will cave in. It will take that drift with it. I was still backing up with occasional swift glances around as the light allowed some vague outline of what lay behind me.

  My mind was working swiftly as I backed away. I knew something now, something that had been disturbing me all day. It was a new idea and, while a puzzling one, it revealed much and made many things clear.

  Whoever it was showed hesitation now. I could almost feel the mind working, could sense what he or she must be thinking. Trying to judge what was true and what not. The person over there wanted, desperately, to kill me, yet there was an element of danger.

  Suddenly, the light went out. Then I heard a grating, a slide, and a sodden sound. Whoever it was had dropped to the floor of the stope!

  Instantly, I put my own light out.

  We were in complete darkness now. Gently, I shifted a foot. Backing as carefully as I could, I got to the wall. I wanted the killer, and I was sure in my own mind that the killer faced me in the stope, yet I wanted no trouble there. The slightest vibration might bring that hanging wall down, and I wanted no part of that.

  My foot hit the wall behind me. If the drift was there, it would be above me, probably out of reach. The muck over which I had been crawling had been slanting down, carrying me even lower than the original ten feet.

  I heard a rock fall, and knew the killer was coming up on me in the dark. He was closing in.

  What did he expect to do? The chances were, he also had a knife. Sweat poured down my face and ran down my skin under my shirt. Dust came up in my nostrils. The air seemed very hot, and very close. I backed up. Then, suddenly, a cool movement of air touched my cheek.

  Keeping it in my face, I edged toward it. I put my hand out and found emptiness. Feeling around, I found the arch of the top of a tunnel. The hole was no more than two feet wide, and chances were the drift was not over seven or eight feet high. Wedging myself in the hole, I dropped.

  My feet hit first and there was a tiny splash of water.

  I got my balance and started rapidly along the drift.

  Once, I bumped hard into the wall at a turn, and once around it I got my light going, but turned it down to a very feeble glow. Then I ran swiftly along the drift, my lungs gasping for air.

  Tom Marshall's body had been discovered at the bottom of a winze well back in the mine. Calculating my own descent through the stope, I believed myself to be on the level where the body had been found. He had been knocked on the head and dropped down the winze.

  Hurrying on through the old workings of the mine, I came suddenly to some recent timbering. I had just crawled over a pile of waste that almost filled a crosscut running from the dead-end drift of the old workings into the new. In a matter of minutes I had found the winze.

  Here it was. Dark stains on the rock were obvious enough. Once, I thought I heard a sound, and flashed the light down the drift that ran out the other side of the air shaft. There was nothing. Kneeling, I began to study the rocks. It was just a chance I could find something, some clue.

  The tiny splash of water between the ties of the track jerked me out of a brown study. My lamp hung on the wall, and I came up fast. I was too slow.

  A gigantic fist smashed out of somewhere, and I was knocked rolling. Lights exploded in my brain and I rolled over, getting to my knees. Soderman was calmly hooking his lamp to the wall. He turned then and started toward me, and I made it to my feet, weaving. He swung, low and hard, and I caught the punch on my forearm and swung my right. It caught him on the side of the face but he kept coming. Toe-to-toe we started to slug it out, weaving, smashing, swinging, forward and back, splashing in the water, our bodies looming black and awful in the glare of the two flickering lights.

  There was blood in my mouth and my breath was coming hard. He closed with me, trying for a headlock, but I struck him behind the knee and it buckled, sending him down. I jerked my head free and kicked him in the ribs. He lunged to his feet and I hit him again, then he dived for me and I gave him my knee in the face.

  Bloody and battered, he lunged in, taking my left and getting both hands on me. His fingers clamped hard on my throat and blackness swam up and engulfed me.

  Agonizing pains swept over me, and I swung my legs up high and got one of them across the top of his head, jerking him back. Then I crossed the other one over his face and, with all the power that was in them, crushed him back toward the floor. He was on his knees astride me, and I thought I'd break his back, but he was old at this game, too, and suddenly he hurled himself back, giving way to my pressure, and got his legs free.

  Both of us came up, bloody and staggering. I swung one from my heels into his wind. He grunted like a stuck hog, and I let him have the other one. At that, it took three of them to bring him down, and I stood there in the flickering light, gasping to get my breath back.

  Then the tunnel swam around me, the floor seemed to heave, and our lights went out. A moment later there came a dull boom.

  Soderman, on the floor at my feet, came out of it with a grunt.

  What . . . was that? The words were muffled through his swollen lips.

  Feeling along the wall for my lamp, I let him have it.

  I think they've blown the entrance to this drift.

  Holding the lamp in my left hand, I struck at the reflector with my palm. On the third strike I got a light.

  The flame leaped out, strong and bright.

  Soderman was sitting up. His face looked terrible but his eyes were clear. Blown up? The idea got to him. Bottled us in, huh! That made me think, and I watched him closely.

  He didn't throw a fit or start rushing around or exclaiming, and I liked that. He got up. Then he stared at me, frankly puzzled.

  He said, Who would do it? Why?

  Soderman, I said, you're a good fighter, but you've got nothing for brains. You and me, we're the only two people alive who know who killed Tom Marshall, and I'm the only one knows why!

  He stared at me, blinking. Then he got his light and set it going. He shook his head. That ain't reasonable. It can't be!

  It is, I said, and it isn't going to do us much good.

  If I'm not mistaken, we're bottled up here. Anybody know you were coming here?

  She did. Nobody else.

  Nobody knew I was coming, either. That means nobody is going to start wondering for a while where either of us are.

  She wouldn't do that! Why, she-? He was taking it hard.

  Buddy, Donna Marshall may have preferred you to her husband, enough to play around a little, anyway, but there was something she preferred to either of you.

  What was that? He scowled at me, not liking it.

  Money.

  But how would she figure money?

  This mine is worth dough. Also, Tom Marshall had a hundred thousand in insurance.

  He studied that one over for a while, staring at his light. Then he started to move. Let's have a look.

  Soderman led the way and we slogged along through the mud and water toward where the main elevator station should be. Coming up from the old workings as I did, I had not been through here before, there was more to that hole than it looked like, and both of us were tired.

  Suddenly, after ten minutes or so of walking, our lights flashed on a slide of rock closing off the drift. He looked around a little, and his face got grim.

  Oh, they did it right! he said. They did it very right! This is a hundred yards inside the main drift. The chances are it caved all the way to the elevator station.

  We couldn't dig through that in a month!

  We didn't waste any time talking about it. We turned around and started back. You must have come in through the big stope, he said over his shoulder. How was it?

  Nasty, I said, and I'd bet a pretty penny there
's no stope there now. That roof was the snakiest looking thing I've seen.

  Roof? he said. I thought you were a miner. You mean, hanging wall.

  Yes, I said, that's what I mean. The reason I said it was because I was checking up on him, just to be sure, and things were clicking into place in my skull. If I get out of this, I added, I'm gonna see somebody swing!

  We only needed one look. The big stope through which I'd come a short time before was gone. Debris bulged into the drift from it, and part of the drift down which I'd come had caved in. We were shut off, entombed.

  He stood there, staring at me, and he looked sick. I'd bet a plugged dime I looked sicker.

  Listen, I said, you've worked in this hole. I haven't. Isn't there anyplace we could get out? An air shaft? An old prospect hole? Anything?

  No. He shook his head. Looks like we've bought it, bud.

  I sat down on a boulder and got out my map.

  Let's look this over, I said. If there's an angle, it's here.

  Over my shoulder, he started to study it with me.

  Here, on paper, was a blueprint of the mine. And a cross section of all the workings, old and new.

  We didn't have to study that blueprint long to know we were bottled up tighter than a Scotchman at a wake.

  There had been only two openings to this section of the mine, and they were plugged. On the other side of the elevator station there was a series of vent shafts, but they could just as well have been in China.

  We're sunk! Soderman said. She's fixed us plenty.

  That blueprint lay there on my knee. Hey! I said.

  Didn't I see a powder locker back down this drift?

  Uh-huh, so what? Do we blow ourselves up?

  Look at this two-twenty drift, I suggested. It cuts mighty close to the edge of the hill. Supposing we set up a liner and see what we can do?

  He looked at me, then he bent over and turned a valve on the air pipe. It blasted a sharp, clear stream of air. The compressor's still running. He looked at me and then chuckled. What have we got to lose?

  The two-hundred-twenty-foot drift was higher than ours but it didn't connect to any of the shafts leading out of the mine. All the ore from that level was dropped down chutes to this level to be trammed out. We got a drill and carried it up into the two twenty and set it up facing the wall of the drift. Then we rustled some drill steel. None of it was very sharp, but there was still some part of an edge on it.

  Neither of us was saying a thing. We both knew what the joker was. There were no figures on that blueprint to show how much distance there was between the wall of the drift and the outside. It might be eight feet, it might be ten, or twenty or fifty. The one figure we needed wasn't on that blueprint.

  We didn't think about that because we didn't want to. Regardless of our fight, we went into this like a team.

  After all, we were miners, even though it had been a time since either of us had run a machine.

  We connected the air hoses and started to work. The rattle and pound of the drill roared in the closed-in drift.

  He bored in with one length of steel, but when he'd drilled in as far as the steel would go, he didn't change to a longer bit, he shifted to another hole instead of completing this one. If need be, we could always load what we had and blast on chance.

  Hour after hour passed. At times, despite the fact that we were afraid they would shut the main compressor down, we let the air blast freely into the drift, cooling us and making sure we had breathing air. Then we would connect the hose again and go back to work.

  Nobody ever put in eight holes any faster than we did. Taking turns, we ran them in as deep as we could, having an ugly time fighting that dull steel. While he was working, I combed the mine for more of it, and while I was working, he brought up some powder and primers from the store on the level below.

  We finally tore our machine down and lugged it out of there. Then we loaded the holes and split the fuses.

  Then we got as far away as we could, and waited with our mouths open for the blast. Maybe that wasn't necessary.

  Waiting with our mouths open, I mean, but neither of us knew what effect the blast would have when both openings of the mine were sealed.

  We heard the thump thump thump of the blasts, and got up and started in after counting the shots. The air was still blue with powder smoke, but we moved over the muck to the face. A nice little crosscut was blasted, but there was solid rock at the end of it.

  Without any talk, we mucked out a space and set up the liner again. This time he used several bits in the same hole, and I watched him. Suddenly, the drill leaped ahead. He just turned and looked at me, and neither of us needed to say a word. It had gone through!

  We ran another hole and then, getting impatient, we loaded them and came out of the drift again. When the shots went, we started on the run, and before we had gone fifty feet we could feel the cool night air on our faces!

  The hole wasn't big, but we got out. Soderman looked at me.

  We did it, pal! We did it! he said. Then he added, Mister, that's the last time I ever go underground until they bury me! I mean it!

  Me? I was already walking. I am not a guy who gets sore very often, but I was sore now, and I had my own ideas about what to do. My rod was still in my waistband, and that was where I wanted it.

  There were swarms of people around the shaft collar when we came down the hill. Somebody saw us, and a yell went up. Who set off that powder? Were you in there?

  Neither of us said anything; we saw Donna Marshall standing there in slacks and a sweater, and her face looked yellow as yeast. Behind her was a short, fat man with thick thighs and a round, pasty face. When I first saw him, I'd thought his eyes were cruel, and even now they looked it, frightened as he was.

  Ten feet away from them, I stopped, and the crowd sort of fell back. I turned to Soderman. Do it, I said.

  Donna Marshall! he called out. I'm arresting you for the murder of your husband, Tom Marshall!

  Harbater was edgy, and while I'd looked at her, I had an eye on him, too. When Soderman spoke her name and everyone's eyes shifted, Harbarer's hand jabbed down in his pocket and he shot so fast it made me blink. The bullet went into the ground between my feet, and be cause he'd never pulled the gun clear of his pocket, he was having trouble raising it farther. He tried to jerk it out of his coat. I aimed and shot, my bullet breaking his kneecap and knocking him down. Then I stepped in, kicked his hand away, and pulled the gun from his pocket. He lay on the ground groaning.

  We locked them up and called for the doctor. Mrs.

  Marshall cursed the deputy like a truck driver, then demanded a lawyer and went to sit in the corner of her cell.

  When we came out, Soderman was scowling at me.

  Now fill me in. Who is this guy? he wanted to know.

  He's the insurance salesman who sold Tom Marshall his policy. I spotted him on the bus coming up here. He had been reading a magazine on the bus, all crumpled and one corner Tom off the cover. Later, I saw that magazine at Donna Marshall's, where he had evidently forgotten it. We probably only missed him by a few minutes.

  At first, I couldn't figure the guy. Rut I saw some of his business papers in his room and everything began to click into place. The only thing that messed me up was you.

  Me? Soderman looked around, his neck getting red.

  1 Well, I said, she's a good-looking babe, and you I wouldn't be the first guy who got into trouble over one. I

  I think Tom Marshall bought that gun for you. He was guess we'll never know. That alarm clock set for five was partly the tipoff. I knew he didn't need it. I chuckled.

  It must have been tough that last time, under that bed.

  How long did you have to stay there?

  He scowled at me. How did you know that? Then he grinned sheepishly. The alarm didn't go off that morning, and when I looked out of the window, he was coming up the hill. There I was in full sight of the whole town if I tried to leave, so I crawled under the
bed, and that guy stayed there all day long!

  I laughed, and he scowled at me again. It ain't funny! he said. And to think that babe made a sucker out of me! I thought you were tryin' to frame her to save the estate for Lew Marshall.

  He rubbed his ear. Who do you think actually did the killing?

  I'm betting on the insurance man. Came in through that old working and killed Marshall, then got out. He followed me in there tonight, but I got away. Then he went back and blasted the tunnel entrance. But that'll be tough to prove.

  Oh, no. His pants will prove it. In that old working there's a streak of limestone, blue lime, and the ore evidently occurred as replacements of the limestone. In the new workings the ore mostly occurs with quartz monazite.

  There's no limestone at all in the new workings. If he crawled over those rocks in the big stope, some of that lime will be in his clothes.

  Now that's good! I chuckled. I've got more on Harbater. I frisked his room in the hotel and found some coveralls he used and a miner's lamp. He probably used the coveralls the first time he came into the mine. We could test those too. You know, it would have been easy, I added, if you hadn't come into it from so many angles!

  Coverin' up for a dame, he said. Well, that cures me! They ain't any good for a man!

  Some of them are, all right, I maintained, thinking of one in particular. Some of them are very much all right.

  I got up and started for the door. It was going to be nice to see Marian at breakfast and tell her that her father was cleared. It was one part of this job I was going to like. I was still planning the way I'd tell her when I fell asleep.

  *

  COAST PATROL

  Dense fog blanketed the Siberian coast. It was cold, damp, and miserable. Turk Madden banked the Grumman steeply and strained his eyes toward the fogbound earth.

  He could not see anything but the gray cottony thickness.

  Occasionally a jagged peak of the Sihote Alins loomed through the clouds, black and ugly where the wind had swept the snow away.

  It was warm in the cabin of the plane, and glancing over his shoulder, Turk smiled to see Diakov asleep. The Ussuri Cossack gunner possessed an amazing ability to sleep at any time or place. And he never dozed. He was either instantly asleep or wide-awake. Well, a few more miles of patrol and they could return to Khabarovsk, to food and a warm bed.