“Jesus,” she said.
It is your professional responsibility.
“I know!” she said. “Leave me the hell alone.”
Kill them, Angie. Kill them good.
She walked back up to the road.
“What a mess,” she said, glancing back at her tracks in the deep powder. She brushed off the front of her coat and her jeans. Her hand was still bloody, but the blood had dried and was caked on her skin. She walked up the road.
It was forked.
Angie saw a fork in the road, and she saw the sign on the ground. The sign read ← Pandora Mill.
They must have missed the sign originally and veered up to the right. At some point, they realized their mistake and had come back toward Telluride. Angie looked at the tracks in the snow.
She couldn’t quite see the horses up ahead, but it couldn’t have been more than a quarter mile farther to the mill.
“That’s where I’ll do it,” she said. “That’s where I’ll kill them all.”
Fifty
Angie saw the mill through the heavy snow, and she knew the men were inside. There was a light on. She saw one window lighted, and she saw light shining from a doorframe over at the stable. The stable stood to the right of the main mill building. That’s where they put their horses, she realized.
She could see the tracks in the powder leading right up to it. She was about fifty yards away from the building, and it occurred to her that she had an advantage by attacking from outside. Because of the darkness outside, the men inside the lighted mill would not be able to see her. Their eyes would be adjusted to the light.
She surveyed the land around the building. She walked over to a stand of ponderosa pines toward her left. The tree line came right up to within thirty yards of the building, and from there, she would have a direct shot in through the window. She would also have cover with the trees.
She couldn’t tell what the land looked like behind the mill, but she knew from maps she’d seen that there was nothing beyond the mill. The mountains rose up precipitously, and the only way out of there was the way that they’d all come.
There was the aerial tram up to the mines, but she could not see it. It was just snowing too heavily.
Angie unsheathed her machete and cut her way through a patch of briars along the wood line. The snow was deep and she had trouble walking, but she was in no hurry. It looked like Foxwell and his men would hold up at the mill for the night.
• •
Angie stared down the barrel of the assault rifle, and lined the sight up with the man’s chest. He stood just outside the door, smoking a cigarette. It was a shame that the last few breaths the man would take would be filled with nicotine and tar. He exhaled, and the smoke mingled with his warm breath and steamed.
Angie pulled the trigger.
The sound was so loud and the kickback so intense, that she lost sight of the man for a second. She was startled, and she ducked down low in the snow. The sound echoed up into the canyon, and there was instant commotion inside the mill.
Angie raised her head up to see what damage she had done. The man lay slumped on the ground by the door. He wasn’t moving. Quickly, she realized someone was going to open the door. She could hear them shouting inside the building.
She lined up the sights with the door, waiting for it to open. A moment later, it did, and the doorway filled with light.
A body stepped into it, contours darkened by the surrounding light. Angie found its chest in the barrel’s sight. The man in the doorway looked outside and saw the dead man lying in the snow. He started to look up toward the woods just as Angie pulled the trigger.
The sound of the assault rifle echoed in the cold night air.
The bullet struck the man squarely in his chest, and he flew backwards into the mill, crashing into a table just inside the entryway. The door remained open, and Angie waited for another fool to step into the light.
None did.
Everything fell silent inside the mill.
She could see the body of the man lying by the table inside the doorway. She could see the other dead man lying in the snow. That meant there were two left inside the mill. One of them was Foxwell.
Angie lay in the snow, rifle aimed toward the open door. She waited.
Ten seconds passed before someone kicked the door shut. The door slammed into the doorframe, but then bounced back open again, as though something blocked it from closing.
Inside, someone kicked the door shut again, but it bounced back again. Angie took aim and pulled in the trigger. This time she held it in, and the assault rifle sprayed the side of the mill with bullets.
Wood exploded near the door. She kept the trigger pulled and sprayed back and forth over the side of the mill. She struck the window, and glass exploded into the air.
Twenty-seven rounds later, the magazine was spent. She could see holes of light spilling through the thin wooden wall of the mill, and she rolled over and ejected the magazine.
Inside, she heard someone shouting. It sounded like Abraham. He was crying out about someone shot inside the mill.
Maybe she’d gotten lucky. Maybe she’d hit the third man randomly through the wall. There was no way to know.
Quietly, Angie refilled the magazine with another thirty cartridges. The snow continued to fall on her, but it felt cool and refreshing and she was strangely at peace with the killing.
Once the magazine was loaded, she put it back into the assault rifle. She hunched down and moved along the tree line to where she had a better view into the window.
She couldn’t see anyone, and Abraham quieted down. She listened to the stillness of the night. She stared at the still-open front door. She held the assault rifle in her right arm, but decided to switch it to her left.
With her right hand, she reached down and unsheathed her machete. It made a metallic sound as it came up from its scabbard. She stood there in the snow a moment, staring at the mill. Her trench coat flowed down past her knees. Her left arm held the assault rifle, and her right hand held the machete up like a sword.
She realized that Abraham was dug in like a tick. If he stayed put inside the mill, she’d freeze before dawn.
She swung the machete back and forth and started walking toward the open door. She was twenty feet away.
The light poured through the doorway, and she saw the dead man on the floor inside. She saw the other dead man lying in the snow. She approached to within ten feet of him.
She was filled with overpowering rage, and she knew if she moved fast enough and powerfully enough, there was no way Foxwell could stop her.
Five feet from the door, her heart felt like it was about to explode, but she continued. She stepped around the dead body in the snow and reached the door.
Was he hiding just inside, ready to shoot her dead?
She didn’t care. She powered her way into the mill with sheer reckless bravado.
The light was blinding after being out in the dark, but she quickly scanned the room. It was some sort of mill-worker lounge. The body on the floor by the table didn’t move. The man was either dead or awfully close to dying.
There was no one else in the room, but there was a clear trail of blood leading through a closed door at the back of the room.
Angie stepped over to the body by the table. It was lying facedown, and she toed it with her boot and rolled the body over. The wide eyes of a dead man stared up at her.
Her gaze went to the closed door at the back of the room.
She switched the assault rifle to her right hand and the machete to her left. The trail of blood on the floor looked like someone had dragged a body across the floor. It only occurred to her then that she had shot someone else. There were four of them, two dead within sight. That meant that the trail of blood across the floor and through the closed door belonged to a third cowboy.
Carefully, she crossed through the room to the door. She paused there for a moment. She lowered the assault rifle down to
ward the door and considered blowing a few rounds through, in case someone stood just on the other side.
Instead, she switched the assault rifle back to her left arm and tried the doorknob. It was locked.
She swore.
What if they were waiting for her just on the other side of the door?
Kill them all.
She nodded. “Yes,” she said. “Kill them all.”
She stepped back three feet from the door, pivoted on her right foot, and kicked the door with her left. The doorknob exploded in the cheap wooden frame, and the door swung open.
It was pitch black inside, and Angie stared into it for a good three seconds. Boldly, she stepped through into the darkness.
She felt along the wall for a light switch but could find none. The acoustics inside the room indicated spaciousness. The odor was like that of fertilizer and old books.
“Abraham Foxwell!” she shouted into the dark. “I’m going to kill you!”
Holding the assault rifle in her left arm, she fired three shots into the black. As if in response, a loud mechanical whirring sound began at the far end of the room. It sounded like a chairlift. Angie squinted and looked into the black.
She grabbed the machete with her right hand and started walking toward the sound. She was halfway across the room when the door slammed shut behind her.
She swung around and saw pitch black space. She sliced back and forth at the air with her machete. She heard footsteps moving over to her right. She sprayed the wall with a burst from the assault rifle. The footsteps stopped.
She was in the dark. She gazed toward the far end of the room, and she realized the source of the sound wasn’t a chairlift. It was the aerial tram up to the mine.
Suddenly, a shot rang out from the darkness. Angie felt it whiz by the left side of her head, and she dropped to one knee and sprayed the wall where the gunshot had fired from.
She heard footsteps running toward the tram.
Quickly, she switched from her assault rifle to the pump-action sawed-off. She fired two shots toward the tram and the sound of the running footsteps. She heard something crash to the ground. It sounded like a shelf.
Slowly, she walked through the darkness toward the tram. As she crossed the room, she could see the faintest light where the tram came into the station house. It was snowing heavily outside, and Angie’s eyes darted back and forth looking for any sign of movement.
One of the tram cars swung into the building, circled around on the giant mechanical wheel in the ceiling, and exited. Angie crouched down low and scanned the darkness for Foxwell.
A shot rang out. Angie felt it strike her right shoulder an instant before she heard it. The pain was sharp and stinging, like a thousand wasp stings at once, and she spun around and dropped to one knee.
Her rifle clattered to the floor, but she managed to hold onto the shotgun.
She was dazed and stunned, and adrenaline flooded her body. She knew she was shot, and the rising anxiety that she would die from the shot overcame her. She scrambled to get to her feet, leaving her assault rifle on the ground momentarily. It was as if she felt that if she could just get to her feet, she could stave off dying. If she was standing, she had to be alright.
Someone ran toward the far end of the mechanical tram area. The footsteps stopped. Then it sounded like someone was dragging something across the floor. Angie staggered toward the darkness.
She saw her reflection in the glass window of one of the tram cars before it exited the building. She looked bad.
She glanced down at her right shoulder and saw that she was bleeding pretty badly.
Another gunshot rang out, this one from beyond the tram cars. It exploded against the wall behind her, and she winced and ducked down against a wall to her right.
She was twenty feet from the giant mechanical wheel in the ceiling, around which the tram cars came into and out of the station house. She was in the shadows. She thought she saw someone on the other side of the mechanical wheel from her. It looked like they were on the other side of one of the tram cars, walking along with it while it circled the wheel.
Foxwell, she thought.
She struggled to lift up the sawed-off shotgun, and she tried to pump the action. Her right shoulder hurt too much, though, to brace it for pumping. So, she squatted down and placed it on the ground.
With her left hand, she removed the machete once again from its scabbard. She remained kneeling in the shadows. She watched the person walking around with the car. It had to be Foxwell.
He was using the car for protection.
There was no way he could see her kneeling in the shadows. In another two seconds, the car would swing around and begin its exit from the station house. She would attack him with the machete then. Catch him by surprise.
She licked her dry lips. She held the machete poised. The car swung around.
And she leapt out of the shadows toward the body, thrusting the machete into its chest. The car kept moving, and she staggered backward three steps. The machete stuck from the man’s chest, but it was not Abraham Foxwell.
It was the third cowboy, and he was dead. He was hung from a hook on the outside of the tram car, and before she had time to grab the machete back from his chest, the car whisked out of the station house and began its ascent up the mountain toward the mine.
It had been a trap.
Another shot rang out from the darkness on the other side of the mechanical wheel. It struck her left leg, and she fell to the ground.
She crawled toward the shadows. She could smell the snow outside. She could feel the cold breath of the air. The fabric of her trench coat bunched under her hands and knees, but she made it to the safety of darkness.
Abraham Foxwell stepped into the light.
Angie saw him by the next tram car that came into the station house. She sat on the floor, her back against the wall. Her leg throbbed with pain. The light was dim, but there was no doubt. It was Foxwell.
Angie patted around on the ground around her. The floor was ice cold, but she could not find the gun. All she had left was the twelve-inch hunting knife strapped to her right leg. Her guns lay in the darkness, too far away from her to matter in the next few seconds.
She threw back her trench coat from her right leg and unsheathed the knife. Even in the darkness, she could see its shiny blade gleam.
Foxwell said, “It’s over.”
Angie hated the calm resolve in his voice. Villains were supposed to be slimy, maniacal, or mentally unhinged. Foxwell sounded soothing and clear, his voice like that of a well-respected family doctor. He sounded weary himself, and with that weariness, Angie felt a twinge of sympathy for him.
Had all this been her fault? Had Foxwell been right all along?
Certainly, the people who would buy into his proposed resort seemed to like him and his taste. Maybe she was the villain, a pillar standing against progress. She gripped the knife with her right hand.
She felt blood soaking through the fabric of her shirt and coat. Her shoulder was wet.
“The last thing I wanted to do was hurt anyone,” Foxwell said.
He shook his head, and to Angie’s dismay, he looked genuinely sorry for everything that had happened. She rolled over and managed to raise herself onto one knee, her good knee. She braced herself against the wall and rose to her feet.
Foxwell could not see her, but he knew roughly where she was in the dark. He stepped away from the tram car back into the shadows.
Angie lurched away from the wall, dragging her bad leg behind her. She held the knife in her right hand. Her shoulder felt chewed away by the gunshot. She shuffled back toward the doorway to the place she was before, the mill-worker lounge.
Suddenly, the lights came on. It blinded her for a moment.
She looked around her and saw stacks and stacks of shelves. There was mining equipment, helmets, suits and uniforms. Abraham Foxwell stood thirty feet away. He held a rifle under his right arm. Angie looked through the s
helves at him. It was like looking through bookshelf stacks in a library.
“I can’t let you get away with this,” he said. “But I don’t want to kill you. Just give up. Give up, Dr. Rippard, and I’ll carry you into town peacefully. Maybe a jury will be kind.”
Angie lurched around one corner, ducking to see him through the shelves. There was a large open area in the middle of the room. That was where she had come through the first time.
She scanned the floor for her gun, but did not see it. Foxwell drew closer to her, but he was one row over. She scrambled around the end of one row and saw her gun lying at the far end of the room. It was on the floor, fifty feet away.
Angie looked up at the stacks. Was there anything she could use for a weapon?
Foxwell had an advantage over her and her knife. Suddenly, there was a wrenching metal sound, and the shelf to her left clattered against the wall. She was all the way over to right of the room, but the situation became clear a moment later.
She was at the end of a row of shelves, trapped. The only way out was straight up the row ahead of her. She could see her gun on the floor at that end of the row, but Foxwell stepped into the space between her and the gun. He held his rifle and looked at her.
She was trapped.
“Dr. Rippard,” he said. “I don’t want to have to kill you. Just drop the knife and come peacefully.”
Angie glanced around her to see if she had any way out. She had none. She was closed into a corner. Foxwell came slowly towards her. Her panic increased.
“Stay back,” she said. She held the knife out in front of her.
Abraham Foxwell stood twenty feet away, straight up the row.
“I will shoot out your other leg if I have to,” he said.
Angie leaned against the shelf, standing on her one good leg.
Even still, at this late hour, after all that had happened in her life and in the past few days, Angie felt a strong surge of compassion for this man. Perhaps it was her fatal flaw, perhaps it was just plain weakness, but she believed deep down in the core of her subconscious that good would prevail, that compromise and sanity would win out. And that if “good” could not rightly be determined, that if both parties could not agree on what was actually good, that nature would run its course and natural law would prevail.
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