The Searcher

by Simon Toyne

  He raised his gun, aimed it at Solomon’s head, and a shot rang out.

  Solomon gasped and watched Morgan fall to his knees, his gun dropping from his hand and onto the ground. He turned to where the shot had come from and saw Holly pointing Ramon’s rifle up at the spot where Morgan had been.

  “Not rock salt this time, you son of a bitch,” she said, her voice already slipping out of focus.

  Then the rifle slipped from her hand and her eyes rolled up into her head.

  89

  ANDREWS WAS HEADING BACK TO THE VAN, SCANNING THE SQUARE FOR movement, when he heard the second gunshot.

  “That’s it, we’re moving out,” he said.

  Mulcahy was hunched over the radio, riding the scanner. “We should take the desert road,” he said. “Not the one past the airfield or the one through the mountains.”

  “Why?”

  “I’ve been picking up some radio traffic from two tactical units. They must have been tipped off by someone, or could be they saw the fire. One is inbound from Douglas, the other’s coming from Globe. I’ve heard nothing from the desert road. Guess they have it down as impassable, but it’s not. I can vouch for that.”

  Andrews nodded and leaned his head toward his lapel mic. “All units, listen up. RV back at the transporters immediately and prepare to exfil. Repeat: RV at the vehicles and let’s get out of here, now.”

  He checked his watch and glanced over at the church. “We need to step on this, that thing’s going up in less than seven minutes. Where’s Ramon?”

  “Over behind the church,” Mulcahy said. “Don’t worry about him, I’ll take him out with me.”

  “You sure? He’s going to be pissed I gave the order to pull out without checking with him first.”

  “I’ll cope,” Mulcahy said. “I just spent two hours in a car with his old man. He can’t be any worse than that.”

  90

  CASSIDY LAY IN THE QUIET OF THE CHURCH, LISTENING FOR ANY SIGNS OF movement. He had heard the door being locked but wanted to be sure before he showed himself. He knew they were looking for him, he’d overheard someone say it, and he didn’t want to be found. He felt like something terrible was going to happen here and that perhaps he was the only one who could stop it.

  He sat up and looked out at the silent church through the canvas arch of the covered wagon. He couldn’t see anyone and the lack of lights suggested there wasn’t anyone to see.

  He moved as quietly as he could, aware of every creak as his weight shifted inside the old wagon. He stepped out onto the floor and listened again before moving toward the line of crates in the central aisle.

  He saw the red LED numbers shining brightly in the darkness, the display showing 5:24.

  Then 5:23.

  Then 5:22.

  Cassidy fell to his knees before it, his hands fluttering over the surface of the thing, hoping for something as simple as an Off switch. The numbers continued to tumble and the 5 became a 4.

  Outside he heard an engine start up. Everyone pulling out before the bomb went off. Why would anyone want to destroy something as beautiful and sacred as a church?

  The numbers continued to tumble, faster than seconds it seemed. He thought about walking it right out of the front door, but there could still be people out there who might make him put it back again, or shoot him and put it back in here themselves. He didn’t care about his own safety, he felt he had forfeited that, what with all the bad choices he had made. He had made them for good reasons though. It was all to save the town. Perhaps he had failed at that. But he could save the church, that much was still in his power.

  He could save the house his ancestor built.

  91

  MULCAHY MOVED TOWARD THE CASSIDY RESIDENCE, WARY OF THE TWO GUNSHOTS he had heard coming from the other side of it. He knew Ramon was back there somewhere, Morgan too, and he thought the woman was also in the mix. He pulled his Beretta from his holster and held it in front of him.

  Behind him the armored trucks started up, their heavy engines shattering the night with their roars as they moved away. By the time he reached the house, they were gone and he listened to the sounds of the night through their fading rumble. He cocked his head to one side and tightened his grip on the gun.

  He could hear the sound of heavy footsteps shuffling across the dry grass and getting louder. He waited until he was sure they were within safe pistol range then stepped out and pointed his gun straight at the figure emerging from the shadows.

  He frowned when he saw who it was. “I thought you were dead,” he said.

  “Apparently not,” Solomon replied and continued walking. “If you’re going to shoot me, get it over with, otherwise give me a hand. She’s been shot and she needs to get to the hospital.”

  Mulcahy looked past him into the shadowed garden. “Who else is back there?”

  “The psychopath with the plate in his head.”

  “Alive?”

  “No.”

  “What about Morgan?”

  “He’s dead too.”

  Mulcahy relaxed a little. “Well, that saves me a job. Let me help you there.” He holstered his gun and took the girl from Solomon. Her leg was a bloody mess and he carried her over to the wide wooden porch and laid her down on one of the porch sofas.

  “Can you call an ambulance?” Solomon said. “She’s lost a lot of blood.”

  Mulcahy checked his phone. “I can now,” he said. “They’ve switched off the jammer.”

  Solomon nodded and looked over at the church. “Make sure she’s okay,” he said.

  Mulcahy inspected Holly’s leg as the ringing tone sounded in his ear. It was a clean in-and-out wound, no hollow points or anything else that might have blown a chunk of her leg off. It could’ve been a whole lot worse.

  “State your emergency,” the voice sounded in his ear.

  “Gunshot wound. Female in her late twenties. She’s been shot in the leg and she needs an ambulance.”

  “State your location, sir.”

  “Cassidy residence. You might want to send some extra folks down while you’re at it. There’s been some gunfire here. Couple of people dead.”

  He hung up before he could get drawn into a conversation he didn’t want to have. They would send cops for a gunshot wound callout, though he wasn’t sure what cops were left. He looked up and realized that Solomon was gone. He stood and walked over to the edge of the porch and spotted him halfway down an avenue of trees. He was heading for the church.

  “No!” Mulcahy called after him, remembering what Andrews had said. “Get away from there.”

  Solomon heard Mulcahy calling him, telling him to keep away from the church, but all it did was make him start running toward it. He felt drawn to it, like a drunk to a drink.

  He felt so tired now, but he pushed himself onward, one foot in front of the other. He wanted to know what was hidden beneath the altar. He needed to know.

  He pulled the cross out from under his shirt and held it in his hand, not understanding how he had come by it or what it might mean, but knowing all those answers were close. The wall was in front of him now and the church just beyond. Somehow he had to get over that, get into the church and find what was hidden in the plinth. The lost Cassidy treasure. His to find.

  The explosion was like a thunderclap, so deep and loud he felt it in his chest. The ground beneath him erupted and he was thrown upward into the lower branches of a tree. He reached out with his hands to try to protect his face but he hit his head hard on a branch and the world went blinding white for a second. Then he felt himself falling, and the sound of the explosion was gone, and the whiteness faded to black.

  92

  ANDREWS WAS DRIVING PAST THE BURNED BILLBOARD ON THE EDGE OF TOWN when he heard the explosion. He thought of the creepy mannequin by the old-fashioned wagon and smiled at the thought that it had been obliterated. The blast and the fire would keep everyone busy for hours, days even. It was the perfect diversion to help them slip away. It had be
en as neat as it could have been: no men lost, minimal gunfire, and none of it from his men. Objective achieved. As far as missions went, they didn’t get any better.

  He fixed his eyes on the road ahead, plotting the best route through the potholes and ridges on the surface. They passed the tangled wreckage of the plane and headed away into the night, the blackened desert blending perfectly with the dark sky. It felt like they were flying instead of driving. He felt like he was free.

  The light flicked on ahead of him when he was almost at the junction, so bright it flooded the cab and forced him to slow right down.

  “Stop your vehicle,” a voice commanded through a megaphone.

  More lights on either side of them. The headlights of vehicles parked out in the desert.

  “We have you covered on all sides,” the voice came again. “Stop your vehicles, turn off your engines, and step outside with your hands where we can see them. I repeat, we have you covered, do NOT attempt anything stupid.”

  Andrews stood on the melted edge of the road with his hands on his head, the rest of his men lined up alongside him. He stared out at the black desert and felt oddly relieved that it was over. All the deception and anxiety about the next call and what he would be required to do to keep his family safe. He knew some of his men had turned for money, but not all of them, and he wondered if those others in the line were feeling as relieved as he was.

  A captain stepped in front of him and regarded him coldly from behind his visor. “Real shitstorm you’ve stirred up here. Not sure the department’s going to get out from under this one any time soon.” He shook his head and looked along the line. “Which one’s Mulcahy?”

  “He’s bringing up the rear,” Andrews said, staring back down the road toward the town. He could see the glow of the fire over at the airfield, but that was all, no headlights coming up the road and no fire in the center of town.

  Then he realized what had happened.

  PART 10

  How terrible is wisdom when it brings no profit to he that is wise.

  —SOPHOCLES

  From the private journal of the Reverend Jack “King” Cassidy

  It happened in late morning on the third day of my journey.

  I had fallen into a kind of limbo, putting one foot in front of the other over land so flat and unbroken and featureless that it had lulled me into a wakeful sleep where my body kept on walking while my mind drifted like a cloud in a clear sky. So detached was I that the savages were almost upon me before I knew they were even there.

  There were three of them, their brown skin shining with animal fat, their heads covered with the skulls and horns of mule deer, making them appear like demons on horseback.

  They had moved in on my blind side, my view of their approach blocked by my mule and the large canvas sack it carried on its back. If I had spotted them sooner, I could have slipped my rifle from the saddle and warned them away with a few shots, but if I reached for it now they would be on top of me before I could fire.

  A recently slain cour deer lay draped across the neck of the lead horse, two fresh holes in its side and ribbons of red streaming down the horse’s flank and dripping onto the decorative tassels stitched along the bridle reins. I was a poor shot at best and the tight group of arrow holes in the dead deer showed that these savages were not.

  The savages saw I had spotted them and broke into a gallop. I was frozen where I stood. They would be on me in a moment and there was nothing I could do. This was how it would end. I focused on the tassels jostling with the movement of the lead horse, catching the sunlight and shining mostly brown or black except for one much paler that made me realize what they were.

  They were scalps.

  The sight of them conjured up the fear I had felt in the shadow of the burned mission and also in the gully with the long-dead prospectors. It came so fierce and fast that it transformed my fear into something else entirely.

  I have often thought that emotions are not linear but circular in shape and that opposites are closer together than we imagine. Thus happiness can switch to melancholy in an instant and laughter to tears. This was what happened to me then. The sight of the swinging scalps turned my fear to rage.

  I let go of the reins of my mule and started walking directly toward the savages, reaching behind me for what was slung on my back. Two of the savages raised their bows, long arrows already fitted to the strings, ready to fire, but the sight of the pale Christ surprised them and I was glad to see such a common emotion weaken their stony countenances. I lifted the cross higher, holding it before me like a shield as I continued my advance.

  The lead horseman halted at the sight of me and the other two fanned out around him, their bottomless black eyes all fixed upon me. The savage in the center spoke to them, his eyes still on me and the two with bows raised turned and rode away, slinging their bows over their backs as they went.

  The remaining savage watched me come closer, the scalps swinging beneath his horse’s neck. I could smell him, I was so close, and he smelled of death and blood.

  I stopped in front of him and planted the cross into the earth as though I was driving a fence post into the ground to mark a boundary. The savage’s pony flinched and reared back a little, forcing its rider to bring it under control. I could only guess at what savagery this beast had witnessed, this hell mount with blood dripping red down its flank and human skin and hair decorating its bridle, and yet it had been spooked by the figure of Christ.

  A shadow seemed to pass across the savage’s face and he spat on the ground and uttered a word that sounded like Sin or Shin, then he kicked the pony’s flanks, wheeled around, and took off after the others.

  I watched until they melted away to nothing in the shimmering mirror of the heat haze, my arms shaking from gripping the cross. I had faced down evil with only my faith as a weapon—and I had triumphed.

  I made it back to Fort Huachuca a day earlier than planned because I no longer skulked my way along, hiding in gullies or keeping to the lower parts of the land. I had no fear of being seen now. Nothing could touch me.

  I rode through the gates and straight to the surveyor’s office, where I retraced my journey, walking my fingers over lines of terrain it had taken me days to traverse on foot. The place I had reached was not clearly marked on their maps and they had to send for an Indian scout to try and pin down the location of it.

  It was strange, seeing a savage wearing the clothes of a civilized man after I had faced his wild, half-naked brethren so recently in the desert. I described my journey to him—the stand of mesquite on the dry river, the twin peaks on a range that curled into a horseshoe of red mountains, and when I mentioned these, the same shadow I had seen pass across the face of the mounted savage crossed his and he pointed to a spot on the map where nothing was marked save for a thin pen line of mountains that petered out to nothing.

  “Chidn Chuca,” he said, then stared at me with what could have been fear or suspicion.

  I knew Chuca meant “mountain” because Fort Huachuca was named after the Thunder Mountains that rose around it. I asked the scout what “Chidn” meant and his eyes flicked to mine then back down to the map on the table as if he did not want to hold my gaze.

  “ ‘Chidn’ means spirit,” he said in that flat-toned way the savages have. “ ‘Chidn Chuca’ means Spirit Mountain. My people do not go to this place. It is a place of the dead, not the living. It is a bad place.”

  I thought about this the whole time they drew up the papers, about why the savage had called me what was probably “Chidn” then ridden away from me in what seemed like fear.

  My answer came a few days later when I rode back out with hired men and wagons loaded with equipment to work my claim properly. This was probably the last time I ever felt truly content. My claim was now filed and secure, Sergeant Lyons was in the stockade with charges of murder and treason hanging over him, and I had a church to build and the means with which to build it. My future was secured. My legacy too.


  It was near the day’s end on the fourth day when the horseshoe of mountains had begun to rise ahead of us that I saw it. It was caught on the trunk of a large saguaro and lay directly on my trail, almost as if it had been put there for me to see, which, thinking about it all now, I suppose it had. I steered my mule toward it and my heart soared when I saw what it was. It was the missing page from the Bible, caught there by some miracle. I halted the mule and slid to the ground, my heart pounding with the joyful prospect of being able to make the Bible whole again and carefully peeled the page away from the spines.

  The page had been battered some in its journey across the wilderness, the surface scoured by sand and grit until the printed words had been all but removed. I turned it in my hand and my heart almost stopped beating in my chest. I wish it had. I wish I had died before ever seeing what was written there. But I did read it, and when I did, the light went out of my life, and I truly understood all that I had lost.

  93

  SOLOMON WOKE TO THE SMELL OF DISINFECTANT AND DISEASE.

  He was lying on starched sheets and staring up at the ceiling of a small private room in the hospital. It sounded busy outside in the corridors. He tried to sit up and his head felt like it was about to split in two.

  “Take it easy.” Dr. Palmer was standing at the end of his bed, writing some notes on a clipboard. “You banged your head pretty bad.”

  “The church,” Solomon said, his voice dry and croaky.

  “The church is fine,” Palmer said, hooking the notes back on the foot of his bed and walking around to his side. “The Cassidy residence however . . .” He clicked on a penlight and shone it into Solomon’s eyes. “Any double vision? Nausea?”

  “No. What happened?”

  “They’re still trying to figure it out.” He switched the light to his other eye. “The rumor is that the mayor and Chief Morgan were involved in some kind of cartel deal that went wrong. Morgan got himself killed and Cassidy was locked in the church with a bomb. They think he dragged it into the tunnel between the church and his house to deaden the blast. They haven’t found him yet, so . . .”