Brimstone p-5

by Douglas Preston

  A second man was shouting up from below. “Carlo! Cosa c'è?"

  Pendergast darted down the stairs, tattered suit flapping behind him, and-leaping toward the second man-sent him sprawling backward with a kick to the head. He landed lightly, paused to pluck the man's gun from his hand, and thrust it into the waistband of his trousers.

  They ran down the dank corridor leading away from the staircase. Behind them, D'Agosta could hear shouts and cries. Pendergast switched off the flashlight to make them less of a target, and they continued forward in almost complete darkness.

  Ahead, the tunnel divided. Pendergast stopped, examined the ground, the ceiling.

  "Note the guano? The bats fly out this way."

  They took the left-hand tunnel. Now a faint light appeared in the distance behind them. A shot rang out, whining off stone. D'Agosta stopped to return fire. Their pursuers hung back.

  "What about the microwave weapon?" he asked.

  "Useless in this situation. Takes too long to operate, doesn't have the range. Besides, we don't have the time now to figure out how to use it."

  The tunnel branched again. D'Agosta smelled fresh air ahead, then caught a faint glow of light. They ran around another corner, then another-and suddenly came up against a thick grate of iron bars, bright light streaming in between them. D'Agosta could see that the grate opened onto the cliff below the castle. Beyond, he could make out the steep flanks of the mountain, to the left plunging into a deep ravine and to the right rising to pinnacles and crags.

  "Shit."

  "I expected something like this," said Pendergast. He swiftly examined the bars. "Ancient, but sound."

  "What now?"

  "We make a stand. I'm counting on that shooting ability of yours, Vincent."

  Pendergast flattened himself against the last angle of the tunnel, and D'Agosta did the same. The men were coming up faster now-judging by the footsteps, there were at least half a dozen of them. D'Agosta turned, aimed, squeezed off a shot. In the dimness, he saw one of the figures fall. The rest scattered, flattening themselves against the rough rock walls. There was an answering blast of a shotgun. This was followed by the fast stutter of an automatic weapon: two short bursts, the bullets caroming off the ceiling in showers of sparks and stone.

  "Shit!" D'Agosta said, shrinking back involuntarily.

  "Keep holding them, Vincent, while I see what I can do about these bars."

  D'Agosta crouched low, ducked briefly around the corner, fired. The automatic weapon returned fire, the bullets once again ricocheting off the ceiling, thudding into the ground in a scattered pattern not far from D'Agosta.

  They're deliberately aiming for the ricochet.

  He yanked his magazine out of the grip, examined it. It was a ten-shot magazine: six bullets were visible, plus the one in the chamber.

  "Here's the spare clip," Pendergast said, tossing it to him. "Conserve your fire."

  D'Agosta glanced at it: full. He had seventeen shots.

  Another short burst of automatic-weapons fire came zinging off the ceiling, thudding into the ground directly before his feet.

  Angle of incidence equals angle of refraction, D'Agosta vaguely remembered from his pool-shooting days. He fired at the place where he'd seen the rounds ricochet off, fired a second time, each time aiming for a smooth patch of stone, carefully angling for the ricochet.

  He heard a cry. Score one to mathematics.

  Now a fusillade of shots came ricocheting in. D'Agosta rolled back just in time, half a dozen rounds slapping the ground where he had been.

  "How's it going?" he called over his shoulder.

  "More time, Vincent. Buy me time."

  More bullets came in off the ceiling, with a spray of broken stone.

  Time. D'Agosta had no choice but to return fire again. He crawled up to the angle, peered around. A man had ducked out from the shadows and was running up to a closer position. D'Agosta fired once and winged the man, who retreated with a cry.

  Now Pendergast was firing his own gun in measured shots. Glancing back, D'Agosta could see him shooting into the masonry holding the grate in place.

  More shots came in, landing about him in irregular spots. D'Agosta squeezed off another round.

  Pendergast had emptied his magazine. "Vincent!" he called.

  "What?"

  "Toss me your gun."

  "But-"

  "The gun."

  Pendergast caught it, took careful aim, and fired point-blank into the masonry at each point where the bars were cemented. The cement was old and soft, and the shots were taking effect, but still D'Agosta winced, unable to prevent himself from counting the wasted bullets. One, two, three, four, click. Pendergast popped out the spent magazine, tossed it aside. D'Agosta handed him the spare. The fire from around the corner had intensified. They had only moments before they were overrun.

  Seven more shots rang out. Then Pendergast paused, crouched.

  "Kick together. On three."

  They gave the grate a violent kick, but it remained immobile.

  Pendergast fired two more shots, then tucked the gun into his waistband.

  "Kick again. From the ground."

  They lay on their backs, cocked their legs, struck the grate together.

  It moved.

  Again, then yet again-and now it came free, clanging down the cliff face with a shower of rocks and pebbles.

  They stood and approached the edge. The rough rock went straight down at least fifty feet before beginning to level out.

  "Shit," D'Agosta murmured.

  "No choice. Toss the device. Look for brush, the gentlest landing place possible. Then climb down."

  D'Agosta leaned out, tossed the microwave weapon down into a thick patch of bushes. Then, swallowing his terror, he turned and eased himself over the edge. Sliding down slowly, holding fast to the mortar of the grate with his hands, he found a purchase for his feet. Then another descent, another purchase. In a moment, his face was below the edge of the chamber, clinging to the cliff face.

  And then Pendergast was suddenly beside him. "Go sideways as you descend. It's easier to see footholds, and you'll make a more difficult target."

  The rock was shelving limestone, dreadfully sheer but offering abundant hand- and footholds. While it probably would have provided little challenge to a professional rock climber, D'Agosta was terrified nonetheless. His feet kept slipping, and his leather-soled shoes were almost useless.

  Down he went, gingerly, one hand after the other, trying not to scrape his hurt finger against the sharp rocks. Pendergast was far below already, descending swiftly.

  Shots echoed from the opening above, followed by a tremendous fusillade, followed by silence. Then a rush of voices: Eccoli! Di là!

  D'Agosta glanced up to see a few heads craning out over the gulf. A hand with a gun appeared, aiming right at him. He was a sitting duck. Christ, it was over.

  Pendergast's gun cracked from far below: his final round. The shooter was hit square in the forehead; he staggered, fell, then came hurtling silently past, headed for the rocks below. D'Agosta looked away, resumed his descent as quickly as he dared.

  From the opening above came more commotion. D'Agosta saw another figure appear cautiously, this time with the automatic weapon in hand. D'Agosta recognized the stubby form of an Uzi.

  He flattened himself against the rock. Pendergast had vanished out of sight below. Where the hell was he?

  He heard the Uzi go off in short bursts, rounds humming past his ear. He tried fishing out with his leg, searching for another foothold, but realized he was protected only by a thin shelf of rock overhead; if he moved again, he would be exposed.

  Another burst confirmed the fact: he was pinned.

  "Pendergast!"

  No answer.

  More shots came, stinging his face with splinters of stone. He shifted one foot, probed.

  Another burst, and he felt one of the rounds nick his shoe. He pulled his leg back. He was hyperventilating no
w, gasping for breath as he clung to the tiny purchase. He had never felt so terrified in his life.

  More shots, the stone fragmenting.

  They were shooting through the thin shelf above him. Even if he didn't move, they'd get him. He felt blood running down his cheek from where the stone chips had cut him.

  Then he heard a single shot, this time from below; a scream from overhead; and then another man hurtled past, Uzi flying.

  Pendergast. He must have reached the bottom and retrieved the dead man's weapon.

  D'Agosta began to climb down in a panic, slipping, recovering, slipping again. There was another shot from below, then another-Pendergast covering him, keeping the opening above clear of men.

  The rock began to level out a little and he half climbed, half slid the last twenty feet. Then he was on his feet at the top of a scree slope, soaked in perspiration, heart hammering, his legs like jelly. Pendergast was here, crouched behind a rock, firing up again at the opening.

  "Get the device and let's go," he said.

  D'Agosta rose, scrambled down to the thicket of bushes, and retrieved the weapon. One of its bulbs was slightly dinged, and the device looked a little smudged and scratched, but otherwise it seemed undamaged. He slung it over his shoulder and raced for the cover of the trees. Pendergast joined him a moment later.

  "Down. To the Greve road."

  They took off downhill, leaping and running through chestnut trees, the sound of shots behind and above growing fainter and fainter.

  And then, suddenly, Pendergast stopped again.

  In the ensuing silence, D'Agosta heard a sound rising from below. The measured baying of dogs.

  A lot of dogs.

  { 82 }

  Pendergast listened for a moment, then he turned to D'Agosta. "The count's boar-hunting dogs. With their handlers. Coming up from below."

  "Oh, my God . "

  "They're trained to fan out into an impenetrable line, trap their prey, and surround it. We've no choice. We've got to go up and over the top of the mountain. That's our only chance to escape."

  They turned and began scrambling up through the steep woods, moving at an angle to the slope, away from the castle. It was a tough, nasty ascent: the chestnut forest was full of brush and brambles, the ground wet and the leaves slippery. D'Agosta could hear the baying of the dogs below, dozens and dozens it seemed, overlapping into a cacophony of noise. The sounds echoed clear across the valley, from one end to the other. They seemed to be getting closer.

  They climbed through an especially steep section of forest and broke out onto a gentler slope, planted in vines, leaves yellow in the fall air. They ran uphill between the rows, stumbling and panting through the wet clods, sticky earth clinging to their shoes.

  There was no question: the dogs were gaining.

  At the far end of the vineyard, Pendergast paused a second to reconnoiter. They were in a couloir between two mountain ridges. Above, the ridges narrowed as they approached the summit, about half a mile away. The castle lay below them on its own projecting shelf of rock, grim and dark.

  "Come on, Vincent," Pendergast said. "There's not a moment to lose."

  The vineyard gave way to another steep slope, thickly covered with chestnut trees. They thrashed their way upward, briars tearing at their already tattered clothes. The broken wall of some ancient ruin came into view overhead, an old casa colonica sunken in vines. They climbed past the ruin and its outbuildings and entered an overgrown clearing. Again Pendergast paused to examine the hillside above them.

  D'Agosta felt his heart was going to explode. The microwave device was a dead weight across his shoulder. Staring down the ridgeline, gasping for breath, he caught a brief glimpse of several of the dogs below, running, baying. Their line was tightening. He could now make out the distant whistling and shouting of the handlers.

  Pendergast was staring intently upslope, where the couloir narrowed toward the summit. "I see a glint of steel."

  "Men?"

  Pendergast nodded. "Have you ever hunted boar?"

  "No."

  "That's precisely how we're being hunted. Like boar. Up there, where that draw narrows, will be the hunters. Perhaps a dozen, maybe more, arranged in blinds. Their field of fire will completely cover the upper part of the ridge." He nodded, almost as if in approval. "It's a standard hunt. The dogs flush out the boar and drive them up a narrowing valley toward a ridgeline, where they are forced to break cover and are taken down by the hunters."

  "So what do we do?"

  "We don't behave like boar. Instead of running away from the dogs, we head sideways."

  He turned and ran along the slope, at right angles to the fall line, following the rise and fall of the topography. The baying of the dogs was closer, their sounds echoing back among the rises of land, making it appear as if the animals were approaching from all sides.

  The steep flank of the mountain lay perhaps a quarter mile in front of them. If they could get over that, D'Agosta thought as they stumbled forward, they could outflank the dogs and head downhill again. But the forest grew ever steeper and denser, slowing them down. And then, quite suddenly, they reached the lip of a small but very steep ravine, a stream at its bottom plunging down over sharp boulders. On the other side, perhaps twenty feet away, was a cliff of wet, moss-covered rock.

  It was impassable.

  Pendergast turned back. The dogs seemed very close now. D'Agosta could even hear the crackling of twigs, the breaking of brush, the curses of the handlers.

  "We can't cross this ravine," Pendergast said. "That leaves only one choice. We must go up, try to creep through the line of hunters."

  Pendergast pulled out the handgun he'd taken from the fallen man, checked the magazine. "Three rounds left," he said. "Let's go."

  They resumed their climb. It seemed incredible to D'Agosta that he could go any farther, but adrenaline-and the dreadful baying of the boar hounds-kept him moving.

  After a few minutes, the forest thinned and it grew brighter. They crouched, then crept forward slowly. Above, the forest gave way completely to meadows and brushy draws. D'Agosta caught his breath in dismay. The draws were full of impenetrable brush; the meadows were open and bare, dotted with isolated copses of trees. The land rose another quarter of a mile, hemmed between the two ridges of rock, finally topping over a barren summit. It was like a shooting gallery.

  Pendergast examined the summit for at least a minute, despite the rapidly approaching dogs. Then he shook his head.

  "It's no good, Vincent. It's suicide to go farther. There will be too many men up there, and they've no doubt been hunting boar in this valley all their lives. We'll never break through."

  "Are you sure? Sure the men are up there, I mean?"

  Pendergast nodded, looking back up the ridge. "I can see at least half a dozen from here. It's impossible to say how many others are hidden behind the rock blinds." He paused, as if considering. Then he spoke rapidly, almost to himself. "The ring is already closed on either side and above. And we can't go down: we'll never penetrate the line of dogs."

  "Are you positive?"

  "Not even a two-hundred-pound male boar, moving through heavy brush at thirty miles an hour, can get past those dogs. As soon as the boar hits the line, the dogs converge, and . "

  He stopped. Then he looked at D'Agosta, eyes glittering.

  "Vincent, that's it. There is a way out. Listen to me . I will head directly downhill. When I hit the line of dogs, their cry will bring the others, and they'll bunch. Meanwhile, you move a couple of hundred yards laterally, that way, quick as you can. Then go slowly downhill. Slowly. When you hear the cornering cry of the dogs-it's an unmistakable sound-you'll know I've hit the line and they're baying at me. The line will break as the dogs converge, and that’s when you can pass. Then, and only then. Is that clear? Listen for the cornering cry. When you break through, head straight to the Greve road."

  "And you?"

  Pendergast held up the gun.

  "Wi
th three shots? You'll never do it."

  "There's no other way."

  "But where will I meet up with you? The Greve road?"

  Pendergast shook his head. "Don't wait for me. Get the colonnello and return in full force as soon as possible. In full force. You understand? Take the machine-you'll need it to convince him."

  "But . " D'Agosta stopped. And then-only then-did the full consequences of Pendergast's intentions reveal themselves to him.

  "The hell with that," he said. "We go together."

  The baying grew closer.

  "Only one of us can get through. There's no other way. Now, go! "

  "I won't. No way . I’m not leaving you to the dogs . "

  "Damn you, Vincent, you must! " And without another word, Pendergast turned his back and took off downhill.

  "No!" D'Agosta shouted. "Noooo-!"

  But it was too late.

  He felt paralyzed, rooted to the spot in disbelief. Pendergast's thin black figure was leaping like a cat down the hill, gun upraised-and then it vanished into the trees.

  There was nothing to do but follow the plan. Almost robotically, D'Agosta began scrambling along the hill, moving laterally, until he had gone about three hundred yards. He turned, prepared to descend.

  Then he stopped. Ahead, in a thickly wooded copse beneath a spur of rock, stood a lone figure. From any other vantage point, he would have been invisible below the outcropping of rock. He stood very still, looking at D'Agosta.

  Jesus, D'Agosta thought. This is it.

  He reached for the microwave device, thought better of it. The man wasn't armed; or, if he was, his weapon was out of sight. This situation was better handled with bare hands. He gathered himself to leap forward.

  But then he hesitated. Though the man was dressed in peasant garb, he seemed different from the rest of Fosco's men. He was very tall and slender, perhaps four inches taller than Pendergast, and he wore a closely trimmed beard. There was something strange about his eyes. They were different colors: the left was hazel, the right an intense blue.