“I’m beat,” Günter said. “Has anyone got food?”
Emerson pulled granola bars out of his duffel bag and passed them around.
“How have you been eating?” Riley asked Günter. “Where do you stay?”
“I’ve been hiding out in an abandoned cabin not far from one of the mine entrances. For whatever reason, the guards don’t seem to patrol that patch of the Tikaboo Valley. I have to be careful, but I can pretty much come and go without being seen. I have some money stashed away but it’s not going to last forever.”
“I saw you at Fletcher’s Cove,” Riley said.
“I was trying to help Maxine. She’d had an affair with Werner but he kicked her to the curb when she turned thirty. If that wasn’t bad enough, he demoted her and gave her to me. The whole office knew. It was humiliating for her. I think she lived to get even. In the end, she didn’t live at all.
“When I realized I had to disappear, I gave her a bar of gold to hide. And not just any bar of gold. It happens to have a serial number that identifies it as belonging to the German government.”
“That bar’s worth about half a million dollars,” Riley said. “You trusted her not to just disappear with it?”
Günter smiled. “The one in my safe was a counterfeit and worth a hundred times more, at least to my brothers. It happens to have the same serial number as the German bar I gave Maxine.”
Riley shook her head. “If it was ever discovered, it could implicate the Grunwalds.”
“Bingo. I told Maxine she should get hold of the bar in my safe and turn both bars over to the press if anything bad should happen to me.”
“Like death?” Riley said.
“Yes. Like death. Unfortunately, Maxine didn’t wait for news of my death. She got into my safe and switched the two bars. Then she went to Fletcher’s Cove and showed it to Werner. She was trying to broker her own deal. To get some measure of revenge. She didn’t know what she was getting into. If only I could have reached her in time to stop her.”
“How did you know she had the fake bar?” Riley asked.
“We would talk once a week. Just a short conversation keeping me informed. She told me she was going to get the bar and blackmail Werner. I told her not to do that, but she wouldn’t listen. It was the last conversation we had. She wouldn’t answer my calls after that so I returned to D.C. to try to stop her. I didn’t dare go to her house but I suspected she would attempt the transfer at the cove. Werner went fishing there every Wednesday. It was a safe way to meet with his brothers and other partners in crime. Needless to say, I didn’t succeed in making contact with Maxine.”
“And then you came back here?”
“I can’t explain it. I feel safe here. It’s like I’m hiding in plain sight. Or maybe I’m waiting for Werner to visit his gold and I’ll sneak in and choke him while he sleeps.”
Riley cut her eyes to him. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No,” Günter said. “I’m quite serious. I would like to kill Werner.”
“Okay then,” Riley said. “Good to know.”
“I’d like to see the gold and get a sample,” Emerson said to Günter.
“The nearest tunnel entrance is over an hour’s walk from here,” Günter said. “Ordinarily I couldn’t do it in the dark but I can find my way if I use your goggles.”
“How did you know we would be here?” Emerson asked Günter.
“I didn’t,” Günter said. “I come here when I want to spy on the airfield. I saw the landing lights go on a couple hours ago so I hiked over. Seeing Miss Moon standing there was a shock.”
“I heard a plane fly in when I was halfway up the mountain,” Riley said.
“I got here just after it landed,” Günter said. “I was too late to see the passengers disembark, but I’ve seen Hans fly into Groom Lake in a similar plane.”
“Does he come here often?”
“Almost never,” Günter said.
Riley was walking on autopilot. The day had been too long. She was wearing the wrong shoes and she was thirsty. She wanted a mojito.
“How much farther do we have to go?” she asked.
“Not much farther,” Günter said.
“I heard that three hours ago.”
“We’ve only been walking for two hours,” Emerson told her.
“So we should be there, right?” Riley said. “Remember how this magical tunnel entrance was over an hour away?”
“It’s slower going in the dark,” Günter said.
“What happens when we find the tunnel?” Riley asked. “Is it attached to a Ritz-Carlton?”
“It’s just a tunnel,” Günter said. “We need to find a big creosote bush. I wouldn’t have a problem in daylight or even bright moonlight, but everything looks weird with these goggles.”
“There are creosote bushes all over the place,” Emerson said. “And bushes that aren’t creosote bushes look like creosote bushes in the dark.”
“This is a big one,” Günter said. “And it has a hole mostly hidden under its branches. Don’t step in the hole.”
Riley and Emerson fanned out and combed the scrub.
“Are you sure we’re in the right area?” Riley asked.
“More or less,” Günter said.
“Found it,” Emerson said. “How stable is the ground around this?”
“Very stable. It’s actually the beginning of a cavern.”
Emerson found a stone, dropped it into the hole, and counted. “I calculate that the floor of the cavern is thirty-six feet below us.”
Riley peered down into the hole. “How do you figure?”
“Physics. All you need is a rock, a stopwatch, and a simple equation derived from Newton’s Laws of Motion.”
“So how fast is the rock going when it hits the ground?” Riley asked.
“Its terminal velocity is about twenty-five miles per hour,” Emerson said.
Riley took a step back. She didn’t like the idea of disappearing down the hole and reaching terminal velocity. It sounded…terminal.
Emerson turned to Günter. “You’ve used this entrance?”
“Not exactly. I accidentally dropped a flashlight into it trying to see the bottom. I decided it was inaccessible and went back to using my original tunnel entrance. Two days later I found the flashlight while I was exploring underground. If you can get down there it’s a shortcut to the gold repository. Otherwise we need to keep walking. There’s an easier entrance about five miles from here.”
Riley looked at the hole in the ground. “Thirty-six feet is a long way down.”
“Fortunately this duffel I’ve been carrying not only contains emergency cash and granola bars but also emergency rappelling equipment,” Emerson said.
“You expected you’d have to rappel?” Riley asked.
“The bag has been in the safe for several months. I originally packed it when I thought I might go on a mountaineering adventure. The adventure never materialized and the bag remained in the safe.”
Emerson unzipped the duffel and pulled out a couple tight coils of rope, some clamps, a hammer, and a small headlamp attached to a headband.
“I have the bare minimum equipment here but I think it will do the job,” he said.
“Do you always take wads of money when you go mountaineering?”
“The adventure involved a possible ransom situation. Fortunately it resolved itself without my intervention.”
“How much money do you have in the bag?” Riley asked.
“Just short of two million. I’ve been paying cash for our motel rooms.”
Riley considered hitting him with the hammer. She’d been scrimping along trying to save money on cheap motels and he had millions in his duffel bag.
“You have that look,” Emerson said to Riley.
“What look?”
“Squinty eyes, jaw clenched, shoulders hunched. I’ve seen that look on women before and it’s never turned out well.”
“Have any of the women with this look ever hit you with a hammer?”
“No,” Emerson said.
Riley made an effort to relax and unsquint her eyes. “There’s always a first time.”
Emerson hooked clamps and anchor plates onto the rope and hammered the anchor plate into an outcropping of rock close to the creosote bush.
“That should do it,” he said, dropping the free end of the secured rope into the hole.
“I didn’t hear it hit bottom,” Riley said.
“Nevertheless I’m sure it did. By my calculations we have more than enough rope. Have you done any rappelling?”
“No. None.”
“I didn’t pack a harness so we’ll have to make do.”
Emerson found a smaller length of rope, wrapped it around Riley’s waist, tied it in a knot, and passed it between her legs.
“How do you feel?” Emerson asked her.
“Like I’m wearing a rope thong.”
“That’s an erotic comparison,” Emerson said. “I like it.”
“You’ve done this harness thing before, right?” Riley asked. “You know what you’re doing?”
“I was into rope bondage for a while in Japan. They call it kinbaku-bi, which means ‘the beauty of tight binding.’ ”
“You’re joking, right?”
“If it makes you feel more comfortable, then yes.” He bound the ropes together in a big loop at her waist and attached a carabiner with a spring-loaded gate onto it, then fed the rope through a large, intricately designed hook with a lever on the side.
“This device is called a descender,” he told her. “Grab the lever and it will control your rate of descent.”
“Couldn’t they come up with a more ominous name for it?” Riley asked. “Maybe a ‘drop into hell machine’?”
“You’re using humor as a defense. Very good.”
“Will it defend me against falling to my death?”
“No. Put these on,” he said, handing her leather gloves and the headlamp. “Turn the headlamp on once you’re fully in the cavern.”
“Wait a minute. What about you?”
“I can manage with less equipment. When you reach the bottom give me a signal so I can descend.”
“You’re going to send me down first?”
“I thought you would want to go down first.”
“I want to go down never.”
“It would be easier for me to help you get started if you go first.”
Riley looked over the edge of the hole. “What’s the big deal? You just jump in, right?”
“More or less,” Emerson said.
“I’ll go down first,” Günter said. “I did my share of mountain climbing when I was younger. I can do it.”
“I don’t have enough equipment to make a harness for you,” Emerson said. “I only packed one descender and one headlamp.”
“No problem,” Günter said. “I’ll be fine.”
“At least take the second pair of gloves,” Emerson said. “Go down as slowly as possible.”
Emerson eased Günter over the side of the hole. Günter wrapped a leg around the rope and swung off into space.
“Eeeeeeeee,” Günter screamed. WUMP!
Emerson and Riley looked into the hole.
“Günter?” Emerson stage whispered.
“Unh,” Günter said.
“Are you okay?”
“No. The rope is too short.”
“I was certain I calculated correctly,” Emerson said. “Perhaps I underestimated the time it took for the stone to hit bottom.”
“I think I broke my leg,” Günter said.
“I’m going next,” Emerson said, hooking the duffel bag over his shoulder. “I need to assess the situation.”
“Sure,” Riley said. “Bon voyage. Happy landings.”
Emerson slipped over the side, and even in the almost total blackness Riley could see that he was controlling his descent. Emerson was toned muscle on a lean frame. And he was skilled on the rope. She heard him drop to the cavern floor, heard a murmured conversation between him and Günter.
“Riley, you’re next,” Emerson called from below. “Pull the rope up and attach it the way I showed you. Remember to switch your headlamp on when you go over the edge and begin to drop.”
Riley looked into the hole. “Over the edge” had new meaning. “Over the edge” was freaking scary. She pulled the rope up and worked it into the descender. She inched closer to the hole and sat with her legs dangling.
“Anytime now,” Emerson called up to her.
“You can do this,” Riley said to herself. “The rope is secure. Emerson is on the bottom. You have a job to do. You need to help Emerson find the gold and see that justice is done. This is what you’ve always wanted to do. This is your chance to make a difference. This is your opportunity to be brave.”
“Riley,” Emerson called, “who are you talking to?”
“Myself.”
“Could you hurry it up?”
“I’m going to be brave,” she said.
“Just jump in and get it over with,” Günter yelled up at her. “I’m not getting any younger.”
Riley sucked in some air, held her breath, closed her eyes, and pitched herself forward into a free fall. She squeezed the descender, the ropes caught, and she hung, swinging in the vast blackness of the hollow earth.
She switched the headlamp on and saw bats clinging to the side of the cave inches from her face. Someone whimpered. She supposed it was her. She switched the lamp off and played out the rope, dropping more slowly, trying to control the whimpering.
“What happened to the light?” Emerson asked her.
“I shut it off. I don’t want to see where I’m going. You didn’t tell me there’d be bats.”
“Well, of course there are bats. It’s a cave.”
“I hate bats.”
“Think of them as pigeons. Pigeons of the night.”
Riley wasn’t too crazy about pigeons either. Even in the daylight.
She turned the headlamp back on and looked down at her rope. Not much left. She looked beyond the end of the rope at Emerson. There seemed to be a lot of empty space between the end of the rope and Emerson.
“Um, Emerson?” she said. “I’ve reached the end of my rope.”
“Release the descender and let yourself drop the rest of the way.”
“No way. It’s too far!”
“I’ll catch you.”
“Not gonna happen.”
“At the risk of seeing that look again I’d like to remind you that you were going to be brave.”
“There’s a difference between brave and stupid.”
“I could cloud your mind and minimize the difference.”
“No! Jeez Louise. On the count of three. One, two, two and a half…”
Riley released the descender and dropped like a sack of cement, knocking Emerson flat on his back with his arms wrapped tight around her.
“Got you,” he said.
Riley was breathless, sprawled on top of him. “I need a moment.”
“No problem.”
“Maybe you two should get a room,” Günter said. “Has anyone noticed I’m in a lot of pain with a broken leg?”
“Do you know anything about broken legs?” Riley asked Emerson. “Like what to do for them?”
“I’ve read a few articles.”
Riley rolled off Emerson. They got to their feet and stood over Günter.
“I need a knife,” Emerson said.
“I don’t have a knife,” Riley said, “but I have a gun.”
“A gun isn’t going to help me,” Emerson said. “I don’t want to kill him. I want to slit his pants leg.”
“I have a Swiss Army knife,” Günter said. “It’s in my pocket.”
Emerson found the knife and cut Günter’s pants leg off above the knee. The leg was swollen and turning purple.
“There’s no bone sticking out,” Emerson said. “I think that’s a good sign.”
“We should make a splint,” Riley said. “What have you got left in your bag?”
“Money.”
“Get me on my feet and I’ll see if I can put weight on the leg,” Günter said.
They pulled him up and he winced in pain.
“I’m not going to be able to walk,” Günter said. “Leave me here.”
Emerson took the headlamp from Riley and handed her the duffel bag. “I’ll carry him,” Emerson said. “We can’t afford to stay here much longer. If the security force patrols this area they might see the rope and come down after us. And we can’t leave Günter here. We need him to take us to the gold.”
Riley nodded. The adrenaline rush from the fall had worn off and she was running on empty. “Understood.”