Day of Confession - Allan Folsom [117]
“He’s gone…”
“Give him a few min—“
Suddenly, a loud, sharp wail echoed from the blackness inches away.
Elena froze where she was. A hand thrown to her mouth in horror.
The wail came again. Longer and louder than before.
“Jesus Christ!” Harry whispered.
Danny was waking.
87
A SHRILL WHINE ECHOED ACROSS THE CAVERN as Thomas Kind touched the starter. The twin two-hundred-and-fifty horsepower Yamahas thundered to life, and the searchlight came on full, swinging in a wide arc across the channel as Kind brought the motorboat’s bow around sharply and roared back the way he had come. As quickly he cut the motors and let the boat drift, playing the light across the cavern walls.
HARRY DUG IN with his hands, grabbing at the rock overhead, pulling the skiff deeper into the recess. Beyond him, over his chest he could see the searchlight swing toward the mouth of the cave. In between, Elena was huddled against Danny on the flattened gurney that lay just below the top of the stern. Whatever sound Danny had made had stopped. He was still and breathing silently as before.
The light swung past the opening and moved on. In that brief second Harry saw more of the cave. It went straight back for another ten or fifteen feet before its height suddenly dropped and it narrowed sharply. There was no way to tell where it went from there. But it was all they had. That was, if the skiff would fit through it.
Thomas Kind swung the light back across the rock outcroppings. All he saw were the shadows where one ended and another began. But he’d heard the cry or whatever it had been. And this time there was no doubt where it had come from, somewhere here, along the wall in this section of the channel.
Now he swung the light back, his eyes intent, the deep scratches Marta had made on his face glistening in its spill.
Behind him, Salvatore sat in a kind of fascinated terror and watched, a spectator at a game. It was who Salvatore was, the most he could be.
There!
Thomas Kind saw it. The low ledge, the dark opening beneath it. Gratification tugged in a cruel smile as he turned the boat toward it.
THERE WAS A LOUD SCRAPE and then a dull bang as the skiff suddenly stopped.
“The flashlight. Quickly,” Harry whispered.
The dull rumble of the outboards grew louder, and the light became appreciably brighter as it danced off the granite walls, moving toward them.
“Here!” Elena leaned toward Harry with the flashlight. Their eyes met for an instant, and then Harry took it, turning, playing it into the cave behind them.
The skiff had caught up against the passage entrance. With a little maneuvering, it would fit inside it. But after that, who knew? The blond man knew where they were and would stay there, waiting for them to come out. And if they went on, trying to find an exit at the far end…. If there was one…. If not, what then?
Suddenly the beam of the searchlight was full on them.
“GET OVER THE SIDE! NOW!”
Harry threw himself forward and sideways at the same time, felt his hand fill with material from Elena’s habit, pulling her over the gunwale into the water in a hail of automatic-weapon fire.
Shoving her under the surface toward the passageway on the far side of the skiff, he looked back to see the skiff surrounded by the bright yellow-green of water roiling with gunfire. Bullets chewed up the cavern walls around him, whining shrilly off the heavy stern. It was only a matter of moments before they would cut through the thick aluminum and reach Danny.
Ducking under the water, Harry shoved the skiff hard from beneath, trying to turn it, get Danny out of the murderous line of fire.
Lungs bursting, using the underwater wall for leverage, he maneuvered the skiff around, fighting it backward and into the passage. Suddenly it caught against something, throwing Harry backward. He swam back, digging in against the underwater wall, trying to free it.
He couldn’t. His chest was on fire. He had to have air. Pushing off, he came up. Broke the surface full in the beam