“My God,” Jonathan whispered.
“You don’t approve?” Ledford asked. “My friend Kemal thinks it’s a wonderful idea, but then, he sees a prominent spot for himself in the scheme. I’m going to make him a very rich man.” He turned to Alex, his voice becoming softly urgent. “Are you with us, Alex? I’ve proved I’m your equal, perhaps even your superior. There’s nothing for you here. You need the stimulus I can give you. You need me.”
“Where’s Caitlin?”
An angry flush touched Ledford’s face. “Are you trying to humiliate me?”
“Where is she?”
“I sent her and the Benedict woman down one of the offshoot tunnels to the ruins. Unfortunately, I don’t believe they’ll make it.”
Alex stiffened. “Why?”
“You couldn’t expect me to make it easy for them. However, I regard myself as being very generous. I did give them a flashlight and warned them they’d have a very bad time reaching the plateau.”
Kemal frowned. “You said you were going to keep them both as hostages until Karazov came.”
“I don’t tell you quite everything, Kemal.” Ledford smiled. “For instance, I didn’t tell you about the plastique.”
Kemal went still. “Plastique?”
Ledford nodded. “My old friend Hans planted it in the tunnels a few nights ago as a little surprise for me. I checked the timers and the charges should go off”—he checked his watch—“in twenty-five minutes, at precisely seven minutes past three. That’s four minutes after the charge in the wooden horse takes out the members of the conference. The devastation will cause chaos and everyone will rush to the ruins. If there are any guards left at the checkpoint, they’ll be easy for us to take out.”
“You expect us to believe you’d destroy all these priceless paintings?” Jonathan asked, glancing at the pile of boxed canvases set against the far wall.
“One painting. A Rembrandt. The other paintings and statues are all aboard the Argosy. I kept the Wind Dancer, the Rembrandt, and those empty crates here only as window dressing to convince Hans that setting the plastique would be worthwhile. Naturally, the Rembrandt and the Wind Dancer will accompany me when I leave.”
“You want the tunnel blown?” Jonathan asked.
“Oh, yes, it’s imperative. That’s why I’ve gone to all this trouble. After Hans does his work, Barney has arranged that he’ll be apprehended by British security. Contrary to popular opinion, the British can be quite savage when their sentiments are aroused, and they’re very fond of Cartwright. Under coercion, I’m sure Hans will confess he planted the bombs and blew up both me and these magnificent works of art. Naturally, since the confession will be made under extreme duress, they will believe him.” He shook his head mournfully. “What a tragic loss for the world.”
“And they’ll no longer look for you or the artworks,” Alex said.
“That’s right.” Ledford smiled at Alex. “You see, Alex, sometimes it’s more difficult constructing a puzzle than solving it. You have no idea how I had to nurture and manipulate Hans to bring him to this emotional point. First I had to make sure he had the appropriate mixture of stupidity, stubbornness, and viciousness, and then it took months of psychological conditioning to bring him to the point where I could use him. His wound had to be convincingly painful but not life-threatening, and I had to set him up with just the right whore to provide him with a bolt-hole to run to and provide me with information when he—” He broke off and shook his head. “But there’s time for me to tell you about that later. We should really be packing up so that we can get to the checkpoint on schedule.” He turned to Kemal. “Take Mr. Andreas out of the room. I wish to speak to Alex alone.”
Kemal nodded and gestured with his Uzi to the door. “If you please, Mr. Andreas.”
“Alex?” Jonathan asked.
“Go on,” Alex said.
After the two men had left the room, Alex said, “Show me the tunnel.”
“You don’t want to go after her,” Ledford said. “You’d never make it.”
“Show me the tunnel.”
“Stay with me,” Ledford said. “Come with me.” He flushed, his words stumbling out awkwardly. “It’s not really physical. I can understand how you—I simply want to be with you.”
“Go to hell.”
The color drained from Ledford’s face. “I didn’t want it to come to this. I truly thought if I showed you I was your match, you’d realized how much better we could be together.” A sudden flare of anger darkened his expression. “You’re a great disappointment to me.”
“The tunnel.”
“You want your cow of a woman?” Ledford’s lips twisted with fury. “Then have her.” He turned toward the door. “Kemal!”
Kemal appeared in the doorway.
“We’re going to take the gentlemen to the tunnel to join the ladies.” His gaze narrowed on Kemal’s face. “Unless you have an objection?”
Kemal shrugged. “Why should I have an objection?”
“You seemed so concerned about the ladies. Lead the way.”
A few moments later they entered a small room. “The women have a fifteen-minute head start on you, but I doubt if they’ve gotten far,” Ledford said, then took the lantern from the table and handed it to Alex. “I wouldn’t want you not to be able to see the minutes ticking away on your watch. Last chance. This is one puzzle you’re not going to be able to solve, Alex.”
“I won’t know until I try.”
“You’ll die. She means that much to you? She’s death, I tell you.”
Alex knew he might not be able to help Caitlin and Chelsea. If he stayed with Ledford, he would have a chance to lull him into false confidence and then kill the son of a bitch. God, how he wanted to do that. He could feel the frustration and hatred sear through him stronger than ever before.
But if he stayed with Ledford, he would be helpless to try to save Caitlin.
There was no contest.
He said quietly, “You’re wrong, Ledford.”
He turned and entered the tunnel with Jonathan.
“An interesting choice,” Kemal murmured.
“You’ll be sorry,” Ledford shrilled after him. “You’re making a mistake.”
Alex looked over his shoulder. Ledford and Kemal were only dark silhouettes against the dim light of the room, but he thought he could see a faint smile on Kemal’s shadowy face. He felt a sudden leap of hope. A variable? Kemal had never been predictable, but now Alex realized he was the most enigmatic man with whom he had ever dealt. He deliberately repeated Kemal’s words to him the day Kemal had called himself Alex’s friend. “We all have to make choices every day.”
Ledford said, “You’ve made the wrong one today.”
The heavy door slammed and left the two men in darkness.
The hiss had become a roar.
“My God, what the hell is it?” Chelsea stopped, her hand clutched Caitlin’s arm. “I feel like David going forth to fight Goliath.”
“Goliath didn’t hiss. He probably pounded his chest like Tarzan of the Apes.” Caitlin moistened her lips. “Is the path inclining downward?”
“I don’t think so. It seems pretty level to me.”
“Then I think we’d better turn on the flashlight.”
“Why?”
“That hissing is coming from somewhere . . . down.” Caitlin aimed the flashlight at the floor ahead and pressed the button.
“That son of a bitch,” Chelsea breathed, taking a step forward.
They stood on the edge of a crevasse plunging over a hundred feet, the stone sides as cleanly cut as if carved by a butcher’s cleaver. Caitlin could glimpse something glittering, moving, writhing at the bottom of the crevasse.
“Water,” Chelsea said. “A spring?”
Caitlin shook her head. “I think the hissing noise is the sea rushing and receding through those rocks.”
“The sea is miles away.”
“But the sea level is very low here.”
She clicked off the flashlight. “And this is earthquake country. I remember reading that one of the cities built on the Troy site was destroyed by an earthquake. Maybe the earthquake caused a fissure that let the sea run this far inland.”
The waters glittered, writhed, hissing up at them.
“You’ll have to turn on the flashlight again,” Chelsea said. “We’ll have to see if there’s a way across it.”
“There isn’t, unless you can jump thirty feet.”
“We were looking down at the water. It’s either find a way across it or stay here and rot. Turn it on.”
Caitlin switched on the flashlight and played it over the surface of the crevasse. “I told you there isn’t—” She broke off as she saw the rope.
To their extreme right a strong mountaineer’s rope was anchored to one of the beams supporting the tunnel on this side of the crevasse. It stretched taut over the abyss and was wound several times around a massive rock on the other side.
Two thirds across the rope a wide red satin ribbon with an enormous shimmering bow bounced merrily in the beam of light.
“A present from Ledford,” Chelsea murmured. “Gift-wrapped.”
“The rope looks strong enough.”
“It’s a trap.”
“Probably. But what if it’s not? Suppose Ledford set this up as one of his sick jokes because he thought we’d be too afraid to save ourselves.” Caitlin stepped closer and tested the rope. It held firm. “What else can we do?”
They both knew there was no choice.
“I’ll go first,” Chelsea said. “I’m lighter.”
“And I’m stronger. I’m a farm girl, remember? It’s thirty feet across, Chelsea. We’ve got a better chance if I go.” Caitlin handed the flashlight to Chelsea and tested the rope again as she sat down and dangled her feet over the edge of the crevasse. She gripped the rope with both hands. “Once I reach the other side, you can undo the rope on this side and tie it around your waist so I can pull you across.”
“Like a sack of potatoes. How damaging to my image.” Chelsea knelt on the ground beside Caitlin and eyed the rope doubtfully. “It looks all right.”
“Hold on to the rope on this side in case it won’t bear my weight.” Caitlin closed her eyes, tightened her grip on the rope, took a deep breath, and slipped off the edge into nothingness.
Her arms snapped with strain in their sockets.
Her palms burned.
The water hissed below like a dragon hungry for a feast.
But the rope held fast.
“I’ll have to go quickly.” She gasped. “I can’t stand—” She stopped talking and started moving, propelling herself hand over hand across the crevasse. The red bow bobbed across the yawning emptiness. If she could keep her eyes and concentration on the bow instead of on the pain in her hands and arms . . .
She was a third of the way across.
The water hissed as it plunged through the fissure.
Almost halfway across.
The scarlet bow shone like a beacon, its wide, shimmering length in frivolous contrast to the rough hemp rope.
More than halfway. A few more feet and she would be within reach of the bow.
A few more feet . . .
She felt a jerk in the rope beneath her hands.
Panic screamed through her. The rope! Dammit, but it had looked so strong. Her gaze flew to the rope ahead. No weakness. Tough hemp.
Chelsea called, “Caitlin, what’s wrong?”
“The rope—it’s breaking.” She hung frozen, afraid to move.
The rope hadn’t begun to break until she had almost reached the two-thirds mark. Until she had almost reached the red satin bow.
The bow.
Merde, it was that goddamned bow! Ledford had partially severed the rope and then covered the cut with a wide band of ribbon. “It’s the bow. He cut—” Caitlin felt the rope give again under her weight as another cord in the braided rope gave way. She couldn’t go back. There wasn’t time before the rope would snap. She could only take a wild chance.
Fast. She had to move fast. She swung forward with frantic speed, hand over hand, toward the scarlet bow. The rope gave, snapped, broke entirely. She released her grip, dove forward past the bow, grabbed the shredded dangling end of the rope with both hands, and held on tight.
Chelsea screamed.
Caitlin’s body weight propelled her forward toward the sheared wall of the crevasse. She felt a hot blinding pain in her left cheekbone as she crashed against the wall.
A woman’s scream echoed through the tunnel!
Sheer terror tore through Alex. He broke into a run.
“That was Chelsea,” Jonathan muttered, pounding behind him. Alex felt a twinge of guilt because he was so relieved. He was vaguely aware of a crackling under the soles of his shoes. Shells? No, glass.
He rounded a curve in the tunnel to see Chelsea kneeling, staring down into the darkness.
Alex felt a cold chill. What the hell was she staring at?
And then he saw Caitlin hanging from the rope across the abyss.
He made a sound low in his throat and took a step forward.
“No!” Jonathan grabbed his arm. “Don’t speak. Don’t distract her. She may make it if—”
“If?” Alex felt the muscles of his stomach knot with panic. He had never felt more helpless. He could do nothing but stand and watch Caitlin clinging desperately to the rope.
Caitlin’s hands began to slip down the rope. One inch. Two inches.
“Caitlin, don’t you dare give up,” Chelsea shouted.
Caitlin hung there, trying to fight the dizziness and pain. If she let go now, Ledford would win. He had killed her mother and now he was killing her. Her head fell back as she looked up at where the rope curved onto the floor of the tunnel. Safety. It was too far. Ten feet at least. But if she died, Ledford would win. Dammit, it wasn’t right for Ledford to win after all they had gone through to defeat him. She braced her bare feet against the stone wall of the crevasse and began to half walk, half pull herself up the side.
Her hands were bleeding, she noticed vaguely, leaving marks as bright red as the scarlet bow on the rope.
Six feet.
Her arms and shoulders were without feeling. The pain was gone but she was numb with weariness.
Four feet.
Her eyes stung with tears and sweat. She couldn’t see the edge of the crevasse any longer. She climbed blindly, automatically.
She was dimly aware of Chelsea encouraging, pleading, cursing at her.
She reached the edge of the crevasse and pulled herself over the top.
She collapsed on the ground, panting, trembling, burying her face in her arms. “I made it!” Her teeth were chattering. “Give me a minute. . . .”
“Thank God,” Chelsea said quietly. “I thought you—”
“Me too.” Caitlin could feel the tears of profound thankfulness running down her cheeks. She was going to live. He wasn’t going to win. She wouldn’t let him win. There might still be other unpleasant surprises in store, but nothing Ledford could throw at them could ever be as bad as what she had just gone through. “Now what?” Caitlin asked shakily. “We seem to be out of rope. How do I get you across?”
“You don’t, Caitlin.”
“Alex?” Caitlin stiffened in shock, her head lifting to stare across the crevasse. Alex stood beside Chelsea, his face pale and grim in the light of the lantern he held in his hand. Jonathan Andreas was behind him.
“Listen, there’s no time,” he said urgently. “Don’t worry about us. You have to get out of the tunnel and get to the ruins to warn them.”
“What about you?”
“We’ll find a way across.”
“You shouldn’t have come. I don’t want to leave—”
“Get going, dammit,” Chelsea said. “The sooner you get out of here, the sooner you can bring us help.”
Chelsea was right. If Caitlin could get out of there and reach the soldiers at the rui
ns . . . Caitlin stumbled to her knees, flinching as her raw, bleeding hands braced against the stone, aching in every muscle of her body. “Yes . . . I’ll get help. I’ll be right back.” She struggled to her feet and started to run down the tunnel toward the pinpoint of daylight. “I’ll bring help. . . .”
Jonathan knelt beside Chelsea. He touched her cheek. “We heard you scream.”
“Caitlin. I was scared to death. . . .” Chelsea shook her head and her tone turned fierce. “You had to come, didn’t you? What good is it going to do for you to be smashed under Ledford’s thumb too? You should have stayed where you were safe. Why the hell don’t you ever do—”
“Hush.” His fingers touched her lips, silencing her. “You’re being completely idiotic. I couldn’t stay away. You’re always telling me what I should do, what I should be. Don’t you know I can’t be any of those things without you? Don’t you know how much I need you?”
“Need?” She looked at him, startled. She had never connected that word with Jonathan. Everyone else needed Jonathan. He was the shelter and the rock. “No, I guess—”
“We may be able to do something with two of these posts.” Alex was studying the crisscrossed beams that supported the roof of the tunnel. He went over to the post that still had the rope dangling from around it and knelt to examine the ground in which it was implanted. “They’re on loose, sandy ground. There’s a chance we could rope two of them together to form a bridge across the crevasse.”
“And risk the roof coming down on our heads?” Jonathan asked.
“In twelve minutes it’s going to come down on us anyway. What have we got to lose?”
“Not a damn thing,” Jonathan said grimly.
“What are you talking about?” Chelsea said. “We can wait for Caitlin to bring help.”
Jonathan shook his head. “Ledford said there’s a plastique charge set in the tunnels.”
“No wonder the bastard wasn’t afraid we’d get out of here alive. He had all the aces.”