Midnight in Madrid (35 page)

MADRID, SEPTEMBER 18, 11:59 P.M.

J
ean-Claude was elsewhere, putting the final touches on the charge of explosives.

Working alone in the narrow, cramped chamber under the American Embassy, he braced his flashlight between an old brick and a stone. Working with the low beam from the flashlight, he spread before him the ten different detonators from the pack he had purchased.

He was taking no chances. He would use all of them. He only needed one to trigger the ten kilos of explosives he had spread in separate packets around the chamber. If just one ignited, chances are much of the block would implode.

On the first Number Ten Delay switch, Jean-Claude used a pair of pliers to crush the end of a thin copper tube containing acid. There was no need to crush the end of the tube completely flat. All he needed to do was crush it sufficiently to break the glass vial, thereby releasing the liquid within. Then he removed and discarded the safety pin holding back the striker. Finally, he inserted the other end of the pencil detonator into a brick of explosives. His charges were good for twenty-four hours, meaning they would blow the next night around midnight, give or take.

He repeated the procedure four more times. He then drew back and fought for his breath. The air was disappearing in this cramped hole. And he was sweating profusely. It occurred to him that if there were some sort of freak accident with the acid leaking too quickly into the explosives, he would be blown into oblivion. So, twenty-four-hour timer or not, it was wise to move as quickly as possible.

There! Everything was set!

Then something clattered in the small adjoining chamber. Jean-Claude froze.

“What the——?”

It wasn’t that unusual for rocks or pieces of concrete to crumble and fall, or for a rat to disturb something. But this sounded different. It sounded like a tool, a flashlight or something, dropping.

His eyes went to the portal that led to the next chamber. He saw a flicker of a light waving. Good God, he was not alone!

What the——!

Then he heard something human. A cough! The cough of a woman!

He left the detonators where they were, set to blast away within twenty-four hours. Angrily, suspiciously, he drew his gun from his belt.

Whoever was in the next chamber sounded as if she was getting to her feet after somehow burrowing in.

Well, he’d killed that busybody woman who had worked for the Metro, and he would kill again.

Jean-Claude checked his pistol and readied it for a quick discharge. It was completely loaded. Whoever was there, he would cut them in half, no questions asked.

He held his pistol aloft and went to the passageway where he could ambush his intruder.

MADRID, SEPTEMBER 19, MIDNIGHT

S
omewhere in the back of her mind, Peter’s words floated like a ghost.

A philosopher with a gun…

Well, at least I’m a philosopher…

On her feet in these strange chambers under the embassy, she thought her heart was going to burst from her chest. She drew her own weapon.

…if you could have murdered Hitler and Stalin and avoided World War II, would that have—?

The shadows shifted in the portal to the adjoining chamber, and she pointed her weapon in that direction. Out of instinct, she identified herself. “Hello? Hello? Police?!” she said.

But the frame of a man quickly bolted into view in the doorway. The gunman gave her less than a second. She could see arms and legs and a head, a trim body and a half-crouch. One of the arms was extended and swung a gun in her direction, and everything she had ever learned at the target ranges in California and Washington kicked sharply into gear, and it was surely a beneficent God that had trained her to be such a good shot.

As his arm swung into its final position to aim, Alex unloaded four staccato shots from her own pistol. The sound was deafening in the tiny dark chamber, followed quickly by the scream of the man she had hit four times, squarely in the midchest and then upward as he was propelled back until the final shot blew away his nose and the front part of his face.

He managed to get one shot off, possibly two. There was a clatter of ricocheting bullets around the chamber, and something smacked her flashlight and took it from her hand.

Then it was all very still, and the man was lying dead. Her lamp flickered.

She examined the body where it lay in an impossibly twisted heap. She stared into the dead eyes, or what remained of them, since one was loose from its socket. She fought back the urge to throw up over what she had done, and her insides were set to explode. By force of old habit, her free hand found the stone pendant at her neck, and she whispered a few words to herself.

She moved to where the man had been working, and with horror she looked at the mounds of explosives, detonators already set. She said another prayer.

Out of instinct, she tried her cell phone. No reception. All she could do now, she hoped, was to get out and get the bomb people in here as soon as possible. She had no idea how much time she had…or didn’t have.

She took the dead man’s torch. Its bulb was dimmer than hers and was wearing down. Suppressing a surge of horror, she returned to the fetid tunnel that had led her there.

She pulled herself into the hole and prepared herself for the final crawl toward open space. As she crawled, edging along in the tight tunnel with mortar and sand coming down on her again, she was almost overtaken anew by the claustrophobic panic that had pursued her like a demon for this whole episode.

But she kept telling herself, she had done this before, she could do it one final time. It was only twenty meters or so. As she proceeded, she took care to drag her feet and push carefully against the clutter and stones.

Then, just as it had previously, more of the sandstone started to trickle down. One inch worth. Then two.
OMG
! This time it was closing up her passage.

She moved forward with a jerk, trying to get some momentum. She got some.

She slid forward another foot or two.

Bad idea, bad idea! Bad idea.

The worse idea you’ve ever had.

Get out! Get out!

This time, by moving forward too quickly, she had dislodged some heavier pieces. And they fell in her path, pinning her left arm.

You’ve dug your own grave! No one will ever find you!

You’re dead! You’re dead! You’re dead.

A million and one thoughts pounded her at once.

But one overpowered all the others.
This time you’re dead. If the explosion doesn’t kill you, suffocation will.

Robert, where are you? Robert, if I die will you greet me in heaven?

She screamed. She screamed a second time.

No human voice could hear.

Oh, God, oh, God, Oh God in heaven, if you’re there, if you’re listening…!

Please! Please, spare me. I do not want to die! Not here, not today. Not in this horrible, wretched place!

As she managed to crawl a little bit farther forward, agony and ecstasy, heaven and hell, were all wrapped up in one. Her knees crunched over coarse gravel and sand. What was that? Glass? Something cut her knee. Low on her hip was her weapon but she wished she could have jettisoned it. No way she could reach it.

Oh, my God, oh, my God
! How foolish could she have possibly been?

She screamed again. No answer. Just an echo of horror in her ears.

The sweat poured off her.

The moisture—the sewage mixed with underground condensation—was already seeping through her clothing. If Alex could survive the crushing claustrophobia of this time and place, she reasoned, she would never feel it again. That too went on her wish list. That, and seeing daylight again.

And then, once again, for a final time, she felt the aging brick and cement walls narrowing on her. She tried to buoy her spirits. Sure, she could make it. Sure, she could get out of there.

She tried to fight off the notion of death. Death was unimaginable in a place like this.

The passage narrowed again, worse than it had been when she had come through. Her flashlight died. She was in complete darkness. She tried to go forward on her back.

No go. She tried to calm herself.

Okay, okay, okay.

She would have to back up. Going forward made no sense. She put everything into her arms, pushed and pushed hard, and managed to go backward.

There! Progress. She was moving.

Then she heard it. The worst sound in creation. A rustling, crumbling, collapsing sound behind her. She could even feel it. A little cave-in. Sand and mortar drifting down, blocking her retreat.

She pushed mightily, but now it was like a heavy car stuck in snow. She wasn’t going to go anywhere. She was stuck, stuck, stuck!

No way to call anyone, no way anyone would know where she was.

Stuck!

Hello! It’s official
. She would starve to death or suffocate or be blown into oblivion.
Blown into heaven
, she prayed.

Oh Lord, oh Lord, oh Lord
…

She prayed like she had never prayed before.

Minutes had the weight of hours, small eternities passing in a living hell of a grave. She was beyond panic but not beyond fear.

She had prayed, but no answer yet.

Her heart pounded and pounded. She almost wished it would stop, that death would claim her gently.

Instead, she would have to wait for it, greet it with courage. Where was her faith? She summoned it as best she could. With all her heart, with everything she believed in, she prayed to God, prayed to Jesus.

Fatigue was settling in. She was motionless. Her energy was gone. She tried in desperation to nudge forward with her shoulders. She couldn’t squeeze forward. She couldn’t squeeze back. It was so tight here that even breathing was now a problem. The stone pendant on her chest felt like an anchor.

Stuck meant death. How many hours, she wondered, when every minute was torture?

Alex broke a sweat. She continued to struggle against the tunnel that now held her so tightly. She hunched her upper body, careful to allow herself a final edge of wriggle room.

His stomach, her nerves, felt as if they were turning to water. Her anger, her desperation, were turning to acceptance of death.

Alex wriggled again and worsened her situation. In her mind she saw her parents waiting for her. Her grandmother, for whom she had lit all those beautiful
luminarias
and set them afloat on a country stream.

There! When she held on to thoughts like that and felt the strength drain out of her, it didn’t seem so bad.

Oh God, please take me to heaven…

The silence was the same immense size as the darkness. Up ahead, a few yards from Alex’s head, there was a slight scratching. Alex, her head at an impossible angle, knew they were rats. Alex spat at them, gave a flick of her head, and screamed!

Couldn’t she even die in peace? They’d be back to get her body after she died, wouldn’t they?

She fought tears.

Now her neck was cramping. Badly. She had no way to relieve the pain. She dug in with her shoes. She pushed again and felt the stone around her grow tighter and sharper. It tore at her clothes.

She sucked in all her strength, dug in her sneakers, pushed with her arms and pushed with all the strength she had left.

A few inches.

Nothing else.

The air in the tunnel was becoming thin. Then thinner.

She summoned up what was left of her courage. A deeper darkness was starting to swallow her.

Now she knew. She was a goner. A few moments later, locked in place, she started to lose consciousness.

In her father’s house, she knew, there were many rooms. And deep down, she also believed, someone had gone ahead to prepare a place before her.

It was easy, really; much like falling asleep.

MADRID, SEPTEMBER 19, SHORTLY AFTER MIDNIGHT

A
lex’s eyes flickered open, and she thought she had her first glimpse of heaven.

She was wrong, but every bit as pleased.

At the end of the tunnel in front of her there was a light, then a stronger light. And all around her now was the sound of tapping.

Tapping, tapping, tapping
, growing louder.

Then hammering. More hammering. All around her hammering!

She yelled. “I’m here! I’m here!”

There was the sound of machinery. She could feel vibrations behind her. A rescue team had knocked their way into the same tunnel. The next thing that happened startled her all the more.

Her feet. Something touched her feet. Hands. Human hands. And after that, someone had pushed a hose past her and was pumping air into the narrow passageway. Breathing became easier. An air pump was part of the machinery she heard. Up ahead of her, she could feel a drill.

A voice in English screamed. “Alex! Alex, we got you!”

“I’m here!” she yelled again. She fought back tears, tears that none could see, but which she could feel cascading down her cheeks. Ahead of her, the light became more intense as workers had broken through the basement floor of the embassy to where the explosives had been stashed and then defused by bomb experts.

Then part of the wall behind her broke away. Her legs were free. So was her upper body. Hands in heavy gloves worked their way up to her hips. The hands cleared debris from the wall.

Firemen. Rescue teams from the police. Rarely had she been so happy to feel strange male hands upon her. Stuck for hours, she was being freed within minutes, once they had located her.

A voice in English. Familiar. “Alex?”

It was Peter.

“Yes! Yes!” she gasped in response.

“They’re going to pull you backward gently. Are you okay with that?”

“I’m okay!” she yelled.

They pulled. And she slid. It was the greatest ride of her life. Ten feet, a dozen, maybe twenty as her jeans and shirt dragged and ripped. They pulled her out into the light, into the clammy underground cavern where she had entered the tunnel.

She turned over and trembled, trying to sit up. Peter knelt down and wrapped his arms around her, and as he embraced her for a moment, she sobbed almost uncontrollably.

They wrapped her in a blanket. They stood her up. Her legs were unsteady, rubbery, but they supported her. The rescue workers had unlocked some doors in the old tunnels and broken through a wall.

“How did you ever find me?” she finally asked. “How? How?”

“Your wallet,” he said.

“What?”

He made a motion to where her wallet rode in her back pocket. She pulled the wallet out and handed it to him. From it, he pulled the Swiss consular ID card that he had forced upon her the day before.

“I doctored it,” he said. “Homing device. After you disappeared once in Switzerland, I wasn’t going to let it happen again.”

She wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. So instead, she did both.

Distantly, as they evacuated her, the sound of demolition grew louder from underneath the embassy.