Primal Fear (22 page)

Chapter Nineteen

The wind lashed at the three men standing twenty-five feet from the quarry’s edge, snatching at their voices as they tried to speak over the fury of the storm.

The sun had come up less than a half hour before, but the heavy clouds overhead still managed to blot out most of its light.  Only a gray smudge showed in the east, against a gun-metal sky that held little promise of brightening any time soon.

Harry chewed his lip, wishing the visibility would improve, but the weather conditions were only supposed to worsen as the day wore on.  The national weather service had confirmed his fears on the early morning news: the blizzard had changed course dramatically, moving inland where it would remain trapped between the cold front descending from Canada and the warm front blowing in from the North Atlantic.  It was the worst imaginable scenario, the weatherman had reported, one that would make it impossible to predict the total accumulation or even the complete duration of the storm.

John returned from surveying their position at the mouth of the pit.  “This is definitely the spot,” he shouted.  “I can just make out the opening, about fifteen feet down.”

Charlie only nodded; Harry suspected he was trying to save his breath for the climb.  He’d met Harry and John twenty minutes before at the quarry’s main gate, just an hour and a half after Harry’s call had roused him from a sound sleep and a warm bed.

He seemed both curious and eager to help, but he’d voiced only a couple of questions concerning their unscheduled meeting here.  Harry’s decision to brave the storm and the pre-dawn darkness had obviously left him confused, but he hadn’t directly challenged the judgment.  Instead, he’d only wondered aloud why they hadn’t contacted the rest of the search party, his eyes settling on Harry for an answer.

Harry had lowered his voice, as if bestowing some great secret of state and country.  “The state police will only tie our hands out here,” he’d said, feeling oddly guilty about offering only half-truths and white lies in exchange for Charlie’s assistance.  Inside, he wished he could reveal the true reasons for their presence here, but something told him to hold the truth at bay, at least until they’d made their way into the tunnels.  Maybe then, with the object of their search so nearby, he could entrust Charlie with all the facts. 

“It’d be a miracle if they agreed to come out in this shit in the first place,” Harry had gone on to explain.  “And if they did, I know for a fact that Brochu would refuse to let any of his men try to get down into that cave.  Can’t really say I’d blame him, but either way, I don’t have the time to screw around arguing with him over something that has to be done.  I’ve got to get down there and check things out.”

“What are you hoping to find in there?”

“If we’re damned lucky, the missing kids.”

“Alive?”

Harry had only stared back at him for a moment.  This was something he couldn’t lie about.  “No,” he’d said quietly, “I don’t think so.”

Charlie’s eyes had narrowed slightly at that point, but to his credit, he’d only nodded, and held his tongue.

“So what do you think?” Harry asked now.  “What’s the best way to get down there?”

“Well, I don’t think my regular equipment is going to do much good out here.  Not in this shit.  The rock face is covered with ice; that’ll make it impossible to drive in any pitons or cams to secure us.  Even if I did manage to get one in, I don’t think I’d trust it completely.”

“Then what do you suggest?”

“I say we should use the winch on my Jeep, let that do the work for us.”

Harry glanced over at the customized Jeep, idling nearby, its headlights trained on the quarry’s edge.  “You sure?”

“Positive.  The three of us could be hanging off of that cable together and the winch would still pull us in.”

“How long is the winch cable?” John asked.

“It’ll feed out to fifty-five feet.”

“Okay,” Harry said, “bring it up as close as you can.  As close as you feel safe, but no closer.”

“You got it, Chief.”  Charlie moved off and climbed into the Jeep.

They stepped aside as he pulled the vehicle up to within ten feet of the edge and set the parking brake.

To Harry it looked too close, and he couldn’t help but imagine what would happen if something went terribly wrong.  Charlie seemed to read his expression and offered Harry a wide grin.  “Relax, will you?  This is the safest thing going.  I’ll guarantee it.” 

With the Jeep in place, he began feeding out the cable from the motorized winch mounted on its front bumper.  John was at the edge again, peering into the gloom below.  He waved Harry forward, helping to guide the cable to the appropriate spot.

“It’s right below us,” John said.  There was a noticeable tremor in his voice, a symptom of sudden fear that was unnerving in its intensity.

“What’s wrong?” Harry asked.  Of the three of them, it was John that was the best prepared to face whatever they might encounter in the dark iciness of the cave.  And yet the fear in his expression now seemed totally out of proportion with the confidence he’d shown earlier.

John shrugged in obvious embarrassment, his eyes rising to check that Charlie was out of ear-shot.  “I’ve just . . . I’ve got this thing . . .” 

He lapsed into silence, struggling to get the words out.  “I’ve got this thing about small places.  The doctors call it mild claustrophobia, but I’ll tell you something: right now it doesn’t feel very mild at all.”  He took a deep breath.  “Right now it feels like it has teeth.”

“That’s why you don’t like to fly,” Harry said.  “Cabin’s too tight for you?”

John nodded.  “That’s right.  Not too bad, if I can put it out of my mind.  But down there,” he cocked his head towards the pit, “down there in the dark, who knows?”

“You don’t have to go in there, you know,” Harry offered.  “You can tell me and Charlie what to look for . . .”

But John was already shaking his head.  “No, I’m going.  I’m the one who made you come out here.  I can’t let you go into that cave alone.  Besides, I didn’t come all this way to stand around on the edge of a cliff while somebody else does my job for me.”

“John, this isn’t your job.  Not really.”

“Yes, it is.  In a very real way, I believe it is.”

Harry saw the fire in his gaze, the conviction that John would need to overpower his own fear.  He laughed softly and shook his head.

“What’s funny?”

“You know, you sure picked a fine time to tell me about this.”

“I was hoping it wouldn’t be this much of a problem.”

Charlie arrived beside them, accepting the end of the cable from Harry and fashioning it into a quick loop.  He pulled his gloves off and secured the loop with a pair of cable clamps, tightening them as quickly as he could.

“That’s about the best I can do,” he said, handing it back to Harry.  “It’ll work as a good stirrup, but you’ll still want to hold on like a bastard.”  He paused, glancing over Harry’s shoulder towards the pit.  “Can’t be too bad, if Marty Slater could make it in and out of there.”

“I’m thinking he found another way in,” Harry, said, waving his arm towards the expanse of the quarry property, “somewhere out there.  And if he didn’t, if he did go in like we are, I don’t think he ever tried it in a blizzard.”

“Good point.”

Harry turned towards the east.  The sky was brightening, though not by much.  Still, it would have to do; they couldn’t put this off any longer.

“Okay,” he said, “who wants to go first?”

“I will,” John said, picking up the end of the cable and creeping toward the edge.

“You’re sure?”

John shook his head.  “Not really.”  He looped the cable around his right foot and lowered himself onto his chest, lying in the snow with his feet hanging over the quarry’s edge.  He gave a quick thumbs-up and then wrapped both hands around the cable.

Charlie crouched down beside him.  “It looks like there’s a small ledge just to the side of the opening.  Once you reach that you should be golden.  Just signal with your flash and we’ll pull the cable up for Harry to go down.”

He moved over to the Jeep’s front bumper, where the winch controls were set into the unit’s side.  Watching John carefully, he began to slowly feed out the cable.

Harry moved as close to the edge as he dared, falling to his belly to watch John’s descent.  John handled himself commendably, reaching out to either side to avoid the occasional out-cropping of rock, even taking the time on the way down to brush some of the snow off of the rock face.  Finally, he set his outstretched left foot on the ledge at the mouth of the cave.

Harry turned to Charlie and held up his hand, the signal to stop feeding the cable long enough for John to get his footing.

Twenty feet below, John climbed carefully onto the ledge, still clutching the cable until he could gain a proper footing.  A moment later, he released the line and dug his flashlight out of his pocket, swinging its beam in Harry’s direction.

“Okay, kid,” Harry muttered, “you’ve got bigger balls than I do.”

He rose to his feet and nodded to Charlie, waiting while the cable snaked its way slowly back up the cliff.  He could already feel the bite of the cold as it crept through his clothing, eager to sink its teeth into his bones.

He wondered if it would be any warmer in the cave and decided it probably would be.  If nothing else, at least the wind wouldn’t be able to reach them down there.

The end of the cable appeared at his feet, and Charlie stopped the winch abruptly.  He jogged over to Harry’s side.

“You can go next,” he said.  “Same deal.  Signal when you reach the ledge.  I won’t need the winch to get down.”

“You’re kidding me.”

Charlie shrugged.  “This is how I spend my vacation time, Chief.  There’s nothing to worry about.  When we’re ready to head back up, I’ll make the climb first and pull the two of you up.” 

“Okay.”

Charlie looked him straight in the eye.  “One thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Don’t look down.”

“Seriously?  You’re really going to tell me that?”

He waited for Charlie to crack a smile, positive his deputy was fooling with him, trying to ease the tension with a joke.  But Charlie’s expression remained passive.

“Seriously, Harry.  It really does make a difference.”  He slapped Harry on the shoulder, and without another word, he turned and headed back to the Jeep.

Harry took a deep breath and picked up the cable.  He looped it around his right foot, gathering his nerve as he lowered himself belly first onto the ground, just as John had done.

Behind him, the mouth of the quarry gaped impossibly wide, as if waiting to swallow him whole.

“Jesus,” he said.  “I can’t believe I’m doing this.”

*     *     *     *     *

True to his word, Charlie slid down the cable easily, without the benefit of the winch to lower him down.  Helping Charlie onto the ledge, Harry wished his own descent had been so uneventful.  There had been a very bad moment on his way down when the cable had become caught up in a notch in the top of the cliff, leaving Harry suspended upon the rock face.  Then, as his weight had finally tugged it free, he’d dropped five feet until the line had pulled taut again.  The cable had almost leaped out of his hands at that point, a terrifying instant of mindless panic.  The second time it had happened, he’d at least been prepared for it, but the sudden feeling of free-fall had been no less unsettling.

To make matters worse, he’d been unable to follow Charlie’s advice about not looking down.  Gaining a foothold on the ledge was impossible without staring straight down the face of the cliff.  He could see the bottom far below, barely discernible in the gloom and the falling snow, but there without a doubt, and happy to receive him if anything went wrong.

Before his fear could get the better of him, John had grasped the tail of Harry’s coat and pulled him to safety.  Now, as the three of them huddled on the ledge, most of the wind was cut off by the natural depression in the rock face.  Harry dug his flashlight out of his pocket and crouched down beside the entrance.  The darkness within seemed impenetrable, even after he directed the light straight into it.  In a moment, however, as he stared into the blackness, he could begin to make out some of the cave’s dimensions.  Its ceiling sloped dramatically downward just beyond the entrance, its walls converging into what appeared to be a perfect dead-end barely ten feet inside.

He couldn’t help but wonder if they’d come all this way for nothing.  And despite everything they’d gone through to get here, a part of him felt relieved at the notion.

Swallowing hard, Harry leaned further into the darkness.  He extended his arm, hoping to improve the limits of the flashlight’s beam, and then he spotted a sharp inclination in the cavern’s floor, a hole no more than four feet across that he suspected would provide access to the rest of the tunnel.  Its edges were coated with ice, its surface glistening under the flashlight’s scrutiny.  Even from six feet away, Harry could feel the cold air emanating from within.