I met Blood on the opposite side of the clearing.
“Way I see it,” I said, “we’ve got two choices.”
“I’d say I’m all ears if there wasn’t so much more of me to offer.”
“We either try that door, see if it’s open.”
“And if it’s open?” Blood asked.
“We go in guns ablazin’.”
“Guns ablazin’. Did you just say that?”
I nodded. “Or, we think this one through a little more, for safety’s sake.”
“I like option number two,” Blood said.
We paused to think about it for a minute. Then, without saying another word, I made my way back to the metal door, wrapped my hand around the lever.
“Careful,” Blood said. “Could be booby-trapped.”
The two cons were smart enough to pull off a daring if not complicated escape out of one of the most secure prisons in the country. It wouldn’t be all that far-fetched to imagine their having placed some kind of explosive device that would detonate as soon as I pulled on the lever. But time was tight. If those two local yokels were any indication, D’Amico and his men would be closing in on this position soon. Sooner than soon. Add to that Agent Muscolino’s promise that the FBI would be taking over later this afternoon, and I was about to lose total control of the situation. I promised to deliver two escaped cons for Governor Valente, and that was what I planned on doing. Keeper the trustworthy.
I pulled up on the lever. It moved slightly. But something was obstructing it from performing its intended function. Something metal and strong by the sound of it.
I stood up.
“It’s padlocked from the inside,” I said.
“And if it’s padlocked from the inside,” Blood said, like a question.
“Then, without question, Moss and Sweet are home sweet home.”
We stood there for another long moment. Mother Nature surrounded us. Songbirds singing, cicadas buzzing in the trees, spiders making webs, snakes in the grass, the breeze blowing through the leaves. It was like living inside a Hallmark card. But down inside that hole were a couple of rats. And we needed to figure out a way to smoke them out.
Smoke them out . . .
“I think I have an idea,” I said.
“’Bout time,” Blood said. “I was getting bored.”
“If they’re underground, it only makes sense they’d require some kind of air circulation system.”
He pressed his lips together. The gesture meant he could already see where I was going with this.
“Still carry your zippo, non-smoker?” he said.
I pulled it out of my cargo pants pocket, flicked open the lid. “Now we just gotta find the vent. Or vents.”
We split up, Blood taking one side of the clearing and me taking the other. We didn’t find any air vents in the clearing, but once we started searching the tall grass, we came upon two separate, T-shaped aluminum vents that stuck six inches out of the ground. The openings were horizontal to the ground to prevent rainwater from getting in, and they were covered with protective screens to keep out the critters, both big and small.
“You got your Gerber, Blood?”
He retrieved the multi-tool instrument from the holster attached to his belt, handed it to me. I accessed the screw-driver and began removing the four screws from the first screen. Then, working as quietly as possible, removed the second screen.
“We need something flammable.”
“Leave that to me,” Blood said. He gathered a small pile of dead leaves and branches that didn’t catch much of a soaking during the day’s earlier thunderstorm. He then filled the two hillbilly hunter camo-patterned shirts with the flammable material.
“How much lighter fluid you got in that Zippo?” he said.
I peered down at the silver-plated lighter. It had been a birthday gift from my wife, Fran, back when we were first married. It had my initials embossed into the metal. JHM. Jack Harrison Marconi. The three letters had faded a bit over the many years since I’d first laid eyes on the lighter. Wear and tear will do that to soft metal. But the memory of Fran hadn’t faded one bit. Her long dark hair, brown eyes, and funny smile still dominated my mind with full clarity. I could even still smell her lavender scent. That kind of true love never died, even if the body has been reclaimed by heaven and earth.
“You okay, Keep?”
I shook my head. “Yeah,” I said, feeling the weight of the lighter in the palm of my hand and the heaviness of Fran’s memory in my mind and heart.
I didn’t smoke anymore, which meant the device contained plenty of fluid. I pulled a coin from my pocket and unscrewed the small bottom access piece until it was loose enough to remove it with my fingertips. Then, placing my thumb loosely over the little round hole, I sprinkled some of the fluid onto both shirts, like holy water on a priest’s cassock. When I was done, I still had at least a third of the fluid left inside the lighter. I screwed the fuel access piece back onto the bottom, then flicked open the lighter lid, pressed my thumb against the black flint.
“Ready?” I said, holding the lighter up like I was about to pull the pin on a grenade.
Blood nodded.
I thumbed the flint and produced a tall flame.
I touched the shirts with the flame.