But where was Tull? Leaphorn was belatedly conscious that he had underestimated the man. Tull had not jumped to the obvious conclusion that Jackie had shot someone and come running to see about it. If Tull was coming at all, he was coming quietly, with his light turned off, stalking the lighted place to learn what had happened. Leaphorn lowered himself slightly behind the stony barrier, aware that Tull might be somewhere behind him looking for Leaphorns shape against the glow exactly as Leaphorn had looked for Tull’s.
But even as he crouched, even as he registered this increased respect for John Tull as an adversary, Leaphorn felt a fierce exultant certainty of the outcome. No matter how cautious Tull was, the odds had shifted now. Tull would see Jackie and Father Tso on the cave floor and the surviving hostages in the cage. That would account for everyone. He would have to come into the light to get the answers. And he would want to find out what had happened, how Jackie and Tso had died. With his weapon ready, with everyone accounted for, there’d be no reason for him to hold back.
Hey. Tull’s voice came from Leaphorns right well out of the periphery of the lantern light.
What happened? The voice echoed, and died away, and silence resumed.
They fought. It was the voice of the scout leader named Symons. The priest attacked your man and I think they killed each other.
A good answer, Leaphorn thought. Smart.
Where’s Jackie’s gun? Tull shouted. Where’s the shotgun?
I don’t know, Symons said. I don’t see it.
A bright light blinked on suddenly, its beam emerging from behind a screen of stalagmites far beyond the cage. It played over the bodies, searching.
Leaphorn felt a sick disappointment. Tull was even smarter than he’d guessed.
You son-of-a-bitch, Tull shouted. You’ve got the shotgun in there. Throw it out. If you don’t, I’m going to start shooting people.
The light had blinked quickly off, but Leaphorn had him located now. A hint of reflected light, perhaps one hundred yards away. Leaphorn tried to line his sights on it, then lowered the gun. The odds of an effective hit at this range were terrible.
We don’t have the gun, Symons shouted. In the dim light, Leaphorn could see Tull had already without a word raised his pistol.
It was still a high-odds shot, but there was no choice now. Leaphorn steadied the gun, trying to keep the dim form visible over the bead. He squeezed the trigger.
The muzzle flash was blinding. Leaphorn wanted desperately to know if he had hit Tull, but he could see only the whiteness burned on his retina and hear nothing but the reverberating thunder of the gunshot booming down the corridors of the cavern. Then there was the sound of another shot. Tull’s pistol. Leaphorn crouched behind the stone barrier, waiting for sight and hearing to return. He became aware that the butane lantern was out. The darkness here now was total. Tull must have shot out the light. A quick-thinking man. Leaphorn stared into the darkness. What would Tull do? The gunman would know now that another person had somehow gotten into the cave. He might guess that the person was the Navajo policeman. He’d know the policeman had Jackie’s shotgun and
. . . how many rounds of ammunition? Leaphorn opened the magazine, poured three shells out into his hand, and carefully reloaded them. A round in the chamber and three in the magazine. Knowing this, what would Tull do? Not, Leaphorn thought, stand and fight in this blackness with a pistol against a shotgun. The darkness minimized the effect of the pistols range and magnified the effect of the shotguns scattered pattern. Tull would head for the entrance, for the light and the radio. He would call Goldrims for help. And would Goldrims come? Leaphorn thought about it. Goldrims had probably intended to radio to the copter as it passed and order it to land, order the pilot out, and then, if he could fly a copter, fly a few miles, abandon the aircraft and begin a well-planned escape maneuver. If he couldn’t fly a copter, he’d disable it and its radio, fix the pilot so he couldn’t follow, and run. Why return to the cave? Leaphorn could think of no reason. Would he come back to help Tull in the cave? Leaphorn doubted it. Tull had been expendable at the Santa Fe robbery. Why wouldn’t he be expendable now? The contest in this cave would be between John Tull and Joe Leaphorn. Leaphorn felt along the top of the rocky ledge for a flat place, put his flashlight on it, aimed it at the place where Tull had been, and flicked it on. He ducked three long steps to his right and then looked over the top. The flashlight beam shone through a blue haze of gunpowder smoke into a gray-white emptiness. Where Tull had been, there was nothing now. Leaphorn slipped back to the flashlight, flicked it off, aimed it at the place the hostages had been kept, and snapped it on again. The beam fell directly on the body of Father Benjamin Tso and illuminated Theodora Adams, kneeling inside the cage. She covered her eyes against the glare. Leaphorn turned off the flash, and felt his way through the blackness to the cage. He unlocked the padlock with the key he had taken from Jackie’s pocket.
Get the lantern off Jackie’s body, he said. Get everybody away from this place. Find a place to hide until I call for you. He didn’t wait to answer any questions.
The speed with which Leaphorn followed John Tull toward the caves mouth was reduced by a healthy respect for Tull. He skirted far to the left of the direct route, carrying the shotgun at ready. When he finally reached the area where light from the entrance turned the blackness into mere dimness, he found droplets of blood on the gray-white calcite floor. At another point, a smear of reddish brown discolored a limestone outcrop.
Leaphorn guessed it was where Tull had put a bloody hand against the stone. Leaphorn hadn’t missed. The shotgun blast had hit Tull, and hit him hard.
Leaphorn paused and digested this. In a sense, time was now on his side. A shotgun would make a multiple wound, hard to stop bleeding and Tull seemed to be bleeding freely. As time passed, he would weaken. But was the crucial measurement of time here being made by Tull’s pumping heart or by a clockwork mechanism attached to about twenty sticks of dynamite still unaccounted for? Leaphorn decided he couldn’t wait.
Somewhere in the darkness around him, Leaphorn was sure that missing timer and perhaps other timers he had never seen was counting away the seconds.
He found Tull where he thought he would find him at the radio. The man had moved the butane lantern some fifty feet back into the cave from the place where Leaphorn had first seen him and Goldrims, and he’d turned on a battery lantern and adjusted its beam toward part of the cavern. The range of light thus extended substantially beyond the effective range of the shotgun. Leaphorn circled, trying to find an approach that offered some close-in cover. There wasn’t one. The floor here was as dead level as a ballroom.
From it ragged rows of stalagmites rose like a patchwork of volcanic islands from the surface of a still, white sea. Tull had moved the radio behind one such island and the lantern was beside it giving Tull the advantage of deep shadow. From there, he could have a clear shot at anyone trying to get out of the cave mouth via the water. The lake protected one flank and the cave wall another. Approaching him meant walking into the lantern light and into the barrel of his pistol.
Leaphorn glanced at his watch, and considered. His hip now throbbed with a steady pain.
Hey, Tull, he shouted. Lets talk.
Perhaps five seconds passed.
Fine, Tull said. Talk.
He’s not coming back, you know, Leaphorn said. Hell take the money and run. You get stuck.
No, Tull said. But I tell you what. You throw that shotgun out there where I can see it, and well just make you one more hostage. When we cut out of here, you’re a free man.
Otherwise, when my friend gets back, he’s going to be behind you, and I’m going to move in from the front, and were going to kill you.