“I heard enough about a positive attitude when I was in the Marines.” Ray opened and shut the lighter again. “Amanda gave you the wrong idea.”
“Wrong idea?”
“What happened back there was self-defense.”
“I wouldn’t know. I didn’t see it.”
“He came at me with a rock.”
Ray didn’t give the corpse a name, Balenger noted. “A man needs to defend himself.”
“Damned straight.” Ray put the lighter away.
They followed the old wagon road toward the mountains. Balenger felt a premonition, wondering why the town hadn’t been built close to its principal customers.
Amanda pointed. “I think I see the mine.”
While the slopes on either side were grassy, the one straight ahead was denuded. Only chunks of rock covered the incline. Balenger saw what appeared to be railroad tracks at the bottom, in a line with the road, emerging from the rocks.
Ruins came into view, a chaos of boards where several large buildings had collapsed. A breeze blew dust.
“No grass. Not even weeds,” Balenger said.
“The gold made a wasteland.” After a long absence, the voice was startling. “The ore was sledge-hammered, drilled, and blasted from the tunnels. Exhausted men filled mining cars and pushed them along tracks. Emerging into sunlight, they used the brakes on the cars to keep them from running down the slope. In what was once a building on your left, steam-powered grinders reduced the ore to bits. The result was mixed with liquid poison, a solution of sodium cyanide which separated the gold from the pulverized rock. But cyanide isn’t the only reason for the sterility around you. Sulphuric acid was another ingredient used to separate the gold from the rock.”
“Is that why the town’s a distance from the mine?” Balenger asked.
“The fumes from the acid could be smelled for miles,” the Game Master replied. “A lot of the miners died from lung diseases.”
The sun descended beyond the mountain. A shadow brought a chill.
“Where’s the entrance?” Amanda wondered. “It’s got to be in a line with the railroad tracks.”
They walked to where the tracks angled uphill. A landslide had buried the upper part of the tracks.
With Amanda and Ray on either side of him, Balenger climbed the slope, his boots dislodging rocks. He stopped on a level area and faced a wall of rock.
“This is where the entrance probably was,” Ray said. “Where we’re standing.”
“The tunnel must have collapsed,” Balenger said. A suspicion made him add, “Or else it was buried for the game.”
Amanda peered down at her scraped fingers. “There’s no way we can clear it by hand.”
The shadow they stood in lengthened, becoming cooler.
Balenger thought about the possibilities. “The Game Master wouldn’t give us an obstacle unless there’s a way to get around it.”
“Explosives would do it,” Amanda replied.
“But where the hell are we going to find them?” Ray gestured in exasperation. “If Mr. Positive Attitude here was thinking, he’d have brought the explosives from under the bridge. But now it’s too late to go back for them.”
“Would you have risked carrying them?” Balenger asked. Ray avoided his gaze. “Anyway, we don’t have a radio or know the frequency that would set off the detonator.”
Amanda studied him. “You can’t set off explosives without a detonator?”
“Nitroglycerine’s so unstable you can blow it up simply by dropping it. But explosives that are safe to handle need a jumpstart.”
“And only a radio signal can set off a detonator?”
“Or a pressure switch or a fuse attached to a blasting cap. There are several ways, but the Game Master seems to prefer a radio signal. What are you getting at?”
“What about an impact?” Amanda asked.
“Impact?”
“A bullet. Would that set off the detonator?”
“Yes.” Ray sounded like he spoke to a child. “A bullet would set off a detonator. In Iraq, sometimes unexploded bombs blew up if something banged against them while they were being dug out. But that doesn’t change the fact that the explosives and the detonator are miles behind us, back in town.”
“I wasn’t thinking of those,” Amanda said.
“Then, for God’s sake, what are you talking about?”
Amanda showed them her GPS receiver.
They stared at it.
“He’d never let us try it,” Ray said.
“If we don’t try it, we’ll still be on this slope at midnight, and this is probably what the Game Master will use to destroy us,” Amanda told them.
They didn’t move. They didn’t even seem to breathe.
Balenger asked Ray, “Can you think of an alternative?”
“No.”
“Game Master, do you truly want us to be resourceful?”
The Game Master didn’t answer.
Balenger set down his rifle and started lifting rocks.
“But we don’t have time to dig our way in!” Ray said.
“I’m making a hole for the GPS unit. The deeper it is, the more force the explosion will have.”
Immediately, Amanda and Ray helped him.
“Angle the hole so it points down the slope,” Balenger said. “I need to see the receiver from down there.”
Amanda and Ray made the hole a couple of feet deep. Balenger noticed that Amanda’s hands started bleeding again. He saw too that nervousness made her tremble when she set her GPS unit into the hole.
Once more, Balenger peered toward the sky. “Game Master, if you’ve got a problem with this, tell us now.”
The voice remained silent.
“This could be the last moment we know we’re alive,” Ray said.
“I prefer my positive attitude.” To the sky, Balenger said, “It’s awfully lonely being God if you have no one to talk to. You enjoy our conversations with us. Why end the entertainment when there’s more to the game?”
The voice continued to remain silent.
Balenger picked up his rifle. “Then let’s do it.”
Rocks clattered as they descended. Needing cover, they went to the largest pile of wreckage.
Balenger waited until Amanda and Ray lay flat. “Put your hands over your ears,” he told her. “Open your mouth to relieve the pressure.”
He shoved the Kleenex wads in his ears, then knelt on his good knee and aimed the rifle. The gun’s stock was solid against his shoulder. But the GPS receiver was difficult to see, gray against the rocks. The shadow of the mountains didn’t help.
“Problems?” Ray asked.
“Just making sure.”
“Let me try.”
Balenger squeezed the trigger.
The roar of the blast jolted him, its concussion shoving him back. He dropped to the ground, landing on his right side, holding the rifle off the ground. Debris pelted around him. He felt the impact of a rock landing near his head. Despite the Kleenex wads in his ears, he heard ringing. Dust blew over him, acrid with the smell of detonated explosives.
The echoing rumble lessened. He looked toward Amanda, relieved to see that she wasn’t injured. She rose to a crouch and peered toward the slope. Ray came to his feet. So did Balenger, who surveyed the slope, pleased to see a huge opening. He took the Kleenex from his ears and stepped from the wreckage.
Amanda hurried toward the slope. “I see a door!”
They scrambled up the rocks and reached the opening. A barrier of old gray wood was visible at the end, jagged from flying rocks.
Balenger saw hinges, a handle. “Yes, a door.”
The force of the explosion had knocked it askew. They stepped over rubble and pushed, toppling it inward. Dust made them cough.
Amanda and Ray leaned inside.
“Can’t see much,” Ray said. “Let’s widen this opening.” He shoved boards away.