Tag Against Time (18 page)

The passage ended at the mouth of the natural chimney running up the face of the cliff. Tag heard Robert's heavy panting just outside the passage.

“You're not going to get away, creep. Come on out now!”

Tag slipped his knife into his waistband and shouted, “In your dreams.” He swung himself into the shaft in the cliff. He
looked up the sheer wall. His heart stopped. There was light at the top of the fifty-foot shaft, but the finger- and toe-notches chiseled up the chimney were hidden in shadows.
How can I ever make it?
His body shook with cold fear.

Robert's heavy footsteps filled the passage.

Taawa, help me!
Tag reached up to the first finger-hold and pulled himself up. He fought to keep his eyes aimed up toward the opening so far above him. His hands were wringing wet with sweat. “One hand, then one foot,” he panted, pulling himself up higher.

“Hey!” Robert's frightened scream echoed in the passage below. “I'm stuck! Help me, kid, I can't move!”

Tag laughed. His left foot slipped out of its hold. His laughter stopped dead as he to clung to the sheer wall. Finding the foothold again, Tag pulled himself up.
Keep going . . . just keep going!

He thrust himself over the edge of the crevice and lay panting. Tag crawled away from the opening and struggled to his feet.

Got to get the paho!
Tag started towards the ruins. He had to double back through the village and then down to get his backpack. Without the paho, he was doomed to stay here in the turbulent hippie age, as his dad had referred to it. Dad! Where was Dad right now? In Kansas on the farm with Grandpa growing wheat, or would he be in college? Was Dad a hippie? Tag couldn't imagine Dad with a ponytail, beard, or bell-bottom pants. Suddenly, Tag realized how little he knew about his own father's life. If he ever made it back home, he would change that!

Where is Slash?
he wondered as he raced passed Great
Owl's House. He had to get down to the storage room before Slash did.

The backpack lay out in the open where Robert had thrown it. Slash was nowhere in sight. Tag sprinted out from behind a tree. The paho was there in the top of the pack. Tag exploded with hope. All he had to do was get back to the cave, and he was home free!

“Hold it right there,” commanded an authoritative voice from behind him. “You are under arrest for pothunting!”

Tag clutched his backpack. His heart thundered in his throat. This couldn't be happening. Had he escaped from Robert and retrieved the paho, only to get arrested for pothunting?

“Drop the pack. Turn around slowly. Keep your hands where I can see them. Do it. Now!”

Tag let the pack drop, stretched his arms above his head, and turned around. The copper-haired, young man wore a flat-brimmed, Smoky-the-Bear hat and gray shirt. A gold, shield-shaped badge hung over his left shirt pocket. A small police radio was clipped onto his thick leather belt, next to an empty holster. A small revolver pointed at Tag.

The ranger, in his early twenties, started toward Tag. “You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can,” he stopped a foot from Tag. “You're just a kid!” Keeping his gun on Tag, he looked around. “You're not alone are you?”

“No, but I am not . . .”

“Quiet!” The ranger slipped his revolver into the holster and pulled out a pair of handcuffs.

“But, there's . . .” Cuffs bit into his wrists as the ranger whirled him around. Tag felt his stone knife being yanked out of his waistband.

“Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.” The man spun Tag around to face him and demanded in a low voice, “How many others are with you, and where are they now?”

“Two, but I'm not with them. I just . . .”

The ranger pulled the yucca sandals out of the pack. “Then explain the knife and these sandals, and what's in this buckskin?”

“I can explain everything, but you've got to listen to me! There are two guys. The fat one is stuck in a passageway and the other . . .”

“Have you been smoking something funny, kid?”

“No! The other one went to get a . . .”

A blast shattered the air. A cloud of dust exploded three inches from Tag's feet. A second blast followed. Something whizzed passed Tag's ear and zinged off the rock ledge behind him.

“Come on.” The ranger pushed Tag toward a boulder. Tag stumbled over his feet and went down. Another bullet zinged by. The ranger jerked Tag up by the handcuffs and started running with him. He pushed Tag behind the boulder. Another shot rang out.

Tag spit out dirt. The Ranger lay inches from him, his face twisting in pain as he clutched his thigh. A dark spot was soaking his green pants leg. “He hit you!” Tag sat up.

“Stay down.”

“But you're going to bleed to death.” Tag could see
Gary O'Farrell
on the nameplate pinned over his the ranger's right pocket.

“Your friend will blow your head off if you don't stay down.”

Another bullet zinged over their heads.

“He's not my friend. I've been trying to tell you that. Where are the keys to the cuffs? If you don't let me help, we are both going to get killed.” Tag met Gary's steel-blue eyes.

Gary reached into his pants pocket. “Turn over.” He groaned in pain as he unlocked the cuffs. “Who are you?”

“No one interesting.” Tag flipped over and slipped off his T-shirt. “Can you use your radio to get help?” From the whiteness of Gary's face, Tag was afraid that he was going to lose consciousness.

“The only person who can pick up a transmission this low in the canyon is the Park Service Dispatcher.”

Tag tore off the bottom of his shirt. “Who is in town at the retirement party, right?”

“How did you know that?”

“I heard the two pothunters talking about the party.” Tag pressed the strip of shirt against Gary's leg. “Why didn't you go?”

Gary spoke through gritted teeth. “The superintendent and I never got along. He didn't think that there was any need for rangers to carry guns.”

The bandage was already soaking through.
He's going to bleed to death if I don't get help!
Tag tore off another strip. “If I get up higher, can some other agency, Flagstaff Police or the sheriff's department, pick up the call?”

“Possibly. But your friend will get you first.”

“He's not my friend. I can get away if I crawl along this ledge and then climb up. Besides it's getting dark, that will help. Give me the radio.”

“You're crazy. With a full moon tonight, there is no way you can do it.”

“You'd be surprised what I can do. Give me the radio. Here take the rest of my shirt. You're going to need it.” Tag traded for the radio. “By the way, are you a relative of Sean O'Farrell, the surveyor who lived here in the late 1800's, early 1900's?”

“He was my great-grandfather.” Gary stared at Tag. “Why?”

Tag slipped the radio onto his waistband. “Sean fought to protect this canyon, too. You look like him, especially your eyes. Can you keep Slash away with your revolver? Good. I'll be back with help.” He slithered away on his belly.

Other than the rocks scraping the skin off his bare belly, Tag had no trouble moving along the ledge. He saw the first stars poke through the darkening sky as he started up the canyon. It took only a few minutes to reach the Island Trail. The moon's bright face smiled down at him, or was it laughing at him?

“Any unit, officer down, officer down, at Walnut Canyon,” Tag called into the radio as he ran up the paved trail. He leaped up the first set of steps.

I'm not high enough out of the canyon yet
. He bounded up the next set of steps. Through the canyon below, a shot echoed . . . Two more bursts followed.

Tag's legs felt like jelly. A small revolver was no match for a high-powered rifle. Was Gary still alive?

Please Great Taawa, help him
.

He pushed himself up the next five steps, repeating his call on the radio. What if no one picked up his transmission? What were the chances that anyone would be scanning the Park Service frequencies? Tag wasn't even sure if the small handset radio had the capability of transmitting more than a few miles.

“The government always buys the cheapest equipment,” his dad had complained hundreds of times in frustration.

Tag felt the same frustration and fear as he climbed to another landing. He heard something moving on the trail behind him. Looking over his shoulder, he didn't see anything. Could it be Slash? Had Robert gotten himself unstuck? Tag's mind ran in mad circles.

Think, positive thoughts
, he told himself as he raced up another set of steps. How many more of the two hundred and fifty steps did he have to go? In the moonlight, Tag recognized a skinny tree growing out of a huge rock.
Not far now, just around the bend and up the last four flights of steps to the Visitor Center!

Another sound came from below. Footsteps? Tag stopped and strained to hear. Nothing but the wind rustling through the trees.

His scalp tightened. Moonlight flooded the black top trail.
I have to get off this open trail!
Tag sprinted up three steps and pushed through a clump of trees at the side of the path.

Tag's foot faltered on the steep incline. He slipped down the hill three feet, before he caught himself. He crawled up and worked his way along a narrow ledge that was closed to tourists.
If only I can just get up over the rim and into the forest, I'll have it made
.

He knew exactly where he was as he rushed up the forested
trail, but hoped no one else did. Tag made the radio call again. “Officer down, officer down . . .”

Mr. Pierce's old ranger cabin appeared through the trees. It stood deadly quiet in the bright moonlight.

“The ghost boy is out tonight, Mr. Pierce!” panted Tag, as he raced by the house.

Tag radioed repeatedly as he ran in the direction of the Visitor Center. There was a phone outside the Visitor Center he could use.
Do they have 911 now? Probably not. I don't even have a quarter, or is it a dime?

His legs throbbed. His lungs burned. He saw the lights of the visitor parking lot at the top of the ridge. Tag climbed.

“Where's Robert?” Slash's voice screamed through the silence of the forest. He stood at the top of the ridge, silhouetted in the strong parking lot lights. Light glinted off the rifle barrel. Tag heard the rifle's metallic action load a bullet into its chamber.