The Highwayman: A Longmire Story (11 page)

Pushing off the ground at the center of the road, I felt my boots slipping on the snowy surface as I fought to gain traction with the tanker bearing down on me. It slammed into the cliff as Coleman attempted in vain to rub some of the speed off. His arms flailed at the wheel, but it was useless as the big Diamond Rio gained momentum, the side of the truck scraping the rocks again, the sparks arcing and leaping from the metal surface like live cables on an electric streetcar.

I heaved myself to the side of the road and rolled out of the way against the guardrail. The truck thundered by as my eyes caught the Toyota still attempting to get started—but, more important, the steadfast and almost peaceful look on Trooper Wayman’s face as she lifted a leather-gloved hand with a loose pearl snap and pulled the transmission selector of the black Charger into drive.

Henry’s words echoed in my mind.

Kindred spirits.

Gripping the guardrail, I pulled myself up and ran toward the tunnel as the Dodge shot forward. Spraying a rooster tail of gravel, snow, and dirt, the vehicle skidded but still stayed on a path that would converge headlong with the runaway tanker.

Henry was also vaulting toward the point of impact, both of us laboring under the delusion that if we could only get there first we might somehow dissuade the tons of steel from their impending impact.

I had the briefest of hopes that Rosey might hit the Diamond Rio on the side of its cab, that she might avoid the tanker portion of the truck, no doubt full of heating oil since it was headed for the rez, and that she
might also push the truck to the side so that it might miss the rear end of the Toyota without sacrificing herself.

It wasn’t meant to be, and I watched as I ran with all the muscle I had toward the disaster thirty-six years in the making, but the Charger accelerated in front of the juggernaut and was T-boned into the front entrance of the north tunnel.

An impact of that magnitude carries a concussion all its own, and both Henry and I were having trouble keeping our feet on the slippery, hard surface of the road as the sound came back at us like some gigantic cannon, the screeching sheet metal and twisting sounds of steel against rock like an agonizing shuttle to hell.

Henry was already running as I regained my footing. Miraculously, there was no fire, but the smell of chemicals and mechanical fluids filled the air. The closer you got, the worse it looked; the Dodge was pushed into the mouth of the tunnel as if a bite had been taken out of it with the front of the tanker lodged in there with the hood peeled back over the cab.

Knowing the Cheyenne Nation was a heck of a lot faster than me, I yelled at him, “Get the fire extinguisher from my truck!” Then I pointed toward the tanker. “And
get whatever is left of that idiot out of there! I’m going after Rosey!”

He turned and headed back as I tried to find a way into the tunnel past all the debris. Parts were scattered everywhere along with bits of rock and concrete, and although there was antifreeze, transmission fluid, and motor oil on the road, there still wasn’t any kind of fuel, and I just hoped the spirit of Bobby Womack or whoever would look down on us with benevolence.

Amazingly, the lights from both vehicles were still operating, one headlight from the tanker shining into the tunnel, where I could see that the Toyopet Crown had been pushed by the impact and was wedged up on the curb about halfway through the tunnel—it looked like neither Sam nor Kimama was moving.

With the cruiser’s emergency lights still chasing the length of the tunnel like yellow hounds, I found a space to the left that gave me enough room to edge along beside one of the crumpled orange fenders and get to where I could see the Dodge’s black metal. The tanker truck had caught it broadside and pushed it up into the roof, and my only hope was that Rosey had survived in the bubble of the sedan’s canopy.

Climbing onto the Rio’s crushed bumper, I straddled
the metal until I was able to peer into the driver’s side of the Charger—Rosey, also motionless, was slumped against the center console.

Luckily, the window was shattered, so I reached in and, checking her pulse, I was gladdened to feel something. I looked at the configuration of her body’s alignment to make sure her neck and spine were intact—it was a gamble to move her, but I was betting it was only a question of time before the whole conglomeration of heating oil, gas, and who knew what was going to come pouring out of the damaged vehicles and we’d be faced with an entirely new catastrophe.

I tried the door, but it didn’t budge, the handle coming off in my hand. I growled, slipped the stag-handled knife out of my pocket, flicked it open with my thumb, and, reaching in, sliced through the nylon safety belt. Getting a strong grip on her jacket, I pulled her up through the window and sat her briefly on the sill, where she slumped against me. She was still out cold, with the side of her face scratched up from the implosion of glass and more than a little blood streaming from one nostril—we would be more than lucky if that was the extent of her injuries.

Pulling her over my shoulder, I began the trip down
and could see the easiest way would be across the hood of the Dodge rather than the route I had taken to get to her.

I could hear that Henry was spraying the fire extinguisher over the engine area of the Rio. “Is he alive?”

“Yes, is she?”

“Believe it or not, yep—concussed for certain and torn up a bit. I can see Sam and Kimama up ahead, so I’m going to need your help in getting the whole bunch out of here before that tanker decides to rupture and we have a more volatile situation on our hands.”

“As soon as I find a way through, I will be there.”

I slid off the hood and transferred her from my shoulder to my arms, found solid ground, and stumbled forward, attempting not to lose my precious cargo.

In the combined light of the one headlight from the tanker and the revolving emergency lights on the lopsided Dodge, I carried Rosey to the Toyopet Crown, which was sitting quietly, the motor having of course quit. The front fender of the import was jammed into the rock wall to my right, but other than that it appeared that Sam’s keepsake was salvageable.

I gently laid Rosey on the trunk and went around to the driver’s-side door, which proved impossible to open,
the crumpled front fenders looking to have blocked it. “Well, hell.”

Reaching in the smashed window, I felt the large man’s pulse and was satisfied he was simply unconscious. Crossing behind, I took another quick look at Rosey, but she hadn’t moved, so I checked on Kimama, also down for the count but still breathing—at least they’d listened and had on their seat belts.

Hearing a noise behind me, I turned to see Henry attempting to get through the tangled mass of twisted metal backlit by the Diamond Rio’s Cyclops headlight. “Hurry it up—we have to get this thing away from the wall so we can push it out of here.”

I was listening to the Bear’s approaching footsteps as I went back around to get a better vantage point in order to push the tiny car when I got a funny feeling and turned back.

Seeing the apprehension on my face, he asked, “Expecting someone else?”

“Never. Where’s the fire extinguisher?”

“Out.”

“Great.” Approaching the driver’s side, I reached in past Sam’s prodigious belly, shoved the Toyota into neutral, and tried to straighten the steering wheel. I had a
little trouble because the fenders were obviously pressing against the inner surface of the tire.

“Why don’t we get them out of the car?”

I finally yanked the wheel free enough to straighten the alignment. “Because there are the two of them in there and Rosey on the trunk and Sam weighs over three hundred pounds.”

“Good point.”

“Push.”

He did as I asked, and the mighty Toyopet Crown bounced off the curb and rolled to the middle of the road in a hesitant manner, squealing as the tires rubbed against the wheel wells, grinding it to an uneven halt. “This may prove to be more of a chore than at first thought.”

“Yep.” Coming around to straighten the wheels again, I joined him, hovering over Rosey, as we began pushing with only minimal results.

“Are you sure it is in neutral?”

“Yep.”

“And the emergency brake is off?”

“Yep.”

“Is Sam’s foot on the brake?”

“That I didn’t check.” I looked and came back, reporting in. “Negative.”

“I do not suppose there is any sense in attempting to start it.”

I took a moment to give him my most incredulous look and then continued pushing. We both bore down to the effort when I noticed we were heading in a slight turn toward the other wall. “Keep pushing, and I’ll try and straighten the wheel again.”

He gave me the look back as he now strained double time.

I reached in and aligned it just as a strange noise came from behind me. I stood up, hearing the clatter of metal on metal, then something sizzling and a long hiss along with the unmistakable sound of liquid hitting the pavement like a cow having a highly combustible piss on a flat rock.

Turning, I stooped and saw a dark reddish liquid filling the gutters on each side of the road and flooding the entire surface as it poured underneath the crashed vehicles and began pooling toward us like arterial blood.

The smell was unmistakable.

“Heating oil.”

“Yep.” I shifted my gaze to Henry as I rushed to join him at the rear of the Toyota, scrambling to get it and its occupants to the far end of the tunnel and safety.

We pushed as hard as we could, and I could feel the Crown getting easier to move, but we were still making uneven progress. I glanced behind and could see the dyed fluid moving toward us like a tide of red.

 • • • 

I don’t know where the spark came from, maybe it was something from the engines, or the settling of sheet metal against granite, or more likely the headlight and emergency-light electrics that finally shorted out.

Heating oil needs a catalyst, and I can only guess that there must’ve been enough gasoline leaking from one of the vehicle tanks to cause it to catch.

The explosion of the vapors was enough to suck both Henry and me from the trunk of the car and away from Rosey, but the flash of heat and disappearance of oxygen was nothing compared to the wall of fire that rose up from the thick oil, now burning blue, that covered the road and continued its relentless crawl toward us.

Deafened by the compression of the explosion in the tunnel, we continued putting our legs into it until the heat of the advancing flames licked at our ankles. Neither Henry nor I was willing to look and see what was
happening when another explosion knocked the two of us to our knees.

I hit my head on the chrome bumper and felt the noxious smell of the oil filling my nostrils and throat, causing me to cough and my eyes to water. In the thickening atmosphere, I could hear Henry gagging as well.

I blinked, my eyes burning and my sight blurred, and then blinked again, sure that I could see someone standing in the inferno reflected in the metal, an erect figure with a long slicker and a flat-brimmed hat who seemed to step down from the wreckage and move freely through the walls of flame toward us.

I kept pushing. “You know how he died . . .” Coughing from the clouds of smoke, Kimama’s words escaped my lips before I could stop them. With one last look back, I wiped at my eyes, grinding the soot into the wrinkles, but in the wavering heat of the flames couldn’t see anything.

Turning my attention forward as the heat became unbearable, all I could think was that if that oil got to us and the gas tank of the Toyopet Crown, we were all going up.

I felt a nudge by my shoulder as someone joined us, pushing both Henry and me to the side, and our speed increased remarkably.

Stealing a glance to my left through the black smoke, I could see him turn his flat-brimmed hat toward me. The lower part of his face was covered by the high collar of his slicker, with only his eyes showing. The eyes stayed on me for a moment, and I had a good look at the darkness in them, almost as if there were no eyes at all until the light caught the slightest glimmer, like the spark that had put us in this precarious situation.

The Crown leaped ahead, and I stumbled to keep up, trying to hold Rosey on the trunk.

After a moment the heat was easier to withstand, and I watched as the front end of the little car crossed through the stark white line of fresh snow as we exited the tunnel. Still pushing the Toyota forward, I glanced to my left again, but the only one there was Henry.

Craning my neck, I looked back, wiping the greasy smut from my eyes. The ghostlike figure was standing at the very edge of the tunnel, backlit by the burning oil, only the brim of his hat and the cuffs on the sleeves of his slicker touched by the moonlight and the falling snow. He looked down as the oil burned, stopping at the snow’s edge and sizzling but going no farther. He waited for a moment, looking at me, and then slowly turned
and limped back into the hellhole, the flames licking around him and finally swallowing him.

There was another explosion as the second gas tank must’ve let go, the flames roiling toward us as they burst from the tunnel and rimed the uneven surface of the opening.

Still stumbling backward, I turned and glanced over the quarter panel and could see someone steering the car from outside the driver’s-side window.

It was the exact same figure as the one in the tunnel, a figure completely covered by a black slicker that trailed from his covered face to the ankles, where his boots protruded. The same flat-brimmed hat sat on his head as he released the wheel of the tiny car and walked past us back toward the burning tunnel.

In the distance, I could hear approaching sirens from the EMTs, HPs, and Hot Springs County patrols that Henry had no doubt called in while at my truck getting the fire extinguisher.

I glanced over at the Cheyenne Nation just to make sure he was seeing what I was seeing as the figure continued to stand in the middle of the road with its back to us, peering into the conflagration inside.

The Bear returned my glance, and the two of us
sat there, propped against the rear bumper of the Toyota, but then his eyes returned to the apparition in front of us.

The specter didn’t move for a while, and I half expected him to drop another silver dollar in the middle of the road at the edge of the hissing oil at our feet, but instead he turned, looked at the two of us, and stepped to where we sat on the warm asphalt. He glanced back at the fire and even paused to stoop down to look in the back window at the two unconscious people in the car and the woman lying on the trunk before kneeling and looking first at Henry and then at me. I could plainly see the name tag: WOMACK.

His voice was rough but had an almost comical edge as he spoke in the singsong cadence of the Arapaho. “10-78, officer needs assistance.”

I stared at him.

He gave one final glance at the whispering edge of the fire that fought a dying cause, and then turned back, popping the metal clasps on the stand-up collar one by one and pulling the black rubber-infused canvas back to reveal his blue eyes—and black, bearded face.