Jackal (10 page)

I jumped to my feet and sprinted away, wanting to run to my bike, but unsure whether I could find it fast enough. DaXing’s ride would have to do instead.

I reached the overgrown gorilla’s bike and threw a leg over it. I stood on the pedals, but the cleats on my shoes didn’t exactly line up with the clips on his pedals. Also, his seat was way too high. I considered dropping the bike and running away, but DaXing roared and got to his feet. He raced toward me, and I instinctively pushed off.

We were on a hill, so I put my faith in gravity. I began to roll quickly, doing my best to keep my feet parallel to the ground and balanced atop the pedal clips. I remembered the general direction of the trail and steered toward it. When I reached the tall ferns, I risked a glance over my shoulder.

DaXing was in hot pursuit. He half bounded, half skidded down the hillside with gigantic strides, gaining on me.

I would have to do better.

I sliced through the ferns, my wheel spokes shredding the foliage like a food processor cutting lettuce. I wove around trees and bounced over rocks, constantly adjusting my feet
to keep them in contact with the pedal clips. I couldn’t turn the cranks, so I more or less just hung on for the ride until the trail suddenly appeared. There was no point in trying to climb the silty hill, so I headed back toward the parking lot.

I cruised around switchbacks and rolled over several small hills, pumping whenever I could to keep up my speed. I was going pretty fast, but I’d have been flying by now if I was on my own mountain bike.

DaXing shouted something in Chinese and I looked back to see that he was, unbelievably, closer than he’d ever been. He was huffing and puffing like a locomotive, and he showed no sign of slowing. If I didn’t pick up more speed, I was doomed.

I rounded a bend, and a lump formed in my throat. I’d reached the stretch where the trail ran along the edge of the park’s deepest ravine. The trail had been cut to lay perfectly flat for hundreds of yards with no change in elevation, to minimize the possibility of somebody losing control and tumbling over the edge.

DaXing shouted again, and I realized that it was some kind of triumphant war cry. He was going to catch me.

I couldn’t let that happen.

I stared down the ravine, looking for an escape route. It was pointless. The gradient was too steep.

But then I spotted the trunk of a dead tree jutting out of the ravine’s slope just a couple feet below the trail. I got an idea. While the ravine was deep, it wasn’t all that wide. The branchless trunk spanned nearly three quarters of the ravine’s width and angled upward like a ramp. I’d ridden plenty of trails that contained tree trunk “bridges” narrower
than this one, and I’d cleared much larger gaps than the one between the end of the trunk and the opposite side of the ravine.

I decided to go for it.

I jerked the bike’s handlebars toward the ravine and bunny-hopped off the trail, down onto the tree trunk. My landing was solid, but my feet slipped off the stupid pedal clips that weren’t connected to my shoes. The bike began to wobble and buck, and I had no choice but to ditch it. I couldn’t fall to either side, so I threw myself over the handlebars.

I sprawled in midair, landing on the tree trunk with one arm and one leg dangling over each side. I probably don’t need to tell you that it hurt. A lot. I looked down and watched as DaXing’s mountain bike tumbled end over end on its way to the ravine floor. It landed with a metallic thunk atop a rock-strewn streambed.

I felt the trunk begin to sway, and I glanced back to see that DaXing was climbing down onto it!

I scrambled to my feet. The rubber and metal bottoms of my shoes got surprisingly good traction on the trunk’s rough bark. Perhaps I could get some speed and make the jump from the end of the trunk to the opposite side of the ravine? I began to weigh my odds of success when I heard the tree trunk’s roots begin to pop.

I turned to see that DaXing had made his way fully onto the trunk. As he advanced toward me, the popping intensified, and the entire tree began to tilt from an upward angle to a downward one.

It was now or never.

I sprinted to the end of the trunk and leaped as high and as far as I could. I imagined I was riding a BMX bike, soaring dozens of feet into the air off of one of Raffi’s perfect dirt jumps.

It worked.

I landed pretty hard, but I was a full five feet away from the ravine’s edge.

Things didn’t go as well for DaXing. I watched as the tree roots completely gave way, and he and the tree trunk went speeding to the bottom of the ravine. DaXing hit the rocky streambed first, followed by the trunk directly on top of his chest, shoulders, and head. He was still wearing his biking helmet, but of course it didn’t matter. An army helmet wouldn’t even have helped. He was now just as broken as his bicycle, which lay near him.

I turned away from the terrible sight and vomited huevos rancheros until my throat ached. Once the retching stopped, I rinsed my mouth with water from the hydration pack and wiped tears from my eyes. Some of the tears were for me, but most were for DaXing. I hated that that had to happen to him.

I pulled my cell phone out of my mud-soaked riding shorts and stared at it. It was dirty and wet, but encased in a watertight enclosure. It would work just fine.

But whom should I call?

Calling 911 would be the right thing to do, but it wasn’t like anybody would be able to do anything for DaXing. As for his remains, the police would want to know what happened to him, but at what cost to me? My parents would find out what I was up to, and I would be dragged into an
investigation. An investigation would delay my trip to China. Worse than that, my parents would
cancel
my trip, for sure, for having rented the limo and come out here in the first place. Then I would have Hú Dié’s mother’s death on my hands as well as DaXing’s.

That would be too much to bear. I needed to get the heck out of the park and fly to China as soon as possible. Once I’d delivered the dragon bone to Hú Dié, I’d decide what to do about DaXing, if anything.

I stood and tried to get my bearings. The bike trail was a loop, and I was certain that it went all the way around this ravine. All I had to do was find the trail on this side and follow it around to the silty hill, where I could retrieve my bike. Then I could ride back to the limo with the dragon bone and hightail it home. It was 3:30 p.m., so I was still good on time.

I started walking, keeping my eyes peeled for the bike trail.

It was 4:30 p.m
. by the time I found my mountain bike beneath the pine tree in the fern grove. It was getting down to the wire time-wise, but instead of grabbing my bike and hitting the trail, I headed for the mushroom patch. I needed to find the rake.

I realized that there was a good chance it could be traced back to me or my parents. I was wearing full-fingered riding gloves at the moment, but the rake likely had my fingerprints on it from handling it earlier. It probably had my mother and father’s fingerprints on it, too; it definitely had DaXing’s fingerprints from when he threw it at me. The rake could also have some of his blood on it, as well as skin or other tissue on the tines.

I needed to get it back.

I recalled the rake hitting my helmet after DaXing and I rolled out of the stinkhorn patch, and I had to think for a minute before I found it. The rake did indeed have some
blood on the handle, as well as creepy bits dangling from the ends of the tines. I gave it a quick wipe-down with some leaves, then hit the trail.

Hard.

I raced back to the parking lot with the rake in one hand. It was nearly five p.m. when I pulled up beside the limo and knocked on the half-open driver’s-side window to wake up Michael. He took one look at me with the rake and nearly jumped out of his seat.

He lowered the window. “What the heck are you trying to do, give me a heart attack? I thought you were the Grim Reaper!”

“The Grim Reaper carries a scythe,” I said. “Not a mini rake.”

“Whatever,” he said. “It still ain’t right. Have you seen yourself? You’re a mess.”

I glanced down at my arms, legs, and torso. He was right, I
was
a mess.

Michael sniffed the air through his open window and made a funny face. “What’s that awful smell?”

“I accidentally fell into a patch of stinkhorn mushrooms.”

“What the heck were you and your girlfriend doing out there? You’re dirtier than your bike.”

“Clawing at stream banks,” I lied. “We were looking for old Native American arrowheads. We just used our bikes to get to the spot faster. She rode in from a different trail.”

That seemed to satisfy him. “Oh,” he said. “That’s pretty cool. Did you have any luck?”

“I found one thing, but I’m going to let her keep it.”

“What a gentleman. I hope it was worth all the trouble.”

“Trouble?” I asked, looking around. There was no one else in the parking lot.

“I don’t mean trouble with somebody else, I mean trouble with
me
. I can’t let you get into the limo like that.”

“But how am I supposed to get home?”

“I don’t know. Call your folks, maybe?”

I frowned. “Don’t you have a tarp or blankets or something in the trunk?”

“This isn’t an emergency tow truck,” Michael said. “I don’t have anything like that. You don’t happen to have a change of clothes inside that grubby backpack, do you?”

I shook my head, and my mind began to race. “Hey,” I said. “Maybe you could buy me some?”

“I’m a chauffeur, not a personal shopper. Besides, the nearest store is miles from here. We’re in the middle of nowhere.”

“They have a lodge. Check the map the ranger gave you at the gate. There’s even a water park with a gift shop where they sell towels and t-shirts and stuff. I think they have bathing suits. I could wear one of those and a t-shirt.”

Michael groaned, reaching for the map. “This is going to cost you.”

“I have cash.” I pulled my wallet out from my riding shorts. It was covered with filth, but I was certain that everything inside was fine. The wallet was rubber, made from old bike inner tubes, and the top zipped shut. I’d ridden in a bunch of rainstorms without my money getting even a little damp.

Michael’s face twisted with disgust. “How about you wash that thing off first? I’ll pay for your new clothes. You’ll pay me back
triple
when I return. Deal?”

“Deal.”

“I’ll be right back,” Michael said. “See if you can find a creek or something. You’re going to have to rinse off those clothes, too, before I can throw them into the trunk.”

I pointed to a building across the road. “That’s a restroom. It has running water. Meet me over there.”

Michael nodded and pulled away.

I put my wallet back into the pocket of my soggy riding shorts and sighed. I really was a mess. This whole situation was one gigantic, expensive, deadly mess.

I rode across the street and waited for Michael to return.

Michael arrived at the restroom much faster than I’d expected. He’d had extremely good luck. He not only found me a t-shirt, board shorts, and two beach towels, but he’d also picked up a pair of flip-flops that fit perfectly. When I stepped out of the restroom, I was a completely different kid.

“Whoa, I hardly recognize you,” Michael said. “If it wasn’t for all that shaggy hair, you’d almost look human.”

“Gee, thanks,” I said. “Let’s get out of here. I kind of plugged up all three sinks.”

Michael laughed, and I handed him the plastic shopping bag that now contained my rinsed-off clothes and riding shoes. He put the bag into the trunk and hung my bike on the bike rack, and we hit the road.

It felt great to be back inside the limo again. The ride was smooth, and the air-conditioning was soothing. I’d
cleaned up the hydration backpack to Michael’s standards, and it was on the floor beside me. The pack was weather-resistant, and it had done a perfect job of keeping the silk bag of dragon bone clean and dry. I wanted to call Hú Dié and let her know about my success, but she was on a plane by now. I wouldn’t get a chance to talk with her for at least a full day, maybe two. She was flying first to Chicago, then to Beijing, then on to Kaifeng and straight to see her mother. The only phone number I had for her was her home/bike shop number, but she said that she was going to try to pick up an international cell phone. She would probably call me before I would be able to catch her at home.

While I couldn’t call Hú Dié, I could call Ryan. He was bound to be awake by now. I’d put my cell phone and wallet into the backpack with the bag of dragon bone a while ago, so I pulled my phone back out. I was surprised to see that Ryan and Phoenix had been blowing it up with voicemails. There was also a voicemail from my dad. I checked the ringer and saw that it was turned off. I turned it back on and was about to start listening to the messages when the phone rang.

It was Ryan’s home number. I answered it.

“Ryan?” I said. “What’s up?”

“Haven’t you listened to my voicemails?” he asked. “Or Phoenix’s? He’s been trying to reach you, too.”