The B Girls (22 page)

Their path deeper into the cave was the passage
carved by the water coming into the room and it was small, only about four feet
by four feet. Lucy refused to consider the possibility it would shrink because
the combination of water and confinement would surely send her over the edge.

"Let's see how bad it's going to be,"
Jane said.

Lucy followed Jane to the hole in the wall,
dragging her feet and wishing they were back at the cabin drinking wine and
celebrating victory. And if wishes were horses . . .

Bending down to look in the passage, Lucy prayed it
wasn't going to be bad. It wasn't.

The water feeding the pool didn't cover the entire
floor of the passage. It was a narrow ribbon snaking across the floor and
appeared only two or three inches deep. If they were careful, they could stay
dry.

The passage itself didn't get any smaller as far as
Lucy could see--as far as the light reached--and it might have even gotten
slightly larger.

"I'll go first this time," Lucy said.

"Lead on MacDuff," Jane said.

Mae gave Lucy a quizzical look. "Are you
sure?"

Lucy nodded. "This section doesn't look so
bad." She stooped and waddled into the passage. At least it was a little
wider than the crack of doom.

After a five minute waddle with Jane and Mae
following behind her, the ceiling disappeared above Lucy's head. The passage
turned into a vertical shaft. Water cascaded down one side, more of a runnel
than a waterfall, but she had another brief thought about rain. She tilted her
head back to see how high they were going to have to climb. It looked to be
about fifteen feet of another fairly easy climb.

Jane and Mae crowded in next to Lucy and added
their lights to hers.

"You still have enough rope?" Lucy asked.

Jane nodded and her light bobbed along. "Sure.
I'll go up first and tie off a line for you and Mae."

Lucy started to protest that she didn't need a line
but she was feeling a little shaky despite the brave face she put on for her
cohorts. "Good plan. I think I'll just sit down for a couple of minutes until
you're ready."

Jane stepped up to the dry side of the shaft,
stepped up on a rock protruding from the wall and reached up for a handhold.

Mae took Lucy's place at the bottom of the opening.
"Be careful."

"Piece of cake," Jane said as she pulled
up and started searching with her toe for the next foothold.

Thirty seconds later a rock clattered down toward
Mae's upturned face and her world went black.

"Oh shit!" Lucy saw Mae go down a split
second before Jane landed on top of her with a sickening crunch.

"Triple shit. I hope I didn't kill her,"
Jane said as she rolled off of Mae and promptly passed out.

Lucy looked from one to the other wondering which
one to tend to first.

Think! You
have to get it together Now is not the time to turn into a crying wimp.

Mae moaned and stirred a little.

Jane was still. Lucy scooted over to her and put
her hand over Jane's mouth. She was breathing thank God. Lucy looked her over
and saw her right forearm was bent where it shouldn't be.

The sight made Lucy lightheaded and she saw stars.

Mae moaned again and moved a little more.

Lucy prayed she was coming around so they could
deal with Jane together. That arm really didn't look good.

She crawled over to Mae and looked down at her.
"Mae! Can you hear me?"

Mae moaned a little more and blinked.

"Mae!" Lucy added a shoulder shake to her
urgent calls.

Mae moved her head from side to side before
squinting up at Lucy. "Lucy? Did you die too?"

"You're not dead. I wasn't sure there for a
minute but you're not dead."

"Then why are you calling me into the
light?" Mae said.

"Mae!" Lucy shook her again. "I need
you to make sense. We have to help Jane."

"Jane? What's wrong with Jane? Won't she come
into the light?"

"Dammit Mae, you're not dead. None of us are
dead. A rock fell and hit you on the head and then Jane fell on top of
you."

Mae squinted against the glare of Lucy's light.
"You're blinding me."

"Oh," Lucy said as she turned her head to
the side just a little. "Glad to see you're back in the real world.

Mae sat up wincing at the increased throbbing in
her head. "What's wrong with Jane?"

"Thank God you're making sense," Lucy
said. "I think she broke her arm."

"Why isn't she saying anything?"

"I don't know. She was coherent when she
rolled off of you but then she just passed out."

Mae turned her head in Jane's direction and
realized her light wasn't on. "Why is my light out?"

"I think it just fell off," Lucy said.
She searched around on the floor with her light and found Mae's headset within
a few seconds. "Here," she said, pushing the button to turn it back
on and handing it over. "Jane's over there." She swept her light a
few feet to the right.

They both crawled over.

Jane looked like she was taking a little nap. Except
for one small problem--her right forearm wasn't straight.

The thought of having to move Jane's arm in order
to splint it made Lucy's stomach roll and she fought the urge to throw up.

"I'd say she passed out from pain, or fear, or
both," Lucy said.

"Well I suppose that's a good thing," Mae
said.

"We're going to have to make a splint or
something. And then we're going to have to figure out how to get her out of
here. Do we have a first aid kit?"

"No," Mae said. "I can't believe we
didn't think to bring one. Jane would be reminding us what idiots we are if she
was awake."

"Let's see what we've got to work with,"
Lucy said.

Mae started to dig through their packs. "We
can use a rope coil for a splint and tie it on with the bandanas," Mae
said.

The rope coil wasn't as stiff as a book or a board,
but since they didn't have either of those, the rope would do. "I've got a
knife," Lucy said. "We'll use part of one of the space blankets for a
sling and to pad the rope."

They knelt next to Jane and took a closer look at
her arm. No doubt it was badly broken. The only bright spot was that it wasn't
a compound fracture.

"Should we try to straighten it out before we
splint it?"

"Don't they make Girl Scout leaders take first
aid courses?" Lucy asked.

"My co-leader was the first aid person."

"Of course she was." Lucy started
rummaging through her pack for the knife. "The answer is no. All we can do
is immobilize her arm and get her to the hospital."

"We'll never be able to get her out of
here," Mae said.

"No, we won't. One of us is going to have to
go for help." Lucy found the knife and sat back down next to Jane.

Mae sat on the other side and shuddered a little as
she looked at Jane's arm.

They spent a few minutes experimenting with the
best way to arrange the rope for maximum support and minimum lumps. In the end,
they decided they couldn't improve on the basic wind and wrap configuration of
a brand new clothesline.

Lucy cut a piece off one of the space blankets and
folded it into a pad hoping to cushion Jane's arm from the rope at least a
little.

Jane stirred and moaned when they lifted her arm to
slide the splint in place. When they tightened the first of the bandanas around
the clumsy contraption, Jane's eyes snapped open and she let out a thin scream.

"Please just pass out again," Lucy said.

"Just shoot me now," Jane said as they
tied the next bandana.

"No way. Take a deep breath. We have to put on
one more bandana."

"No, you really don't," Jane said.

Mae sniffed back tears. "Yes, we do."

Jane squeezed her eyes shut tears leaked from under
her closed lids and streamed down her face. "Fine. Get it over with."

Lucy worked fast with the last bandana and added
the sling Mae had fashioned from more of the tarp and a couple of straps she
cut off one of the packs. "Better?"

Jane winced. "Yes. Of course better is a
relative term."

"Good. Lucy, you stay here and take care of
her. I'm going to give Ranger Rick an opportunity to gloat and say 'I told you
so'."

###

"No hell you're not," Jane said. "You
two are going the rest of the way and getting that piece of history we came
after."

"Don't be ridiculous. We need to get you to a
hospital," Lucy said.

"And you will. But first go find the
Declaration."

Lucy was shaking her head. "You're nuts. We're
all nuts thinking we could pull this off without help. Belle needs
professionals on her side not crazy suburban amateurs."

"No. You two are crazy if you think I'm
letting you give up now. We've come this far. You keep pointing out we don't
have time to go back and start again."

"Hello? Severely broken arm?"

"No one ever died of a broken arm."

"But people
do
die of shock," Mae said.

"Do I sound like I'm in shock?"

Lucy cocked her head and gave her the eye. "As
a matter of fact you do sound a little delirious. Otherwise why would you be
suggesting we go treasure hunting instead of getting you rescued?"

"Logic," she said. "We're here. I
think my body has started producing natural painkillers. And most important, if
we walk out of here without finding that document, Belle is the one who'll pay
the price for our failure."

"We can negotiate--come back another
time," Mae said.

"Do you really think Ranger Rick is going to
let us get within a mile of here after this?" Jane shook her head.
"He'll probably post a guard or something until he can build a locked gate
over the entrance. And once word gets out why we risked out lives in this
fucking hole in the ground Cohutta will probably start to look more like
Woodstock. And let's not forget we still don't know for sure that Ranger Rick
isn't the kidnapper."

Lucy knew Jane was right about that but they
couldn't just leave her here alone. And neither Mae nor Lucy could go on alone
and take the chance of making things worse by getting hurt or lost without any
backup. No they had to be sensible and go for help.

She'd find a way to make a deal with the kidnapper.

"Stop thinking like a girl," Jane said.

"Excuse me?" Lucy said.

"We wouldn't be having this argument if we
were men. Don't you watch all those macho adventure movies? I can put up with a
couple of extra hours of pain and swelling. We need to finish this."

Mae was shaking her head.

Lucy was starting to think maybe Jane was right.
She knew she should be offended that Jane was using "thinking like a
girl" as an insult. It wasn't about gender it was about compassion and
caring. But dammit, Lucy would never forgive herself if something happened to
Belle.

"Are you sure?" Lucy asked.

Jane nodded. "We can debate sexism in survival
situations later."

Lucy frowned.

Jane quirked a brow at her.

Lucy laughed. "You're quoting
Jurassic Park
? Really?"

Jane managed a little chuckle. "It seemed
appropriate."

"Let's do it," Lucy said.

"You can't be serious?" Mae said.

"I think I am. I can't take the chance that
Belle's going to get hurt," Lucy said.

Mae frowned.

"What do you say?" Jane asked.

Mae looked from Jane to Lucy and back again.
"I must be losing my mind. Okay. If we're going, let's get moving."

They spent the next ten minutes repacking all the
important gear. They tucked one space blanket around Jane and folded up another
to pad the pack they put under her head as a pillow.

"We'll move as fast as we can," Lucy
said. She gave the pack a final pat and made sure Jane had a water bottle in
easy reach. "Are you sure about this?"

She smiled, weak and painful though it was.
"Just be careful. I'm going to lay here and take a little nap."

Lucy nodded and turned back to Mae. "I'll go
up first. You stay away from the opening in case another rock falls."

"Are you sure you're feeling steady enough for
this?" Mae asked.

"Oh yeah," Lucy said. And it was true.
Maybe she had a mild concussion, or maybe it was seeing Jane acting so brave,
but the fear was gone at least temporarily. She was just determined to see this
through and get Jane out of here with nothing worse than a broken arm.