Legacies

3.

"What's wrong?" Alicia said. "Why are we stopping?"

They'd cruised north on the thruway with no problems, and no sign—at least so far as she could tell—of anyone following them. Most of the trip since they'd left the city had passed in silence.

My doing, she thought. She'd awakened this morning feeling tired and drained, and didn't feel much better now. She didn't feel like talking anymore, and she was pretty sure that was okay by Jack.

So now they'd just paid the toll at the New Paltz exit, and Jack was pulling over to one of the phones in the plaza past the toll booths.

"Want to get my bearings," he said. "And I want to make sure no one's on our tail."

Alicia sat in the car while Jack faked a phone call and scratched hurried notes on a small spiral pad as he watched the cars pulling away from the toll booths. Not much traffic this time of day on a Thursday in December.

Finally, after a good fifteen minutes, Jack hung up and returned to the car. He nodded with satisfaction as he stuck his head in the door.

"All right. Didn't see anyone I know. How about you?"

"No one. What are you writing?"

"Makes, models, color, license plates. I see one of those cars again, I'm going to want to know why. Now… one more thing and we'll get rolling again."

He reached into the backseat and came up with the Land Rover—fully reassembled now with its black plastic body snapped into place. He took it out to the shoulder and watched it run along the pavement. His dark eyes were bright with excitement when he returned to the car.

"You know, the thing's running almost due west now. I think we're close."

Low gray clouds slid across the sky, obscuring the timid winter sun as Jack drove on into the hills of Ulster County. From a distance the denuded trees lent the surrounding hills a hazy look, a light brown fuzz broken here and there by dark green patches of pines.

At every major fork in the road, Jack would stop and watch the traffic for a while, then he'd take out the truck, see which way it ran, and choose their path accordingly.

The Rover led them farther and farther into the hills. As the pavement gave way to a hard-packed dirt road, Alicia felt a growing sense of anticipation seeping through her. She fought it for a while—she didn't want to look forward to anything connected to that man—but finally she gave in. Up ahead, perhaps over the next rise or around the next bend in the road, on one of these leafless wooded slopes, something momentous waited.

But as her anticipation grew, she noticed an increased edginess in Jack.

"Is something bothering you?" she said.

He shrugged. "All this wide-open space." He gestured to an expanse of hills and valleys visible through a break in the trees. "Not my kind of place. I like my roads paved, preferably with the option of traveling under them, and I like my trees growing in evenly spaced holes in the sidewalk."

Just then the tires began to spin and slip on the steep upgrade.

"Should have rented a Jeep," Jack said. He seemed annoyed with himself. "Should have thought of that."

But the tires finally caught and propelled the car up to where the rutted dirt road leveled out a little.

"It can't be too much farther," she said. "There's not much more of this mountain left."

"Yeah, but what if the Rover is pointing at the next mountain?"

Alicia hadn't thought of that.

A moment later they came to the end of the road.

"Swell," Jack said.

Alicia leaned forward, scanning the wall of tree trunks and thick underbrush ahead of them. She didn't want to believe they'd have to go all the way back down that road. And then she saw what looked like a break in the brush.

"Hang on. Is that a path?"

Rover in hand, Jack stepped out of the car. This time Alicia followed.

"Good eye, Alicia," he said, pointing to a thin footpath trailing off into the brush. "Lucky the leaves are gone. No way you'd see that if the brush was greened up. And that's a good thing."

"Why?"

"Could mean someone doesn't want it found too easily. Let's go."

Alicia pulled her coat collar more tightly around her neck. They'd traveled north, they were on a hilltop, the sun was hiding, and a wind was rising. She wished she'd dressed warmer.

The path threaded left and right around trees and boulders for a good fifty yards before it opened into a wide clearing. Alicia gasped when she saw the old log cabin that stood at its center. Those logs were the only thing old about the scene. The rest was all high-tech. The cabin's roof and much of the yard around it were decked with photoelectric solar panels. Also on the roof, jutting twenty-five or thirty-feet above the solar panels there, stood a strange-looking antenna.

"I'm going to be very surprised if this isn't the place," Jack said.

He put the Rover down and let it run. It rocked this way and that as it plowed through the weeds, but it moved inexorably toward the cabin's front door.

"One more check," Jack said.

As he carried the Rover around toward the north side, Alicia moved closer to the cabin. She noticed that the windows were sealed… bricked over. Someone did not want visitors.

"Look at this," Jack called from her right. "I moved it ninety degrees to the north, and now it's running south… right at this cabin. No doubt about it, Alicia. We've found it. This is the place."

Alicia rubbed her upper arms through her coat. Now she was really cold.

Suddenly Jack was at her side. "Here," he said, handing her the Rover. "Hold this while I get us inside."

"Going to pick the lock?" she said.

"Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my pick set." He bent and looked closer at the lock. "Too bad. It's a Yale. I'm good with Yales. Nope… looks like I'm going to have to do it the old-fashioned way."

So saying, he leaped forward and slammed his foot against the door just inches from the lock face. The sound of the impact echoed away down the hill.

But the door hadn't budged.

"I'll be damned," Jack said, checking out the hinges. "This door opens outward. Weird. And that's going to make it even tougher."

He took another flying leap at the heavy oak panels, with about as much success as before.

Three more times in rapid succession, with the noise echoing around them, and still the door stood firm.

Alicia froze as an accented voice behind them said, "Perhaps I might be of assistance?"