Ten Little Bloodhounds (7 page)

We raced over the open area, scrambling for purchase, his paws and my feet sliding in the shifting sand. He was baying continuously and I was yelling in excitement and praising him for his victory. He reached the end of his journey, and placed both paws on a man-made circular object, and continued his baying.

I fell to my knees and shrugged off my backpack.

My chest heaved from the exhausting run. Sweat was pouring from every pore. I had to cool down some before I tried to ease my constricted throat with liquid. I sat there gasping like a fish out of water. Ivanhoe finished his solo and dropped on his belly beside me. He was huffing, and puffing, as hard as I was.

“We both need to exercise more,” I wheezed.

I absently patted his shoulder as we both eyed the cistern. My mind had furnished the name while I was waiting for my breathing to ease. They were made years ago, to store water, or to contain a natural spring or hand-dug shallow well. It must be old. The solid mixture of concrete and crushed seashells had a dark patina, fading from black to light gray. The outside was pitted, and had spider cracks leading to where mortar had eroded and fallen away.

It was embedded in the sand, three feet above the ground, and three feet from side to side. The top looked heavy. I was in no hurry to try to slide the cover
over far enough to inspect the contents.

Ding dong bell, Pussy’s in the well.
Throw Amelia in the ocean, the tide might wash her back to shore. Toss her in the trash, and she might be found. I didn’t know how garbage was handled on the island. Sorted and burned, buried, or Rand might airfreight it out. They couldn’t use an open landfill; the animals would be at risk. With the high water table here, she couldn’t have been killed and hidden in the brush either. In this heat the smell would draw scavengers, and buzzards circling the area would be a dead giveaway for the search party.

So Amelia was abducted, and tossed in an abandoned cistern which, I imagine, very few knew about. No one would lift the lid to look inside. She couldn’t have fallen in accidentally, then pulled the cover over her. Amelia hadn’t walked here. She was carried in someone’s arms. Ivanhoe had been taking the scent out of the air, not the ground.

Maybe she had been catnapped. A terrified cat can be a handful. They scratch and bite, and can seem to have supernatural powers to wiggle free if they don’t want to be held. Maybe she was killed accidentally, while someone was trying to spirit her away. That would account for no ransom demand. Anyone who knew Miz Cancannon would know that she wouldn’t pay ransom without positive proof that Amelia was still alive. That could prove tricky. How could someone prove that a cat was still alive without producing the cat?

Amelia was either abducted for ransom, or killed to make Miz Cancannon suffer. With her tight surveillance
and security, if she wasn’t blowing smoke, it had to be a servant, a resident of the island, lawyer, veterinarian, pilot, or niece. It could be a conspiracy. A stranger working with Rand. He could have flown someone in and flown him or her out. But if that was a correct scenario, why put Amelia in the well? She could have been dropped from the air anywhere on the mainland.

I was rested and was breathing normally. I had fed Ivanhoe deer jerky, given him water, and drunk myself. I had stalled long enough. It was going to be an unpleasant task, but if I could recover her body, I was taking Amelia back to Miz Cancannon. I wanted her to know for sure that her cat was dead by someone’s hand on the island, who possibly wanted payback. I disliked her, but it was only fair to warn her.

I pulled on my gloves and walked Ivanhoe over to a tree about twenty feet from the cistern and tied his leash securely. I didn’t want him dancing around my legs while I was hanging over the well taking a look. He was strong enough at 130 pounds to push me over the edge when he was highly excited. He wasn’t Lassie. If he knocked me in, he wouldn’t race back to the house barking excitedly, and lead people back here to save me. He would whine a little, maybe peer over the edge trying to see me, and do something stupid like sailing over the lip and landing on top of me.

I checked the time. It was a quarter to six. I had an hour before first dark. I opened the backpack and pulled out a plastic body bag. I unzipped and spread it open.

It was large enough to hold a 250-pound human.
The cat’s body would look pitifully small in it, but it was all I had. I would roll it up, and seal the tiny bundle. I fished out tape, and wet wipes to cleanse my hands after, a fresh pair of gloves, and an industrial-strength pressed paper towel. I placed them all on the body bag.

I grasped the edge of the cover and pushed. I couldn’t budge it. I groaned. The second time, I scooped back sand with my shoes until I had enough to brace my feet against so I wouldn’t slip. I got into position and threw my 128 pounds behind my push, and grunted in frustration when I saw I had moved the sucker about an inch. At this rate, I’d still be standing here straining when Rand took to the air to search for me after sunrise. I braced and tried again, moving it another hard-fought inch. I had to stop because black dots began to float within my vision.

As I rested, I eyed Ivanhoe. When the puppies matured into adults on their first birthday, they were trained to pull the rescue sled. They were first paired with a seasoned dog, then trained solo. I had no idea if Ivanhoe had passed with flying colors or had failed miserably. I couldn’t remember. It was worth a try.

From my backpack I took out a 25-foot, 150-pound test, three-ply nylon rope. I snapped it on his harness, wrapped his long lead around my waist, and brought him back to the cistern. He began to whine and scratch on the sides of the well.

Seeing him diligently trying to scratch through the solid cement to find Amelia’s scent brought a fragment of a lecture I had listened to in the broiling sun of July, three years ago in Atlanta. I had Lazarus standing
beside me. It was a training exercise for cadaver dogs. I could see the short, slight instructor’s sweaty face as he delivered his message.

“Remember, trainers, your dog is not scenting on a human body smell here, they are searching for the smell of death. A chemical odor has been lab-produced that resembles the death odor. Once a living body dies, it doesn’t produce an individual smell. All cadavers smell alike. Your scented search sample has been sprayed with this odor, as well as the dummies buried under the rubble.”

His words—just remembered—gave me hope. I believed that Ivanhoe followed Amelia’s scent while the abductor was carrying her. He was still trying to reach her. He had never been given any training to search for a cadaver, so he couldn’t have scent memory of the cadaver death smell, so therefore—

I broke off speculating, hooked the rope tightly around the short protruding edge of the cistern’s cover, and, acting animated and excited, stood shoulder to shoulder with Ivanhoe and gave the command to pull.

“Pull, pull!” I cried as I tugged on my end of the rope. It was looped around my right shoulder and padded with a bandanna. I looked at Ivanhoe and he was standing there expectantly, slowly wagging his tail, but he wasn’t doing any pulling. He seemed to be waiting for me to give him a clue about this new game.

My expectations took a nosedive. He must have flunked Sled Pulling 101. Shit. I decided to move forward, so he was behind me. If he knew how to pull, me being in front of him might jog his memory. It was the trainer’s normal position. In front, with him between
the sled/cistern and me, I slid my feet back and forth, pretending to walk, and called, “pull, pull,” and then bent to the task.

I strained and felt the line move. Without looking back, I pulled and yelled and pulled. I heard the heavy cover scraping across the edge. The grating sound was beautiful music to my ears. I kept yelling and pulling, so when the cover became lopsided, the heavy side slid over the edge, landed on the sand, and released all pressure from the rope. I hit the dirt lightheaded with success. Ivanhoe ran up and began licking my face.

I fended him off with my elbows and gave him his well-earned praise. I unwound his lead from my waist, replaced it, and unfastened the rope. When Ivanhoe was again tied to a tree, I coiled the rope and returned it to my backpack.

I pulled the flashlight out of my pocket and checked the time. Half past six. I had a few minutes of daylight left. I trudged wearily toward the well. This was the moment of truth.
Is she, or isn’t she?

I
leaned over the edge, making sure my body was not touching any part of the well. I wasn’t sure how strong the sides were and I didn’t want to put any pressure on them until I knew how stable they were. It wouldn’t be any fun if I discovered Amelia was down there, then knocked half the wall in on top of her.

The inside of the well was dark, and at first, even with the flashlight, I saw only algae-coated walls and dark water several feet down. The sun was behind me, but it was still bright enough to make my light’s beam look puny and ineffective. I leaned over and quartered the area. My eyes were slowly adjusting to the dim interior. I sensed movement and turned my light. Two bright green orbs were caught in its beam, and their color was reflected back to me.

“Amelia? Is that Amelia down there?”

I heard a plaintive,
“Meow?”

“It is Amelia!” I answered, talking cat talk to assure her I wasn’t the enemy and deliverance was near.

“Amelia, you couldn’t prove your identity to me, you look like a drowned rat! Are you sure you’re Amelia?”

I wanted to keep her looking up, so I knew where she was. Without the reflection of her eyes, I would have trouble finding her again. She was about eight feet below, and the water seemed to be up to her neck. All I could see was a head. I hated to move the light, as she had been down there a lot of hours already, and I didn’t want her to think I was leaving, but I had to get the rope and decide how I was going to get her out.

I kicked the side gingerly with my foot and tried pushing the top rim with my hand. It felt solid. I heard a small splash and looked down, and couldn’t see her eyes. I finally found her with the light and sucked in a breath when I saw her struggling in the water. She was trying to get her body back on what she had been clinging to. I couldn’t see what it was because it was underwater.

She seemed to be moving in slow motion, but she finally dragged herself back up on her precarious perch. She wasn’t standing on the bottom, she was balancing on something to keep her head above water and not drown. I felt a lump in my throat when I wondered how many times she had slipped off and had to pull herself out of the water during yesterday afternoon, a long night, and most of today.

I still find it hard to think of man’s inhumanity to animals even when I’m staring it in the face. Did he
know that she would find a way to survive, or had he merely tossed her in and covered her up? I say he, although there are females just as capable of cruelty as males.

I couldn’t come up with a way to lift her out. I got the rope and lowered it near her to measure the distance I would have to lower myself to the water. My estimate was close. It was seven and a half feet to Amelia’s head. I lowered the rope again and tried to hold it close to her face. I was talking nonsense to let her know I was trying to save her.

“Now, Amelia, grab the rope, and stick one paw inside of the loop and pass it over your shoulder, that’s right, now hold on tight and I’ll pull you out of there.”

All the natural oil on her skin was soaked away by now. Her long thick hair would be heavy. No wonder she was so slow in regaining her balance. I could try to place a slipknot over her head and pull her up, but I could crush her throat and/or garrote her in the process. Maybe if I could get it under her chin … Oh shit!

She had jerked her head to avoid the rope, and was back in the water, floundering. I watched anxiously until she slowly pulled herself back on her perch, while I was practicing my excuse for Miz Cancannon.
You see, ma’am, I knocked her in the water by accident, and she drowned before I could save her.

I ran to the backpack and dug out the ground sheet for my sleeping bag. I pulled it out and started flapping it in the air to shake loose the folds. I jerked off my gloves and fumbled with the side straps that would add four inches of space on each side of my suit. The buckles were small and haste made my fingers clumsy. I had
a feeling Amelia couldn’t survive more than one or two more dunkings.

I crammed the ground sheet into my suit, making a crude nest for Amelia, if I could get her into it. My belt would hold her from slipping below my waist, and the sheet, vinyl on one side and thin flannel on the other, was to protect my chest from being shredded by her claws. I zipped the suit up to hold the sheet in place.

I tied the rope to the closest tree and paced off the yards back to the well. Nine feet, I had enough. I doubled the rope and tied it around my waist and looped one side around my thigh. My body and arms were protected, but my face and head were vulnerable. I unrolled the three-inch Ace bandage and wound it around my neck, up my face, and around my head. I left slits for my mouth, nose, and eyes. I pulled on them gently to get more slack, and it just made the strips cling more tightly. It would have to do. If one of the Filipino searchers strolled by about now, I’d possibly give him pause, because I must look very strange.

I knew I could slide down easily enough, but getting back up was the problem, especially with a squirming cat. I rigged up the remaining rope, and hoped I had gotten it right, under the left thigh and over the right shoulder. I backed over the edge and started sliding down, rappelling, actually. The rescue attempt would have been child’s play if the walls weren’t covered with a thick coating of green growth. It was slick as owl’s shit, and I couldn’t get a purchase for my feet.

I had my small flashlight clenched in my teeth. The large one was in a waterproof pocket of my suit. I looked below and located Amelia. She wanted to run
from me, but she wasn’t stupid. She knew she had a choice, the big hunk that smelled like a dog, or the water. She tried to duck her head to avoid my glove, but had to raise it quickly because it went under the water.