He tied the rope tightly around his chest, threw the other end to Connell, then waded gently into the stream. He dropped with each slow step, as if descending a steep staircase, the water splashing up around his body.
Connell quickly lined everyone up on the rope. He stood closest to the water. Sanji took anchor, tying the rope around his girth.
O'Doyle looked at Connell. “You ready?” he asked. Connell nodded. The others stood rock still, eyes wide with trepidation. O'Doyle walked back to the shore. He took a deep breath, then sprinted for the water, his fat bouncing and muscles rippling. He lunged outward with a yell, feet churning the air in classic long-jumper fashion. Headlamps tracked him, his painted body illuminated brightly amidst the lightless chasm. Connell realized that O'Doyle wasn't jumping directly for the far side, but a bit upstream toward a rock that jutted out of the river like a shark's fin breaking the surface just before attack.
O'Doyle hit the water and tumbled forward, arms pumping amidst the swirling eddies. He shot downstream as soon as he splashed in, carried swiftly by the pounding current. O'Doyle tried to turn his body to catch the shark-fin rock, but he could find no purchase to brace himself. The current slammed him into the jagged stone like a bird hitting a window pane. He bounced back a bit, stunned, and rolled off the far side of the rock.
The rope slid around the rock's far side, and snapped taut in an instant, pulling the party unexpectedly toward the water. Veronica lost her footing on the wet silt and hit the ground hard. The rope yanked Sanji forward and he lost his balance, feet sliding on the slimy ground and dropping him on his ass.
The rope pulled Connell into the water, but he didn't let go. The river swirled around his shoulders. Mack splashed directly behind him, the water up to the Aussie's waist. Lybrand grunted and strained. Mack's feet slipped in the slick silt and he fell face-first into the water, splashing madly as he fought against the shallow's insistent current.
Less than four seconds after he'd jumped in, O'Doyle's life lay in the hands of Connell and Lybrand.
The current's pull on O'Doyle's weight continued to yank Connell into the river. The rough rope rapidly slid through his hands. Water swirled around his head, in his mouth, up his nose. Connell planted his feet against an invisible rock and pulled with all his strength, tilting his head back to pull in breaths that seemed to be half air, half water.
The slipping rope tore through his KoolSuit gloves and ripped into the skin of his palms and fingers. Connell screamed in pain, but squeezed harder and yanked — the slipping stopped, and the rope snapped taut once again. He grimaced with effort, refusing to let go, ignoring his burning hands. The river pulled his helmet fell from his head. The current pulled it downstream — it disappeared in an instant.
Behind him he heard Lybrand growl with effort. Primitive instincts screamed at him to let go of the rope, to get back to shore, but he ignored them. He braced his legs and pulled with all his might as his muscles howled in protest. Something in his back popped with a banjo-like twang of pain, but he ignored that as well.
Veronica stood and threw herself on the line, pulling back as hard as she could. Her strength gave Sanji a chance to recover as well; the fat man dug his heels into the dirt with a snarl of fury. He started walking backward, one strong step at a time. Coughing up water, O'Doyle grabbed the rope and began pulling himself hand over hand toward the shark-fin rock.
Connell backed up a step from his platform rock. Mack tried to stand, but again slipped and fell. His helmeted head bounced off a round rock with a splash and a dull thonk. He instantly went limp and started to float downstream. Connell left one hand on the rope and desperately reached out with his other, snagging Mack by the collar just as the current started to suck the Aussie toward the river's powerful middle. Mack's helmet stayed glued to his head.
O'Doyle reached the shark-fin rock and crawled atop it. The rope sagged. Connell let go of the rope and used both hands to pull Mack toward the shore. Lybrand rushed in and helped. Together they pulled Mack clear of the water, dropping his limp body on the damp, glistening sand. Ignoring the pain from his back and bleeding hands, Connell again picked up the rope.
O'Doyle managed to perch on top of the shark-fin rock. Water sprayed at his feet. He looked as if he were surfing the rapids. His coiled legs launched him across the stream once again. He splashed in just five feet shy of the far tunnel. He swam toward the far side with long strokes of his powerful arms. Just as he'd predicted, O'Doyle smashed into the shoal at a ferocious speed. So frightening was the impact that Connell thought surely the man would bounce off, sink and drown, but O'Doyle clung tenaciously to the rocks. The ferocious current sprayed water up and around him.
O'Doyle pulled himself along the shoal toward the far side's dark tunnel entrance. He finally pulled himself on the shore.
He secured the rope to the other side and the party crossed the river one at a time. Lybrand took O'Doyle's KoolSuit and crossed first, showing the proper method. Then the professors crossed, one at a time. Mack regained consciousness. He was groggy and weak, but was able to make it across with help from Connell.
As he stepped from the roiling water to the shore, his knee and back throbbing, Connell saw that he wasn't the only one in pain. O'Doyle hadn't put on his KoolSuit gloves — his knuckles looked like cheap hamburger. Both his palms were open and bleeding. The big man walked over to Connell.
"Lybrand told me what you did,” O'Doyle said only loud enough for Connell to hear. “Thanks.” O'Doyle offered his mangled hand in friendship and gratitude.
Connell extended his own hand, noticing that his palm — raw and bloody from the rough rope — spilled red droplets onto the wet rocks. They shook hands, ignoring the other's wounds as well as their own, their blood running together. Connell looked up into the big man's eyes, realizing this was the first time he'd ever shaken O'Doyle's hand. Connell also realized, quite suddenly, that it was the first time in years anyone offered him a hand in friendship, not as some business formality.
Lybrand bandaged their wounds. Connell replaced his torn gloves with the spare pair in his belt. O'Doyle moved the crew farther down the tunnel, until the river's rage faded to a dull roar. They found an alcove resplendent in dull brown flowstone glistening with a sheet of slowly trickling water. O'Doyle lay down and was out instantly. Sleep nabbed them one at a time, all except for Lybrand. Connell nodded off last, watching Lybrand stand over the body of her sleeping man, H&K clutched in her hand. Her eyes flicked attentively up one end of the tunnel and down the other — and at the ceiling.
Always at the ceiling.
Chapter Twenty-six
Kayla hated being away from the mountain. Anything could be happening back on that dark peak. She had to make this quick — she still had the 90-minute drive back from Milford to the EarthCore camp.
She got in on the tail end of visiting hours. That was okay, she didn't need long. Milford Valley Memorial Hospital looked clean and well run, despite its small size. Kayla approached the reception desk, behind which sat an overweight nurse with a beehive hairdo and horn-rim glasses. From the look of her she might have been working that job back in the sixties, when she would have been the epitome of fashion.
The woman — her name tag read “Alice" — looked up at Kayla, but didn't smile. “May I help you?” she asked.
"I'm here to see Angus Kool."
The woman's eyes widened slightly, then returned to normal.