Crouched across from her in the sand hollow among the desert brush sat Tom, watching her with intent curiosity.
She drew herself up and sat hugging her knees. She looked at her husband, knowing that he knew her not at all, at once both frightened of him and wanting to reach out to him. After a while she mustered up enough courage to speak to him.
“Tom,” she said apprehensively. “I–I know you don't understand my words. But I… I want to help you.” She kept her voice low and gentle, trying to let her tone of voice convey her compassion.
“I know you're confused,” she continued. “Afraid. I understand. I do understand, Tom.”
He listened, his eyes following the movement of her lips with fascination. Suddenly he winced. With a dirty hand he scratched at the wound on his shoulder.
Randi followed his motion. She became aware of the torn, blood-soaked cloth. Her eyes widened.
“You're hurt!” she exclaimed. And with sudden comprehension: “It was you they shot at!” She looked at him, shocked. “Oh, Tom. How frightened you must have been!”
Again he picked at the painful wound.
“Don't,” she said, concerned, knowing he would not understand, but needing to express herself in words. “Don't touch it. You'll get it infected.” She took out one of the handkerchiefs she had stuffed into the pockets of her pants. “Here,” she said. “Let me…”
She reached for him.
At once he drew back, instantly alert, suspicious.
She froze. With sudden insight she understood. Tom was like an injured animal — suspicious of the hand that would help him, wary because of the weakness the injury presented. She would have to win his confidence before he would let her touch the wound. She would have to convince him, prove to him that she meant him no harm. She was frightened — but she persisted. “Tom. It's all right, Tom… it's all right.” She spoke soothingly, reassuringly. “Be still now, Tom… it’s all right.”
He watched her uncomprehendingly — but his tension left him.
Again she reached out for him. He pulled back, never taking his wary eyes from her. But he let her touch the wound.
“There,” Randi said. “You see? It's all right, isn't it?” Cautiously she began to peel the torn cloth from the clotted blood around the fresh wound. He trembled, but he did not interfere.
“Oh, my God!” Randi exclaimed. “The buckshot's still there!” She examined the little black pellets imbedded in Tom's skin. Now that the wound was exposed, she could see it was quite superficial. But the shot had to be removed. She looked earnestly at her husband.
“Tom,” she said gently. “Be still, now… I know it's going to hurt… but — trust me. Please trust me.”
Gingerly, using her nails, she picked a shot from the wound. Tom flinched. His lips drew back, but he did not move away. Instinctively he knew that she was helping him. Randi kept talking to him, steadily, soothingly.
“Easy, Tom… Easy. It won't really hurt… Just — just a few more… There… I'll get help. As soon as I can. You won't have to run away anymore.”
The last of the shot had been picked out. Randi cleaned the wound as best she could, folded the handkerchief and placed it inside the torn suit as a makeshift protection.
She was encouraged. She felt she had reached him, communicated with him. There was hope in her eyes as she watched him.
Tom was looking at her with curiosity and growing interest. Suddenly he stiffened. Slowly he turned his head and stared intently into the surrounding brush. He had seen movement out of the corner of his eye.
Randi followed his gaze. A fat chuckwalla lizard, almost a foot long, sat in the sand, slowly moving its head from side to side.
Tom watched the lizard raptly. Slowly he reached out a hand toward it. Momentarily startled, the reptile moved out of the way. Tom froze, hand outstretched.
His eyes were riveted on the lizard. He had a flash memory of the coyote pouncing on its prey.
Imperceptibly he shifted his weight — and suddenly he threw himself, lightning fast, toward the big lizard. His hands grabbed the bloated body and he pulled it to him as it struggled frantically in his grip.
For a moment he gazed at the wriggling reptile in his hands — then he made a sudden, wrenching motion, breaking its back. He raised the still twitching body to his mouth and with his teeth he tore into the skin.
Randi stared at him, her eyes wide, her face frozen into a mask of unbelieving horror. She gagged. She clasped her hands to her mouth and swallowed hard, trying to keep down the burning bile that rose in her throat.
Tom ripped the skin from the dead lizard and tore strips of bloody meat from it. He pulled off the tail and threw it to Randi. Still jerking with a macabre life of its own, it lay before her.
White and nauseated, she fought to conquer her profound revulsion. She averted her eyes — from the hideously twitching tail, and from her husband, greedily gulping down the bloody lizard meat. Utterly horrified, shocked to her innermost depths, she realized her husband's true state.
And she despaired.
Tom threw the gnawed lizard carcass aside. He looked around. With a soiled hand he grabbed Randi and pushed her ahead of him as he started to crawl from the dune.
They were just about to emerge from the growth of desert shrubs when Tom stiffened. In the distance the dreaded, familiar and threatening rumble of an enemy could be heard, rapidly growing louder. At once he flattened himself among the weeds and pulled Randi down with him.
She peered out through the brush. Not too far away from the sandy hillock a road ran through the desert. In the distance a lone vehicle was fast approaching…
Jerry Hayden's buggy was tooling down the road. He was returning to the area where he believed his quarry to be, after having been to Stove Pipe Wells to make his 0800-hours contact with his L.A. control. He had reported last night's killing. He had not asked, but from the man's reaction he knew it was not his counterpart he'd eliminated. He was still not the only agent in Death Valley hunting the downed flier. He looked around. Pretty soon he'd pick a vantage point and take up his vigilance. Now? Here? Mentally he flipped a coin. He continued down the deserted road.
With mounting agitation Randi watched the buggy rapidly drawing closer. Her heart raced. She realized that Tom was mortally afraid of the vehicle and its disturbing noise. She also knew that their only chance was to be found — and helped. She glanced at her husband, lying stiff and tense next to her, watching the approaching vehicle with fear and hatred on his face.
The car was almost directly in front of them.
It would have to be now!
She rose to her knees. As loudly as she could she screamed:
“He-e-e-re! Over he-e-e-re!”
Instantly Tom grabbed her. Roughly he pulled her down, snarling his rage at her. His hands pushed her into the sand; powerful fingers dug into her flesh as he held her down, sending waves of pain through her. Defeated, helpless, she did not — could not — resist…
On the road Hayden pulled up. He stopped. Over the drone of his open buggy he'd thought he heard what sounded like someone calling out. A high-pitched sound. He picked up his binoculars lying on the box of artist's materials on the seat next to him and scanned the desert.
On his left it stretched up toward the foothills; on his right several hillocks and dunes overgrown with vegetation sparsely dotted the flat expanse, larger and farther apart than the little mounds of the area known as the Devil's Cornfield, through which he'd just passed. There the little dunes overgrown with arrowweed resembled rows of eerie corn shocks. He'd made sketches of them.