I went through the vault door, which was embedded in about three feet of concrete.
Madox, behind me, said, “Welcome to my fallout shelter.”
Luther brought up the rear, and I could hear the vault door closing and locking.
I had the sense that we were under the back terrace, deep in the bedrock, and not connected to the basement of the house. I also had the sense that there wasn’t anyone on the surface who could ever find us.
CHAPTER FIFTY
We were now in a wide corridor whose concrete walls were painted a light green that changed into sky blue about a third of the way up the ten-foot height. The ceiling was covered with frosted glass panels, behind which were bright violet lights that, I guessed, were grow lights, though I didn’t see any vegetation, unless you counted the horrid 1980s Astroturf on the floor.
I suppose someone was trying to create the illusion that you were outdoors in a sunlit meadow that happened to look like an underground concrete corridor.
Madox said, unnecessarily, “You’re supposed to think you’re aboveground.”
I asked, “Aren’t we?”
He didn’t answer my question. “My idiot ex-wife’s idea.” He added, “She had an irrational fear of atomic war.”
“Silly woman.”
He seemed in a better mood, and he motioned to an open door to the right, which I could see was a children’s playroom. “The children were young then, and she thought they’d thrive down here.”
I commented, “The grow lights might help, but their playdates might be somewhat limited.”
He wasn’t paying any attention to me, and he actually seemed to be talking to himself. “She saw On the Beach and Dr. Strangelove about twenty times, and I don’t think she realized one was a serious film, and the other was gallows humor.” He added, “Nuclear Armageddon movies sent her to her therapist for months.”
I had the impression that Bain Madox had some issues with his ex-wife’s obsession with nuclear holocaust, and maybe what he was trying to do now was work through that by starting a nuclear war of his own. I was sure that Mrs. Madox would be one of the first people he called after it was over.
Anyway, Kate and I moved slowly down the passage in our shackles, and every time I hitched up my pants, Luther yelled, “Hands on your head,” and I replied, “Fuck you.”
I could hear the vents blowing, but the air smelled damp and slightly unpleasant.
On either side of the passage were open doors that revealed furnished rooms-bedrooms, a sitting room, a kitchen, and a long dining room with paneled walls, heavy drapes, a coffered ceiling, and plush carpets. Behind one closed door, I distinctly heard talking, then I realized it was a radio or television-so maybe someone else was down here.
Madox, again talking to himself, said, “She spent a fortune decorating this place. She wanted to sit out the half-life of radioactive fallout in the style to which she’d become accustomed.”
He was on a roll, so I didn’t comment.
He continued, “On the other hand, I find this space useful. First, for my ELF transmitter-and also as a place to store a fortune in art treasures, gold, and cash.” He made a joke. “The last IRS agent who came snooping around is still locked in a room down here.”
Good one, Bain. Actually, this place looked like the Führerbunker, but this might not be the right time to make that comparison.
We reached the end of the passageway, which must have run for fifty yards, and Carl unlocked a steel door, opened it, and turned on the lights.
Madox said, “Kate, follow Carl. John, stop.”
Kate disappeared into the doorway, and I stood there.
Carl called out, “Clear.”
Madox said, “John, follow.”
I was getting a little tired of these doggie commands, but it wasn’t worth mentioning now that we were so close to… the end.
I entered the room and saw that Kate again was on the floor, and Carl stood against the far wall, covering her and me as I entered.
Madox instructed, “John, down.”
I lay facedown on a plush blue carpet. On a professional level, I appreciated Carl and Bain’s military precision, and their textbook handling of two prisoners who, though shackled, unarmed, and outnumbered by three armed men, they understood to be potentially dangerous.
On the downside of that, these guys weren’t giving me an inch to wiggle out of this.
Using shackles instead of handcuffs was a judgment call, and I could see why Madox had gone with the shackles up to this point.
The only real mistake they’d made so far was not finding the BearBangers, which was why the police strip-searched prisoners and examined the body cavities. Now that we were in the dungeon, that might very well be Madox’s next move, along with handcuffs-and that would be our signal to act.
Meanwhile, Madox and Carl seemed to be busy with something other than us, but I caught a glimpse of Luther near the door with his M16 raised and pointed, and the muzzle sweeping back and forth between me and Kate. I didn’t see the canvas bag, which Luther had apparently stowed somewhere along the way. Therefore, the only weapons in this room were the ones we saw pointed at us.
On the subject of weapons, Carl’s choice of an automatic shotgun in confined quarters was also very professional-bullets from high-powered rifles have a tendency to pass through people and hit other people you don’t necessarily want to hit, then ricochet and become dangerous to the shooter and his friends.
In fact, down here, Luther’s M16 was almost as dangerous to him as it was to us. Nevertheless, I didn’t want him firing it at us.
As for Madox’s Colt.45, it was okay in confined quarters with masonry surfaces. It would put a big hole in you at close range, and its exit velocity wasn’t usually fatal to anyone on the other side of the intended victim. Also, if it hit a concrete wall, its blunt-nosed bullet was more likely to splatter than ricochet.
Having analyzed all that, my conclusion was that Kate and I were basically fucked. In fact, the BearBangers were getting smaller and smaller in my mind.
Madox said, “On your knees. Hands on your heads.”
I lifted myself into a kneeling position, with my hands on my head, and I saw Kate do the same. We were about ten feet apart in the dimly lit room, and we made eye contact. She dropped her face and eyes down toward where the BearBanger was stuck, somewhere in her jeans or panties, and probably behind her zipper. She glanced at me, and I gave a slight shake of my head. Not the right moment, I wanted to say. You’ll know when.
I looked around the room as my eyes adjusted to the dim light.
Madox was sitting with his back to us at some sort of electronic console that was against the far wall. I assumed that was the ELF transmitter. Eureka. Now what?
Luther was still standing near the door, covering Kate and me with his rifle.
Carl wasn’t visible, but I heard him breathing behind us.
The room itself was a sparsely furnished and functional-looking office. This was obviously Bain’s atomic-war headquarters, where he could spend the day making phone calls to see if anyone was alive out there after the Big One. He probably had a ticker tape, too, to see how his defense and oil stocks were doing.
I never understood, during the ’70s and ’80s, why people wanted to survive a nuclear holocaust. I mean, other than some cans of chili and a case of beer, I never made any long-range, post-nuclear war plans.
But to be fair to Bain, this was mostly his ex-wife’s idea. I wondered what became of her. Wood chipper?
Anyway, I noticed, too, that mounted on the paneled wall to the right of the electronic console were three flat screen television monitors on swing arms. They looked new and out of place in this 1980s time capsule.
To the left of the console was a bank of six older television sets, and they were all lit, but it was hard to see the black-and-white images on them, which kept shifting. I realized these were security monitors, and I made out the gatehouse on one screen, then an image of the lodge taken from the gatehouse, which then shifted to an image of the generator building, and so forth.