Two Graves by Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child Read Free Book Online Page B

it’s been moving fast across central and northwestern Florida.”
    “How fast?”
    “Plane-fast.”
    “When?”
    “Seventy minutes ago.”
    “That must be the plane that just landed in Alabama. What else?”
    “Nothing except for a brief unencrypted burst in Spanish. That burst mentioned a place: Cananea.”
    “
Cananea
,” Pendergast whispered. “Where is that?”
    “A town in Sonora, Mexico… in the middle of nowhere, thirty miles south of the border.”
    “Sketch me a picture of the town.”
    “My research indicates it has a population of thirty thou. It was once a huge mining center—copper—and it was the site of a bloody strike that helped launch the Mexican Revolution. Now it hosts a couple of maquiladora factories on the north side and that’s about it.”
    “Geographic situation?”
    “There’s a river that starts in Cananea and flows north over theborder into Arizona. Called the San Pedro. One of the few north-flowing rivers on the continent. It’s a major route for smuggling drugs and illegals. Except that the surrounding desert is brutal. That’s where a lot of those would-be immigrants die. The border along there is apparently remote as hell, just a barbed-wire fence—but it’s got sensors and patrols up the wazoo. Plus a tethered blimp that can see a cigarette on the ground in the dark.”
    Pendergast cradled the phone. It made sense. Deprived of their plane, and anticipating the APB border alerts, Helen’s captors would have had to find a clandestine way to cross the border into Mexico. The Rio San Pedro corridor south to Cananea was as good as any.
    That would be his last chance to intercept them.
    He left the telephone booth—staggered, his head still spinning—and found himself forced to sit down abruptly in the dirt. He was weak, he was exhausted, he was losing blood, and he had not slept or taken nourishment in more than two days. But this sudden weakness went beyond the physical. His mind, his entire being, was wounded.
    He forced himself to examine his shattered psychological state. What he now felt for Helen—whether or not he still loved her—he did not know. He had believed her dead for twelve years. He had reconciled himself to that. And now she was alive. All he knew for certain was that if he had not insisted on seeing her again, if he had not bungled their assignation so badly, Helen would still be safe. He had to reverse that failure. He had to rescue her from
Der Bund
—not only for her preservation, but for his own. Otherwise…
    He did not let himself think about the
otherwise
. Instead—summoning every last reserve of strength—he rose to his feet. He had to get to Cananea, one way or another.
    He limped toward the parking lot of the airfield, bathed in sodium lights. A single car was parked there: an old tan Eldorado. No doubt owned by the airport administrator.
    It appeared the man would be doing him another favor.



+ Eighty-Two Hours
    P ENDERGAST PULLED THE SMOKING, BATTERED ELDORADO into a gas station outside the tiny town of Palominas, Arizona. He had covered the twenty-two hundred miles without rest, stopping only for gas.
    He got out, steadying himself by leaning on the door. It was two AM , and the immense desert sky was sprinkled with stars. There was no moon.
    After a moment, he went into the convenience store attached to the gas station. Here he purchased a map of the Mexican state of Sonora, half a dozen water bottles, some packages of beef jerky, cookies, some potted meat product, a couple of dish towels, bandages, antibiotic ointment, a bottle of ibuprofen, caffeine tablets, duct tape, and a flashlight. All these went into a doubled-up plastic grocery bag, which he took back to the car. Sitting in the driver’s seat once again, he studied the map he had bought, committing its features to memory.
    He left the gas station and drove eastward on Route 92, crossing the San Pedro River on a small bridge. Past the bridge, he turned right on a dirt