chapter 118
“ARE HIS HANDS tied?” Yancey yelled.
“Yeah, with plastic zip ties, and I’m guessin’ whoever you just heard drivin’ is the same a*shole that dropped him in this pipe.”
“Shit, they’ll kill us too if they find us!”
They could hear a truck coming closer fast. They had less than thirty seconds.
“Man, I can’t leave him.”
“Listen to me—they’ll kill us. It’s probably the Dixie Mafia or some drug thing!” Yancey yelled with great urgency.
“We gotta get some help. Do you got cell service?”
“No, I already looked. Come on, we gotta get the hell outta here. We’re freakin’ sittin’ ducks if they drive up!”
“I can’t leave this poor bastard,” Trance said.
“You ain’t no good to him or your kids dead! Now come on!”
The truck’s engine revved as it went through a mud hole, and it was definitely getting closer. “Dammit to hell.”
“We gotta hide on the other side of the levee!”
The two men quickly sloshed back to the levee, grabbed their coats, and crawled into the button brush as the truck’s headlights flashed through the trees above them. They were out of breath and running on adrenaline, not realizing just how cold they were.
“Get down, here they come,” Yancey whispered.
The would-be rescuers turned their heads from the approaching truck and pushed their white faces down into the mud so they wouldn’t be seen in the headlights. Doing so, however, prevented them from seeing the small, flashing blue light on the truck.
The warden followed Moon Pie’s tire tracks right to the middle of the levee and turned off his truck so he could listen for clues. He quickly got out and didn’t hear anything. He immediately shouted, “Jake Crosby!”
The rescuers looked up slightly and saw the small blue lights flashing on the dark truck.
“It’s the law,” Yancey whispered.
“Do you think he dumped him?”
“How do I know? But why would he be yelling some guy’s name?”
“Jake! It’s the game warden! Can you hear me!” the warden yelled as he walked down to the water’s edge. This has to be the location, he thought. With his flashlight, he could see plumes of muddy water, indicating that something or someone had recently been in it.
“Maybe he’s tryin’ to see if he’s still alive,” Yancey whispered.
The warden walked closer to the edge of the muddy water. When he saw two sets of fresh footprints leading over the levee, he quietly removed his Smith & Wesson service revolver from his holster, then shined his flashlight down at the tracks.
The grave robbers turned rescuers were too committed to hiding to run, so they lay facedown in the wet leaves and hoped the warden wouldn’t spot them. They prayed they weren’t about to be executed, since they didn’t know if the officer was crooked and responsible for the guy in the pipe.
The warden followed the tracks over the levee and down to the woods’ edge, where he saw the two men. He trained his pistol on them and shouted, “You there, in the woods, put your hands where I can see them. Now!”
The rescuers complied.
“Stand up and walk to me!”
They did as directed, shaking from a combination of fear, cold, and adrenaline. They slowly walked up the levee bank, hands in the air, straight at the man who was shining a bright flashlight in their faces. They noticed a red laser moving between them, and it made their legs feel like jelly.
“Who are you, and what the hell are y’all doing here?” the warden asked when they got close.
“We’re lost. Who the hell are you?” Yancey asked.
He realized that in all the excitement, he hadn’t identified himself. “I’m the game warden. Tell me the real reason that you’re here!” he said, keeping the light in their faces.
The men sighed from relief. Trance started to explain as he took a few steps closer, “This is gonna sound crazy—”
“Stay right there. Don’t move any closer,” the game warden interrupted.
“Listen to me—there’s a guy trapped in the bottom of that drainpipe. We heard him screaming for help and were trying to pull him out when you drove up. His hands are tied, and we heard you comin’, so we just freaked out and hid. We thought you were gonna try to kill us too!”
The warden quickly processed what they were saying. They looked normal enough, aside from being soaking wet. He quickly glanced over his shoulder at the drainpipe without taking his weapon off the two men.
“I swear, Officer. I’m tellin’ the truth. That guy’s in bad shape, and we’re wasting time!”
Trance bolted down the levee, yelling, “Come on, we need your help!”
All three men quickly sloshed out to the pipe and peered in. The water had receded some, but Jake’s head was slumped back, facing up, and his eyes were closed. The game warden instantly recognized the man as Jake Crosby.
“Jake! Jake! Can you hear me? Jake! We’re here to rescue you! Hang on!” the warden yelled rapidly. He could see the vapor from Jake’s breath, and he knew that he was alive.
“I went in upside down, but he couldn’t reach up to me. It’s a long way down.”
“It’ll take all of us to pull him out, if we can,” Yancey said.
The warden did a quick assessment and said, “I got an idea. We’ll use my winch!”
As the warden ran through the water to his truck, he yelled, “One of y’all come help me.”
The warden flipped his Warn winch to free spool and said, “Start pulling this to the pipe while I radio in where we’re at and what’s goin’ on.”
He grabbed his radio mic and keyed it. “This is unit Twenty-Two for county dispatch. Do you read me? Over.”
There was about a five-second pause, and a young female voice said, “Go ahead, Twenty-Two.”
“I got an urgent situation. I located the missing person, Jake Crosby. He’s trapped in a drainpipe, but I think I can get him out. But he’s gonna be hypothermic for sure. Have an ambulance meet Trooper Wallace at his twenty. It’s too muddy for the van to get back to where I’m at. I’ll meet ’em at the gate. Make sure they got warm blankets. Over.”
After several long seconds, she responded, “Ten-four, unit Twenty-Two. Copy that. Will advise.”
The warden had another idea. He quickly searched through his hunting gear until he found his tree stand safety harness. When he looked up, they had the winch cable pulled almost all the way out. He inserted the remote control and laid it on the hood, and when he saw they had enough cable, he flipped it from free spool to lock and took off running for the water.
“Okay, look, you’re the thinnest and you look plenty strong,” the warden said to Trance as he took off his belt. “There’s barely enough room in the pipe for him and no way both of you can fit down there at the same time, so I need you to let me lower you down into the pipe by my belt, and then you wrap this safety harness under Jake’s arms, leaving a loop, and we’ll winch you out. Then we’ll drop the cable hook down and catch the loop on the vest so we can slowly winch Jake out. Got it?”
“Got it. I’ll do whatever,” Trance said, shivering.
The warden then turned to the older man. “Ever run a winch?”
Yancey nodded. “I can handle it.”
“The control’s on my hood. Go! When I holler, give me some slack. Okay?”
Yancey started running to the truck. “You got it!”
The warden shined his light into the pipe to analyze the situation one more time. “All right, Jake. Hang on, buddy. We’re comin’ to get you!”
He then turned to Trance and said, “I wish I could see his legs. He could be wedged in some debris down there. I can’t tell anything with that muddy water. The winch is gonna pull him in half if he’s stuck on something down there. So when you get down there, look closely to see if you can tell anything.”
“I understand,” Trance said as he put the belt around his chest and they tightened the winch cable.
“Be careful and hurry up,” the warden said, as they lowered him headfirst into the drainpipe.