“I’m coming,” she called.
He heard her feet thump on the ground, but he didn’t turn. When Leia joined him, they both began to scoop out dirt with their hands. It was fully dark now, but moonbeams illuminated the hole enough to keep working. Sweat trickled down his back and soaked his T-shirt. “I think we’ve almost got it loose.” He struggled with a tree root that had entangled the box until he succeeded in breaking its grip. The large chest lay exposed. “Can you help me lift it out of the hole?”
“I think so.” Leia got her fingers under the end of the chest and began to lift. “It’s heavy, but I think I can do it.”
He hefted his end, and they succeeded in maneuvering the cumbersome object out of the hole and onto the solid ground. “Open it,” Leia said, her voice hushed. He nodded and tried to lift the lid. It was locked.
He seized the shovel and stood. “Stand back.” He hit the lock with the back of the shovel, again and again, until it broke. “You want to do the honors?” His smile felt huge as Leia reached toward the lid.
She touched it. “I’m almost scared,” she whispered. They stared at each other, then she lifted the lid to reveal a small jumble of jewelry and gold coins. She frowned. “I expected more,” she said.
The jewelry and gold coins barely covered the bottom of the chest. Bane had reached to pick up a coin when he felt something hard dig into his back.
“Step away from the chest,” a cold male voice said. “Don’t turn around.” A burlap bag was thrust into Bane’s hands. “Put the stuff in the bag and don’t try anything, or I’ll shoot you both. The girl-friend can help too.”
Bane’s anger rose, but he didn’t dare turn and attack. Not with Leia here. They both began to drop handfuls of jewelry and coins into the bag. He felt keen regret as precious rings, brooches, and coins went through his fingers and into the bag. To come so close and now lose it left a bad taste on his tongue. Maybe he could over-come this guy. His thoughts raced to find a way out. His fingers scraped the bottom of the wooden chest, and he got the last pieces into the bag.
“Where’s the rest of it?”
“That’s all there is.”
The man swore, and the gun dug deeper into Bane’s back. “Drop the bag behind you. Don’t turn around, either one of you.”
There went his idea to hit the guy with the bag when he handed it to him. Bane eased the burlap bag to the ground behind him. If only he still had the shovel at his fingertips, but he had nothing, no weapon other than his bare hands.
“Count to one hundred before you turn around, or your girl-friend gets a bullet to the head,” the gruff voice warned. “Start counting.”
Bane curled his fingers into his palms. If only Leia weren’t here, he would whirl and jump the guy. It was foolhardy to try it, he knew. The hard gun dug in again, and he began to count. “One, two, three . . .”
“Keep counting.”
The gun was removed, and he heard a soft umph and the sound of footsteps running away. “Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen . . .” He stopped and turned cautiously. There was no one there. Leia was gone too.
The man’s hand smelled of onions as he kept it clasped over her nose and mouth. Leia struggled to free herself, but the man kept an iron grip on her and dragged her behind the other man. Her captor paused, and his grip slackened. Leia bit down on the finger closest to her mouth. His stifled scream sounded like a snort, and he turned her loose. She darted into the thick vegetation to her right.
Leia dived under a thick bush. The moon hid its face behind a bank of clouds. On both sides of her, the jungle was alive with sound: crickets chirped, tree frogs croaked a deep bass melody, and some larger animal thrashed through the underbrush. Probably a deer, she told herself. She could hear the men whispering as they searched for her, and she held her breath. The sound of their voices faded, and she prayed they were giving up.
She crawled out from under the bush and hurried along a narrow path she recognized that led back to her grandmother’s cottage. The air around her seemed to thicken, and it almost sounded as though someone or something stalked her again. She whirled and stared into the encroaching darkness. Her knees were barely sup-porting her as the adrenaline raced through her body. The only sound that came to her ears was the waterfall behind her. She forced her feet forward.