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“I see it.”
“Wow, look at this—”
“Sam.”
“What?”
“I hate to stifle your imagination, but we’ve got a bottle of wine to steal.”
“Right, sorry. Let’s go.”
Having used Google Earth to draw up their own overhead sketch of Bondaruk’s estate, complete with angles and distances, as well as annotations from Bohuslav’s notes, they kept track of their steps as they headed into the tunnel.
Under the moving beam of their flashlights Sam could see signs of limited blast work along the walls, but it appeared most of the tunnel had been carved out the old-fashioned way, by hammer, chisel, and backbreaking labor.
Here and there on the floor were wooden toolboxes, coils of half-rotted rope, rusted pickaxes and sledgehammers, a pair of half-rotted leather boots, canvas coveralls that partially disintegrated when Remi nudged them with her shoe. . . . Attached to the right-and left-hand walls every ten feet were oil lamps, their glass globes black with soot, their bronze reservoirs and handles covered in a scabrous green patina. Sam tapped one with his index finger and heard sloshing inside.
After fifty yards of walking, Remi stopped, studied the sketch, and said, “We should be just under the outer wall. Another hundred yards or so and we should be directly under the main house.”
She was off by only a few yards. After another two minutes they reached a widened intersection, the tunnel and tracks continuing straight as well as to the right. Five old-fashioned ore carts sat in a line against the left-hand wall, while a sixth sat on the north-south tracks.
“Straight ahead to the stables, and right to the east wings,” Sam said.
“I think so.”
He checked his watch. “Let’s check out the stables first and see what we can see.”
After another half mile or so of walking, Remi stopped suddenly and placed her index finger to her lips and mouthed, Music. They listened in silence for ten seconds then Sam leaned in and whispered in Remi’s ear, “ ‘Summer Wind’ by Frank Sinatra.”
She nodded. “I hear voices. Laughing . . . singing along.”
“Yeah.”
They continued on and soon the tunnel came to a dead end at a set of stone steps leading upward to a wooden trapdoor. Sam lifted his head and sniffed. “Manure.”
“Then we’re in the right place.”
The music and laughter were louder now, seemingly coming from directly above their heads. Sam placed his foot on the lowermost step. At that moment, there came the thunk of a footfall on the trapdoor. Sam froze. Another foot joined the first, followed by two more, these lighter, somehow more delicate. Through the gaps in the trapdoor shadows moved, blocking and unblocking the light.
A woman giggled and said in Russian-accented English, “Don’t, Dmitry, that tickles.”
“That’s the idea, my lapochka.”
“Ooh, I like that. . . . Stop, stop, what about your wife?”
“What about her?”
“Come on, let’s get back to the party before someone sees us.”
“Not until you promise me,” the man said.
“Yes, I promise. Next weekend in Balaclava.”
The couple moved off and moments later there came the banging of a wooden door. Somewhere above a horse whinnied, then silence.
Remi whispered, “We’ve managed to stumble into one of Bondaruk’s damned parties. Talk about bad luck. . . .”
“Maybe good luck,” Sam replied. “Let’s see if we can make it work for us.”
