to have a way to sneak out when the bulls show up. That’s what they used to call the police. I know all about this because I got the classics movie channel on my TV package.”
We returned to the back room and looked around. Six La-Z-Boy chairs. A monster safe. A card table with four folding chairs. Big-screen TV. No windows or doors other than the door opening to the barroom.
After several minutes of searching, we found a trapdoor hidden under a rug. We opened the door, climbed down a ladder, and stood squinting in the dim light of an escape tunnel that was approximately six feet high and three feet wide. It was encased in concrete and lit by a single bulb that was about thirty feet in front of the ladder.
Lula and I were now standing under that bulb. The tunnel changed from concrete to dirt at this point. It was supported by wood posts at regular intervals and it narrowed slightly.
“I’m going back,” Lula said. “No way in hell am I going to squeeze myself into that dirt tunnel. First off, it’s going to smudge up my dress. And second, it’s the tunnel to death and doom.”
“I imagine you got the death-and-doom message from your nipples?”
“Don’t underestimate my nipples. I got nipple radar. When they talk, I listen.”
Lula turned and huffed back to the ladder. She climbed the ladder and stopped at the top.
“This here door’s closed,” she said.
“You followed me down. Did you close the door?”
“Yeah. I didn’t want anyone to know we were down here. I didn’t count on it being so hard to get open again.”
“Maybe there’s a latch somewhere. A button to push,” I said.
“I’m feeling all around and I don’t see no button.”
“Are you sure you can’t push the door open?”
“Would I be standing here on this freaking ladder if I could get the freaking door open?” Lula said.
I replaced Lula on the ladder and tried the door. No luck. I climbed down the ladder and pulled my cell phone out of my pocket. No bars. I looked down the corridor at the dark, dirt tunnel of death and doom.
“Guess what?” I said.
“I don’t like ‘guess what.’ And I don’t like the way this place smells,” Lula said, following me to the end of the concrete.
“It smells like dirt.”
“Exactly,” Lula said. “There’s no other smells besides dirt, and that would indicate that we’re underground with no windows or anything. Like we’re in a tomb. You see what I’m saying?”
“We aren’t in a tomb. We’re in a tunnel that Lou Salgusta just used so it has to go somewhere.”
Okay, truth is, I was every bit as creeped out as Lula. I didn’t like being underground. It was claustrophobic. The air was heavy with dirt and damp, and I had to keep reminding myself that I wasn’t suffocating. Even worse was the thought that Lou Salgusta might be waiting at the other end. I wanted to capture him, but I wasn’t confident that I could do it under these circumstances.
I tapped my phone’s flashlight app. “Stay close behind me and don’t use your phone,” I said to Lula. “We should save your battery.”
“Do you want my gun, being that you’re first in line?”
“Sure.”
I took the gun from her not so much for self-defense as to make sure Lula didn’t panic and accidentally shoot me in the back.
We walked a short distance and the tunnel curved. The single lightbulb disappeared from view and there was only blackness in front of us and behind us.
“I can’t see what I’m walking on,” Lula said. “It feels squishy and I hear water dripping.”
Water was dripping from the top of the tunnel and the dirt underfoot was muddy. I could see men’s footprints in the mud. Salgusta, I thought. Maybe someone else. Hard to tell in the dark. The tunnel came to a T-intersection. I flashed the light in both directions and saw nothing but endless dark tunnel. I went right, following the footprints.
“There’s something dropped on my neck,” Lula said. “I can feel it crawling. It’s one of them big tarantulas. Lord help me, I got them all over me!”
I turned and flashed the light on Lula. “I don’t see anything. I think you’re just getting dripped on.”
“It was on me and then it jumped off.”
I directed the light to the ground and a small rat scurried away.
“Holy hell,” Lula said.
I bit into my lip to keep from screaming and moved forward.