Blood Wedding

Fargo lay down on the floor and scooted into the opening. His shoulders cleared the sides by only a few inches, and it was even darker in there than where he’d just been. The absence of light was total. God only knew what he was getting into. Somebody had told him once that it was better to face the devil you knew than to take a chance of facing the devil you didn’t know. He’d always thought that was a pretty craven way of thinking, but right now he wasn’t so sure that it wasn’t good advice.

Too late to worry about that, though. He slithered along as best he could, keeping his head low so as not to hit it on the rock above him. He didn’t think he could help yelling if he did, since his head was still as sore as if he’d been scalped.

After a few minutes, he stopped moving and listened. He could hear Molly scraping along behind him. He didn’t say anything. He just moved on.

It wasn’t long before he lost all track of time. All he knew was that there was rock above him and rock below him and darkness all around him. It was like being buried alive. Now and then something like that happened to people, if you were to believe the stories that you heard around the campfire.

He could hear Molly’s breathing now. It was too fast, and too shallow. She was getting close to panicking, Fargo thought, and he didn’t much blame her. They were too far into the tunnel to go back.

The floor of the tunnel seemed to be sloping downward, and Fargo didn’t know if that was good or bad. Bad, he guessed. The way out seemed more likely to be up than down. On the other hand, there probably weren’t any bats down there on the lower levels. He kept moving forward, pulling himself with his elbows and pushing with his toes.

After another couple of minutes, he thought that something seemed different, and he raised up carefully. Sure enough, the roof of the tunnel was higher. He could get on his hands and knees and crawl. Better yet, if he slouched over, he could even sit up.

“We have a little more room,” he told Molly. “Time for a rest.”

Molly didn’t say anything. She was panting. She sounded like a dog after a long run.

“We’ll be fine,” Fargo said, not knowing if he was lying. He put out a hand and touched Molly’s arm. “We have some room to move around in now.”

“It’s . . . so dark. Can’t see . . . anything. We can’t . . . get out.”

She was right about not being able to see. Fargo could have held his hand an inch from his nose, and he wouldn’t have seen it at all. Molly wasn’t worried about the bats anymore, though, and that was good.

“We’ll get out,” Fargo said. “It’s no worse in here than having your eyes closed on a dark night.”

“It’s . . . worse.”

Fargo moved closer to Molly and put his arms around her. He didn’t talk. He just sat there and held her until her breathing returned to normal. It was eerie to have a woman in your arms and not be able to see her. It was almost like holding a ghost, but ghosts weren’t solid, or so Fargo had heard tell.

After a while Molly’s breathing slowed and then became normal again.

“If we do get out of here,” Molly said, “are you sure you don’t want to settle down and be a farmer? I think I can make a go of it on Tally’s place.”

Fargo grinned in the darkness. “I’m no farmer. And we aren’t out of here yet.”

“You said we’d get out. I’m almost starting to believe you.”

Fargo wished he believed it himself. He said, “We’d better start moving again. Try not to skin your hands and knees too bad.”

“When can we stand up?”

“Later,” Fargo said. “When we get out of this tunnel.”

It seemed like a long time. It seemed almost like forever. But finally they did come out of the tunnel. They practically fell out of it, in fact, which proved that Fargo had been right. They were going downward.

They found themselves in another room. Fargo stood up and breathed deeply. It was good to be out of the tunnel, though he still couldn’t see anything, and he stretched to loosen his cramped limbs.

“How big is this place?” Molly asked.

Fargo said that he didn’t know. He called out and tried to judge by the echo. The sound of his voice reverberated hollowly around them.

“Pretty big, I’d guess,” Molly said. “What do we do now?”

“Find a way out,” Fargo said. “Just like before.”

“I hope it’s not as small as the last way out. I don’t think I could take much more of that.”

“We’ll have to take what we find. Unless you want to go back.”

“It’s a good thing I can’t see you, Fargo. I’d hit you if I could.”

“I’ll try to stay out of your way. Let’s see if we can find a way out of here.”

They started working their way around the wall. The rocks were rough under Fargo’s hands and irritated the cuts from the knife. He ignored the stinging pain and felt carefully, looking for fissure, a wide gap, anything.