a doll but striking in a slightly foreign sort of way. By some freak of dynamics the force of the impact had thrown her back instead of forward. She was lying with one arm dangling over the back of the seat, her left knee drawn up almost to her chin, her other foot on the floor boards. Her skirt was wadded around her middle leaving her completely exposed. In the yellow gleam of the flashlight her blood-smeared white thighs looked like they were carved of white marble.
“Know her?” Sheriff Prichard asked.
It was an effort for Renner to lie. “No. I never saw her before.”
“Me either,” Prichard said. “She’s probably a hitchhiker the old guy picked up.”
“What makes you think that?” Renner asked him.
Prichard told him. “That cheap skirt and sweater she’s wearing. They don’t belong in a Cadillac.” He added, “Besides, there’s a cheap hat box—you know, the kind that dancers and chorus girls carry—over there in the bushes. It was probably thrown out of the car when they went over.”
Renner studied Tamara’s face. Her eyes were closed but she seemed to be breathing regularly. He asked, “Why can’t we just lift her out?”
Prichard shook his head. “I tried that. You have to climb up on the car to get at her. And when you do it upsets the balance. I thought for a moment the whole thing was going to go, me with it.”
It wasn’t a matter of choice. It was something he had to do. Renner climbed the slope again, calling back over his shoulder as he climbed. “I’ll back the truck as close as I can to the edge. Then I’ll come down with the hook and cable and we’ll take a strain on the car before we try to get her out of there.”
Kelcey was still standing beside the police car. He walked along with Renner as he pushed his way through the growing crowd to the truck. “You saw her?”
“I saw her,” Renner said curtly.
Kelcey proved he was feeling better. “She’s a little honey, isn’t she? Boy, would I like to get my hands on her. You know how I mean.”
It was all Renner could do to keep from hitting him. With Tamara in danger, possibly dying, all Kelcey could thing of was enjoying her.
Angel was still leaning against the fender of the bus. As Renner climbed into the cab of the truck the fat Mexican pushed himself erect and asked if there was something he could do.
“Yes,” Renner said. “Tell all the paisanos with cars to park them so their headlights shine over the cliff. Then you can handle the winch while I go down and try to hook on a cable.”
Guitierrez spoke in spanish as he passed on the instructions.
Then, with Angel guiding him, Renner backed the truck to within three feet of the edge of the slope and stopped when Angel held up his hands.
“You go on down to the car,” Angel said. “I’ll play out the cable behind you.”
Renner carried the hook over the edge of the shoulder and scrambled down the slope again with Angel playing out the cable behind him. With a dozen pair of car headlights spotlighting the scene it was much easier-going than it had been the first time.
Renner had to crawl under the back of the wrecked car to secure the hook and cable. When he finally managed to secure it, he crawled out again and called back up the slope.
“Take up the slack—easy.”
Angel reversed the winch, using Renner’s raised hand as a guide. When the heavy cable came so taut the big car nosed forward slightly, Renner gave him a cut-off sign.
“That should do it. Ease off a trifle and lock the winch.”
“Sí, senor.”
Prichard was still worried. “I don’t know if we’re going to pull this off or not, Kurt. When that cable came taut she almost nosed over right then.”
Renner wiped his greasy hands on the skirt of his coat and tested the balance of the car. It wasn’t good. He wished he could be in two places at the same time. Unfortunately, he couldn’t. It was going to be up to Angel to keep just the right strain on the cable while he lifted Tamara out of the car.
He called up the slope again. “Keep the cable as taut as you can without taking too much of a strain on it. And if the truck starts to slip back, slap it into low gear and gun her.”
Angel made a circle with his thumb and second finger to show he understood. “Bueno.”
Working as carefully as he could, Renner tried to open the door on Tamara’s side of the car and couldn’t. The door was jammed. Leaning over the door he tried to lift her out and wasn’t any more successful. The top part of her torso raised but her right foot seemed to be caught on something.
While he was straining to lift her she opened her eyes and spoke rapidly but without panic. “I’m sorry, Kurt,” she said in Hungarian. “But when I missed the bus in Cove Springs and the man offered me a ride, I accepted.” The blonde girl shuddered and tried, instinctively, to cover her exposed flesh. “I didn’t know what kind of man he was. Am I going to die?”
“No,” Kurt said crisply. “Just sit tight and leave everything to me.”
“What kind of language is that?” Prichard asked.
Renner told him. “Hungarian.”
“What did she say?”
“She said she missed the local bus in Cove Springs and the dead guy offered her a ride.”
“Ask her her name?”
“I’m Tamara,” Tamara said in English. “Tamara Daranyi.”
Renner took the light out of Prichard’s hand and walked around the car and pulled the dead man out of the shattered windshield to get rid of some of the weight forward.
“What are you going to do?” Prichard asked.
Renner told him. “Get her out of there.”
He crawled in past the broken wheel post and turned the beam of the flashlight on Tamara’s wedged foot. It was caught in a lethal boot formed by the expensive leather and heavy paperboard liner under the cowl. He tried to free it, but his hands were so slippery with blood and grease he couldn’t get a good grip on her ankle. He wiped his hands on her skirt and tried again. As he did, the car tilted forward precariously. There was an ominous scrape of metal on stone and the men up on the top of the cliff began to shout.
Above the excited babble of Spanish and broken English and the racing motor of the tow truck, Renner could hear Kelcey shouting, “For God’s sake get out of there, Renner. Your weight is upsetting the balance and the tow truck is slipping backwards. The ground is too soft for Angel to get traction.”
Still other voices were shouting for Angel to get out of the truck.
Then, as if to emphasize the danger, a small fall of rock broke loose and cascaded down the slope, banging against the back and the underside of the car.
Even
