Short Cut to Santa Fe by Medora Sale

van?”
    Charlie blinked. The lids dropped over his bloodshot eyes. His head drooped onto his chest.
    â€œMr. Broca—wake up. Did you see the van?”
    His head snapped up and his eyes opened wide. “Chevy van, cream-coloured, one, maybe two years old, Missouri plates. Didn’t get the number. Guy was tall, wife skinny, about five six.” His head fell onto the table, just missing the coffee, and he was out. The time was 4:25 a.m.
    Karen Johnson had already been frozen into immobility when the lights when out for the last time and Gary uttered his final threats. She was, she had decided, beyond terror. It was the outrage of it all, the random outrage of it all, that had finished her. That by some vicious chance she—a fill-in, totally unprepared for the job—should have to cope with
this
. The unfairness of it had destroyed her, had transported her out of the bus into some other dimension, one ruled by strange laws, where she was enveloped not in air, but in some thick, muffling substance. Each breath she took had to be dragged into her lungs with deliberation; sounds came to her ears from very far away; people’s movements were slow, terribly slow, as if impeded by a terrific force of gravity. But in here, in this gelatinous fog, she was safe, wrapped up, away from harm. As long as she didn’t try to move, or speak, or think.
    She reached for comfort toward the old lady beside her, and realized that she had fallen asleep. She had her own manner of fleeing the horror, and Karen decided that she had no right to interfere with it. There was nothing for it, then, but to sit here in immobile silence until daytime came and they started to kill. Tears she was scarcely aware of trickled down her cheeks.
    From somewhere in the bus, she heard a voice whisper, “Grab the girl. We might need her.” A huge hand encircled her arm and squeezed; she gasped and another hand was clapped over her mouth. She was lifted up out of her seat and pulled into the aisle; in a few stumbling steps she was out of the bus. The cold air felt like the water off Popham beach back home; clean, powerful, and breathtakingly frigid. She shivered.
    â€œShe’s cold.” Karen recognized Wayne’s voice.
    â€œHere—she can have this.” That was Gary. And one of them placed a jacket over her shoulders and with great care and delicacy put her arms into the enormous sleeves. The jacket came down to her thighs, the sleeves almost as far. The same careful hands brought the zipper together and fastened it almost to her chin. It was warm, blissfully warm. A gust of wind blew against her face, and she realized she was breathing again.
    â€œHow fast can you walk?” said Gary softly.
    â€œPretty fast, except that these shoes aren’t the best for walking. They slip on the dirt and gravel.” This was her voice, speaking normal, intelligent things.
    â€œOkay. We have a plane to catch, you might say, and we’re taking you with us for insurance. You stay quiet and stay with us and nothing will happen to you. We’ll make sure you get back to Dallas or wherever safely. Now let’s move.”
    The two men walked with extraordinary speed and silence through the dark night. They were following the road farther up the mountain, around the bend that the bus hadn’t managed to negotiate. Neither one spoke, and Karen was too concerned with keeping her footing and not losing her companions to want to fall into casual conversation. She was wearing elegant flat-heeled shoes that slipped up and down her heels and slid on every stone, making each step an adventure. At the outset, Gary had gone ahead, and Wayne had walked beside her, his hand on her arm, holding it, lightly. After twenty or thirty minutes, they were following along in single file. And either the sky was lightening somewhat, or Karen was developing eyes like a cat, because now she was able to see, more or less, where she was