Part 5
"For every one you pull out another six will grow, you know," Murdock drawled.
"Really?" Peck pulled a face as he turned to look at the driver. He was seated in the passenger seat of the car looking at himself in the mirror and resolutely pulling out grey hairs. He gave a resigned sigh. "I guess you're right. Can't stop time, can I?" He looked moodily away then across the brilliant vista of mountains that surrounded them. "Twenty years," he mused. "Just twenty years – that's all I want back!"
Murdock glanced at him and smiled sadly. "It's never gonna be, Faceman. And there's no point in wasting the time we got craving after it, either."
"I guess but…" Peck had returned his attention to the mirror and was precisely combing his hand through his hair but he caught a glimpse of the car behind them and stopped in mid sentence. He screwed his eyes together to get a better view.
Murdock glanced a second time. "What you need glasses as well as going grey now?" he asked. As he spoke he felt his own body tighten as he perceived the tension in his partner. Peck was now peering over his shoulder, his body taunt and straining. "Son of a bitch!" he spat.
"What?"
"Should have come in the Viper!" Peck said. He turned back to the front. "How fast does this go?" As he spoke he moved over and used his own foot to depress Murdock's one that was on the accelerator.
"Shit!" Murdock cursed as the car lurched forward. "What the hell?" Furiously he squeezed hold and pushed away Peck's leg.
"Car behind," Peck said, ruefully rubbing his leg. "It's got Westwood and Thomas in it."
"And they are?"
"Lorelei's goons."
"Well, why didn't you say that?" Murdock snapped, pursing his lips as he concentrated on sliding the bulky station wagon around the sharp corners as best he could.
Peck looked over his shoulder, noting that the black sedan behind had increased its speed correspondingly. "How in hell did they find me so soon?"
"Doesn't matter!" Murdock growled. "What matters is that they un-find you pretty pronto!"
They were on a tortuous narrow mountain road that wound its way precariously up and down some of the highest peaks of the Sierra Nevada. There were wonderful views but also heart-stopping drops on either side of the road.
"Some scenic ride this turned out to be!" Peck said referring to the disagreement they had had earlier when he had voiced his objection to leaving the Interstate and going cross country. Murdock had persuaded him that there were plenty of hidden hideaways along this road where they would not be disturbed and could renew their friendship.
"How was I supposed to know that mad bitch had you staked out?" Murdock snapped. "You got your gun?"
Peck snorted. "Hardly! You just picked me up from prison, remember? I'm on parole – where am I supposed to have got a gun from?"
"Glove compartment," Murdock said.
Peck gulped as he stopped his hand from moving forwards. "I can't Murdock!" he whined. A sinking feeling clutched at his guts. He had just spent one hundred and twenty days in prison, one hundred and twenty days to get a clean sheet, one hundred twenty days so he didn't have to be afraid every time he saw a cop car, one hundred twenty days so that he and Murdock could relax, buy a house with a picket fence and grow old together like any other couple. And now, within two hours of his release, he was about to violate the terms of his parole. He lurched from one fuck up to another as trouble seemed to stalk him. "It's not fair!" he said despondently.
"No, it's not," Murdock agreed, sensing precisely what was going through Peck's head. "But it's happening and I need your help to get out of it!"
Peck ran his hand through his hair, licked his lips and then reached forward in a rush to flip the door of the compartment open and take out the gun. Once resolved he quickly released the safety, wound down his window and, sticking his head out, began to fire at the car behind. "What's another parole violation anyway!" he muttered.
The road climbed steeply towards the summit and Murdock cursed as he saw a slow moving gasoline tanker in front. The occupants of the sedan had started to return fire and a bullet shattered the station wagon's rear window with a terrific crash.
Rather than be caught between the crawling tanker and the enemy, Murdock pulled out to overtake it.
"Murdock!" Peck shouted as the pilot just managed to squeeze back onto the correct side of the road in front of the tanker before being swept away by the on-coming traffic. The discordant note of a horn screeched through the air.
"Loads of room!" Murdock retorted. "Can't outrun these goons though. We need a plan." He was flooring the gas pedal, trying to take advantage of the fact that the sedan was momentarily trapped behind the tanker. The station wagon's engine was complaining loudly and a tail of black smoke plumed behind their car.
Peck reloaded his gun whilst trying to keep his adrenaline rush from shaking his hands too much. "Shit!" he spat as he dropped one of the bullets. It rolled away under his seat lost.
"You OK, Face?" Murdock asked worriedly.
Peck snorted. "Just dandy!" The firing had started up from behind them again. The sedan was past the tanker and bearing down on them once more. "Ditch the car?" Peck suggested, nodding towards a picnic area fast approaching.
Murdock nodded. "Mountains are big – easy to get lost in them!"
"And I am so dressed for a mountaineering expedition!" Peck muttered, glancing down at his powder blue suit and soft leather shoes.
The car screeched to a halt and they were both out in one bound, both heading left, up a steep slope and disappearing into a clump of evergreen trees. The few picnickers in the area just stared, their mouths dropping wider as the sedan pulled up, black suited, burly occupants alighted with weapons flashing in the afternoon sun, cursed and then made to follow their disappeared quarry.
Further up the track Murdock was jogging along quite happily. "Lovely scenery," he breathed. He ran an appreciative hand down the wrinkled bark of the nearest pine tree. "And the smells…" Peck laboured up behind him, panting hoarsely. "You're out of condition, Face," he admonished. "Didn't you do no exercise in prison? Shame on you!" he reached across and took the gun from Peck's limp hand. He shook his head. "I'll take that – what your parole officer don't see, your parole officer don't know!"
Peck opened his mouth to respond but the crack of a branch breaking and muttered curses drifting on the breeze towards them stopped him. Murdock puffed out his chest and snorted imperiously. "Come!" he ordered.
Peck shook his head but wearily followed. "Do you have any idea where we're going?" he muttered.
"My dear boy, I am a pilot!" Murdock pronounced in his best upper class English accent. "Inside my head is a map, a map of all the terrain I have ever flown over. I know precisely the location of every mountain, every stream, every molehill, why every traffic light even, in this whole damn state!"
"Yeah but do you know where we're going?" Peck repeated through gritted teeth.
"I know exactly where! Yonder, at the top of this little hillock we climb is a gully; a place of sanctuary, of escape from all the disenchantments. A place of hope and fulfilment; far flung from the barren batterings and dreaded disappointments of life. Yes, my friend, there is the refuge that you seek. A small babbling brook meanders gracefully through the patchwork of soft grass. There are tall pines that shade and shelter as they whisper, contentedly on the breeze…."
"Murdock!"
"… whilst overhead an eagle, the epitome of American freedom glides blissfully on the currents, watching, waiting…"
"Mur – oh shit!"
Murdock ceased both his physical and verbal rambling and turned to see Peck behind him, on his knees on the pine needle covered forest floor.
"Faceyman, what you doing down there?"
Peck looked up, his face red with both exertion and anger. He pulled himself to his feet and kicked out at what appeared to be an innocent fallen branch. "Who put that there?" he hissed. He looked down at his filthy pants. "Awwwh! Dry clean only – I am never gonna get these clean!"
"It's OK, Facey!" Murdock reached out his hand to steady the other man. As they touched he felt the unhealthy tension that was thrumming through Peck. "Calm down," he said soothingly. "You OK to carry on?"
Peck snorted. "I guess. Lead on, Murdock!"
They climbed for another few minutes and Murdock topped the rise first. He stopped. "Oh!"
"Oh, what?" Peck asked slithering along the last part of the climb. The forest had thinned until it stopped completely a few feet below the top, petering out into bare stark grey rock and the two men had to clamber up to a narrow plateau above. Eventually Peck stood beside Murdock stricken by what he saw. "No gully, no valley, no grass, no eagle! So much for what's inside your head, Murdock!"
"All right!" It was Murdock's turn to snap. "I maybe made a slight miscalculation!"
The narrow plateau on which they stood held a few giant boulders that dotted its surface in a random pattern but after that was a whole, great lump of nothing – a sheer drop of some forty feet. To their right a waterfall crashed from the height they were at down into the basin it had carved from the rock below.
"Oh great!" Peck breathed.
A bullet chose that particular moment to whistle past his head as the goons exited the trees below. "Face!" Murdock screeched as he took hold of the other man's shoulder and pulled him down behind the shelter of an ample boulder.
Murdock took the gun from out of the back of his pants where he had shoved it and managed to get off a few shots that stopped the goons climbing any nearer.
"What now?" Face asked, breathing hard and finding it even more difficult to control his adrenaline rush.
Murdock screwed up his face, opened his mouth to speak and then stopped. His features suddenly broke into the most exquisite of grins. "Oh my god!" he breathed.
"What?" Peck asked.
"Don't you get it?" Murdock was so excited he was almost levitating.
Peck put a grounding hand on the other's shoulder – just in case. "Get what?"
"Look at this place!" Murdock swept his arms wide, scrunching his eyebrows knowingly. "Do we fight or do we jump, Sundance?"
"Sundance? I thought…." Peck groaned as comprehension came to him. "Oh shit," he moaned bleakly.
Murdock shook his head. "No, you say 'We fight!'"
"With what?" Peck snapped back.
Murdock pouted. "Face! You're not doing it right!"
"Murdock – I am not doing it at all!"
"You want to fight, you can't swim, remember?"
"Murdock! This is not a scene from goddamn Butch Cassidy and the goddamn Sundance Kid! And besides, I can swim, not that it matters much cos the fall will probably kill us!
"No!" Murdock shrieked. "That's my line! You're ruining this for me, Face!"
A bullet twanged off the boulder they were hiding behind. Peck snorted. "How much ammo you got left?"
Murdock shrugged. "Only what I got in the chamber – three, four maybe."
"Right." Peck drew in a deep breath. "I want you to know I am only doing this cos I have to." He turned towards the deathly drop behind them but then hesitated. "Oh, and one other thing," He grabbed hold of Murdock and planted a strong but swift kiss on the pilot's startled lips. "I love you!"
"Funny, I don't recall that bit!" Murdock murmured as Peck pulled him towards the edge. Taking one last deep breath they leapt into the yawning abyss together.
"SHIT…………………………………….!"
TBC
