Of course, we had to rely upon my memory to reach Mike’s hideout, and my memory wasn’t great, plus the fog had thickened and Mr. Needlemier crawled along, even when I yelled at him to speed up.
“Where is Hell’s Gate?” I asked him.
“Ah, I’ve done some research on that,” he answered, and passed a folder back to me. Inside were several pages printed from the Internet.
“The first Hell’s Gate we found is in Kenya,” Mr. Needlemier said. “There is another Hell’s Gate located in British Columbia and a third in New York City. However, the only mention we could find of a ‘hell’s gate’ that is also called ‘devil’s door’ is in Florida.”
“Florida?” I asked. I turned to the last page in the file.
“Called ‘Devil’s Millhopper,’ ” Mr. Needlemier continued.
“What’s a millhopper?”
“A place where corn is held before it is ground into meal.”
“A grinder?” I studied the picture. Shot from the top of a winding wooden stair leading to the rim, the picture showed a black hole about five hundred feet across, rimmed by tangled undergrowth and the tops of trees growing in the bottom of the pit. “You grind things up in it?”
“Yes. The oldest legend surrounding the millhopper concerns an Indian princess who was sucked into the hole by the devil. It is well known in the literature for, and I quote, ‘devouring sinners.’ Of course, geologists believe it is actually a sinkhole.”
“That’s it,” I said, slapping the file closed. “That’s the one they mean.”
“How can you be sure?” Op Nine asked.
“It’s the only one that goes by both names. Plus the grinder reference. It’s their style.”
“Whose style?” Mr. Needlemier asked.
“The demons,” Op Nine answered.
“The demons! Alfred, what have you gotten yourself into?”
“Well,” I said. “At least it’s not something really bad, like drugs or alcohol.”
A sign materialized in the swirling mist. It was the sign for the park entrance.
“There!” I said. “Right before the sign, that gravel road.”
“That road?” Mr. Needlemier asked. “Alfred, that road appears to go straight up.”
But he turned onto the road, and the gravel crunched beneath the tires of the Lexus. I sat holding the sword between my legs and it comforted me somehow. We crawled up the side of the mountain, the needle on the speedometer barely registering. I could see sweat shining on the back of Mr. Needlemier’s bald head.
“What is our plan?” Op Nine asked.
“I don’t have one,” I said.
“Perhaps this is the time to develop one.”
“It was hard for me to plan even when I wasn’t slowly going mad.”
Mr. Needlemier looked at me in the rearview mirror.
“Is this Mike person armed?” Op Nine asked.
“Oh, you can bet on it.”
“But we are not.”
“Just the demon blasters. They’d blow a hole in him the size of Nebraska.”
“Do we wish to do that, though? Blow a hole in him the size of Nebraska?” Op Nine asked.
“Timing’s everything,” I said. “First we get the Vessel; then we blow a hole in him the size of Nebraska.”
“To what purpose, if we have the Vessel?”
“He’s the cause of it all,” I said, my face growing hot.
“He’s responsible.”
“I still do not understand. Why do you need to kill him, Alfred?”
“One word,” I said. “Maggots.”
We reached the final crest before the road leveled off at the top of the mountain. I ordered Mr. Needlemier to stop the car. We got out. It was very cold. The fog of our breath mixed with the fog that had wrapped itself around the world.
We gathered around the open trunk. I loaded fresh clips into the 3XDs and handed one to Op Nine. I stuck the sword into my belt and said to Needlemier, “Stay here with the car.”
He nodded rapidly, looking relieved. Op Nine was staring at the 3XD.
“What is this?” he asked.
“Your life’s work.”
“I made this?” He slowly shook his head. “A weapon! Seems a waste of a life.”
“Well, they’ve come in pretty handy. You put my blood in the bullets.”
“I did?” He shook his head again.
“What are you going to do, Alfred?” Mr. Needlemier asked. His voice had gone high-pitched in his excitement.
“That which must be done,” I said, and started up the last hundred feet to the top of the mountain.