Free Takedown by W. G. Griffiths Page A

Pond.
    He checked his watch. 5:50. The train would be leaving Oyster Bay in two minutes and be here in eight.
Move, move, faster, faster.
He set the jack, pumped it up, and then pumped the other two. A lot of popping and squeaking but not much more movement.
     Maybe an inch and a half.
    He grabbed the torch and aimed it, shielding his face with his left hand. The cutting went so much faster when he held the
     torch. He glanced up through the smoke. The man in the boat was rowing toward him. He cursed. 5:54.
Move, move.
He grabbed at the large gravel stones and stacked up a small pile to set the torch on, again refocusing the flame. Oxygen
     was getting very low. He yanked the final fourth jack out of the bag, wishing he had brought a fifth. If this didn’t work,
     he wouldn’t likely get a second chance in the near future. The jack fell into place just before the flame, with more room
     to spare than the others had had. Pump, pump, pump. More popping and squeaking. Pump, pump, pump.
    “Hey!” the man in the boat yelled, rowing faster. “What are you doing up there?” The guy was close enough to see, big and
     strong, rowing for exercise.
Great, a jock,
Hess thought.
Worse, a hero jock.
    Pump, pump. Back to the first jack, two more pumps at the second, then the third, back to the first again, more on the fourth.
     Steel creaking, squeaking, wood splitting, cracking, the rail slowly widening. He grabbed the torch again and aimed it, the
     flame losing blue, gaining yellow, the roar quieting. The oxygen. He cursed and bore down, the gap in the rail substantially
     cut through but still holding on.
    “What?” He heard an engine. The train. 5:56. Early. He cursed, dropped the torch, attacked the jacks, his hands shaking as
     he pumped. The rail was still glowing red but jack seals were going to give out. How could sixty-four tons of pressure not
     be enough? Why hadn’t he brought five jacks? Why hadn’t he brought a bigger tank of oxygen? Why hadn’t he…
    Pop, pop.
    At first he thought it was a seal, but no, the rail was wider… separated. He looked down the track. The engine was louder,
     closer, but still no visual. He kept pumping. The rail was widening easier now. Pump, pump, pump. Wider, wider. “Come on,
     come on,” he said.
    One jack maxed out, then another until they were all extended as far as they could go. Good. But the hero jock was no longer
     yelling, just rowing harder than ever. Getting close to the shore. Hess looked toward the bird sanctuary and saw that the
     crane was still there. At least his escape route was clear.
    One last thing.
    He struggled to take off his left glove. The stupid thing had gone on easily enough. He pulled on each fingertip.
Come on.
He looked up. The big guy in the rowboat was almost at the bridge, headed for the shore. The glove finally came off, the
     Vaseline still on his fingers. He found a small tin of thumbtacks in his right front pocket. He clumsily emptied the tacks
     on the gravel, dropped to his knees, and pinned the glove onto a timber with the middle finger extended and the others curled
     up. Hopefully this little message would survive.
    Hess looked at the rowboat and cursed. The boat was empty and slowly floating away from the shore. Scrub trees moved and the
     jock appeared—shorts, muscular legs, sweat-drenched gray tank top, fighting branches and running. Hess’s hand reflexively
     went to his side, feeling for his jagged-bladed knife. His fingers slippedaround the handle and through spiked steel rings. The grip felt good, just as it had so many times in his bedroom. The jock
     was much bigger and stronger, but Hess was a soldier, a
called
soldier with a destiny yet to be fulfilled.
    The train.
The yellow nose of the locomotive with its four bright headlights led the way as the double-decker train steamed around the
     bend, full of rush-hour passengers on their way home from work. The hero rowboat man was halfway up the gravel hill, grunting,
     moving