Along Came a Spider (Alex Cross 1)

“Nah,” I said to Jezzie. “I’m just fine. There’s nothing wrong with me.”

I let the FBI agents and Sampson make the formal arrest of Jezzie Flanagan. Then I took a skiff back to the hotel. I packed and was on my way back to Washington within the hour.

CHAPTER 86

TWO DAYS after we returned to D.C., Sampson and I were back on the road. We were headed for Uyuni, Bolivia. We had reason to hope and believe that we might have finally found Maggie Rose Dunne.

Jezzie had talked and talked. Jezzie had traded information. She had refused to talk to the Bureau, though. She’d traded with me.

Uyuni is in the Andes Mountains, one hundred and ninety-one miles south of Oruro. The way to get there is to land a small plane in Río Mulato, then go by jeep or van to Uyuni.

A Ford Explorer held eight of us for the final leg of the difficult trip. I was in the minivan with Sampson, two special agents from Treasury, the U.S. ambassador to Bolivia, our driver, and Thomas and Katherine Rose Dunne.

Charles Chakely and Jezzie had both been willing to trade information about Maggie Rose during the last grueling thirty-six hours. The butchered body of Mike Devine had been found in his Washington apartment. The manhunt for Gary Soneji/Murphy had intensified after the body was discovered. But so far, nothing. Gary was certainly watching the story of our trip to Bolivia on TV. Gary was watching his story.

Chakely and Jezzie told virtually the same tale about the kidnapping. There had been an opportunity to take the ten-million-dollar ransom and get away with it. They couldn’t return the girl. They needed us to believe that Soneji/Murphy was the kidnapper. The girl could dispute that. They’d drawn the line at killing Maggie Rose, though. Or so they said back in Washington.

Samson and I were quiet inside the minivan for the last miles of the trip through the Andes. So was everyone else.

I watched the Dunnes as we approached Uyuni. They sat together quietly, a little distant from each other. As Katherine had told me, losing Maggie Rose had nearly destroyed their marriage. I was reminded of how much I had liked them in the beginning. I still liked Katherine Rose. We had talked for a while during the trip. She thanked me with genuine emotion and I would never forget that.

I hoped their little girl was waiting safely at the end of this long and horrible ordeal… I thought about Maggie Rose Dunne—a little girl I had never met, and was about to meet soon. I thought about all the prayers said for her, the placards held outside a D.C. courthouse, the candles burning in so many windows.

Sampson elbowed me as we drove through the village. “Look up the hill there, Al

ex. I won’t say this makes it all worthwhile. But maybe it comes close.”

The minivan was climbing a steep hill in the village of Uyuni. Tin and wood shacks lined both sides of what was virtually an alleyway cut into rock. Smoke spiraled from a couple of the tin rooftops. The narrow lane seemed to continue straight up into the Andes Mountains.

Maggie Rose was there waiting for us halfway up the road.

The eleven-year-old girl stood in front of one of the nearly identical shacks. She was with several other members of a family called Patino. She had been with them for nearly two years. It looked as if there were a dozen other children in the family.

From a hundred yards away, as the van strained up the rutted dirt road, we could all see her clearly.

Maggie Rose wore the same kind of loose shirt, cotton shorts, and thongs as the other Patino children, but her blond hair made her stand out. She was tan; she appeared to be in good health. She looked just like her beautiful mother.

The Patino family had no idea who she really was. They had never heard of Maggie Rose Dunne in Uyuni. Or in nearby Pulacayo, or in Ubina eleven miles over the high and mighty Andes Mountains. We knew that much from the Bolivian officials and police.

The Patino family had been paid for keeping the girl in the village, keeping her safe, but keeping her there. Maggie had been told by Mike Devine that there was nowhere for her to escape to. If she tried, she would be caught and she would be tortured. She would be kept under the ground for a long, long time.

I couldn’t take my eyes off her now. This little girl, who had come to mean so much to so many people. I thought of all the countless pictures and posters, and I couldn’t believe she was really standing there. After all this time.

Maggie Rose didn’t smile, or react in any way, as she watched us coming up the hill in the U.S. embassy van.

She didn’t seem happy that someone had finally come for her, that she was being rescued.

She appeared very confused, wounded, and afraid. She would take a step forward, then a step backward, then look back at her “family.”

I wondered if Maggie Rose knew what was happening. She had been severely traumatized. I wondered if she could feel anything at all. I was glad I could be there to help.

I thought of Jezzie again, and I shook my head involuntarily. The storm inside wouldn’t stop. How could she have done this to the little girl? For a couple of million dollars? For all the money in the known universe?

Katherine Rose was the first one out of the minivan. At that very moment, Maggie Rose opened her arms. “Mommy!” she cried out. Then, hesitating for only a split second, she seemed to leap forward. Maggie Rose ran toward her mother. They ran into each other’s arms.

For the next minute, I couldn’t see much of anything through my tears. I looked at Sampson and saw a tear seeping from under his dark glasses.

“Two tough de-tectives,” he said and grinned at me. It was that lone wolf’s smile I love.