Jagger frowned, then nodded. "So what?"

"If we both thought it was speeding up, that means it was coming from one of the stations, right?"

Jagger shrugged. "I guess."

"Don't most of the trains leave the city heading north?"

"How the fuck should I know?" Jagger growled.

Jeff ignored the question. "Because if they do, then at least we know which way we're going." He pointed in the direction the train had gone. Its rumble had almost completely faded away. "If that train was heading out, that way's gotta be north. Pretty soon it'll be running along the river. The tracks come out around Seventy-second Street-we might just be able to walk right out of this tunnel."

They headed in the direction Jeff thought was north, and this time he took careful note of how many paces he took before they came to the next alcove.

One hundred eighty-four.

"I never would've made it," Jagger said softly, and Jeff realized that both of them had been trying to measure the distance. "I guess maybe I owe you one, too."

They kept walking, moving steadily, until they came to the cross passage they'd used earlier.

Neither of them were tempted to turn into it.

A few hundred yards later, Jagger grabbed hold of Jeff's shoulder. "Holy shit," he breathed. "Would you look at that?"

For a second Jeff didn't trust his vision-it had to be a hallucination. But as they took a few more steps, he realized it wasn't a trick of his eye.

There was light ahead.

Daylight.

CHAPTER 23

The familiar beep of the answering machine in Jeff's apartment signaling a message waiting was so unexpected that both Keith and Heather stopped short at the door. Their eyes locked on the machine, the same thought crashing into both their heads.

Jeff!

He'd gotten out of the tunnels and was calling for help and-

And both of them hesitated before they'd taken more than a single step toward the machine. Why would Jeff call here? He couldn't know they were looking for him, let alone that his father was staying in his apartment. The red light continued to blink and the beep sounded again.

"No one knows I'm here," Keith said.

Where a moment ago both of them had been eager to listen to the message, they were now reluctant. Why would anyone call here?

"Probably my foreman," Keith said, but the lack of conviction in his voice told Heather he didn't really believe it. Finally, Heather went over and pressed the button.

"One new message," the impersonal voice of the machine intoned.

"Keith? Are you there? If you're there, you pick the phone up right now!" It was Mary's voice, and the edge on it told Keith his wife was on the verge of hysteria. There was a barely perceptible pause, and then she went on. "I know you're staying there-Vic DiMarco says he hasn't seen you since day before yesterday. You have to be at Jeff's. I don't see how you can stand it, with all his things around you-" She abruptly cut off her own words and Keith could almost hear her struggling to regain control of herself. Then she started over: "There's going to be a memorial mass for Jeff tomorrow. I was going to hold it out here at St. Barnabas, but then-well, I started thinking about how much Jeff loved the city, and how many friends he has there, and how much he loved St. Patrick's. So the mass is going to be there. At one o'clock tomorrow afternoon. I tried to call Heather, but she's not home. I'll keep trying…" Her voice trailed off, and now Keith had the distinct impression she was trying to think of more to say, if for no other reason than to avoid hanging up the telephone. Finally, she spoke again, and now her voice had a flat, defeated quality. "If you get this, please call me back, Keith."

There was a click, and then the computer-generated voice spoke again: "1:52 p.m."

As the machine fell silent, neither Keith nor Heather said anything. Keith reached out and pressed the button that activated the outgoing message on the machine, and Jeff's voice emerged from the tinny speaker. "Hi! You know what to do, so go ahead and do it. I'll call you back as soon as I can!"

They both listened to the message, then Keith shook his head. "I can't erase it. We kept it on all through the trial because we were sure he was coming home. And I'm still sure."

Heather chewed at her lower lip. "What about the memorial tomorrow?"

"What about it?" Keith asked, a note of stubbornness creeping into his voice that told Heather what he was thinking as clearly as any words could have.

"We have to go," Heather said.

"But he's not dead!" Keith's voice began to rise. "What are we supposed to do, sit there acting like he's dead when we don't believe it?"

"I think we need to be there anyway," Heather replied. "If neither one of us goes, how will it look? Everyone else thinks that Jeff is dead, and if we don't go to the mass-"

"I don't give a damn what anyone thinks," Keith cut in. "Going to that mass is like admitting he's dead. I'm damned if-"

Suddenly, all Heather's tension erupted in pure anger. "Why doesn't anyone matter except you?" she demanded. "Don't you care about how anyone but you feels? And it's not admitting he's dead!"

"The hell it isn't!" Keith shot back. "It's not just a mass- it's a funeral mass. It's praying for the dead."

Heather hardly let him finish. "Then don't say the prayers for the dead! Pray that we find him-pray that he's all right- pray for any damn thing you want!" Her eyes fixed on him. "And call Mary. Don't be the same kind of asshole my dad is to my mother!" Shocked by her own outburst, Heather clapped a hand over her mouth for a second, then shook her head almost violently. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I shouldn't have said that. I mean-"

But now it was Keith shaking his head. "It's okay," he told her, his own anger draining away as quickly as hers. "You're right-no matter what problems Mary and I have, she shouldn't have to go through all this alone." For the first time since they'd come into Jeff's apartment, he smiled. "Actually, one of the main things we fought about was you- Mary always thought you were the best thing that ever happened to Jeff, and as I'm sure you know, I didn't agree. So I guess it turns out I was wrong about that." He picked up the phone and dialed Mary's number. "It's me," he said when she picked up. "You're right-I'm at Jeff's. I'm-well, if I told you what I'm doing, you'd only think I was crazier than you already do."

"You're right," Mary replied. "I don't want to know." There was a short silence. "Just be at the mass tomorrow, all right?"

Before Keith could reply, the phone went dead in his hand.

I still say it can't be this easy," Jeff said. The patch of daylight had been growing steadily, and now it seemed to be drawing them out of the grim shadows of the railroad tunnel like a magnet.

"Why not?" Jagger demanded, his eyes fixed on the expanse of blue sky ahead. "All they said was we had to get out-that if we could get out we'd be free." He took another step toward the bright beacon, but Jeff's fingers closed on his arm, holding him back.

"It can't be that easy," he said. "They're not going to just let us walk out." Now he had an uneasy feeling that they weren't actually alone in the shadows, that somewhere in the darkness, someone was watching them. He glanced around, but his eyes had already been blinded by the brilliant daylight ahead, and in contrast, the shadows behind him were an impenetrable pitch-black.

If there were people behind them-and he thought he could almost feel them now-he and Jagger would be framed in perfect silhouette against the bright backdrop of the sky. He moved off the center of the track like a creature of the darkness reacting to the dangers of daylight.

But Jagger was already moving toward the light again. Not wanting to lose his companion, Jeff followed him. After another eighty paces or so they could see the mouth of the tunnel. Though there was still a roof over the tracks and a solid concrete wall to the east, the west side of the tracks was open to the Hudson River. To the north they could see the George Washington Bridge, and across the river the wooded bluffs of New Jersey.