Finn helped him clear away more dirt around the outside of that corner of the box, both of them digging carefully until a large silver oxygen tank was revealed. It had a short, narrow rubber tube running from the tank to the small hole in the box that had imprisoned Simon. For the first time, all of them became aware of the very, very faint hissing sound of oxygen escaping.

At the end of the tank with the valve and tube, there was also a plain metal box surrounding the valve.

Finn hesitated. “Prints?”

“I doubt it,” Bishop replied. “Still . . .” He removed a pair of exam gloves from a jacket pocket and put them on before carefully prying the small box open. There was a tangle of electronics inside—and a cell phone whose lighted surface showed plus four hours and forty-seven minutes and counting upward.

“Is that how long he was buried?” Nellie asked.

Miranda said slowly, “Plus. If that’s a timer set to begin releasing oxygen just before the ambient air in the box would have run out, the clock would have started at zero. So we can add approximately five hours to that time. Which means he was probably here close to ten hours.”

Hollis said, “Since around dark last night. So where was he for the twenty-four hours or so after he was taken? No sign of a gag, and we can assume he would have yelled for help if he could have. Unless he was unconscious or otherwise unable to make a sound. Either the blitz attack left him out for quite a while or he was drugged.”

“Which,” Miranda said, “could tell us more about the unsub. Drugs could mean possible medical training. We really need to talk to Simon. Find out what he remembers.”

Bishop very carefully stopped the timer on the cell phone, and immediately they heard the soft hissing stop. He produced an evidence bag from a pocket and put the gadget into it. He looked at Finn. “As soon as your deputies come back to watch this area until we can conduct a thorough search after daylight, let’s get down off this mountain and talk to Simon.”

Nobody argued.

—

“I DON’T REMEMBER anything,” Simon told them ruefully. He was in bed and in a very spacious room at the hospital, torn between being glad of the warmth and comfort, for which he had a new appreciation, and the awareness that he really was all right and should have been up and about now that he was. “Walking home, feeling my head explode—and then waking up in that damned box.”

Bishop and Finn had stopped to talk to the doctor, and exchanged glances now before Bishop said, “You were also injected with a sedative strong enough to keep you out for nearly twenty-four hours before you were placed in the box.”

Simon blinked. “I was?”

“Given when you were taken, and everything that was happening before and after you were taken, our guess is that you were probably kept in the trunk of a car or some other relatively safe place until he could transport you up the mountain. Either he took some of that time to prepare the box or else already had it ready. For you or someone else.”