The Rule of Four Read Online Free PDF

as melted snow drips through the holes. There is movement above.
    “You’re going to get us caught,”
I whisper.
    “He says he can’t get reception anywhere else,” Gil says.
    “Bill’s never done this before,” Paul whispers back.
    I pull at his arm, but he jerks free. When he lights up the silver face of the pager and shows it to us, I see three numbers: 911.
    “What’s that supposed to mean?” Charlie whispers.
    “Bill must’ve found something,” Paul says, losing patience. “I need to find him.”
    Foot traffic in front of Edwards mashes fresh snow through the manhole. Charlie is getting tense.
    “Look,” he says, “it’s a fluke. You can’t get reception down he—”
    But he’s interrupted by the pager, which begins to beep again. Now the message is a phone number: 116-7718.
    “What’s that?” Gil asks.
    Paul turns the screen upside-down, forming text from the digits: BILL-911.
    “I’m getting out of here
now
,” Paul says.
    Charlie shakes his head. “Not using that manhole. Too many people up there.”
    “He wants to use the exit at Ivy,” Gil says. “I told him it was too far. We can go back to Clio. It’s still a couple minutes before the proctors switch.”
    In the distance, tiny sets of red beads are gathering. Rats are sitting on their haunches, watching.
    “What’s so important?” I ask Paul.
    “We’re onto something big—” he begins to say.
    But Charlie interrupts. “Clio’s our best shot,” he agrees. After checking his watch, he starts to walk north. “7:24. We need to get moving.”

Chapter 3
                           
     
    The shape of the corridor remains boxy as we keep north, but the walls, which were once concrete, are increasingly of stone. I can hear my father’s voice, explaining the etymology of the word
sarcophagus
.
    From the Greek meaning “flesh-eating” . . . because Greek coffins were made of limestone, which consumed the entire body—everything but the teeth—within forty days.
    Gil’s lead has grown to twenty feet. Like Charlie, he moves quickly, accustomed to the landscape. Paul’s silhouette blinks in and out of the uneven light. His hair is matted against his forehead, tamped down with sweat, and I remember that he’s hardly slept in days.
    Thirty yards up, we find Gil waiting for us, his eyes shifting from place to place as he shepherds us toward the exit. He’s looking for a backup plan. We’re taking too long.
    I close my eyes, trying to see a map of campus in my thoughts.
    “Just fifty more feet,” Charlie calls to Paul. “A hundred at most.”
    When we arrive below the manhole near Clio, Gil turns to us.
    “I’ll pop the lid and look out. Get ready to run back the way we came.” He glances down. “I’ve got 7:29.”
    He grips the lowest step iron, lifts himself into position, and raises his forearm against the manhole cover. Before applying pressure, he looks over his shoulder and says, “Remember, the proctors can’t come down here to get us. All they can do is tell us to come out. Stay down and don’t say anyone’s name. Got it?”
    The three of us nod.
    Gil takes a deep breath, shoves his fist upward, and pivots the cover against his elbow. It cracks open half a foot. He takes a quick inventory—then a voice comes from above.
    “Don’t move! Stay right there!”
    I can hear Gil hiss, “
Shit
.”
    Grabbing his shirt, Charlie pulls him back, catching him as he loses his footing.
    “Go! Over there! Turn your flashlight off!”
    I stumble into the darkness, pressing Paul in front of me. I try to remember my way.
    Stay to the right. Pipes on the left, stay to the right.
    My shoulder glances the wall and tears my shirt. Paul is staggering, exhausted by the heat. We manage twenty paces stumbling over each other before Charlie stops us so Gil can catch up. In the distance a flashlight enters the tunnel through the open manhole. An arm descends after it, followed by a head.
    “Come out of