by steve higgs
He opened his mouth to answer but paused as if he didn’t know the answer, then replied, sounding almost flustered, ‘It’s a small village. Everyone knows everything.’
I pursed my lips but decided not to pursue it. ‘Well, I saw a creature I couldn’t identify but I have not been convinced the creature killed Marie Caron. Until I do, I remain here.’
‘What,’ he scoffed, turning to his father on the Ski-Doo next to him. ‘He thinks there’s a murderer in the mountains and the Yeti is just a friendly woodland creature.’
His father pulled down the scarf that covered his mouth, then smiled broadly as he said, ‘I dare say he does, Gils. Let’s hope we don’t see him today anyway.’
I didn’t rise to their goading, there were more important tasks to focus our effort on, but I saw Big Ben squinting at Gils as if trying to decide whether to say something or not. I guess he filed the insults away for later as he took another bite of his croissant and chewed it slowly while continuing to stare at the back of Gils’s head.
Francois finished organising the crowd into groups and set the search party in motion. Gils waved his hand as he twisted his throttle. Then he pulled away, his father following and the rest of us peeled off to form a snaking line as we set off up the mountain.
The call to tell us the search was over came at 1047hrs. They probably would have been found sooner but the deep snow that fell overnight hampered everything the search party were attempting to do. It was Hubert’s team that had found the bodies, the news that they were dead quickly followed by a report that they had been killed not by the storm but by the Yeti. Big Ben and I exchanged grim looks and the ski instructor made horrified noises until Big Ben calmed her with a strong arm around her shoulders that might have been what she was angling for anyway.
Each group only had one radio, ours was controlled by Gils, so I asked him, ‘Where were they found?’
‘At the bottom of Trevalle Bluff. It’s on the western face on one of the black routes. Why?’
‘Because that’s where we are going. I need to see the site for myself.’
Gils cranked his throttle to swing his machine around and position it in front of mine like the top of a tee. ‘No. You’ll be coming back to the hotel now. These Ski-Doos are expensive to maintain and run. The search is over, which means play time is over.’ He swung his head around and stood up in his seat to address everyone. ‘We’re heading back down now.’ Then he looked right at me, using his extra height so he could look down. ‘That means you too.’
I laughed. I hadn’t really meant to but watching him try to intimidate me was funny. I raised my voice, ‘Ben.’
‘Yup?’ he had been comforting the ski instructor still, his head down and probably whispering something in her ear until I called.
‘We are off to see the attack site. Are you ready?’
‘No, you’re not,’ snapped Gils.
I leaned forward on my handlebars to get in his face. ‘I’m not sure what is motivating you, Gils, but unless you plan to wrestle this machine away from me, I am going to the attack site. They may need a hand there, but either way, I am here to conduct an investigation and that is what I am going to do. Trying to stop me will not profit you in any way.’ I was going to add that the Ski-Doo would be returned shortly and in the same condition it was in now and that I was happy to pay for the fuel or even a rental charge, but I didn’t get to that bit because he tried to hit me.
Maybe he just wasn’t used to being argued with or challenged or maybe he is just a bully, but his arm shot out toward my jaw and I was well within striking distance.
Big Ben caught it easily though, hooking a hand into the crook of Gils’s arm as he threw it forward. Gils had been focused on me, and with a padded helmet on, he hadn’t heard my friend walking up behind him. Gils’s face registered surprise before Big Ben levered upward to yank the man from his Ski-Doo and dump him on his arse next to it.
‘Wow,’ said Alice who was riding as a passenger of Jagjit’s machine.
The motor of Gils’s machine was still running so Big Ben climbed on, abandoning his own where he had left it, twisted the throttle and pulled away saying, ‘Shall we?’ As he headed back the way we had come. I quickly caught up and took the lead since I had a rough idea where we were going. One advantage of a long army career is you learn to map read from topography. Like everything else, if you practice it, you get good, so I had more or less memorised the map of the mountains and had been able to navigate using the two largest peaks to get my bearings.
As we chewed a path through the snow, I wondered if Gils might race after us to continue the fight, but when I looked back, they were nowhere in sight.
Yeti Attack. Thursday, December 1st 1155hrs
Navigating to the site was surprisingly easy, not because I had a compass inside my head, but because we could see it when we reached the top of the very first rise. They were two-hundred feet below us and half a mile away with the sun on our backs. It still took over an hour to get to it, by which time Francois had been joined by Hubert and another team of searchers that had been designated an area not too far away. The hotel guests that were among the volunteers were waiting to be taken down the mountain but there had been staff from the hotels, and villagers that worked in other businesses that had been pressed into digging the bodies out.
It was grim work and tiring. Big Ben saw what was going on, the two of us joining the work party soundlessly except for a word to keep Jagjit and Alice with the Ski-Doos. It wasn’t that I thought them too weak to handle it, I just didn’t want either of them to see sights that would stay with them forever. Big Ben and I were already scarred.
Most of the work was already done though, the bodies were no more than a few inches down in the snow where they had fallen. It was at the edge of a short drop so the air was blowing over it, making the snow thinner there. It was pink in places, no doubt that was how it had been spotted. Francois was standing near the feet of one of the bodies, not moving, not speaking, just staring at it silently, the cold breeze coming up the hill making his wispy hair flutter. The sun had warmed the mountain and was amplified by the snow reflecting it. It was cold only when the wind blew.
As I joined him, he turned to see who it was. I got a rueful nod of his head as he said, ‘I have to tell their parents. I see bodies every year. There is always a climber that falls or someone that ignores the warning signs and skis where they shouldn’t. Or there will be a paraglider that hasn’t checked his equipment. It’s never been someone I knew until this week though.’
The young man on the icy ground in front of me was barely recognisable as human. Only his clothes gave it away. His face looked like it had gone through a wood chipper. I forced myself to focus on the details as I picked a clean bit of snow to kneel in. Leaning over the body, I could inspect the wounds. ‘Can I touch him?’ I asked without turning my head.
‘Yes,’ Francois replied. ‘Just don’t move him. I need to take photographs yet. Hubert sent for my camera equipment. The storm knocked out the phone lines and damaged the cable car so the coroner cannot get here until we fix it. I have to catalogue the scene and arrange for the bodies to be removed and stored until I can transfer them.’
I was thinking about the logistics of it when I realised what he had said. ‘The cable car is broken?’
‘A tree came down and hit the cable. They have to perform a one hundred percent inspection of the cable millimetre by millimetre before they can allow it to run again. It will take at least a day and far longer than that if they find any damage.’
I bit my lip in frustration. I wasn’t going to see Amanda any time soon, but I had two dead men in front of me that would laugh at my petty concerns. I tuned myself back into what I was doing. The wounds I could see did not look machine made, nor did they look like knife wounds or bullet wounds or any type of wounds I had ever seen. If I had to give an answer, I would have said they looked like bite marks. It was a gruesome sight. I wasn’t sure what I was l
ooking for, but when I saw it, I had to force myself to not react. It was the clue I was mostly praying I would not find, but there it was and since it meant I could no longer trust anyone here, I kept it to myself.
I moved to the other victim looking for the same piece of evidence and I found it instantly. Now that I knew what I was facing, and my worst fears were confirmed, I needed to speak with my assistant Jane more than ever. She would be able to delve where I couldn’t and probably find out who was lying to me and who was not.
How long would the phone line be down?
I wanted to stand up to ask the question out loud because I believed that if there is a God up there, he has a massive sense of irony. I didn’t bother though because even if he did pick that exact moment to fix the phones, there would be no signal at this altitude anyway. Instead, I left the poor young men behind me and returned to my Ski-Doo. On the way there, I spotted something in the snow. Where the loose powder was being blown around, there was a line in the snow leading to the bodies. I knelt to inspect it. The line was a deep depression in the snow that was mostly hidden by the fresh powder but had been cut into the older snow beneath. It was four inches across and went on as far as I could see in both directions. I couldn’t actually see all that far because the powder was covering it and wouldn’t have seen it at all if I hadn’t stepped over it. The unnatural appearance of a straight line had drawn my eye though. Now that I knew it was there, I followed it a little way, losing it under the fresh snow then spotting it again where the snow was thinner. It led away from the attack site and down the slope in the direction of the resort.
So, what was it?
Curious, I tried to find another one running parallel. I judged the distance and began wafting the powdery snow away with my hands. I had to be gentle so I wouldn’t destroy the mark while I was looking for it but I found nothing. Undeterred, I tried on the other side of the track, striking gold almost immediately and now I had a pair of parallel tracks that left a deep impression in already compacted snow.
‘What have you found?’ asked Francois. I hadn’t heard him approach but for once the surprise didn’t make me jump. I hadn’t wanted him to see but now that he had, I really didn’t want him to realise that he was suddenly among my long list of suspects. I showed him the two tracks. ‘What do you think made it?’ he asked.
‘I have no idea. I am not given to believe in coincidence though.’
We exchanged a glance but were distracted by the appearance of three more Ski-Doos coming up the slope on a direct path for us. They were riding in an arrow formation and I could already see that it was Vermont Wensdale with Arthur and Stefan flanking him because of the capes and long coats flapping behind them.
‘Heads up,’ I murmured to Big Ben as I got back to my machine. The sound of the approaching party hadn’t reached anyone else as the breeze was carrying it away, so I was the only one on the slope that had seen Vermont coming. Big Ben swung around in his seat then yawned to show his disinterest in a kind of, “fought them before, beat them, can’t be bothered to teach them another lesson,” kind of way.
‘Do we stay?’ Big Ben asked.
‘Only long enough to check they are not going to cause Francois any trouble.’ After saying that, I watched the police chief cross to the Snow-Cat tracked vehicle and wave it off. It was taking the hotel guests back but was leaving a small party of others behind. I could see those still here were staff from the hotels as they each had on one of two different coats, each with the emblem from their hotel. It was worth noting that despite the two owners hating each other, the staff bore no animosity or rivalry at all. Or, if they did, it had been set aside to deal with the more pressing matter of finding and now caring for the two young men.
‘Check for tracks,’ Vermont instructed his henchmen as he skidded to a stop. He paid no attention to anyone else as if all others were so insignificant that he didn’t see them. However, as Stefan and Arthur fanned out, their eyes on the ground, Vermont made a beeline for Francois. ‘The beast has claimed two more victims, yes?’ Francois nodded but didn’t reply. ‘Then time is of the essence. This beast will not stop until it is slain. It is a good thing I came.’
He turned to see what his men were doing. ‘Anything?’ he called at a volume they would hear. Arthur held up a hand. I had no idea what he might have found but he was way over to the left of us and appeared to have found something because Vermont raced over to him on foot, then the pair of them came back for their machine and within two minutes of arriving, they had gone again.
‘He sure is entertaining,’ observed Jagjit.
I couldn’t argue with his statement, but said, ‘Let’s get back. I have research to do.’
Amanda and Jane. Thursday, December 1st 1400hrs
My quest to speak with Mrs Caron didn’t get very far, or more accurately, it failed to get me a result. Michel Masson, the hotel manager assured me she was not in the hotel but assured me he had passed on my previous message and would do so again. There wasn’t much more I could do in pursuing her, so I put the task off again and sought out some food.
As I finished my sandwich, a rumour the phones were back up spread through the restaurant like wildfire. All around me, people pulled their phones out and started to check them. The air was filled with beeps as messages, emails and other notifications landed all at once. I was among those with my phone in my hands, eagerly checking to see if could now connect with Amanda.
My French onion soup and bread was left to cool while I read the messages that had just landed. I had several texts from Amanda staring at 0803hrs with a breezy, “Good morning.” Shortly after that she must have learned that the cable car was out because that was what her message was telling me. I elected not to read any more of them and called her instead.
‘Tempest,’ she said suddenly as if she had snapped up the phone in desperation to speak with me. ‘Is everything alright?’
‘The cell tower got knocked out. The phones have been down until now. Otherwise, the answer to your question depends upon one’s perspective: there have been two more deaths.’
I heard her take a sharp intake of breath. ‘Two more? And are they supposed to be Yeti attacks?’
‘Yeah, about that. My theory that it would be a man in a suit?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Well… it’s not.’
I could almost hear her cogs grinding as she processed that bit of information. ‘It’s not. So, what is it then?’
‘A YETI!’ I delivered with a ridiculous vaudevillian cackle. I switched my voice back to normal to say, ‘Whatever it is, it is not a creature that exists as far as the planet is aware and it chased and almost ate me yesterday.’
‘Definitely not a man in a really good costume?’ she questioned. I would have questioned it too if I hadn’t seen it.
‘It was somewhere near nine-feet-tall and opened its mouth when it roared at me. It is not a man. This thing had a mouth whose bite might have to be measured by radius. A bit like my mother,’ I added.
‘Wow. Okay. So, what are you doing now?’
‘I’m still investigating. Regardless that the creature blamed for the deaths is actually a creature, I am not buying the idea that this is some undiscovered monster that has lived in the Alps undetected for centuries.’
‘What is it then?’
‘I haven’t worked that bit out yet,’ I admitted. ‘But I looked at the latest victims and… look I can’t talk openly because, other than my friends, I don’t know who I can trust. I need to speak with Jane and get her to do some more research. I have a few specific questions to ask her.’
‘Understood. Have you any idea how long it will take them to fix the cable car? The station at this end is closed and no one else seems to know anything.’
‘They told me it would be many hours because they have to inspect the whole length of the cable. I guess they don’t want people plunging to their deaths. If they find any damage it will be days before it reopens I guess.’
I sighed. ‘This is annoying.’
‘Yes, it is,’ she agreed. We talked for a bit and then she let me go because I had work to do: Jane had emailed.
Boss,
There wasn’t much to find on the Chevaliers or the Carons other than family history and mundane facts about their business interests. No one in either family has a criminal record, everyone was educated to a high level and Gils Chevalier graduated from the Sorbonne summa cum laude for law and business. There is nothing about a feud between the two families that I could find.
The Yeti has several reported incidents across the Alps
1832 B. H Hodgson’s Yeti Report
1889 Major Waddell’s Yeti Prints
1903-1904 British Army Shoots a Yeti
1913 The French Snowman
1921 September 22nd Colonel Hogarth-Boynes’s Yeti Sighting
1922 William Knight’s Yeti Sighting
1923 Major Cameron’s Experience
Please see attached document for full list
I began scanning the entries but did not read them all as there were so many. Opening one at random, I read that Colonel Hogarth-Boynes had seen and given chase with his Lieutenant when they rounded a rock formation and spotted a tall creature with white fur. His report was detailed, even noting the time at which the event occurred. The Yeti legend was already established so he was most likely seeking notoriety for killing the beast and presenting it to the world as his trophy. Given that the time was listed as early evening, I suspected it more likely he had been at the gin in the Officers’ Mess and had imagined the whole thing.
Jane’s report then switched to Marie Caron; the person I had asked her to pay special attention to.
Marie Caron attended the prestigious Institut Villa Dellareui in Paris which was where she met Priscille Peran. I have attached a photograph from their graduating school year but couldn’t find one that listed names beneath each girl. I was able to lift the social media profile for her though so I have provided the best head shot I could find. A chunk of her past is missing. About eighteen months ago, all her social media feed across all platforms is just gone but until then she was prolific. It slowly started coming back after a gap of nearly four months. I figured this was the smoking gun I was looking for and I will admit it took some convoluted digging to find it through other contacts in her friends list.