by Gwen Moffat
Mae said: ‘It was my Mom’s. It’s genuine. There’s a flashlight beside you, Seale. Show her.’
Seale picked up a heavy-duty torch and walked to the entrance, looking for the switch. A brilliant beam sliced the gloom. ‘Oh, my!’ Seale breathed.
Mae was pleased and flattered. ‘It’s bright, isn’t it? We don’t have to light the lantern no more every time we have to look for something in the daytime.’
‘It’s great.’ Seale touched Miss Pink’s shoulder. ‘Don’t trip over the bench.’
Miss Pink groped her way along the plank as the torch beam danced, seemingly at random, round the interior, coming to rest on what she now saw was a bare mattress, a pillow without its case, and the quilt.
‘Is it hand-sewn?’ Seale asked, and Miss Pink bent to examine the seams.
‘Every inch of it,’ Mae said. ‘I gotta go and wash out these cups.’
Miss Pink turned and saw the tent flap fall. Seale directed the beam on a heap of skins at the foot of the bed, pushed Miss Pink aside, lifted and felt them, looking round the tent as she did so. Miss Pink spread the quilt on the mattress and when Mae returned they were both bent over it, tracing a design of stylized yellow roses.
Coffee was made and they returned to the plank bench while Mae crouched low in what appeared to be the bucket seat from a car. ‘So what’s new?’ she asked when they were settled. ‘Did they find any sign of Shelley Patent yet?’
‘Not so far as I know,’ Seale said.
‘He could have drug her a long way.’
‘You think she was attacked by a bear?’ Miss Pink asked.
‘Of course she were! He got Tye, then he went after the woman.’
‘But the Search and Rescue people—’ Miss Pink began, and looked at Seale who said: ‘They’ve had dogs up there, Mae; there’s no sign of a second body.’
‘No human body,’ Miss Pink amended, without emphasis.
‘There’s been a lot of snow,’ Mae pointed out. ‘Dogs wouldn’t get any scent, see? Not if he drug her a long ways off.’
‘I suppose those two were asking for trouble,’ Miss Pink mused, her voice old and censorious: ‘Leaving the trail, going into a wild basin where no one ever goes, climbing a remote mountain … What was Tye doing up there? I mean, what was the object?’
Seale said: ‘You mean, he had something in mind other than the view?’
Miss Pink spread her hands. ‘Men like Tye always have ulterior motives.’
‘So what was he after?’
‘Tye was obsessed with the illegal killing of bears.’ Miss Pink looked from Seale’s attentive eyes to Mae who smiled thinly. ‘And then he’s killed by a bear,’ Mae said. ‘Funny, that.’
‘Oh, no!’ Miss Pink was earnest. ‘He wasn’t killed by a bear—at least, not by the dead bear—’
When she did not continue Mae asked: ‘What dead bear?’
‘The one in the grave. The one that had been skinned.’
Mae was so still she must have been holding her breath. For a while no one spoke, until Miss Pink, calmly sipping her coffee, said: ‘We’d better leave a message for Mr Trotter. We can’t keep Sim waiting any longer; we said we wouldn’t take more than half an hour.’
‘Oh, hell!’ Seale exclaimed. ‘Mae, I forgot. We’re starting the drive Thursday. Will Jed come?’
‘Yeah, he’ll come.’ Mae stood up, walked to the entrance and lifted the flap. Miss Pink and Seale rose and stood by the stove waiting for the woman to become aware of their proximity and move outside. When she did so, allowing the flap to fall in their faces, Seale lifted it and looked a query at Miss Pink who sketched a shrug and went towards her horse. Behind her Mae asked: ‘How was the bear killed?’
‘I’ve no idea,’ Seale said.
Miss Pink caught a movement in the forest and two large black and tan hounds came round the corral, circling fast, eyeing the visitors, alert but silent. They were followed by two horsemen, or rather, a man and a youth, both in old and functional clothes from their felt hats and padded jackets to ancient boots and spurs. Each carried a rifle in a scabbard on his saddle.
‘Hi, Jed,’ Seale called. ‘Hi, Billy. Thought we were going to miss you. Sim says will you help get our cows down on Thursday?’
The boy said quickly: ‘Me too? I’ll come.’
‘You got school,’ Seale said.
Billy grinned. He was about fourteen, and thin, the eyes too large in the bony face. All the Trotters looked older than their years. ‘I’m sick,’ Billy said, staring at Seale meaningfully, transferring his gaze to Miss Pink, passing over her to stare critically at her horse.
Jed Trotter dismounted. ‘You got a new rifle,’ Seale said, although he hadn’t taken it from its scabbard.
‘It’s used,’ he said, unsmiling. He had large dark eyes like his son: a lanky man, over six feet tall. ‘Tell Sim we’ll be there, if he’ll take our horses up in his trailer.’
Mae turned and went back in the tent. Seale said: ‘We were admiring your new stove; it throws out a terrific heat, Jed.’
He smiled then, slyly, but said nothing. Seale hesitated, shot a glance at Miss Pink and said: ‘This is my friend, Melinda.’
Miss Pink became fatuous. ‘Such a cosy home,’ she enthused. ‘A wood-burning stove, the beautiful skins—’
‘Coyote skins,’ Seale put in quickly.
‘Incredible.’ Miss Pink twinkled at them. ‘Back to the old system of barter. How many skins do you need to purchase a fine stove like that, Mr Trotter?’
Young Billy giggled, Trotter glanced at the tent and said carefully: ‘It depends, ma’am; the right pelts, properly cured—’
The flap of the tent was lifted. Mae said roughly: ‘Get some dinner before you goes out again searching. Because they’ve not found no sign of her yet, Seale says. But she said they found a dead bear—skinned. That’s nasty, Jed; that means poachers. And they say as how Tye weren’t killed by no bear.’
Miss Pink stood by her horse’s head and realized that, with one exception, everyone was tense. Even the dogs seemed to have stiffened. Young Billy swallowed, his eyes on his mother.
Only Jed Trotter remained unmoved. He took his rifle from its scabbard and held it towards Seale, displaying it.
‘A Winchester?’ Seale said flatly.
‘Bear rifle.’ He raised his eyebrows in apparent consternation. ‘I mean, this rifle will stop a bear in his tracks with the right bullet.’ He grinned wickedly. ‘But it didn’t—not yet. ’Course, I only had it since yesterday; no knowing what it shot for its last owner.’
Returning through the forest they were silent until the pines thinned enough for the horses to walk abreast, then Seale said without preamble: ‘She was warning him, wasn’t she?’
‘I’m sure of it. Her manner changed when she learned about the skinned bear. Would you say their affluence is sudden? None of them looks as if they get enough to eat.’
‘They’ll get plenty of meat, but deer meat and elk are hardly a balanced diet. Did you notice that there were only coyote skins in the tent? They had deer skins lying around when I called that other time, after I found the unbranded calves. There’s no closed season on coyotes, by the way; they’re varmints.’
‘So the deer—and elk?—skins had been removed. Would those have fetched a high enough price to purchase a stove and a rifle?’
‘I wouldn’t think so. The stove has to be over a thousand dollars, and that rifle looked new to me; it must have set him back a few hundred. Fifteen hundred is what I’d guess, and that’s a lot of money for the Trotters to have come into suddenly.’
‘How much is a bear pelt worth?’
‘Mel! You don’t think that!’ Miss Pink did not respond. ‘We’ll have to ask Sim,’ Seale went on, her voice troubled. ‘You really are bothered now: telling Mae that Sim knew where we were, that he was waiting for us—’
‘Just taking precautions.’
Pines crowded the trail and forced the chestnut to drop back, the riders
occupied with their own thoughts. As soon as she could, Seale let Miss Pink come abreast again.
‘Mae was scared,’ she said. ‘But Jed wasn’t. What did you make of that?’
‘Jed could know something that Mae doesn’t. Otherwise it’s just additional information, and I can’t see where it fits.’
‘Maybe it doesn’t. Coincidences do happen and it’s possible Jed and Billy shot several elk and sold the carcasses without keeping the meat for themselves. That way they might have got enough money for a stove and a rifle. And because no one in that family ever bought a hunting licence in his life, they’re worried about all the police activity, which is why they’ve cached the skins somewhere.… And now it appears there’s another poacher working the area, and he’s mean. Real mean.’
‘Yes,’ Miss Pink murmured, as if to herself. ‘Was she warning him about another poacher, or was she just warning him?’
They emerged from the trees and, starting across the horse pasture, saw two other riders approaching.
‘That’s Tara Osborn,’ Seale said. ‘I never expected that lady would turn out to be a neat rider. It’s a shame Lee can’t mount her on something decent. Look at that animal she’s on! All it’s got is bad vibes. Still, she’s coping well enough. The guy with her looks as if he’s never been on a horse in his life until now.’
Tara waved and her horse jerked into a canter. There was a startled cry from her companion as his own mount leapt forward. Tara spun back and ranged alongside him, laughing gaily. Miss Pink and Seale advanced, drew rein, and Tara introduced her husband.
George Osborn wore a Russian fur hat, a sheepskin, and smart twill trousers tucked inside scuffed cowboy boots which, it transpired, had been borrowed from Wilbur Farrell.
‘So he decided to take some time off,’ Tara was saying. ‘When I talked to him Sunday, it was pouring in Seattle and I said: “Why not come? No one’s indispensable”, and it is fun—’
A helicopter rattled up the canyon. Osborn observed it morosely; he had a clown’s face, now drawn in lines of resignation. Miss Pink thought he might suffer from ulcers; those lines could be the result of pain. Tara was explaining: ‘Of course when I called him none of this had happened—’ she waved a gloved hand at the helicopter. ‘It was fun, sweetie.’
Osborn said: ‘You’re incorrigible. A man’s dead and a woman’s missing.’ He addressed Miss Pink. ‘She got frightened about the bears; she needed company.’
‘George, you never listen. I tried to call you back and you’d already left. When we talked on Sunday nothing had happened—in fact—’ she giggled, ‘—that was the trouble. I was just a little bit bored—well, you’ve seen the place. I mean, look at this horse! We’ll leave tomorrow, sweetie; how about that? Fly down to Mexico?’
Osborn shrugged. ‘I only just got here. Let’s turn back now; I could do with a drink.’ He addressed Miss Pink. ‘She’s dragged me ten miles this afternoon and I’m sore.’
‘There was a very good reason for that,’ Tara said darkly. ‘The ranch is inundated with the Press, and since we don’t have a car here, the only way we could escape was riding. Poor George, you’re not over-fond of horses, are you?’
Miss Pink said: ‘What are the Press doing at the dude ranch?’
‘Oh, nothing sinister!’ Tara laughed. ‘They’re just fishing—’
‘And free-loading,’ Osborn put in sourly.
‘Now, sweetie: having the Press around is good publicity for Lee. The atmosphere,’ she told Miss Pink, ‘is a little strained; the only thing to do is get out from under everybody’s feet.’
‘I escaped them by helping Sim Logan move cattle. Poor Seale was less lucky; she had to show the police where the body was.’
‘You were up there today?’ Tara stared. ‘You went back?’
Seale shrugged. ‘Someone had to show them where the body was.’
Osborn looked at his wife. ‘Surely you didn’t expect them to leave the body in the mountains?’
‘I never thought about it. How unpleasant. So one of these helicopters had poor Irving’s body on board?’
‘You never met him,’ Osborn said.
‘I’ve heard enough about him.’ Tara turned to Miss Pink as they paced across the pasture. ‘Did you know that everyone disliked that man? No one can be all bad. Certainly no one deserves to die as horribly as he did.’
‘How did he die?’ Miss Pink was all innocence.
‘Why—the bear—’
‘Oh, I thought you had news of the autopsy, but how could you have? Stupid of me. You didn’t even know the body had been removed. And the other body: you haven’t heard about that?’
‘Other body?’ Tara’s horse slewed sideways.
‘The bear. Or rather, its carcass.’
‘They found a dead bear up there?’
‘They found part of it. The pelt and the head were gone. It had been skinned.’
The Osborns stared at her blankly. ‘Poaching,’ Seale explained. ‘It’s big business.’
Tara looked from her to Miss Pink, her eyes wide. ‘The bear’s body was near Tye’s?’
‘Near enough,’ Seale said cheerfully.
‘Near enough for what?’ She seemed to be infected by Seale’s mood and her eyes danced with horrified amusement. ‘You mean there’s a connection? Oh, my God.’ She turned to Osborn. ‘And I was bored!’
‘And I suppose that’s the last I’ll hear about a vacation in Mexico. Look, why don’t you ladies come over to the ranch for a civilized drink and we can talk about this astonishing—er—development in comfort, and in chairs?’
‘What a good idea, sweetie. Do come Miss Pink, and Seale.’
‘Later,’ Miss Pink said. ‘We have to collect men for the roundup on Thursday. A drink would be most welcome when we’ve completed our errands.’
‘That might take longer than you think.’ Tara was looking down the field. ‘You’ve got company.’
For the second time that day a police car was coming up the drive towards the house.
Chapter 9
Sheriff Murray was massive and slow, given to a briar pipe and a portentous manner. He wore a close-fitting woollen cap like a longshoreman: an indication that he might consider himself a local character. This, and the combination of western drawl and a keen glance, alerted Miss Pink. If his manner was a mask for stupidity, he represented nothing more than nuisance value. If he were pretending to be a stupid fellow emulating Maigret, he could be dangerous. Bluff or double bluff? She assumed the studied interest of the elderly foreigner fascinated by the mores of an alien culture, and wondered what was the significance of his happy acceptance of an audience when his business appeared to be with only one member of it.
As they sat at the kitchen table, drinking the inevitable coffee, tucking into Ginny’s carrot cake, there was an element of tradition about the occasion, of etiquette. The men discussed the low price of beef, damp hay, pink eye and foot rot, while the women listened politely, but carefully. Logan appeared to be so overcome by the sheriff’s wit that, in contrast to her son’s amusement, Ginny appeared disapproving. Etiquette. Everyone knew what was coming, to a point.
The sheriff decided it was time to close in. ‘You been wasting your time,’ he told Logan. ‘All your cows have drifted back. You gotta start over.’
‘Care to give us a hand?’ Logan asked. ‘We need all the riders we can get. We’ll be starting the drive Thursday.’
‘Yeah? Most of your cows will be on Wapiti?’
‘I hope so. We don’t know until we start.’
‘You won’t be welcome in Sundance a second time.’
Ginny stiffened, Seale’s eyelids drooped, Miss Pink observed Logan’s broad smile and polite eyes. ‘A second time?’
The sheriff looked at Seale. He said, with a trace of asperity: ‘That’s right; it was the two ladies in Sundance, not the boss. Now why was that?’
‘We were looking for cows,’ Seale said.
‘And for the missing hikers
,’ Miss Pink put in. ‘I’d met Tye, he wanted to climb a mountain; I put myself in his place. Desolation Peak was obvious from Dead Horse, Desolation is in Sundance So was Tye.’
‘You sound like you’re giving evidence, ma’am.’
‘I read crime novels.’
‘Is that so? Perhaps you can give us the benefit of your experience. Do you have a theory?’
‘Oh, no.’ She was prim. ‘I leave that to the experts.’
Everyone stared at the sheriff. ‘Well,’ he said, studying the table, ‘illegal killings are a way of life around here—’ He looked up sharply, focusing on Miss Pink.
‘You mean murder?’ she asked politely.
‘Now that’s amazing—’ he invited the others to share his amazement, ‘—I was talking about a grizzly, what most of us calls vermin, and she comes up with murder.’ As they continued to regard him with an expectancy that amounted to deference, he explained to Miss Pink: ‘ “Illegal killings” means grizzlies. There’s a lot of it about, isn’t there, Sim?’
‘Not a lot.’ Logan smiled, softening the contradiction. ‘Some.’
‘And them we don’t know about. Like murder.’ He turned back to Miss Pink. ‘Most murders go undetected.’
‘Really?’
He hesitated, pulled out a tobacco pouch, leaned back and knocked the dottle from his pipe into the ash pan. He filled the pipe and lit it. Miss Pink, recognizing that the silence had stretched so far he would be hard put to it to find a way of saving his face, decided she should help him.
‘This case,’ she said tentatively, ‘revolves round an illegal killing?’
He pulled on his pipe reflectively. ‘You might say that, ma’am.’
‘It’s poaching,’ Ginny said. ‘And you know that, Seth Murray.’
He looked astonished. ‘Of course it’s poaching!’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Not quite in the normal run of poaching though. Dead grizzlies is one thing, and that—’ he stared at Logan, ‘—we’re used to, aren’t we?’ He shook his head. ‘But killing a man is going a bit too far. I wonder, could Tye have been on to something?’
‘Where’s the connection?’ Miss Pink asked.