There was a movement in the darkness ahead of me and then I heard the crunch of Mac’s footsteps coming to the cabin door. ‘Stay out of here, Mac,’ I yelled.
My eyes were getting accustomed to the interior darkness and I could see the light patch of a window at the back of the cabin. I dropped to one knee in a crouch and looked around slowly. Sure enough, the light patch was momentarily eclipsed as someone moved across it and I had my man placed. He was moving from left to right, trying to get to the door unnoticed. I dived for where I thought his legs were and grabbed him, and he fell on top of me but didn’t come to the ground.
Then I felt a sharp pain thumping in my shoulder and had to let go and there was a boot in my face before I could roll over out of the way. By the time I stumbled to the door there was just the sound of running footsteps disappearing in the distance, and I saw Clare bending over a prostrate figure.
It was Mac, and he got groggily to his feet as I walked up. ‘Are you all right?’
He held his belly. ‘He…just rammed…me,’ he whispered painfully. ‘Knocked the wind out of me.’
‘Take it easy,’ I said.
‘We’d better get him into the cabin,’ said Clare.
‘Stay away from there,’ I said harshly. ‘It’s ready to go off like a bomb. There’s a flashlamp in the Land-Rover; will you get it?’
She went away and I walked Mac a few steps to a stump he could sit on. He was wheezing like an old steam engine and I cursed the man who’d done that to him. Clare came back with the lamp and flashed it at me. ‘My God!’ she exclaimed. ‘What happened to your face?’
‘It got stepped on. Give me the torch.’ I went into the cabin and looked around. The stink of kerosene made me gag and I saw the reason why it should; the place was a mess—all the sheets and blankets had been ripped from the beds, and the mattresses had been knifed open to liberate the stuffing. All this had been piled in the middle of the floor and doused with kerosene. There must have been five gallons because the floor was swimming.
I collected a pressure lantern and some cans from the larder and joined the others. ‘We’ll have to camp out tonight,’ I said. ‘The cabin’s too dangerous to use until we clean it out. It’s lucky I didn’t unpack the truck—we still have blankets we can use.’
Mac was better and breathing more easily. He said, ‘What’s wrong with the cabin?’ I told him and he cursed freely until he recollected that Clare was by his elbow. ‘Sorry,’ he mumbled. ‘I got carried away.’
She gave a low laugh. ‘I haven’t heard cussing like that since Uncle John died. Who do you think did this, Bob?’
‘I don’t know—I didn’t see any faces. But the Mattersons move fast. Mrs Atherton made her report and Matterson acted.’
‘We’d better report it to the police,’ she said.
Mac snorted. ‘A lot of good that will do,’ he said disgustedly. ‘We didn’t see who it was and we have no evidence to connect it with the Mattersons. Anyway, I can’t see the cops tackling Bull Matterson—he draws too much water to be bulldozed by Sergeant Gibbons.’
I said, ‘You mean that Gibbons has been bought just like everyone else?’
‘I mean nothing of the kind,’ said Mac. ‘Gibbons is a good guy; but he’ll need hard evidence before he as much as talks to Matterson—and what evidence have you got? None that Gibbons can use, that’s for sure.’
I said, ‘Let’s make camp and talk about it then. And not too near the cabin, either.’
We camped in a glade a quarter of a mile from the cabin and I lit the lantern and set about making a fire. My left shoulder hurt and when 1 put my hand to it, it came away sticky with blood. Clare said in alarm, ‘What’s happened?’
I looked at the blood stupidly. ‘My God, I think I’ve been stabbed!’
IV
I left Clare and Mac to clean out the cabin next morning and drove into Fort Farrell. The wound in my shoulder wasn’t too bad; it was a clean cut in the flesh which Clare bound up without too much trouble. It was sore and stiff but it didn’t trouble me much once the bleeding was staunched.
Mac said, ‘Where are you going?’
‘To pay a call,’ I said shortly.
‘Keep out of trouble—do you hear me?’
‘There’ll be no trouble for me,’ I promised.
The feed-pump was giving trouble, so I left the Land-Rover with Clarry Summerskill, then walked up the street to the police station to find that Sergeant Gibbons was absent from Fort Farrell. There was nothing unusual in that—an RCMP sergeant in the country districts has a big parish and Gibbons’s was bigger than most.
The constable listened to what I had to tell him and his brow furrowed when I told him of the stab wound. ‘You didn’t recognize these men?’
I shook my head. ‘It was too dark.’
‘Do you—or Mr McDougall—have any enemies?’
I said carefully, ‘You might find that these men were employees of Matterson’s.’
The constable’s face closed up as though a blind was drawn. He said warily, ‘You could say that for half the population of Fort Farrell. All right, Mr Boyd; I’ll look into it. If you would make a written statement for the record I’d be obliged.’
‘I’ll send it to you,’ I said wearily. I saw I wouldn’t get anywhere without hard evidence. ‘When is Sergeant Gibbons due back?’
‘In a couple of days. I’ll see he’s informed of this.’
I bet you will, I thought bitterly. This constable would be only too pleased to pass such a hot potato to the sergeant. The sergeant would read my statement, nose around and find nothing and drop the whole thing. Not that one could blame him in the circumstances.
I left the police station and crossed to the Matterson Building. The first person I saw in the foyer was Mrs Atherton. ‘Hello there,’ she said gaily. ‘Where are you going?’
I looked her in the eye. ‘I’m going up to rip out your brother’s guts.’
She trilled her practised laughter. ‘I wouldn’t, you know; he’s got himself a bodyguard. You wouldn’t get near him.’ She looked at me appraisingly. ‘So the old Scotsman has been talking about me.’
‘Nothing to your credit,’ I said.
‘I really wouldn’t go up to see Howard,’ she said as I pressed for the elevator. ‘It wouldn’t do you any good to be bounced from the eighth floor. Besides, the old man wants to see you. That’s why I’m here—I’ve been waiting for you.’
‘Bull Matterson wants to see me?’
‘That’s right. He sent me to get you.’
‘If he wants to see me, I’m around town often enough,’ I said. ‘He can find me when he wants me.’
‘Now is that a way to treat an old man?’ she asked. ‘My father is seventy-seven, Mr Boyd. He doesn’t get around much these days.’
I rubbed my chin. ‘He doesn’t have to, does he? Not when he can get other people to do his running for him. All right, Mrs Atherton. I’ll come and see him.’
She smiled sweetly. ‘I knew you’d see reason. I have my car just outside.’
We climbed into the Continental and drove out of town to the south. At first, I thought we were heading for Lakeside, the nearest thing to an upper-class suburb Fort Farrell can afford—all the Matterson Corporation executives lived out there—but we by-passed it and headed farther south. Then I realized that Bull Matterson wasn’t just an executive and he didn’t consider himself as upper class. He was king and he’d built himself a palace appropriate to his station.
On the way Mrs Atherton didn’t say much—not after I’d choked her off rudely. I was in no mood for chit-chat from her and made it pretty clear. It didn’t seem to worry her. She smoked one cigarette after the other and drove the car with one hand. A woman wearing a mini-skirt and driving a big car leaves little to the imagination, and that didn’t worry her either. But she liked to think it worried me because she kept casting sly glances at me out of the corner of her eye.
Matterson’s palace was a reproduction F
rench château not much bigger than the Chࣝteau Frontenac in Quebec, and it gave me an inkling of the type of man he was. It was a type I had thought had died out during the nineteenth century, a robber baron of the Jim Fisk era who would gut a railroad or a corporation and use the money to gut Europe of its treasures. It seemed incredible that such men could still exist in the middle of the twentieth century, but this overgrown castle was proof.
We went into a hall about as big as a medium-sized foot-ball field, littered with suits of armour and other bric-à-brac. Or were they fake? I didn’t know, but it didn’t really make any difference—fake or not, they illuminated Matterson’s character. We ignored the huge sweep of staircase and took an elevator which was inconspicuously tucked away in one corner. It wasn’t a very big one and Mrs Atherton took the opportunity to make a pass at me during the ride. She pressed hard against me, and said, ‘You’re not very nice to me, Mr Boyd,’ in a reproachful tone.
‘I’m not very sociable with rattlesnakes, either,’ I observed.
She slapped me, so I slapped her in return. I’m willing to play along with all this bull about the gentle sex as long as they stay gentle, but once they use violence, then all bets are off. They can’t expect it both ways, can they? I didn’t slap her hard—just enough to make her teeth rattle—but it was unexpected and she stared at me in consternation. In her world she’d been accustomed to slapping men around and they’d taken it like gentlemen, but now one of the poor hypnotized rabbits had stood up and bitten her.
The elevator door slid open silently. She ran out and pointed down the corridor. ‘In there, damn you,’ she said in a choked voice, and hurried in the opposite direction.
The door opened on to a study lined with books and quiet as a cemetery vault. A lot of good cows had been butchered to provide the bindings on those books and I wondered if they shone with that gentle brown glow because they were well used or because some flunkey brightened them up every day the same time he polished his master’s shoes. Tall windows reached from floor to ceiling on the opposite wall and before the windows a big desk was placed; it had a green leather top, tooled in gold.
Behind the desk was a man—Bull Matterson.
I knew he was five years older than McDougall but he looked five years younger, a hale man with a bristling but trim military moustache the same colour as newly fractured cast iron, which matched his hair. He was a big man, broad of shoulder and thick in the trunk, and the muscle was still there, not yet gone to fat. I guessed he still took exercise. The only signs of advanced age were the brown liver spots on the backs of his hands and the rather faded look in his blue eyes.
He waved his hand. ‘Sit down, Mr Boyd.’ The tone of voice was harsh and direct, a tone to be obeyed.
I looked at the low chair, smiled slightly and remained standing. The old man was up to all the psychological tricks. His head twitched impatiently. ‘Sit down, Boyd. That is your name, isn’t it?’
‘That’s my name,’ I agreed. ‘And I’d rather stand. I don’t anticipate staying long.’
‘As you wish,’ he said distantly. ‘I’ve asked you up here for a reason.’
‘I hope so,’ I said.
A glimmer of a smile broke the iron face. ‘It was a damn silly thing to say,’ he agreed. ‘But don’t worry; I’m not senile yet. I want to know what you’re doing in Fort Farrell.’
‘So does everyone else,’ I said. ‘I don’t know what business it is of yours, Mr Matterson.’
‘Don’t you? A man comes fossicking on my land and you think it’s not my business?’
‘Crown land,’ I corrected.
He waved the distinction aside irritably. ‘What are you doing here, Boyd?’
‘Just trying to make a living.’
He regarded me thoughtfully. ‘You’ll get nowhere blackmailing me, young man. Better men than you have tried it and I’ve broken them.’
I lifted my eyebrows. ‘Blackmail! I haven’t asked anything from you, Mr Matterson, and I don’t intend to. Where does the blackmail come in? You might have your secrets to hide, Matterson, but I’m not in the money market where they’re concerned.’
‘What’s your interest in John Trinavant?’ he asked bluntly.
‘Why should you care?’
He thumped his fist and the solid desk shivered. ‘Don’t fence with me, you young whippersnapper.’
I leaned over the desk. ‘Who, in God’s name, do you think you are? And who do you think I am?’ He suddenly sat very still. ‘I’m not one of the townsfolk of Fort Farrell whom you’ve whipped into silence. You think I’m going to stand by when you burn out an old man’s home?’
His face purpled. ‘Are you accusing me of arson, young man?’
‘Let’s amend it to attempted arson,’ I said. ‘It didn’t work.’
He leaned back. ‘Whose house am I supposed to have attempted to burn?’
‘Not content with firing McDougall just because you thought he was making friends with the wrong people, you—’
He held up his hand. ‘When was this so-called arson attempt made?’
‘Last night.’
He flicked a switch. ‘Send my daughter to me,’ he said brusquely to a hidden microphone. ‘Mr Boyd, I assure you that I don’t burn down houses. If I did, they’d get burned to the ground; there wouldn’t be any half-assed attempts. Now, then: let us get back to the subject. What’s your interest in John Trinavant?’
I said, ‘Maybe I’m interested in the background of the woman I’m going to marry.’ I said it on the spur of the moment, but on second thoughts it didn’t seem a half bad idea.
He snorted. ‘Oh—a fortune-hunter.’
I grinned at him. ‘If I were a fortune-hunter I’d set my sights on your daughter,’ I pointed out. ‘But it would take a stronger stomach than mine.’
I didn’t find out what he would have said to that because just then Lucy Atherton came into the room. Matterson swung round and looked at her. ‘An attempt was made to burn out McDougall’s place last night,’ he said. ‘Who did it?’
‘How should I know?’ she said petulantly.
‘Don’t lie to me, Lucy,’ he said gratingly. ‘You’ve never been good at it.’
She cast a look of dislike at me and shrugged. ‘I tell you I don’t know.’
‘So you don’t know,’ said Matterson. ‘All right: who gave the order—you or Howard? And don’t worry about Boyd being here. You tell me the truth, d’you hear?’
‘All right, I did,’ she burst out. ‘I thought it was a good idea at the time. I knew you wanted Boyd out of here.’
Matterson looked at her incredulously. ‘And you thought you’d get him out by burning old Mac’s cabin? I’ve fathered an imbecile. Of all the stupid things I ever heard!’ He swung out his arm and pointed at me. ‘Take a look at this man. He’s taken on the job of bucking the Matterson Corporation and already he’s been running rings round Howard. Do you think that the burning of a cabin is going to make him just go away?’
She took a deep breath. ‘Father, this man hit me.’
I grinned. ‘Not before she hit me.’
Matterson ignored me. ‘You’re not too old for me to give you a good lathering, Lucy. Maybe I should have done it sooner. Now get the hell out of here.’ He waited until she reached the door. ‘And remember—no more tricks. I’ll do this my way.’
The door slammed.
I said, ‘Your way is legal, of course.’
He stared at me with suffused eyes. ‘Everything I do is legal.’ He simmered down and took a cheque-book from a drawer. ‘I’m sorry about McDougall’s cabin—that’s not my style. What’s the damage?’
I reflected that I was the one who had lectured Clare on sentimentality. Besides, it was Mac’s dough, anyway. I said, ‘A thousand bucks should cover it,’ and added, ‘There’s also the question of a wrecked Land-Rover that belongs to me.’
He looked up at me under grey eyebrows. ‘Don’t try to shake me down,’ he said acidly. ‘What story
is this?’
I told him what had happened on the Kinoxi road. ‘Howard told Waystrand to bounce me, and Waystrand did it the hard way,’ I said.
‘I seem to have fathered a family of thugs,’ he muttered and scribbled out the cheque, which he tossed across the desk. It was for $3,000.
I said, ‘You’ve given your daughter a warning; what about doing the same for Howard? Any more tricks on his part and he’ll lose his beauty—I’ll see to that.’
Matterson looked at me appraisingly. ‘You could take him at that—it wouldn’t be too hard.’ There was contempt in his voice for his own son, and for a moment I was on the verge of feeling sorry for him. He picked up the telephone. ‘Get me Howard’s office at the Matterson Building.’
He put his hand over the mouthpiece. ‘I’m not doing this for Howard’s sake, Boyd. I’m going to get rid of you, but when I do it’ll be legal and there’ll be no kickback.’
A squawk came from the telephone. ‘Howard? Now get this. Leave Boyd alone. Don’t do a damn’ thing—I’ll handle it. Sure, he’ll go up to the dam—he’s legally entitled to walk on that land—but what the hell can he do when he gets there? Just leave him alone, d’you hear? And, say, did you have anything to do with that business at McDougall’s cabin last night? You don’t know—well, ask your fool sister.’
He slammed down the telephone and glared at me. ‘Does that satisfy you?’
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘I’m not looking for trouble.’
‘You’ll get it,’ he promised. ‘Unless you leave Fort Farrell. With your record it wouldn’t be too much trouble to get you tossed in the can.’
I leaned over the desk. ‘What record, Mr Matterson?’ I asked softly.
‘I know who you are,’ he said in a voice like gravel. ‘Your new face doesn’t fool me any, Grant. You have a police record as long as my arm—delinquency, theft, drug-peddling, assault—and if you step out of line just once while you’re in Fort Farrell you’ll be put away fast. Don’t stir anything up here, Grant. Just leave things alone and you’ll be safe.’
High Citadel / Landslide Page 45