High Citadel / Landslide

by Desmond Bagley

  I undid a button of my shirt to let the air circulate, and stretched my legs. ‘I wouldn’t have any other life than this,’ I said.

  ‘You can do anything you want now,’ said Clare.

  ‘Say, that’s so, isn’t it?’ I hadn’t thought much about the money; it hadn’t yet sunk in that I was pretty rich.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ she asked.

  I said dreamily, ‘I know of a place just north of the Great Slave Lake where a man with a bit of dough—enough to finance a real exploration—would have a chance of striking it rich. It really needs a magnetometer survey and for that you need a plane, or better, a whirlybird—that’s where the money comes in.’

  ‘But you are rich,’ she pointed out. ‘Or you will be as soon as the deal goes through. You’ll have more than I inherited from Uncle John, and I never thought I was particularly poor.’

  I looked at her. ‘I said just now I wouldn’t want any other life. You have your archaeology—I have my geology. And you know damn’ well we don’t do those things just to pass the time.’

  She smiled. ‘I guess you’re right.’ She peered at me closely. ‘That scar—there, on your chest. Is that…?’

  ‘The accident? Yes, it is. They don’t trouble much with plastic surgery where it doesn’t usually show.’

  She put her hand out slowly and touched my chest with her fingertips. I said, ‘Clare, you knew Frank Trinavant. I know I haven’t his face, but if I am Frank, then surely to God there must be something of him left in me. Can’t you see anything of him?’

  Her face was troubled. ‘I don’t know,’ she said hesitatingly. ‘It was so long ago and I was so young. I left Canada when I was sixteen and Frank was twenty-two; he treated me as a kid sister and I never really knew him.’ She shook her head and said again, ‘I don’t know.’

  Her fingertips traced the long length of the scar, and I put my arm round her shoulders and pulled her closer. I said, ‘Don’t worry about it; it doesn’t really matter.’

  She smiled and whispered, ‘You’re so right. It doesn’t matter—it doesn’t matter at all. I don’t care who you are or where you come from. All I know is that you’re Bob Boyd.’

  Then we were kissing frantically and her arm was about me under my shirt and drawing me closer. There was a hiss and a sudden wooof as half a jigger of good Scotch got knocked into the fire, and a great yellow and blue flame soared to the sky.

  Later that night I said drowsily, ‘You’re a hard woman—you made me gather twice as many spruce boughs as we needed.’

  She punched me in the ribs and snuggled closer. ‘You know what?’ she said pensively.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You remember when you slept in the cabin that time—when I warned you about making passes?’

  ‘Mmm—I remember.’

  ‘I had to warn you off. If I hadn’t I’d have been a gone girl.’

  I opened one eye. ‘You would!’

  ‘Even then,’ she said. ‘I still feel weak and mushy about it. Do you know you’re quite a man, Bob Boyd? Maybe too much for me to handle. You’d better not radiate maleness so much around other women from now on.’

  I said, ‘Don’t be silly.’

  ‘I mean it.’

  A few minutes later she said, ‘Are you awake?’

  ‘Uh-uh.’

  ‘You won’t think I’m silly if I tell you something?’

  ‘Depends what it is.’

  There was a silence, then she said, ‘You earned that negotiator’s fee, you know—and never forget it. I was glad you earned it for another reason.’

  I said sleepily, ‘What reason?’

  ‘You’re too goddam proud,’ she said. ‘You might never have done anything about me if you’d thought about it too much. I thought you’d be scared off by my money, but now you have money, and it doesn’t apply.’

  ‘Nonsense!’ I said. ‘What’s a mere six hundred thousand bucks? I want the lot.’ I pulled her closer. ‘I want everything you’ve got.’

  She gave a small cry and came to me again. Finally, just as the false dawn hesitated in the sky, she went to sleep, her head on my shoulder and one arm thrown across my chest.

  III

  The survey that should have taken four days stretched to two weeks. Maybe we were taking the honeymoon before we were married, but, then, so have lots of other folks—it’s not the worst crime in the world. All I know is that it was the happiest time of my life.

  We talked—my God, how we talked! For two people to really get to know each other takes a hell of a lot of words, in spite of the fact that the most important thing doesn’t need words at all. By the time two weeks were up I knew a lot about archaeology I didn’t know before and she knew enough geology to know that the survey was a bust.

  But neither of us worried about that. Three of the days towards the end were spent near a tiny lake we discovered hidden away in the folds of the hills. We pitched our camp near the edge and swam every morning and afternoon without worrying about costumes, and rubbed each other warm and dry when we came out shivering. At nights, in the hush of the forest, we talked in low tones, mostly about ourselves and about what we were going to do with the rest of our lives. Then we would make love.

  But everything ends. One morning she said thoughtfully, ‘Matthew must be just about ready to send out a search-party. Do you realize how long we’ve been gone?’

  I grinned. ‘Matthew has more sense. I think he’s got around to trusting me.’ I rubbed my chin. ‘Still, we’d better get back, I suppose.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said glumly.

  We cleaned up the camp and packed our gear in silence. I helped her on with her pack, then said, ‘Clare, you know we can’t get married right away?’

  Her voice was soft with surprise, ‘Why ever not?’

  I kicked at a stone. ‘It wouldn’t be fair. If I marry you and stay around here, things are going to bust loose and you might be hurt. If they’re going to bust at all I want it to be before we’re married.’

  She opened her mouth to argue—she was a great arguer—but I stopped her. ‘Susskind might be right,’ I said. ‘If I probe too deeply into my past I might very well go nuts. I wouldn’t want that to happen to you.’

  She was silent for a while, then she said, ‘Supposing I accept that—what do you intend to do?’

  ‘I’m going to break this thing wide open—before we’re married. I’ve got something to fight for now, besides myself. If I come through the other side safely, then we’ll get married. If not—well, neither of us will have made an irrevocable mistake.’

  She said calmly, ‘You’re the sanest man I know—I’m willing to take a chance on your sanity.’

  ‘Well, I’m not,’ I said. ‘You don’t know what it’s like, Clare: not having a past—or having two pasts, for that matter. It eats a man away from the inside. I’ve got to know, and I’ve got to take the chance of knowing. Susskind said it might break me in two and I don’t want you too much involved.’

  ‘But I am too involved,’ she cried. ‘Already I am.’

  ‘Not as much as if we were married. Look, if we were married I’d hesitate when it’s fatal to hesitate, I wouldn’t push hard when pushing might win, I’d not take a chance when it was necessary to take a chance. I’d be thinking of you too damn’ much. Give me a month, Clare; just one month.’

  Her voice was low. ‘All right, a month,’ she said. ‘Just one month.’

  We reached her cabin late at night, weary and out-of-sorts, neither of us having said much to the other during the day. Matthew Waystrand met us, smiled at Clare and gave me a hard look. ‘Got the fire lit,’ he said gruffly.

  I went into my bedroom and shucked off my pack with relief, and when I’d changed into a fresh shirt and pants Clare was already luxuriating in a hot bath. I walked over to Matthew’s place and found him smoking before a fire. I said, ‘I’m going pretty soon. Look after Miss Trinavant.’

  He looked at me glumly. ‘Think she needs it mo
re’n usual?’

  ‘She might,’ I said, and sat down. ‘Did you mail that letter she gave you?’ I meant the Matterson contract going to her lawyer in Vancouver.

  He nodded. ‘Got an answer, too.’ He cocked his head. ‘She’s got it.’

  ‘Good.’ I waited for him to say something else and when he didn’t I stood up and said, ‘I’m going now. I have to get back to Fort Farrell.’

  ‘Wait a minute,’ he said. ‘I’ve been thinking about what you said. You wanted to know if anything unusual happened about the time old John was killed. Well, I remember something, but I don’t know if you’d call it unusual.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘Old Bull bought himself a new car just the week after. It was a Buick.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I wouldn’t call it unusual.’

  Waystrand said, ‘Funny thing is that it was a replacement for a car he already had—a car he’d had just three months.’

  ‘Now that is funny,’ I said softly. ‘What was wrong with the old one?’

  ‘Don’t know,’ said Waystrand laconically. ‘But I hardly know what could have gone wrong in three months.’

  ‘What happened to it?’

  ‘Don’t know that, either. Just disappeared.’

  I thought about it. It would be a devil of a job trying to find out what had happened to a car twelve years earlier, especially a car that had ‘just disappeared’. It didn’t seem as though there would be much hope in following up such a tenuous lead as that, although who could tell? It might be worth a check in the licensing office. I said, ‘Thanks, Matthew—you don’t mind me calling you Matthew?’

  He frowned. ‘You took a long time on that survey of yours. How’s Miss Trinavant?’

  I grinned. ‘Never better—she assured me herself. Why don’t you ask her?’

  He grunted. ‘I don’t reckon I will. Yeah, I don’t mind you calling me by my given name. That’s what it’s for, ain’t it?’

  IV

  I left early next morning just after daybreak. I suppose you couldn’t have called the few words Clare and I had an argument, but it left a certain amount of tension. She thought I was wrong and she wanted to get married right away, and I thought otherwise, and we had sulked like a couple of kids. Anyway, the tension dissolved in her bed that night; we were getting to be like a regular married couple.

  We discussed the Matterson contract which her lawyer had thought not too larcenous, and she signed it and gave it to me. I was to drop it in to Howard’s office and get a duplicate signed by him. Just before I left, she said, ‘Don’t stick your neck out too far, Bob. Old Bull wields a mean axe.’

  I reassured her and bumped up the track in the jeep and made Fort Farrell by late morning. McDougall was pottering about his cabin, and looked at me with a knowing eye. ‘You look pretty bushy-tailed,’ he said. ‘Made your fortune yet?’

  ‘Just about,’ I said, and told him what had happened with Howard and Donner.

  I thought he’d go into convulsions. He gasped and chortled and stamped his foot, and finally burst out with: ‘You mean you made six hundred thousand bucks just for insulting Howard Matterson? Where’s my coat? I’m going down to the Matterson Building right away.’

  I laughed. ‘You’re dead right.’ I gave him the contract. ‘See that gets to Howard—but don’t part with it until you get a duplicate signed by him. And you’d better check it word for word.’

  ‘You’re damned right I will,’ said Mac. ‘I wouldn’t trust that bastard as far as I could throw a moose. What are you going to do?’

  ‘I’m going up to the dam,’ I said. ‘It seems to worry Howard. What’s been happening up there?’

  ‘The dam itself is just about finished; they closed the sluices a couple of days ago and the lake has started to fill up.’ He chuckled. ‘They’ve had trouble bringing the generator armatures in; those things are big and heavy and they didn’t find them too easy to manage. Got stuck in the mud right outside the powerhouse, so I hear.’

  ‘I’ll have a look,’ I said. ‘Mac, when you’re in town I want you to do something. I want you to spread the word that I’m the guy who survived the accident which killed the Trinavants.’

  He chuckled. ‘I get it—you’re putting the pressure on. Okay, I’ll spread the word. Everybody in Fort Farrell will know you are Grant by sundown.’

  ‘No,’ I said sharply. ‘You mention no names. Just say that I’m the guy who survived the accident, nothing more.’ He looked at me in bewilderment, so I said, ‘Mac, I don’t know if I’m Grant and I don’t know if I’m Frank Trinavant. Now, Bull Matterson may think I’m Grant, but I want to keep the options open. There may come a time when I have to surprise him.’

  ‘That’s tricky,’ said Mac admiringly. He eyed me shrewdly. ‘So you made up your mind, son.’

  ‘Yes, I made up my mind.’

  ‘Good,’ he said heartily. As an apparent afterthought, he said, ‘How’s Clare?’

  ‘She’s fine.’

  ‘You must have given her place a good going-over.’

  ‘I did,’ I said smoothly. ‘I made absolutely sure there’s nothing there worth the digging. Took two whole weeks on the job.’

  I could see he was going to pursue the subject a little further so I backed out. ‘I’m going up the dam,’ I said. ‘See you tonight—and do exactly what I said.’ I climbed into the jeep and left him to mull it over.

  Mac had been right when he said the Matterson Corporation was having trouble with the generators. This was not a big hydro-electric scheme like the Peace River Project at Portage Mountain, but it was big enough to have generators that were mighty hard to handle when transporting them on country roads. They had been shipped up from the States and had got to the railhead quite easily, but from then on they must have been troublesome.

  I nearly burst out laughing when I drove past the powerhouse at the bottom of the escarpment. A big logging truck loaded with an armature was bogged down in the mud, surrounded by a sweating, swearing gang shouting fit to bust a gut. Another gang was laying a corduroy road up to the powerhouse—a matter of nearly two hundred yards—and they were up to their knees in an ocean of mud.

  I stopped and got out to watch the fun. I didn’t envy those construction men one little bit; it was going to be one hell of a job getting that armature to the powerhouse in an intact condition. I looked into the sky and watched the clouds coming in from the west, from the Pacific, and thought it looked like rain. One good downpour and the trouble would be compounded tenfold.

  A jeep came up the road and skidded to a halt in the mud and Jimmy Waystrand got out and stamped over. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’

  I gestured to the stalled truck. ‘Just watching the fun.’

  His face darkened. ‘You’re not welcome round here,’ he said harshly. ‘Beat it!’

  ‘Have you checked with Bull Matterson lately?’ I asked mildly. ‘Or hasn’t Howard passed the word on?’

  ‘Oh, hell!’ he said exasperatedly. I could see he was itching to toss me out but he was more afraid of old Bull than he was of me.

  I said gently, ‘One wrong move from you, Jimmy, and a court order gets slapped on Bull Matterson. That’ll cost him money and you can bet your last cent—if you’re left with one—that it’ll come out of your pay packet. Your best bet is to get on with your job and get that mess cleaned up before it rains again.’

  ‘Rains again!’ he said savagely. ‘It hasn’t rained yet.’

  ‘Oh? Then how come all the mud?’

  ‘How in hell do I know?’ he said. ‘It just came. It just…He stopped and glared at me. ‘What the hell am I doing chewing the fat with you?’ He turned and went back to his jeep. ‘Remember!’ he shouted. ‘You make no trouble or you get whipped.’

  I watched him go, then looked down at the mud interestedly. It looked like ordinary mud. I bent down and took some in my hand and rubbed my fingers together. It felt slimy without any grittiness and was as smooth as soap. It wo
uld make a good grade of mud for lubricating an oil drill; maybe Matterson could make a few cents out of bottling and selling it. I tasted it with the tip of my tongue; there was no saltiness, but I didn’t expect to find any because the human tongue is not a very reliable guide.

  I watched the men slipping and sliding around for a while, then went to the back of the jeep and picked out two empty test-tubes. I picked my way into the middle of the mess, getting thoroughly dirty in the process, and stooped to fill them full of the greyish, slippery goo. Then I went back to the jeep, put the test-tubes away carefully, and drove on up the escarpment.

  There was no mud anywhere on the escarpment nor on the road which climbed it. They were still working on the dam, putting in the final touches, but the sluices were closed and the water was building up behind the concrete wall. Already the scene of desolation which I had grieved over was being covered by a clean sheet of water. Perhaps it was a merciful thing to do, to hide the evidence of greed. The new lake spread shallowly into the distance with the occasional spindly tree, too poor for even Bull Matterson to make a profit on, standing forlornly in the flood. Those trees would die as soon as the roots became waterlogged, and they would fall and rot.

  I looked back at the activity at the bottom of the escarpment. The men looked like ants I had seen—a crowd of ants trying to drag along the corpse of a big beetle they had found. But they weren’t having as much success with the trucks as the ants did with the beetle.

  I took one of the test-tubes and looked at it thoughtfully, then put it back in its nest of old newspaper. Ten minutes later I was battling it out on the road back to Fort Farrell.

  I badly wanted to use a microscope.

  EIGHT

  I was still giving myself a headache at the microscope when Mac came back from town. He dumped a box full of groceries on the table which made the slide jiggle. ‘What you got there, Bob?’