The Hunting Tree

by Ike Hamill

  With no income and mounting debt, he would lose his small house soon. His company had stretched his forced hiatus another week; still waiting on sufficient cause to fire him outright. Mike pushed himself up from the couch and scratched the top of his head. Down the hall the bathroom called. He shuffled by his unused bedroom and noted how clean it looked compared to the rest of the house. His typical day involved watching television until he was hungry or drunk enough to make a meal of popcorn, rice, or noodle soup. He had no use for the formality of clean sheets and pillows, preferring to spend his night dozing so he wouldn’t feel the letdown of nothing to do in the morning.

  He returned to the living room just as the local newscaster appeared in the commercial break of the morning game shows with a news flash—“Police have responded to this New Hampshire home this morning based on a distressed call from a neighbor.” She glanced back over her shoulder at the pleasant two-story cape that served as her backdrop. “Find out what they discovered. That and your weekend forecast, all in our noon report.”

  Mike propped his arm on the couch cushions and let his eyelids sink halfway, thinking he could use another short nap before breakfast. His eyes had nearly closed when curiosity fluttered them back open. In the background of the reporter’s shot, a nicely dressed young man with glasses appeared briefly in the distance. Mike couldn’t be sure, but he thought there was a chance that the guy had been Leslie’s producer. Mike searched for the remote control. He hadn’t seen the young producer since the incident at Bill’s house, and he didn’t even know the guy’s name, but he flipped to Leslie’s channel to be sure. He was just in time to find Leslie delivering a more lengthy broadcast from the same scene.

  “Authorities aren’t commenting on exactly what they found inside this quiet country house,” she informed her viewers, “except to say that the owner and sole inhabitant appears to have been the victim of foul play." She tilted her head and frowned slightly, letting the public know that she disapproved of murder.

  “A few minutes ago, we had a chance to ask the officer in charge a few questions,” she continued.

  The shot cut away to a medium-sized, plump man wearing the uniform of New Hampshire state police. “We don’t have any details yet except to say that we have indeed found evidence of a break-in, and there appears to have been a struggle. We’ll have more information in the coming hours,” he assured the camera.

  Just after the officer finished his statement, but before the live shot of Leslie returned, the camera panned down as the cameraman moved away. Mike’s thumb stabbed at the remote control, pausing the image. His lips parted as he beheld the officer’s feet, shown on TV because of a bad edit by the local station. Just to the left of the officer’s scuffed shoe, Mike spotted a giant footprint in the loose dirt. The similarity to the footprint he had found on his hike was unmistakable. He stared at the footprint for another few seconds and then started the video again, noting every detail. Eventually, Leslie described the town of the attack, but not the exact location.

  Mike recognized the town name: East Motton. He had driven by that very town just days before, on his way back from his hike. He replayed the newscast again, picking out pertinent details and trying to discern visual landmarks from Leslie’s brief on-camera monologue. Rubbing his forehead, Mike jumped up and trotted to the kitchen to fetch a pencil and paper. He watched the story a third time, writing down the facts he would need. When he was finished, he turned off the TV for the first time in days and propped his notepad up against the front door. He was shaved, showered, and out the door in under fifteen minutes.

  * * * * *

  ON THE ROAD, Mike scanned the radio for more information about the murder. Until recently, conducting genetic research had provided this same feeling—turning over a wide set of jumbled details again and again until they fit themselves together into one coherent world-view. Doctors would send him mountains of unsorted test results. His job had been to synthesize everything—all the tiny tidbits—into a big picture. In that same way, Mike puzzled through the details of the crime, trying to understand why he was so sure that it was connected to his hike. He paused on a AM news station when he heard the phrase “home invasion,” but it turned out to be a different crime.

  “Police say the Montville couple were discovered by a home healthcare worker this morning, but won’t comment on whether the case is linked to East Motton incident reported earlier,” read the DJ.

  Mike checked his mirrors and then pulled off the highway to the shoulder. The map on passenger seat confirmed what he guessed: he could draw a straight line from the cave’s location, through East Motton, directly to Montville. Furthermore, he could narrow the location of the East Motton farmhouse down to two roads which traveled west to east and might match the northern view he had spied in the newscast. Mike circled the map with his pencil, turned on his signal, and merged back onto the highway.

  * * * * *

  BY THREE THAT AFTERNOON, Mike found the house of the first victim. It was easy to spot, the emergency vehicles had left muddy tracks in and out of the driveway and several vehicles were still parked at the house. From the road he could just pick out the yellow police tape that cordoned the yard.

  He sucked in a deep breath and tried to control his fast heart. Grabbing a clipboard from the back seat, Mike jumped out of his car. Using the house as his landmark, he consulted his memory and rounded the building until he found the side where the police officer had given his short statement. Mike glanced nervously at the house, but nobody came out to greet him, so he studied the ground until he found the print. He knelt to study its outline. The print was surrounded with plaster debris. Mike was pleased that the police had discovered the print and thought to make a cast of it. It matched the size of the one he had seen at the cliffs and had the same odd spread to the toes. Mike pulled out his phone and used its camera to snap a picture of the giant print.

  The porch door opened and a young, broad-shouldered policeman strode out to greet Mike—“Can I help you?”

  “Yes sir, thank you,” said Mike, raising the pitch of his voice slightly. “Did you happen to find any more prints like these?”

  “May I ask who you are?” asked the officer.

  “Certainly,” said Mike. “My name is Dr. Mike Markey. I’m from U.N.H.? They called me in to see the cast of this footprint, but I wanted to see the original. Do you know if there are any other examples?”

  The officer knit his brow and considered Mike carefully. He reached up to the radio clipped to his pocket and placed his thumb on the button. “I’m going to have to call this in,” he informed Mike.

  “That’s fine,” said Mike, holding his clipboard in front of him. “Could I see the other prints while I wait.”

  The officer shrugged and waved him towards the house as he squeezed the receiver and placed his call. “Dispatch, this is Sutliffe,” the policeman told his radio as Mike entered the house. In the hallway he found two spots in the hall had been taped off, marking other footprints. He stepped around those as he headed for the front door. When confronted with the cop, Mike had panicked and arrived at this simple plan; he decided to pretend he belonged at the scene and then get away as quickly as possible. He was thrilled that the officer had stayed out on the back porch to make his call. As he put his hand on the doorknob leading to the front porch, Mike felt the slightest glimmer of hope that he might get away clean.

  Pulling open the door, he expected a protest to come from the officer at any second. He held his breath as he opened the door and slipped past the screen door, finding freedom on the other side. Carefully controlling his stride he walked down to his car, Mike slipped behind the wheel, set the clipboard down on the passenger seat, and started his car. He twisted around in the seat as he pulled the gearshift back into reverse. He had to jam on the break to avoid colliding with the new police car pulling into the driveway behind him.

  “Shit,” Mike said under his breath. He pulled forward a couple of feet to give the of
ficer room to pull up alongside, and then give himself enough room to resume his escape. A bang from the front of his car drew his attention, and Mike whipped around to see if he had hit anything.

  He discovered that something had hit him. Officer Sutliffe stood in front of his car, having just slapped Mike’s hood. The policeman rounded Mike’s car and motioned for him to roll down his car window.

  “Where you going?” he asked.

  “I have to get back to the university,” Mike lied.

  “That’s great,” said Sutliffe. “We don’t have any record that you’re working this case.”

  “I was just brought in this morning,” said Mike. “Maybe word hasn’t gotten around.”

  “This case is being run by Bob Farrell,” said Mike. “If you think any decision about this case is not going through Bob, then you’ve clearly never worked with Bob before.”

  “Okay,” said Mike. “My mistake. Thank you for your time.”

  Now that Sutliffe wasn’t blocking Mike’s path, Mike was free to pull ahead and then make his getaway.

  “I think we’re going to have to take a little trip back to headquarters,” said Sutliffe.

  “I don’t have time for that,” Mike protested, still trying to make his way out of the situation with just pure denial.

  “You’ll just need to make time,” said Sutliffe. He pulled open Mike’s door.

  Mike felt helpless facing the big man. He reached over and unbuckled the seatbelt.

  “Am I under arrest or something?” he asked.

  “Nope,” said Sutliffe. “Not yet.”

  Sutliffe gripped Mike’s elbow as he got out of his car.

  * * * * *

  AT HEADQUARTERS, THEY SAT MIKE ALONE in an interview room and left him for close to an hour. When they finally entered, he had become both scared and angry.

  A man wearing a button-down shirt and suspenders entered first, followed by a uniformed officer. They both sat opposite Mike and laid out notebooks and folders before addressing him.

  “So, Mr. Markey,” began the man in plain-clothes.

  “Doctor,” Mike corrected.

  “Yes,” said the man. “My mistake, Doctor Markey,” he continued. “My name is Pat Farnham, and his gentleman is Red Bisson. “What was your intention at the crime scene today. Officer Sutliffe said he caught you examining a footprint?”

  “Yes,” said Mike. He wondered if he should demand to have his lawyer present, but he didn’t want to incur any more hourly charges to his already expensive defense fund.

  “And then you pretended to be a member of the investigation team?”

  “Yes,” said Mike. “But I was just trying to find an excuse to leave.”

  “Why was that important to you?” asked Pat Farnham, hooking a thumb under one of his suspenders.

  “I thought I had seen a footprint like that before,” said Mike.

  “What brought you to that house?” Pat asked quickly.

  “I saw the footprint on TV. I saw it on channel six,” Mike clarified.

  “Channel six,” Pat commented. “Where were you when you were watching TV?”

  “At home,” said Mike.

  “So you were at home,” he said, consulting a paper on the table, “almost a hundred miles away, and you saw something on TV that made you drive all the way up here so you could look at a footprint?”

  “It looked like a pretty unusual footprint,” said Mike. “Big, you know? I’m a scientist, and I study mutations and species and stuff. Footprints that big are really interesting to a guy like me.”

  “Let’s get right down to it,” said Pat. “Tell us what you were doing at the scene of a brutal murder—how you came to be there, and more importantly, why. Interfering with an investigation is incredibly easy for us to charge, so you better have some really good answers.”

  “I found the house because I know where the guy started from,” said Mike, abandoning all pretense.

  “Okay,” said Pat. “Where?”

  “I found another footprint the guy left behind on a hiking trail, west of Campton. When I heard that there was another murder in Montville, I figured out what road he must have taken. Once I drove by the place, it would have been hard to not know where the murders took place,” said Mike.

  “Never hear of a phone? Never think to call us and let us know your information?” asked the officer.

  Mike shrugged and tried to choose just the right words—“I’ve investigated this type of thing before, and my experience has shown me that people in your position are sometimes averse to receiving unusual theories.”

  “It sounds like you’re suggesting that I don’t know how to do my job,” said Pat. “Perhaps you can explain that a little further.”

  “Okay,” said Mike, trying to sound even-tempered and rational. “I investigate paranormal events. This footprint, and where I found it, suggested a paranormal source. I didn’t think it would be very helpful if I called you up and said ‘I know who killed the guy in that house—it was paranormal being.’”

  Pat pushed back from the table and smiled with only the corners of his mouth. “That’s perceptive,” he said. “So how about you give me an explanation that I can believe.”

  “But that’s it,” said Mike. “That’s my only explanation. I think something paranormal is heading east, and it happened to kill your guy a couple of days ago, and maybe this pair in Montville sometime today. There must be similarities in the cases. Aren’t there?”

  “I can’t discuss the details at this moment,” said Pat.

  “Okay, sure,” said Mike, “but you must have run across at least one footprint like the one I saw today. And I can take you up to that hiking trail I was talking about. It’s called The Ledges. I’ll show you the footprint that I found last Thursday,” he assured.

  “That’s great,” said Pat. “We had a giant thunderstorm last weekend. The trail almost certainly got soaked. Probably washed that footprint down to the river. I’m guessing you knew that already,” said Pat.

  “No, I hadn’t heard,” said Mike.

  “So what exactly am I to do with you?” Pat looked over at his uniformed associate as he asked. The man shifted in his chair, but stayed silent.

  “Maybe you could show me the scene in Montville?” asked Mike. “I am a very experienced paranormal investigator. I might be able to see something that your other officers overlooked.”

  “Well,” said Pat. “Here’s the thing about your paranormal investigations: I’ve been on the phone with Rockingham county a few times this afternoon. When they heard that I was trying to nail down the credentials of Dr. Mike Markey, I found out there were a number of people down in Rockingham who already had an opinion on the matter.”

  “Oh?” asked Mike. He struggled to think of anyone who might know him from that county.

  “Yes,” said Pat. “Turns out that their sheriff, Sheriff Murphy, has a fully-developed opinion about Dr. Mike Markey. In fact, he seems to think that you’re a grave-robbing charlatan.”

  “Come on,” said Mike, rolling his eyes. “That guy is an ignorant hick. He wouldn’t listen to any of my evidence.”

  “Stop right there,” said Pat. “That ignorant hick happens to be one of my in-laws.”

  “Shit,” said Mike.

  “You said a mouthful,” said Pat.

  Mike leaned back in his chair, trying to think of something to help him win some credibility. He took a deep breath and considered starting from the beginning, spilling his whole story, but he released the breath and idea almost immediately. Some people were intelligent and pragmatic, but had no imagination for things they couldn’t explain. Mike figured he currently sat in front of one of those men.

  “Oh wait!” said Mike. A sudden flash brought an idea of how to convince Pat that this was a paranormal event, and that the two incidents must be connected. “If my theory is correct,” he continued, “and the same creature committed both crimes, then he would have to be on foot, so the murders would be sep
arated by at least a day or two. Wait, how far apart are Montville and East Motton?”

  Pat folded his arms as he listened. “Forty miles,” he informed Mike.

  “So you would think that it would take him at least a couple of days to cover that distance,” said Mike, “but this guy moves fast. Probably about ten miles an hour, but he only moves at night. I bet he made the Montville couple within twenty-four hours.”

  “Okay,” said Pat. “A guy doesn’t have to travel on foot to take a day between killing.”

  “How about this then,” offered Mike. “I bet something was missing from the bodies. Maybe an organ, probably even the brain, because he’s trying to figure out where and when he’s at.”

  “Where and when?” prompted Pat.

  “Yes,” said Mike. “I think he was asleep for a while. I have data that suggests that he was in the same location for several months. I’m guessing that he was there for years before that, trapped underground.”

  The other man at the table, Red Bisson, leaned forward and whispered something in Pat’s ear. Pat glanced at Red and then nodded while he frowned.

  “It seems that each time you start a sentence, some new detail emerges that completely changes the nature of your story,” said Pat. He pushed up his sleeve and glanced down at his watch. “In the interest of time, start from the top, from his hiking trail, and give us one more quick run-through.”

  “Okay,” said Mike, “but some of this stuff is a little hard to believe.”

  “Don’t worry about that part,” said Pat. “We’ll get that sorted out later.”

  Mike nodded, tilted his head back, and stretched his neck. “From the top: I conduct paranormal investigations,” he glanced to Red and Pat, pausing until they nodded their affirmation. “My former colleague, Gary, discovered a paranormal power source off that trail called The Ledges. The other day, I went to check out that place and I saw a giant footprint.”