Hunters

by Chet Williamson

  "That's a damn shame," said Shakey. "But even if you do get up there, how you gonna get back in? Cabin close to the road?"

  Chuck shook his head sadly. "No. It's about three miles in."

  "Snowmobiles be the only way I know," said Chuckles.

  "That'd be good," Chuck said, nodding at Chuckles' sagacity. "There anyplace up there has them?"

  "Well, lessee," said Shakey. "Otis Bridges in Aurora used to rent them, probably still does, if you can talk him out of one."

  "Much obliged. Otis Bridges. I'll remember that," Chuck said, and rejoined the others.

  While Michael paid the check, Chuck whispered something to Sam, who waited until the others preceded her through the door. Then she walked up to Shakey and Chuckles, who eyed her with a combination of wariness and pity. "I'm really sorry," she said, "for that outburst there. I'm really glad that my friend explained it to you. I mean, I wouldn't want you to think that I was a..." She jerked her head and twisted her mouth for a moment. "...a cuntlapping bitch, cocksucking motherfucker. Have a piss-shit day," she added as she went through the door with a happy grin and a cheery wave.

  The two men looked after her for a long time.

  Outside, she slapped Chuck jovially on the back. "Thanks, man," she said. "I feel a whole helluva lot better now." And she giggled for the first three miles.

  It took them nearly two hours to travel from Port Allegeny to Coudersport, a trip that would have taken less than a half hour without the snow. There they turned north on 44, but traveled only a half mile before they decided to return to 6 and go north further on. The less they had to travel on secondary roads, the better time they would make.

  They finally headed north on 449 at Walton, and found the going tedious and nerve-wracking. Sam's temporary good humor had disappeared, and everyone seemed on edge. Driving through the storm by daylight wasn't as bad as at night, but it was still an ordeal. Several vehicles were stuck in snow banks, and they passed one whose driver waved frantically at them, but they didn't slow down.

  It was noon by the time they pulled into Aurora, a small village that the storm had turned into a ghost town. No cars or trucks were on the road, whose unblemished surface made knowing where to drive nearly impossible. Chuck had to use guesswork based on the widely spread apart houses and stores. He came up against a curb several times.

  At the far end of town was a house next to a gas station whose hoseless and rusty pumps proclaimed it long out of business. But a light shone through the dusty and ice-coated windows of the station building, and beneath the Mobil flying horse, whose red coat had turned piebald with rusty blotches, a more primitive sign read Bridges' Vehicle and Equipment Rental. A ramshackle JerrDan wrecker stood buried nearly to the top of its tires in snow.

  "Otis Bridges?" Jean said.

  "Well, if he isn't," Chuck replied, "he'll know old Otis. They're probably all inbred up here." He pulled off where the snow appeared to be least deep, and got out of the jeep. The others followed him to the small door set into the drop-down garage door. Chuck opened it and stuck in his head and shoulders. "Mr. Bridges?"

  "Go on in, for crissake," Sam growled, pushing on Chuck's back. "There's a goddam snowstorm out here, in case you hadn't noticed!"

  Chuck pushed back just for a moment, then stepped into the relative warmth of the under heated garage. There was a ten year old Mercury Marquis, sans hubcaps and side trim, parked over an old-fashioned grease pit, and the light and a sound of hammering were coming from down in the pit. A quick glance around showed Chuck another car on blocks, three snowmobiles, one of which was partially disassembled, and shelves full of tools and parts that appeared to have been tossed there at random rather than placed in any order. "Mr. Bridges?" he called again, aiming the comment toward the grease pit.

  The hammering ceased. "I heard you the first time," came a pinched, high-pitched voice from the pit.

  "You Otis Bridges?" Chuck asked.

  "Yes, I'm Otis Bridges," came the petulant reply, "and I ain't hauling anybody out of the snow today. Call Triple A if you're stuck." The hammering started again.

  "We're not stuck. But we need some snowmobiles," Chuck said loudly.

  "I ain't got none."

  "You got some right here."

  "They ain't for rent."

  "We'll buy them," Jean said.

  "They ain't for sale."

  Sam walked over to the outlet where the cord to the snake light came up from the pit, and pulled the plug. The light under the Mercury went out. "Hey!" Bridges yelled. "Plug that back in!"

  "After we talk, man," Sam said, tossing the plug on the floor. "Get up here, you got a business or what?"

  The man climbed the concrete stairs to the level of the garage. He was as black and filthy as a miner, and his scowl didn't make him any prettier. He looked mad enough to use the hammer he carried. "Now what do you people want? I'm working here!"

  "I told you," Chuck said, "We need some snowmobiles. Four if you got 'em. We need to get some people out of a jam."

  "Well, you're gonna have to get them out of their jam with somebody else's snowmobiles."

  "Who would you suggest?" Jean asked with more sarcasm than curiosity. "There doesn't seem to be a large number of snowmobile dealers in your little town."

  "You bet not—I'm the only one. Fella down in Galeton has some, but he's not gonna truck 'em up here either. You got people in trouble, you call the state police."

  "This is a private matter," Michael said.

  "Gonna stay private, far as I'm concerned."

  "Listen to me, Mr. Bridges," Jean said. "We need your snowmobiles. Now if you won't rent them, we'll buy them."

  "No you won't. They ain't for sale."

  "What if we gave you twice what they're worth?"

  "I don't care. I don't need your money. I just need you to go away so I can get back to work."

  "Mr. Bridges," Michael said calmly, "let's be reasonable. We really do need your machines. Now how much trouble would it be for you to rent them to us?"

  Bridges shook his head and pursed his lips, as though he was going to have to explain simple matters to a child. "Where you wanta take them?"

  "About ten miles north of here. And then three miles into the woods on a dirt road."

  "Then you're not gonna drive them up there from here. What'd you come here in?"

  "A jeep."

  "Well, you ain't gonna haul them with that. So that means I gotta get them on my JerrDan, drive ten miles up where you want to go in this storm, and then drive back again. And I'm not gonna do that."

  "Are you saying," Michael said, "the truck couldn't make it?"

  "No, I ain't saying that at all. It'd make it. But I'm too old to be slippin' and slidin' around in this kinda weather."

  "Then rent us the truck," Chuck said. "I'll drive it."

  "No you won't. Nobody drives my JerrDan but me."

  "But if you don't drive it," Jean said with a cold and furious logic, "and you won't let him drive it, then we can't get there."

  "You're getting it now, miss," Bridges said.

  Sam gave a thick laugh. "So what you're sayin' is you only rent snowmobiles when the weather's nice. You like want us to wait till the goddam summer?"

  Bridges's superior sneer changed to a puritanical face of stone. "I don't appreciate you taking the name of the Lord in vain."

  "Oh, well, Jesus H. Christ, I'm really goddam sorry."

  Bridges's nostrils flared. "All right, you all get out of here right now. I'm not doing any business with you, I told you that and I meant it, and now I know what kind of people you are I mean it even more. So get."

  Chuck gave a big, dramatic sigh, crossed his arms, and shook his head. "We can't get, Mr. Bridges. See, you're the only man who's got what we need, and it's a matter of life and death." He glanced at Jean. There was no mistaking the hard look on her face. She gave him a short, sharp nod. "Okay, of death, really. Now we gotta have those snowmobiles. And if you won't rent them, and you
won't sell them, then we're gonna have to take them."

  Otis Bridges looked at Chuck as though he had just begun speaking in French. "Take 'em? What do you mean take 'em? You can't take 'em unless I say you can take 'em."

  In reply, Chuck took out a pistol from his parka's deep pocket and pointed it casually at Bridges. "Now. You open up that door, and we'll back that wrecker around here and load those snowmobiles on it. How many machines you got?"

  All the righteous anger had gone out of Otis Bridges. He had suddenly become the soul of cooperation. "Just the two. But they'll hold two people each."

  "What about that third one?" Chuck said.

  "Waitin' on parts for it."

  Bridges opened the garage door, and he and Chuck went out to the wrecker, while Michael filled the snowmobiles' gas tanks from a five gallon can. Bridges showed Chuck how the truck worked, and then drove it around to the open bay. It was slow going, but the sheer size of the truck allowed it to bull itself through the deep snow.

  "Helluva vehicle," Chuck said appreciatively.

  Bridges nodded. "Get through almost anything."

  "It better."

  By the time they got the wrecker backed up to the bay, a middle-aged woman was standing next to Jean. She was bundled against the cold, and when Bridges shuffled through the snow into the garage, she frowned at him. "I heard the JerrDan, so I come out. This lady tells me you're going out somewhere?"

  Bridges looked uncomfortably at Chuck, who just smiled at him. His hands and the gun were behind his back, out of the woman's sight. "Uh, yeah," Bridges said. "These folks got some trouble, so I'm gonna help them out."

  "Well, you're gonna have some trouble, you do," the woman said. "You know what the doctor said about your going out in this stuff. Bad enough you're out here in this cold garage."

  "Now don't tell me," said Chuck. "This must be Mrs. Bridges. Only a wife would care that much about her husband's health. Well, you don't have to worry your head over a thing. Mr. Bridges won't be going with us. We're going to take care of this ourselves."

  At first Mrs. Bridges looked at Chuck as though he were crazy, and then she turned the same disbelieving glare on her husband. "What?"

  "They're, uh, taking the JerrDan. And the snowmobiles."

  "Otis, have you lost your mind?"

  "No he hasn't, ma'am," said Chuck. "Under the circumstances, your husband's doing the only sensible thing."

  "Circumstances?" the woman said in a way that explained to Chuck why Otis Bridges was so cranky. "What circumstance?"

  Chuck held out the pistol as though he were offering her a piece of pie. "These circumstances."

  It was like someone had just goosed her, Chuck thought. She threw up her mittened hands with a gasp, and started to pant like a wooly dog on a hot day. It was damned interesting the effect guns had on people. "Ah," Chuck said, "you seem to grasp the circumstances too."

  "Don't worry, Abby," Bridges said. "They won't hurt us."

  "That depends," Jean said, "on how cooperative you are. Now let's stop screwing around and get to it."

  Mrs. Bridges wasn't fit to do anything in her near hysterical condition, so Jean and Sam kept an eye on her, while the men loaded the snowmobiles onto the wrecker's bed and secured them. "Okay," Chuck said when they were finished, "let's have the keys to the snowmobiles."

  Bridges led him into a small cluttered room with a desk from which the man took two sets of keys. He handed them to Chuck, who noticed his hand shaking. Chuck looked into Bridges's face, and the man looked away.

  Then they went back to the bay, where Chuck hopped up on the wrecker's bed. Bridges, his mouth open in surprise, looked up after him. Chuck looked down and grinned. "Boy, I'd hate to get where we're going and find out you accidentally gave me the wrong keys." He tried to fit the key in the first snowmobile's ignition, but it wouldn't go in. He looked down at the keys, grinned again. "Must be this one," he said, holding up the other key.

  It didn't surprise him when the second key refused to go in, but he feigned it nonetheless. "Golly, Mr. Bridges, I think we have the wrong keys here." He hopped down next to Bridges. "Now I know you're a little nervous and all, but I think you'd better get me the right keys this time." He looked at Jean. "You packed?"

  In response, she drew a .38 semi-automatic from her pocket.

  "That's fine." Chuck, still smiling, looked at Bridges. "If we don't come back with the right keys, my friend is going to hold that gun against your wife's fluffy coat and shoot her right in the chest. You think you can find the right keys for me now?"

  "Yessir," Bridges said quietly, afraid to look up at Chuck.

  When they came back into the bay, Michael was already on the wrecker bed. Chuck tossed him the keys. "Hope you put the right one in first," Chuck said. "It doesn't fit...pop."

  "The yellow tag's that first one!" Bridges said quickly. "The yellow tag!"

  Michael looked at the keys in his hand, and held up the one with the worn yellow cardboard tag secured to it with a twist of rusty wire. He tried to slide it into the ignition, but it wouldn't go.

  "It's upside down!" Bridges cried. "Just turn it around!"

  Michael did, and it slipped in smoothly, as did the other key in the second vehicle.

  "That's dandy," Chuck said. "Okay, let's pull it on out of here and get that door down." He and Bridges drove the loaded wrecker forward until it cleared the door. Then they got out again. Chuck gestured to Michael. "You drive the jeep with her," he said, nodding at Jean. "Old Foulmouth and I will ride in the Jairrrr-Dan." He winked at Sam. "After we go inside and settle up with Mr. and Mrs. Bridges here."

  "You're not...gonna hurt us, are you?" Bridges said. His wife clung to his arm, trembling from cold and fear.

  "Now, Mr. Bridges, you did everything we asked you to. And we've been very careful not to use our names. The young lady and I are just going to tie you up." He gestured with the gun, and he, Sam, and the Bridges went back inside the garage, into the small office.

  While he held the pistol, Sam tied the couple tightly together, back to back, with wire. When she was done, Chuck crouched next to the Bridges. "There. I said we'd just tie you up and we did. Now we're just going to kill you."

  Mrs. Bridges started to scream, so Chuck shot her first, pressing the muzzle against her breast and quickly pulling the trigger twice. The sound was efficiently muffled by her thick down coat. He shot Mr. Bridges in the same way, less than three seconds after shooting Mrs. Bridges. Death was not instantaneous, and he and Sam stood and watched until Mr. and Mrs. Bridges stopped moving, and only blood came from their mouths.

  "That was rewarding," Chuck said, slapped Sam on the shoulder, and closed and locked the office door behind them. He rolled a multi-leveled cart full of Snap-On tools in front of the door, and he and Sam walked outside, closing and locking the smaller inset garage door behind them. Sam giggled all the way.

  "'...and now we're just gonna kill you...'" she said. "Aw, that was great...that was really great..."

  Michael rolled down the window of the jeep. "What did you do with them?" he asked, blinking away the falling snow that the wind whirled into his eyes.

  "Do not worry, Don Corleone," Chuck said in a bad Italian accent. "The Bridges sleep with the grease monkeys." Sam's giggles bubbled to a laugh. "They won't find them for a long time. The storm covered the shots, and this guy isn't likely to have many friends coming to call. Follow us."

  They pulled out of Aurora and headed northeast, the jeep in the wrecker's wide wake. While they had been in the little town, they had not seen a vehicle on the streets, or any people except the Bridges.

  Michael looked at Jean. She was sitting in the jeep's passenger seat, her eyes fixed on the road ahead, her hands folded in her lap. She looked pale. If her eyes had been closed, Michael could have imagined that she was dead, and he thought about how far they had come since they had arrived in Pennsylvania, not in terms of miles, but of what they had done.

  "When's the last time," Mi
chael said, "that you thought about the animals?"

  Jean didn't answer for a long time. Finally she said, "It isn't about the animals anymore."

  The truck and the jeep drove through the snow as through a white sea, a giant shark with two remora on its back, and a carrion fish behind.

  By late afternoon, the snow had not slackened. If anything, Ned Craig thought, it had begun to fall harder, so that whatever crevices not previously filled by the artful hand of the wind were now covered by the accumulation of snow, a collaboration between nature's mass and its skill.

  Except for well-bundled trips to the outhouse, he and Megan had remained inside all day. They had twice allowed Pinchot to go out when he whimpered and scratched at the door. "Dog like this goes in the house," Ned had said, hurrying to answer Pinchot's summons, "you'd need a shovel and a mop to clean it up."

  "Elegantly put," Megan said as he pushed the door closed behind the big dog. "I have to get you out in the woods more often. It reveals your poet's soul."

  Through the afternoon, they played backgammon and cribbage, and read quietly for a couple of hours. When Ned got tired of the silence, he asked Megan if she would play her fiddle. She happily complied, and there followed a half hour's assortment of Scots, Old Time, and even some Cape Breton tunes, a style Megan was just learning. She ended with Ashokan Farewell, the song Ned had first heard her play. Before the final chorus, she slipped a small but heavy brass practice mute over the strings to make the sound even softer.

  When the last note died away, she took off the mute, slipped it into her shirt pocket, and set the fiddle and bow on the desk. "I could go for a walk," she said. "How about you?"

  "A walk? In this? We'd be lost in the first hundred yards. It's bad enough getting to the outhouse."

  "Oh, Pinchot won't let us get lost. And I'm sure he'd be up for a frolic in the snow. How about it?"

  Ned grinned and stood up. "I'm game—as long as we have our trusty canine guide...and high boots."

  "We've got both," Megan said. "Let's do it."

  They put on their coats and pulled on their boots, Ned humming Megan's last tune as he laced his up. Hats and gloves followed, and soon they were at the door. Pinchot had divined their intentions quickly, and was batting his tail against the heavy Dutch door, his front paws galloping in place, as excited as a puppy.