The Stalker

by Gail Anderson-Dargatz

  Liz shook her head. “I thought this was all over.” Then she looked at me. “I’ll tell you one thing. No matter who this guy is, I’m not going to let a stalker run my life ever again.”

  “So what do you want to do?” I asked her.

  “We stick to our plans. We take Sam and Gerald to the burial cave. I’ll make a nice dinner. And we’ll see what happens. First, let’s watch to see if Gerald is on the phone when we get the next call.”

  “And if he is?”

  “I guess we’ll just have to confront him, as politely as we can. Ask him what the hell he’s up to.”

  “And what if he isn’t on the phone when we get the next call?”

  Liz scanned the wilderness around us. “Then we have a much bigger problem on our hands.”

  Chapter Six

  For the next couple of hours, Gerald stopped paddling every fifteen minutes or so to check where we were on his GPS. “Gerald,” I said finally, “we’ll never get to that cave if you keep stopping. And look at those storm clouds. We’ll have to find a place to camp soon.”

  “Storm?” Sam looked up at the boiling clouds above us. “My god! Where did that come from?”

  “They roll up quickly here,” I said. Most of my clients lacked the experience to paddle in rough water. When storms hit, we had to make camp on one of the islands. There we would wait until the storm passed.

  Gerald didn’t hear a word. He puzzled over his GPS unit, then waved excitedly at the island to our left. The rocky shore shot up into a cliff that was full of shallow caves. Bone Island, we called it. We often paddled by, but we never went to shore.

  “That island doesn’t appear on the map,” Gerald said. He held up his GPS unit. “Look! Here we are.” He showed me a blip on the screen. “And here is where that island should be. But there’s nothing on the map but water. That’s one of the forbidden islands, isn’t it?”

  I glanced at Liz. “The burial cave I’m taking you to is on an island up ahead.”

  “But I want to go there,” he said, pointing again at Bone Island.

  “No,” I said. “We aren’t allowed.”

  “I knew it! That is one of the forbidden islands.” And Gerald was off, paddling towards Bone Island.

  “Gerald!” I called. “You can’t go there!”

  But Gerald didn’t turn back. I paddled after him. I caught up to him easily, but how could I get him to turn around? If I grabbed him, I risked overturning his kayak.

  I pulled ahead and crossed his path to make him turn. “Listen to me, Gerald,” I said. “You can’t go on that island. Taking things from these sites is illegal. You could be charged.”

  “I just want to look,” he said. But his childish whine told me he lied. He wanted a souvenir.

  “We’re turning around,” I said.

  “No.”

  “There is plenty to see in the cave I’ll show you,” I told him.

  “But I want to see those caves,” he said, pointing at Bone Island directly ahead of us. Many of the caves were burial caves, and they contained human remains and the items buried with them. We were almost to shore.

  “Shit,” I said. We would have to beach before I could talk some sense into him. And even then, I figured, I would need Sam’s help. She knew the guy. I turned and waved at the women, inviting them to meet us on the beach of Bone Island.

  We dragged our kayaks on shore, one by one. Together with Liz, Sam and I tried to talk some sense into Gerald. But then Sam’s phone rang. She listened to the caller for a moment and said, “Who is this?” Then she held the phone away from her ear. “What the hell? He hung up on me.”

  “Who?” Gerald asked.

  “I don’t know,” said Sam. “His voice was very strange.”

  “Like a space alien’s voice?” I asked.

  “How did you know?”

  So Gerald wasn’t the stalker. He hadn’t been on the phone when Sam got the call.

  “What did the caller say?” Liz asked Sam.

  “He said we don’t belong here. Then he said people would get hurt if we didn’t turn around and go home.”

  Liz and I both nodded.

  “This guy has phoned you, too?” asked Sam.

  “A couple of times when we were out on the water,” I said. I hesitated. “And a few times just before we left.”

  “And you took us out into this godforsaken wilderness anyway?” said Sam.

  I wouldn’t tell them I thought the caller was Gerald. And I wouldn’t tell them about Liz’s ex, not unless I had to. “We thought maybe it was just one of Jason’s pranks,” I said.

  “A prank?” said Sam.

  “He put a snake in my kayak once,” I said.

  “Then a squirrel,” Liz added.

  “I got him back by letting a tarantula loose in his bedroom,” I said. Liz and I both tried to laugh.

  “Is this the humour you Canadians are so famous for?” Gerald said. “If so, I don’t find it very funny.”

  I shook my head. “Me neither. Look, why don’t I phone Jason right now and find out if it is him. Then we don’t have to worry.”

  I pushed my speed dial button to get Jason. He answered with his usual clipped greeting: “Hey.” But I could barely hear him. His voice kept cutting in and out as we spoke. The storm was affecting cell phone reception. A few drops of rain had already fallen.

  “Have you been making prank calls to us?” I said. “Threatening us? They’ve got to stop.”

  “You know I wouldn’t do anything like that,” said Jason.

  I paused before saying anything more. I did know, of course. “I’m sorry,” I said. “Things are kind of crazy right now.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “We’re on Bone Island. Some creep is out here with us, watching. He’s been making calls to Liz and me and now to Sam. He threatened us.”

  “Oh, man,” Jason said. “You are coming home, right?”

  I looked up at the boiling clouds above us. The rain hammered down now. “Yeah,” I said. “It’ll be tough paddling for Gerald and Sam but I think we better give it a try. If we run into trouble, we’ll find a place to wait out this storm. I’ll call you once we get close to the launch site. You can meet us there.”

  “I’ll wait for your call, then.”

  “Thanks, buddy.” I flipped my phone shut. “All right, everyone. Let’s go.”

  “But I haven’t seen the burial caves,” said Gerald. “And I’m not leaving until I do.” He climbed up the rocky beach in the rain, sliding on the slick rocks that led up to the closest cave.

  “Ah, hell,” I said. I climbed up after him, leaping from rock to rock. When I put a hand on his shoulder, he shrugged it off.

  “Are you going to knock me out and drag me back down this cliff?” he said. “If not, I suggest you allow me to see that cave. I’m not leaving here until I do.”

  “All right, all right,” I said. “We’ll all go together and see one of the burial caves.” The more eyes on Gerald the better, I thought. “Then we’re getting out of here. Agreed?”

  “Agreed.”

  I waved at Liz and Sam to join us. We all climbed the cliff with our hoods up, braving the heavy rain. We balanced along a thin ledge under a long, narrow rock overhang to view the grave.

  Gerald was disappointed. He looked into the grave glumly, like a child who has just dropped his ice cream. The cave was shallow, little more than a pocket in the cliff face. The remains of a body were still in there. The skeleton was partly covered by the rotted cedar burial box that had once contained it. If the cave had ever held anything else, it had long since been taken away.

  “That’s it?” said Gerald.

  “Well, what did you expect?” said Sam. “King Tut’s tomb?”

  “I think it’s amazing,” said Liz. “I know we’re not supposed to be here, Mike, but thanks for this.” She squeezed my hand.

  “Now,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  But as we turned to take our first step back dow
n the cliff, gunshots zinged past our heads.

  Chapter Seven

  The gunman fired down from the cliff edge above us. Because of the narrow overhang, he couldn’t actually hit us. But the bullets were close. I heard the zing as one flew just in front of our faces. We all pressed ourselves against the cliff face as the shots rained down.

  “Did you see him?” said Liz.

  I shook my head. “No.”

  “Why is he shooting at us?” asked Gerald.

  “That’s obvious: he doesn’t want us here,” I said. “He’s trying to scare us off.”

  “Someone from the Indian band?” Gerald asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. But likely he was right. The stalker had warned us not to come out here, and then he shot at us when we intruded on this cave.

  “We should just leave,” said Sam. “Run down to shore and get in our kayaks.”

  “Not with this guy shooting at us,” I said.

  “What, then?” she said. “We’re trapped.”

  I flipped open my phone. “I’ll call the cops.” But I got no signal.

  “Must be the storm,” Liz said. “I’ll try.” She tried her phone, then shook her head.

  Sam and Gerald both pulled out their cell phones. “Nothing,” said Sam.

  “Well, at least we won’t get any more calls from that stalker,” I said, trying to make light of the situation. Nobody laughed.

  The shots stopped for a moment. The guy needed to reload his gun, I thought. I squinted up into the rain to see if I could catch sight of him, but I couldn’t. “You want us to leave, we’ll leave,” I shouted up at him. “Just stop shooting.”

  Immediately the guy started firing again. I jumped back under the overhang. But this time he didn’t aim at us. He shot at our kayaks. One by one, the boats jumped as he shot them full of bullet holes. Then the shots stopped. We all listened to the pouring rain, waiting for the gunfire to start again.

  “Oh, god,” said Liz. “Now we really are trapped. We can’t get off the island.”

  Sam’s voice rose in alarm. “He shot holes in our kayaks, and now he’s going to kill us, like he killed that tourist!”

  “We can’t afford to panic,” I said. “So far he seems more intent on scaring us than killing us.”

  “What are we going to do?” said Gerald.

  “What can we do?” Liz said. “We wait this guy out. And we wait this storm out.” She pointed at the shallow caves in the cliff wall on either side of us. “We can hide here.”

  “At least that way he’ll have to show his face if he plans to kill us,” said Sam. She was right. The cliff was a natural fortress. The stalker would have to stand on shore or climb up the rocks below us if he intended to shoot us. We would see him coming.

  “All right,” I said, taking charge. “Each of these caves is big enough for only one of us, so I’ll give you each a cave.”

  “I’m not going into a cave with a body,” said Sam.

  “There are several here without remains,” I said. “Stay in there, keep your head low. We’ll just wait it out, like Liz says. As soon as the storm lets up and our phones work, I’ll call for help.”

  I led Sam and Gerald along the cave face under the overhang. I chose caves for each of them that had boulders in front of them. These rocks would provide at least some protection if the gunman decided to fire directly at us. Gerald’s cave was little more than a shallow dent in the rock face. But it was fairly dry, and it held nothing for him to steal.

  When Gerald saw the cave was empty, he backed out and said, far too loudly, “But I want to see the other burial caves.”

  I pushed him into his cave. I feared that the stalker might take another shot at him for that one. “Look, asshole,” I said. “You dragged us here and got us shot at. For your own safety, you will shut up and do what I say for the rest of the trip. Understand?”

  As Gerald nodded, rain dripped from his hair. “I understand.”

  Sam, listening from her own cave, began to clap. Quietly at first, then in real applause.

  That night, I kept watch from my little cave. My jackknife stayed in my hand, open and ready. The rain didn’t let up. The wind howled eerily across the mouths of the burial caves above and around us. Sometime in the night, I heard footsteps outside my cave. My heart beating hard in my chest, I sat up too quickly and jabbed myself in the shoulder with my own knife. I pressed my hand against the small wound, feeling the blood slick on my fingers. “Who’s there?” I said. “I can hear you.”

  “It’s just me.” Liz appeared in the cave entrance. She carried the tiny flashlight she kept in her dry suit. Her hair was completely wet from the rain. She looked helpless, beautiful.

  “Can I double up with you tonight?” she asked. When I didn’t answer immediately, she said, “I’m not here for that.”

  “I didn’t think you were.”

  “I’m just so scared and cold.”

  I closed up the jackknife and shifted over to give her room. The cave was barely big enough for one person, let alone two. We had to lie curled up together on our sides to fit. Liz lay with her back to me. She smelled clean, of Ivory soap and rain. I liked her for that.

  “You can feel the spirits of the dead all around us,” Liz said. “The stalker is right. We don’t belong here. What are we doing bringing tourists to these graveyards?”

  “We don’t know for sure the gunman is from the band,” I said. “The guy could be your ex, for all we know.”

  “Thanks for that cheerful thought,” she said.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “Being trapped here is frightening for all of us, but it must be so much more terrifying for you. You went through all this before, with your ex-husband.”

  “He didn’t try to shoot me.”

  “But I get the idea that he threatened you.”

  “Yes, many times.”

  We both listened to the storm raging outside.

  “I meant to apologize earlier for what I said about your top this morning.” I said. “I was out of line.”

  “No, you were right,” she said. “What I wore wasn’t appropriate.”

  “Well, it did make me uncomfortable.”

  “I shouldn’t have worn it.”

  “No. I mean, I liked it. You looked nice. That was what made me uncomfortable.”

  She turned to face me. Our noses were only inches apart. “I wore it for you,” she said.

  I grinned. “Then I hope you wear it again sometime.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  I could hear a smile in her voice. I leaned forward and kissed her in the dark. But she turned away as best she could in the cramped cave.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I thought that’s what you wanted.”

  She shook her head. “You like Sara.”

  “She’s married.”

  “She likes you.”

  I thought about Sara’s dress, the cookies she had brought me, the way she had smiled at me that morning. “She knows I don’t get involved with my employees,” I said. “Besides, I would never break up a marriage.”

  “But if Dave wasn’t in the way...”

  “But he is in the way. I’m not interested in getting involved with Sara.”

  “Because she’s married.”

  “Yes, because she’s married.”

  That didn’t seem to be enough for Liz. “And you don’t get involved with your employees,” she said. “I’m an employee.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Let’s just forget that kiss ever happened.”

  But after a time she backed up against me and I wrapped an arm around her. We didn’t make love or even kiss, but I held her body close to mine.

  “Do you think the stalker is still out there?” Liz asked.

  I paused a moment before responding. I wanted to reassure her, to make her feel safe. But I knew that, somewhere out there, a guy with a gun waited for us to come out.

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  Chapter Eight<
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  As daylight came, the storm started to move on. But I still had no phone reception. Perhaps the cliff itself blocked the signal. Even so, there was no way I was going to step down onto the beach to check. The stalker might still be waiting with his gun on the cliff above us. One shot and it would be game over for me.

  Then I heard the sound of a motorboat heading our way. I climbed over Liz, waking her. “What?” she said, still half asleep. “What is it?”

  “A boat,” I said. “Someone’s here.”

  When I peeked over the rocky ledge in front of my cave, I saw Sara jumping to the shore from my motorboat. She tied the boat to a driftwood log. Jason leapt out of the boat after her. I stood up, pressing my body against the cliff face, and called their names, waving my arms.

  Sara waved back until she saw Liz come out of the cave behind me. She let her arm fall.

  “Is everyone all right?” Jason called up to us. “You had me scared shitless. You phone to tell us some guy is threatening you, you say you’re coming home, and that’s the last I hear from you.”

  I looked back to the caves. Sam poked her head out of hers. Gerald stood up and stretched. “Yeah, I guess we’re all right,” I said. “But check out the kayaks.” Gunshot holes peppered the boat hulls.

  “Oh, my god,” said Sara. “You’re living that missing tourist story all over again.”

  “The guy shot directly at us, too, from up there.” I pointed at the top of the cliff above me. “He had us trapped in these caves all night.”

  “I don’t see anyone up there now,” Jason said. “I think it’s safe to come down.”

  We all scrambled down the rocks to shore. Despite our dry suits, we were wet, cold, and shivering. Sam and Gerald both went directly to their kayaks, looking for a change of clothes.

  “I’ll fire up my camp stove,” said Liz. “Make us coffee and something to eat to warm us up.”

  I hugged Sara and slapped Jason on the shoulder. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you two,” I said.

  “When you didn’t call or turn up at the launch site,” Jason said, “I tried to phone you. But I couldn’t reach you. I phoned Sara, and at last I got hold of her. I wanted to come out here late last night. But Sara convinced me that the water was just too rough. So we waited out the storm. I’m kicking myself now. We got plenty of rain, all right, but Sara and I could have made it out. That gunman could have killed you.”