They were still ten yards away when Elvin made eye contact. Rising, he grinned and began stretching, as if he were about to engage in an Olympic event: Eskimo pummeling.
Ray held up his palm in an attempt to calm the giant, then shot him a peace sign. “We don’t want trouble.”
Elvin chucked at this. “Then you’re in the wrong place, Mr. Muktuk.”
“We need to ask you a few questions … about the murder.”
“Ask all the questions you want.” He lifted a pool cue, examined it to make sure it was true, and without further warning, swung it, grazing Ray’s thigh.
“Hey!” Ray leapt backward. “Elvin, we’re police. We could arrest you for assaulting an officer.”
“Oh, yeah? Go ahead and try, klooch.”
“What exactly do you have against my people?”
“Let’s see … you’re dirty, ugly, smelly, stupid …”
“Other than that, I mean.”
Elvin laughed crudely.
“Me, I’m just a cop. Trying to do a job. One of Fanny’s ladies was murdered. We’re trying to find out who did it. You can understand that, right?”
“I understand that you slant-eyed savages should go back to your igloos.”
“They don’t live in igloos,” Billy Bob argued.
Elvin frowned at him. “Who asked you?” He took a swing, but the deputy leaned out of range.
“I’ll make you a deal, Elvin,” Ray tried. “You answer our questions, take a look at the pictures we brought, then we’ll leave you alone. How’s that?”
“I’ll make you a deal,” the bouncer replied. “I beat you to a pulp, then throw your carcass out in the snow. How’s that?”
Ray looked at the pool cue, then estimated the distance to the entrance. Though the giant had to be relatively slow, they probably couldn’t make it to the Explorer and get it started before he caught up with them.
“What’s your thing, Elvin?”
“Huh?”
“What’s your thing? You like booze, women, money … What do you like?”
“I like ‘em all.” He swung; Ray dodged. “Stand still!” he demanded.
“No hobbies? Special interests?”
“Hogs,” he announced, stalking forward.
“Hogs?” Billy Bob wondered. “You grow up on a farm too?”
“Motorcycles,” Ray clarified. “What kind? Harleys?”
“Got two back home … on the farm.” He jabbed the cue at Billy Bob, just to keep him honest. The crowd had lost interest, their attention back on darts, pool, and drinking themselves into stupors.
“What models?”
“‘84 Softail and a ‘59 Sportster.” The beast stood his ground, distracted.
“Nice bikes.”
“Yeah. Except the Sportster needs a new tank. Been lookin’ for one for months. Originals are tough to find nowadays.”
“I know a guy back in Barrow who’s got a ‘58 Sportster—Comp Hot. Mint condition.”
“You’re kiddin’? ‘58 CH?” The cue did a slow rotation to the vertical position and Elvin leaned against it as he reflected on this disclosure. “Those babies are hot.”
“And he’s got a ‘59 chassis.”
Goliath’s mouth fell open. “No way …”
“Yeah. He’s been trying to sell it. But … well, in Barrow, there’s not much of a market for vintage hogs.”
Elvin swore, the anger gone. “I’d give my eyeteeth to get my hands on that chassis.”
“Tell you what,” Ray offered, “I’ll put you in touch with him if …”
“If …? If what?” he asked, licking his lips like a starving man who had just been allowed to glimpse a gourmet meal.
“If you help us out here.”
“And ya don’t kill us,” Billy Bob added.
“Deal?” Ray extended his hand cautiously.
Elvin discarded the cue and smothered his hand in a vice grip. “Deal.”
Ray showed him the sketches. “We need to know if these men were in here recently.”
“What’s the ‘58 got?” Elvin asked. “‘74 OHV?”
“You’ll have to ask. Now about these men …”
“I remember him,” he said, poking Weinhart’s picture. “Mr. Moneybags. Guy slipped me a hundred dollars just to get his scrawny, suit-wearing butt into Fanny’s.”
“When was that?”
“Oh, either yesterday or the day before. I think the day before. Yeah.”
“Don’t guess you know who he went to see?”
Elvin shook his head. “Nah. Could have been any of the girls.”
“What about this guy?” Ray offered Driscoll’s picture.
“Him … I’m not sure about. But I think he was here too. Pretty sure I saw him drinking and playin’ pool. Might of gone up to Fanny’s … maybe.”
Ray began folding the sketches.
“You think one of ‘em killed Honey?”
“No,” Ray answered. “They’re both dead.”
Elvin’s eyebrows fell, causing his forehead to grow. He looked Cro-Magnon now, like a caveman attending to a primitive puzzle.
“We think the same person may have killed all three of them.”
He cursed at this, frowned, then said, “About that Softail …”
Ray fished out a card and scribbled a name and number on it. “Ask for Jack. Tell him Ray Attla mentioned the hog he’s selling He’ll give you a fair price.”
Elvin’s face lit up as he stared at the number. The fierce, tough-guy aura quickly faded, replaced by a look of pure joy: a little kid who had just gotten everything he wanted for Christmas.
“Thanks, man,” he sighed, seemingly overwhelmed. Suddenly the brute was hugging Ray, arms squeezing his breath away.
“One more thing,” Ray panted, struggling out of the embrace. “What do you know about Salome?”
The name seemed to have a magical effect on him. “Not enough.”
“You know who she is, right?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“What can you tell us about her?”
“Not much.”
“Do you know if that’s her real name? Where she’s from?”
“Nope.”
“What do you know?”
“Just that she is one beautiful thing, man.”
“She’s a Native?”
He acted offended by this. “No. I mean … not like …” Then he grinned at Ray. “No offense, man, but most of your women … I mean …”
“You don’t find them attractive?”
“Dogs,” he confirmed. This was followed by a long coyote howl. “Bow-wows.” He giggled, then grew serious. “But Salome, she ain’t like that. She’s special.” He was almost panting. “There ain’t many of Fanny’s girls I’d want to get close to. Got diseases and stuff. But Salome …” He emitted a wolf whistle. “She’s something else.”
“You don’t know where we can find her?”
“Huh-uh.”
“Is there any chance the men I showed you were here to see Salome?”
“Sure. If they was smart.” He paused, a thoughtful expression on his face. “You know what size tank that ‘69 had?”
“No. One last question, Elvin. When we stopped by earlier, Fanny got a phone call. After she hung up she said, ‘He’s coming.’ Any idea who ‘he’ might have been?”
“Huh-uh.”
“You didn’t see anyone come in just after we left?” Elvin shook his head. “I was still on the floor, bleeding.”
“Oh, yeah. Sorry about the nose.”
The bearded giant snorted at this, gently rubbing his wounded beak. “No problem, man. That was a nice move. Where’d you learn to kick like that? Kung Fu?”
“Klooch Olympics,” Ray answered with a straight face.
The bouncer burst out laughing. “I’m starting to like you, man.”
“Does this place have a back entrance?”
“Through the kitchen.”
Ray looked in that direction, then asked
, “Any other way out?”
“There’s a fire exit in the stairs. But I ain’t never seen nobody use it.”
“Okay.” He caught Billy Bob’s eyes and nodded toward the door to Fanny’s. “Thanks for your help, Elvin.”
“Anytime. Thanks for the line on the Softail. Man, that’s sweet.”
In the stairwell, Billy Bob asked, “What are we lookin’ fer?”
“Someone was coming up. Maybe it was the murderer. Or maybe whoever it was saw something. Either way, there’s a chance they used this door.”
“What door?”
They both stood looking up the stairs. Even in the semi-darkness, there didn’t seem to be a door, or a sign, or any evidence of a fire exit. “It’s gotta be here somewhere,” Ray grumbled, starting up the steps. When he reached the landing he felt along the paneled wall. “Maybe it’s hidden.”
“A hidden fire exit?” Billy Bob wondered. “Don’t make much sense.”
“Check up on the next landing,” Ray told him.
After ascending the stairs, the deputy gave the walls a quick rap, then reported, “Nothin’ up here.” He sat on the top step and watched as Ray patted the second of three walls on the landing. “Boy, howdy! I thought for certain that Elvin fella was gonna beat us black and blue. Shore is a good thing you know a guy with the right motorcycle.”
“I don’t,” Ray grunted, starting on the last wall. This one bore a thin curtain.
“What do ya mean, you don’t?!”
“I mean, I don’t know anybody with a ‘59 Harley.” He pulled the curtain back and found a concrete slab. “Those are rare bikes. No one in Barrow owns one.”
“But—But you told Elvin—”
“I know what I told him.” There was a gap in the concrete. He followed it with his fingertips. “I was betting he wasn’t smart enough to realize there aren’t many decent Harleys north of the Arctic Circle. And I was right.”
Billy Bob swore loudly. “When he finds out …!”
“We’ll be long gone.” The gap was rectangular.
“No, you’ll be gone. I work right down the block. He’s gonna come after me.”
“Bingo!”
“What? You want me to get myself tore down by a guy who makes Leon Lett look like a cream puff?”
“Who’s Leon Lett?”
“All-pro tackle for the World Champion Dallas Cowboys,” Billy Bob explained with obvious pride. “Listed at three hundred forty pounds. Actual weight, three hundred eighty. He’s one mean mama.”
“Sounds like a lot of man.” He waved Billy Bob down. “I found it.”
“Found what? My death certificate?” The deputy trotted down and squinted at a steel door. Ray extracted his penlight. Wide red letters declared: Fire Door. On the frame above a burned-out electric sign repeated the same words.
After nodding at it, Billy Bob muttered, “I’m dead meat.”
“Relax,” Ray consoled. “I do know a guy in Anchorage who’s into Harleys. Maybe he can track down a Sportster somewhere in the lower forty-eight.”
“Call him!” Billy Bob demanded.
“I will … later. Right now, let’s find out where this goes.” He gave the door a push. It clunked, but wouldn’t open. With the aid of the penlight, he found the latch and depressed it. This time the door swung back, hinges singing. Frigid air rushed to greet them and they found themselves staring into the night.
THIRTY-FOUR
“SPOOKY,” BILLY BOB observed with a frown of disapproval.
Ray agreed, but refused to voice it. The howling wind, the near total darkness … It was like looking into a void, a black hole in space where only cold and evil existed.
“Bet Freddy Krueger’s out there somewheres.”
“Who?”
“Ain’t you never seen Nightmare on Elm Street?”
Ray shook his head. “TV show?”
“Nah,” Billy Bob replied, still transfixed by the vision. “Series of movies. Real scary. There’s this feller named Freddy. He’s got these long, killer fingernails and a dog-ugly face. He goes around slicin’ and dicin’ teenagers.”
“I’m sorry I missed it. Sounds like Oscar material.”
“Anyway, sometimes, he sneaks into their dreams, leaps out from nowhere.”
They studied the scene for another ten seconds. When the deputy’s beeper went off they both flinched. Billy Bob swore as he fought to deactivate it.
“It’s Reynolds,” Billy Bob said after examining the readout. “Should I call him?”
Ray nodded.
“You’re not goin’ out there, are ya?”
He shrugged at this. “We could use a break. Maybe I can scrounge up some evidence, bloody footprints … a murder weapon … a psychopath who wants to confess …”
“Well, I’ll make this call and wait for you up front. Unless you want me to …”
“Go find out what Reynolds wants,” Ray grumbled. “I’ll be scouring the Styx for fingerprints if you need me.”
The deputy offered a sideways grin before trotting down the steps toward safety. Ray pulled on his mask, hood, and his mittens, then used the penlight to check the outside door handle. The latch was locked. Once the door shut, he wouldn’t be coming back in that way without a key. He found a clump of ice the size of a pineapple on the grated landing and wedged it between the door and the facing.
Armed only with the penlight, he began a slow inspection of the outer door. It was unmarked, covered with a sheen of ice. In the mini-pool of light, he noticed that the snow on the grating and on the steel steps leading away from it had been trampled recently, a waffle pattern repeated at opposing angles, as if the same individual had come and gone several times, or at least the same type of boots. Wide, tick-tack-toe design with snowflakelike diamonds: Sorrels. Since Sorrels were the most popular boots on the Slope, that narrowed the owner down to one of several thousand men.
At the bottom of the steps was a drift, bordered by a low wall. A garagelike roll door was hidden behind another drift. A loading dock, Ray decided. An old, obviously neglected dock, from the days when the roadhouse had been a hotel.
Boot prints left the stairs and, ten feet later, a trail of snowshoe marks set off into the darkness. North. Toward … nothing. The rest of Deadhorse was south. The airport was due west. The only thing north was the Arctic Ocean, the polar ice cap … And some three to five miles away, the Bradbury.
Ray knelt and felt the boot tracks with his mitten. They were deep. Whoever was in the boots was large, heavy. Without snowshoes, he wouldn’t have made it out of the shadow of Harry’s. The snowshoe tracks were shallower, and asymmetrical. Either Tubbs or Yuba. The mark left by the heel cleat and the fact that the Tubbs Ray was familiar with were ultralites, preferred by athletes, led him to choose the latter. Somebody, murderer, delivery man, shy john, or maybe even a disoriented drunk, had left by the back door in Sorrels, donned a pair of Yubas, and gone … where? For a walk? In the dark? At 50 below zero? In the middle of a storm?
Ray shined the weak beam at the trail of prints. Not a drunk. They were too even, the gait too smooth. Whoever left them was pretty good with snowshoes. A delivery person would have come to the front door, especially in light of the loading dock’s condition. That left a john who feared exposure or the murderer. It was probably just a john, Ray decided. Although, why would anyone care about being spotted entering a roadhouse in Deadhorse? The townspeople probably wouldn’t give it a second thought if the president showed up and stopped off at the bar for a quick belt. And just because you went in the tavern didn’t mean you were patronizing Fanny’s.
A gust of wind rushed across the snow, hitting Ray like an invisible ocean breaker. He dropped the penlight. The snow was deep and soft under his hands. It was only after he had dug a hole nearly a yard wide and a foot deep that he found the light. Gripping it tightly with his mitten, he set off in the direction of the tracks, intent upon locating the man who had forged the trail. The chances of a killer leaving such an obvious
trail were remote, but in the absence of any other ideas …
Ray managed four unbalanced steps before sinking to his waist. A minute later, when he had climbed out, he took a single step and was buried to the chest. No wonder the mystery traveler had brought along the Yubas. The snow was virtually bottomless, Ray realized, the result of a swirling effect caused by the angle of the roadhouse. The drifts were probably three or four yards deep in spots. There was no way to follow the tracks, short of growing wings or going back to the Davis camp for his Northern Lites.
As he waded toward the loading dock, Ray heard a wail behind him, a low, angry voice warning that another unseen tsunami of vaporized ice was on its way. Hunching, he adjusted his goggles and braced for the attack. He floated forward with the blast, digging a path through the drift, until the wind was gone, the penlight disappearing with it.
If the light was still on, it was buried, its glow rendered powerless. He brushed a layer of snow aside, felt, tapped, brushed another layer, felt, tapped … Ray cursed the thing, then swore at himself for losing his grip on it, twice. He considered giving up and going on without it. That would require locating a wall, in what seemed to him, absolute darkness, and using the wall to lead him to the stairs, then the door. And all of that hinged on maintaining a sense of direction. If he had gotten turned slightly, he might spend the next hour or so blundering around in the snow in back of Harry’s. He suddenly had a humorously morbid vision of Billy Bob finding his body frozen solid just a few feet from the door, a popsicle that had succumbed to vertigo and died within reach of salvation.
After another minute of fishing through the powder, he felt something. It was hard. The light? Wrong shape. Wrong weight. This was flat, heavy. Taking it in his right mitten, he waded forward, toward the wall he hoped was still directly ahead of him. A dozen concerted steps later, he located the roadhouse, with his face. Falling against it with the grace of a drunken musk ox, his cheek slid along the cold, rock hard surface. The mask took the brunt of the scrape, but his skin stung, and his nose cracked audibly when it serendipitously discovered the ledge of the loading dock.
Righting himself, he followed the wall with a hand. In a matter of a few feet, he emerged from the snow, his boots meeting a hard-packed surface. He found the rail, the steps. He leapt up the grating, pulled back the door, and entered the warmth and dim light of the stairwell. Panting from the effort, he ripped away his goggles, mask, and hood, then started to take off his mittens. That’s when he realized he was holding a prize: wide, fan-shaped blade, thick bone handle, razor-sharp edge stained dark red. An ulu.
Elements of Kill Page 28