Snowman

by Norman Bogner

  "She won't be easy," said another.

  Cathy listened patiently to the macho, juvenile chatter, hoping the challenge would entice Barry.

  "She'll be screaming by the time she's off the chairlift, and we'll be snowplowing by cocktail hour," Barry said confidently.

  "Twenty dollar's says you von't," said Erich, the Kitzbühel Wunderkind. He had been hired in spite of bad references (three paternity suits against him the previous season) when Monte had insisted on having somebody with a German accent, to lend European dignity to the instructional staff.

  "My method never fails," Barry began expansively. He nodded to Cathy, treating her as one of the boys. "Her arches and ankles will be aching. Muscles pulled in the calves. Her can'll be sore, and that's when, gentlemen, I'll recommend my St. Moritz special foot bath . . ."

  "How's it work, Barry?" Cathy asked.

  "I run a hot tub, add a jigger of rum, two of Lavoris, and a squeeze of Vitabath to make the water bubble. Muffin takes off her warm-ups, slips into a robe. Then I plant the flags for the Giant Slalom."

  "If you skied like you pork you'd be an Olympic gold medalist," Baxter, a lean ex-Aspen skeptic, said.

  "Barry, you can't make a conquest just talking. It's time you met Janice," Cathy said.

  "You're on for twenty, Kraut," Barry said. "Anyone else?"

  Chapter Two

  In the timeless universe inhabited by the Snowman there was no sense of location. He had been formed in the graveyard of Antarctica just as the ice age, the Pleistocene Epoch, was ending and Neolithic man was beginning to evolve.

  The extreme climatic changes which altered the land masses of what came to be known as Asia and the Americas forced the Snowman to adapt to his surroundings and gradually mutate.

  As he grew larger, he fed on dying whales and sharks in the Antarctic, and when this source of life became scarce, he moved on. The hair on his body had become rock-hard bonelike extensions, and his gray skin had been able to absorb ice and fuse it so that it shielded him from the elements.

  As his appetite increased, his digestive tract and biochemical glandular functions became more sophisticated. He had always been a flesh eater and through the ages had fed on the various species of man which had evolved. Java, Peking, and Heidelberg man lived in caves to protect themselves from the cold and from this enemy who preyed on them. But as temperatures became warmer and deserts formed, the Snowman was driven higher and higher into the Trans-Himalayan mountainous regions, where the volcanic activity had subsided. There he had an ample supply of animals, which he stalked relentlessly, until they too began to disappear.

  The Snowman had left the Lhotse Face almost ten years before. He had moved from the Himalayas when his food supply had run out. It had been a journey governed by primordial instinct, blindly, almost tropisticly. He had drifted down the East Siberian Sea, carried along by an iceberg which was moved by the current through the Beaufort Sea to North America.

  Through Alaska, Canada, down into Washington and Oregon, he had gone in search of hunting grounds and the permanent glaciers which afforded him protection in the spring and summer. But he was always on the move, driven, searching for a more plentiful food supply and the frozen wastelands which his body required. For almost a year now, he had been embedded in a giant sérac in the California High Sierras. The supply of mountain deer and bears and the eagles which had their aeries below the sunmmit had provided him with sustenance.

  There had been virtually no snow even as the temperatures fell, and so he was secure. Snow threatened him, the strange menace of flakes zigzagging through the winds created a formation in the air which he could barely see. It aroused his fear, and on blind impulse he would leave the ice to strike wildly at the whiteness, the movement engulfing him.

  Snow was his enemy, his constant antagonist. He sensed that it waited, an ill-defined pursuer which had the power to destroy him. He had to fight that glistenlng white blanket which filled the sky.

  Through the glaze of six feet of ice, the Snowman clawed his way to the surface, confronting his nemesis.

  Janice's suite was on the first floor. Amid bouquets of flowers, bowls of fruit still covered in yellow cellophane wrap, she languidly posed in front of the mirror. The boutique inventory of size ten warm-ups, jackets, parkas, jumpsuits, and sweaters lay like a rummage sale on the king-size bed. In an improved temper, Janice pirouetted for Cathy around the room. Her breasts bulged out of a bra too small for her, and she made no effort to cover up when Barry poked his head in.

  "Cathy, do they make thermal bras?" she asked.

  "Not this year."

  After the introductions were made and the principals identified, Cathy stood back and observed the prospective seducer and his victim smiling coyly at each other. Now if she could just get him to put those curves on skis and make a respectable pass down the beginners' slope, Monte would climb off her back and confine his attention to the sales team.

  "Ever been on skis?" Barry asked.

  "On water, around Catalina," Janice said proudly.

  "Not on snow?"

  "The only time I really truly enjoy snow is when I see it in the movies."

  "Janice, why don't you get dressed and Barry'll take you out to the ski school and show you some of the fundamentals," Cathy said, carefully avoiding the word "teach" with its ghastly implications of working.

  "You won't let me fall, will you?" Janice asked in a childlike voice.

  His eyes moved from her face to the bed, then back again. "I'll be holding you," he said.

  "See you two beautiful people outside in ten minutes," Cathy said. "We'll shoot some publicity stills of you and Barry."

  "Thank God for sexual attraction," Cathy told Jim Ashby, who studied a press handout with Janice's biographical data and gave her a melancholy look.

  "She was a cocktail waitress."

  "A singing one," Cathy persisted. "Couldn't you stress the entertainer aspect of her career?"

  "A singing waitress in a Santa Monica German beer garden? That's entertaining?"

  On the ski-school slopes Barry and his pupil, who was on the short, one-meter skis, were staggering hand in hand before the lodge photographer.

  "She must be a pretty fair piece of tail for Barry to make such a horse's ass out of himself," Ashby observed.

  "That's what I sold him on," Cathy replied.

  On the slope above them, Barry was trying to console and encourage Janice.

  "Press your ankles forward till they rest on your boots. Weight on the balls of your feet. Don't move your upper body . . . everything comes from the legs."

  She tried to digest the information as she clung nervously to his arm.

  "You're going too fast and I'm afraid."

  Barry skied midway down the mini-hill and extended his arms, but Janice remained rooted to the spot. She turned her head and watched small children skiing down the icy runs. Their expressions of exhilaration and freedom apparently affected her. She turned her skis to the parallel position and skied down to Barry. In another moment the two of them were moving down together, and there was something touching about Janice's innocent elation.

  "That's good—good—good," the photographer barked as he clicked.

  "Before and after," Ashby said. "It's got human interest. You get yourself a Snow Queen and in ten minutes she's skiing. I'll do a spread with pictures and run a tear-out so you can use it for promotion."

  The pieces were falling together, miraculously, Cathy thought, relaxing for the first time that day. Barry and Honeypie would look gorgeous in the color brochure, and sales would be bound to pick up.

  "She's doing fine," Monte said, joining them. Accompanying him was Ken Atkins, his sales manager, a hangdog man in his indeterminate fifties who spent his days sopping up abuse from Monte because of the slow sales.

  The company had expected instant success, for the rather naive reason that they had made a huge investment and wanted immediate returns on their money. But the sales matched
the slugish economy. People weren't quick to snap up Chamonix (the one-bedroom-and-loft apartment) or Innsbruck (two bedrooms and den) or the luxurious St. Moritz (three beds, den, and loft which could sleep twelve).

  A fortune in advertising had been spent celebrating the virtues of Sierra, the quality of its buildings, the authenic Finnish saunas, the exciting night life at the Snowplow. What had induced people to come up for Thanksgiving was that fifteen chairlifts and gondolas were in operation, and lift tickets and ski instruction were free, while charter flights round trip from L.A., subsidized by the company, cost a mere twenty dollars. If they didn't pack them in for Thanksgiving, it would be a long cold winter. Cathy had persuaded Monte to hold a drawing and give a Chamonix model to the lucky winner.

  But the weather refused to cooperate with them. Sierra had the highest annual snowfall in California, but this year the snows had been late and the lower slopes were barely covered for the opening.

  Monte motioned her in the direction of the models, and Ken laggardly followed. A few couples were trooplng in and out of the buildings with that detached, reserved air of lookers. Salesmen pursued them relentlessly with floor plans, literature, and offers of free hot rum toddies.

  "Well, at least We've got Janice airborne," Cathy said,

  looking at the slopes and silently praying for snow. The clouds at the summit of the mountain were darkening, and the weather forecaster had promised a low-pressure system from Canada. But he'd been making the same promise for weeks.

  "We still need some kind of media hype," Monte said.

  "Opening a new ski resort isn't exactly network news."

  In an effort to keep the pressure on her and saddle her with the failure of his salesmen, Ken broke the silence.

  "Robert Redford. He's what we need, and he's a skier."

  "He's got his own resort, and it's called Sundance."

  "Competion's everywhere," Ken muttered darkly.

  "Maybe you picked a bum sales team," Monte said, hitting his favorite refrain.

  "Monte, they sold the ass off the Bahamas," Ken replied. "These guys moved land that was under water three hundred days a year. They ran inspection tours from boats!"

  "Then why can't they sell our condos? The board let me drop the mortgages to eight and a half percent with five percent down. It's the best deal in the country."

  "No one's disagreeing," Ken said.

  "Do I have to bump up the commissions, is that it?"

  "No, the men are hungry enough."

  Chartered buses were disgorging hundreds of people behind them at the lodge. Soft flakes of lazy snow began to fall, and Cathy looked up with pleasure.

  "God's on our side, gentlemen."

  Near the summit of Sierra a violent cleavage occurred. The Snowman crouched low as the spears of iced snow pounded off his barbed trunk. His powerful hands crashed against a sangar, and loose stones were jarred and fell down the slopes. His rage was all-consuming, and he smashed everything in his path as his horned feet dug into the glacier. He began to climb down to the lower slopes, striding rapidly—in flight from the nameless enemy which implacably followed him. He paused at the edge of a snow bridge, then shielded himself in the hollow of a cornice.

  In the distance were vague amorphous forms, and his roar was so deep that the snow bridge collapsed.

  "Your progress is incredible," Barry told Janice. "Fact is, you're the best pupil I've ever taught." She was making fine looping turns. She'd be worth complete fidelity for the weekend, he thought, picturing her foot bath and a lengthy main event in the sack.

  "It's like flying," she said excitedly. She had made two successful runs down the beginners' slope without a fall. "I love it."

  Even the ride up the chairlift excited her. There were bright prisms of sunlight shimmering and forming rainbows above the peaks; a halo crowned the summit.

  She turned to look at the lodge receding in the background. The chairlift passed over a large wooded area of serried Jeffrey pine trees. The branches rustled in the wind. All around them skiers in brightly colored outfits were going down the slopes. The snow was getting heavier, and she lowered her goggles.

  "We can use this," Barry said. "It'll be packed by morning. Perfect conditions."

  "Am I ready for the intermediate slope?"

  "Let's see how you go on this run."

  He leaned over the bar and pressed his face against hers. Then something caught his attention, and he pulled away abruptly.

  "What's the matter?"

  Coming into her view above them was a single ski. It gathered speed and flashed menacingly as it whipped past other skiers. She sensed the danger without understanding it.

  "It's a suicide ski. Somebody's in big trouble."

  The chairlift was nearing the get-off point for the intermediate slopes. Barry's body tensed as he searched the slopes for a struggling figure.

  "Janice, stay on the lift all the way up. It'll take you down again. Just keep your poles on the outside," he said quickly, then glided off in a quick lithe movement to the booth placed at the get-off point. He signaled a man in the booth and shouted, "Call the ski patrol! I'm going out to look—"

  She lost his words in the wind and craned her neck around to watch him sidestep up the slope past the booth. She adjusted the straps of her poles and faced front. The snow flurries were heavier as the lift moved higher. Sharp needles of ice were crashing into her face and bombarding her. The wind had picked up and scoured the flanks of the mountain with the loose falling snow.

  It was becoming difficult for her to see, and she squinted through the goggles. The chairlift, caught in a wind current, began to rock wildly, and she grew frightened. As she moved higher, she saw that these slopes were deserted. The sky had turned an ominous slate gray. The mountain was darkening, and the increasing momentum of the snowfall had obliterated the runs. She waved at a solitary skier in the distance and called out to him, but the shrilling whine of the wind drowned out her voice.

  "Get me off!" she shouted as the chairlift passed the booth on the advanced slope. She thought she made out a figure huddled in the booth. Above her heavy eaves of snow near the summit had been formed into cornices by the prevailing wind. The lift girdled the great facade of the glacier. The stark, glaring whiteness of the ice sheet blinded her, and her unease caused her to suck in great breaths of air, which burned her lungs. The rarefied air and lack of oxygen slowed her mind down.

  It was unreasonable, this panic, she tried to tell herself. Soon she would be coming down and she would be safe. She was alone and she didn't want to think about it, but she couldn't help herself. Tears

  froze on her eyelids, forming hard crystals, and her cheeks were becoming numb with frostbite.

  Higher up the storm had developed into a blizzard, the sheets of snow masking the relentless cliff lines. The ground below her seemed shaky. There were eerie, rumbling underground noises of ice movement, as if the mountain would cleave open and collapse in an avalanche. When the sky cleared for an instant, she saw a long sloping shelf leading to a vertical crack; the crack widened as she moved.

  Her fingers were paralyzed from the cold, and when she attempted to bend them she realized that they were frozen. She almost blacked out in the thin air, but some deep instinct for survival enabled her to fight against the loss of consciousness. A sudden razor shard of light illuminated the summit of the mountain; she had the sense of relief which light inspires. For a moment she was entranced by the astonishing cascades of ice which stretched out in an unbroken line.

  A series of triangular tracks resembling geometric rungs of a ladder created a rainbow mirage. As her eyes followed the clear line of the rainbow, she relaxed. She chided herself for her city girl's silly fears about what was nothing more than an extended amusement-park ride. Ridiculous.

  In the distance beside the rainbow she thought she discerned the movement of light reflecting a shadow. She could see the complete Sierra range. There were hollow spaces beneath the cliffs, and na
rrow, twisting ice channels.

  The shadow blended in with the ice; there was no contrast. It appeared to be traveling at the same speed as the chairlift, but then it loomed ahead, pulverizing the ice and creating fissures.

  Something, she thought, was following her.

  An unidentifiable sound echoed from below. For an instant it seemed to come from an animal: the deep enraged growl of a bear. It mystified her.

  The chairlift dipped on its route to bypass a steep ridge that jutted up like a bent needle. The rainbow tracks were ahead of her on the other side of the ridge. Suddenly a beam of searing light burned her face; her goggles began to melt. She was too astonished even to cry out. The light vanished, and she wiped her face, blinking rapidly to enable her eyes to focus.

  She saw reaching toward her a grotesquely shaped, clawed hand. She swerved away, crashing into the metal pole dividing the lift. The fingers groped, and the form pursued her, keeping pace with the lift. She huddled against the bar. The fngers were upon her, touching her, squeezing the bone in her arm; she felt it splinter. A low agonized whine was the only sound she was capable of.

  Her ski poles flew through the air; whirling along with them in free fall was her arm. ripped from its shoulder socket. A long plume of snow vapor turned a blackish red. Her eye's were closed. The hand clasped her right leg, and again disbelief was as intense as the pain.

  Granitelike fingers held on to her torso. She forced her eyes open. Words were formed by her lips, but they were stillborn as the Snowman's grotesque massive face came closer. A series of grey-black veins snaked through the flat cheekbones, which were covered by razor-sharp pointed burrs. The nose was deeply recessed and virtually boneless, the forehead a series of angled rock-hard protuberances. The head itself was the size of a barrel and was set on the body with no neck. The gaping mouth opened and clasped her leg.

  The snapping jaws echoed, opening and closing like some violent machine . . .

  Janice was no longer anybody's headache.

  Chapter Three