I started to raise my gun though it was a silly thing to do. I shoved Chuck with my shoulder.
“Get up against the bank! Hunch over. Make an airpock—” That was all I got out before we were knocked down.
* * *
“I am sorry, Mr. Smith.” Anatoli sounded sincere. He was also without his usual accent. “I don’t have a snowmobile to rent out right now. A couple of tourists drove off with them and haven’t come back. And with this storm….”
Anatoli shook his head with feigned regret.
“Tell you what though, once it lets up, if the snowmobiles aren’t back, we’ll find someone to drive you up. You don’t mind a bit of a hike, do you? Maybe about six miles? And not all uphill. There aren’t any real roads that go into the Gulch, you know.”
“No roads.”
“None. In fact, I can’t see why anyone would want to go there. All they’ve got are mean bears and meaner people. Why I’ve never seen any place so inbred and ugly.”
It was too much to say that Mr. Smith was dismayed, but he did look a bit less enthused about his travel plans. Anatoli decided that it was time to share some lurid and entirely apocryphal bear stories. It was purely by luck that he hit on the same notion as Horace Goodhead and began to talk about ferocious bears driven insane by rabies.
* * *
I don’t care what Chuck says. We were not caught in an avalanche. A snowslide, yes. But if you can dig your way out in three minutes, well, ten minutes, then it isn’t an avalanche. The icy cave-in was scary though, and pretty much depleted our energy though an ecstatic Max actually did most of the digging out for us.
After that last adventure we abandoned shortcuts and went back to the wolves’ trail, or what would have been their trail if it wasn’t buried in four feet of snow. Thank goodness for snowshoes—two feet or twenty, they don’t care about how deep the snowpack is.
The light was fading, leaving us in an unpleasant twilight, but I recognized where we were. If need be, I could guide us back by flashlight—as long as the snow didn’t thicken. We hadn’t been troubled by snow inside the woods but we were now out in the open. So far the weather was being polite, but that can and does change without much notice, so I quickened our pace once I was sure there were no more pitfalls before us. It isn’t good to work up a sweat out in the cold, but it was far worse to be in the forest after dark with man-eating bears and wolves and a storm closing in.
Chapter 9
We dragged ourselves into the pub, looking for a hot meal and a glass of wine for Chuck. We’d have been in sooner but had stopped to talk to the Bones about Brian’s potential contagious state. The Bones wasn’t worried, but he was also pretty drunk, so I was only marginally reassured by our conversation and his belief that Brian’s corpse wasn’t a germ factory for a bioengineered plague.
As I pulled off my snowshoes in the vestibule I heard the faint clatter of the kitchen and caught a whiff of searing meat. There was also the low hum of mostly male chatter. The Moose had more patrons than usual, but that is often the case when there is a death. Though loners we sometimes feel the need of others’ company.
The first thing that met my bleary gaze was not Big John or the Flowers, but Chuck’s beaming father.
I stopped abruptly and Chuck plowed into me. It took us a moment to regain our balance and by then Chuck had seen his father too.
“Horace!” I said. “This is a surprise.”
“Hi, kids,” Horace said, slipping off his barstool and coming to give me a hug and Chuck a pat on the back.
“Dad?” Chuck was bewildered. “Why are you here? Is everything okay?”
“Gotta talk to you. Found out something interesting on the flight up.” Horace’s voice was pitched low. “Let’s grab a pew and I’ll fill you in.”
“Dinner first. Chuck and I are starved and frozen.” And I wasn’t sure how much more “interesting” we could take without some rest.
“Sure thing. Judy is cooking up some venison steaks. Handy, her husband being a butcher.”
“Yes.” The Butcher of Minsk actually, and it wasn’t always steaks he worked on.
Horace helped us out of our coats and we all took a seat at a table near the fireplace. Big John brought us coffee and stayed to hear what Horace had to tell us.
Chuck’s father raised an eyebrow at us, asking if it was okay to talk in front of Big John. Since Horace was not usually circumspect I began to worry about just what he had learned that sent him hurrying to the Gulch.
“Go ahead, Pop. We have no secrets here in the Gulch.”
Ha! We had nothing but secrets in the Gulch. But I didn’t contradict Chuck out loud.
“I figured out what was going on with these bear attacks.” Horace was looking at his coffee and therefore didn’t see our identical arrested expressions.
“You did?” I asked weakly, wondering who could have blabbed.
“Well sure. I’m not dumb. Bears hibernate in the winter after all. Unless they’re polar bears. You aren’t talking about polar bears, are you?”
“No. And you’re right. Usually bears are still hibernating at this time of year,” I admitted since Chuck and Big John had been struck dumb.
“Thought so right away when I heard about the attacks. What clinched it was this fella that was on my flight. I couldn’t figure out why Danny was acting so weird around him, but then the penny dropped. He is some kind of government zoologist. First I thought he was just checking things out in a routine way, but I don’t think that anymore.”
“No?”
“No. I bet those damned bastards have been trying out some new drugs on the bear population and it’s driven them mad. Probably one got loose. Now they’re sending someone out to see if it’s one of their bears that’s doing the killing and maybe to cover everything up. Hell, they could end up shutting down the whole town.”
“But how—”
“Tracking device. They’d have chipped them. Saw a show on it. Damned zoologists are always stuffing chips into animals and following them around. Anyhow, I was glad to leave the sneak in Seven Forks. Danny and I ditched him and then flew on ahead to warn you.”
Chuck went pale. Paler. I knew he was thinking of whatever drug might be in Brian’s body and worrying if there was now something ghastly going around the wildlife of the Gulch. Something that might very well draw official attention.
“They didn’t touch Brian,” I reminded him. “Just the girl.”
“Oh. Right,” Chuck said and then relaxed. A little. Apparently Doc hadn’t done a great job of reassuring him either. I prefer bears to germs. Bears I can see. Germs are the stuff of nightmares and horror novels.
Big John all but mopped his brow. I gathered that he had talked to Doc and knew the situation.
“A zoologist? Are you sure that’s what he is?” I asked.
That wasn’t great news, but we could work with that. It beat some of the alternatives.
“Not a regular kind. No bush hat. Calls himself Mr. Smith. No, this guy was wearing a suit and had sunglasses. Like he was trying to look like a movie spy or something. Very pretentious and unfriendly. Knows nothing about airplanes either.”
We all stiffened again. In our experience real spies looked a lot like movie spies. They also seemed to like using the Smith alias. Even Brian had borrowed that one.
“He’s in Seven Forks now?” Big John asked.
“Yep. And I’m betting he has trouble renting a snowmobile. Danny said as how Anatoli has been having trouble with most of them and his two best ones have disappeared.” Horace winked at us.
“Well thank the Lord for small favors. Big John, you’ll call Anatoli tonight and let him know the score?”
“Aye, but likely he knows anyway.”
“But, Pop, why are you here?” Chuck asked again. “Aren’t you supposed to be in a bridge tournament with Mrs. Matthers this weekend?”
“Well, see, I called up to talk to Butterscotch.” Horace flushed and hurried on. “And Big Joh
n told me how you were out tracking bears—which is dangerous, of course, but could also be kind of exciting. Anyway, Harriet Matthers is a walking lobotomy. She can’t bid to save her life and I’m tired of partnering her. I came up to help instead.” He smiled happily. “That way Butterscotch needn’t go out again. Ladies don’t like finding bodies.”
“For the record, gentlemen don’t like finding bodies either,” Chuck said with some asperity.
“Bears like it,” I said without thinking, a sign that I was exhausted.
“Butterscotch! But you must be exhausted, poor girl.” Horace patted my hand.
“I think we have established that beyond all doubt,” I agreed.
“First of all, hunting bear is not exciting,” Chuck said immediately. “It’s just very cold. And messy.”
“Very messy,” I echoed.
“You found the woman then?” Big John asked.
“She was dead? The bears got her too then,” Horace guessed. I couldn’t tell if he was sympathetic or disappointed to have missed being at the find.
“Bits and pieces of her anyway,” Chuck said evenly.
“The bears got her and the wolves came for cleanup. They left a hand.” I closed my mouth and fought down nausea. It hadn’t bothered me so much while we were outdoors with fresh air, but thinking about it now with the smell of meat in the air made me both sick and hungry.
There was also no reason to mention to Horace that she had been shot first.
“Well, tomorrow I’ll go out with you. We’ll find these damned man-eating bears and put them down. And if they are full of drugs and microchips we’ll go to the press and tell them everything.”
“No,” Chuck said flatly.
Horace began to bridle and I rushed in.
“We won’t be going out tomorrow. The storm has closed in these last few minutes. It would be too risky,” I said. “We also need to consider the danger of contagion.”
“What?” Horace sounded startled. “Contagion?”
“Well, what if it wasn’t a drug that the zoologist gave the bears?” I skipped right over the part where I tried to talk him out of the idea that the man on the plane wasn’t a zoologist involved with the bears. Because he wouldn’t believe me, no matter how illogical it was to think that the government would test something like an animal drug in anything other than the tightest laboratory conditions. And certainly not on bears. Also, this Smith person probably was involved in something sneaky, just not the way Horace thought.
“What if it was some new vaccine they’re trying and it went wrong like you said? Or maybe the bears have something like rabies? We haven’t actually seen one yet, so how can we know what’s wrong with them?” Chuck was catching on.
“Do bears get rabies? I thought about that right off but….”
“Of course they do.” I had no idea if they did but it seemed likely since they were mammals. “We need to consult with a vet. In fact…. Horace, once the snow stops, would you be willing to head back to Seven Forks? Parris Grant is the nearest vet and someone we can trust to be discreet.”
“But—”
“I don’t want to discuss this matter over the phone. You know we’re on a party line and we don’t want to cause panic with our speculation. Or alert the zoologist. That might just lead to a bigger cover-up.” I turned to Chuck. “Maybe Doc could send down a blood sample for analysis.”
“But, is this Parris Grant discreet enough?” I looked at Chuck with disbelief. “Sorry. Yes, I’m sure he’s great, but should we risk it? It would have to go to a lab somewhere and what if….”
“But if it’s frozen and if he’s warned….”
But could we really warn the people at the lab without explanation? How the hell else were we going to know how to put Brian’s screwup back in the bottle? We were working blind.
“Let’s think about it. I’m too tired to make decisions,” Chuck said. And he looked it. Chuck was never going to be completely at home in the outdoors and today had been especially grueling.
“You’re right. And we won’t be doing anything until the snow stops. We have time to plan.”
“Except eating dinner. That you must do,” Big John said and then stood as the Flowers approached our table. Though I had felt ill a while ago, at that moment food had never smelled so good to me.
“Big John, could we borrow your computer later?” I asked.
“Surely. But it has no Internet.”
“That will be okay for the first thing we need to do.”
“My phone has Internet,” Horace said proudly. “You can use it if you want.”
“No,” Chuck and I said together.
“Cellphones can be traced,” I added. “We can’t risk it if the zoologist is government. He knows you were on the plane after all and might be monitoring your calls.”
Horace nodded, looking solemn. I could see that his imaginary world was expanding.
“But not Sasha’s portable thingy,” Big John said after a moment of thought. He clarified the comment. “He was telling me it has some kind of thing on it that confuses anyone who’s listening. Makes them think he’s in Istanbul or something. Anatoli got them for the boys for … uh … business.”
“That’s handy,” Chuck said. “Because I find that for once in my life I actually need Google.”
“Let me warm up your coffee,” Big John said as I picked up my cutlery.
I nodded and fell on my steak. Chuck wasn’t shy either. Almost dying burns up a lot of calories.
Chapter 10
Chuck didn’t feel bad leaving his father at the pub. Fiddling Thomas had come in and was tuning up his violin, and Sasha had put off his apron and was teaching Horace a Russian card game. He would be entertained.
And Chuck was looking forward to bed with Butterscotch even more than he had his dinner—and he had wanted that pretty badly.
There was a lot to think about, but it would have to wait for morning. It wouldn’t do to act carelessly in this matter. A period of rest and reflection—and perhaps a little recreation—was called for. Suffice it unto the day the trouble therein.
* * *
Some snows are joyous, others oppressive. This snow was of the latter variety. Fortunately it was in a rush to reach the States and smother Chicago and so it sped by us in a hurry.
Chuck shed his lingering exhaustion and worry fairly quickly after I got some breakfast in him, and his father and Sasha were dispatched to Seven Forks with instructions to act normally but to visit Anatoli and pick up all the gossip about the zoologist. I assured Chuck that Sasha would keep his dad from harm. I don’t know that we really believed this, but it was safer to have Horace out of the Gulch while we called a town meeting.
It wasn’t that I questioned Horace’s desire to do right and help his son, but I was beginning to think that Horace was kind of crazy. Chuck seemed surprised too and this made me nervous. How did we know that Horace’s definition of “right” might not cause trouble for the rest of us in the Gulch?
Big John was arranging the meeting. He is the mayor of McIntyre’s Gulch and is entrusted to make day-to-day decisions about what is best for us, especially if it involved the outside world. But any matters that pertained to town money or public welfare called for a town hall meeting. We had called one for two o’clock so Doc could explain Brian’s condition and we would decide whether to have a funeral for the pink glove. There would be a potluck after since we couldn’t see any reason not to combine work with pleasure.
Meanwhile, Chuck was able to use Sasha’s tablet—he had to explain tablet to me since the last one I had used had been made of paper—and to discover some information about Janet Dee. She was a lab tech of some sort for a private company, and not part of the governmental brain trust who thought up the cures and biological curses of the modern age. Unless you counted diet pills among the modern evils.
In fact, if her social media profile was to be believed she lived for doing Jell-O shots, watching hockey fights, and online
dating. Lots of online dating. In her photo she wore a pink sweater and had a pink bow in her hair. I found her unutterably sad. And not just because she had been shot by a scoundrel and then eaten by bears. Perhaps it is because I had never had a childhood of my own, but I found adult women who clung to babyish ways to be pathetic.
There were other things that were disturbing. Living as I do, the new technologies are especially wondrous, but they are also sinister in a way that I don’t think most people understand. Take the Internet: for all that it can supply people with masses of information it doesn’t bring any wisdom about how to use it. It’s a tower of Babel that often lies and often spies on its users. If we let it in I fear that the day will come when we won’t be able to keep our secrets. Little by little our profiles will gather in places where the people we are hiding from will be able to find them.
Though I had plenty of other things to distract me, part of my mind was on that rock that looked so much like a rune stone. Wouldn’t it be great if it was real? Not that I could tell anyone from the outside what it was—but it would just be so wonderful if it was genuine and I could figure out what it said. Imagine being the first person to understand a message from someone who had died a thousand years ago.
Google was helpful. The memory stick proved to be more stubborn though. We could see files there, but only one would open and it seemed to be some kind of chemical formula and a proposed marketing plan for a superfast weight-loss drug.
Maybe there is a lot of money to be made there, enough to justify industrial espionage, but would Brian—who was in bed with the CIA and the Russian mafia—bother with a formula for diet pills, if that was in fact what the formula was?
And what the heck was in all those other files that we couldn’t open? Thinking about it made my head hurt. There were too many possibilities.
* * *
Points West (A Butterscotch Jones Mystery Book 5) Page 4