The Puppet Master

by John Dalmas

  Ahead of them the slope steepened, while the ridge crest above descended faster than they, in a series of great rugged steps. Before long, the crest met the trail, to form a long, nearly level "backbone" 10 to 20 feet wide on top, leading out to a crumbling sandstone "chimney." From the backbone they looked out across the miles-wide Grand Canyon. The terrain below them was wildly broken—a confused jumble of time-eroded ridges, chimneys, and arroyos. The sun was newly risen, and the pinnacles and upper walls of the opposite rim were washed with pale rose.

  To the east they heard a distant commotion of raven voices. A great clamoring flock, diffuse and disorganized, was flying westward down the canyon toward them, and Tuuli and Martti, hands joined, stopped to watch. The flock flew pretty much at the same level as the crest they stood on, and as it approached, its noise differentiated into separate voices, deep and harsh: "COR-R-R-RP! COR-R-R-RP!" with now and then a single liquid note, as if a stone had been dropped into a deep well.

  The point of the flock crossed ahead, then the flock proper was passing close around them. One great black bird climbed past them not four meters distant, gaining altitude, its wings, spreading some 40 inches, sounding a sharp whoosh! whoosh! whoosh! as they thrust the air. The flock passed and passed. Two crossed the crest just ahead and some 20 feet higher, flying parallel perhaps 15 feet apart. Abruptly and in unison they folded their inside wings, slipping sharply down and toward each other, then spread them again, rolling sideways, their bodies touching in a playful feathered kiss before they flew on.

  Then the flock was past. The earthbound humans watched it draw away, Tuuli radiant, Martti humbled. After another minute they turned and hiked on.

  * * *

  Another van drove eastward from the village, a larger and more expensive machine, also with California plates. When it came in sight of the travel van, it slowed, to pull off the blacktop across the road from it. Four black men and a woman got out and walked to Martti's vehicle. "It's theirs, all right," the leader said. "Got to be." He turned to one whose eyes showed oriental ancestry. "Harley, open it up."

  Harley Suk O'Connell took a flat kit from a jacket pocket, removed a tool, and worked with it on a lock. After a few seconds the door opened for him. The leader climbed inside, checked the glove compartment, then the driver's door pocket. He found the Walther, and after removing the cartridges from magazine and chamber, replaced the magazine. "Just in case," he said grinning, and got back out.

  One of the men was dressed differently than the others, in denims and work boots. He was tall, lean, and very dark, with exceptionally long hands. The leader turned to him. "What's next, Cowboy?"

  Cowboy beckoned with his head, then turned away without speaking and strode into the woods, the others trotting to keep up. In a minute they came to the trailhead sign that Martti had studied the evening before. Cowboy stopped and began to read silently. One of the others scowled. "Read it out loud, Cowboy," he said.

  Cowboy looked at him. It was clear he didn't like the man. "Read it yourself."

  The man tightened. "I don't read shit like that."

  "I'll bet you don't."

  The man's face twisted in anger, and the leader intervened. "Lionel, Cowboy, cool it, both of you!" he said, then read the sign aloud himself. When he'd finished, he grunted. "It's like the ranger said when he talked to Seppanen yesterday: You could get lost and die down there."

  Eyes hooded by blued lids, the woman looked down the trail. "And they went down anyway?"

  "Looks like it." He turned to Cowboy, who was examining the ground.

  Cowboy nodded. "Fresh tracks. One set is small."

  The leader looked where Cowboy was pointing. All he could see was that the ground was scuffed. "You ready to go down there now?"

  The man shrugged. "Why not?"

  They went back to their van, where Cowboy opened the luggage compartment and belted on his canteen and heavy Colt .44 revolver. Then he took his rifle out, an old .257 Sako with scope and a silencer—a high-velocity, flat trajectory sport rifle with a clip of soft-point bullets. Finally he saluted the leader. "See you later, Jamaal." He looked at the others. "Harley, Naylene. Lionel. Quite a while later, unless they change their minds and don't go all the way down. That may be what they'll do."

  He slung the rifle across his back, and the others followed him back to the trailhead. He started down, and they watched till the canyon wall curved and Cowboy passed out of sight. Then they returned to their van again. It was still chilly on the rim, and they sat inside to stay warm.

  "How come," said Lionel, "that Cowboy talk like he does? He don' sound like no brothuh."

  Jamaal looked him over before answering. Not many blacks talked like Lionel anymore. It was out of style, though he tended to slip into it himself a bit when talking with Lionel. "Cowboy's from Wyoming," Jamaal said. "He's a cowboy. He didn't grow up around brothers, except his family. Everyone else was white around there."

  Lionel already knew Cowboy's origins. Simply, his considerations of race didn't allow for such anomalies—for any anomalies. He couldn't handle them; forgot them, or failing that, ignored them. Now he dismissed Cowboy from his mind. "We should have killed 'em last night. Found out what room they in, snuck up there and killed 'em then."

  "We're supposed to kill them where no one will know," Jamaal said patiently. "If we can. That's why Terence hired Cowboy. Seppanen's a shark, you know that. Works for Prudential, and Terence doesn't need Prudential on our ass. That's why, when I heard Seppanen and that ranger, I decided we'd do it down there." He gestured toward the canyon. "Down there, if Cowboy does his job right, nobody'll find the bodies. And the rangers won't know they never came out. Likely Prudential won't even know they were here, unless Seppanen called and told them. And why would he do that? He's on vacation."

  Jamaal was as much reviewing things for himself as talking to Lionel. Terence would like the way he was handling it, he told himself. There'd likely be a bonus for him when they got back.

  Meanwhile Lionel sulked. "That's roach shit, bein' scared of Prudential."

  "When you tell Terence he's roach shit," Jamaal said dryly, "do it when I'm not there. You'll be lucky if the worse he does is whup your ass. He's not bein' roach shit; he's bein' smart. He's avoidin' hassles with no profit in them."

  Lionel subsided, scowling, then looked toward Harley, who was smoking a cigarette in the driver's seat. "Hey, gook eyes," Lionel said, "what you thinkin' about?"

  Harley didn't even turn around. "You don't want to know."

  Lionel bridled at that. "What you mean, I don't want to know? I asked you, didn't I?

  "Lionel!" Jamaal snapped, "shut your mouth." Jamaal wished he'd argued when Terence had assigned the man to him. Lionel had tried repeatedly to pick a fight with Harley. Without his own repeated intervention, they'd have fought by now, and one of them might be dead.

  Cowboy was worth ten Lionels. Jamaal had no doubt that Cowboy would kill the Seppanens that day, and leave them where they'd never be found.

  * * *

  With the ravens gone, Tuuli and Martti set out again. The trail dropped down off the crest along a tilted unconformity, a ledge widened by Barney's pick and shovel till it reached a slope less precipitous. Then it wound down into a broad cove that fanned into a set of descending draws divided by low broken ridges. Martti and Tuuli were far below the rim now, and the morning was no longer chill. In places the ground was clothed with brush, and there were piles of boulders. Once they startled a small bevy of mule deer, and once a family of desert bighorns that clattered noisily away across a scree slope. Lizards scooted out of their way. Twice they found their path dead-ending: They'd gone astray onto a game trail—deer or bighorn or wild burro—and had to backtrack.

  Finally they came to a sandy canyon bottom, nearly level among towering rocks, and as narrow as an alley. After a little, it opened onto a low dune, with the Colorado River surging past, wide and powerful, a violent, booming rapids not far upstream. They stood on the du
ne, watching, holding hands again. After a minute, Martti looked at Tuuli.

  "Shall we eat lunch?"

  She nodded, smiling. Lunch might not have been the best word for it—her watch said 10:14—but they'd started at daybreak. When they'd eaten, they lay down to rest before beginning the steep hike back. Then she grinned, run her fingers along his thigh and kissed him, and instead of napping, they made love on a poncho, the sun warm on their limbs and bodies.

  Afterward they lay there for a bit, Martti looking at her covertly. Her eyes were closed, her lips parted and smiling. She'd definitely changed. When she'd first come back from Long Valley, he'd thought it wouldn't last, but it had. She didn't get mad as easily; he wasn't sure she got mad at all anymore. And he—somehow he didn't put his foot in his mouth as much as he used to. It was as if her new patience, her new tolerance, had rubbed off on him.

  Except it wasn't patience or tolerance; not with her. It was more basic than that, he told himself. It was as if—as if she had a new viewpoint. That almost whatever he did was fine with her. Like his flareup at the ranger, the day before. She laughed more these days, too, a lot more. She was more demonstrative, and more admiring in a comfortable way. Certainly she was more affectionate. A year earlier she'd never have initiated sex on a sand dune.

  Sex was better too, their foreplay more relaxed, more loving. He felt less urgent, and . . . It was as if she could read his sensations as well as her own, building him, holding him, even slacking him a bit till she was ready, then—crescendo and climax! It seemed to him now that that, in fact, was exactly what she did—read his sensations.

  After a few minutes they dressed again, then shouldered their packs and started back. Soon they were climbing. It was hot, 5,000 feet below the rim, perhaps 90 or 95 degrees, and they sweated. But it wasn't a problem. Mostly they were shaded by the rim high above, the humidity was low, and he kept to a pace that it seemed to him they could hold all the way, given occasional breaks.

  At one point, hiking along a winding stretch through thick patchy brush, they rounded a turn to find five wild burros staring intently at them, not a hundred feet distant. For several seconds both sides stood unmoving, then the jack snorted and wheeled, and all five galloped off, disappearing into the brush.

  It was on the easier stretches, topographically speaking, that Martti had the most difficulty. These tended to be brushy and have numerous game trails, making it harder to distinguish the trail proper. Often he wasn't sure, and on several occasions they'd cliffed out or otherwise dead-ended, having to backtrack.

  They were perhaps halfway up, and he was beginning to feel he was off the trail for sure, when he topped a rise and saw the proper trail well off to his left. With a seated rifleman watching it, some hundred yards from where he stood! Martti hissed for silence, holding his hand back to warn Tuuli as he knelt, then slowly lowered himself onto his belly. The man, a black, was downslope of them and a dozen yards to their side of the trail, sitting against a tan rock, inconspicuous in a khaki shirt and faded jeans. He was watching downtrail, his rifle across his knees. From where he sat, he must have seen them half a mile back, hiking along a ledge there, and was waiting for their reappearance at much closer range. Even here they were within his peripheral field of vision. If his attention hadn't been so strongly on the trail, he might well have spotted Martti.

  Lucky I lost it, Martti thought. He examined the terrain above the man, for the possibility of bypassing him. There wasn't any. Whether deliberately or by chance, the man was well situated to prevent it. Behind him the east wall of the canyon became too steep to walk on, except for the trail itself.

  Besides, Martti told himself, he's not here alone. Not if he's mafia. There'll be more of them above, probably two or three more, probably watching our van.

  The van! He'd left his gun in it! He was so used to carrying his Walther, it was natural to react as if armed. He tapped Tuuli's shoulder and they backed away on their bellies till they could stand unseen. The rifleman must expect them any minute, would soon get restless, perhaps start looking around.

  Martti removed his pack, took out his binoculars, and looked the man over, then put them back.

  "We need to go back to the river," he murmured, "and see if we can get out of here by working our way along the shore. We're not going to bypass this guy. The tricky part will be that ledge section we crossed back there. He'll see us for sure, and we'll be going the wrong direction for him. And his rifle's got a scope and silencer." In answer, Tuuli took off her pack and, reaching inside it, brought out her Lady Colt. Martti stared, not at it but at her. She'd never liked carrying it, yet here, where it was against the law . . .

  He took it, ejected the magazine and checked it. It was full, seven rounds, and there was another in the chamber. But it was a minimal weapon, small caliber, short barrel, low muzzle energy—a weapon intended for close quarters, for intimidation as much as violence.

  "Thanks." He paused for a moment as a plan took form, then handed his own pack to Tuuli. "Go back to that rocky hump," he said, pointing in the direction they'd come from. "Then crawl up on the top till you can see him—him and the slope in back of him. I'm going to work my way as far past him as the terrain allows, then try to close in on him from behind. When I can't get any closer safely, I'll wave to you. When you see me, wait a couple of seconds, then yell that the trail has disappeared. He'll think I'm somewhere behind you. That's when I'll move in on him, close enough for a good shot."

  She doesn't even look frightened for me, he thought. Attentive, serious, but not frightened.

  She turned away and started walking, crouching a bit. Martti went the other way. After a long bypass, he crawled to the crest again and peered over. He'd worked his way past and above the rifleman, who was again some hundred yards distant but facing somewhat away. The biggest danger was that the man would hear his approach.

  Martti slipped over the crest and began his stalk, keeping the rifleman in sight. He too would be visible, if the man turned, but more or less obscured by branches and brush.

  At 50 yards he reached his last cover. There, standing where Tuuli should see him, he waved his arms, then stepped back into cover. Short seconds later he heard her voice, distant but more clearly than he'd expected, and through a screen of branches saw the man move a few yards—enough that there was brush between him and the location of Tuuli's voice. He was on one knee, rifle ready, prepared to fire or move.

  Crouching only slightly, Martti advanced across the open slope, silently cursing the slight hiss of sand moving beneath his boots. The Lady Colt was clenched in his right fist. At 25 yards he saw the man's head start to turn his way, and launched himself. The response was immediate; the man began to rise, turning. Martti's first shot missed, and his second. The rifleman was still pivoting, rifle butt under his arm as he fired off balance toward Martti, the sound harsh but not loud, muffled by the silencer. Martti's third shot hit him high in the chest, knocking him on his back, feet in the air, sending the rifle's second shot skyward. Martti's fourth missed. His fifth struck the sprawling gunman in the left calf, plowing upward into the knee, and Martti heard him roar. On his back, rifle barrel between his knees, the man got off a third round. By that time, Martti was only 8 or 10 yards away, dodging to his right, and the little Colt's sixth round took the rifleman through the temple. He went slack.

  Martti straightened, breathing hard, as much from spent tension as from running. From the hole in the man's head, he was clearly dead. Looking up, he saw Tuuli and waved, then walked over to the second man he'd ever killed, the first since he was sixteen and killed his parents' murderer. He found himself calm, and wondered if it would hit him later.

  The dead man lay within plain sight of the trail. Martti stripped to avoid getting blood on his clothes, then lugged the corpse over the little ridge from which he'd first seen him, leaving it in the draw on the other side. Vultures and ravens would find it, but well out of sight of anyone on the trail. Next, the two of them picked u
p the spent cartridge cases, all except two of Martti's which they couldn't find. Then, while Tuuli spread dust over the blood where the rifleman had died, Martti picked up the rifle, using his shirt to avoid leaving his prints on it, and left it by the body. Finally, with branches cut from a shrub well away from the trail, they brushed out the signs of disturbance as best they could. The site wouldn't stand a close inspection, but it was a dozen yards from the trail. A passing hiker would notice nothing.

  * * *

  When they'd finished, they discussed their next action. Tuuli recognized the dead man as someone she'd seen in the Visitors' Center. He'd been with other people, including a woman. Except for the woman, that fitted Martti's theory that the rifleman was part of a hit team. The others, presumably waiting on the rim, might well have heard the shots from the little Colt. For which he had only two rounds left; Tuuli had brought no extra cartridges. He'd thought of taking the dead man's big .44, but decided not to. Best not to have it, especially as conspicuous as it was. If the body was found, let its weapons be with it.

  At any rate, it seemed out of the question to hike up and confront the others on the rim. He and Tuuli would be exposed and helpless on the last leg of the trail.

  On the other hand, he suspected that the people after him had expended their one trail-wise man. They were almost certainly inner-city people, and unless one of them had been in the military—the infantry or marines—they'd be unlikely to venture far down the trail looking for him. Not if they'd read the warning sign.

  So they started back down toward the river. If they could find no way to follow the shore, they'd hide out there. Perhaps some rafters would come along and pick them up, though it might be too late in the season for rafters. Otherwise they'd wait as long as they dared without food, then he'd hike out.