by Henry, Sue
Now—if it would only start.
A glance in the direction of the other boat told her that its rower had hesitated and was leaning forward against the handles of his oars, had seen the motor, and was watching her efforts closely. As she met his interested gaze, he grinned at her again, then took the handgun from a jacket pocket and held it high for her to see, warning her without words that he would use it if she tried to come out after him.
Very near the boat there was a sudden splash and a low-pitched hornlike call—ko-hoh—that startled her into a motion that set the boat rocking wildly again. A large white shape paddled quickly away—a trumpeter swan, returned to the north, that had blundered too close as she looked at the engine and was now vocalizing its displeasure as it fled. Ko-hoh! Nothing to worry about.
Jessie squeezed the bulb on the hose to prime the engine, took firm hold of the starter rope, gathered her strength, and pulled. A burp and a gurgle, nothing more. The rope rewound itself. She adjusted the choke and tried again. This time it almost gargled.
Another look toward the other boat told her that McMurdock was rowing again.
Once again she cautiously squeezed the primer bulb, smelling fuel, worried about flooding the engine, then pulled with all her strength and speed. With a sputter the motor came to life, ran roughly for a few seconds, then died. Encouraged, she opened the throttle on the steering handle slightly, gave the starter rope a mighty fourth effort, and was rewarded with a steady roar from the engine. A wisp of smoke hung over it in the still early morning air.
Turning to look toward the bow, Jessie took firm hold of the steering handle, twisted the throttle, and felt the boat surge forward in response. As it moved away from the shore and out into the lake, she gradually turned it in the direction of the other boat, which was moving west toward Teslin, several miles away, on a long course that was slowly bringing it closer to the shore.
Cutting the distance between the two crafts in half, she slowed her speed until it matched that of the rower. All she could do now was follow and watch, being careful to stay out of range of the gun but close enough to make an attempt to rescue Patrick if the opportunity arose.
25
WEBSTER ARRIVED FIRST AT THE DRIVEWAY THAT LED down to the Dawson Peaks Resort and moved the barrels and poles that blocked the entrance, laying them to one side and leaving it open for the time being. They drove both vehicles down to the lodge and got out. Maxie left Stretch inside the Jayco but took Tank with her on his leash. A pickup was parked toward the rear of the building, but no one was in sight.
She and Webster were inspecting the locked front doors of the lodge when Loomis suddenly leaned forward and cupped his hands around his eyes to peer into the shadows beyond the window glass.
“There’s somebody in there,” he said, startled. “He’s coming to the door.”
When it opened, a tall, pleasant-looking man in well-worn jeans, and a red plaid shirt with sleeves rolled to the elbow, greeted them with a smile so infectious that they all found themselves smiling back in spite of the situation.
“I was just about to go up and move the barrels. It’s our first day open this season. Can I help you with something?”
His eyes widened and his smile faded and turned to a curious frown when he saw Webster’s RCMP patrol car. “Something wrong?” He hesitated, then opened the door wide and motioned them in. “Please, come in.” He held out a welcoming hand. “I’m Dave Hett.”
The front of the lodge was one large room divided lengthwise by heavy posts that supported a gently peaked ceiling. Broad windows separated the left half from a deck outside that overlooked the lake, but a canvas tent had been erected to fill the other half, reminiscent of those used by gold miners in the early days of the territory. Both halves contained small tables with chairs slid neatly under them. Around the walls, paneled in rough-hewn boards, stood and hung an interesting collection of antiques—a wood stove, a sideboard, a huge gold pan, an airplane propeller, skis, snowshoes, tools—along with several photographs, posters, and paintings.
Beyond the tables and chairs Maxie noticed two doors, one leading to restrooms, the other open to a kitchen, where she could hear the rattle of pans on a stove and water running.
“We’re looking for someone who was supposed to stop here,” Webster told Hett, but before he could go on, a woman appeared in the door to the kitchen and walked toward them with a questioning look.
“I thought I heard voices.”
“This is Carolyn Allen,” Hett said, placing an arm around her shoulders to draw her into the circle. “We run Dawson Peaks together.”
Shorter than he, she was also dressed in jeans, with an apron over her green T-shirt. She smiled and shook hands as Webster introduced himself, Maxie, and Loomis.
“Did a woman in a Winnebago motor home stop here last night?” he asked. “It would probably have been fairly late.”
Both Hett and Allen shook their heads.
“We weren’t here at all yesterday,” Hett told him, explaining that they had made a trip to Whitehorse for supplies two days before and had not returned until late last night themselves. “We have a separate house a half mile west, so we don’t stay here at night anyway.”
“You mind if we look around?”
“Not at all. Help yourself, but there’s nobody here but us.”
He led the way onto the deck to point out the road that would take them down to the cabins and tents as well as the lake.
Looking down at the pale canvas walls of the tents, Maxie frowned as she noticed an odd shape to the side of one of them, something a little lighter cream color than the canvas. As she examined it with more attention, it slowly resolved itself into something that wasn’t a tent at all but a shape she thought she recognized.
“Do you have a motor home down there?” she asked Hett suddenly, interrupting his description of the property.
“No, just the tents and cabins.”
As she turned to show Webster what she had seen, a whisper of an early breeze from the west rustled through the leaves of the nearest birches. Tank was immediately straining at his leash, all but tugging Maxie off balance as he pulled her toward a flight of stairs that led to a trail down the hill.
“I think that’s the Winnebago,” she called back. “Down there behind that tent. Tank seems to think so too.”
Before they could answer or follow her from the deck, the sudden crack of a gunshot reached them from somewhere out of sight to the west.
“Hey,” Hett said, noticing for the first time. “My boats are gone.”
As Maxie struggled to keep Tank from pulling her over, the three men ran past headed for the lakeshore. She trotted along after them, soon reaching the lower section of the road, and was able to see that Jessie’s motor home was indeed parked beside one of the tents, the door hanging open.
“Jessie?” A quick look inside told her the rig was empty, so she didn’t go in but went on toward the lake. When they reached the open grassy shore, Tank stopped abruptly and barked, twice, toward the water. Maxie almost ran over him, but he was off again immediately, this time yanking the leash from her startled fingers and breaking into a lope, dragging the leash behind him as he ran.
“Bloody hell!” she swore and started after him, but soon stopped, knowing she hadn’t a chance.
Far out on the lake she could see a small boat and hear the sound of a motor. Between it and the shore was another boat, and from it came another crack of gunfire. There were two people in the second boat, one sitting in the back, one at the oars. But there was only one in the boat with the motor, and that one was Jessie.
Maxie was hardly aware of company when Carolyn Allen, who had followed them all down the hill, came up and stood beside her to see what was going on.
Hett and the two policemen were still running, and Webster was now shouting, though she couldn’t make out what he was saying. Loomis stumbled and fell to his hands and knees. As he regained his footing, Tank caught up and pass
ed him. When the dog reached a point on the shore directly opposite the nearest boat, where Maxie thought he must stop, he threw himself into the water and began to swim out toward the boats.
Frightened and worried, Maxie knew she had let Jessie down by letting her dog escape. But there was nothing to be done about it. All she could do was watch him swimming strongly away from the shore and think that the water was icy cold, even for a husky, and it was a long way to where Jessie was running the motorboat back and forth, keeping it in motion in an attempt to evade the shots that were being aimed at her.
The man with the gun had not yet seen the animal in the water. But he, the boy—and his handgun—were all in the rowboat, directly between the dog and where he was determined to go.
What Maxie also knew was that the second figure in the rowboat had to be Patrick Cutler. So the man with him was, without a doubt, his stepfather.
Webster was assessing the situation without much optimism.
“You wouldn’t just happen to have a third boat, would you?” he asked Dave Hett, without turning his attention from the drama taking place on the lake.
“No—sorry.”
“Didn’t really think so.”
Loomis caught up and they all three stood helplessly watching.
“I’ve got a rifle at the house. Would that help?”
“Better get mine, I think,” Webster said grimly. “If anyone has to be shot, it’d better be with an official weapon. Here’s my trunk key. Will you get it for me?” he asked Loomis.
“I can go faster,” Hett told him. “I’m used to the hill and can bring it back down in the pickup.”
“Go—as fast as you can.”
From her vantage point in the lake, Jessie had seen Tank run along the shore, then leap into the water and start to swim, and she was even more worried than Maxie, but there was no stopping him. Now she had two problems—Patrick and her lead dog—to say nothing of the chance of being shot herself. But at least she was no longer alone. There were people on the lakeshore who could see what was happening, though they had no way to reach or help her.
She was watching closely, however, and saw the tall man with Webster and Loomis begin a long-legged, ground-covering run back toward the lodge. Forgetting for a moment to keep an eye on the other boat, she was startled into a quick turn when a bullet thumped into the stern. Another quickly followed. He was shooting not at her, she realized, but at the motor, trying to disable it and leave her dead in the water—perhaps literally. And he was a pretty good shot.
She wished for a moment for her reliable old Winchester, a bolt-action rifle her father had given her, which had survived the fire that had burned her cabin. Even in a rocking boat she knew she would have a better chance of hitting this madman with it than he had of hitting her with the handgun. But it would have been very tricky to avoid hitting Patrick as well.
Above the whine of the motor on her boat, she faintly heard the sound of another engine and saw a pickup come bouncing from the road that ran between the lodge and the lake. Moving fast, it rocked its way onto the grassy shore and headed west toward the two policemen but was soon stopped by several large rocks.
She could see that Loomis had walked a little way back toward where Maxie and another woman were standing and was waving the pickup to a stop. The man in the truck handed out a rifle, which Loomis took. He headed back toward Webster and was still perhaps twenty feet from the inspector when Jessie’s attention was distracted.
The man in the other boat suddenly stood up and, balancing himself, feet spread wide, reached for the boy. A struggle ensued, Patrick cowering and trying desperately to evade his grasp but losing. He was hauled onto the center seat and his knees were lifted over the side, feet dangling in the water, with the heavy rock still attached.
“You see this?” McMurdock shouted to the men on the shore. “Back off, or I’ll dump him in. Loomis, you son of a bitch, so help me, I’ll…”
Loomis and Webster had dropped flat on the lakeshore, and Jessie could now see that the Wyoming detective, who still had the rifle, was aiming it at the man who was standing in the boat. Swinging the motorboat away from his line of fire, she waited to see what would happen next, ready to drive in toward the rowboat if he started to shove Patrick over the side, knowing that she was the only person who had any chance at all of reaching him.
“Give it up, McMurdock,” Loomis yelled back.
So, the man had a name.
“Give it up and bring the boy back in.” Webster joined the conversation. “We’ll work it out.”
There was silence for a moment from McMurdock, then he leaned forward and reached as if to take hold of the boy, who was trying, and failing, to pull his feet back into the boat against the weight of the stone.
“We couldn’t. Not with—” He started to say something that was abruptly cut off by the crack of the rifle. He staggered as the bullet caught him in the chest. One arm windmilled vaguely and he fell backward, almost in slow motion, it seemed to Jessie from where she had stopped her boat and shut off the motor in order to hear. If he had not been standing, he would have fallen into the boat. As it was, the gunnel caught him at the knees, flipping him over into the water with a splash. For a few seconds he appeared to float face down, then vanished beneath the surface with only a ripple that quickly spread, leaving the surface once again smooth where he had been.
There wasn’t a sound from any of those watching. Shocked into immobility, no one moved for a long moment. All was totally silent. Then, from somewhere farther down the shore, the low, lonely ko-hoh of the swan came echoing across the water.
As if it broke some kind of spell, other sounds rushed in immediately. A truck grumbled from up on the highway. Webster stood up and shouted something at Jessie. There was a splashing in the water, and Tank came swimming up beside the boat, panting hard from his exertion.
Reaching over the side, she lifted him into the boat and clung to him, soaking her clothes with the water that ran from his coat, and not caring in the least. He wriggled and joyously licked her face and hands, though he was shivering violently with cold, energy all but expended. She took off her jacket and wrapped him up in it.
“Oh, you wonderful dog. You are the best dog in the whole world and I love you more than anything. Good boy, Tank. Good old mutt.”
Laying him down in the bottom of the boat, she started the motor and went to rescue Patrick.
26
JESSIE HELPED PATRICK SWING HIS LEGS OUT OF THE water, stripped the duct tape from them and let the stone fall into the bottom of the boat as she continued to strip the tape from his mouth and wrists. She then headed for shore, where willing hands helped them back onto dry land. Webster and Hett took the motorboat back out to see if they could retrieve McMurdock’s body, though it seemed there was little chance.
“You’ve got a bullet or two in that one,” Jessie told Dave Hett as he climbed into the boat. “I’m sorry.”
“Not your fault,” he told her, “and no great damage done.”
“You all right?” Loomis asked her, noticing that she was shivering with delayed shock in the cool morning air, as they watched the two men in the boat drawing a wide circling wake on the lake water as they searched.
“Yes, I’m fine. But I need to get Tank dry and warm.”
“Brave dog, but you’re cold, too. Here, take this.” He took off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders with a smile.
“But—”
“Hey, it’s okay. I’ve got another one in the car. Keep it—you might need it before you reach home.”
“Mine will be okay as soon as I wash it, but—thanks.” Jessie gave him a grateful smile, then turned and took Tank on his leash back to the motor home, where she used a towel to dry his damp coat, rubbing briskly until he stopped shivering and was happily eating a second breakfast, while she sat beside him on the floor, affectionately rubbing his ears.
“Cold and dry is okay for you, isn’t it, guy? Cold and wet is n
ot.”
She had been very glad to see Patrick, pale but recovering from his ordeal, given a huge hug by Maxie, and had watched them walk away from the shore and climb toward the lodge with Carolyn Allen. Now a knock at the door of the Winnebago announced him, dressed in his own clothes and followed closely by Maxie and Stretch. He handed her the jeans, sweatshirt, and socks she had loaned him.
“I had to leave my backpack at the hot springs when I ran. That cop had it in his trunk.”
Wet to the knees and grubby from a night in the brush, Jessie wanted nothing more than a bath and change of clothes herself.
“There’s a shower in the lodge,” Maxie suggested. “You won’t have to wait for water to heat.”
Taking what she needed for a good scrub and shampoo, with clean clothes over her arm, Jessie climbed the hill with them and was soon closing the door of the small shower room, ready for the luxury of someone else’s hot water.
Tank, not willing to leave her side, followed her in and lay down on the floor of the cubicle. Before taking off the jacket Loomis had given her, she plunged a hand into the pocket for the shampoo she had stashed there. Her fingers closed on the plastic bottle and a scrap of paper, which she withdrew to see that it was a piece torn from something, a notebook perhaps, and wadded up as if to be thrown away. Uncrumpling it she found nothing but a phone number, 867-390-2575, evidently one he had decided he didn’t need anymore.
She dropped it back into the pocket, quickly disrobed, and was almost immediately lathered with soap and singing happily to herself. “Oh what a beautiful morning…”
Outside in the restaurant section of the lodge, where the others had collected around a large round table and were drinking coffee, Hett, who was playing waiter for the group, turned an ear to listen to the muffled gladness that was echoing down the hall from the shower and grinned.
“Gutsy lady,” he commented, filling Webster’s cup from the pot in his hand and nodding in the direction of the music. “You wouldn’t catch me out in an open boat chasing a guy with a gun.”
“She’s all wool and a yard wide,” Maxie agreed, using an Aussie expression that made Loomis grin. “But I think she could do with a rest before we head on up the highway. Would you have a couple of spaces for us for tonight, Dave?”