The Mountain King

by Rick Hautala

  Guy shrugged and shook his head.

  “Look, I ain’t in on the investigation. It’s out of my hands. The only reason I called you guys in here at this ungodly hour is because I need you for . . . well, for two things. First, I want to try and locate Mark Newman so the staties can question him. Second, and more important, I got a call from the Forestry Department, asking us to assist them in their search for Phil Sawyer.”

  “Shit, we ain’t never gonna find Phil,” someone said.

  “ ‘Least not alive,” another man offered.

  After a brief burst of confused comments, Dan Jenkins spoke out loud enough to be heard above everyone else. “Come on, Guy! Don’t you think these two things might be a little more closely related than you’re letting on?” He narrowed his gaze as he looked at the police chief.

  “What the hell are you getting at?” LaBrea asked, frowning.

  “Well . . .” Dan turned and scanned the crowd now that he had their attention. “I ain’t about to start tellin’ tales out of school, but I know for a fact—a lot of you guys who work at the mill know it, too—that Phil Sawyer was going to get promoted to shift supervisor, and Mark Newman thought he deserved the job. Am I right?”

  Several men grunted their agreement.

  “And—” Dan went on, shrugging and rubbing his hands together nervously. “Well, there’s been some talk ‘round town about how Mark’s old lady Polly’s been sleeping around, and that Dennis was kinda keeping the bed warm, if yah catch my drift.”

  Nervous laughter rippled through the room.

  “I think if you’re looking for a motive,” he went on, “the fact that Dennis was shagging Mark’s wife might appear motive enough for him to do what he done to Dennis.”

  “Hold it right there, Dan,” LaBrea said, nailing Jenkins with an angry look. “Mark Newman’s not on trial here for anything. You got that? And I hope to hell I don’t need to remind you that here in America, a man’s innocent until he’s proven guilty. Now, the sun’s up, and we’ve got a job to do—”

  “But did you see him?” Dan shouted, trembling as he scanned the crowded room again, looking for sympathetic faces. “Did any of you guys see what Dennis looked like after he was through with him?”

  “That’s enough, Dan,” LaBrea said, purposely lowering his voice to keep tempers from flaring any more.

  “Most of you were at Dennis’s funeral yesterday,” Dan continued. “Closed casket! A closed fucking casket! You know why? Do any of you know why—?”

  “I said that’s enough!”

  “Because he was ripped to shit, that’s why! His stomach had been torn open, and his guts pulled out. That’s what I heard. Come on, Frank . . . and Eddie— you guys’ve all heard the same things I’ve been hearing. Back me up on this. Whoever went to work on Dennis with that knife or axe or whatever really did a hell of a number on him.”

  “I’ve known Mark Newman a lot of years, and I’ll tell you one thing—he ain’t the kind of man who’d do something like that—to anyone, no matter what the reason.”

  All heads turned and looked at Sam Barker, who was standing in the far corner of the room. A few other men nodded their agreement.

  “He’s worked in my department a lot of years. Now, you can spread rumors all day about what his wife might or might not have been doing, and about him not getting this promotion he might’ve thought he deserved, but all of you men here—especially you guys who work at the mill—you know Mark, and you can’t tell me you think he could kill someone in cold blood!”

  “Well, someone did it!” Dan shouted, his face flushing red with anger. “Who else had a better reason?”

  “That’s not for any of us to decide,” LaBrea said as he slammed his fist onto his desk. “You’re way out of line here, Jenkins! I knew Dennis Cross, too. I can’t very well say he was a close friend of mine, but believe me—no one wants to get to the bottom of this more than I do.”

  “Okay, then why don’t you bring one of those hot-shot state investigators in here to tell us what the fuck’s going on? Let’s hear what they’ve found out and what they’re thinking, huh? We’ve got a right to know. This happened in our town—to a friend of ours!”

  LaBrea shook his head.

  “And why don’t you tell us why Dennis’s funeral had to be closed casket? What happened to him? You went out there that night. You saw what happened to him!”

  “Yeah, I did,” LaBrea said mildly, trying his best to maintain control over this increasingly volatile situation. The memory of how horribly mutilated Dennis Cross’s body had been sent a wave of nausea racing through him.

  “So why are you covering up for Newman?”

  A chorus of loud approval wafted through the crowd like a breeze fanning sparks into a blaze.

  “Yeah, what the hell happened out there?”

  “We’ve got a right to know!”

  “If Newman didn’t do it, then who did?”

  Glancing at Barker for support, LaBrea hushed the crowd with an angry wave of his hand. “I’m not covering up for anybody! Look, we’re not judge and jury here, all right? Most of you know something pretty similar happened to some of Josh O’Connell’s cows.”

  “Maybe he done that to set up, like, an alibi or something,” someone offered.

  “All I can say is, the staties are working on it. What we have to do is a single, simple job—to assist in a search party for two men—one who’s missing, and one who’s wanted for questioning. And that’s all! As of right now, there are no suspects in the case. I don’t want anyone thinking this is some kind of manhunt, that we’re out to bring anyone to justice.”

  “Just tell us—” Dan started to say.

  “I’ve heard all I want to hear from you, Jenkins! We’ve got a big piece of forest to cover, and I’m gonna need a lot of help out there today, but I can make damned sure you don’t go.”

  He scanned the crowd while he pointed angrily at Dan.

  “You’ll all find out what we know when there are some solid answers. We’re not holding anything back from you for any reason.” He glanced over his shoulder at the clock on the wall. “It’s almost six-thirty. Gibbons should be here in a few minutes. He’ll do a breakdown of the search areas we have to cover before we head out. We’ve even got a state helicopter for a couple of days. Oh—just one more thing. I don’t want any of you fellas bringing any rifles out into the woods.”

  A loud chorus of disapproval filled the room. The scattered catcalls and jeers didn’t abate for a while, and LaBrea had to shout to be heard.

  “You heard me! No guns. With tempers heated up the way they are, I don’t want anyone taking any potshots at anyone.”

  “Now wait just a damned minute—”

  It was Barney Reynolds speaking. LaBrea let the old man have the floor if only to keep Dan Jenkins shut up.

  “I can appreciate you not wanting to let the cat out of the bag, so to speak, about your investigation,” Barney said. “I mean—hell, whether it was Mark or someone else, somebody did a number on Dennis Cross. But you can’t tell me you want us up there on Agiochook without protection.”

  “Protection from what?” LaBrea asked, instantly regretting that he left Barney an opening to continue.

  “Why, from whatever the hell’s up there on the mountain,” Barney said. “Lots of you younguns might not recall some of the things that’ve happened around here over the years. But you all have heard about what happened out to Josh O’Connell’s a few nights ago....”

  “Let’s not trot that out again, Barney,” LaBrea said. “As far as I could tell, it looked like a bear or a wolf got into his barn and killed a calf.”

  Barney smirked and shook his head. “To my way of thinking, there’s a damn sight bit of difference between a bear’s tracks and a wolf’s tracks. ‘N anyway, I just don’t see how you ‘spect us to go off into the woods and not be able to defend ourselves if we have to. What if there’s a bear or something out there that’s plumb loco?”

&
nbsp; “Yeah,” Dan added, “or a killer who’s already killed one person.”

  “One?” Barney said, cackling. “I’m talkin’ ‘bout dozens of people ... maybe hundreds over the years. We ain’t gotta worry none about Mark Newman. We gotta worry about whatever else might be up there . . . the same thing that killed one o’ Josh’s prized calves a few-nights ago. You fellas seem to be forgetting ‘bout those two hikers who disappeared last July up on Agiochook, ‘n all the other hikers who’ve gone missing ‘round these parts over the years. Now, I ain’t saying this thing—whatever the hell it is—got all the way into town here and did the same thing to Dennis— though I reckon that ain’t impossible—but there’s something up there, a creature of some kind that’s probably been in this neck of the woods a lot longer than any of us . . . prob’ly since long before the white man came. If you listen to some of them Indian tales about—”

  “We don’t really have time for this,” LaBrea said. “Gibbons will be here in a few minutes. I’ll tell you all this much—if I find out any of you went out there armed today, I’ll slap your ass with a fine and do everything I can to make sure you do a little time in the accommodations we have downstairs here. Can I make myself any clearer?”

  There was a murmur of assent from the men in the room, but it didn’t sound at all convincing. LaBrea was positive at least a few of them would bring their deer-hunting rifles or shotguns along with them ... especially now that Barney had raised the specter of some kind of murderous creature in the woods. Before LaBrea could say anything more, Fred Gibbons, accompanied by a team of rangers, knocked on the door and entered the office. It took nearly half an hour to divide up the search areas and assign them to teams, each to be led by a forest ranger. Once that was done, more than thirty men from Hilton and a dozen state forest rangers took off into the White Mountain National Forest to find Mark Newman and—hopefully—to discover what had happened to Phil Sawyer.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Pursued

  “What was that?”

  “What was what?”

  “That sound ... I just heard something—a click or something.”

  “Maybe it was your brain knocking against the inside of your skull.”

  “No, seriously.”

  For several seconds, there was nothing but silence on the mountaintop; then came the clump and scuff of heavy boots on stone. The wind whistled in brief gusts that curled like cold fingers over the rocks and carried the voices down under the rock overhang where Mark was hiding. It was a damned good thing he had seen these men first and had found such good cover. He gripped his rifle tightly in his hands, cursing himself for bolting it. That was the sound that had alerted one of them, but Mark knew he had to be ready to defend himself if he needed to.

  The sound of footsteps came closer. Then, off to the right, a thin, blue shadow stretched out over the down slope like a long, distorted, pointing finger. From his hiding place, Mark watched the shadow shift first to one side, then to the other as the person above walked back and forth. He knew the man was scanning the area, waiting for the sound to be repeated. As far as he could tell, there were only two of them, but he couldn’t be sure. They might be just a couple of hikers, but they might also be part of the search party out looking for Phil. More than likely, though, after what Sandy had told him yesterday, they might be two of any number of men sent up to Agiochook by the police to find and bring him in for questioning about the murder of Dennis Cross.

  “Probably just a rock falling or something,” one of them said.

  “Maybe, but it sounded like—I dunno—like something else.”

  “Go check it out yourself. You wanna climb down there on that narrow ledge, be my guest if you’re so damned curious.”

  “No, you go and take a look! I ain’t no fucking mountain goat!”

  “Well, I ain’t, neither.”

  Mark could almost place one of the voices, but not quite.

  He ached with curiosity to look up over the edge of the rock and see who it was. If this was someone he knew from town, maybe someone from work, he probably should reveal himself. He could ask them what was going on in town. For all he knew, they might have found Dennis Cross’s killer, and Phil might have already been found. Not willing to chance it, though, he pressed his back against the cold stone, clinging to the shadows as he breathed shallowly and waited for the two men to move along.

  “This whole thing is a real pain in the ass, you know that? How much further do we have to go, anyway?”

  No, Mark thought, they don’t sound anything like weekday hikers.

  There came a faint rustle of paper, and Mark realized they were checking a trail map.

  “Looks to me like the Twin Brooks Trail’s just over that ridge over there.”

  And they don’t know much about this mountain, either. Twin Brooks Trail was a good three miles off.

  “We’re supposed to meet up with Foster’s team at the fork around three o’clock, right?”

  “Uh-huh. Gibbons said he wanted all of us off the mountain by dark.”

  The other person said something, but they were moving away, so Mark didn’t quite catch it. He stayed where he was, motionless for a long time, listening as the eerie silence, broken only by fitful gusts of wind whistling over the rocks, settled back over the mountain.

  Before long, the chilly air started to penetrate his down-filled jacket and clothes. His body shook, and his teeth were chattering. He desperately wanted to leave his hiding place, if only to get out into the sunlight and move around a bit to warm himself up. But then, just as he was starting to ease out onto the ledge, he heard something else. At first, it was so low he thought it might be his pulse, thumping in his ears. But it got steadily louder, and he recognized the chopping whack-whack of helicopter blades off in the distance.

  “Ahh, shit!”

  If there was a helicopter out, then this probably wasn’t just a routine search for a missing man. Clutching his rifle, Mark eased himself up to the edge of the overhang and scanned the sky. The cloudless, bright blue stung his eyes, making him squint. At first he couldn’t see it, but then, far off to his left, he made out the dark grasshopper-shape, silhouetted against the afternoon sky. It was moving at an oblique angle across the southern flank of the mountain. The sound of the rotors got steadily louder as it skimmed close to the contour of the mountain.

  No doubt about it, there was some kind of serious search effort going on. Maybe the police and forest rangers had mounted it to find Phil; but Mark knew, if there was a warrant out for his arrest, there might be dozens of men out looking for him. It was just a matter of time before someone spotted him . . . or stumbled onto him, as those two men almost had.

  “God damn it!”

  Sunlight glinted off the helicopter’s side as it swung gracefully around and started heading straight toward him. Mark cringed back into the shadow of the overhang, fighting the thought that they had already seen him and were now honing in on him. Off and on all day, he’d had the uncanny sensation that he was being watched by someone who remained unseen. Now it was easy to imagine a man up there in the helicopter, scanning the mountainside with high-powered binoculars while he radioed in directions to the men on the ground. All he needed to complete the mental picture was a couple of shotgun-totting rednecks being dragged along by a pack of bloodhounds, howling and straining at their leashes as they closed in on him from all sides.

  Mark glanced over his shoulder to make sure no one else was around. It wouldn’t do to let someone use the covering sound of the chopper to sneak up on him from behind. Satisfied that he was alone, he squatted close to the ground, peeking out from his hiding place just enough so he could keep an eye on the approaching helicopter. It was still flying straight toward where he was hiding.

  “Come on, fly by—fly by—fly by!” he started to chant.

  He ducked back under the rock when the rushing sound overhead grew deafeningly loud. A bulbous shadow swept across the rocks like a moving puddle
of dark water. Mark didn’t dare peek out at the helicopter, but he could easily imagine that it had stopped and was hovering right above him as dozens of armed men—maybe a SWAT team from Boston—swarmed down over the rocky slope toward him.

  This is crazy, hiding like this! Absolutely insane! he thought. It’s not like I’m some kind of outlaw!

  But Mark’s instinct to keep out of sight was overpowering. A deep, primitive instinct warned him that he would be in serious danger if the men in the helicopter spotted him. He shifted his feet up underneath him and scuttled forward, ready to duck back and hide or stand and run if anyone was close by. Peeking up over the rock, he clearly saw the markings on the gray metal side of the helicopter: MAINE STATE POLICE

  “Jesus Christ!” he muttered. “It is a fucking manhunt!”

  He ducked back under cover as the whirling blades roared overhead, less than a hundred feet above him. The whooshing sound echoed from the rocky mountainside, and then the sound Dopplered as the helicopter made a slow, lazy turn and headed northwest. Within seconds, it disappeared behind the coned peak of the mountain.