Bagley, Desmond - Landslide

by Landslide

  At the 'end of the first day I checked my findings against the Government geological map which was, to say the best of it, sketchy; in fact, in parts it was downright blank. People sometimes ask me: "Why doesn't the Government do a real geological survey and get the job done once and for all?" All I can say is that those people don't understand anything about the problems. It would take an army of geologists a hundred years to check every square mile of Canada, and then they'd have to do it again because some joker would have invented a gadget to see metals five hundred feet underground; or, maybe, someone else would find a need for some esoteric metal hitherto useless. Alumina ores were pretty useless in 1900 and you couldn't give away uranium in the 1930s. There'll still be jobs for a guy like me for many years to come.

  What little was on the Government map checked with what I had, but I had it in more detail. A few traces of molybdenum and a little zinc and lead, but nothing to get the Matterson Corporation in an uproar about. When a geologist speaks of a trace, he means just that.

  I carried on the next day, and the day after that, and by the end of the week I'd made pretty certain that the Matterson Corporation wasn't going to get rich mining the southern end of the Kinoxi Valley. I had everything packed back at the camp and was sitting twiddling my thumbs when the helicopter arrived, and I must say he was dead on time.

  This time he dropped me in the northern area by a stream, and again I spent the day making camp. The next day I was off once more in the usual routine, just putting one foot in front of the other and keeping my eyes open.

  On the third day I realised I was being watched. There wasn't much to show that this was so, but there was enough; a scrap of wool caught on a twig near the camp which hadn't been there twelve hours earlier, a fresh scrape on the bark of a tree which I hadn't made and, once only, a wink of light from a distant hillside to show that someone had incautiously exposed binoculars to direct sunlight.

  Now, in the north woods it's downright discourteous to come within spitting distance of a man's camp and not make yourself known, and anyone who hadn't secrecy on his mind wouldn't do it. I don't particularly mind a man having his secrets -- I've got some of my own -- but if a man's secrets involve me then I don't like it and I'm apt to go off pop. Still, there wasn't much I could do about it except carry on and hope to surprise this snoopy character somehow.

  On the fifth day I had just the far northern part of the valley to inspect, so I decided to go right as far as I had to and make an overnight camp at the top of the valley. I was walking by the stream, trudging along, when a voice behind me said, "Where do you think you're going?"

  I froze, then turned round carefully. A tall man in a red mackinaw was standing just off the trail casually holding a hunting rifle. The rifle wasn't pointing right at me; on the other hand, it wasn't pointing very far away. In fact, it was a moot point whether I was being held up at gun-point or not. Since this guy had just stepped out from behind a tree he had deliberately ambushed me, so I didn't care to make an issue of it right then -- it wouldn't have been the right time. I just said, "Hi! Where did you spring from?"

  His jaw tightened and I saw he wasn't very old, maybe in his early twenties. He said, "You haven't answered my question."

  I didn't like that tightening jaw and I hoped his trigger ringer wasn't tightening too. Young fellows his age can go off at half-cock awfully easily. I shifted the pack on my back. "Just going up to the head of the valley."

  "Doing what?"

  I said evenly, "I don't know what business it is of yours, buster, but I'm doing a survey for the Matterson Corporation."

  "No, you're not," he said. "Not on this land." He jerked his head down the valley. "See that marker?"

  I looked in the direction he indicated and saw a small cairn of stones, much overgrown, which is why I hadn't spotted it before. It would have been pretty invisible from the other side. I looked at my young friend. "So?"

  "So that's where Matterson land stops." He grinned, but there was no humour in him. "I was hoping you'd come this way -- the marker makes explanations easier."

  I walked back and looked at the cairn, then glanced at him to find he had followed me with the rifle still held easily in his hands. We had the cairn between us, so I said, "It's all right if I stand here?"

  "Sure," he said airily. "You can stand there. No law against it."

  "And you don't mind me taking off my pack?"

  "Not so long as you don't put it this side of the marker." He grinned and I could see he was enjoying himself. I was prepared to let him -- for the moment -- so I said nothing, swung the pack to the ground and flexed my shoulders. He didn't like that -- he could see how big I was, and the rifle swung towards me, so there was no question now about being held up.

  I pulled the maps out of a side pocket of the pack and consulted them. "There's nothing here about this," I said mildly.

  "There wouldn't be," he said. "Not on Matterson maps. But this is T rinavant land."

  "Oh! Would that be Clare Trinavant?"

  "Yeah, that's right." He shifted the rifle impatiently.

  I said, "Is she available? I'd like to see her."

  "She's around, but you won't see her -- not unless she wants to see you." He laughed abruptly. "I wouldn't stick around waiting for her; you might take root."

  I jerked my head down the valley. "Ill be camped in that clearing. You push off, sonny, and tell Miss Trinavant that I know where the bodies are buried." I don't know why I said it but it seemed a good thing to say at the time.

  His head came up. "Huh!"

  "Run away and tell Miss Trinavant just that," I said.

  "You're just an errand boy, you know." I stooped, picked up the pack, and turned away, leaving him standing there with his mouth open. By the time I reached the clearing and looked back he had gone.

  The fire was going and the coffee was bubbling when I heard voices from up the valley. My friend, the young gunman, came into sight but he'd left his artillery home this time. Behind him came a woman, trimly dressed in jeans, an open-necked shirt and a mackinaw. Some women can wear jeans but not many; Ogden Nash once observed that before a woman wears pants she should see herself walking away. Miss Trinavant definitely had the kind of figure that would look well in anything, even an old burlap sack.

  And she looked beautiful even when she was as mad as a hornet. She came striding over to me in a determined sort of way, and demanded, "What is all this? Who are you?"

  "My name's Boyd," I said. "I'm a geologist working on contract for the Matterson Corporation. I'm . . ."

  She held up her hand and looked at me with frosty eyes. I'd never seen green frost before, "That's enough. This is as far up valley as you go, Mr. Boyd. See to it, Jimmy."

  "That's what I told him, Miss Trinavant, but he didn't want to believe me."

  I turned my head and looked at him. "Stay out of this, Jimmy boy: Miss Trinavant is on Matterson land by invitation -- you're not, so buzz off. And don't point a gun at me again or I'll wrap it round your neck."

  "Miss Trinavant, that's a lie," he yelled. "I never "

  I whirled and hit him. It's a neat trick if you can get in the right position -- you straighten your arm out stiff and pivot from the hips -- your hand picks up a hell of a velocity by the time it makes contact. The back of my hand caught him under the jaw and damn' near lifted him a foot off the ground. He landed flat on his back, flopped around a couple of times like a newly landed trout, and then lay still.

  Miss Trinavant was looking at me open-mouthed -- I could see her lovely tonsils quite plainly. I rubbed the back of my hand and said mildly, "I don't like liars."

  "He wasn't lying," she said passionately. "He had no gun."

  "I know when I'm being looked at by a 30.30," I said, and stabbed my finger at the prostrate figure in the pine needles.

  That character has been snooping after me for the last three days: I don't like that, either. He just got what was coming to him."

  By the way she bared
her teeth she was getting set to bite me. "You didn't give him a chance, you big barbarian."

  I let that one go. I've been in too many brawls to be witless enough to give the other guy a chance -- I leave that to the sporting fighters who earn a living by having their brains beaten out.

  She knelt down, and said, "Jimmy, Jimmy, are you all right?" Then she looked up. "You must have broken his jaw."

  "No," I said. "I didn't hit him hard enough. He'll just be sore in body and spirit for the next few days." I took a pannikin and filled it with water from the stream and dumped it on Jimmy's face. He stirred and groaned. "He'll be fit to walk in a few minutes. You'd better get him back to wherever you have your camp. And you can tell him that if he comes after me with a gun again I'll kill him."

  She breathed hard but said nothing, concentrating on arousing Jimmy. Presently he was conscious enough to stand up on groggy feet and he looked at me with undisguised hatred. I said, "When you've got him bedded down I'll be glad to see you again, Miss Trinavant. Ill still be camped here."

  She turned a startled face towards me. "What makes you think I ever want to see you again?" she flared.

  "Because I know where the bodies are buried," I said pleasantly. "And don't be afraid; I've never been known to hit a woman yet."

  I would have sworn she used some words I'd heard only in logging camps, but I couldn't be certain because she muttered them under her bream. Then she turned to give Jimmy a hand and I watched them go past the marker and out of sight. The coffee was pretty nigh ruined by this time so I tossed it out and set about making more, and a glance at the sun decided me to think about bedding down for the night.

  It was dusk when I saw her coming back, a glimmering figure among the trees. I had made myself comfortable and was sitting with my back to a tree tending the fat duck which was roasting on a spit before the fire. She came up and stood over me. "What do you really want?" she asked abruptly.

  I looked up. "You hungry?" She stirred impatiently, so I said, "Roast duck, fresh bread, wild celery, hot coffee -- how does that sound?"

  She dropped down to my level. "I told Jimmy to watch out for you," she said. "I knew you were coming. But I didn't tell him to go on Matterson land -- and I didn't say anything about a gun."

  "Perhaps you should have," I observed. "Perhaps you should have said, 'No gun'."

  "I know Jimmy's a bit wild," she said. "But that's no excuse for what you did."

  I took a fiat cake of bread out of the clay oven and slapped it on a platter. "Have you ever looked down the muzzle of a gun?" I asked. "It's a mighty unsettling sensation, and I tend to get violent when I'm nervous." I handed her the platter. "What about some duck?"

  Her nostrils quivered as the fragrance rose from the spitted bird and she laughed. "You've sold me. It smells so good."

  I began to carve the duck. "Jimmy's not much hurt except in what he considers to be his pride. If he goes around pointing guns at people, one of these days there's going to be a bang and hell hang as high as Hainan. Maybe I've saved his life. Who is he?"

  "One of my men."

  "So you knew I was coming," I said thoughtfully. "News gets around these parts fast, considering it's so underpopulated."

  She selected a slice of breast from her platter and popped it into her mouth. "Anything that concerns me I get to know about. Say, this is good!"

  "I'm not such a good cook," I said. "It's the open air that does it. How do I concern you?"

  "You work for Matterson; you were on my land. That concerns me."

  I said, "When I contracted to do this job Howard Matter-son had a bit of an argument with a man called Dormer. Matterson said he'd straighten out the matter with someone called Clare -- presumably you. Did he?"

  "I haven't seen Howard Matterson. in a month -- and I don't care if I never see him again."

  "You can't blame me for not knowing the score," I said. "I thought the job was above board. Matterson has a strange way of running his business."

  She picked up a drumstick and gnawed on it delicately. "Not strange -- just crooked. Of course, it all depends on which Matterson you're talking about. Bull Matterson is the crooked one; Howard is just plain sloppy."

  "You mean he forgot to talk to you about it?" I said unbelievingly.

  "Something like that." She pointed the drumstick at me. "What's all this about bodies?"

  I grinned. "Oh, I just wanted to talk to you. I knew that would bring you running."

  She stared at me. "Why should it?"

  "It did -- didn't it?" I pointed out. "It's a variation of the old story of the practical joker who sent a cable to a dozen of his friends: fly -- all is discovered. Nine of them hastily left town. Everyone has a skeleton in some cupboard of their lives."

  "You were just pining for company," she said sardonically.

  "Would I pass up the chance of dining with a beautiful woman in the backwoods?"

  "I don't believe you," she said flatly. "You can cut out the flattery. For all you knew I might have been an old hag of ninety, unless, of course, you'd been asking questions around beforehand. Which you obviously have. What are you up to, Boyd?"

  "Okay," I said. "How's this for a starter? Did you ever get around to investigating that Trinavant-Matterson partnership agreement, together with the deal Matterson made with the trustees of the estate? It seems to me that particular business transaction could bear looking into. Why doesn't someone do something about it?"

  She stared at me wide-eyed, "Wow! If you've been asking questions like that around Fort Farrell you're going to be in trouble as soon as the old Bull finds out."

  "Yes," I said. "I understand he'd rather forget the Trinavants ever existed. But don't worry; he won't get to hear of it. My source of information is strictly private."

  "I wasn't worrying," she said coldly. "But perhaps you think you can handle the Mattersons the same way you handled Jimmy. I wouldn't bank on it."

  "I didn't think you cared -- and I was right," I said with a grin. "But why doesn't someone investigate that smelly deal? You, for instance."

  "Why should I?" she said offhandedly. "It has nothing to do with me how much Bull Matterson gyps the trustees. Tangling with the Mattersons wouldn't put money in my pocket."

  "You mean you don't care that John Trinavant's intentions have been warped and twisted to put money in Matterson's pocket?" I asked softly.

  I thought she was going to throw the platter at me. Her face whitened and pink spots appeared in her cheeks. "Damn you!" she said hotly. Slowly she simmered down. "I did try once," she admitted. "And I got nowhere. Dormer has the books of the Matterson Corporation in such a goddam tangle it would take a team of high-priced lawyers ten years to unsnarl ever ything. Even I couldn't afford that and my attorney advised me not to try. Why are you so interested anyway?"

  I watched her sop up gravy with a piece of bread; I like a girl with a healthy appetite. "I don't know that I am interested. It's just another point to wonder about. Like why does Matterson want to bury the Trinavants -- permanently?"

  "You stick your neck out, you'll get it chopped off," she warned. "Matterson doesn't like questions like that." She put down her platter, stood up and went down to the stream to wash her hands. When she came back she was wiping them on a man-sized handkerchief.

  I poured her a cup of coffee. "I'm not asking Matterson -- I'm asking a Trinavant. Isn't it something a Trinavant wonders about from time to time?"

  "Sure! And like everyone else we get no answers." She looked at me closely. "What are you after, Boyd? And who the hell are you?"

  "Just a beat-up freelance geologist. Doesn't Matterson ever worry you?"

  She sipped the hot coffee. "Not much. I spend very little time here. I come back for a few months every year to annoy him, that's all."

  "And you still don't know what he has against the Trinavants?"

  "No."

  I looked into the fire and said pensively, "Someone was saying that he wished you'd get married. The implication
was that there'd be no one around with the name of Trinavant any more."

  She flared hotly. "Has Howard been ?" Then she

  stopped and bit her lip.

  "Has Howard been . . . what?"

  She rose to her feet and dusted herself down. "I don't mink I like you, Mr. Boyd. You ask too many questions, and I get no answers'. I don't know who you are or what you want. If you want to tangle with Matterson that's your affair; my disinterested advice would be 'Don't!' because hell chop you up into little pieces. Still, why should I care? But let me tell you one thing -- don't interfere with me."

  "What would you do to me mat Matterson wouldn't?"

  "The name of Trinavant isn't quite forgotten," she said. "I have some good friends."

  "They'd better be better than Jimmy," I said caustically. Then I wondered why I was fighting with her; it didn't make sense. I scrambled to my feet. "Look, I have no fight with you and I've no cause to interfere in your life, either. I'm a pretty harmless guy except when someone pokes a gun in my direction. I'll just go back and report to Howard Matterson that you wouldn't let me on your land. There's no grief in it for me."

  "You do that," she said. There was puzzlement in her voice as she added, "You're a funny one, Boyd. You come here as a stranger and you dig up a ten-year-old mystery everyone has forgotten. Where did you get it from?"

  "I don't think my informant would care to be named."

  "I bet he wouldn't," she said with contempt. "I thought everyone in Fort Farrell had developed a conveniently bad memory as well as a yellow streak."

  "Maybe you have friends in Fort Farrell, too," I said softly.

  She zipped up her mackinaw against the chill of the night air. "I'm not going to stick around here bandying mysteries with you, Boyd," she said. "Just remember one thing. Don't come on my land -- ever."

  She turned to go away, and I said, "Wait! There are ghosties and ghoulies and beasties, and things that go bump in the night; I wouldn't want you to walk into a bear. I'll escort you back to your camp."