Pick Up Sticks

by Deaver Brown

  He was now doing the Yankee handyman to perfection.

  The young couple, however, did not recognize dramatic performances. “We left our car on Route 27,” they reported.

  “North or south?” Henry asked artlessly.

  Two blank stares were his only response.

  “Well, where were you coming from?”

  This evoked a spate of tumbled explanations which Henry finally quelled with an upraised palm. “Now, let’s get this straight. You’d been to some construction site and you were heading back south to the White Mountains Motel. About three miles short of the motel, you decided to take a walk?”

  “And we got lost so that there was nothing but trees, trees, trees, until we found this place,” they chanted in unison. “Then we stopped—”

  But Henry was interested in geography, not suffering.

  “Then as near as I can make out,” he broke in firmly, “it’s simple enough to get you back to your car. You go back north along the trail until you get to the place that’s got a white blaze and a blue blaze, then you head off the trail, going due southeast, until you hit the riverbed, and follow that east by southeast to Route 217. Then, head south for your car. Should be about three miles, all told.”

  The young man stared at Henry with a hopelessness that Thatcher had rarely seen equaled.

  “Three miles?” he repeated dully, following Henry’s gesture toward the tree-lined trail. “Three miles?”

  Then, as Thatcher had feared she would, Sukey burst into tears.

  Chapter 2

  LITTLE ACORNS

  APPALLED, HENRY MORLAND stared at the results of his cheerful directions. As the sobbing continued, his bewilderment became tinged with resentment.

  “What’s she crying about?” he muttered to Thatcher.

  The young man had moved behind the girl and placed his hands on her shoulders. Now he straightened and glared across her bowed head.

  “Sukey,” he said defiantly, “is upset.”

  “What’s she got to be upset about?” Henry demanded. “All I did was tell you how to get back to the road.”

  Thatcher thought he saw light. “Maybe they didn’t understand your explanation,” he suggested. It was useless, of course, to expect Henry to realize his instructions might just as well have been phrased in Mongolian.

  “Oh, is that all? Well, I’ll show you on the map. Get it out for me, will you, John?”

  Obligingly Thatcher unstrapped the outer pocket of Henry’s pack and extracted the mapcase. While Henry found the proper U.S. Geological Survey section, the young man relayed the good news.

  “Sukey! Did you hear? They’ve got a map. Everything’s all right.” He accompanied these tidings with several hearty thumps on her back.

  Under this bracing treatment, Sukey revived. She lowered her hands and smiled at him. “Oh, Alan, go and find out how to get out of this awful place!”

  Alan beamed happily. “By the way,” he said, advancing to Henry’s side, “we’re Sukey and Alan Davidson.”

  The jubilation was short-lived. While Thatcher completed the self-introductions, Alan bent forward to look at the survey section. The next instant, he gave an involuntary yelp of protest.

  “But it isn’t a real map,” he stammered. “It doesn’t have any roads on it.”

  “It’s a topographic map,” Henry explained. “See, this is where we are now, on the Appalachian trail. It’s a crest trail, so it’s at the highest point on the map.”

  Steadily, Henry droned on. The shortest route to the road where they had left their car was south by southeast. Unfortunately that route involved the steepest gradient. Perhaps it would be wiser, on the whole, if they went southeast until they hit the road and then turned south. It was really quite simple. There were any number of points on which to take bearings. All they had to do was . . .

  Henry’s voice, eliciting no response, was steadily growing less confident. Even Sukey became anxious.

  “What is it?” she asked. “Is something wrong, Alan?”

  “No, no,” her husband lied gallantly. “Everything’s fine, Sukey. But I think maybe I’d better look at this a little longer.”

  A hideous suspicion began to dawn on Henry.

  “You do have a compass, don’t you?”

  “Well, actually, we don’t.” Alan lowered his head studiously.

  To keep Henry from comment, Thatcher intervened. “Tell me,” he asked kindly, “what exactly are you doing on the Appalachian Trail?”

  As an exercise in drawing fire, this was not successful since Sukey unguardedly exclaimed, “Oh, is that where we are?”

  “Control yourself, Henry,” Thatcher murmured.

  The Davidsons proceeded to a somewhat disjointed account of their plight. They were weekending in New Hampshire, with a view to buying a vacation home. They had inspected a large construction site. They had studied model summer cottages and ski chalets. They had, Alan Davidson, said, decided to go for a walk.

  “I mean,” he said, “the one thing we hadn’t seen much of was New Hampshire.”

  Well, that was another question answered. Not only did the Davidsons not have a compass. They had probably never seen a compass.

  Wordlessly, Thatcher caught Henry’s eye. Their duty was clear. Simple humanity demanded that these innocents be escorted to the nearest road.

  “We’ll go with you,” he announced.

  Alan and Sukey overflowed with gratitude.

  “It’s terribly nice of you,” Sukey said warmly. “We’re sorry to take you out of your way. I mean, I suppose you’re going somewhere.” She ended with a dubious glance at their surroundings and at the older men’s packsacks. Clearly she regarded their proceedings as some form of madness.

  Thatcher made no attempt to enlighten her. “That’s all right,” he said. “It’s not far. It won’t take us more than forty-five minutes.”

  At first he did not realize his error. Alan and Sukey were so relieved to acquire an escort that they set off in Henry’s wake with an initial burst of energy. Thatcher brought up the rear, content with his mild act of charity.

  But, with the best will in the world, they could not achieve a smooth rate of progress. As they stopped for the fifteenth time in ten minutes to untangle Sukey from the embrace of a tendril of briars, Thatcher permitted himself a comment.

  “These slacks of yours,” he said, sucking a thumb, “aren’t very practical.”

  Sukey looked down. “But they’re my country clothes. I don’t see why I have so much more trouble than the rest of you.”

  Henry had followed her gaze. The slacks started off trimly enough at the waist but, somewhere around the knees, they blossomed out into an abundance of material and became miniature Zouave skirts.

  “What kind of country did you have in mind?” he asked, genuinely interested.

  Sukey flushed. “I’ve been wearing them all summer without any trouble. Everywhere. All over Europe.”

  “We were on our honeymoon,” Alan amplified. “Spain and the South of France and Greece.”

  “Oh,” said Henry without enthusiasm. “Beaches.”

  Sukey shifted from defense to offense. “I’ll tell you what. The country in Europe isn’t like this at all. There are always people around and there isn’t all this stuff growing everywhere.” She scowled resentfully at the trees and the underbrush.

  Henry Morland was nothing if not a gentleman. He wasn’t going to hit Sukey when she was down, even though his gorge rose at this comparison between resort plages and the Appalachians.

  “I can see how it would be different,” he replied evasively. “Are you ready now?”

  But Thatcher and Morland had failed to appreciate just how far down Sukey was. The rejuvenating effect of companionship had worn off now. Henry, loping effortlessly ahead and sliding neatly through branches that became stinging whips when the Davidsons approached, knew only that Thatcher called to him three times to slacken the pace. Thatcher, who had fallen back to protect hi
mself against the effects of the Davidsons’ tumultuous passage, could see only that Sukey was limping. Finally they came to a grove of tall pines, where the mulch of pine needles had kept the underbrush at bay. Thatcher pulled abreast, took one look, and called a halt.

  Sukey’s face was white, her lower lip was gripped tightly under her teeth, and she swayed as she stood. Thatcher frowned, recalling what the Davidson boy had said. If the girl had only been in the woods for an hour, or an hour and a half, she couldn’t possibly be as exhausted as she looked.

  “What’s up?” asked Henry, cantering to their side.

  Thatcher shook his head irately. He was silently conning a list of alarming possibilities. Convalescence, pregnancy, debilitating disease . . .

  Sukey released her lip and spoke tremulously. “It’s my feet,” she gasped. Then she hitched up her slacks and the mystery was clarified.

  Simultaneously Henry and Thatcher breathed sighs of relief. Sukey was not suffering from exhaustion and shock. Sukey was in pain. The voluminous folds breaking over her instep had concealed the fact that she was shod in sandals secured by a thong passing between her toes.

  Thatcher directed a look at his old friend. Now was no time for Henry to ask why Sukey went mountain climbing in sandals.

  “They have very thick soles,” said Sukey, answering the unspoken accusation.

  Thatcher went down on one knee. “I don’t think that’s the problem. Here, let me take a look.”

  As he had expected, grit and fine splinters had lodged under the toes. In addition, the thong had rubbed a broad raw patch wherever it passed.

  “You’re going to have a fine crop of blisters,” he remarked, restoring her foot to ground. “The less walking you do, the better.”

  Henry was already deep in his map. “It’s simple enough. There’s an old logging trail near here. We’ll get Sukey that far, and I’ll go ahead to send a car for you.”

  “You could get our car,” Alan suggested. “I’ve got the keys here.”

  Henry repressed his impatience. “I will if I have to. But this construction site you mentioned must be nearer. And we probably ought to have a jeep or something for that trail. Do you know when they stop work at the site?”

  Neither Davidson had the slightest idea.

  “It’s five-thirty now,” Henry pointed out. “What about a phone? Is there one there?”

  Again Alan began to shake his head, but Sukey stopped him. “Yes, there is. Remember, Alan, Mr. Quinlan used it while we were there.”

  Thatcher and Henry made their plans as they moved at a cripple’s pace to the logging trail, Alan supporting Sukey behind them. Henry would go ahead to the site and phone the motel for a vehicle. Thatcher would remain with the Davidsons until succor arrived. With luck this good deed would be completed within the hour; they could still regain the trail and reach the shelter where they proposed to spend the night. With a last cheerful grin, Henry bounded athletically into the brush. A short exploration led Thatcher to a bubbling brook not thirty yards from their rendezvous point. Carefully stacking the two packs so they were visible to an approaching car, he shifted the Davidsons to brookside and directed Sukey to soak her feet.

  “It will be cold,” he warned, “but it will save you a good deal of discomfort tomorrow.”

  Sukey obeyed and, after a period of acclimation, agreed that it was heavenly. “In fact,” she said, “it’s the first time I’ve felt comfortable this whole weekend.”

  “But I thought you said you were staying in a motel,” Thatcher remarked. “That you’d come up here to inspect a summer place.”

  “That’s what we thought,” Alan said bitterly. “They said it would be a weekend when you could see New England at its best. But it hasn’t turned out that way at all. It’s been a rat race from beginning to end.”

  “They think just because it’s free, we have to do everything they say. You’d think we’d sold them our souls or something!” Sukey’s spirits were recovering something of their natural fire.

  Alan became very grave. “Of course, we realize that we live in a materialistic society where everything is directed to a profit goal, but we’d never seen anything like this!”

  Even on vacation, a banker is interested in profit goals. And Thatcher thought he recognized the situation underlying these plaints. “Do you mean that you were offered a free weekend here by one of these development colonies so they could try to sell you a lot?” he asked.

  Alan and Sukey flowered under this interest. They had received a brochure in the mail, they explained. It was all about a colony of vacation homes to be built in New Hampshire, called Fiord Haven.

  “Fiord?” Thatcher exclaimed in spite of himself. “But this is nowhere near the sea.”

  “They have a lake. And there’s going to be a ski tow and tennis courts and a golf course. And once you buy the lot, you can use that as a down payment against a house.”

  “But the main thing is the private tow.” Alan’s eyes sparkled with enthusiasm. “Then you wouldn’t have to wait in line for hours the way you do at Cannon Ball and Black Mountain. And they are going to have really good ski trails.”

  “Naturally we have no intention of committing ourselves to any kind of property now. We believe in human values, not property rights.” Sukey seemed to feel that Alan was not as alert as he might be to this aspect of the situation. “But they offered us a free weekend at this motel to come up and inspect the development. And we’d never been to New Hampshire, so we thought—why not? We thought it would be fun.”

  Alan barked a short laugh. “Fun! Were we ever taken! The minute we got here, the hard sell started. That was last night. And it hasn’t let up since.”

  Almost apologetically, Thatcher said, “I suppose that’s why they offered you the weekend. So that they could deliver a hard sell.”

  Alan realized he was being accused of naïveté. “Naturally we expected something like that. We know big companies don’t do things out of charity.”

  He expanded this theme, assisted by Sukey. The Davidsons had no illusions, they wished to make that clear. But still, they had been surprised, very surprised.

  “We expected to give them an hour or two of our time. That wouldn’t have been too bad. As a matter of fact, we were interested to hear how these places are arranged.” Alan was again showing signs of apostasy.

  Gently Thatcher explained that realty companies could get an hour or two of prospective clients’ time without any extraordinary efforts. The reason they transported a whole batch of potential purchasers to deserted country spots was in order to force them to listen for much longer periods than they would ordinarily agree to.

  “But you don’t understand what it’s been like. It’s just unbelievable.” Sukey was in full swing. The tide of woe broke over Thatcher’s head. They had been awakened at seven. They had listened to a two-hour lecture. Then they had been taken on a two-hour tour. After lunch, they had been split into small groups, each the object of attack by a single salesman. Then, out to the construction site again to see individual sites. Tonight there would be slides and another lecture. Tomorrow would be a repeat performance.

  “And that salesman, Burt O’Neil, he tried to tell us that we weren’t supposed to take tomorrow morning off to visit some friends. How do you like that?”

  “That’s really why we went for a walk in the woods,” Alan intervened. “We knew if we went back to the motel, someone would be waiting to grab us with another sales pitch.”

  “That’s a pretty stupid way to run a business.” Sukey swept back a curtain of dark hair scornfully. “All they do is make people mad.”

  Thatcher forebore to point out that, however unpleasant the process, it seemed to have succeeded in waking some spark in Alan. It would be unkind and, in any event, he had other things to think about. He looked at his watch again. Henry had been gone for nearly an hour. It should not have taken him more than half an hour to get to the development site. What had happened?

&nbs
p; As Alan and Sukey continued their antiphonal lament, Thatcher reviewed the possibilities. He was not personally worried about Henry. That is, he did not fear a fall, a sprained ankle, a wrong direction. What he did fear was Henry’s excessive zeal. Suppose the phone at the site had been locked up? What would Henry do? Probably break in. Suppose it had been disconnected? Henry was not above overcoming that difficulty too.

  Heedless of that chatter raining down on him, Thatcher frowned. That was the trouble. Henry was efficient and Henry was determined. However misguided his actions, they usually achieved their goal. Even if he had been forced to strew disgruntled realtors and phone companies behind, Henry should have returned by now. Or a car should have arrived.

  Thatcher squinted at the lengthening shadows. Soon he would have to decide. He could wait for Henry or he could move Sukey down the logging trail while there was still light. Night closed in on the woods sooner than on open country. He would give Henry exactly one half hour.

  The shadow of the tall oak which he was using as his measuring stick was just creeping toward the large boulder in the stream when he heard voices calling. Good, Henry had arrived with reinforcements. He arose from his log and let his own voice ring out.

  “Henry! We’re coming!”

  Letting the Davidsons follow slowly, he strode rapidly back to the packsacks. At first, he could not see clearly because of the gloom after the glare of sunset on water. He could dimly make out the shape of a car and several men. Then his eyes adjusted. Oh, my God, he thought to himself, what has Henry done now?

  Because Henry, looking much smaller, was flanked by two enormous state policemen.

  “John,” he said, sounding almost embarrassed, “I’m terribly sorry, but there’s been a murder!”

  Chapter 3

  ASHES ASHES

  WHATEVER JOHN THATCHER had expected, it was not this. Before he could demand further information, one of the troopers intervened.

  “Now just a minute,” he said. “Let’s get a few things straight, right away. Mr. Morland said there were supposed to be three of you. Is that the other two I hear?”