Fear No Evil

by John Gordon Davis

  They rolled down the mountainside in a furious mess of jaws and fur, amid the yells of Elizabeth, Davey, and Charlie. Mercifully Sam still was on top of Kitty’s neck, out of the way of her slashing feet, then he let go and fled. Sam went bounding flat out, back up the mountain, snatched up his possum, and fled across the mountainside, crashing through the undergrowth, his tail between his legs. He took one look over his shoulder, saw Kitty’s gaping fangs just behind him, and ran for all his terrified worth—slap bang into a hole. Suddenly his forelegs disappeared, his hindlegs twisted in mid-air, and he lost the possum. Kitty dived for it, Sam picked himself up and hurled himself onto her neck again, and the possum suddenly took to its feet and tottered off.

  For he had only fainted, as Elizabeth had suggested; he come around with a terrible headache and sore ribs, and his ears full of the most deafening din. He staggered off under a nearby bush to collect his wits and looked back at the frightful melee taking place over his flesh, remembered what had happened, and took to his heels. He scuttled down the mountain and got the hell out of it.

  Meanwhile, back up the mountain, Sam still clung to Kitty’s neck with all his desperate might, too terrified to let go because then she would be onto him. Kitty roared and twisted in fury, then Davey was on them both. He flailed his lumber jacket, grabbed Sam by the scruff of his neck, and threw him; he wall-oped Kitty across the head with the jacket.

  Sam landed in the undergrowth, wild-eyed, gave a winded half-bark of defiance and took gratefully to his heels. Kitty dodged around Davey and started after him. But she had lost heart in the battle. Sam was too far ahead, and her bounds turned to a few half-hearted prances; then she gave up.

  Elizabeth was holding onto a tree, laughing.

  ‘If Nature’s always right, why didn’t you let Kitty clean up this possum-eater here? …’

  That night they crossed the Newfound Gap road, the highway that cuts the Great Smoky Mountains and connects the town of Cherokee, in North Carolina, with the town of Gatlinburg, in Tennessee.

  Six Cherokees, friends of Chief Owle, were waiting for them in the forest. They told Davey that the coast was clear; the highway had been sealed off by the government. They had a big knapsack of food supplies and a pig’s carcass—plus a bottle of Scotch whisky which Davey had asked Tom Underwood to send as a treat for the doctor.

  To Elizabeth, it was a wonderful feeling to cross that highway unafraid, knowing that the Cherokees were protecting them, that no rifle shots were going to crack out. Two Cherokees remained at Newfound Gap to cover their rear and to obliterate their spoor in the morning. Davey and the four other Cherokees led the animals down the short tourist road along the mountains’ edge to the Clingmans Dome tower. It was the first time Elizabeth had seen him in such good spirits.

  That night, deep in the forest, they had a feast.

  The big cats slavered over their pig’s carcass, Sam chomped on his share of it (well away from Kitty), a leg of pork roasted over the fire, the elephants rumbled and sighed around, feeding, the bears rooted, and the gorillas scratched their nests together. While the pork spat and sizzled, Davey ceremoniously presented the Scotch to Elizabeth. The grinning Cherokees all applauded her, and for the first time she almost felt like an accomplice.

  forty-three

  When she woke up just before dawn, her body telling her that she had drunk too much, the anxiety had come back: O God, what happens now? And when?

  So, they had made it: extraordinary. Wonderful. But the ghastly fact was that if these animals weren’t recaptured immediately they were going to be butchered by the great American hunter, or have war declared on them by the local citizenry such as Sheriff Boots Whatisname in the righteous claim of protecting hearth and home. O God, the blood, and the suffering! The stark fact was, the sooner Mr. Forsythe got himself down here the better, for the animals own sake.

  And, oh how awful it was going to be for them … having tasted the wilderness. How awful it was going to be just to stand behind bars for the rest of their lives, confused, wondering, with nothing to do but remember and yearn and wait. For what? For death. For Davey Jordan to come back. But he would never come back for them. Because he was going to go to prison for a long, long time …

  At first light they were on the move again. The four Cherokees stayed behind, painstakingly collecting the animals’ dung and putting it into separate plastic bags.

  ‘Are they trying to obliterate our spoor?’

  ‘No,’ Big Charlie rumbled. ‘Our spoor here is too big.’

  ‘What are they doing, then?’

  The big Indian did not answer.

  ‘Charlie?’

  ‘Forget it,’ he said apologetically.

  ‘Charlie? …’

  He kept walking. ‘Yes, Dr. Johnson?’

  ‘Please stop a moment.’

  He stopped reluctantly and turned to face her.

  ‘Look. You either trust me, or you don’t.’

  She waited for some response, but there was none.

  ‘Do you trust me or do you not?’ she demanded.

  He looked at her embarrassed. ‘No,’ he said at last.

  She stared up at him. ‘Then all that jolliness around the campfire last night was phoney?’

  ‘Of course we appreciate you, Dr. Johnson. You’re our vet.’

  ‘But?’

  He took an uneasy breath. ‘But you still want those animals back in their cages, don’t you?’ Before she could answer he put his hand gently on her shoulder. ‘That’s what you’ve got to decide, Dr. Johnson.’

  He turned away, embarrassed, and hurried to catch up with the animals.

  She stared after him. But after ten paces he stopped. He turned around uncertainly and looked back at her.

  ‘They’re going to make phony spoor with that dung, Dr. Johnson. They’re going to take it back to the other side of New-found Gap, way down into the valley, and spread it around some. Then tell this guy from South Africa where it’s at. Then he’ll follow a false trail. It probably won’t fool him for long, but he’ll waste time checking it out. Okay?’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said tersely.

  He walked on, hurt. Then he tried to make her feel good.

  ‘What we need now is a real good rain. To wash out all our spoor.’

  After a while, she rode Rajah. The going was difficult, crossing the mountain; she did not ride Dumbo because in his enthusiasm he would not be smart enough to watch out for overhanging branches. Rolling along on Rajah’s neck, she could tell he was pleased—maybe it was because he was showing Jamba what he could do. He had curled up his trunk and felt her gently; in a kind of reassuring greeting, and he watched carefully for overhanging branches, maneuvering ponderously around them; she could tell he liked her riding on him and that he was happy with the whole world. Dumbo was jealous and came huffing alongside with his load of knapsacks, to make her pay attention to him, and Elizabeth smiled at him. She did not want to think about what Big Charlie had said, about whether she deserved their trust; if it were true, it was only because of her dread of what Jay ahead.

  Then the sun came up over the Great Smoky Mountains, and, oh, she did not want to think about the expert from Africa. The sun flamed red across the sky, setting the mountaintops on fire and turning the oceans of cloud mauvy gold; the air was crisp and clean, and the whole world was young and free. She looked at the big broad backs of the animals lumbering so earnestly and trustingly after their shepherd, and she could only think about those lovable creatures and what it must be like to have all the magnificent space after their awful cages. The words kept recurring to her: their Promised Land …

  Their Promised Land. This is how it was in the beginning, before Man came and murdered and raped and plundered. Now new life coming back where life belonged …

  Maybe she was becoming emotional, but it made her feel young again, strong and full of determination to be fully alive, appreciate to the full these days when life was coming back to the wilderness of Ame
rica. Her head felt light; her blood was zinging. The whole world was clean and clearly etched.

  And free. She prayed fiercely to the omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent God she truly believed in, prayed with all her might—for what? That the man from Africa would fail, that the animals not get caught? For rain, to wash out their spoor? Oh, she didn’t even know what she was praying for any more! For peace? For no more blood. For no more terror. That only the right thing would happen? She looked at the beautiful animals lumbering along; they were God’s perfect creations, and she knew what was the right thing to happen. He had made them to live free …

  The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

  He maketh me to lie down in green pastures …

  Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

  I will fear no evil; for Thou art with me.

  When she prayed she could almost believe that somehow they would escape the skills of the man from Africa, that finally the world would cry out, ‘Enough!—let them be!’

  And she wanted to pray for rain, to wash out the spoor.

  Late the following afternoon Big Charlie pointed it out to her in the distance: a mountain called Thunderhead. Way below it was the valley they called the Garden of Eden.

  There was not a cloud in the sky.

  forty-four

  The sun began to come up again, lighting up the tips of the multi-fluted mountains and the silent crests of the ocean of cloud, and glinting into Elizabeth’s exhausted eyes.

  She sat slumped against a tree on the slopes of Thunderhead Mountain, her heart singing. They had made it. Way down there, beneath that gold-tipped ocean, was the magic jumble of valleys that David Jordan had promised them.

  She sat, her limbs aching. They had been on the march most of the night, and her body wanted to collapse on her back and feel the exhaustion pouring out of her into her mother earth, and sleep. But she also wanted just to sit here and marvel, revel in the wonderful feeling of being at the end of the trail.

  Big Charlie came and crouched down beside her.

  ‘Dr. Johnson? It’s all downhill from now on …’

  She heaved up to her feet. She stood for a moment, watching her beautiful animals loping down the slope in the misty sunrise, following the man they trusted into the promised land. Then she started after them, into the early morning shadows of the wilderness, down into the clouds.

  She swung down through the steep forest, and she was laughing inside because they had made it. She looked at the animals lumbering down the mountain, blindly trusting and following Davey, and she wanted to throw her arms around their great big animalness and tell then that a beautiful country lay just ahead below those clouds, a wonderful country for an elephant to be an elephant in, and a lion a lion and a bear a bear. She wanted to fling her arms wide to the sky and cry out: Please keep helping us now. In the name of Love and Pity!

  Then she felt the first drops of rain on her flushed face.

  Then, as suddenly, down it came.

  The rain came sweeping up the Great Smoky Mountains in great curls and furls, up through the forest to the high rugged crests, obliterating the spoor and washing away their scent.

  Elizabeth stood in the rain, her arms held wide and her head tilted back, a laughing smile all over her face.

  O thank God!

  Davey and Big Charlie were plastered wet and grinning. They looked back up at her standing there with her arms outstretched, and they laughed. She looked at them and she laughed too, and there were tears in her eyes.

  Sultan and the lions had scattered to shelter beneath the trees; the elephants and the bears stood still, enduring the water beating down on them; the gorillas and chimpanzees all crouched together under one tree, horrified, rain dripping off their miserable faces, soaked, trying to squeeze under each other, quarrelling for the notional shelter. Davey tried not to laugh at them.

  ‘Come.’

  The chimpanzees came scrambling, but King Kong and Auntie stared out miserably.

  ‘Come!’ He held out his hand.

  They didn’t move. He had to turn away to smother his smile. He called, ‘Sorry, Dr. Johnson, we got to keep going.’

  ‘Where’re the lions?’

  ‘They’re in the forest, they’re all right.’

  ‘But will they follow us through the rain?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter if they don’t. We’re here now. But they’ll follow; they’re hungry.’ He turned to Rajah, standing forlornly behind him. ‘This is called rain, Rajah—rain. It’s good for you. Makes things grow green.’ He gave him a big pat, and started striding on down the mountain, singing as he went.

  The elephants and the bears lumbered hurriedly after him, but the gorillas huddled doggedly under their tree, sodden.

  They did not want to walk in the rain, but neither did they want to be left behind. Elizabeth was swinging down the mountainside. They clutched each other wetly, wracked by indecision. Then Elizabeth passed out of sight, and King Kong gave a decisive grunt. He started galloping down the steep mountain, the rain beating on his screwed-up face.

  Out of the forest came the big cats, springing distastefully through the mud and rain. First big, grumpy Tommy, his tawny hide like a sodden old carpet and his mane bedraggled, trying to dodge the wet bushes and shaking his paws. Then Kitty, as if discharged from a catapult, then Princess, hot after her, and finally Sultan, looking as miserable as sin, soggy and discommoded.

  But it was downhill all the way.

  Thirty miles beyond Newfound Gap highway, the rain beat down on Smoky bear.

  He stood in the middle of the trail, the rain flattening his fur, making him almost look skinny; his brown eyes were gaunt, his black nose twitched desperately at the mud. He couldn’t smell the scent any more, only the sharp fresh rain. His left foreleg was bent, and his head pounded with the pain that swelled down his shoulder.

  Smoky sniffed at the mud, then slowly, painfully, sat down. He sat, at a loss, enduring the throbbing: then, with a grunt, he painfully shoved himself off the ground, and reared up onto his hindlegs.

  He could see nothing but the gray mist of rain, and he could smell nothing.

  There was nothing he knew to do, except carry on the way he was going.

  Seventy miles away Sheriff Lonnogan and his posse slogged through the rain, heading in completely the wrong direction, collars turned up, doggedly following the Cherokee tracker whom Chief Nathaniel Owle had provided.

  They had been following this tracker for almost forty-eight hours, and it was mostly uphill all the way. Lonnogan had dark bags under his red-rimmed eyes and his stubbled face was etched with exhaustion; he could feel the grandfather of all colds coming on.

  forty-five

  The bottom of the valley was like a cupped hand, the steep mountain ridges, the fingers, and the valleys the spaces between. A dozen streams came tumbling down, cascading over rocks, bubbling and tinkling, and wandered into a river, crystal clear, with little waterfalls, deep pools, sparkling rapids, and smooth boulders. Along the banks grew ferns and vines, heavy rhododendron, and thick green grass. At the bottom of it all lay blue Fontana Lake, long and jagged, spread-eagled along the edge of the Great Smoky Mountains, with hundreds of bays and inlets reaching into the steep, mountainous forests.

  The clouds had disappeared, the sky was blue again, and the sun shone through the treetops in dapples and patches, sparkling on the gurgling water. The earth smelled rich and clean, and the boulders by the rivers felt warm.

  An abandoned homesteader’s cabin stood a quarter mile up a gentle little valley. It had only one room, with a loft above it. The walls were made of logs, mud stuffed between them, and the roof was made of wood-chip shingles. The door was almost gone, and one corner of the roof had collapsed, but the loft’s wooden floor and the fireplace, made of stone and mud, still stood. A stream ran by the cabin and the hillbilly had cleared a pasture, a couple of acres, on both sides of the river. But the forest was reclaiming it, a
nd now thick vegetation grew along the river again. There were the remnants of a wormwood fence paddock, and some hogsties of stone. Once upon a time, there had been a path from the pasture to the cabin, but now trees grew right up to the rotting porch. There had been scrawny chickens scratching about the yard, a barefoot woman to serve the tough hillbilly, and smoke spiraling from the chimney. And now there was smoke again.

  She would remember the rest of that day as a dream.

  She wanted to sleep, to throw herself down on the friendly earth, but she was too happy to sleep. She wanted to glory in earthiness, feel it between her fingers, feel the grass and the leaves, the sun and crisp warm air on her skin. She wanted to kick off her boots and go running and skipping over the cool green grass, dance through the forest, and sing. She wanted to throw her arms around the animals, and rub her face against theirs and tell them that they were here at last.

  But she just had to lie down.

  She threw herself down on top of her sleeping bag in the sun outside the cabin, on her stomach, her arms outspread, reveling in the feeling of being at the end of the trail.

  She slept.

  When she woke, the Garden of Eden was in deep shadow. Smoke was curling from the chimney, and there was the smell of roasting meat. Davey was smiling down at her.

  ‘I’m going to feed the lions, Dr. Johnson. Do you want to come?’

  She sat up. She felt groggy, rested, stiff, sore and dirty.

  ‘Where did you get the meat?’

  ‘Charlie shot a boar.’

  ‘Where does he get the strength?’

  The boar’s carcass was suspended from a rope in a tree near the river. The big cats had found it: they were prowling under the tree, sniffing and licking its dripping blood. Kitty had climbed the tree in desperation and pawed at the carcass, while Princess moaned below, but all Kitty had reached was the rope so the carcass was swinging like a pendulum, while feline heads were turning to and fro, salivating.