He was not going to argue. He said quietly, ‘A lot of things are going to start happening soon, Dr. Johnson. I’m going to start splitting up the animals. They can’t keep living in a circus group any longer.’
She was staring at him with a sinking heart. She started to speak, but he went on. ‘We’re going to be moving about some. We may get separated. Especially in an emergency.’ He looked at her. ‘Do you know how to find your way out of here?’
She blinked. ‘Yes. I think so. The Appalachian Trail’s somewhere up there.’
‘But there’re no foot trails to get to it. And it would be at least four or five nights alone in the wilderness getting out.’ He added, ‘I can get you escorted out now, if you want.’
‘What are you talking about, Davey? Do you want me to quit? Aren’t I an asset? Or am I just another responsibility?’
He didn’t answer her question.
‘I think you should quit now. Think about it, Dr. Johnson. Because things are going to start happening soon.’
‘I’ve thought about it! And I’m not quitting. And what’s going to start happening soon?’
He turned and started walking.
‘You still don’t trust me, do you?’
He didn’t answer. She called after him: ‘I don’t get it, Davey! If you don’t trust me, I could go and tell Jonas Ford where you are, if I quit now, couldn’t I?’
He stopped. ‘If you did that, I’d soon know. And we’d be gone.’ He shook his head slightly. ‘I can run circles around those people for weeks, Dr. Johnson.’
He started to turn away, then he said, ‘Yes, I would have stopped Kitty. There’s plenty for her to eat here apart from chimpanzees. But Champ learned something today.’
‘What, pray?’
‘Not to trust lions. Or even me, any more.’
At that moment, high up on the crest of the mountains, the furry silhouette of Smoky bear was hobbling along the Appalachian Trail. Before him loomed the mountain called Thunderhead.
The pain in his side was very bad. His whole flank throbbed, and with each step his head thudded from the yellow poison in his body. He was exhausted from running, hobbling, going he knew not where; he only knew he had to keep going, to find his keeper, keep running from the terrors that lay behind him.
Near Thunderhead, he stopped on a small rise, to test the wind again, searching for a familiar smell. He stood, his head slowly turning, his black nose pointed, the wind ruffling his fur; then his heart contracted with excitement.
It was gone on the shifting evening breeze, but he had definitely caught it once: the faint but familiar whiff of elephant dung, coming up the mountainside in the dusk.
That night the three men from Sylva sat around the bar in the den. Large-scale surveyors’ maps of the Great Smoky Mountains were spread across the floor. On one wall was Mama’s tiger skin, freshly hung. She was too good to have on the floor as a mat. Her bullet holes had been patched up nicely, and two glass tiger eyes, sent from New York, had been mounted in her sockets. Her snarling jaws were agape. She looked good. Three knapsacks with bedrolls were stacked neatly against the wall. The three men were drinking whisky. A leather cup of poker dice stood on the bar between their glasses. The first man was behind the bar, and he was reading slowly from a list.
‘Three elephants, two grizzlies, one black bear, two gorillas, three lions, one tiger, three or four chimps, one wolf. Okay? … That’s it, far as we know from the press. Anything else is a bonus. Now, how’re we going to organize this? Do we play straight poker dice—winner chooses his kill? Or lie dice? Or what?’
The third man said emphatically, ‘Not lie dice. That ain’t the purpose, to kid each other. The purpose is just to be fair, so each has a decent chance.’
‘Right,’ the second man said. ‘There’s three lions, so we each have one of them: all we play dice for is the male ‘cos he’s the best trophy. Same with the elephants. Same with the bears.’
‘Except one’s a goddamn black bear,’ the third man said. ‘They’re a dime a dozen.’
‘Still makes a good trophy,’ the second man insisted. ‘The gorillas we dice for. What’s the male supposed to be called?—King Kong. Hey, how about that? Having the actual King Kong in your den!’
‘And the tiger?’ the first man asked. ‘There’s only one of him.’
‘Well,’ the second man said reasonably. ‘I vote that with the tiger it’s first come first served. We don’t dice—whoever has the chance to swat him, good luck. Otherwise it’s unfair; one of us gets the best trophy and the other two just got to watch him have the fun.’
‘Supposing we all see him at the same time?’
‘Fine. We all have a crack at him.’
‘And the skin?’
‘In that case we dice for the skin, like we did for this bitch.’ He jerked his head at Mama. ‘Same deal with the wolf.’
‘We should try to knock that wolf off first of all,’ the first man said. ‘He’ll make trouble.’
‘Sure. Get the bastard out of the way.’ He added, with a smirk, ‘Be kind of good to get that Indian and Jordan out the way too …’
They all smiled. ‘Wouldn’t that be something?’
The second man thought, then said, ‘Say, you know where I reckon we should go next year? Brazil.’
‘Why the hell Brazil?’
‘Because,’ the second man said, ‘I hear it’s about the last place left where you can bag yourself a real live Indian.’
forty-nine
At sunrise, Elizabeth was suddenly wide awake.
She lay in her sleeping bag, tensed, listening. There was complete silence. Then she realized that was what it was: the silence. Suddenly she knew, with awful certainty, that she was alone.
She scrambled out of her sleeping bag, wearing only her bra and panties, dashed to the door of the cabin and looked out. Her heart sank. She stared into the wilderness morning: they were gone.
There was not a sign of anybody. The porch, where Big Charlie and Davey slept, was empty. Their bedrolls and knapsacks were gone. There was not an animal in sight. She felt the panic rising. She spun around, and her eyes darted about the cabin. All that remained was their rifle and their stewing pot.
She stood there, her mind fumbling over what he had said yesterday. ‘Things are going to start happening.’ ‘Do you know your way out of here?’ And now, because she had refused, he had just left her to it. She looked feverishly around again, for a note, perhaps.
But there was nothing.
Panic. She pulled on her sweater, jeans, sneakers. Then she rolled up her sleeping bag and shakily strapped it to her knapsack. Then stopped.
To go where?…
Where was she going with her knapsack? Cherokee? To look for the animals? How was she going to find them if Davey could run rings round the experts, as he said? She stood, collecting her wits. The she dashed outside.
She crouched and examined the ground for spoor.
There was spoor everywhere. It all looked fresh. She hurried toward the pasture for twenty paces: more spoor. Elephants’. Gorillas’. Bears’. It could be today’s or yesterday’s
She felt helpless. What spoor to follow? She knew the only thing to do, but she had no confidence in herself doing it: ‘a three-sixty.’ Walk a big circle around the cabin, decide on the freshest spoor, and follow it. That was the scientific way she had learned on zoological expeditions, but she had not been good. She would follow the wrong spoor. How would she even see the spoor in that shadowed forest? She could get hopelessly lost. Lost … Then came the primitive fear of being alone in the dark wilderness. Pull yourself together. There is nothing to be afraid of You are not lost yet. You know how to get out of here. Now, think …
Why did she assume that Davey had just abandoned her? Or Charlie? He had said he was going to split up the animals—that was what he was doing, just taking the animals out, to resettle them. Would Davey be so cruel as to leave her alone in the wilderness after all she had done
for him? Or Big Charlie?…
She closed her eyes. The answer was yes.
A man who had the audacity to rob a zoo and a circus to return his beloved animals to the wild was just the sort of man to abandon you if it became necessary. All he cared about was those animals. And what had she done for him? Nothing but try to argue him out of it. She had not even had to use her medical skills yet. And he had warned her, loud and clear, last night, that he wanted her out. And if he was just taking the animals out, why had he taken his sleeping bag? He obviously didn’t intend returning tonight. He had left her the gun, for protection. He did not need the gun because he wasn’t going to feed the lions again—and Charlie had one of the sheriff’s guns.
The panic surged back—she felt the eerie fear of discovering herself completely alone. Of the ringing quiet of the wilderness, as if everything was watching her. The primeval menace of it. And Elizabeth wanted the rifle. She dashed back to the cabin. She picked up the gun, her eyes darting from the window to the door. She sidled into the corner; then looked at the gun in her shaking hands. Was it loaded? No—Davey would never leave a loaded gun around. How did it work? She was looking at a simple Winchester, with a silencer and telescopic sights. She identified the bolt action, and pulled it open recklessly, half expecting the thing to explode. It opened with a business-like click. The chamber was empty.
She looked for the cartridges, found a small box. She hastily slid one into the chamber and closed the bolt.
The thing was ready to fire …
And, definitely, she felt safer with the gun in her hands. And, suddenly, she also felt foolish.
What was the gun going to protect her against? From hillbilly murderers? From Sheriff Lonnogan and his posse?
She took a deep, quivering breath.
No, realistically, she was not afraid of them. It was the very wilderness she was afraid of. Like that first night in her rented car in the mountains outside Erwin. The primitive fear of the forest, the dark unknown, the menace of goblins and demons, dreadful fiends and evil spirits, lurking in low places. More than anything else she wanted to run for her life until she burst out of menacing low-lying darkness into the sunlit high places. O God, God, how thin the veneer of civilization … And, oh, she understood the human need for the cave, to gird ourselves against fearsome Nature—and for woman to cling unto man. By God she wanted Davey Jordan around now.
She made her muscles untense. She made herself sit down. She slowly laid the rifle across her lap. She felt for her cigarettes, lit one with trembling fingers, inhaled deep.
Now, think this through, Johnson … there are no such things as fiends and goblins. You’re safer here than in the streets of New York…
Then the doorway darkened as a dreadful fiend blocked out the light; her eyes widened in terror, a scream welled up, and she grabbed up the gun.
Smoky bear stared at her a petrified instant, then he whirled about and plunged out of the doorway.
He bounded off the porch and went galloping into the undergrowth, and Elizabeth yelled, ‘Smoky!…’
He blundered on into the trees; then stopped when he heard his name. Flanks heaving, he looked back fearfully over his shoulder.
‘Oh clever Smoky! How did you find us?’ Her heart was still hammering.
She could just see him in the shadows. But she had seen his limp.
‘Poor Smoky. What’s happened to you?’ It was like seeing an old friend—and she wasn’t alone anymore. ‘Come here, Smoky. Come …’
Smoky stood, listening to her reassuring voice, wanting to trust her, but not daring to. He remembered her from the first day in the glen: he could smell the other animals; he knew his keeper must be near, and he was too sore to run any farther.
Elizabeth withdrew from the window, and reached for her medical bag. Perhaps it was crazy, but she was going to do it: she was about to approach a wounded animal four times her size and try to treat him—alone. Without iron bars, straitjackets, assistants. In the zoo she would have half a dozen people helping her. Her heart was hammering again. But she knew, without hesitation, that she was going to do her duty: this was what she was here for.
She pulled out the tranquilizer pistol, and shakily slotted in a cartridge. She took a deep breath and stepped slowly through the doorway.
‘Hello, Smoky,’ she smiled.
Smoky had turned to face her, but he had moved farther into the forest. Elizabeth walked slowly, nervously, out onto the porch, the pistol held against her thigh, smiling reassuringly, repeating his name. Smoky backed off a little farther.
Elizabeth slowly sat down on the end of the porch, holding the tranqu-pistol between her legs, smiling at him. Smoky was trembling. ‘Come on, Smoky …’ For another minute he stood there, trying to make up his mind; then slowly, painfully, he sat down. Elizabeth estimated the distance between them behind her smile.
Fourteen, fifteen paces …
It was the maximum distance she felt she could use the pistol on such dense fur. But, oh, everything else was wrong: he was in deep shadow and she needed light. He was in thick undergrowth and she needed space. She needed water. But if she waited till she had everything, this bear would never get treated. If she so much as coughed now he would run. She slowly raised the pistol, her heart thumping.
Smoky jerked when he saw the movement, ready to run for his life. Elizabeth whimpered, Please God he falls the right way—and she squeezed the trigger.
There was a popping noise, and Smoky jerked at the stab of pain, terrified at this treachery. He blundered five frantic paces before he fell.
Elizabeth lashed the rope around his paws. ‘Oh, Smoky, why did you fall on the wrong side?’
She looped his forepaws together, then ran the rope to his hindlegs and bound them too. She jumped over the furry body, and heaved on the rope, gritting, Please God …
Smoky’s legs came up saggily; she took the strain with all her weight, and Smoky was nearly halfway over. She heaved again, her heels digging in and her hands starting to slip, and Smoky was almost about to thud back; then over he came, with a thump.
She dropped to her knees, and parted his fur.
‘Poor Smoky…’
His flank was matted with dried blood and pus, and she could feel the long hump of swollen flesh beneath. ‘Poor baby …’ She ran her fingers through his fur, measuring the size of the lump. Then she grabbed up her medical bag and hurried to the stream to scrub her hands in the ice cold water.
First, she snipped with the scissors, cutting off big chunks of matted fur, exposing the swollen stripe of inflamed flesh. She changed to the clippers, plowing away the fur on both sides of the wound. She sloshed soapy water onto the swollen flesh, and began to shave it with a razor. She swabbed away the soap and thickly painted the whole area with strong disinfectant. Then she pulled on a pair of surgical gloves and picked up a scalpel.
Where to start? Which way to cut? A long courageous incision which would let out more poison but require lots of stitches; or a short deep one where that bullet was lodged, and let the poison drain gradually? She studied her site, juggling alternatives: time available, stitches, antibiotics, aftercare, tomorrow, the next day, next week—what was going to happen to this bear? He wasn’t going to be waiting in a cage. And what else was she going to find after she’d opened him up?
She made up her mind, and leaned forward. She sank her knife carefully into his flesh. The blood welled up around the shining blade; then, with a firm hand, she began to cut.
Through the blood it came: the yellow, red-streaked pus, welling out of Smoky bear, yellow poison flooding out over his sleeping flank; and Elizabeth could almost feel the relief of the awful pressure. She was glad with all her heart that she was a vet.
She put down the knife and pressed the sides of the big incision, and more yellow-red poison oozed out. The flesh was wrinkling like a deflating balloon; then began to flow the surgeon’s enemy—blood.
She cursed and swabbed it away, and cut farther
, probing for the bullet. Elizabeth knelt beside Smoky, working on him, making him better, and she had forgotten about demons.
It was almost noon when she finished.
She slumped on the porch, reeking of disinfectant and blood, her jeans smeared. Her leg muscles ached from working on her haunches, but she felt elated. She had done it, by herself.
Smoky lay on his side fifteen paces away, breathing stertorously, his wound an ugly swathe of bleeding stitches. But to Elizabeth it was beautiful. She had done a beautiful job, if she said so herself: she had removed the bullet, the chips of ribs, arrested the infection. Smoky bear was going to live happily ever after.
Though he wasn’t going to feel too clever when he came around, For a while, the pain would be worse, and the wound exposed to scratches from the undergrowth. He wasn’t going to have the sense to keep still; he was going to go blundering around, trying to escape the pain—and that was going to be agony. And he would probably go charging off, so she would never get near enough to bang another dart into him to treat him further.
But she had packed that wound and shot him full of enough antibiotics to last him a good few days. After that, his big bear body had an excellent chance of fighting off infection. He was young. He was in bad shape, run down and undernourished but he was young.
And, oh, he was so beautiful. She looked at Smoky’s shaggy body, his killer paws lying harmless, his furry face outflung, red tongue slopping out, half-closed eyes glazed, his sculptured nose vibrating and his tufty ears so fluffily defenseless. He was her friend.
It was no good keeping his legs tied. How could she untie them when he woke? Would he run away? He probably would, looking for Davey. From here he would be able to track him like a bloodhound. She would never keep up. She had considered keeping him tied by one leg, but it would frighten him; he would struggle and run, the rope dragging behind, which could kill him if it caught.
‘Oh, Smoky, don’t leave me. Stay and let me fix you up properly. Then we’ll find him together.’
But she was too happy to let herself worry about that yet. She had to stay where she was until Smoky woke up. Maybe six hours. Maybe twelve. The longer the better. There was nothing more she could do today; she could not leave. She just had to sit here and look at her splendid work.
Fear No Evil Page 29