Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 106, No. 4 & 5. Whole No. 648 & 649, October 1995

Out of the Woods by Henry Slesar

Trumbull was bewildered by the city, by the sea of people who never seemed to notice him. Except on the day he shot and killed the off-duty police officer, pumping his own gas in the station Trumbull had decided to rob.

It had been only three weeks since he had left the Oregon woods. A city girl with a mocking smile had hired him as guide, and in the deep of the forest had suddenly kissed him and told him he was cute. Trumbull was struck dumb with love, and decided to give up the only life he knew.

She didn’t even recognize his name when he called. He took his misery to a shabby hotel and watched his money disappear. Broke and desperate, he bought a cheap handgun. When the cop ran at him, he discovered that it was loaded.

Every newspaper featured a police sketch of his face, chillingly accurate. He stiffed the hotel and took a bus back home.

Nobody in the small town of Culver seemed to know Trumbull had been gone. He was relieved to see that Culver’s only hotel was crowded. The weather was good, and there was a convention in town, and as soon as he walked into the lobby, Sonny, the manager, asked if he wanted a job.

“His name’s Potter,” Sonny said. “He’s just checking in now.” He nodded towards the front desk, at a tall, sad-eyed man in his late twenties.

Trumbull was hesitant about showing his face, but he had no choice. He introduced himself and said he would meet Potter in the lobby at seven the next morning.

He was just walking off when he heard the words of the desk clerk, words that seemed to open the floor beneath him.

“May I see your badge, Mr. Potter?”

He turned and watched Potter slip his wallet from a back pocket, flipping it open.

Trumbull had drawn a cop.

He slept only half the night, trying to decide what to do. If he didn’t show up, wouldn’t that make Potter suspicious? And maybe he had never even seen his Wanted poster.

Potter didn’t talk much as they entered the woods. It made Trumbull uneasy. He began to jabber himself, spilling all the woodsy lore he knew. When they reached the crest called Indian Point, they unpacked their lunch, and Trumbull gaped.

There was a newspaper in Potter’s backpack, and Trumbull’s face looked out at him.

It might not have been a conscious plan that made Trumbull do what he did next. He took Potter down the most poorly marked trail he knew. When it finally vanished into the undergrowth, Potter began to look concerned. They turned in another direction, but it only led deeper into a dank darkness. Potter began to look worried, but Trumbull smiled.

“It’s all right,” he said. “Just stay here and I’ll come right back for you.”

“Where are you going?”

“Going to find a ridge, get our bearings. Be back before you know it.”

He knew the forest from childhood, but it was six hours before he found his way out of the woods, in more ways than one. Because he knew policeman Potter would never see the treeless sunlight again...

He didn’t report the disaster immediately. First he rehearsed his story about Potter “wandering off,” about his desperate but futile seach...

It was almost morning when he staggered into the hotel lobby. When he saw Potter sitting on the lumpy sofa, talking to the town’s only two policemen, Trumbull’s knees quivered. One was holding the newspaper, and all three were looking m his direction. When the handcuffs were closing around his wrist, Trumbull could only gasp out one word. “How?”

How did Trumbull get caught? Turn to page 158 for “The Final Paragraph.”

Continued from page 53

“Of course Mr. Potter was able to find his way out of the woods,” the policeman told Trumbull. “He’s here for a Scoutmaster convention. Everyone invited had to show an Eagle Scout Badge.”