Hell Is Empty

6

They’d blown through the piled-up berm at the bridge. The dual tracks of the Thiokol Spryte were almost three feet wide leading up West Tensleep Road, but it was easier to just walk between the tread marks in my borrowed snowshoes.

That wasn’t why I was standing there, unmoving.

After they’d busted through, they had stopped. You could see where the snowcat had steered slightly to the right. I pulled my Maglite from my duty belt and shined it on the tracks, hoping I’d see an oil or fuel leak. There were a few drops, but nothing that was going to slow the behemoth. My eyes were drawn to something leading to the snowbank, what looked like a different kind of leak-possibly antifreeze.

I stood there looking at what was illuminated by my flashlight, which, like the light in the parking lot, provided a center stage spot for a curtain call or maybe a prologue.

Pissed in the snowbank was a single word.

ABANDON.

Raynaud Shade had pretty good handwriting, considering the instrument.

ABANDON.

He’d seen the Basquo reading the Inferno. He’d left the message for me and evidently hadn’t had the bladder capacity to finish the stanza: “… hope all ye who enter here”-the warning above the gates of hell in Dante’s opus.

Maybe he’d seen a similarity between our situation and that of the Italian poet. The wind pressed at my back and the flakes swirled around, but the impromptu calling card stayed there as if he’d written it in molten lead.

It was about a mile up to the Battle Park cutoff, where I assumed they’d turn west and try for the Hyattville Road that led toward the tiny town and eventually to Manderson, which was situated alongside the Big Horn River. Then what-north to Basin or south to Worland? Try as I might, I couldn’t see what they were gaining by going off-road. They, and by they I meant Shade, had to know that there would be an entire law enforcement army waiting for them when they got off the mountain in either direction.

There were no roads that connected the north side of the Bighorns with the south side, and the only substantial trail that led east was over Florence Pass near Bomber Mountain and Cloud Peak toward the Hunter Corrals. Florence Pass was more than eleven thousand feet, and if they tried that they were likely to solve society’s problems on their own, which was fine for the convicts but not for the two hostages.

A lot of people made the mistake of heading up West Tensleep in the hopes that it led somewhere besides Cloud Peak, a 13,167-foot glaciated monolith, seventh largest in Wyoming, with a vertical mass of one minor and three major cirques that supported its own weather pattern. The Crow, Cheyenne, and Lakota venerated Cloud Peak as a place to bestow gifts of redemption and to retrieve Eewakee, or the mud-that-heals. In 1887, U.S. Engineer W. S. Stanton, the white mountaineer who claimed to have conquered the mountain’s west slope first, discovered medicine bundles and a bivouac that the Indians had left behind.

So much for being first.

ABANDON.

The message pissed in the snow kept invading my thoughts as I trudged on, my snowshoes keeping me on the surface of the snow, the history of Wyoming alpinism unable to wipe the urinated message from my mind.

The trees on either side of the road had sheltered the way so far and I appreciated the protection, but the weight of the snow was already taking its toll, and I could hear heavy branches cracking and falling like severed limbs.

There was a consistent wind, and I ducked my hat against the gusts as the snow continued to dart down at a thirty-degree angle-at least it wasn’t adhering itself to me like it had in the open spaces back at Deer Haven-but I could tell that the temperature was dropping.

I figured there wasn’t much need to be concerned about being ambushed, just the steady slog of working my way higher into the range and staying between the wide tracks of the surplus snowcat. If I fell into one of the troughs, I knew I was off course.

The collar of my sheepskin coat had attached itself to the left side of my face, and the narrow V – shaped aperture that I looked through allowed me only a limited view of the road ahead, so I was more than a little surprised when suddenly there was the glare of a lot of lights and the thrum of internal combustion from a fast-moving, highly lifted 4?4.

I bounced off the Jeep’s grill and threw myself to the right-the vehicle had slowed and missed rolling over my legs by about a foot as it slid to a stop. I lay there for a moment and then started getting up. The snowshoes were cumbersome, and it took me a while to stand and make my way to the lee side of the Jeep, which was shaking from some kind of thunderous music being played on its stereo. I paused for a second and remembered another time on the mountain when I’d been assaulted by a different kind of music-drums, specifically.

I waited patiently as the driver rolled down the window about four inches and looked out at me. His voice was agitated. “What the hell are you doing walking in the middle of the damn road?!”

I breathed a laugh and had a coughing fit from the cold of the high-altitude air. “What the hell are you doing speeding down a mountain in this weather?”

He was middle-aged, a little chubby, and in his early fifties, with black hair and a black goatee, a Hollywood smile, and a black down jacket with a black Greek fisherman’s hat. On closer inspection, even the Jeep was black, black being the new black. I glanced at the Wrangler-it probably had about thirty thousand dollars’ worth of modifications, and from the decibel level, they were mostly in the stereo.

“You mind turning your music down?” I hung an arm over his side mirror and took a few breaths as he did as I requested. He seemed a little worried, and I guess I would’ve been too if I’d found somebody traipsing up West Tensleep Road in the middle of a high-altitude blizzard. “I’m Sheriff…” I cleared my throat.

He rolled the window down a little farther. “What?”

“Sheriff… I’m Sheriff Walt Longmire.”

“Oh.” He seemed uncertain as to what to do with that information. “Are you okay?”

“Yep. You haven’t seen a Thiokol Spryte go by here, have you?”

He looked at me, blank like a freshly wiped chalkboard. “A what?”

I pointed toward the tracks in which he was driving. “Big snowcat; square like a very large lunchbox.”

He shook his head. “Nope, we pulled onto the main road from our cabin and started driving out. Haven’t seen anything except you.”

I shifted the knapsack farther up on my shoulder, crouched against the Jeep for cover, and could see a blonde-haired woman in the passenger seat. “How far up is your cabin?”

He paused and glanced at the woman before resting his eyes on me again. “Look, Sheriff-if you are a sheriff-I don’t want any trouble. ..”

I fumbled with the opening of my coat and tried to unbutton the top button so that I could show him my badge, but my gloves made it slow going. I finally got my jacket open enough so that he could see it. “There.”

He stretched out the next words. “All right.”

“I need your help.”

He really looked worried now. “To do what?”

“Give me a ride back up this road.”

He looked around, as if to emphasize the point. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No, I’m not.”

He sighed and placed the palms of his gloves on the steering wheel. “Sheriff, we’ve been listening to the radio and they say that they’re… that you guys are going to close the roads.”

“They’re already closed, in both directions on 16. Once you get out of here you’re only going to get as far as Tensleep Canyon to the west and Meadowlark Lodge to the east. If you’ve got food, supplies, and heat, I’d advise you to go back to your cabin till the WYDOT guys can break through.”

He glanced at the woman again, and she folded her arms and looked out the other window. He tipped his hat back and looked at me. “Actually, the electricity went out about an hour ago.”

I thought about all the cabins I knew of on the mountain. “Don’t you have a secondary heating source?”

“A what?”

“A fireplace or a stove?”

He nodded. “Yeah, there’s a fireplace.”

“Firewood?”

“Yeah.” He sat there without looking at me and then spoke. “We think we’d rather take our chances.”

I stared at the side of his face. “You’re not listening. The roads are closed, and I’ve got three sheriff’s departments, search and rescue, a couple of detachments of HPs, and the majority of WYDOT shoveling their way up here. If you go on, you’re going to end up sitting on the roadway waiting for them to clear it, and if they don’t do that before you run out of gas, you’re going to get very cold. My advice is that you go back to your cabin and let me borrow your Jeep.”

He set his jaw and stared at the instrument panel with a disinterested nonchalance. “We’d rather go ahead.”

I thought about how I could just commandeer the Wrangler, but how far would that get me and how much time would it take?

I took my arm off his mirror. “When you get down to Deer Lodge, don’t go in-there’s a guy cuffed to a water pipe in the main building. My advice is to head east. You’ll get as far as Meadowlark; one of my deputies is in charge, and they had power the last time I was there-that’s probably your best bet.”

His mood suddenly brightened. “Great. Thanks!”

I felt like smacking him but instead rebuttoned my coat and started past; it would appear that no matter the price, the boatman was not going to ferry me across.

Not losing any time, he gunned the motor, and the shiny, black vehicle leapt forward, the rear fender extension clipping my hip and bumping me. I watched after the retreating vehicle as he squirreled it in an attempt to get away. The music surged back up, and I’d swear they were laughing.

“Happy motoring.”

I made the mile to the Battle Park cutoff in pretty good time-but the Thiokol hadn’t cut off.

I shined the Maglite up the pathway, but the calf-deep snow on the road was pristine. I reached up and banged the tin sign, loosening the snow that revealed the large black numbers on the yellow background-24. I wanted to make sure, knowing how easy it was to mistake distances and directions in these conditions.

The tread tracks continued on the main road toward West Tensleep Lake-maybe they’d missed the turn and had taken the one from the north. I tucked my head down into my jacket and continued on another couple of hundred yards, but the arching entrance onto 24 from that direction was also vanillacake smooth. The tracks continued on 24 toward the inescapable, highest point in the Bighorn range.

Once again I stood there, dumbstruck. Where the hell were they going?

There was only one way to find out. I kicked off and after another mile could see where the Jeep had pulled out near the Island Park campground. I looked down the short road that must’ve led to the Jeep driver’s cabin and thought about the firewood and the fireplace.

My legs were unused to the added exertion of walking in snowshoes and were tired. I could get a fire started and warm my feet and hands-the parts of me that were approaching numb. My Sorels and snowshoes stamped in the tread tracks, anxious for me to make up my mind. “Well, hell.”

I trudged on, but I didn’t get far. The snowcat had stopped again, and this time it was only another quarter of a mile up the road. They had pulled to the side, and then it looked as if they had sat there for a while before moving on.

I scanned the area with the Maglite and looked for another message. I could see where at least two individuals had gotten out of the thing, and that one of them was big, with shoes as large as mine. He had walked on the side of the one access road that led off to the left and then disappeared into the trees. The other had followed. The Thiokol, on the other hand, with five remaining occupants, had continued north.

It was possible that they’d dropped off the two women and that one of them was wearing the boots of the Ameri-Trans guard. It was also possible, as Vic would say, that flying monkeys were soon to appear out of my ass.

I clicked off the flashlight and changed direction, remembering that Omar had said something about having a cabin on West Tensleep, past 24, and up near Bear Lake.

I followed the footprints to a rise leading to a hanging shelf from which I could see a large, old house. Through the blowing snow I could make out the shape, but there were no lights on. According to the couple in the Jeep, the power was out, and it certainly looked as if that was the case here as well.

The road continued along the tree line until it ended at the side of what only Omar would call a cabin. As I got closer I could see that it was a log-and-stone affair and something any of the rest of us mere mortals would’ve called a house, a very large and extravagant house, which overlooked the frozen, snow-covered, and partially visible expanse of Bear Lake.

The Forest Service was pretty strict about remodeling any of the historic cabins in the Bighorns, especially the ones not only in the national forest but adjacent to the wilderness area. You were not allowed to change or expand the original footprint of the structure, but Omar seemed to have overcome that hurdle by simply going up.

The front of the cabin was oriented toward the lake with an overhang supported by huge, burlwood logs. The extended deck stuck out from a massive set of archways below, with an overhanging shingled roof above. Even in the limited visibility, I could make out the four sliding glass doors that led to the deck, but other than a diffused light deep within the recesses, possibly from a fireplace, I couldn’t see anything inside.

I continued to follow the boot prints and stuck close to the tree line with the flashlight still off; if they were looking, there wasn’t any sense in advertising like a used-car lot.

The wind was carrying the smoke from a fire in the other direction, but I could still smell it. I was reassured by any aspect of normalcy and came up on the garage-door side of the building. The doors were closed, but there was a walkway to the right that must’ve led inside; the prints, however, led to the left and around the building next to a rock retainer wall where the drifting snow had piled up.

All I really wanted to do was get inside, so I decided to try the nearest door. It was unlocked, so I pushed it open and stepped through into a lengthy mudroom with a washer and dryer.

I quietly closed the door and then stood there for a moment, just orienting myself from being outside. I still leaned to the left as I’d done all the way up the road and drifted forward, countering the effects of the wind and the movement of the snow. I slowed my breathing, stood up straight, and looked down the oblong room at another door, one step up.

There was still no noise, but as I’d expected, the flicker of some fire fractured a warm light on the glass panel. I slid the flashlight into the retainer loop on my belt, took off my gloves, stuffed them in my coat pockets, and unbuckled the snowshoes. I unsnapped the safety strap from my holster and drew the large-frame Colt.

I took another deep breath, carefully stepped across the mudroom, and peered through the corner of the glass pane. There was, indeed, a fire in the fireplace and, to my relief, Omar Rhoades was standing at the center island of the kitchen, his back to me, a dish towel over one shoulder. It looked like he was eating a very large sandwich.

I turned the knob and held it as I stepped up onto the hardwood floor, which was partially covered with what looked to be a vintage Navajo rug; the hardened snow sloughed off the sides of my Sorels onto its red and black wool. I glanced around the timbered structure, which was illuminated by a few candles that flickered from the draft.

In one swift movement, the big-game hunter swung around and leveled the business end of a Model 29. 44 Magnum at the bridge of my nose. It took quite a bit to not counterraise my Colt, but I was assisted in not moving to action by the twisted wire-loop handle of a cleaning rod that stuck comically from the barrel of the big revolver.

I just froze there, first making the strongest eye contact with him that I’d ever made, and then looked around the rest of the room.

By the time my eyes got back to him, he’d lowered the Smith amp; Wesson, and the cleaning rod fell from the barrel to the floor between us. He was leaning against the butcher-block counter with one elbow, exposing the blood-soaked surface of his shirt beneath the towel wrapped around his armpit. He tossed the blued and engraved revolver onto the island amid the other cleaning supplies-the heavy weapon made a frightening clatter. Omar’s voice was thick with drink, fatigue, and possible blood loss. “Took you long enough.”

From all appearances, there was no one else in the room. “Are we clear?”

He breathed a whistling laugh and stretched his eyes to keep them open. “Clear as the noonday sun.” He picked up his Dagwood sandwich.

“You cleaning that Smith?”

He glanced at the detritus on the counter, which included a tumbler and an ancient, half-empty bottle of Laphroaig. He bit into the sandwich and mumbled, “Yeah.”

I knew from experience that he cleaned his guns only when he was upset. “Settling your nerves?”

It took forever, but he smiled at my knowledge of him. “Yeah.”

“You’re hurt.”

“A little; bullet went into the refrigerator. Took out the icemaker.” He gestured toward the massive, stainless steel appliance behind him. “Better it than me.” His voice trailed off with the crackling of the fire.

“You got visitors?”

He breathed the same laugh, smaller this time, and then looked up at me as if surprised that I was there. “Wasn’t the Girl Scouts.”

“Where are they?”

“Um…” He paused, as if trying to remember. “One… one’s in the bathroom, the other one’s over by the door.”

I took a few steps toward him, but he turned a hard shoulder toward me and held a hand out. “I’m good, I’m good… but you better go check him.”

I nodded and directed my. 45 toward the entryway across a sitting room in the back. I stepped over the head of a massive Kodiak bear rug and could see something lodged against the front door. The stained glass of the door panel was shattered, and the blowout from an exit wound had sprayed in a spot a foot wide with foreign material embedded in the wood. The liquid pattern narrowed in a sliding path to a solidifying pool of dark blood and the slumped and inert body of Marcel Popp.

There was one of the Sig. 40s in his lap, and I used my boot to flip it from between his outstretched legs. His head had lolled forward, and the back of it was pretty much gone.

As a formality, I lowered a hand and placed two fingers along his neck but could feel the unnatural coolness of the postmortem flesh and no pulse. I stooped a little more and looked at the side of the big convict’s face. There was a jagged hole at the left cheekbone from which thickening blood slowly dripped, his still eyes following the path to where his life had drained.

I fought the urge that my legs telegraphed to collapse under me and take a rest. I stood and looked out the shattered door. The shot had fittingly exited through the middle of a rose-red triangle, and the insidious cold pulsed through the hole as if the wilderness was attempting to give back the bullet and the death that it carried.

I wavered there for a moment, then turned and looked at Omar, who was intently studying the crystal in his hands. He reached behind him for the bottle, poured a full four fingers, took a slow sip, and returned it and the bottle to the counter. “Happened fast. They knocked on the door, and I don’t answer the door at three in the morning up here without accompaniment.”

I crossed back toward the kitchen but stood a little away from him. The bullet he’d taken must’ve clipped him below the main tendons in his shoulder and above the clavicle, but it still must’ve hurt like hell.

“Said their car was stuck. I let ’em in, but when I turned from the door he raised up that automatic and got a shot off. I guess maybe he saw the Mag in my hand, and it spooked him.” He breathed heavily, and I could hear a faint whistling sound. “Got me in the shoulder, but I don’t think it hit anything important-still works.” To emphasize the point, he raised the arm a little. “Rolled to the side when he fired again, and I put one in his head.”

I found myself nodding. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

He breathed some more. “Yeah.” He picked up the tumbler with a sickly smile. “Sterilizing from the inside.” He took a large swallow. “Funny, I’m hungry as hell.” He took another bite of the sandwich and chewed. “You want half of this?”

“Maybe later.”

“I’m horny, too.”

I took a while to respond to that one. “I don’t think I want to help you out with that, either.” He laughed, and the timbre of it was a little higher than I remembered and a little unnerving as well. I gestured toward his sandwich. “It’s a normal, life-reaffirming process. Kicks in when you really think you’re going to die and don’t-the urge to reproduce, eat… It’s when you almost lose your life that you really start appreciating it.” Omar was staring at the counter again, so I switched to another topic, a more urgent one. “The woman’s in the bathroom?”

He glanced up. “Huh?”

“He had a woman with him. She’s in the bathroom?”

“Yeah.”

“Where’s that?”

He used his good arm to gesture after picking up the scotch. “Down the hall.”

I began to turn but stopped when he started to go for the scotch bottle again. “Omar?”

“Yeah?”

“Stop drinking.”

He didn’t move. “Right.”

We stood there like that, neither of us so much as twitching. “I mean it; I may need you.”

He set the glass down, and I made my way into the hall. There were three doors-the nearest was closed, so I knocked on it. There was no answer, so I knocked again. Someone whimpered, and it didn’t sound the way an FBI agent would whimper. “Beatrice?”

There was more keening, and I leaned in closer to the door. “Beatrice, it’s Walt Longmire, the sheriff from the lodge. Is it okay if I open the door and see if you’re all right?”

There were no more sounds, and I did what I had to do, turning the knob and carefully opening the door. It was dark in there, but I could see a body wrapped around itself and wedged between the bathtub and the toilet.

“Beatrice?” She started when I spoke again. I slipped in sideways and holstered my Colt. “Are you okay?” It was a stupid question, but I had to open with something. “Do you remember me?” Another stupid question. I started thinking I should try some statements. “Beatrice, you’re not hurt.”

She mewled into the crossed arms that covered her face above her drawn knees.

“You’re going to be okay.” Nothing. “Are you hurt?”

I kneeled down and leaned against the side of the tub, the burning in my legs attempting to overtake me. She didn’t appear to be physically damaged but continued to huddle against the wall. I carefully reached a hand out to her. “I’m here to help, Beatrice. I need to know if you’re okay.”

The moment my fingers grazed the sleeve of her jacket, she yanked back and screamed and didn’t stop. Her eyes were wide, and she stared at me with the fierceness that only cornered animals have, animals like the one I’d encountered on the roof of the cabin at Deer Haven Lodge.

I didn’t move at first but finally allowed the leg under me to collapse, and I slid against the far wall, my hat falling into my lap. I sat there looking into the ferocity of her eyes and took all they could give.