Landslide

I

The weather turned nasty. Clouds lowered overhead and it rained a lot, and then the clouds came right down to ground level and I walked in a mist. It was good and bad. The poor visibility meant that I couldn’t be spotted as easily and the low clouds put that damned helicopter out of action. Twice it had spotted me and put the hounds on my trail, but now it was useless. On the other hand, I was wet all the time and daren’t stop to light a fire and dry out. Living constantly in wet clothes, my skin started to whiten and wrinkle and it chafed where rubbed by folds of my shirt and pants. I also developed a bad cold, and a sneeze at the wrong time could be dangerous.

Howard’s staffwork had improved. He had me pinned down in a very small area, not more than three square miles, and had cordoned it off tightly. Now he was tightening the noose inexorably. God knows how many men he was using, but there were too many for me to handle. Three times I tried to bust out, using the mist as cover, and three times I failed. The boys weren’t afraid to use their shotguns, either, and it was only by chance that I wasn’t filled full of holes on my last attempt. As it was, I had heard the whistle of buckshot around me, and one slug grazed me in the thigh. I ducked out of there fast and retreated to a hidey-hole where I slapped a Band-Aid on the wound. The muscle in my leg was a bit stiff but it didn’t slow me down much.

I was wet and cold and miserable, to say nothing of being hungry and tired, and I wondered if I’d come to the end of my tether. It wouldn’t have taken much for me to have lain down and slept right on the spot and let them come and find me. But I knew what would happen if I did. I had no particular ambition to go through life crippled even if Howard let it go at that, so I dragged myself wearily to my feet and set off on the move again, prowling through the mist to find a way out of this contracting circle.

I nearly stumbled over the bear. It growled and reared up, towering a good eight feet, waving its forelegs with those cruel claws and showing its teeth. I retreated to a fair distance and considered it thoughtfully.

There’s more nonsense talked about the grizzly than any other animal, barring the wolf. Grown men will look you straight in the eye and tell you of the hair-raising experiences they’ve had with grizzlies; how a grizzly will charge a man on sight, how they can outrun a horse, tear down a tree and create hell generally with no provocation. The truth is that a grizzly is like any other animal and has more sense than to tangle with a man without good reason. True, they’re apt to be bad-tempered in the spring when they’ve just come out of hibernation, but a lot of people are like that when they’ve just got out of bed.

And they’re hungry in the spring, too. The fat has gone from them and their hide hangs loose and they want to be left alone to eat in peace, just like most of us, I guess. And the females have their young in the spring and are touchy about interference, and quite justifiably so in my opinion. Most of the tall tales about grizzlies have been spun around camp fires to impress a tenderfoot or tourist and even more have been poured out of a bottle of rye whiskey.

Now it was high summer — as high as summer gets in British Columbia — and this grizzly was fat and contented. He dropped back on to four legs and continued to do what he had been doing before I interrupted him — grubbing up a juicy root. He kept a wary eye on me, though, and growled once or twice to show he wasn’t too scared of me.

I stepped back behind a tree so as not to cause him too much alarm while I figured out what to do about him. I could just go away, of course, but I had a better idea than that because the thought had occurred to me that an 800-pound bear could be a powerful ally if I could recruit him. There are not many men who will face a charging grizzly.

The nearest of Matterson’s men were not more than a half-mile from this spot, as I knew to my cost, and were closing in slowly. The natural tendency of the bear would be to move away as they approached. I already knew they made a lot of noise when moving and the bear would soon hear them. The only reason he hadn’t heard me was that I’d developed a trick of ghosting along quietly — it’s one of the things you learn in a situation like I was in; you learn it or you’re dead.

What I had to do was to make the bear ignore his natural inclination. Instead of moving away, he had to move towards the oncoming men, and how in hell could I make him do that? You don’t shoo away a grizzly like you do a cow, and I had to come up with an answer fast.

After a moment’s thought I took some shotgun shells from my pocket and began to dissect them with my hunting knife, throwing away the slugs but keeping the powder charges. In a little while I had a heap of powder grains wrapped up in a glove to keep them dry. I bent down to dig into the carpet of pine needles with the knife; pine needles have a felting effect when they get matted and shed water like the feathers on a duck, and I didn’t have to dig very far to find dry, flammable material.

All the time I kept my eye on brother bear, who was chomping contentedly on his roots while keeping an eye on me. He wasn’t going to bother me if I didn’t bother him — at least that was the theory I had, although I coppered my bet by choosing an easily climbable tree within sprinting distance. From one of the side pockets of the pack I extracted the folded Government geological map of the area and a notebook I kept in there. I tore up the map into small sheets and ripped pages from the book, crumpling them into spills.

I built a fire on that spot, laying down the paper spills, lacing them liberally with gunpowder and covering the lot with dry pine needles. From the fire I led a short trail of gunpowder for easy ignition, and right in the centre I embedded three shotgun shells.

After listening for a moment and hearing nothing, I circled around the bear about one-sixth of a circle, and built another fire in the same way — and yet another on the other side. He reared and growled when he saw me moving about but subsided when he saw I wasn’t coming any closer. Any animal has its ‘safe’ distance carefully measured out and takes action only if it feels its immediate territory infringed on. The action will then depend on the animal: a deer will run for it — a grizzly will attack.

The fires laid, I waited for Matterson’s boys to make the next move, and the bear would give me warning when that was coming since he was between us. I just stood cradling the shotgun in my arms and waited patiently, never taking my eyes off the grizzly.

I didn’t hear a thing — but he did. He stirred and turned his head, waving it from side to side like a cobra about to strike. He made snuffling noises, sniffing the wind, and suddenly he growled softly and turned away from me, looking in the other direction. I thanked the years of experience that had taught me how to keep matches dry by filling a full matchbox with melted candle wax so that the matches were embedded in a block of paraffin wax. I ripped three matches free from the block and got them ready to strike.

The bear was backing slowly towards me and away from whatever was coming towards him. He looked back at me uneasily, feeling he was trapped, and whenever a grizzly feels like that the best place to be is somewhere else. I stooped and struck the match and dropped it on the powder trail, which fizzed and flashed into fire. Then I ran like hell to the other fire, shooting into the air as I went.

The bear had lumbered into action as I broke cover and was covering the ground fast heading straight towards me, but the bang of the shotgun gave him pause and he skidded to a halt uncertainly. From behind the bear I heard an excited shout. Someone else had also heard the shot.

The bear turned his head uncertainly and started to move again, but just then one of the shotgun shells in the first fire exploded, just as I ignited the second fire. He didn’t like that at all and turned away growling all the time, as I sprinted to the third fire and dropped a match on it.

Bruin didn’t know what the hell to do! There was trouble — man trouble — coming up on one side and loud unnerving noises on the other. There were a couple more shouts from the other side of the bear and that almost decided him, but just then all hell broke loose. Two more shells exploded one after the other and half a second later it sounded as though a war had broken out.

The grizzly’s nerve broke and he turned and bolted in the opposite direction. I added to the fun by stinging his rump with a charge of buckshot and then began to run, following close in his rear. He charged among the trees like a demon out of hell — nearly half a ton of frightful, ravening ferocity. Actually, he was not so much frightful as frightened, but it’s then that the grizzly is at his most dangerous.

I saw three men looking up the slope, aghast at what was coming down on them. I suppose to them it was all teeth and claws and twice as large as life — and another tale would be told in a bar-room if they lived to tell it. They broke and scattered, but one was a little late and the bear gave him a flick in passing. The man screamed as he was slammed into the ground but luckily for him the bear didn’t stop his rush to maul him.

I went past at a dead run, my boots skidding on the slippery ground. The bear was moving much faster than I could and was out-distancing me fast. From ahead there was another shout and a couple of shots and I spun round a tree to find a guy waving a shotgun at the departing bear. He turned and saw me coming down at him fast and took a sudden snapshot at me. The hammer of his shotgun fell on an empty chamber and by then I was on to him. I took him in the chest with my shoulder and the impact knocked the feet from under him and he went sprawling, aided by a clout behind the ear I gave him as I went on my way. I had learned something from that bear.

I didn’t stop running for fifteen minutes, not until I was sure no one was chasing me. I reckoned they were too busy looking after their casualty — when a bear clouts you in passing there are steel-like claws in his fist. I saw my friend bounding down the hillside and became conscious that the mist was lifting. He slowed up and slowly ambled to a stop, looking behind him. I waved and took another direction because that was one bear I wouldn’t like to meet for the next couple of days.

Almost as I had stumbled on the bear I came across the man staring into the haze and wondering what all the noise was about. I had no time for evasive action so I tackled him head on, first ramming the muzzle of the gun into his belly. By the time he had recovered from that I had my hunting knife at his throat.

He eased his head back to an unnatural angle trying to get away from the sharp point and a drool of spittle ran down from one corner of his mouth. I said, ‘Don’t make a noise — you’ll only get hurt.’

He nodded, then stopped as the knife pricked his Adam’s apple. I said gently, ‘Why are you hunting me?’

He gurgled, but didn’t say a thing. I said again, ‘Why are you hunting me? I want an answer. A truthful answer.’

It was forced out of him. ‘You beat up old Bull Matterson. That was a lousy thing to do.’

‘Who said I beat up the old man?’

‘Howard was there — he says so. So does Jimmy Waystrand.’

‘What does Waystrand know about it? He wasn’t there.’

‘He reckons he was and Howard doesn’t say he wasn’t.’

‘They’re both liars,’ I said. ‘The old man had a heart-attack. What does he say about it?’

‘He don’t say nothing. He’s sick — real sick.’ Hatred looked at me out of the man’s eyes.’

‘In hospital? Or at home?’

‘He’s at home, so I heard.’ He managed a grin. ‘Mister, you’ve got it coming to you.’

‘Old Matterson had a heart-attack,’ I said patiently. ‘I didn’t lay a finger on him. Would a little matter of a thousand dollars have anything to do with me being chased all over these woods?’

He looked at me with contempt. ‘That don’t matter,’ he said. ‘We just don’t like strangers beating up old men.’

That was probably true. I doubt if these loggers would set out on a manhunt like this on a purely blood-money basis. They weren’t bad guys, just fools who’d been whipped up into a frenzy by Howard’s lies. The thousand dollars was merely icing on the cake. I said, ‘What’s your name?’

‘Charlie Blunt.’

‘Well, Charlie, I wish we could talk this out over a beer, but I regret it’s impossible. Look, if I was such a bad guy as Howard makes out I could have knocked out your people like ducks at a shooting-gallery. People have been shooting at me but I haven’t shot back. Does that make sense to you?’

A frown wrinkled his face and I could see he was thinking about it. I said, ‘Take Novak and those other guys — I could have slit their throats quite easily. Come to that, there’s nothing to prevent me from slitting yours right now.’

He tensed and I pricked him with the knife. ‘Take it easy, Charlie; I’m not going to. I wouldn’t hurt a hair of your head. Do you think that makes sense, either?’

He gulped and shook his head hurriedly. ‘Well, think about it,’ I said. ‘Think about it and talk about it to those other guys back there. Tell them I said old Bull had a heart-attack and that Howard Matterson and Jimmy Waystrand have been feeding them a line. Talking about Jimmy, I don’t think much of a guy who’d beat up his own father — do you?’

Blunt’s head made a sideways movement. ‘Well, he did,’ I said. ‘All you have to do to prove I’m telling the truth is to ask Matthew Waystrand. His place isn’t too far from here — not so far that a man couldn’t walk over and get at the truth for once. Talk about that to the other guys, too. Let you and them decide who’s telling the truth in this neck of the woods.’

I eased up on the knife. ‘I’m going to let you go, Charlie. ‘I’m not even going to sap you or tie you up so you won’t set the other guys on my trail again. I’m just going to let you go as you are, and if you want to raise a holler that’s your privilege. But you can tell the other guys this — tell them I’ve had a bellyful of running and not hitting back too hard. Tell them I’m getting into a killing mood. Tell them that the next man I see on my trail is a dead man. I think you’re very lucky, Charlie, that I picked you to take the message — don’t you?’

He lay quiet and didn’t say or do anything. I stood up and looked down at him. I said, ‘The killing starts with you, Charlie, if you try anything.’ I picked up the shotgun and walked away from him without glancing back. I could feel his eyes on my back and it gave me a prickly feeling, not knowing what he was doing. He could be aiming at my back with his gun right at that moment and it took all the will-power I had not to break into a run.

But I had to take a chance on the reasonableness of men some time. I had come to the conclusion that sheer raw violence wouldn’t get me out of this jam — that it only produced counter-violence in its turn. I hoped I had put a maggot of doubt in one man’s mind, the ‘reasonable doubt’ that every jury is asked to consider.

I walked on up the hill until I knew I was out of range and the tension eased suddenly. At last I turned and looked back. Way down the hill Blunt was standing, a minuscule figure looking up at me. There was no gun in his hands and he had made no move for or against me. I waved at him and, after a long pause, he waved back. I went on — up and over the hill.

II

The weather cleared up again, and I had broken out of Howard’s magic circle. I had no doubt that they would come after me again. To think that a man like Blunt could have any lasting restraint was to fool myself, but at least I had a temporary respite. When, after a whole day, I saw no one and heard no one, I took a chance and killed a deer, hoping there was no one there to hear the shot.

I gralloched it and, being hungry for meat, made a small fire to cook the liver, that being the quickest to cook and most easily digested. Then I quartered the beast and roasted strips of flesh before the fire and stuffed the half-raw pieces into my pack. I didn’t stay long in that place but hid the rest of the carcase and moved on, afraid of being cornered. But no one came after me.

I bedded down that night by a stream, something I had never done since this whole chase had started. It was the natural thing to do and I had not done the natural thing ever, out of fear. But I was tired of being unnatural and I didn’t care a damn about what happened. I suppose the strain was telling and that I had just about given up. All I wanted was a good night’s sleep and I was determined to get it, even though I might be wakened by looking into a gun barrel in the middle of the night.

I cut spruce boughs for my bed, something I hadn’t done because the traces could put men on my trail, and even built a fire, not caring whether I was seen or not. I didn’t go to the extreme length of stripping before I turned in, but I did spread the blankets, and as I lay there before the fire, full of meat and with the coffee-pot to hand, everything looked cheerful just as most of my camps looked cheerful in better times.

I had made camp early, being wearied to the bone of moving continually, and by dusk I was on the point of falling asleep. Through my drowsiness I heard the throb of an engine and the whir of blades cutting through the air overhead and I jerked myself into wakefulness. It was the goddam helicopter still chasing me — and they must have seen the light of the fire. That blaze would stand out like a beacon in the blackness of the woods.

I think I groaned in despair but I moved my bones stubbornly and got to my feet as the sound died away suddenly in the north. I stretched, and looked round the camp. It was a pity to leave it and go on the run again but it looked as though I had to. Then I thought again. Why had I to run? Why shouldn’t I stop right here and fight it out?

Still, there was no reason to be taken like a sitting bird, so I figured out a rough plan. It didn’t take long to find a log nearly as tall as myself to put under the blankets, and by the time I had finished it looked very like a sleeping man. To add to the illusion I rigged a line to the log so I could move it from a distance to give the appearance of a man stirring in his sleep. I found a convenient place where I could lie down behind a stump and tested it. It would have fooled me if I didn’t know the trick.

If anything was to happen that night I would need plenty of light, so I built up the fire again into a good blaze — and I was almost caught by surprise. It was only by a snapping twig in the distance that I realized I had much less time than I thought. I ducked into my hiding-place and checked the shotgun, seeing that it was loaded and I had spare shells. I was quite near the fire so I rubbed some damp earth on the barrel so that it wouldn’t gleam in the light and then pushed the gun forward so that it would handle more conveniently.

The suddenness of the impending attack meant one of two things. That the helicopter was scouting just ahead of a main party, or that it had dropped a single load of men — and that meant not more than four. They’d already found out what happened when they did stupid things like that and I wondered if they would try it again.

A twig cracked again in the forest much closer and I tensed, looking from side to side and trying to figure out from which side the attack would come. Just because a twig had cracked to the west didn’t mean there wasn’t a much smarter guy coming in from the east — or maybe the south. The hair on the nape of my neck prickled; I was to the south and maybe someone was standing right behind me ready to blow my brains out. It hadn’t been too smart of me to lie flat on my belly — it’s an awkward position to move from, but it was the only way I could stay close in to the camp and still not stick out like a sore thumb.

I was about to take a cautious glance behind me when I saw someone — or something — move out of the corner of my eye, and I froze rigid. The figure came into the firelight and I held my breath as I saw it was Howard Matterson. At last I had drawn the fox.

He came forward as though he were walking on eggshells and stooped over my pack. He wouldn’t have any difficulty in identifying it because my name was stencilled on the back. Cautiously I gathered in the slack of my fishing-line and tugged. The log rolled over a little and Howard straightened quickly.

The next thing that happened was that he put the gun he was carrying to his shoulder and the dark night was split by the flash and roar as he put four shotgun shells into the blanket from a distance of less than eight feet as fast as he could operate the action.

I jumped and started sweating. I had all the evidence I needed that Howard wanted me out of the way in the worst way possible. He put his foot to the blanket and kicked it and stubbed his toe on the log. I yelled, ‘Howard, you bastard, I’ve got you covered. Put down tha—’

I didn’t get it all out because Howard whirled and let rip again and the blast dazzled my eyes against the darkness of the wood. Someone yelled and gurgled horribly and a body crashed down and rolled forward. I had been right about a smarter guy coming in from behind me. Jimmy Waystrand must have been standing not six feet away from me and Howard had been too goddam quick on the trigger. Young Jimmy had got a bellyful.

I jumped to my feet and took a shot at Howard, but my eyes were still dazzled by the flash of his discharge and I missed. Howard looked at me incredulously and shot blindly in my direction, but he’d forgotten that his automatic shotgun held only five shells and all there was was the dry snap of the hammer.

I must say he moved fast. With one jump he had cleared the fire, going in an unexpected direction, and I heard the splashing as he forded the stream. I took another shot at him into the darkness and must have missed again because I heard him crashing away through the undergrowth on the other side, and gradually the noises became fainter.

I knelt down next to Jimmy. He was as dead as I’ve seen any man — and I’ve seen a few. Howard’s shotgun must have been loaded with those damned rifled slugs and Jimmy had caught one dead centre in the navel. It had gone clean through and blown the spine out of his back and there was a mess of guts spilled out on the ground.

I rose unsteadily to my feet, walked two paces and vomited. All the good meat I had eaten came up and spilled on the ground just like Jimmy Waystrand’s guts. I shivered and shook for five minutes like a man with fever and then got myself under control. I took the shotgun and carefully reloaded with rifled slug shells because Howard deserved only the best. Then I went after him.

It was no trick to follow him. A brief on-and-off glimpse of the flashlamp showed me muddied footprints and broken grasses, but that set me thinking. He still had his gun and had presumably reloaded with another five shells. If the only way I could follow him was with a flashlamp I was about to get my head blown off. It didn’t matter how much better I was in the woods on a night as dark as this. If I used a light all he had to do was to hole up, keep quiet and then let go as I conveniently illuminated his target for him. That was sure death.

I stopped short and started thinking again. I hadn’t done any real thinking since Howard had pumped four shots into that log — everything had happened so fast. I cranked my brain into low gear and started it working again. There couldn’t be anyone else other than Howard or I’d have been nailed back at the camp while I was puking and twitching over the body of Jimmy Waystrand. The two must have come from that helicopter which must be within reasonable walking distance.

I had heard the sound of the helicopter die away to the north quite suddenly and that must have been where it had come to earth. There was a place not far to the north where the soil was thin, a mere skin on the bedrock. No trees grew there and there was ample space to land that whirlybird. Howard had plunged away to the west and I reckoned he wasn’t much good in the woods anyway, so there was a chance I could get to the helicopter first.

I abandoned his trail and moved fast unhampered by the pack. I had humped that pack continuously over miles of ground for nearly two weeks and its absence gave me an airy sense of freedom and lightness. By leaving the pack I was taking a chance because if I lost it I was done for — I couldn’t hope to survive in the woods without the gear I had. But I had the reckless feeling that this was the make or break time: I would either come out on top this night or be defeated by Howard — and defeat meant a slug in the guts like Jimmy Waystrand because that was the only way he could stop me.

I moved fast and quietly, halting every now and then to listen. I didn’t hear Howard but pretty soon I heard the swish of air driven by rotors and knew that not only was the helicopter where I thought it was but the pilot was nervous and ready for a quick take-off. I reckon he’d started his engine when he heard the shots back at my camp.

Acting on sound principles, I circled round to come on the helicopter from the opposite direction before coming out on to the open ground, and when I did come out of cover it was at the crouch. The noise was enough to make my approach silent and I came up behind the pilot who was standing and looking south, waiting for something to happen.

Something did happen. I pushed the muzzle of the shotgun in his ribs and he jumped a foot. ‘Calm down,’ I said. ‘This is Boyd. You know who I am?’

‘Yeah,’ he said nervously.

‘That’s right,’ I said. ‘We’ve met before — nearly two years ago. You took me from the Kinoxi back to Fort Farrell on the last trip. Well, you’re going to do it again.’ I bored the gun into his ribs with a stronger pressure. ‘Now, take six steps forward and don’t turn round until I tell you. I think you know better than to try any tricks.’

I watched him walk away and then come to a halt. He could have easily got away from me then because he was just a darker shadow in the darkness of that moonless cloudy night, but he must have been too scared. I think my reputation had spread around. I climbed up into the passenger seat and then said, ‘Okay, climb up here.’

He clambered up and sat in the pilot’s seat rigidly. I said conversationally, ‘Now, I can’t fly this contraption but you can. You’re going to fly it back to Fort Farrell and you’re going to do it nice and easy with no tricks.’ I pulled out my hunting knife and held it out so the blade glinted in the dim light of the instrument panel. ‘You’ll have this in your ribs all the way, so if you have any idea of crash-landing this thing just remember that you’ll be just as dead as me. You can also take into account that I don’t particularly care whether I live or die right now — but you might have different ideas about that. Got it?’

He nodded. ‘Yeah, I’ve got it. I won’t play tricks, Boyd.’

Maliciously I said, ‘Mr Boyd to you. Now, get into the air — and make sure you head in the right direction.’

He pulled levers and flicked switches and the engine note deepened and the rotors moved faster. There was a flash from the edge of the clearing and a Perspex panel in the canopy disintegrated. I yelled, ‘You’d better make it damned quick before Howard Matterson blows your head off.’

That helicopter suddenly took off like a frightened grasshopper. Howard took another shot and there was a thunk from somewhere back of me. The ‘copter jinked around in the air and then we were away with the dark tide of firs streaming just below. I felt the pilot take a deep breath and relax in his seat. I felt a bit more relaxed myself as we gained more height and bored steadily south.

Air travel is wonderful. I had walked and run from Fort Farrell and been chased around the Kinoxi Valley for nearly two weeks, and in that wonderful machine we headed straight down the valley and were over the dam in just fifteen minutes with another forty miles — say, half an hour — to go to Fort Farrell. I felt the tension drain out of me but then deliberately tightened up again in case the frightened man next to me should get up his nerve enough to pull a fast one.

Pretty soon I saw the lights of Fort Farrell ahead. I said, ‘Bull Matterson should have a landing-strip at the house — does he?’

‘Yeah; just next the house.’

‘You land there,’ I said.

We flew over Fort Farrell and the upper-crust community of Lakeside and suddenly we were over the dark bulk of Matterson’s fantastic château and coming down next to it. The helicopter settled and I said, ‘Switch off.’

The silence was remarkable when the rotors flopped to a stop. I said, ‘Does anyone usually come out to meet you?’

‘Not at night.’

That suited me. I said, ‘Now, you stay here. If you’re not here when I come back then I’ll be looking for you one day — and you’ll know why, won’t you?’

There was a tremble in the pilot’s voice. ‘I’ll stay here, Mr Boyd.’ He wasn’t much of a man.

I dropped to the ground, put away the knife and hefted the shotgun, then set off towards the house which loomed against the sky. There were a few lights showing, but not many and I reckoned most of the people would be asleep. I didn’t know how many servants were needed to keep the place tidy but I thought there wouldn’t be many around that time of night.

I intended to go in by the front door since it was the only way I knew and was coming to it when it opened and a light spilled on to the ground in front of the house. I ducked back into what proved to be the house garage, and listened intently to what was going on.

A man said, ‘Remember, he must be kept quiet.’

‘Yes, doctor,’ said a woman.

‘If there’s any change, ring me at once.’ A car door slammed. ‘I’ll be home all night.’ A car engine started and headlights switched on. The car curved round and the headlights momentarily illuminated the interior of the garage, then it was gone down the drive. The front door of the house closed quietly and all was in darkness again.

I waited awhile to let the woman get settled and used the time to explore the garage. By the look of it, in the brief glimpses of my flashlamp, the Mattersons were a ten-car family. There was Mrs Atherton’s big Continental, Bull Matterson’s Bentley, a couple of run-of-the-mill Pontiacs and a snazzy Aston Martin sports job. I flicked the light farther into the garage towards the back and held it on a Chevvy — it was McDougall’s beat-up auto. And standing next to it was Clare’s station-wagon!

I swallowed suddenly and wondered where Clare was — and old Mac.

I was wasting time here so I went out of the garage and walked boldly up to the front door and pushed it open. The big hall was dimly lit and I tiptoed up the great curving staircase on my way to the old man’s study. I thought I might as well start there — it was the only room I knew in the house.

There was someone inside. The door was ajar and light flooded out into the dimly lit corridor. I peeked inside and saw Lucy Atherton pulling out drawers in Bull Matterson’s desk. She tossed papers around with abandon and there was a drift of them on the floor like a bank of snow. She’d be a very suitable person to start with, so I pushed open the door and was across the room before she knew I was there.

I rounded the desk and got her from behind with her neck in the crook of my elbow, choking off her wind. ‘No noise,’ I said quietly, and dropped the shotgun on the soft carpet. She gurgled when she saw the keen blade of my knife before her eyes. ‘Where’s the old man?’

I relaxed my grip to give her air enough to speak and she whispered through a bruised throat, ‘He’s... sick.’

I brought the point of the knife closer to her right eye — not more than an inch from the eyeball. ‘I won’t ask you again.’

‘In... bedroom.’

‘Where’s that? Never mind — show me.’ I slammed the knife into its sheath and dragged her down with me into a stoop as I picked up the shotgun. I said, ‘I’ll kill you if you raise a noise, Lucy. I’ve had enough of your damn’ family. Now, where’s the room?’

I still kept the choke-hold on her and felt her thin body trembling against mine as I frog-marched her out of the study. Her arm waved wildly at a door, so I said, ‘Okay, put your hand on the knob and open it.’

As soon as I saw her turn the knob I kicked the door open and pushed her through. She went down on her knees and sprawled on the thick carpet and I ducked in quickly and closed the door behind and lifted the shotgun in readiness for anything.

Anything proved to be a night nurse in a trim white uniform who looked up with wide eyes. I ignored her and glanced around the room; it was big and gloomy with dark drapes and there was a bed in a pool of shadow. Heaven help me, but it was a four-poster with drapes the same colour as those at the windows but drawn back.

The nurse was trembling but she was plucky. She stood up and demanded, ‘Who are you?’

‘Where’s Bull Matterson?’ I asked.

Lucy Atherton was crawling to her feet so I put my boot on her rump and pushed her down again. The nurse trembled even more. ‘You can’t disturb Mr Matterson; he’s a very sick man.’ Her voice dropped. ‘He’s... he’s dying.’

A rasping voice from the darkened bed said, ‘Who’s dying? I heard that, young woman, and you’re talking nonsense.’

The nurse half-turned away from me towards the bed. ‘You must be quiet, Mr Matterson.’ Her head turned and her eyes pleaded with me. ‘Please go.’

Matterson said, ‘That you, Boyd?’

‘I’m here.’

His voice was sardonic. ‘I thought you’d be around. What kept you?’ I was about to tell him when he said irritably, ‘Why am I kept in darkness? Young lady, switch on a light here.’

‘But, Mr Matterson, the doct—’

‘Do as I say, damn it. You get me excited and you know what’ll happen. Switch on a light.’

The nurse stepped to the bedside and clicked a switch. A bedside lamp lit up the shrunken figure in the big bed. Matterson said, ‘Come here, Boyd.’

I hauled Lucy from the floor and pushed her forward. Matterson chuckled. ‘Well, well, if it isn’t Lucy. Come to see your father at last, have you? Well, what’s your story, Boyd? It’s a mite late for blackmail.’

I said to the nurse, ‘Now, see here: you don’t make a move to leave this room — and you keep dead quiet.’

‘I’m not going to leave my patient,’ she said stiffly.

I smiled at her. ‘You’ll do.’

‘What’s all the whispering going on?’ inquired Matterson.

I stepped up to the bedside keeping tight hold of Lucy. ‘Howard’s going hog wild up in the Kinoxi,’ I said. ‘He’s whipped up your loggers into a lynching-party — got them all steamed up with a story of how I beat you up. They’ve had me on the run for nearly two weeks. And that’s not all. Howard’s killed a man. He’s for the eight o’clock walk.’

Matterson looked at me expressionlessly. He’d aged ten years in two weeks; his cheeks were sunken and the bones of his skull were sharply outlined by the drawn and waxy skin, his lips were bluish and the flesh round his neck had sagged. But there was still a keen intelligence in his eyes. He said tonelessly, ‘Who did he kill?’

‘A man called Jimmy Waystrand. He didn’t intend to kill Waystrand — he thought he was shooting at me.’

‘Is that the guy I saw up at the dam?’

‘He’s the one.’ I dropped a shotgun shell on Matterson’s chest. ‘He was shot with one of these.’

Matterson scrabbled with a dessicated hand and I edged the shell into his fingers. He lifted it before his eyes and said softly, ‘Yes, a very efficient way of killing.’ The shell dropped from his fingers. ‘I knew his father. Matthew’s a good man — I haven’t seen him in years.’ He closed his eyes and I saw a tear squeeze under the eyelid and on to his cheek. ‘So Howard’s done it again. Aaah, I might have known it would happen.’

‘Again!’ I said urgently. ‘Mr Matterson, did Howard kill John Trinavant and his family?’

He opened his eyes and looked up at me. ‘Who are you, son? Are you Grant — or are you John Trinavant’s boy? I must know.’

I shook my head soberly. ‘I don’t know, Mr Matterson. I really don’t know. I lost my memory in the crash.’

He nodded weakly. ‘I thought you’d got it back again.’ He paused, and the breath rattled in his throat. ‘They were so burned — black flesh and raw meat... I didn’t know, God help me!’ His eyes stared into the vast distances of the past at the horrors of the crash on the Edmonton road. ‘I took a chance on the identification — it was for the best,’ he said.

Whose best? I thought bitterly, but I let no bitterness come into my voice as I asked evenly, ‘Who killed John Trinavant, Mr Matterson?’

Slowly he lifted a wasted hand and pointed a shaking finger at Lucy Atherton. ‘She did — she and her hellion brother.’