Prey

Chapter Six

"What do you mean, all flights are booked?" Henry Lightstone demanded.

"We can get you out on the first flight tomorrow morning," the reservations clerk offered. "You'd be landing at Bozeman at nine thirty-seven."

Henry, it is now or never. You know how our system works. This one-the one you have dreamed about all your life-is yours, but you must decide now.

They'd already failed to show up at two scheduled meets. Possibly because they had their own scheduling problems, but far more likely because they still didn't trust him. And he knew they had other hunters on their string, so he didn't dare push them too far or they'd be gone.

So he had to do exactly what Henry Allen Lightner, the wealthy Montana sportsman with an unsated lust for yet another record trophy kill, would do.

Either that or lose his first undercover investigation as a federal agent.

"No, I'm sorry," he said. "Tomorrow morning would be too late. What about another airline?"

"I'll be happy to check for you, sir, if you'd like."

"Yes, thank you."

As he waited, Lightstone tried to calculate moves. That was not easy, though, since Alex Chareaux was by far the least predictable individual Henry Lightstone had met in his life.

"I'm sorry, sir, but there are no other flights to Bozeman until tomorrow morning."

"Could you put me on stand-by?"

"Certainly, sir, but we already have a waiting list. You would be

… let me see, number eight."

"What about taking a couple of hops? A roundabout route?" Lightstone tried, anxious now because he knew what McNulty would suggest if he couldn't find himself a commercial flight.

Carl Scoby or Larry Paxton.

Both of the agents were licensed pilots, but only for Super Cubs: the small, slow, underpowered, but nonetheless reliable two-seater planes that the Fish and Wildlife Service biologists used for monitoring wildlife populations.

To Henry Lightstone, the small planes looked like something one of Paxton's teenage boys might have built in their garage over the weekend. Paxton had taken him up for a ride one day. Lightstone had wedged himself into the backseat of the Super Cub for a few claustrophobic moments before advising the black agent-pilot that he'd just as soon go jump off the roof of the airport tower. Get it over with quicker and save the government a couple of gallons of gas in the process.

But Paxton, Scoby, Dwight Stone, and Mike Takahara had been persistent, and Lightstone had finally agreed to go up for a short orientation flight. Two hours later, after receiving at least a dozen threats on his life from the backseat, Paxton had brought the plane back in a wing- swaying, multibounce landing that he later admitted was not one of his best because he'd been laughing so hard.

That had been on a nice, calm day, Henry Lightstone reminded himself, shuddering at the memory.

Lightstone reassured himself that MeNulty would never let them put a Super Cub up in this kind of weather. It would have to be a bigger plane. At least a 737.

The reservation clerk was back in less than two minutes. "Sir, I can route you through Missoula with a stopover at Butte."

"And that's on a seven-thirty-seven, correct?"

"Uh, yes sir. The flight out of Great Falls is on a seven-thirty-seven, but you'll have to change planes at Missoula, and we're experiencing weather advisories-"

"What kind of plane would I be changing to at Missoula?"

"Oh, let me see. That would be a Metro Three jet prop."

"You mean a small plane?"

"Oh, they're not really that small," the reservation clerk chuckled understandingly. "The Metro Three has eighteen seats and twin props."

A small plane, Lightstone thought. Jesus!

"What time would I arrive in Bozeman?" he interrupted, not wanting to hear anything more about the Metro Three.

"Approximately seven-thirty this evening."

"I see. Thank you anyway."

Henry Lightstone closed his eyes and shook his head slowly as he hung up. He waited for a few second, then dialed the familiar number and let it ring four times.

"Hello?"

"This is Henry. I've got a problem."

He explained the situation to his field supervisor.

"I could send Carl or Larry down in one of the Cubs, but they're both in Nebraska," McNulty said. "Never make it there in time."

Henry Lightstone smiled.

"So what do you think?" he asked, making an effort to sound disappointed. "Call Alex and try to reschedule?"

"No, don't do that yet," McNulty said. "I think you're right. If you back away now, you'd probably lose him. Give me a few minutes. I'll call you back shortly."

McNulty would arrange it, no problem, Lightstone knew. It was McNulty who had registered Lightstone into the federal government's Criminal Investigator's School and Special Agent Basic as a U.S. Custom's agent trainee. Sixteen long weeks in Glynco, Georgia, had taught Lightstone how federal officers enforced federal laws, handcuffed suspects and read them their rights (as he expected, pretty much the same as every other state and local cop).

Along about week fifteen, it occurred to Lightstone that he had learned almost nothing about fish or wildlife.

"Look at it this way," McNulty had suggested. "You'd know a duck if you saw one, wouldn't you? Let's say it's four o'clock in the morning and you're in a swamp, maybe waist- deep in water, and you're sneaking up on a couple of guys sitting in a duck blind."

"Yeah, what are they doing, selling coke?"

"No, just sitting there in the blind, wrapped up in blankets, drinking coffee, and waiting for daylight so they can start killing ducks."

"And I'm standing in waist-deep water, freezing my nuts off and watching these assholes drink coffee? Am I out of my mind?" Lightstone had asked, incredulous.

"No, you're a federal agent of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, and you're looking to nail these guys for multiple violations of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act."

"So what is it, a capital offense to shoot a duck at sunrise?"

McNulty shook his head. "Actually, a misdemeanor, but only if they go over the limit. Which you won't be able to prove unless you count the number of ducks they shoot. So what you're going to have to do is stay out there in the swamp until, oh, I'd say until about eight or nine in the morning, ideally behind some cover, and count drops."

"Drops, as in dropping ducks?"

McNulty nodded. "And while you're doing that, you're going to be keeping detailed notes on the approximate location where each duck falls, the time, the sex, the species involved… and on the apparent hunter."

"With my waterproof pen and paper," Lightstone had smiled agreeably.

"Which reminds me," McNulty had added as Lightstone's amused smile turned to laughter. "Assuming that you've searched all around the swamp in about a fifty-yard radius, and all through the blind, and you haven't been bitten by a snake or an alligator, and you haven't found anything that looks like a duck, what else are you going to be looking for in the way of evidence?"

At that point, Henry Lightstone had stopped laughing because it suddenly occurred to him that his supervisor might be dead serious.

"I don't know," he'd shrugged. "Feathers? Duck shit?"

"Okay. And what are you going to do if you can't find any feathers or duck shit anywhere around the area?" McNulty pressed.

"Then I'm probably going to figure that the stupid sons of bitches haven't the slightest idea of what a duck looks like either," Lightstone had replied with unrestrained sarcasm.

"There you go." McNulty had shrugged in apparent satisfaction. "Sounds to me like you've got the basics down just fine. I'll have Mike send down a couple of ID books with pictures, get you a little better oriented to the critters. In the meantime, you just make sure you pass those final exams and get that badge. It's about time you started earning your keep around here."

Those last words spoken by McNulty three months ago still echoed in Henry Lightstone's mind.

It was those words, and pride, and a strong personal conviction that he really did need to earn his keep-by taking on homicidal idiots like Alex Chareaux and his brothers, even if it meant getting into a goddamned flimsy airplane-that kept Henry Lightstone waiting on the phone.

Ten minutes later, McNulty was back.

"I've got the man you need, close by with a plane all fueled up and ready to go. Name is Len Ruebottom. Nice fellow, family man, hell of a pilot."

"Ruebottom? Is he one of us?" Lightstone asked. "Name's not familiar."

But that didn't necessarily mean anything, Lightstone knew, because during the entire six months that he'd been employed by the federal government, the only Fish and Wildlife Service agents that he had ever met face-to-face were the members of McNulty's Special Operations team.

Paul McNulty seemed to want it that way.

"No, he's actually one of the new agent-pilots," McNulty said. "I made arrangements to borrow him from the Portland regional office for a while. Plane and pilot are ours for as long as we want them, long as I pay all the expenses."

"You're sure the guy's to be trusted?"

"Halahan will make sure Ruebottom keeps a lid on. Unfortunately, he's still green when it comes to investigative work. Tends to want to do everything by the book, which is probably why he's so good at keeping airplanes up in the air."

"Have I ever mentioned to you that I hate to fly?" Lightstone asked.

"You'll get over it. Have to if you're going to stay in this outfit. Think you can handle Ruebottom?"

"Do I have any choice?"

"I could always send you to flight school," McNulty shrugged.

"Ruebottom sounds like one hell of a guy," Lightstone said quietly. "We'll get along just fine."