by Gwen Moffat
‘There was no sign of the bear, not even a track; there must have been more snow after he came sniffing round the tent. Irving came out after a while but he wasn’t himself at all and then it started to snow again and he got back in his sleeping bag and he told me to go for help. I tried to convince him that it was dangerous to spend another night up there: the bear would get bolder; after all, it’d be sure to come back the second night—and I didn’t think I could get down to the valley and guide people back in one day. There wasn’t time. The bear might come back in the daylight anyway. And why shouldn’t Irving come out with me? He was quite fit. I started to pack my rucksack thinking he’d come out of it when he saw me doing something constructive, but he told me I didn’t need a pack, to go without it. He said he had to have my sleeping bag as well as his own; he was cold. That’s when I told him there was nothing wrong with him, to pull himself together—and he went for me. He hit me.’
Shelley’s fingers traced the bruise on her cheekbone. ‘Panic,’ Miss Pink said comfortably. ‘He’d lost touch.’
‘I knew that,’ Shelley said. ‘Then suddenly he stopped hitting me and dashed outside, shouting at the top of his voice. I thought he’d gone mad, and at that point I didn’t care. He came back, said—or rather, shrieked—that he’d heard a shot, picked up the gun and ran away—just ran out into the snow. That was the last I saw of him.’
‘Then what did you do?’
‘I’m not proud of what I did—now; at the time I didn’t stop to think. I hadn’t heard any shot and I thought he’d imagined it. He’d been punching me, then he’d gone out with a loaded gun; if he came back in the same violent mood, I wasn’t going to be there. My rucksack was packed. I left.’
‘You left to walk out alone when you knew there were grizzlies around?’
‘I didn’t care.’ The voice from the back of the Jeep was desolate. ‘I felt like the bottom had fallen out of the world. You think I was bothered about being attacked by a bear after what had happened? I wanted to die—but I was frightened of Irving all the same. Most of all I was frightened of that loaded gun.’
‘Did you hear any more shots?’
‘More? I never heard the first—the one Irving said he heard. But after that, when I’d left the tent and was making my way through the snow, I thought I heard something like shots behind me. I couldn’t be sure; it could have been boughs breaking under the weight of snow. Of course, I wasn’t feeling good, nor thinking straight.’ There was the ghost of a laugh. ‘I couldn’t even stay in Hoodoo. I found the exit from Sundance all right: I stumbled on the lake by chance, walked round it to the outlet and followed the creek down—hell, I must have been in Hoodoo at that point—then I must have drifted too far west. Everything was covered by snow, most of the time snow was actually falling, and it never cleared for long enough for me to get a distant view, just trees and snow all the time. When it finally stopped falling I was on a timbered ridge which I thought was Pioneer but it had to be No Man Ridge on the other side of Hoodoo. Of course, I didn’t know that at the time.
‘I wandered for a while, following the ridge down until I got below the snowline—and then I started to feel better immediately. It was the snow was so frightening: everything covered, nothing recognizable. I discovered that after all I wanted to live; I didn’t think of it like that at the time, but I started to look around me, trying to work out where the nearest house was. I let the ridge take me down, thinking I’d come out near the mouth of Hoodoo but in fact I came down to Trapper’s Cabin on Squaw Creek. It had been stocked with food ready for Proctor’s round-up, and there was a pile of wood. I got there just as it was getting dusk and that night I never thought about Mom and what she must be going through. I was hungry and dehydrated and absolutely exhausted. I slept for over twelve hours and it wasn’t until the following afternoon, when I reckoned the others would have got down—Joe and Gale anyway—that I realized Mom would be frantic. But I didn’t want anyone, even her, to know how Irving had behaved, and I couldn’t let anyone see me how I was, my face and all. There was a mirror in the cabin. I figured on holing up until the swelling had gone down some.’
Miss Pink addressed Edna: ‘Why didn’t you insist on knowing where she was?’
‘I didn’t have a chance. She rang off before I could ask any questions. But she’d sounded so odd: about not letting anyone know it was her on the phone, that I kept quiet for a while, and then Sim Logan called and told Otis that Irving was dead. At that point—’ Edna stopped talking and sighed heavily.
‘At that point,’ Shelley put in, ‘she jumped to the conclusion, because of what I’d said, or hadn’t said, on the phone, that I had something to do with his death, if I hadn’t actually killed him.’
Miss Pink said: ‘The original theory was that Irving was dragged away by a bear. The tent was ripped; a bear had definitely been there.’
‘I’d have accepted the bear theory if Shelley hadn’t already called me and talked so strangely,’ Edna said, then she stiffened. ‘ “Original theory”? So what—how was he killed?’
‘Here we go,’ Shelley said. ‘Back to me.’
Miss Pink shook her head. ‘To be a suspect you’d have to be able to skin a grizzly, and it would need to be proved that you had a horse in Sundance. It looks now as if Irving did hear a shot when he rushed outside the tent, and that could have been the shot which killed the grizzly.’ She explained about the discovery of the bear’s carcass. Edna received this with bewilderment, apparently unable to relate it to Shelley’s story, and missing the obvious point. Shelley did not. ‘You mean Irving was shot by a hunter?’ she asked. ‘An accident?’
‘With the bear buried?’ Miss Pink asked. ‘And another thing: Irving’s billfold is missing, and Joe says he sold his car for cash and was carrying about two thousand dollars.’
‘You mean it was stolen? Are you saying Irving was shot by someone who also stole his billfold? I don’t believe it.’
‘There’s something else you have to know.’ Miss Pink was grim. ‘If this is what happened: that Irving was killed, not by a hunter with a licence, but by a poacher, then you’re vulnerable yourself. You were too close.’
‘But I didn’t see anything.’
‘The killer wouldn’t know that. It was snowing, there is plenty of cover in Sundance among trees and rocks; he couldn’t be sure. Of course, now that you’ve told your story there shouldn’t be any danger. I hope the police are waiting for us.’
Edna was not listening properly. ‘I’ve had enough of the police; they’ve been in and out of the studio all day. The Press too.’
‘The more people around you, the better,’ Miss Pink insisted. ‘We’ll pick up Joe and Gale and I’ll drive you home. Where did Otis and Frank go?’
‘They were both out on the search.’
Miss Pink noted two points: that Edna had kept the news of Shelley’s safety from her son-in-law as well as everyone else, and that Shelley, in evincing no surprise at the presence of her husband in Prosper, was already aware of it.
‘One other thing,’ she said. ‘When Irving left the tent, the last time you saw him, was he wearing both his belts?’
‘Belts? I expect so.’ Shelley stared through the windscreen as they passed the first cabins on the outskirts of Prosper. ‘Is it important?’
‘He wasn’t wearing them when he was found.’
‘Probably they were stolen along with his money. I don’t know. What happened to his gun? I’ve had about all I can take of this.’ Miss Pink did not respond but as she turned off the highway towards Edna’s studio Shelley said dreamily: ‘He never undressed that night, and when I took the gun out of his holster he was wearing both belts then.’
‘What significance do the belts have?’ Seale dropped her saddle on its bench and turned to face Miss Pink across the tack room.
‘I think they were undone deliberately,’ Miss Pink said: ‘to facilitate access. I mean, to help the scavengers. It’s possible that the body was even o
pened to attract animals more quickly.’
Seale sighed and shook her head and walked out to the buckskin tethered in the barn. Miss Pink followed with a brush and comb and started to groom the chestnut.
‘Is Shelley safe?’ Seale asked suddenly.
‘So long as she isn’t alone, I suppose.’
‘Why suppose? Why wouldn’t she be safe with other people—oh!’
‘Yes, it depends who she’s with. If Tye was killed because he recognized the person who shot the bear, then that has to be, or perhaps one should say, is likely to be, a local. There aren’t many to choose from. The Farrells, the Trotters, Otis Lenhart—’
‘Archie Burg, Zack Coons.’ Seale’s voice was level—then she swore as several things happened at once. Both horses, tied close together, pivoted with a thud of hooves, throwing up their heads towards a figure silhouetted in the great doorway. A voice asked harshly: ‘Where’s Logan?’
Miss Pink recovered first. ‘He may be with the sheriff, Mr Patent. Can we help?’
‘Could be.’ Frank Patent stepped into the barn. ‘I heard what you were saying. You hadn’t got as far as Logan but you were nearly there. Have they got a confession out of him?’
‘Not to my knowledge,’ Miss Pink said.
‘He’s going to have to tell me.’
‘Tell you what?’ Seale asked.
‘Where he put the body.’
The women exchanged glances. Miss Pink said gently: ‘The body was found yesterday, Mr Patent.’
‘You’re mad if you think you can protect him. And why should you—for two murders? Tye—okay, but why did he have to kill my wife?’
After a pause Miss Pink said: ‘You didn’t overhear much of our conversation. Shelley is alive and well, and at the moment she’s at home at the Lazy S with her family.’
His expression didn’t change. ‘I guess Logan’s somewhere in here. You have to be talking for his benefit.’ He peered over the backs of the horses but they blocked his way and evidently he wouldn’t walk behind them.
‘Why don’t you come across to the house and telephone the Lenhart place?’ Miss Pink suggested.
‘You found Tye’s body,’ he said slowly. ‘Are you all in it? His mother, his hired help, even you?’ He stared at her in what appeared to be genuine bewilderment.
‘Why should Sim Logan kill Tye?’ she asked, although she guessed what the answer would be.
‘Because he killed a bear four years ago and Tye was on to him. Joe Bullard told me that last night. I don’t care about Tye; he asked for everything he got—but not Shelley. He shouldn’t have killed Shelley.’
‘Right,’ Seale said. ‘Let’s go and find Sim.’
She walked out of the barn and Miss Pink followed. Patent was close behind them.
Once he agreed to enter the kitchen subsequent events were predictable: Seale’s telephone call to the Lazy S, his refusal to believe what Edna told him, his collapse when Shelley came to the telephone.
Logan came home while Patent was still incoherent, and Seale was trying to persuade him to allow her to take him to the Lenhart place. He was too dazed to drive himself, nevertheless he was insisting that he had to see the reporters before he met his wife.
‘I know she’s safe now,’ he babbled. ‘She can wait—I mean, it can wait: reunion. Maybe she doesn’t want to—she hasn’t seen me for weeks.’ He tossed back the whisky they had pressed on him and stared wild-eyed at Logan: ‘You’re a good man,’ he said. ‘Tye was a creep. Everything’s come out right—oh, my God, where are they all staying? They’re together somewhere, some motel, or was it The Covered Wagon? Call them,’ he told Seale. ‘Find out where they are. I’ll say I was—er—drunk? No, unstable—because I thought Shelley had been—you know? I want to forget about it. She’s all right! Everything’s okay.’
Miss Pink asked sternly: ‘What did you tell the reporters?’
For a moment he wouldn’t meet her eye, then he burst out defiantly: ‘Everyone knows! Last night, at the ranch, they were all talking about it: Edna, Otis, Gale, Joe, me: five of us. Are you going to tell me it wasn’t common knowledge, an open secret?’
‘You bloody idiot,’ Seale said bitterly.
Ginny regarded him with contempt, Miss Pink in despair. Only Logan smiled and started to speak, to be interrupted by a pounding on the back door and a man shouting: ‘Logan? Open up. It’s the police.’
He squeezed Patent’s shoulder. ‘Just tell the truth,’ he said, and glanced at the women. ‘We don’t know what all this is about. Maybe the sheriff will explain.’
It wasn’t the sheriff but two men from Sweetgrass in plain-clothes. Miss Pink’s heart sank. The older fellow, the one with a short grey haircut, was hard, unsmiling and, despite his neat town suit, not in the least put out by his surroundings. His younger colleague was balding, a little fleshy, with wide eyes and a diffident air, an air which must be nothing other than a front for competence. Suddenly Miss Pink looked old and vacuous.
The older man performed the introductions; he was Coachman, the other Ross. Presumably they had Christian names; Miss Pink didn’t catch them. She was on edge to see how the others would handle the situation. As a visitor, with no official standing in the group, she had to be a bystander or call attention to the fact that, in taking control, she would be implying that the others needed protection.
Before the detectives arrived Patent had been the focus of attention; now, in his guilty confusion, he reclaimed the stage, well-meaning but retracting too late.
‘They just told me my wife’s safe,’ he informed the newcomers. ‘I’m Frank Patent. I’m married to Shelley, the girl who was missing. I feel as if I’ve been living through a nightmare. She’s with her mother. I’ve spoken to her.’
Ross, the plump one, nodded and smiled, sharing Patent’s relief. Coachman accepted Logan’s offer of a chair, settled himself, looked incuriously at Patent, and from him to Ross who passed a hand over his skull. Ross had switched to bewilderment. ‘Why did you say Mr Logan had killed your wife?’ he asked.
They all studied Patent as if he were a small boy trapped in a lie. Like small boys he went in deeper. He looked blankly at Logan, received no help from that quarter, glanced at Seale and saw a warning there, or a threat—and an escape route.
He said: ‘Tye made a play for Miss Seale and since Logan and her … I’d heard they were—they got a relationship going … You see?’
Coachman’s very absence of expression implied contempt.
‘Go on.’ Ross’s eagerness suggested that Patent was telling a risqué story.
‘I wasn’t myself,’ he protested. ‘I thought Shelley hadn’t only been killed but her body left to the bears too. That was obscene. The grizzlies could have got to her before she died. I went mad.’
‘What have you got to say to that?’ Coachman asked of Seale.
‘It’s a figure of speech. He was mad only temporarily.’
His attention remained with her, his eyes widening a little.
Ross asked, like a voyeur: ‘When did Tye make a play for you?’
‘I never realized he did. He tried to chat me up in The Wagon once; I don’t remember that I said anything to him. I moved away—but if by making a play for me this guy means Tye made an attempt, why yes, he did.’
‘And what was your reaction?’ Coachman asked Logan.
‘I didn’t know until now. I don’t think much to it, except—’ Logan glanced at Seale, ‘—Tye would be the injured party, wouldn’t he?’
‘Do you hunt?’ Coachman asked.
‘No, sir. I’m not a hunting man.’
‘You don’t kill vermin?’
‘That’s not hunting. I kill animals if they’re a danger.’
‘Like what?’
‘A rattler round the buildings, a badger making a den in a pasture—that kind of thing.’
‘You’d kill a badger?’ Seale exclaimed.
‘My horses is more valuable than badgers: galloping hard, putting a foot
in a hole, having to be shot. You ever shoot a horse?’
‘Bears,’ Coachman said flatly. No question, just one word.
‘Not bears,’ Logan said. ‘They’re no bother.’
‘Not when they kill stock?’
‘Oh, then I’d shoot a bear. I don’t know how you’d go about it though. Who would give you the authority: the Fish and Wildlife people or the Forest Service? Or do they send out experts to trap the beast and then re-locate it?’
‘I guess you’d have to contact the Forest people,’ Ross said doubtfully. ‘What happened four years ago?’
Logan smiled at Ross who gave him his flattering attention. In contrast Coachman looked surly, and even the women, except for Miss Pink, failed to conceal their disapproval. Patent was agonized, but they ignored him.
‘Well,’ Logan said, ‘a bear with a radio collar was plotted travelling across Dead Horse Pass and down Cougar Creek, then the radio stopped transmitting. And that’s all there is. Of course, there have been rumours and jokes ever since; everyone’s had the killing laid on his doorstep, including me.’
‘Why you?’ Coachman asked.
‘If the animal was killed, most likely it was by a rancher. Bears have been known to kill stock in the past.’
‘Did this one?’
‘It may have taken the odd calf but you can’t tell; if you find a carcass that a bear’s been feeding on, there’s no way of telling if the bear killed it. Most likely he didn’t. Like Tye: we all thought he’d been drug away and killed by a bear just because scavengers had ate the body—and probably an old bear among them.’
