Track Of The Cat

by Nevada Barr

  She stepped off the asphalt and walked the narrow dirt path toward the chain link fence that surrounded Maintenance.

  Was Craig Eastern that crazy? Anna dismissed him from her thoughts. This morning's mission was to investigate Karl Johnson-or, at any rate, his truck.

  Karl felt he had been cheated out of the ranger position in Dog Canyon, believed he had been betrayed, that something he had earned and deserved had been snatched away. The National Park Service had very few women in middle or higher management. Women held the lower-paying clerical and seasonal jobs. Word had come down from on high to promote women and people of color whenever possible. The Good Old Boy contingent thought Karl was just another victim of the plot against white males. Maybe Karl thought so, too.

  A lot of people went through life feeling they'd been ripped off. The money, the good jobs, the beautiful women, the rich husbands, had been snatched away from them, given to the wrong people.

  How many crimes were committed because somebody felt the need to get "some of their own" back? Just to feel, for once, that they had a little control, were a little smarter than the rest?

  Human crimes seemed more sordid, yet at the same time infinitely more forgivable, than crimes that were just business as usual; all the profits neatly laundered, washed clean of the victim's blood and vomit before reaching the lined pockets of the three-piece suits.

  As she slipped through the gate into the Maintenance Yard, her mind set on a little breaking and entering, Anna wondered if there were a crime she wouldn't commit under the right circumstances. Murder certainly. In fact she was keeping a list of Those Better Off Dead. If she were hungry she would steal. There were betrayals of the heart.

  She'd never be cruel to an animal and she wouldn't litter.

  "That's as good as it gets," she said to the sun, just edging above the eastern desert; to whatever powers might be listening.

  Just after six-thirty a.m. she let herself into the Maintenance building through the shop door. The Roads and Trails crew wouldn't come on duty till seven.

  The place smelled of new paint and automotive oil. A smell that she usually found comforting. It put her back in her father's auto shop where she'd played endlessly with nuts and bolts and cotter pins. This morning it only served to remind her she was on alien ground. Technically she had a right to be in the building. The key she'd been issued was an indication of that. Half a dozen times a week she was in and out of Harland's enclave. But this time she'd come to rifle through his files. That shed a different light on the matter. One she didn't much care to be seen in.

  Soundlessly, Anna crossed the concrete floor of the shop and tried the door to Harland's office. It was locked. Squinting to cut through the gloom, she peered into the crack between the door and the jamb. The bolt was not thrown. Quick as a cat, she ran to the scrap bin in the carpentry shop and dug through the bits of wood and metal. A triangle of tin caught her eye. Anna grabbed it out of the heap and trotted back to Harland's office.

  The tin was better even than a credit card for slipping the catch. In less than a minute, she was inside. There was no point in closing the door behind her. The two windows of Harland's interior office looked out on the auto shop to one side and the carpentry shop on the other. He worked in a fishbowl. Fortunately there were only two filing cabinets. Anna pulled open all six drawers. Too dark to read. "In for a penny…" she whispered and flipped on the overhead light.

  Harland Roberts was an organized man and Anna blessed him for it. Each hanging file was labeled and color-coded. Aptly enough all pay, overtime, annual leave, and sick leave requests were under money-green tabs.

  Anna pulled out the overtime file. The requests, signed in Harland's neat, military hand, were in chronological order, most recent first. She flipped back through them to the seventeenth of June. Nothing. On the fifteenth the mule packer had worked six hours overtime packing fence materials into the backcountry and on the twenty-first Karl had worked two and a half hours overtime fixing a broken water main. No one had worked the night of June 17. There were no extenuating circumstances, no last-minute changes. Karl was in McKittrick Canyon that night on personal business.

  Leaving everything as she'd found it, Anna left the office and relocked the door.

  Johnson drove a small blue half-ton pickup with metal toolboxes on either side. The truck was parked across the yard near the building where the ambulance and fire truck were housed.

  Staring at the mundane little vehicle, Anna realized she wasn't exactly sure what she'd come to look for. Buttons? Threads? Flakes of skin? Soil from Dog Canyon? Hairs? Given the hand-me-down nature of government vehicles, the truck was bound to be a regular treasure trove of human artifacts.

  The temptation to turn around, go home, and have another cup of coffee before starting up the Tejas on backcountry patrol was strong. But she had promised Christina she would check it out and she'd risen ninety minutes early to do it.

  "Just look," she told herself. "Don't look to find."

  Armed with half a dozen plastic sandwich bags she'd grabbed on the off chance something promising did turn up, Anna started with the bed of the little truck.

  For a vehicle used primarily for hauling garbage, Karl's truck was quite clean. As she peered at the collection of aluminum pop-tops, cigarette butts, and plastic tent pegs her sweep had turned up, she tried to picture how the pickup, seen-allegedly-in the McKittrick Canyon parking lot from five to ten p.m. on the night of Sheila Drury's murder, the night Karl said he was in Van Horn lifting things down from garage shelves, could have been used.

  Sheila, already unconscious or dead, might have been hauled in the back hidden from sight under a tarp or bags of garbage. A small-framed woman, she might have been squeezed into one of the toolboxes. Or she could have been forced into the cab, her pack thrown in the back.

  Of the various situations there remained only a few constants. If the truck had been used in the crime and had been used to transport Drury, Anna could look for anything that might indicate the presence of an iridescent green backpack, Sheila herself, or any signs of a struggle.

  The truck bed indicated neither the first nor the second possibility and was so battered from years of use that any trace of the third would blend right in.

  Anna moved to the cab.

  Karl's tidiness ended at the door. From the evidence that met her eye, Anna could have made a case for the man living in his vehicle. Loose papers and empty Gatorade containers covered the seat. The dash held compass, maps, sunglasses, sticky Styrofoam cups, and two monkey wrenches. The floor on the passenger side was ankle-deep in papers and crumpled soda-pop cans.

  Again Anna considered going home. There was still time for that second cup of coffee.

  "Just look."

  Careful not to arrange Karl's heap into any telltale orderliness, she began picking through the piles. The dash provided nothing more damning than an empty tin of Red Man chewing tobacco. If that were the extent of Karl's sins against society he would go unpunished. At least in West Texas.

  Not wanting to slide through the flotsam of Karl's life, Anna got out and went around to check the glove box from the passenger side. She glanced at her watch: 6:45. Soon she must give it up or leave it for another day.

  The glove box produced the expected pencils with broken leads, pens without caps, and registration papers. And a hypodermic syringe without a needle.

  Anna sniffed at it delicately but only because she'd seen cops on television do it. Unless it was filled with Jean Nate or Windex she doubted she'd learn anything. Hoping Karl wouldn't miss it, that he wasn't diabetic and would die from lack of a syringe, she dropped it in one of her sandwich bags and stowed it in her shirt pocket.

  Law Enforcement rangers had only ten weeks of training to a regular cop's sixteen. In the old days, before crime had moved into the parks, it had sufficed. This morning Anna found herself missing that month and a half. Maybe that's when they'd covered Sniffing Suspicious Substances.

  Wi
th one potential "find" to her credit, the search took on more interest. Scooping up the mess on the seat one section at a time, Anna checked the upholstery. Near where the driver sat was a dark stain on the vinyl. At one time seven or eight drops of red-brown liquid had fallen on the seat. Most of it was smeared away but some had caught in the fabric where the smooth surface had been worn and frayed. If a victim had been stretched across the seat, head on or near the driver's lap, blood from face, neck or shoulder wounds would have dripped just there.

  Excitement trembled in her hands as she scraped up some of the frayed cloth with her pocket knife and stowed the shreds carefully in a fresh sandwich bag. Anna was having fun. Intent upon the hunt, she had forgotten about the big kindly man who gave carrots and sugar to the horses.

  Neither the rest of the seat nor the floor offered up any more promising items. On the passenger door, just above the handle, were two long smears of mud. If a victim had lain on the seat as Anna imagined and if she had struggled, the mud from her boots could've smeared the door at just that place.

  Feeling like Sherlock Holmes on a good day, she began scraping the mud into a third Baggie. Maybe there was a difference between Dog Canyon dirt on the park's northernmost edge and dirt from Frijole or McKittrick on the southern borders.

  "Sorry Miss, but rangers aren't allowed to carve their initials on Roads and Trails vehicles." The voice so startled Anna, she actually squawked like a duck.

  Smiling, Harland was looking down through the window glass to where she squatted. His thick dark brows asked the question he seemed too polite to phrase: "What the hell are you doing?"

  Anna had no answer. The bag, the knife, the time of day- none could be explained away by even the most ornate lie.

  "Good morning, Harland." Straightening up, she folded the knife and slipped the Baggie into her trouser pocket. Anna wracked her brain and drew nothing but blanks. Except for the truth, there was no good reason she could come up with for scraping dirt from the inside of a Maintenance vehicle's door. Harland was waiting while she decided which was the lesser of the two evils: telling him nothing or telling him something-anything.

  "There has been a little matter that's been concerning Paul," she began, feeling her way. "Nothing serious. I was hoping a look at the truck would clear it up. Just guess-work and speculation at the moment. If I find out it's a real problem you'll get a full report. If, like I expect, it's just gossip, I'll tell you the whole story over a beer and we'll at least get a good laugh out of it." Hard-eyed, Harland waited for a better explanation. Anna smiled in a way she hoped looked as sheepish as it felt. Nothing is more disarming in a woman than incompetence.

  "I'll hold you to that beer," Harland said finally. "And especially that laugh. But right now chivalry's dead. You get to handle Karl all alone. He hates anybody messing with 'his' truck." He nodded toward the gate where Karl, looking like a storm about to break, was hurrying in from the parking lot. Harland gave Anna a wink and, whistling, sauntered across the yard to his office.

  Investigative paraphernalia safely tucked out of sight, Anna had a little more presence of mind. "'Morning, Karl," she said easily. "I left my sunglasses in the barn yesterday. I thought you might have picked them up for me. They were on top of the oat bin."

  Karl stared at her for a full three seconds, his face utterly blank, and Anna felt her belly grow cold.

  "No," he said. "They weren't there. I gave the mules some oats with their dinner. I'd've seen them."

  Anna had no idea whether Karl had been fooled or not but the fun had gone out of the morning as quickly as it had come into it. "Thanks anyway," she said and made her escape.

  "Anna, headed back to housing?"

  It was Harland. Anna hoped she'd not been obviously hightailing it out of Maintenance.

  "Yup. Getting my pack. Backcountry patrol."

  "I'll walk with you, keep you safe from the forces of evil." He smiled, his gray eyes taking in the hundred yards of peaceful road between the yard and the housing area. The great threats were a desert cottontail the size of a small boot and two butter-colored butterflies. "I forgot my radio," he confided in a stage whisper as he fell into step beside her.

  Anna laughed. "I do it all the time." She was mildly impressed that he walked. Most of the staff seemed to drive their private cars the quarter-mile to the Maintenance Yard where they traded them for a government vehicle.

  "Perfect day for the high country," Harland said wistfully. "I wish I was going with you. Don't ever let them promote you to GS-11," he said earnestly. "You'll be trapped behind a desk forever after."

  Anna looked up at the green and brown hills, then the pale cliffs of the escarpment. The tops were fringed black with evergreens robbed of color and shape by distance. "I won't," she said, and meant it.

  Harland smiled. His teeth were straight and white but they looked like they were his own.

  Fifty is not old, Anna found herself thinking, and wondered why.

  Harland reached down, picked up a cigarette butt and put it in his hip pocket. "What has Karl done to get the Ranger Division's notice?" he asked.

  Having no credible answer, Anna asked him a question in return. "Speaking of notice, the other day you said something about Craig Eastern being… well… not quite all here."

  "Mentally ill," Harland said bluntly.

  "Yes. And to take care of myself. I've given that some thought. Not much, because I don't know what in the hell I'm supposed to make of it. Care to elaborate?"

  "Not really," Harland replied.

  For a minute, or nearly so, they walked without talking. When they were at the seasonal housing where Anna lived, Harland stopped. She deliberated whether this was some gentlemanly hint that the walk was over or if he'd thought better of keeping the rationale behind his cryptic warning a secret.

  It was the latter.

  "Please say this will stay between you and me," Harland said, not looking at her. "Because I'm going to tell you anyway and I'd just as soon sleep sound at night."

  "It will," Anna promised, hoping she could keep it.

  "Craig suffers from paranoid delusions. He's been institutionalized twice for it. He's on medications but he has had violent episodes in the past. You know how he feels about human beings in general, how protective he is of the land. But maybe you didn't know that he particularly fears women. Especially women he is sexually attracted to. He feels women use sexual politics to outdistance him. Just something I wanted you to be aware of, take care about. That's all."

  "How do you know?" Anna was embarrassed at how suspicious she sounded. Suspicion was becoming a habit.

  "Craig was at the mental institution where my wife lives," Harland said simply. "In Austin."

  "Oh," was all Anna could find to say.

  Harland Roberts laid a hand on her arm. "It's okay," he said kindly. "They've got trees and flush toilets, chicken on Sunday-everything. It's a far cry from Mrs. Rochester's attic."

  Anna nodded and echoed, if a bit weakly, his smile.

  "Give my regards to the high country," he said and strode off toward the "real" houses.

  "I will," Anna called after him, wanting to give him some return for the confidence.

  There was no time for that second cup of coffee. Anna packaged the samples and the hypodermic and sent them to the police lab in Roswell, New Mexico, care of Timothy Dayton. They'd gone to law enforcement school together. He would do it as a favor, eschewing channels.

  "Three-eleven; three-one-five en route up the Tejas." Anna radioed in her position then zipped her radio into the side pocket of her pack. It would be good to get into the high country again, up where it was clean. Too many days had been spent down among people.

  With each step up the glaring limestone of the Tejas Trail, she felt a thread break; one of the peevish tethers of social and professional minutiae snap. Alone, in the backcountry, politics, sex, murder, and all their derivations would fade. They never vanished entirely; mostly the clamor just dulled, like the roa
r of trucks on 62/180 that poured endless trailer-tank loads of natural gas into Mexico.

  One day, Anna thought, she would walk far enough, go deep enough, stay long enough, that the toxins of humanity would finally work completely out of her system, leaving her mind new again. That would be the trip she would never return from. Molly would find her living on roots and berries, wearing nothing but a loincloth and humming a mantra in some mountaintop cave.

  Anna smiled at the picture. Molly in Italian pumps and a Giorgio Armani suit standing in the mesquite, cigarette in hand.

  Someday.

  Bucolic splendor, peace of mind, oneness with Nature, all the elevated thoughts buoying Anna up the endless switchbacks of the Tejas, evaporated as she rounded the sharp bend above Devil's Hallway.

  Shaded from the rays of the morning sun by a fist of wind-carved stone, Craig Eastern sat with his back to a rock and his legs across the trail. The bill of a white baseball cap with the green fist of the EARTH FIRST! logo emblazoned on it covered his eyes. Muscular neck and shoulders, displayed nicely by a gray tank top, sloped down from small flat ears.

  Anna stopped several feet from him and waited. Of course he had heard her crunching ascent. One did not sneak in lug-soled boots and a heavy pack. Head down, he was scribbling in a little yellow notebook. When he'd finished he snapped it shut with a gesture reminiscent of Captain Kirk snapping shut his communicator.

  "Howdy, Anna," he said solemnly, looking up. He smiled and it was as if an elf or a child suddenly took over the man's body. His dark eyes glowed, his lips curved in a sweet smile exposing small, even, very white teeth. One cheek dimpled.

  Because of this man-or, more accurately, because of what Harland had told her about him-Anna had been locking her door nights. At that moment Eastern couldn't have looked less like an anti-social psychotic or more like an appealing boy. His thirty-six years had scarcely marked his face and, with the cap, the thinning hair was hidden.

  Surely, she thought, no one with that choirboy grin would do any real damage.