by Douglas Hirt
I went around back of the truck, crawled into the aluminum shell and dug out a pair of heavy cotton socks. In a plywood box I located a pair of hiking boots and brushed the dust from them. They were well-worn but sound, and a damn sight more practical than the open-toed sandals she had wandered into camp wearing. Of course, they were about five sizes too large for her, but I didn’t think Marcie Rose was much concerned about fashionable ladies’ outdoor wear at the moment.
When I appeared at the door again Marcie pushed her head from the steering wheel and peered oddly at me. “Where have you been?” She asked bewildered.
“Here, put these on.”
She studied me a long, confused moment, realizing she’d fallen asleep. Her mouth formed word of a question but didn’t speak it when she saw the items I was holding. Eyelids narrowing, shading her blue eyes behind a scowl, the revolver gave a little meaningful jerk to show she still meant business and she said, “Just set them on the floor.”
“Sure thing, lady. Keep those hungry wolves at bay and all that. Don’t let your guard down for a minute.” I stepped back a couple paces to reassure her. After all, she did have a gun, and even a little .22 can kill tougher men than me.
She squirmed out from behind the wheel and unrolled the socks. I found a deadfall to sit on to ease her mind. I didn’t want her fumbling with a loaded gun while trying to get into something more practical than she was wearing. She set the revolver on the seat beside her, reached under her dress and wiggled out of the shredded pantyhose.
“I have an extra pair of trousers in back if you’re interested.”
She though it over. “Why not? I already look like a circus clown.”
I dug the pants and a spare flannel shirt out of the plywood box and tossed them to her. She stripped off the pastel blue dress that was more mud brown than blue and stood there in bra and panties, shivering, getting the pants oriented. Marcie Rose had a fine figure, easy on the eyes in spite of the grime. She kept one eye on me and the other on the trousers, pulling them quickly up around her waist. Then the shirt. Once the scenery was properly covered up, she moved a little slower, more methodically.
“There wouldn’t happen to have an extra belt in the box back there?” she asked buttoning up the fly.
“Sorry. Keeping them up is your problem.”
She grinned before she realized what she was doing and instantly removed it from her face. “Well, how about a piece of rope?”
“Rope I can supply.” It was at the bottom of the plywood box. By time I came back around the truck Marcie was put back together and lacing up the boots. Her fingers stopped and I saw she was thinking about the gun on the seat. I tossed the rope and pretended not to notice. “Breakfast is waiting. Don’t forget to turn off the ignition.”
I moved the skillet back over the coals, checked under the lid that nothing had burned, pushed the eggs about with a fork, and poured myself another cup of coffee. I set out two plastic plates—the colorful, unbreakable kind you have around the house when you have little kids—and unfolded a second camp chair.
A wistful glance at the fishing pole and tackle box reminded me of the important business I’d driven up here to transact. Maybe after breakfast. The morning had gotten old, too old for any spectacular angling, but I might be able to coax a late feeder or two to my hook for make lunch...that is if Marcie Rose didn’t have other ideas.
Chapter Two
The engine stopped, the door squeaked, and footsteps crunched up behind me. I said, “Take a seat and grab a plate.”
“Smells good.” Marcie moved around where I could see her, lowered herself into the green fabric chair and laid the Carcano on the ground—far side, right-hand side. The revolver was in her pocket. Well, I’d tried to be non-threatening. Maybe it was beginning to occur to her that I really was.
“Well, pick up a plate, Miss Rose,” I said when she just sat there. “I cooked it for you, but I’m sure not going to feed you too.”
Her lips tightened and she grabbed the yellow one. I scrapped a pile of eggs onto it and half the bacon. “I don’t get you, Granger. I could have killed you a half dozen different times. You don’t seem to be taking me seriously. You think I’m bluffing?”
“No ma’am, I don’t think you’re bluffing. What you say is true. You can kill me, take my clothes, eat my food, and steal my truck like you stole that rifle and parka.” Her eyes got narrow. I went on before she could deny it. “But then you’d be all alone again, wouldn’t you? That’s not what you want or need at the moment, is it?”
She tossed her head and said, “And what do you think I really need, Mr. Psychoanalyst?”
“What you really need is a friend. Someone to help you out of whatever trouble you’re in.”
She didn’t answer, she didn’t have to. The softening about her mouth and eyes told me I’d gotten it right.
I filled a coffee cup and handed it to her. “If you kill me, you might just be killing that someone.”
She didn’t know how to answer that.
“Eat your eggs before they get cold.” I carried my green plate to the other green camp chair, set the cup on the ground and balanced the plate on my knee. Breakfast tasted pretty good, with lots of pepper and couple splashes of Tabasco sauce.
“You’re a strange man, Granger.”
I gave a short laugh. “How’s that,” I asked around a forkful of scrambled eggs.
From the other side of the campfire she peered at me with tired eyes, an egg-filled fork suspended halfway between her plate and mouth. The corner of her lips tipped down into a small frown. She shook her head, dirty, tangled hair brushing her shoulders. “Not sure. If it had been my campsite and you had steamrolled into it waving a junk rifle, making demands, I’d have been furious. It doesn’t seem to bother you.”
“It must be my easygoing nature, ma’am.” I said offhanded, but my thoughts had taken a turn. Marcie Rose had just told me something important about herself. I don’t think she knew she had.
“That’s not it.”
I shrugged. “What’s your theory?”
“Haven’t got one...yet.”
“Maybe I’m stringing you along until you drop your guard?”
“Maybe. Cockran has connections. One thing is certain. You’ve had guns pointed at you before.”
It was my turn to look surprised.
“It’s kind of suspicious finding someone up here in the middle of winter.” She nodded at my fishing gear. “Sure, you’ve got all the right props, but where are the fish? Anyway, who comes up into these mountains in March and freezes their butts just to catch a few lousy fish?” Her eyebrows arched questioningly.
“I do,” I said and just learned something else. A man named Cockran was after her.
“Where are they?”
“You a cop?”
She laughed. “Hardly.”
“My stomach.”
“What?”
“The fish. You asked where they were. I ate them for dinner last night. That is, after all, why I caught them.”
“Real convenient.”
“And tasty.”
Marcie bit the eggs from her fork and stabbed a piece of bacon. “Until I’m certain you don’t work for Cockran, I can’t take a chance.”
“If you say so. More coffee?” She shook her head. I warmed my cup. “So, what does Cockran have on you?”
She looked up sharply. “Can’t talk about it.”
“That bad?”
“Don’t pry.”
“Is Cockran the law?”
“No!” She gave me an incredible look. “I told you not to pry.”
“You’ve kind of made it my business to pry.”
Marcie swallowed a mouthful of eggs, an unhappy look returning to her face.
I said, “How long have you been wandering around out here?”
“Since yesterday morning.”
“Haven’t eaten much since, have you?”
“No.”
“Give me y
our plate.” I scrapped the remaining eggs from the skillet. She didn’t talk and concentrated on eating. I sipped my coffee thinking it over. She still carried a ton of suspicion, but she seemed to have forgotten the revolver in her pocket—well, at least while she took care of her current endeavor of filling the hunger-hole in her stomach. When she’d cleaned the plate, she patted her mouth with the back of her hand and extended the tin cup.
“I’ll have some more now, please.”
“Please?” I nodded approvingly. “That’s a pleasant turn.”
Her view narrowed. “Don’t get the idea anything has changed. You’re still one of the bad guys until I’ve proven otherwise.” The gun reappeared. “I won’t hesitate to use this.”
I laughed just to show her I wasn’t intimidated, although I was a little. In any case, I wasn’t ready to call her bluff. “I believe you would. You seem pretty comfortable around firearms, Miss Rose. Where’d you learn to shoot?”
“We had to-,” she started to say, and then stopped and scowled into her coffee cup. “I had three brothers. They hunted.” She took a drink and stared at me over the cup in her hand. “You’re prying again. Put a lid on it.”
I stood and went to the fishing gear against a tree.
“Where are you going?” she demanded when I took the rod in hand.
“All of a sudden I have this desire for pleasant company. And since I don’t have a dog—supposedly man’s best friend—I’ll have to settle for the company of the local brook trout.”
“You can’t just leave now.”
“Watch me.” I headed for the stream down the hill past a grove of bare-branched aspen trees. Before entering them, I glanced over my shoulder.
Her lips were scrunched, her face tired with a wan, defeated look in her eyes. She had put on a tough act, but the fight had worn her down—that and the weather and the mountains, the grime, and maybe life in general. I suspected a long soak in a warm tub of water would take care of many of her problems—but not all of them. It was easy to feel sorry for her.
I called back, “You’re welcome to use the truck heater again. Leave a window cracked. I can’t guarantee you won’t get carbon monoxide leaking from that rusty exhaust pipe.”
“Mr. Granger. Wait.”
I stopped while she kicked her way through the winter-brown grass, halting just beyond my reach, her right hand inside the oversized pocket. A man with a fishing rod in one hand and a tackle box in the other wasn’t going to suddenly grab her, but she was prepared just in case. Her blue eyes were not threatening now, merely worried.
“I know I’ve been difficult, but trust me, I really can’t tell you what it’s all about.”
“Lady, I don’t trust anyone who points a gun at me.”
She grimaced. “You don’t know what’s involved.”
“And it doesn’t look like you intend to enlighten me, right?”
“I...I can’t.” She caught her lower lip in her teeth.
I shot a sleeve and glanced at my watch. “I came up here to go fishing, Miss Rose, and I’m already late getting about business. If I hurry, I just might snag a straggler or two still feeding.”
She stared at me and I saw in her face a sudden anger that I had the audacity to be more interested in fish than in her. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. I was curious, and pretty sure her problem would prove very interesting, but I’d listen when I was ready to listen. And I wasn’t ready yet. I doubted she was going to go anywhere.
I said, “Climb into the truck and get yourself warm again. I’ll be back in a while.”
“We might not have a while before-.” She caught herself again.
“Before what?”
“Oh, never mind,” she said irritably and stomped back to camp, hands plunged deep inside those big pockets, head turtled down into the collar.
All of a sudden, I wasn’t in the mood to hoof it down to the stream. I did it anyway because I had told her I was going to. Poking around inside the tackle box produced a fuzzy red and yellow fly that I thought might look tasty to the trout—at least it had yesterday—and cast it out and reeled it back in.
Up the hill the truck’s door slammed and the V8 growled awake and settled down to an easy rumbly purr. It didn’t drive away. I didn’t think it would. I hoped she’d cracked open the window like I’d advised her to do.
I played the line back and forth a while with hardly a nibble, not really paying attention to the business of catching fish. Too many other thoughts had buried that whole enterprise beneath a pile of worry growing inside me. Why the secrecy? Who was Marcie Rose running from? Whatever has frightened her was contagious. Something—a feeling—told me it was time to leave. And who was I kidding anyway, standing here pretending to be catching fish?
I reeled in, gathered up my gear, and glanced at my watch. Seventeen minutes was all. It felt longer. The truck rumbled softly through the trees, idling in its peculiar halfhearted fashion.
She had seemed ready to talk. I wanted to hear what she had to say...or at least was willing to tell me. Trudging up the steep landscape, I tried to piece it together, but so far there wasn’t enough to get the corners right let alone the edges.
Coming through the trees, I spied the old beast purring contentedly where I’d left it, but I didn’t see Marcie. I set the gear aside, instantly alert. You never forget, not really. You might think you have, but then something unexpected happens and instantly you’re back. My reflexes had been dulled somewhat by years in front of a blackboard looking at bored faces using up their GI Bill or burning through mom and dad’s bank account. It wasn’t the V.C. now, this was a new enemy, and probably just as deadly.
In a glance I surveyed the campsite, seeing nothing out of place. It could be something as innocent as a hike to a distant tree to take care of business, but I wasn’t taking any chances. Whatever had frightened Marcie had been very real. I was sure of that.
Had she just up and left on foot? She’d said she couldn’t stay. If so, I should feel relief. I didn’t. I stayed back among the trees thinking it through. She’d gotten to me with her talk and wild look. I let go of a breath and felt the adrenaline ebb away. I’d lived the dull, safe life for too long. Maybe I was ready to be scared again—just a little—for old time’s sake.
Even so, I felt a familiar tingle at the back of my neck as I stepped into the open and approached the truck. It was a feeling I’d learned to depend in another place and another time—another lifetime ago, it seemed, and I was reassured that it was still there, just waiting to be used again.
She’d opened the window a crack like I’d told her to. I peered inside. Stretched out on the seat, an arm for a pillow, knees pulled up in the classic fetal position—which was the only way she could fit on the seat—Marcie Rose slept.
Unlike the driver’s door, the passenger’s side didn’t have the annoying squeak. I quietly opened it, reached across and switched off the ignition. Marcie never stirred as the truck shut down. The air inside was toasty warm.
I eased the rifle from the floorboards, slowly opened the action and ejected the cartridge into my hand. I unloaded the magazine next, putting six more rounds of 6.5 ammo into my pocket. I did the same with the revolver, replacing it gently back near her hand.
Marcie slept like a baby. The air inside the cab would remain reasonably warm now with the sun higher and shining on the faded roof. She’d sleep a while, and she needed it.
I returned to the camp chair by the fire, my pocket heavy with ammunition, the feeling inside me lighter for it. With the remaining coffee now in my cup, I pondered my predicament...and suddenly, for no particular reason I could discern, I thought about Sherri.
Chapter Three
The morning had been peaceful. My thoughts were not. Earlier I’d considered brewing another pot of coffee but didn’t think we’d be here much longer. The sky to the north was building a bank of low gray clouds, and rain, or maybe snow, threatened. That wasn’t the reason why I didn’t heat up more water.
I’d tried to ignore it at first, but for the last half hour the far-off baying of hounds had slowly wormed its way into my thoughts. The wind, blowing in from the right direction now, brought that ancient, haunting sound down the mountainside, triggering my early warning system. I grimaced, unable any longer to ignore the klaxon sounding inside my head. Those pups were getting excited, their baying getting louder not softer. They were coming toward me, not away.
If this had been another time, I’d have waited around to see what the dogs were hunting, but Marcie Rose had gotten me psyched out. I had a strong feeling their quarry was the young lady presently asleep inside my pickup truck.
Sound carries a long way down mountain canyons, especially in this cold air, but by the sound of them, those dogs, and whoever was following them, had gotten too close already. I began to fold up camp and haul it to the truck.
When the door squeaked, I poked my head out the camper shell and peered around the side of the truck. “Afternoon, Miss Rose. Have a good nap?”
She looked startled, and then alarmed. “Afternoon?”
“Well, just barely.”
“How long have I been asleep?” A note of panic sounded in her voice.
“About three hours, give or take a handful of minutes.”
“No. I shouldn’t have.”
“You fought it off. You needed it.”
“You don’t understand, Granger. It’s not safe for me out here. Or you either.”
“Me? I thought I was one of the bad guys. Since when do you worry about the enemy’s well-being?”
“Okay. I was wrong.” She looked at the revolver in her hand, at her side. “I probably wouldn’t still have this if you were.”
“Probably not,” I said sharply.
“I don’t blame you for being mad.”
I scooted out of the camper and gathered up the cardboard box of groceries.
She said, “When I came upon your camp this morning I almost crept past it, but the smell of coffee, and a fire...Guess I barged in on your life like a linebacker for the Broncos, didn’t I?”
