Books by Sue Henry

by Henry, Sue

  A tiny whimper of fear escaped Patrick and he jerked as if he had been unexpectedly touched, then froze into stillness.

  Jessie also froze, staring into the darker shadows of the motor home, trying to see as well as hear, but whoever it was stayed on the far side of the rig, out of sight. She knew the coach door was locked, so this person would probably try the cab doors next. She had locked the one on the driver’s side, but had the passenger door been locked or not? She couldn’t remember and silently cursed herself for not checking it before they slid out. With a sinking feeling she remembered that Patrick had climbed out on that side when they stopped and come to the coach door to get back in. Had he locked it? Most likely he had not. There was no point in asking, with what was almost certainly his stepfather so close.

  Was it his stepfather? Could it possibly be Webster or Loomis? Even Maxie? Could whoever had been using the tools to build the unfinished cabin have come in the middle of the night? She thought not. Any one of them, looking for her, would have made obvious sounds as they approached, would have called out to let her know they were there. This person, whoever it was, had moved stealthily and was taking his time.

  The sound of the passenger door handle reached her, and as she had feared, the door opened. She could hear him climb in and vaguely saw the Winnebago rock slightly with his movement. There was a long pause, then the galley light came on and remained on. He was searching. But now there were walls between him and the two of them. It was time to go, and quickly.

  “Come on,” she breathed in Patrick’s ear. “We’re getting out of here.”

  He shrank back. “He’ll hear us.”

  “Get up, Patrick. He’ll do more than that if we don’t go. He’ll be out here and find us in a minute or two.”

  Hauling the boy to his feet, she half-dragged him out of the brush and onto the grassy verge of road that curved gently down toward the lake. Thinking he would stay close behind her, she let go of his arm and started to lead him away from the motor home as quietly as she could. But Patrick was clumsy in his panic and almost ran to catch up with her, stepping off the grass and onto the road itself, where the sound of his feet made an unmistakable crunching on the gravel.

  Behind them Jessie heard a muffled shout from inside the motor home and the screech of the coach door as it opened, then the thud of it flying back to hit the outside wall. There was the sound of running from the side to the front of the rig, and without warning a bright beam pierced the dark in their direction—a flashlight.

  “Hey. Stop right there. I’ve still got a gun,” the man yelled.

  But Jessie knew that his night vision had been compromised by turning on the galley light. If they could stay out of the beam of light he was waving around, they might make it far enough to put a tree or two between them. Grabbing Patrick’s arm again she tried to yank him into a run, but he had taken only three or four steps when he stepped on a rock that rolled from under his foot and pitched forward, falling to his hands and knees in the road.

  The sound of boots closing in behind them kept Jessie in motion. She knew instantly that stopping to rescue the fallen boy would only put them both within range; that their one chance might be for her to remain on the loose and free to find help. She dashed on into the dark, paying no attention to how much noise she was making now—knowing he would stop to make sure of Patrick before he turned his attention in her direction.

  Reaching the lakeshore, she angled west and continued to run along it, finding it not covered with rocks as she had imagined it would be, but quite flat and covered with grass that muffled the sound of her pounding feet, though she couldn’t tell if she was leaving a track he could follow. She ran until she was gasping for breath, then paused to listen for pursuit—leaning forward, hands braced on knees as she panted, held her breath, and panted again. Hearing nothing behind her, she all but staggered into the shelter of the brush and trees that lined the shore. Throwing herself down, she lay completely still on her belly, trying to control her ragged breathing enough to listen—and to not be found.

  By the time she was finally breathing normally and had taken the bottle of water from her pocket to quench the thirst produced by her run, she knew that Patrick’s stepfather had not followed her along the edge of the lake. But morning was coming, when he might.

  What could she do now, without transportation or communication? It was nearly seven miles to Teslin. Should she climb up to follow the highway into town and try to find help there? It would take precious time. Or should she stay where she could perhaps watch for Patrick? Would he keep the boy in the motor home where it was or drive it out and away on the road above? The keys were in her pocket, but she guessed that a policeman would be able to start the vehicle without them.

  Leaning back against a fallen birch log, she rested and considered the situation. She mustn’t do anything that might get Patrick or herself hurt—or killed. She mustn’t put herself back into the hands of this frightening man. But under all her deliberations, she knew she would go back—that there really wasn’t a choice to be made—for she remembered Patrick’s panic and the terror his stepfather inspired in him. She couldn’t leave them alone together.

  What she really wanted to know was why all this was happening. What could be so important that this man would make such an effort to locate and capture his stepson? He had evidently killed the boy on the bridge at Kiskatinaw. Would he kill Patrick before she could find a way to rescue him?

  Slowly, Jessie stood up and began to move cautiously up the hill from where she had rested in the trees. As she crept through the darkness among the trees that grew more thickly away from the water, every shadow seemed a threat and the slightest rustle of leaves a menace. Feeling extremely vulnerable, as a stone slid from under her foot and hit another with a sharp report, she knew that there was no way to disguise the small sounds of her passage through the forest. There were too many things she couldn’t see in the gloom—and one of them might be the very person she least wanted to meet.

  24

  WHEN MAXIE WOKE EARLY THE NEXT MORNING, IT was just growing bright enough to see inside the Jayco without turning on a light. Swinging her feet toward the floor, she came close to stepping on Stretch and Tank, who were curled up together beside the bed.

  “Good morning, galahs. Time for a walk before breakfast. Yes?”

  Stretch, more than familiar with the word walk, went pattering off into the front of the coach, but Tank only sat up and watched attentively while she washed her face, brushed her teeth, and dressed for the day.

  “You’re really missing Jessie, aren’t you?” she asked him and reached to give him a few consoling pats. “So am I. We’ll go and find her then, shall we?”

  At the sound of the familiar name, he turned his head toward the door, as if expecting Jessie to open it and walk in. When it remained closed, he moved back to sit beside it as he had the day before, silently, patiently begging to be let out.

  Maxie took the time to put a pot of coffee on to brew, then attached leashes to the collars of both dogs, put on a jacket, and stepped out into the coolness of the early dawn air.

  Across the parking lot she could see Webster, still sitting in the patrol car watching the highway, as a truck that reminded her of Stringer rumbled past, heading for Whitehorse and probably Alaska beyond it. She walked across to the car window, which he rolled down to greet her. In the passenger seat, Loomis was asleep, head back, mouth open, snoring in a soft buzz.

  The two law enforcement officers had stopped and knocked on the door of the Jayco when they returned from the Dawson Peaks Resort the night before. Startled awake, Maxie had realized she had gone to sleep in her clothes and that the lights were still on, as she went to the door to let them in.

  They had found no evidence of Jessie, Patrick, or the Winnebago.

  “It’s still closed for the season,” Webster had told her. “The lodge is locked up tight and there’s no one in the RV spaces. She isn’t there, Maxie.”
<
br />   “What shall we do?”

  “Wait till morning. Loomis and I will take shifts watching the road in case we missed her somehow between here and Liard Hot Springs. If she goes past, we’ll see her. When it gets light we’ll go back and search the place again—when we can see to do it right.”

  There had been little else to suggest. Still, Maxie worried. Now it was light enough and she wanted to see Dawson Peaks for herself. Jessie might have arrived there after Webster and Loomis returned to Teslin.

  “I just put on a pot of coffee,” she told Webster through the car window. “Shall I bring you a cuppa, or will you come in?”

  He would come in, leaving Loomis, who was yawning his way to consciousness, to keep watch, then to take his turn.

  While the inspector made a quick trip to the restroom in the Yukon Lakeshore Resort, she walked the dogs. They arrived at the Jayco at the same time and climbed in, Tank, as usual, resisting, then sitting watch at the door, though this morning he ate the food that Maxie set down beside him.

  “You know,” Webster said thoughtfully, sipping at a steaming mug of coffee as he looked at the dog that so clearly wanted to be elsewhere, “I think that husky of Jessie’s might be some help this morning. If she’s out there, or has been out there, he just might figure it out faster than we would. Should have taken him last night maybe.”

  Maxie, who in lieu of cooking breakfast had put out bread and fruit, agreed. “Can we go soon? I’m really worried.”

  “I’ll send Loomis to ride with you while he has his coffee and we’ll go now.”

  Readying the Jayco, Maxie was ready to roll in ten minutes, at the wheel herself this time.

  A caribou moved like a shadow in the unreliable first hint of dawn light, slipping so steadily and silently through the edge of the trees that it was difficult for Jessie to tell if it was actually there or only the product of imagination and fear, for she had watched the area around the Winnebago with anxiety for over an hour from a spot high on the hill above it. Wisps of ground fog drifted almost imperceptibly around the animal, partially obscuring its background. Without sunlight to brighten nature’s colors they were all similar neutral shades of gray, and she found that the caribou was almost undetectable when she looked at it directly—only a hint of motion in her peripheral vision. Slowly it moved away and without a sound disappeared among the trees.

  The pale sky was scattered with clouds beginning to show the first of the light that would soon be caught in the glow of the rising sun, reflecting it onto the dark waters below. The breeze had died and everything was very still, even the lake. Nothing moved but the mist that flowed slowly from the water across the shore, just above the long grass through which Jessie had run in her flight the night before.

  She had made her way from the forested edge of the lake back to a sheltered place near the lodge, where she could see but not be seen. She had half expected the Winnebago to be gone, that Patrick’s stepfather would have driven it up the hill and escaped on the highway. But when she arrived at a point where she could look down, she could make it out still sitting where she had parked it. She knew it was still occupied for she had heard shouting from it less than fifteen minutes earlier, though it was now quiet.

  Why had he elected to stay there? He must have realized that she was a threat, that it would be possible for her to reach Teslin in little more than an hour and come back with help. What had he waited for?

  She couldn’t go in after him or go too near the motor home; he might use the gun on her or Patrick. Her greatest fear was that he might use the gun on the boy before she could make her way back, but his shouting had told her otherwise. In the dark she had crept once down the hill, trying to hear what was being said inside the rig, but made out very little, only the loudest of his angry threats and demands. “Where is it, dammit. What have you done with it?”

  She wished she had not been so tired the night before that she had neglected to make Patrick tell her everything, as he had promised. Now she wanted desperately to know what it was. The boy was evidently stubborn and stronger than he appeared, even if he was terrified of the man, for as long as the demands continued it was clear he had not told what he knew. She hoped he realized that whatever his stepfather wanted might be all that was keeping him alive. Whatever it was, it must be very important to the Wyoming cop to make him so irate and keep him from making the boy disappear, which would be so incredibly easy in this kind of country. All he would have to do was drive off the highway on some lonely road and either take Patrick into the millions of miles of trees, where nothing of him would ever be found, or dump him into one of the swift-flowing rivers that wound their way away from the few manmade paths into the endless wilderness where man had never, and might never, set foot.

  Jessie had gone carefully back up the hill to the space she had found, sat down on a log to keep herself from the cold damp ground, and continued her watch, determined to know if the rig was moved or if they left it, waiting impatiently for daylight.

  Not more than half an hour later it was light enough to see quite well through the trees when the door of the Winnebago suddenly opened and the man pushed the boy out onto the ground, from which he picked himself up slowly. He had secured Patrick’s hands together behind him with duct tape and applied a strip of it across his mouth, ensuring his silence. Jessie could see that he carried the roll of tape with him in one hand. She remained unmoving in the shadows of the trees and watched between the leaves of a bush as the man looked cautiously around, making sure there was no one to see, then turned back to the boy.

  From the way Patrick stood, shoulders slumped, head hanging, Jessie knew he had not only been hurt but had finally given in to his stepfather’s demands and told him what he wanted to know, for every line of him had been sketched with the gray mourning color of defeat. He exhibited no resistance and seemed to have only enough endurance to keep himself upright as the man growled something and shoved him forward.

  At first Jessie thought he meant to walk the boy up the hill, and began to glance around for some other hiding place, for she would be visible the minute they were halfway up and came around the curve in the road. But instead Patrick was directed onto the path that led to the lakeshore, stumbling slightly, moving on legs that looked as if they might collapse under him.

  As the man and boy moved behind a small stand of trees, she got up and quickly slipped farther down the hill. Crouching behind the narrow trunks of a pair of birch trees, she could see that they were heading for two small boats that lay at the edge of the water, each covered with a blue plastic tarp to keep out the rain. She had not noticed them at all, half in, half out of the water, either in her run past them in the dark or in the half-light of this new morning.

  It became clear what McMurdock meant to do when he paused to pick up a large rock and carry it along to the nearest boat: drown the boy and be sure his body never surfaced from the deep lake as evidence of the murder. Pulling off the tarp, he pushed the boat out until it floated, then made the boy clamber in and climbed in after him. There he taped the boy’s legs together and used the rest of the tape to attach the heavy stone to his feet. Swiftly, competently, he fitted oars into the oar-locks and began to row the boat away from the shore with strong, deft strokes.

  Jessie could hardly believe what she was seeing but understood its significance immediately and, ceasing to care if she was seen or not, wanting him to know he had a witness, stood up and shouted.

  “No-o!”

  Then she was running down the hill toward the water, leaping over brush, stumbling, falling once to her knees, crashing through branches that caught and tore at her as she passed, dashing across the lower part of the gravel road and finally out onto the open ground of the lakeshore.

  McMurdock’s head came up as he heard her yell, but he continued to row. By the time she reached the water, he was twenty yards out and too far away for her to catch.

  She screamed at him in frustration and anger. “I’m here, yo
u bastard, and I see what you’re doing.”

  He didn’t pause as he looked back in her direction, just kept on rowing steadily, and grinned at her, powerless on the shore.

  “You’re next, girlie,” he called, every word carrying across the still water, over the rhythmic sound of the oars. “I almost got you at Summit Lake and I’ll get you now. You’re next.”

  Jessie knew she couldn’t stop him, but, beyond fear, she thought she might be able to distract him enough to keep him from drowning Patrick, as he obviously intended. If he threw the boy overboard, maybe she could keep him from sinking irretrievably into the dark depths of the lake. The boy in the back of the boat sat silent and frozen in dread, wide, horror-filled eyes looking back at her over one shoulder as he was carried away over the ominous water.

  She went quickly to yank the blue cover from the second boat, shoved the boat into the water, and was turning it around when she noticed a detail he had missed. Canted up so its propeller was out of the water, an outboard motor was clamped tightly to the transom at the back of the boat, invisible until its covering was removed. One single piece of luck, for the man in the other boat would surely have taken this one had he seen it.

  Wading into the shallows, Jessie climbed into the boat. It rocked, almost unbalancing her, as she moved quickly to examine the motor.

  A can of fuel sat next to it, half under the rear seat, a hose attached to the motor. Someone had taken this boat out recently and planned to use it again soon or the motor and its fuel would not have been left. Another piece of luck.

  She tipped the motor on its hinged clamp, easing the propeller into the water.