Night Wind

by Stephen Mertz

"My God."

  "Remember how she was feeling under the weather at the school meeting? What we saw was the drug she'd been administered first beginning to take effect. After she left us, she went home and committed suicide."

  Robin said again, "My God. If only we'd known. If only I'd insisted on going home with her, like I offered to, maybe. . . ." She heard the despair in her voice, and let the sentence taper off.

  "Robin, we have to deal with what is happening," he said in a steady voice, "not with what could have happened."

  "I know." She forced her mind to push on. They had to push on. They could not dwell on "what if's." They must focus on the unanswered questions. On strategy. She said, "The serial killer. Whoever it is, wouldn't people around him notice that something was wrong, the way we did with Mrs. Lufkin?"

  "Maybe, maybe not. Assume the drug brings to the surface whatever dark impulses each one of us carry buried in our subconscious. The drug causes people to act on those impulses. With Bobby Caldwell it was sheer naked aggressive violence and self-destruction. It awakened Mrs. Lufkin's grief over the loss of her family, a grief that never did heal over the years. Now, the serial killer . . . those impulses are rooted so deeply within him that, even with the drug, he managed to keep it under wraps from those around him. I'm making this up as I go along, by the way. How does it sound so far?"

  "The jury is still out," said Robin. "How could such a drug be administered?"

  "Bittman has men working for him, professionally trained soldiers who sell themselves to the highest bidder. Trained commandos who could move around freely and easily under cover of darkness. These men are trained for stealth. A town like Devil Creek would be nothing for them. They could slip into a person's house while the person slept. Something colorless, odorless, tasteless, added to the morning orange juice. In Bobby's case, make that his morning beer. Simple, and the drug has been administered."

  She said, "That night when I thought I saw someone outside my window—"

  "Remember Charlie driving out from the direction of town to help you and Paul, and then doing his U-turn and driving back into town? I think they had us both under surveillance because we were newcomers and therefore an unknown element in Bittman's little experiment, worth keeping an eye on. We weren't 'pure' locals. That's probably why they didn't dose us. That prowler you saw could damn well have been one of Bittman's guys, or maybe Charlie himself, keeping tabs on us."

  "And these are the men who are after my son." She spoke through clenched teeth.

  He didn't take his eyes from the road, but he grunted an approving sound. "You're pissed off. Good. That's the best motivation there is. Stay mad."

  "Don't you worry about that. Can't we go any faster?" Mike white-knuckled them around another curve. "I'm afraid this is it."

  "Fair enough. And, uh, there is one other thing, Mike."

  "What's that, Robin?"

  "I want to fall in love with you too."

  He glanced at her. "Want to?" he asked.

  Robin was staring straight ahead, steadying herself against the swaying of the speeding Jeep and saying nothing. Mike returned his attention to the road ahead. That line of conversation was done for now.

  Minutes later, they raced across the bridge that spanned the dry creek bed. Then Mike was slowing a little as they tracked onto a dirt road that was hardly more than a two-wheel, rutted path running parallel to a creek bed. The Jeep stormed on, jarring, bouncing as the washboard road climbed and dipped, leading them farther and farther from the highway, deeper and deeper into a seeming nowhere land of scrub brush. The trail topped a rise, dropped back down, and she saw a cleared parcel of land adjacent to the dry creek bed, the adobe but with a very old pickup truck parked in front of it.

  Sunlight shone off the chrome of a Harley Davidson motorcycle next to the truck. A man, clad completely in black, stood securing a bedroll and a backpack to the rear of the motorcycle. As Mike braked to a stop, the man turned toward them. He was a Native American. Lean-muscled, he wore a knife in a sheath at mid-chest. His black hair was worn in long braids. He left the motorcycle, striding forward with no sign of greeting, his face a stern mask, his eyes dark and impassive.

  "Better wait here," Mike suggested to Robin.

  "Like hell," she said.

  She left the Jeep with him, to stand at his side.

  The man in black did not acknowledge her. He walked straight up to Mike. They stood there facing each other, toe-to-toe.

  The man in black said, "You're mighty stupid, mister."

  "I don't have time for macho bullshit, Joe," Mike said.

  "This is Robin Curtis. Robin, Joe Youngfeather."

  Robin said, "Joe, Mike says you're the only person in town who can help us."

  "Your friend is wrong." Youngfeather didn't break eye contact with Mike. "The last time your friend was out here, I thought we came to an understanding that he wasn't coming back again, ever, or it'd be his last time."

  Robin reached out. She gripped Youngfeather by the arm, catching him by surprise and with enough strength to force him to face her.

  "Dammit, mister, I'm talking to you."

  He tugged the arm free. He indicated the Harley. "Everything I own is on that hog over there, except for my butt. And that's where my butt is going to be in one more minute: on that bike, hitting the road. Sorry, lady. I don't know what you came here for, but there's nothing I can do for you."

  "You listen to me, damn you." She indicated the mountains in the near distance. "My son is somewhere up there. He's been shot. There are evil men who want to kill him. He's only twelve years old. You can help us save his life."

  Youngfeather said to Mike, "What the hell is she talking about?"

  "There's no time, Joe," Mike said briskly. "Believe her. Her boy called home and left a message on the answering machine. He's holed up in a cabin. We need you to help us pinpoint his whereabouts."

  "Why don't you call the cops?"

  "Because all of the weird things that have been happening in Devil Creek are connected, and we don't know who to trust."

  Joe said softly, more to himself than to them, "Gray Wolf."

  Mike nodded. "Right. You told me you believed in the spirit world."

  "Gray Wolf dwells there now."

  "The evil he fought against has manifested itself, and it's about to take the life of this woman's son. I never met your grandfather. But from what you've said about him, I think he'd want you to help us."

  "I don't need you to tell me what Gray Wolf would want. He told me already, last night in a dream."

  Robin's impatience bristled to the surface. "We can't afford to stand here talking. We came to you because you're an outsider in the community. We don't know who to trust in the community."

  For some reason, that seemed to be all it took to win Joe's cooperation.

  "You're right," he told Mike. "In my vision, Gray Wolf told me that I would carry on his fight. I told myself that it was just a dream."

  Mike said, "The boy wasn't sure where the cabin is exactly that he was calling from. He said power lines ran along the property, heading down the side of the mountain. He said he could see the town and the landing strip."

  "Could be two or three places."

  "These two or three places," Robin said. "You mean in one area?"

  "Right. Most likely one of the hunting cabins up on Missionary Ridge." Joe surveyed the mountain range. "Yeah, it would be one of three places. I know that country. Been hunting up there." He turned eyes, like laser beams, on Robin. "What the hell's this about men wanting to kill your son?"

  "We'll fill you in," Mike said, "if you're coming with us."

  "I'm going with you. The lady already knows that. Don't you, miss?"

  "I hoped I would find a good man here," Robin said. "I knew that if I did, he would help us."

  "Guess I don't really have a choice. I told you what Gray Wolf said to me in a dream." Joe strode to his Harley, reached into the pack and returned with a pistol that h
e handed to Mike. "Sounds like you could use some firepower."

  Mike accepted the weapon, but with a frown. He slipped the gun into his belt.

  "Let's do it," he said.

  They hurried to the Jeep. As they boarded, Robin said to Joe, "Aren't you taking a gun?"

  Joe nodded to the Harley. "What I'd like to take is that hog. But a bike's no good for sneaking up on folks." He patted the wide-bladed knife worn on his chest. "This is the only weapon I'll need."

  "Where to?" Mike asked.

  "Back past town. A dirt road. The cabins are about a half mile up. It's a steep climb."

  "Hang on."

  Robin grasped the roll bar and the dash. She thought, my God. A mad scientist and Indian mysticism. Stay safe, Paul, she thought, fighting down the panic that would take hold if only she'd let it. Mom is on her way.

  The Jeep kicked up a cloud of red dirt, rocketing back along the washboard road back toward the highway.

  Chapter Forty

  The command center for the volunteer search and rescue was a dozen or so official vehicles of every description parked alongside the highway, flanked by dozens of civilian vehicles driven by the volunteer searchers. The temperature was gradually returning to normal as the sun crested the mountaintop.

  Ben Saunders sat behind the steering wheel of his cruiser, listening to the police band, staring at the short wave radio in his hand as if doing so would somehow summon up news that the boys had been found.

  The area crackled with activity. Rooftop lights flashed. Police radios chattered. Personnel from several agencies moved about grimly. There were satellite dish-topped television vans from Albuquerque and Las Cruces. Enterprising reporters had continually broken through, pointing microphones in Ben's face. They all wanted to know the same thing. Was there anything that hadn't been made public yet about the missing boys? The search teams continued to fan out, all in radio contact with the base camp, making good time. But there was no sign of Paul Curtis or Jared Philbin, on or off the record.

  When Ben saw Roy Rinehart approaching, he stepped from the cruiser. He could see, over Roy's shoulder, where Mrs. Philbin, Jared's mother, was being cared for at one of the ambulances that were waiting to give immediate attention to the boys if they were found. When they were found, Ben corrected himself. It was only a matter of time. That's what he'd told Mrs. Philbin when she showed up, drunk as a skunk at seven-thirty in the morning. She was a gaunt woman who looked older than her thirty-eight years. She was overwrought; had screamed into Ben's face, berating him in slurred words reeking of whiskey, accusing him of not doing enough. Her son was lost and it was his job to find Jared. He was failing in his duties. He was a sorry excuse for a policeman. Why wasn't he up there helping the others? Ben had motioned to Roy with a silent nod to escort her to the paramedics.

  "Thanks," he now greeted Rinehart. "I sure feel sorry for that woman. Must be hell on earth."

  Roy nodded, his eyes sympathetic. "At least she's in good hands. That's all we can do for her, Chief. Anything new come in on the radio?"

  "The choppers reported in. They haven't seen a thing." Ben lifted his eyes to the sky above the mountain. "I wish I was up there with them."

  "Don't let what Mrs. Philbin said get to you, about not doing your job and all. We're doing our best. We got the Rev sedated and under guard at the hospital. There won't be any more serial killings."

  "I know. That's one of the few things we have accomplished." The Devil Creek media circus had gone into high gear on two fronts at the start of this day. Another news contingent was staked out at the Town Hall after learning of Kroeger's arrest. The Reverend, a psycho serial killer. Everyone was having trouble absorbing that one, including Ben. He said, "I don't like sitting on the sidelines."

  "You've got that look, Chief," said Roy. "What are you thinking?"

  "I'm thinking that I could pull some rank and get on one of those search choppers, me being the Chief and all, if I pushed hard enough."

  "Can't say as I'd blame you for wanting that. I'm getting right antsy myself, sitting on my thumbs down here with nothing to do but wait."

  "Think I'll have a talk with one of them chopper flyboys."

  "We'll find those kids, Chief. You'll see."

  "I want to find them alive, Roy. Damn. Sure wish we could find the Curtis boy's mother and that neighbor fella, Mike Landware."

  "It's kind of unusual, her not being around waiting for word with the rest of us."

  "Real unusual. Stay here and keep an ear to the ground. I'm going to see a man about a helicopter."

  Chapter Forty-One

  The winding, climbing road became extremely rugged as soon as it left the highway, so steep and curving, with spots of mud and clay made slick by last night's mixture of rain and snow, that it was difficult for the Jeep to build much speed. Within less than a quarter mile, they were into the pines. Time crawled for Robin, dragging slower the closer they got to where, she hoped with of all her heart, they would find Paul.

  Mike gave Joe a concise briefing on Dr. Horace Bittman and the very real probability that a madman's private, unauthorized mind control experiment was being conducted upon the citizens of Devil Creek. Unlike her, Joe did not register initial disbelief or skepticism. He sat there, leaning forward, resting one arm on the back of their bucket seats, listening without comment to the recitation.

  Mike concluded, "So that's why we don't know who to trust."

  "That's easy," was the first thing Joe said. "Don't trust white men." He spoke without emotion, stating a simple fact of life.

  "We're white," Robin pointed out.

  "You're a white woman," Joe said. "That gets you the benefit of the doubt." To Mike, he said, "You, I'm not so sure about."

  "That's mighty nice of you," Mike said without rancor. "Joe, let's cut the crap. Tell me what you think."

  "Okay. I believe everything you just told me."

  "Glad to hear it, because another thing connected to everything else was you and me getting acquainted. Charlie Flagg's assignment was to keep tabs on what they couldn't monitor electronically, and that included you and your grandfather. Charlie 'suggested' that I visit you and Gray Wolf for a possible story for the newspaper. That was his attempt to keep tabs on the two of you. Unfortunately for Charlie, I told him you didn't exactly make me feel welcome and that was all he ever got. But anything I had told him would have been reported directly to Bittman."

  "The evil which Gray Wolf saw coming," said Joe. "It was Bittman and what he's doing to your town."

  "You may be an outsider," Robin said, "but it's your town too."

  "No. Not my town. My fight. There's a big difference. And when the fight is over, my debt to my grandfather will have been paid in full and I'll have my ass on that Harley and be on my way the hell out of here."

  She considered this. She considered Joe. The man was an enigma. A brooding, impassive man of obvious physical and inner strength. A man used to his own company, his own council; unaccustomed to helping, or asking for help. An outsider, yes. She may have been a new arrival, but Joe Youngfeather was a true outsider. And here he was, helping them, quite likely about to risk his life for her and her son, both total strangers. She understood that there was more to it for him. There was the "evil" they spoke of and his grandfather, Gray Wolf. This was somehow intensely personal for Joe even before Robin had entered the equation. She wanted to know more about this. But later, when there was time.

  There was some sort of begrudging mutual respect between Joe and Mike from some previous encounters, obviously, but that was a male thing that she had little interest in at the moment. It was enough for her that they were working as a team, and that she felt she could depend on them. As for Joe, never in her life, and likely never again, had a stranger played such a key role in such a vitally immediate life and death matter to her. The thought came to her that everyone lived in a world of strangers, where people can mean nothing or everything to each other, can build or destroy, save or condemn,
at unforeseeable points when the arcs of lives interconnect.

  She did not want Joe to remain a stranger. As good-looking a specimen of manhood as he was, she did not have the hormonal or heart response to him that she had for Mike. These feelings for this new acquaintance weren't about that. But she hoped that a way would present itself for them to become real friends when this was over. Joe would fascinate Paul, and she sensed that Joe would understand her son, who was an outsider in his own right.

  She said, "Your grandfather sounds like a wise, special man, Joe." She hoped that she didn't sound inane. Talking took some of the edge off her anxiety.

  "To most people around here," said Joe, "Grandfather was the crazy old Indian who lived outside of town. They laughed at him. Hell, I don't know. Maybe sometimes I thought he was crazy too, after I'd spent too much time around white folks. I told myself that I could ride away from this after he died, him sitting out there in the hot sun in the middle of that dry creek bed, chanting away day and night. Chanting himself to death. Well, I can't ride away."

  "I'm sorry I'll never get to meet him."

  "If I'm right and this is the evil he saw coming, maybe you will meet him. I've seen too much over the years not to believe in Gray Wolf's magic."

  "I hope his magic helps us today."

  Robin had always considered herself spiritual, but she wasn't a churchgoer. Still, it was impossible not to acknowledge a greater power in the universe than man, a power responsible for creation. And she agreed with her New Age friends that there were most likely more planes of reality than our own. Perhaps it was a feminine "thing," but she'd had truly intuitive experiences in her life. Yes, there was more to reality than what the five senses perceived. Strange thoughts to be having as she bounced along in this Jeep on their way to hopefully—no, definitely!—find her son. But Joe's talk of his grandfather and magic brought into stark relief in her mind this collision course of mysticism, on the part of Joe and Gray Wolf, versus the powers of high tech and modern bureaucratic evil in the form of a madman named Horace Bittman.