“Calm down,” whispered Joshua soothingly. “What is it now?”
“It’s Dad. He didn’t come back home last night. I’ve been out looking for him and—” He gulped convulsively. “I’ll take you to where he is.”
Beckoning to them, Tip turned, and retraced his tracks. Joshua followed at an easy trot, while Kehoe stumblingly brought up the rear. They passed through a large clearing where the ground had been blown free of snow, and Kehoe almost tripped as twigs and leaves caught at the webbing of his snowshoes.
Reentering the forest, the men finally reached a vertical mass of shale that jutted upward like some monstrous grave marker. Tip signaled for Joshua and Kehoe to stop. “Over . . . over there.”
Leaning their rifles against a tree, the two men left Tip and moved off in the direction that he had indicated. The white snow on the ground caught the sunlight that filtered through the branches and threw it back into their eyes so they squinted from the glare. They burst out onto what appeared to be a game trail amid the trees – and suddenly the snow wasn’t white anymore.
It was red. The bloody, frozen circle was almost six feet in diameter.
Kehoe had seen dead men before, but he clamped his teeth together and swallowed loudly as he beheld the body of Karl Spearing spread-eagled in the snow, its lower part across the bloody stain. The body’s left foot was shod in a calked boot with the letter “S” worked into the sole – but all that was left of its right leg was a stump, ending in a raw, open wound.
“Cut clean through the leg bones, just below the knee,” Kehoe said to Joshua. “Knife’s missing from the sheath at his hip, too. What do you suppose happened?”
“Oi’ve got a fair idea,” replied the Indian. “Not too pretty, either. Oi’ve heard about such things often enough in this country, but this is the first time oi’ve seen it. Would ye mind followin’ me? An’ hev a care where ye step, if ye please, so’s not to destroy tracks. Eventually we’ll hev to call in the local law. No sense ruinin’ all such things fer ‘em.”
They moved off down the trail, keeping well clear of the wide swath in the snow where Karl Spearing had evidently dragged his tortured body in a desperate attempt to seek help. The trail led past a thick stand of willow shoots. Joshua pulled aside the leafless branches.
“Yonder’s the trap, Mr Kehoe. Hev a look.”
Kehoe gaped at the shiny-toothed jaws of the bear trap in the midst of the white snow of the willows. They were clamped inexorably together on a bloody booted leg.
His eyes riveted on the leg, Kehoe spoke to Joshua. “You said you knew what happened here. What was it?”
Quickly the Indian sketched in the story. A lone man in midwinter, the chance misstep, and the heavy jaws of the trap, chained to a thick tree, leaping up out of the snow to grip the leg. In such a fix there was only one desperate chance, to be taken before cold seeped too deeply into the bones and blood.
A tight tourniquet was applied, after which the imprisoned limb was packed with snow to numb it as much as possible. Then, in a grinding hell of shock and pain, the pinioned man performed an amputation – on himself. Finally, if cold and loss of blood did not take their toll, it might be possible to make one’s way to where help was available. A slim chance at best, but Karl Spearing knew what must be done. He had tried – and he had lost.
“Spearing’s house is but a short ways beyond the trees there,” Joshua said, pointing. “Great big stone buildin’ it is, with a telephone line down to the village. If he’d been able to get to it, he might be alive now.”
“Rotten business,” added Kehoe. He pointed to a bone-handled hunting knife lying on the flattened snow. “Must be what he did the operation with. The poor devil hardly had a chance, did he? Well, what now?”
“We’d best get back to Tip and take him to the house. Oi’ll call Vern Lefner from there.”
“Lefner? Who’s that?”
“He’s our sheriff. When he’s done makin’ out his reports on this – that’ll take several hours, ez Vern loves to scribble on official papers – the two of ye kin talk about police work fer the rest uv the day. What with all our shoutin’ and hollerin’, oi doubt there’s a deer left in the whole county.”
“Do you think it’ll be okay to leave the body unguarded? I mean, couldn’t it be mutilated by wild animals?”
“Oi’d doubt it. There’s some bears ez travels this game trail during the summer, but they’re all hibernatin’ now. Besides, they’re not too partial to human flesh. And the body’s too cold and stiff to attract wolves.”
The two men flanked the wide trail in the snow that led back to Karl Spearing’s body. Kehoe gave the corpse a wide berth, but Joshua seemed intent on examining it at close range. Suddenly he paused, peering quizzically at a spot on the ground.
“There’s a queer thing,” he breathed softly.
“What’s the matter?” called Kehoe, who had moved a few paces ahead.
“Oi’ve found a bit uv an oddity here. Yer the detective. Come and tell me what you make uv it.”
Kehoe padded closer on his snowshoes.
“Hev a care,” Joshua said. “Ye’d not want to destroy evidence, would ye?”
“Evidence? What evidence?”
Joshua pointed to a spot near the toe of the left snowshoe. “What hev ye to say about that?”
“Karl Spearing’s footprint, that’s all. There’s no mistaking that ‘S’ from the bottom of his boot. He probably tried to stand before he became too weak to do so, and—”
“Mister Kehoe, would ye take note uv the fact that the print wuz made by the right foot? An’ the leg to which that foot’s attached is now caught fifty yards back down the trail in a bear trap.”
“Why yes, that’s true, but—”
“Then tell me, sor, how did the print get up here next to the body?”
“Well, it . . . that is . . . Oh, there’s got to be some simple answer.”
“Then would ye care to offer an explanation? Is it yer contention that the severed leg, takin’ on a life uv its own, somehow got out uv the trap an’ then hippety-hopped down here to the body like a Pogo stick? An’ then later returned and put itself back into the trap?”
“No, of course not. But . . . well, maybe Karl Spearing left the print several days earlier. If there was no new snow since then . . .”
“He just happened to be in the area, I suppose? An’ how would you suggest he arrived here that first time? There’s no second set of footprints. Just the ones that lead to the thicket where the trap is.”
“Oh. Then perhaps Spearing walked ahead on the trail a little way and came to this spot. He went back for some reason, and that’s when he got himself caught. Dragging his body along, he’d have covered up the other tracks he made.”
“Oi see.” Joshua’s voice dripped sarcasm. “He walks up to here. ‘Oh my!’ he sez, ‘oi’ve forgotten somethin’.’ So he turns about, walks back down the trail and thrusts his foot into a trap he’d set hisself. After cuttin’ off his own leg he crawls back, destroyin’ all tracks except this one by the body, which he leaves to confound us. No, Mr Kehoe. There’s more to Karl Spearing’s death than meets the eye.”
“Josh, according to what you told me yourself, this whole thing is open and shut. Karl Spearing cut off his leg and then bled – or froze – to death. Stop trying to make such a big deal out of it. Why, if you hadn’t seen that footprint—”
“Ah, but I did see it, Mr Kehoe. An’ so did you.”
“Yes, and I’ll bet when this Lefner fellow gets here, he’ll have a dozen logical explanations for how it got there. Better leave detective work to the police, Josh.”
“Very well. But oi’ll hev no part uv any explanation uv Karl Spearing’s death that doesn’t take that footprint – that damned impossible footprint – into account.”
The two men returned to where the weeping Tip Spearing was waiting and half-led, half-carried him through the woods to his house. While Kehoe looked for the telephone to put in a call
to the village, Joshua laid logs in the huge fireplace and soon had a roaring blaze going. From the liquor cabinet he took a bottle and administered a healthy tot of whiskey to Tip as well as taking a mammoth swig for himself. Then he laid Tip on the couch and repeated the dosage. Within half an hour the bottle was nearly empty, Tip was asleep, and Joshua was honoring Kehoe with a nasal rendition of “The Rose of Tralee”.
It was almost noon when Sheriff Vernon Lefner’s jeep stopped at the edge of the dirt road that ran past the house. Matt Kehoe met him at the door.
“Glad to know you,” Lefner said when Kehoe had introduced himself. “Always good to meet another cop. How’s the hunting been going?”
“Got me a new guide this time,” Kehoe said. “His name’s Joshua Red Wing. He looks Indian but talks like he was mayor of Dublin. Do you know him?”
“Know him?” was the reply. “I’ve run him in for hunting and fishing out of season more times than I can remember. He’s a good guide though, at least when he’s sober. By the way, what’s that sound? Is somebody using a chain saw out back?”
In reply Kehoe opened the door to the livingroom. In front of the embers of a dying fire Joshua was sprawled out in a leather easy chair. His eyes were closed, but his open mouth resembled the entrance to a mine shaft. The gargantuan snores coming from his throat reverberated from the room’s beamed ceiling.
Lefner, considering the empty bottle on the floor near the Indian’s right hand, said, “He’ll be out for quite a while, but it’s just as well. It’ll give the two of us a chance to examine Karl Spearing’s body.”
“Fine.” Kehoe hauled his parka from the closet. “By the way, Josh found a footprint down there. A little strange, its being where it is, I guess. But he’s trying to make a big thing of it.”
“Between his police magazines and what he sees on TV, Josh considers himself another Sherlock Holmes,” Lefner commented. “C’mon. Maybe we can get back before he wakes up and decides he’s being attacked by a herd of pink elephants.”
It was almost sundown when Joshua woke. He got up from his chair, holding his head as if it were about to burst, and gingerly walked to the kitchen.
“Cold lamb,” he groaned, looking from the two men at the table to the platter in front of them through bloodshot eyes. Within the Indian’s head a gang of tiny miners seemed to be excavating his brain with pickaxes and dynamite.
“We found it in Karl’s refrigerator,” Lefner said. “I had some men come up and take the body to Dr Fanchion’s in town for a medical examination, but I wanted to be here to ask Tip a couple of questions when he wakes up. I thought we might as well eat while we’re waiting. Slice some off, Josh, and dig in.”
“No sense me even tryin’ to eat,” moaned Joshua softly. “With a bit o’ luck, oi’ll be dead within the hour anyway.”
He shuffled to the door, threw it open, and took several deep breaths of the cold, clear air. Slowly his eyes focused, and the mining operations within his head closed down. “An’ what, Vernon, is yer conclusion ez to Karl Spearing’s death?”
“An accident, no question about it, Josh. Spearing did everything he could to save himself. If he hadn’t cut off his leg he’d have frozen to death right there in the trap. As it was, well, at least he went a lot more quickly his way.”
“An’ the footprint? Ye did see it, didn’t ye?”
Lefner nodded. “I saw it, Josh. It’s gone now, of course. When the men came for the body they scuffed up the area pretty badly.”
“So it’s gone, eh? An’ with it, any embarrassin’ explanations ye’d hev to make about it.”
Lefner gestured toward Kehoe. “We both saw it, Josh. We admit it was there. It’s just that we don’t think it’s that important.”
“Oh.” Joshua slumped into a chair. “Oi see. Then how d’ye explain its presence by the body?”
“I don’t know, Josh, but . . .” Lefner shook his head in annoyance. “Kehoe, talk to this knothead, will you? Tell him what police work is really like.”
Joshua turned to Kehoe, a look of intense interest on his face. “Do that, Mr Kehoe,” he said. “Talk to me about how the police ignore clues that’s right in front of their noses.”
Kehoe cut himself another slice of lamb, the knife grating on the bone of the roast. “What Lefner is trying to say,” he began, “is that real police cases aren’t like the shows on TV. On the crime shows everything’s neatly wrapped up at the finish. But in real-life criminal cases there are a lot of loose ends—”
“Ez the police,” interrupted Joshua, “oi merely want yez to explain how that one footprint got up by the body, when the foot that made it wuz fifty yards away, caught tight in a bear trap. Is that too much fer a tax-payin’, law-abidin’ citizen to ask?”
Lefner was taken with a sudden fit of coughing. “Josh, we’ve got to be getting back to town,” he said finally, getting control of himself. “Now we’re going to have to wake Tip, and when we do, I don’t want to hear anything more about that footprint. The boy’s been through enough for one day.”
“Then ye wouldn’t be interested in me theory.”
Kehoe and Lefner looked at one another and then both stared at Joshua. “What theory?” asked Kehoe.
“About the footprint, uv course. But if you two detective gintlemen are too busy, why . . .”
Lefner, red-faced, began rising from his chair. Kehoe restrained him. “Just a minute, Vern. How long will this take, Josh?”
“P’rhaps thirty minutes. Oi’m sure Tip’ll sleep that much longer. He drank almost ez much ez oi did from that bottle, an’ he ain’t had near the practice.”
“Okay!” Lefner pounded the table. “Okay, Josh. We’ll hear you out. But it had better make sense. And after this, no more talk about that blasted footprint. Agreed?”
“Yer charmin’ manner puts me completely in yer power,” Joshua said. “Agreed.”
The Indian stood up and dug a hand deep into a trousers pocket. Then he held the hand over the table and allowed three scraps of grimy paper to fall lightly in front of Lefner. “Oi’d ask yez to look at these,” he said. “Meanwhile oi’ll be outside, lookin’ about a bit.”
As Joshua left the room, Lefner took one of the bits of paper and passed another to Kehoe. “Looks like an IOU,” Lefner said. “From Tip Spearing to Joshua. Seven dollars and eighteen cents.”
“Mine’s the same,” Kehoe said. “But the amount’s different. A dollar and a quarter.”
“Less than a week old, both of them. The third’s for five dollars even. Josh probably got ’em in one of those poker games they hold at the hotel. Everybody in town knows Tip gives IOU’s. But he always makes good on them.”
“But what’s this got to do with the footprint?” Kehoe asked. “I still don’t see—”
He was interrupted by the thump of something being deposited on the back porch. Then the outside door burst open, and amid a blast of frigid air, Joshua entered, smiling broadly at the two.
“We saw the IOU’s, Josh,” Lefner said. “What’s the matter, don’t you think Tip will make good, now that his father’s dead?”
“Oi’ll disregard yer remark ez unworthy uv ye,” Joshua said, grinning expansively. “Fer while yez two were sittin’ here stuffin’ yerselves, oi’ve been solvin’ the murder of Karl Spearing.”
“Murder!” Lefner’s face turned a beet-red. “Josh, I’ve heard enough already. Nothing’s been said at all about Karl Spearing’s being murdered.”
“Yes there has. Oi just said it meself. Now if ye’ll calm down a bit, oi’ll elucidate fer ye.”
Lefner turned to Kehoe, shaking his head.
“Ye see, Vernon,” Joshua began, “there wuz somethin’ about Karl Spearing lyin’ there in the snow that disturbed me from the first. In addition to the footprint, oi mean. A couple of things, in fact. In the first place, while the snow around the body itself wuz drenched with blood, there wuz none to speak uv back at the trap. What oi mean to say is, the leg wuz covered with it, but none at
all on the snow. Even if Karl had wrapped his tourniquet to the tightest, seems ez if there’d be a drop or two, don’t it?”
Kehoe was seeing the Indian through new eyes. “You know, you’re right,” he said. “But that’s still not conclusive, Josh.”
“P’rhaps not. But try this. Karl Spearing had a sheath knife to do his cuttin’ with. The blade wuz mebbe six inches long. Oh, t’was sharp enough, and he could hev performed the amputation with it. But only if he’d cut off his leg at the knee where the joints come together. But no. The bones wuz sheared through cleanly, a few inches below the joint. An’ ye just can’t cut a bone like that with a knife without doin’ a good bit o’ hagglin’ at it. Ye kin experiment on the lamb roast right now, if ye’d like.”
Both Kehoe and Lefner let their confusion show in their faces. Their preconceived notions were trickling out of their minds like sand through an hourglass.
“Karl Spearing’s leg,” Joshua went on, “wuz cut off with the one weapon an outdoorsman might carry that could slice through bone with a single cut – a finely-honed ax.”
“Wait a minute,” protested Lefner. “Karl Spearing didn’t have an ax with him.”
“Ah.” Joshua held up a finger triumphantly. “So finally yer comin’ around to me way o’ thinkin’, eh? Ye’ll admit, then, the presence uv a second party?”
“Well . . . yeah, I suppose so,” Lefner said. “But I still don’t see how the other person got there. I mean, there were no tracks around except Karl’s.”
“But there wuz other tracks, don’t ye see? Don’t forget the trail Tip Spearing, Mr Kehoe an’ me made when we went to view the body.”
“Why, sure we did,” Kehoe said. “But neither of us killed—” He stopped abruptly.
“Yer beginnin’ to see what oi’m drivin’ at, ain’t ye?” Joshua said, smiling.
Kehoe jerked a thumb in the direction of the livingroom. “Are you saying you think Tip killed his own father and then retraced his trail back to where we were?”
“Somethin’ like that. O’ course the killin’ wuz probably done a day or so ago. But ez long ez Tip walked in the tracks he’d first made, there’d be just the single trail. When Tip located us in the woods an’ took us to the body, we figured the tracks had been made when he discovered his father. But they could just ez easy uv been put there a day or two before, when the killin’ wuz done.”
The Mammoth Book of Perfect Crimes & Impossible Mysteries Page 19
