The Totem

by David Morrell

  "I have work to do."

  "Yourself?" he said to Lucas.

  "No. I have to see my father."

  "Without help?"

  "I've had a chance to do more thinking. If there's trouble, I know where my place is."

  "Yes." Slaughter studied him. "I understand that, I suppose. I'll see you." He started toward the parking lot.

  "Hey, wait. I'm going with you," Dunlap said.

  "You'd better not. I don't know how I'm going to stop Parsons, but tomorrow will be rough."

  "You need a witness."

  "Is it me, or just your story?"

  "I'm not certain any longer."

  "Just so you know the risks. I'm going to need a friend up there, that's certain. Rettig, you stay here and watch the town. I've got to count on someone."

  "But you don't have any men," Rettig said.

  "How many would I need? Ten? A hundred? If I take the men we have, this town will be defenseless. Even then, we wouldn't be a match for Parsons and what I assume must be an army. No, if Dunlap and I can't do it, then it simply won't get done. The numbers are against us if I try to beat Parsons on his terms. I'll have to beat him on my own terms."

  Rettig studied him. "Take care."

  "I mean to. I'll see you in a couple days."

  "Sure." But Rettig didn't sound convinced.

  Somber, they shook hands. Then Slaughter moved toward the parking lot.

  The group was disbanding. Lucas went one way, the medical examiner another. Rettig watched as Slaughter reached the parking lot, scanned the police station, and walked toward his car. Slaughter had the rifle and the handgun. Dunlap got in the cruiser. Slaughter slid behind the steering wheel. The engine started, and they drove from the parking lot. Rettig waited until they disappeared. He frowned as the rumble of gunfire rolled across town.

  PART SEVEN. The Mountains

  ONE

  Parsons and his men woke half an hour before sunrise. They crawled from their sleeping bags, squinting, shivering in the morning dampness. There was hurried cooking, hunters packing their gear and squatting by the camp's latrine, then scuffing out the cookfires, pouring water on the coals, checking that the embers died before the Jeeps and trucks were started and the caravan moved out. A few men were reminded of Quiller's caravan when he first crossed the valley. Now a different kind was heading up to stop him, and they thought about their families, their businesses, the cattle dying, and they meant to put a stop to this as soon as they were able. Parsons didn't talk much now. If there had been a way to go back to the town, he would have, not because he was afraid, but he was wishing they would do this on their own. If it went wrong, he could avoid the blame then. Otherwise he still could take the credit. But he'd come this far, and he'd be noticed if he left, and so he stayed with them, silent, letting their determination carry them forward. They would drive up through this meadow, take another loggers' road up to a second meadow, then a third. After that, they'd move on foot. By five o'clock, they'd reach the start of the escarpment, and if not today, then tomorrow, everything would be completed.

  As the column passed rockfalls, cliffs, and ridges, there were unseen caves that shut out the sunlight, and for now, what hid in there slept uneasily.

  TWO

  The helicopter was anchored near the runway. Slaughter crouched behind oil drums near a shed and stared at the damp, chill, post-dawn mist that shrouded the chopper. He dimly saw the rotor blades that stretched out from the top, their long ends partly sagging, saw the bubble of the nose, the insect-resembling tail, the smaller rotors at the back. He felt the wind shift, swirling mist so that the helicopter now was thoroughly enveloped, and he turned to Dunlap who crouched beside him, shivering.

  "It can't be long now."

  "That's what you keep promising," Dunlap said. "What I wouldn't give for a shot of rye to warm me up."

  "You want to back out?"

  "Try to make me."

  Slaughter frowned. Dunlap was in bad shape, more than Slaughter had realized when they had left the jail. But there had been so much to do, so much to think about back then that Slaughter hadn't argued with him. Anyway, what Dunlap had said last night was true-Slaughter did still need a witness, although Dunlap shook so much now that Slaughter wasn't sure how useful the reporter would be. There wasn't any choice, however, Slaughter reminded himself. Events were in charge, and he was compelled to move with them. He could tell himself that, if he wanted to, he could run. But given who he was, he couldn't allow himself to run. His life had trapped him.

  When he'd left the jail, his first impulse had been to go after Parsons in a Jeep, but Parsons and his men were too far ahead of him. Slaughter needed something quicker, and he'd thought about the helicopter that Altick had been using. Because it couldn't search the hills at night, the pilot would, have set it down until the morning when he would take off again. The hard part was to find it. Slaughter didn't think the pilot would have gone back to his home base in a neighboring valley. Given the emergency, the pilot would have saved time, staying here. Slaughter drove out to the state-police office on the highway, but the helicopter wasn't there. He checked the park, the fairgrounds, and at last settled on the obvious, the simple airfield from which ranchers flew to reach their cattle in the worst of winter, dropping bales of hay. There was just one airplane that the ranchers leased in common, a gravel runway, one hanger, and a few equipment sheds, but there the helicopter was, anchored near the runway.

  After that, Slaughter had risked driving home. He doubted that with so much trouble in town, guards would have time to search for him. Nonetheless he'd been nervous when he reached his house. Relieved to find it deserted, he'd quickly packed two knapsacks with food, canteens, woolen shirts, sleeping bags, lots of ammunition, and a first-aid kit. Dunlap didn't have his camera anymore, so Slaughter had lent him one. If there'd been time, Slaughter would have made coffee, but dawn was approaching, and they returned to the runway just before the sun rose.

  Now the mist was thinning. Slaughter glanced at his watch. The sun had been up for half an hour.

  "Maybe he's not coming," Dunlap said.

  "No, the helicopter's too important. He'll be here. I'm sure of it."

  At once, Slaughter heard footsteps crunching on gravel. He tensed as the footsteps came closer. Then the footsteps paused on the other side of the equipment shed.

  Slaughter frowned. He glanced at Dunlap, then out toward the helicopter. When the footsteps went back toward where they had begun, Slaughter didn't understand. Who was here? A patrolman?

  "So this is where you are."

  Unnerved, Slaughter swung to face the voice. He found himself staring at Lucas.

  "Christ, don't sneak up on me," Slaughter told him.

  "He's not here yet?"

  "Who?"

  "The pilot."

  "No, we're waiting. How'd you find us?"

  "Process of elimination. Yesterday you talked about a helicopter that the state police were using. I drove around until I found it."

  "Where'd you get a car?"

  "A truck. It was my father's. Look, I'm going up there with you."

  Slaughter noticed the rifle Lucas held.

  "What's happened?"

  Lucas didn't answer.

  "Some tiling with your father?"

  Lucas gazed out toward the helicopter. Then he looked at Slaughter.

  "They killed him." Lucas squinted. "He was evidently hunting them. He had some cattle staked out for bait, and he was going out at night to shoot from a tree. He must have killed a lot of them. There was so much blood."

  "You found the bodies?"

  "Only his. As much as I could recognize when they were finished with him." Lucas wiped his mouth. "They disemboweled him for a start. They-"

  "You don't have to talk about it."

  "But I want to. Then they ripped his arms and legs off." Lucas spoke without expression. "When I got to the ranch, I didn't find my father. But I smelled this stench that drifted toward m
e from the foothills. Roasted meat and burning hair. I drove my father's truck out. There was something burning, all right. I could see the flames, mostly from range grass when I got there, and I saw the mangled cattle and the blood, and then I found my father in a half a dozen places. From the empty cartridges around the tree, I'm sure he must have killed a lot of them. Even drunk, he never failed to hit a target. They must have taken the bodies with them. As I said, I'm going with you."

  "But you didn't even like him."

  "I don't care. I owe him. I took two years from his life, and if I hadn't, maybe everything would somehow have been different."

  "I don't know what good you'll be up there." '

  "I'll be your eyes behind you. Right now you need all the. friends you can find."

  Lucas said the right thing, that was certain. Slaughter stared at him and nodded. "If the pilot ever comes."

  Then Slaughter heard other footsteps crunching on gravel. No, a double set of them, and he motioned for Lucas and Dunlap to crouch with him beside the oil drums next to the shed.

  The footsteps crunched past the opposite side of the shed and then moved into the open. With the mist almost gone, Slaughter glimpsed two men who crossed to reach the helicopter. One man rubbed his hands together and blew on them. The other unhooked the helicopter's mooring cables.

  Slaughter straightened, walking toward them, Lucas and Dunlap following. "You've got some passengers," he told the two men, who swung in surprise.

  Slaughter recognized the pilot. The other man he didn't know, but they were rigid, and he wondered if they'd heard about his jail break.

  "Who's that? Slaughter? Hell, you scared me."

  "We'll be going with you in the chopper."

  "There's not enough room."

  "Then we'll leave this other guy behind."

  "And what about the rest of you?"

  "They're coming with me."

  "Sorry. I can't do that. One man with me isn't any problem. I took two men with me yesterday." The pilot shook his head. 'Three men with me, and I guarantee we'd never make it. This thing wasn't built for that much weight."

  "We'll have to try it anyhow," Slaughter said.

  "That's impossible."

  Slaughter pointed toward the western mountains. "You don't understand the trouble up there."

  "Maybe. But there'll be even more trouble if we all try to go up in this thing."

  "We'll have to chance it."

  "Without me to fly you. Choose less men or none of us gets off the ground."

  They scowled at each other. Slaughter turned toward Lucas and Dunlap. Which man could he choose? He really needed both of them, and more important, neither of them would agree to be left behind.

  "I can't do that," he said, and his first mistake had been to think that they knew nothing about how he'd broken out of jail, his second had been to turn toward Lucas and Dunlap. Because suddenly he felt the pilot's arms around him, grabbing for the rifle. At the same time, Lucas was struggling with the pilot's companion. Dunlap faltered, blinking.

  "Well, if you boys planned to have a dance, I would have bought some tickets," someone said, and everybody stopped then, pivoting toward the shed as a policeman stepped into view. He had his handgun drawn, and Slaughter didn't know if this was help or more trouble as he recognized Hammel, the new man on the force whom he'd disciplined when they had looked at Clifford's body on Friday.

  "Now then, everybody step clear of each other. Keep those rifles down."

  They didn't move.

  "I mean it." Hammel walked sternly forward, and they parted.

  "You two." Hammel pointed toward the pilot and his friend. "Step over to the left there. Don't you know enough to stay away from men holding rifles? In particular our fine police chief here. He might get angry and shoot your toe off. My God," Hammel asked the pilot, "what did you think you'd accomplish by trying to capture Slaughter? Did you think the town would make you a hero?"

  "I don't care about his jail break. I don't even know why he was arrested. I just don't intend to go up with three other men in that helicopter."

  "Well, you're honest. That's a credit." Hammel smiled and waved his handgun. "Okay, clear out. You're no use to us."

  "But-"

  "Hey, I'm giving you a break. Clear out. Don't try my patience."

  Slowly they moved toward the shed, and then they started running.

  "'No use to 'us' you told him?" Slaughter asked.

  "That's right. Let's keep this in the family. When Rettig told me what had happened, we sat down to figure "where you might turn up."

  "I must be obvious as hell."

  "Well, a few of us aren't quite as stupid as you think we are."

  "You call it smart to chase off my pilot?"

  "We don't need him. Rettig told me to keep a watch on you, to use my judgment."

  "And your judgment-"

  "-says I'm going with you. Do you remember when we found Clifford's body? I said something about what had killed him being obvious. You called me on that. Oh, not much. Enough, though. Hell, you made me feel like an idiot. And it turned out you were right. So, fine. But now it's my turn. I can do a few things you'd give anything to do. I'm going to fly your helicopter for you."

  Slaughter thought back to the file he kept on every man.

  "I see that it's coming back to you," Hammel said. "I spent three years in the Air Force. My specialty was choppers. And I was damned good. Just this once you're going to shut your mouth and watch somebody else who's good at what he does, and when I'm finished, you had damned well better step up, face me straight on, and say, 'Thank you.'"

  "More than that, I'll say I'm sorry for the other day."

  "It's too late for that, Slaughter. Shove your friends inside. Let's get this party started."

  Slaughter touched his beard stubble. "There's only one thing."

  "What is it?"

  "If we crash, I'll say we should have kept that other guy to fly us."

  Hammel started laughing.

  THREE

  "You can see that something happened here." Parsons and his group looked at the barricade.

  "The question, though, is what."

  There weren't any bodies, but they saw the blood, the state police hats, the ripped discarded knapsacks, the empty bullet casings.

  "So there really was a fight up here. That wasn't thunder we heard."

  "It wasn't thunder. No, it wasn't thunder."

  They walked around the barricade. Several of them glanced nervously toward the forest.

  "I don't like this."

  "Why? You think those hippies would be stupid enough to attack this many men?"

  "We don't know anything about them."

  "We know that they've likely killed more people."

  "I don't mind admitting I'm scared."

  "So what? You think we ought to go back for more help? You think that we don't have enough already?"

  "I can't tell you what I think."

  "Let's leave it that way. Altick is in trouble. That's all anybody has to know."

  "Or was in trouble."

  "It's the same. We're here to put a stop to them. If Altick still needs help, we're here to give it. If he's long past help, we're here to make them pay for that."

  The odd part was that Parsons didn't have to say a word. The group had formed a common personality, and for a time as they had driven up the loggers' roads, he had been satisfied that he would not be blamed if things went wrong. But as they drove higher, he had gradually felt uneasy up here, and when at last they'd left the Jeeps and trucks to continue on foot, he started feeling scared. For one thing, he had never liked the mountains. Oh, he'd gone up hunting with his friends, but that was part of his position. Hunting was expected from him. But he'd never really liked it or the wilderness up here. His best surroundings were his office and the town-council chambers. These men were at home up here, however, and for several hours they had grown in strength as his diminished. They had used terrain m
aps, plotting which direction was the best way to the base of the escarpment. They had hiked up past the lake where Altick's men had disappeared. They'd traveled Sunday afternoon and evening, then today through Monday morning. All told, they'd been ten hours on the move now, mostly in the trucks and Jeeps. Considering how poor the loggers' roads were and how hard it was to hike up through these mountains, sixty miles was some achievement, although they had another fifteen yet to go.

  The things behind them traveled only in the night, so they would not catch up until tomorrow at midnight if they moved as fast as they were able. In the hills above the group, however, there were many others sleeping, waiting, although of course that information came out only later. In the meanwhile, there was nothing in the forest near the barricade to indicate what finally had happened to the men within the barricade. The sun was high above the forest, and the group was tightening their knapsacks, taking time to eat some beef jerky or to urinate. Then they were moving higher. As one member of the group would later say, it was like climbing toward another country.

  FOUR

  Slaughter flinched from every treetop they scudded over. "Jesus, go down any lower and you'll have us pulling pine needles from our asses."

  Hammel grinned. "If you want a smooth ride, call United Airlines. Did I promise anything except to get you off the ground?"

  "But… Watch it! Look out!"

  The helicopter tilted, its rotors nearly colliding with a tree. Slaughter clutched his harness as Hammel worked the controls, and the helicopter tilted on a different angle. Frantic, Hammel fought to gain altitude. Abruptly the helicopter was steady again. Slaughter realized that he'd stopped breathing.

  "It's the wind. I didn't count on this much wind," Hammel said.

  "Can you get us there, or can't you?"

  "If you want to take your chances, I can keep on trying."

  "Hey, you didn't talk about taking chances when we were back on the ground."

  "Well, that was easy, talking."

  As Hammel grinned again, Slaughter said, "Oh, I get it now. You're crazy."