Death Qualified Part 57

"He left in a car.

Whose?"

They had to go out to see that he had taken Barbara's car. She remembered that the man who had delivered it earlier had said the key was in the ignition. She described it to the sheriff, and gave him the license number. Nell was sitting as if stunned.

After the sheriff was finished phoning, Nell asked, "Can I go now? I want to go home to my kids."

"Sure, honey," Frank said.

"I'll drive you over. I won't be more than a few minutes," he added to Barbara.

"Hold the fort."

"I'd better go collect Mike," she said.

The phone rang; the sheriff scooped it up and began to talk again. He waved them all out.

On the deck outside, Barbara pulled on her cap and turned up her jacket collar. The fog had crept up the riverbanks to create a new earth form, joining the land that the river had bisected. The fog appeared solid enough to walk on. She began to walk toward the woods, toward Doc's house, benumbed by the last half hour, not elated over dive's collapse, not jubilant at beating him, not at all victorious. Benumbed described it, but even with the word in her throat, she knew it was wrong. Soiled, dirty, that was how she felt.

In the Buick, Nell huddled, staring straight ahead. Frank glanced at her, back at the road, at her again, stymied for anything to say to her. She broke the silence when he turned into her long driveway.

"He wanted me to go to his house, after we saw you and Barbara. He said he had champagne that he's been saving for months, for this day. We would have .. . would have...."

"Honey, it's over. You can relax. It's really over," Frank said, and then he caught his breath. Barbara's car was in the driveway near the little house.

Nell choked back a cry; her voice was like a sob, "He's gone. He took his truck. That's all, he just came for his truck." Then she looked at Frank and whispered, "He keeps a rifle in his truck. He'll have that, too."

THIRTY-EIGHT.

entering the deep woods was like stepping out of time, Barbara thought as she walked slowly. The trail here was so narrow that too little light penetrated for undergrowth to take hold; the trees closed overhead, creating a perpetual twilight out of time. Ten thousand years ago, it was like this: Trees grew, died, fell; and new trees rose, always the same in the midst of change. Moss was on everything, hanging from lower limbs, layer upon layer on tree trunks and rocks, velvety, moist, deeply green, fragrant. Even the silence was uncanny, unworldly; distance, trees, fog muted the voice of the river, turned it into a ghost river, also out of time, frozen under the spectral robes of fog.

Then she heard a sound on the trail ahead somewhere.

"Mike? Is that you?"

The silence returned, more profound than before. She strained to hear anything and had to give up. Nothing.

The trail was crooked; no trail in the deep woods was straight. Trails twisted around living trees, snaked around fallen tree trunks, circled boulders. She could not see more than ten feet ahead, and could hear nothing now.

She realized she was holding her breath, unmoving, and breathed again, took a step. A bird, she thought. A squirrel or rabbit. Coyote. Cougar, bear, elk, deer.. .. She walked faster, making no noise on the carpet of endless cycles of needles, and she heard a sound again, the snap ping of a branch, a foot sc.r.a.ping a rock, something. This time it was to her left.

To the right, fifty yards away, thirty, twenty, some where, was the edge of the cliff, the river below. To her left, at about the same indeterminate distance, was the gravel road. She must have covered half the distance to Doc's house, she thought. And then.. .. Then she would have to cross the cleared s.p.a.ce, be out in the open.. ..

The sound came again, to her left, behind her, between her and the road, between her and home. She started to run.

"Run, Barbara," Clive said mockingly, still behind her, off to her left.

"Run, run."

She ducked off the trail, behind a tree. He laughed.

Slowly, she edged away from the tree, darted to another one, only to hear his mocking laughter again.

"Don't do this, Clive. Go back to the house. Let's just talk about it. You can plead your case, you know."

"Shh," he said.

"You know, it's funny in a way. I didn't want to kill Lucas. I saw the rifle and I got mad that Nell left it where one of the kids could pick it up, fool around, get hurt. That's all. I picked it up, and the sh.e.l.ls, and I wasn't thinking about shooting anyone, until he began popping up here, there. But I want to kill you, Barbara.

Not too fast, not from behind so that you don't know what's happening. Oh, I want you to know. I've had you in the cross hairs at least twice already, and I waited, you see, because I wanted you to know. And now you know."

"What about that girl? Why did you kill that poor girl?"

she called. As soon as he spoke, she moved again, behind the next tree.

"I saw Lucas and her going up that dead end road, and I got curious when they didn't come out again. Then she said he was walking home, and I thought she was kidding me, mocking me, trying to be funny." He stopped moving, stopped talking; she didn't move a muscle. Then he said, "You guessed right about her, Barbara. I wouldn't have touched that little s.l.u.t for all the gold on Earth. I used a stick. Crazy Lucas, let them think crazy Lucas did it. I didn't want him dead. In jail, the b.o.o.by hatch, Nell ever faithful. I would have been her good, loyal friend good to her, good to the children."

As soon as he spoke, she moved again, froze again; the eerie silence returned. This was his world, she thought desperately; he knew how to move, how to hunt down his prey. She was not even sure how far from the trail she had drifted, how close to the edge of the cliff she was now, and she could hear nothing.

His voice sounded very close, amused when he said, "You'd better breathe, Barbara."

"You can get a good attorney who will handle the case," she cried, and ran again, stopped again.

"You could say you found the car and no one there. You were ready to blame Lucas; you still can.

A good lawyer would raise doubts in the jury's mind." This time she held her breath, listening.

The silence was prolonged. She pulled off her cap, a light blue wool cap that would be visible a long way in the darkening woods. She looked around and saw a spike sticking out from a tree, a broken branch, head high; she dropped down in a crouch.

He chuckled, and she ran in a crouch to the tree with the spike.

"Thank you, Barbara. Good defense. I just didn't want to get involved. I had no idea a crime had been committed. I a.s.sumed it was just hikers out in the woods. Very good, Barbara, very good." She still had not seen him; his voice carried in a way that did not yield a real clue about how far away he was.

But he could see her every time she moved, she knew.

Predator and prey, prey and predator. Only one had need to see the other. She wedged the cap on the spike so that most of it was on the side of the tree where she was, with an edge that Clive could see, if he was still behind her and to her left. She bent over as low as she could get and still move, and this time she crept away from the tree to take shelter again behind another one. No sound followed.

"Breathe, Barbara," Clive said softly.

"Don't just wait for me. I like it when you run. Run, Barbara."

His voice was farther away; she was certain it was farther away, that he was talking to her cap. She looked around in desperation; the trees were not as big now, and there was the beginning of underbrush. She was coming to the edge of the woods. The light was fading, twilight and fog settling over the forest. Already the tree trunks and shadows merged and looked like a solid wall. But in the open, she would be clearly visible.

"I said move, d.a.m.n you!" Clive said then, clearly, too loud.

She was shaken by the sound of a shot. She raced to the nearest underbrush and threw herself at it.

He shot again.

At her cap, she realized, when he began to laugh.

"Hey, Barbara, good trick! Really good thinking." He shot again.

"Problem is, Barbara, you've run out of woods to hide in."

I know, she thought despairingly. I know. She kept her face down, her hands under her, not to let anything pale show in the shadows. Soon it would be too dark for him to see her; if she could be a shadow among shadows until then.. ..

"Clive, knock it off."

Barbara gasped. Mike! She lifted her head to look for him.

"Stay away from him!" she yelled. "I was thinking," Mike said easily, in a conversational tone, "Lucas must have scared the h.e.l.l out of you."

"You, too," Clive said, and fired again.

"I didn't come looking for you, Dinesen. But you, too."

"Yes, it must have been a shock. What did he do, ap pear and vanish, take a giant step to the edge of the clearing Must have scared you pretty bad."

Clive shot again.

"Like this, I suppose," Mike said.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n you! d.a.m.n you!" Clive screamed, and shot again.

"Over here," Mike said.

"Let's walk, Clive. This way.

Go on to the house, Barbara, now."

"Like him," Clive whispered.

"You're like him! Devils He fired the rifle again.

Mike's voice kept moving, Barbara thought in terror.

She drew herself up to her knees to look out over the top of the brush she had landed in. She saw Clive aiming, saw Mike disappear behind a tree. Beyond him the trees were a solid ma.s.s of darkness where wisps of fog curled and retracted, rose and fell. Clive spun around, facing her for a second, then away, and shot again. His face was livid with fear and insanity.

Barbara got up and ran across the clearing to Doc's house. She was trying to punch in the numbers of Frank's phone when he appeared and took the telephone from her hand. He held her at arm's length examining her, then drew her in close in a hard embrace. The sheriff was be side him.

"Where is he? Are you hurt?" LeMans asked.

"He's in the woods, over there! Mike's in there!"

"We've got him," LeMans said grimly.

"I radioed for help as soon as we heard the first shot. There's no place he can go."

"Mike's in there!" she screamed at him.

"Well, it's getting dark. If he can stay out of sight just a little longer...." There was another shot from the woods. Then a car pulled in at the house; 'the state police had arrived. They had a bullhorn and lights, and many men who milled about for a time. Barbara sat unmoving. No more shots came from the woods. No sound at all came out of the woods.

"We'll go in from all three sides," LeMans told her father.

"We'll bring them both out."

She shook her head.

"Mike took him out on the fog and let him drop off in the middle of the river. And Mike just kept going, laughing. He was laughing." Her voice came out thick and strangled, as if she were fighting her own insane laughter, or sobs. She clamped her lips together.

LeMans looked at her father and said, "You'd better take her home. I'll come around when it's over."

"Yes," Frank said heavily.

"We'll go. Come on, Bobby.

Come along. We'll go clean up those cuts and scratches."

She went with him without protest. It didn't matter where she was.

Later, she sat in the living room. Now and then she s.h.i.+vered until Frank brought down a blanket and wrapped it around her shoulders. He put a drink on the table by her chair and then sat down opposite her.

Still later, the sheriff came back and talked to Frank in low tones in the foyer. She could hear every word. They had found blood. They had found dive's rifle, about fifteen feet from the edge of the cliff; they must have fought there, must have gone over the cliff together, down into the river. It was too dark and too foggy to continue the search tonight. They would resume in the morning. They would bring in skin divers in the morning. She did not move.

In the little house Nell said, "Aren't you kids tired of that game yet?"

Travis shrugged in that gesture that was wrenching to her every time she saw it; she turned away. Tawna stood at the door.

"Come on, Nell. Leave them to it. They had hamburgers and stuff. If they get hungry, they can come up to the big house." The two women left Travis and Celsy at the computer.

"Let's see what's on this other program," he said. They had killed the dragon, rescued the princess, escaped the alien s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p. He keyed in a command and the screen cleared, then a brilliant Mandelbrot filled it again, all electric blue, silver, flaming pink.

"Rad!" Celsy said softly.

"What is this?"

"More of Mike's Mandelbrot stuff, I guess. The disks turned up, so I copied them. I haven't checked it out yet.

Let's watch."

Barbara stood in her room. Since she wasn't hungry, she must have eaten. Since she was in her room, it must be bedtime. Since the house was deathly silent, Frank must have gone to bed already.