Walt Longmire 07 - Hell Is Empty (10 page)

All I really wanted to do was get inside, so I decided to try the nearest door. It was unlocked, so I pushed it open and stepped through into a lengthy mudroom with a washer and dryer.

I quietly closed the door and then stood there for a moment, just orienting myself from being outside. I still leaned to the left as I’d done all the way up the road and drifted forward, countering the effects of the wind and the movement of the snow. I slowed my breathing, stood up straight, and looked down the oblong room at another door, one step up.

There was still no noise, but as I’d expected, the flicker of some fire fractured a warm light on the glass panel. I slid the flashlight into the retainer loop on my belt, took off my gloves, stuffed them in my coat pockets, and unbuckled the snowshoes. I unsnapped the safety strap from my holster and drew the large-frame Colt.

I took another deep breath, carefully stepped across the mudroom, and peered through the corner of the glass pane. There was, indeed, a fire in the fireplace and, to my relief, Omar Rhoades was standing at the center island of the kitchen, his back to me, a dish towel over one shoulder. It looked like he was eating a very large sandwich.

I turned the knob and held it as I stepped up onto the hardwood floor, which was partially covered with what looked to be a vintage Navajo rug; the hardened snow sloughed off the sides of my Sorels onto its red and black wool. I glanced around the timbered structure, which was illuminated by a few candles that flickered from the draft.

In one swift movement, the big-game hunter swung around and leveled the business end of a Model 29 .44 Magnum at the bridge of my nose. It took quite a bit to not counterraise my Colt, but I was assisted in not moving to action by the twisted wire-loop handle of a cleaning rod that stuck comically from the barrel of the big revolver.

I just froze there, first making the strongest eye contact with him that I’d ever made, and then looked around the rest of the room.

By the time my eyes got back to him, he’d lowered the Smith & Wesson, and the cleaning rod fell from the barrel to the floor between us. He was leaning against the butcher-block counter with one elbow, exposing the blood-soaked surface of his shirt beneath the towel wrapped around his armpit. He tossed the blued and engraved revolver onto the island amid the other cleaning supplies—the heavy weapon made a frightening clatter. Omar’s voice was thick with drink, fatigue, and possible blood loss. “Took you long enough.”

From all appearances, there was no one else in the room. “Are we clear?”

He breathed a whistling laugh and stretched his eyes to keep them open. “Clear as the noonday sun.” He picked up his Dagwood sandwich.

“You cleaning that Smith?”

He glanced at the detritus on the counter, which included a tumbler and an ancient, half-empty bottle of Laphroaig. He bit into the sandwich and mumbled, “Yeah.”

I knew from experience that he cleaned his guns only when he was upset. “Settling your nerves?”

It took forever, but he smiled at my knowledge of him. “Yeah.”

“You’re hurt.”

“A little; bullet went into the refrigerator. Took out the icemaker.” He gestured toward the massive, stainless steel appliance behind him. “Better it than me.” His voice trailed off with the crackling of the fire.

“You got visitors?”

He breathed the same laugh, smaller this time, and then looked up at me as if surprised that I was there. “Wasn’t the Girl Scouts.”

“Where are they?”

“Um . . .” He paused, as if trying to remember. “One . . . one’s in the bathroom, the other one’s over by the door.”

I took a few steps toward him, but he turned a hard shoulder toward me and held a hand out. “I’m good, I’m good . . . but you better go check him.”

I nodded and directed my .45 toward the entryway across a sitting room in the back. I stepped over the head of a massive Kodiak bear rug and could see something lodged against the front door. The stained glass of the door panel was shattered, and the blowout from an exit wound had sprayed in a spot a foot wide with foreign material embedded in the wood. The liquid pattern narrowed in a sliding path to a solidifying pool of dark blood and the slumped and inert body of Marcel Popp.

There was one of the Sig .40s in his lap, and I used my boot to flip it from between his outstretched legs. His head had lolled forward, and the back of it was pretty much gone.

As a formality, I lowered a hand and placed two fingers along his neck but could feel the unnatural coolness of the postmortem flesh and no pulse. I stooped a little more and looked at the side of the big convict’s face. There was a jagged hole at the left cheekbone from which thickening blood slowly dripped, his still eyes following the path to where his life had drained.

I fought the urge that my legs telegraphed to collapse under me and take a rest. I stood and looked out the shattered door. The shot had fittingly exited through the middle of a rose-red triangle, and the insidious cold pulsed through the hole as if the wilderness was attempting to give back the bullet and the death that it carried.

I wavered there for a moment, then turned and looked at Omar, who was intently studying the crystal in his hands. He reached behind him for the bottle, poured a full four fingers, took a slow sip, and returned it and the bottle to the counter. “Happened fast. They knocked on the door, and I don’t answer the door at three in the morning up here without accompaniment.”

I crossed back toward the kitchen but stood a little away from him. The bullet he’d taken must’ve clipped him below the main tendons in his shoulder and above the clavicle, but it still must’ve hurt like hell.

“Said their car was stuck. I let ’em in, but when I turned from the door he raised up that automatic and got a shot off. I guess maybe he saw the Mag in my hand, and it spooked him.” He breathed heavily, and I could hear a faint whistling sound. “Got me in the shoulder, but I don’t think it hit anything important—still works.” To emphasize the point, he raised the arm a little. “Rolled to the side when he fired again, and I put one in his head.”

I found myself nodding. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

He breathed some more. “Yeah.” He picked up the tumbler with a sickly smile. “Sterilizing from the inside.” He took a large swallow. “Funny, I’m hungry as hell.” He took another bite of the sandwich and chewed. “You want half of this?”

“Maybe later.”

“I’m horny, too.”

I took a while to respond to that one. “I don’t think I want to help you out with that, either.” He laughed, and the timbre of it was a little higher than I remembered and a little unnerving as well. I gestured toward his sandwich. “It’s a normal, life-reaffirming process. Kicks in when you really think you’re going to die and don’t—the urge to reproduce, eat . . . It’s when you almost lose your life that you really start appreciating it.” Omar was staring at the counter again, so I switched to another topic, a more urgent one. “The woman’s in the bathroom?”

He glanced up. “Huh?”

“He had a woman with him. She’s in the bathroom?”

“Yeah.”

“Where’s that?”

He used his good arm to gesture after picking up the scotch. “Down the hall.”

I began to turn but stopped when he started to go for the scotch bottle again. “Omar?”

“Yeah?”

“Stop drinking.”

He didn’t move. “Right.”

We stood there like that, neither of us so much as twitching. “I mean it; I may need you.”

He set the glass down, and I made my way into the hall. There were three doors—the nearest was closed, so I knocked on it. There was no answer, so I knocked again. Someone whimpered, and it didn’t sound the way an FBI agent would whimper. “Beatrice?”

There was more keening, and I leaned in closer to the door. “Beatrice, it’s Walt Longmire, the sheriff from the lodge. Is it okay if I open the door and see if you’re all right?”

There were no more sounds, and I did what I had to do, turning the knob and carefully opening the door. It was dark in there, but I could see a body wrapped around itself and wedged between the bathtub and the toilet.

“Beatrice?” She started when I spoke again. I slipped in sideways and holstered my Colt. “Are you okay?” It was a stupid question, but I had to open with something. “Do you remember me?” Another stupid question. I started thinking I should try some statements. “Beatrice, you’re not hurt.”

She mewled into the crossed arms that covered her face above her drawn knees.

“You’re going to be okay.” Nothing. “Are you hurt?”

I kneeled down and leaned against the side of the tub, the burning in my legs attempting to overtake me. She didn’t appear to be physically damaged but continued to huddle against the wall. I carefully reached a hand out to her. “I’m here to help, Beatrice. I need to know if you’re okay.”

The moment my fingers grazed the sleeve of her jacket, she yanked back and screamed and didn’t stop. Her eyes were wide, and she stared at me with the fierceness that only cornered animals have, animals like the one I’d encountered on the roof of the cabin at Deer Haven Lodge.

I didn’t move at first but finally allowed the leg under me to collapse, and I slid against the far wall, my hat falling into my lap. I sat there looking into the ferocity of her eyes and took all they could give.

7

She sat on the sofa near the fire and was wrapped in a rustand ivory-striped wool blanket that had a band of Lakota ghost ponies woven on the edge as I attempted to bandage Omar’s wound. I placed the affected limb in a sling made from a couple of monogrammed linen napkins from William the Samoan
,
as Lucian Connally referred to the purveyor of fine tableware.

Omar looked up at me, and I could see that his eyes were starting to clear a little at the pupils. “You’ll help me bury the body, right? I mean, that’s what friends are for.”

I had finished my own ham and cheese and tried not to watch the pot of water on the propane range for philosophical purposes. He was still drunk, but I’d found a French coffee press, unsure who needed the caffeine more, him or me. I had gotten him to sit on one of the fringed leather barstools and retrieved the finally whistling kettle. Carefully pouring the boiling water over the grinds in the glass contraption, I stood there for a few moments thinking about all the things I was going to have to do before heading out after the remaining escaped convicts. Henry had a French press, and from the many times I’d seen my friend go through the procedure at his house, I probably should’ve waited longer for the coffee to brew, but I had work to do. I depressed the strainer to compress the grinds and poured three of the O bar R Buffalo China cups to the brim.

I turned and sat one of the heavy mugs in front of him. “Drink that.”

He nodded, and I picked up the other two mugs and moved toward the sofa. “Beatrice, how ’bout a little coffee?”

She stayed crouched in the Pendleton blanket with her legs curled under her. I had found her glasses, and they reflected the flames of the fireplace; it was as if I were looking into two miniature hatches of a firestorm.

“You want anything in it?” I stood there for a minute more and then crossed the rest of the way and sat on the edge of the cushion beside her. I could see that she was shaking. “If you drink a little something you might feel better.”

The eyes shifted behind the mirrored blaze but didn’t make it all the way to me. I took a chance and held the mug out in her sightline, between her and the roiling fire.

She finally looked at me, and I smiled. “Coffee?”

She took a deep breath, letting it out in a shuddering release that seemed like an exorcism, and the words that came from her were barely audible. “I like tea.”

I felt like laughing but couldn’t risk the energy. “Would you like me to make you some tea?”

She nodded, just barely.

I’m not sure if she really wanted tea or if it was a way of insulating herself for just a little bit longer. I refilled Omar’s coffee with the contents from Beatrice’s cup and, with his help, found a box of Earl Grey bags and submerged one into what was left of the boiling water.

I lifted the edge of my improvised sling to check the patch job I’d done on the big-game hunter—it looked like the bleeding from his shoulder wound was subsiding. “How are you doing?”

“Fuzzy, but I’ll get there.” He yawned, which emphasized the leonine aspects of his features. “He was—I tried to . . .” He stopped speaking, and the only noise was the popping of the pine logs in the fire.

I studied him. “What?”

He took a deep breath. “Nothing.”

I clamped my jaws shut to keep from yawning in sympathy, thinking about how much further I had to go, wondering how far that was and what I’d find there. I thought about my plan, or lack of one. They were mobile, and unless Omar assisted me, I was not. They were many and well-armed, I was not. The only thing I had going for me was the topography—the simple fact that they would soon have nowhere to go. They didn’t know it, but they had bottled themselves up, and other than Tyrell Ranger Station, the concrete, not-so-portable potties were the only indoors in all the great outdoors.

They would have to stay in the Thiokol for the night, so I could grab a few hours of sleep and maybe that would help me clear my head.

I looked at the shine in my friend’s eyes and thought about how many creatures Omar had killed and in how many exotic locales, only to slay his first human being literally on his own doorstep. I lowered my voice. “There’s a conversation we’re going to have to have, but not in front of her.”

He nodded and slowly sipped his coffee.

When I got back to the sofa, Beatrice was still hypnotized by the fire. I stood there feeling the heat radiating against my back, pulling at my sore muscles, and prickling my skin. The waves of exhaustion washed against me like an ebb tide, causing me to waver a little. I forced the air from my lungs and blinked to clear my eyes to find Beatrice’s looking up at me.

She took the tea and held it in front of her face in clasped hands. “Thank you.”

I waited, but she didn’t say anything else.

“Um, I have some questions.”

“I bet you do.” She looked away from me and back to the fire. “ ‘The heart has its reasons that reason knows nothing of.’ ”

“Pascal.”

She looked at me again.

I tipped my hat back. “I’ve been thinking of moonlighting at the local community college.”

It took a while, but she did laugh and then laughed again. When the words came out of her, they weren’t the ones I was expecting: “He’s not as bad as you think; he’s not a simple misanthrope.”

Aware of the Stockholm syndrome, I still wasn’t sure what to say to that. “Excuse me?”

“I was sure you knew, when I told you I was from Wacouta and you mentioned the Red Wing factory, that there’s a maximum security prison just down the road.”

“No.”

“That’s where I met Raynaud, and I guess I was vulnerable, but he’s so, well, I don’t know, charming, kind of, and he loves me, really . . .” She froze for a moment, and I was worried that I’d lost her, but then her lips moved and she began speaking again. “My father had just died, and I was struggling with a thyroid cancer diagnosis and a divorce. I was working at a veterinary clinic, and maybe it was coming to terms with my own mortality when I started feeling sorry for the number of dogs that were exterminated for lack of adoptive owners. A friend of mine suggested I start a cell-dog project with the prison. You know those programs?”

I figured this was the only way to get her talking, and I was curious about how she’d gotten tangled up with Shade. “I’ve heard of them.”

“I interviewed Raynaud for the program, and we argued at first about which method produced the best-trained dogs, discipline or positive reinforcement.”

“Want me to guess which one he believed in?”

She sighed a laugh. “I asked him which one worked best with him.” She tucked the blanket in a little closer. “He was magnificent with the dogs, had a real talent working with the most vicious animals—they loved him. I think he saw a reflection of himself in them.” A hand crept up and stayed there at the side of her head. “One day he complimented me on my hair.” She looked up at me. “I know I’m not very much to look at, Sheriff, and that’s probably why it struck me the way it did—like water on a dying plant, I guess. Anyway, a few months later we made plans for him to escape so that the two of us could be together. I was going to sneak him out in my van with the dog supplies. We were going to run away to the Northwest Territories, in Canada, where he’s from. I pulled forty-two thousand dollars from my bank account; it was about all I had, but he was worth it.”

“What happened?”

“They had a heartbeat monitor at the gate that discovered him. I was charged with aiding and abetting, but my husband—my ex-husband—paid the bail money from what was left from the forty-two thousand. Raynaud was transferred to the prison in Utah but wrote me a letter asking me to forgive him for getting me into all the trouble.” She sipped her tea. “We continued to stay in touch, and he told me there would be one last opportunity for him here, in Wyoming. We had devised a kind of code; he’s brilliant, Sheriff. A genius.”

I thought about how much planning this entire escapade must’ve taken, which reinforced my thought that Raynaud Shade was more than your usual, garden-variety sociopath. “So, he had all of this planned far in advance.”

She nodded. “He said there was a body that he had buried here in the mountains and that he knew where that was and could get himself this far. All I had to do was help him get free and provide supplies, and he’d take care of the rest.”

Indeed. “So you figured out the hairpin trick with the handcuffs?”

“He taught me.” A quick sob escaped her, and she shook, finally speaking into her mug. “I know everybody wants me to hate him, but I don’t.”

I waited, thinking about all the things that affected us, things we were aware of and things we weren’t. I recited the rest, hoping I could remember it all: “We must always love something. In those matters seemingly removed from love, the feeling is secretly to be found, and man cannot possibly live for a moment without it.”

She turned, and I could see the tears shining on her cheeks. “More Pascal?”

“More Pascal.” It was time to change the subject, and I only hoped she’d stay with me. “I’m going to be honest with you; there are some serious consequences for what you’ve done, but that really doesn’t concern me right now. Right now, I’ve got only one question—do you have any idea where they might be going?”

“No.” Behind the glasses, her eyes were still full of tears—maybe she was attempting to dampen the flames. “I really don’t know.”

I waited a little before asking again. “Anything you might’ve overheard?”

“No.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

I leaned back in the sofa, and it was so soft I thought I might die there. I was tired and not sure how to proceed. The choice was to either leave her and Omar here or send them out and back to Meadowlark Lodge, and for me to continue up.

“There was something about money.”

I shifted my position on the sofa. “Excuse me?”

“Raynaud said something about money.”

“What’d he say?”

“There was some money that had been taken or something and that they would get the money if they helped him—that’s what he told all of them.”

“Who?”

She glanced toward the door where I’d duct-taped a piece of cardboard over the broken glass after I had dragged Popp onto the porch—if I had to leave the two of them in the cabin, I wasn’t going to leave them here with a corpse in full view.

“The other convicts?”

“Yes, and . . .”

“What?”

“He has a package with him, a rubber duffel, and waterproof like you carry in a kayak.”

This was news. “And you think it’s full of money? ”

“I don’t know. I could have sworn he didn’t have it with him, and then it was just there suddenly.”

“You didn’t bring him the bag?”

“No.”

Perhaps the story of the money was true after all. “You are sure you don’t know where they’re going?”

She honestly seemed confused. “I don’t . . . Away—that’s all I know.”

“Beatrice, there’s no way out where they’re headed.” She continued to look at me blankly. “There are no roads.”

“Raynaud said there was a road . . . Battle Park.”

“You’re already past that—it’s about three miles back.” I tried to get her to understand. “There are only a few branch roads off of West Tensleep and you’re already past all of them. The main road goes on for another mile and a half but then it throttles off into trails that are going to be so choked with snow that he won’t even be able to walk out of there, even with snowshoes.”

“Raynaud said . . .”

“Beatrice, there are no roads.”

She was confused by this information. “Maybe they turned back.”

I shook my head. “No, the tracks went on.”

I left it at that. There were a few other questions I had and couldn’t risk her shutting down again. “You brought them supplies?”

She swallowed. “I did.”

“What’ve they got?”

“I don’t . . .”

“Insulated clothing, packs, sleeping bags, food, snowshoes? The things they’d need if they were going to try and hike out of here?”

“I guess. Yesss . . .” It was a strangled reply, like a tire slowly deflating.

“What about weapons? I know they took the marshal’s rifle from our van and some sidearms from the federal agents and the two Ameri-Trans guards. Was there anything else?”

“No.”

I nodded. “I’ve got to know: are the others, Pfaff and the Ameri-Trans driver, still alive?”

“Yes, they are.” She nodded with the words—glad to have good news, I suppose. “They were fine—no one had done anything to them the last time I saw them.”

“Good.”

She started to say something and then paused for a moment. “There was someone they were going to meet.”

I didn’t move but then finally pulled in enough air to ask, “What?”

“Someone. Raynaud said something about meeting somebody who knew the way.”

“The way out of the mountains?”

She nodded. “Yes.”

“Who?”

The frustration rose in her voice. “I don’t know.” She sat there fingering the edge of the blanket like a child would, and I thought she was through talking, but she wasn’t. “Raynaud, he’s rather . . . Charismatic is the only way I can describe it. He has a power over people . . . not just me.” Her eyes came up to mine. “I’m not crazy, Sheriff. If it wasn’t impressed on me that Raynaud was a killer before, it is now. He left me here to die, and I thought I was the most important person in his life.” She looked at the ceiling, and when she looked at me, there were still tears. “I just don’t want you to underestimate him.”

“I wasn’t intending to.”

“If you go after him, he’ll kill you.”

I nodded and rose. “Drink the rest of your tea.”

Her face returned to the fireplace, and the reflection of the conflagration again replaced her eyes. I turned and looked at the fire, reveling in its warmth and letting my mind thaw with my face.

For the first time, I noticed that Omar’s Sharps buffalo rifle was hanging above the mantel. I stepped forward and placed a hand on its elongated barrel; it was the one I’d used to explode a pumpkin in his backyard. It wasn’t like the Cheyenne Rifle of the Dead that was securely ensconced in the gun safe in my closet, but it was close enough to raise the hair on the back of my hand. It was beautiful, a museum piece, really. It hadn’t had the hard wear of the Indian weapon but had a dignity of its own. There were new additions since the last time I’d seen it over a year ago: a period military shoulder strap and a beaded rear stock cover with three .45-70 rounds tucked in the butterlike leather—the father, the son, and the Holy Ghost.