(1995) The Oath (23 page)

A broken bottle of Jack Daniels whiskey. The ground was wet with the spilled liquor, the smell unmistakable. He searched the immediate area for any other signs or clues. The grass was flattened all around the stone, but that was no surprise.

Steve clicked the light off and sat down on the rock, trying to figure things out. He had heard screams, yet there was no one around. The only evidence that someone had just been there was the broken bottle of Jack Daniels. There had to be—

Uh-oh. Now he heard more sounds, then saw two flashlights approaching from up the street. Harold Bly’s two spies again? He immediately looked for a place to conceal himself.

The flashlights continued up the street, sweeping back and forth, searching.

He looked for a back door to this place. Funny. There were only three walls and no roof, and here he was looking for the door. Apparently it was hidden by the remnants of the fallen roof. He’d have to make a wider sweep around the rear wall to get out. He kept low and started working his way along the building.

The lights were coming closer, moving directly toward Hyde Hall. That made sense, but it wasn’t good news. He recalled that his truck was still parked out on the highway like a billboard to advertise his presence. Whoever this was, they had to be coming after him. He kept a grip on his shotgun, desperately hoping he wouldn’t have to use it.

“Steve!” came a voice behind one of the lights. “Steve Benson, are you out there?”

Tracy Ellis. Did that mean he was in or out of trouble? There were no more secrets; that was certain.

He called back, “Over here, in Hyde Hall!”

Now he could see the lights heading toward the old ruin. He worked his way back toward the flat rock, trying to think of ways to look innocent.

Too late. The first flashlight beam found him, and he heard the voice of Sheriff Lester Collins. “Benson! Hold it right there! Don’t move!” Collins did not sound cordial. Steve didn’t move. “And put down that rifle!”

This was definitely a bad development. Steve slowly set the shotgun down on the rock.

Collins and Tracy, dark shadows behind their flashlights, stepped over the foundation and into Hyde Hall.

“I’ve found something here,” Steve said, hoping that would explain his presence.

“Drop that revolver too! Put it on the rock, slowly! And the flashlight!”

He set down the flashlight, then unbuckled his gunbelt and set it on the rock. Collins remained in front, his police revolver in his hand, while Tracy circled around behind.

Oh no, what was this?

“C’mon,” said Tracy, “let’s have those hands.”

Steve obeyed, and Tracy put on the handcuffs.

“Mr. Benson,” said Collins, “you’re under arrest. You have the right to remain silent . . .”

WHEN COLLINS
brought the patrol car to a halt in front of a large, brick home in Hyde River, it seemed an unexpected twist— Steve hoped it would be a favorable one.

Collins turned off his engine and looked back at Steve, still cuffed in the back seat. “Dr. Benson, I’m a practical kind of guy, and I know you are too. Now neither one of us needs extra trouble in our lives, and I’m guessing you’d just as soon get out of Hyde Valley altogether than spend time in jail. Am I correct, sir?”

“I would agree with that,” Steve said. Actually, he wasn’t so sure, but as the sheriff said, he was a practical kind of guy.

“All right, good. That’s what I wanted to hear. Now. This is the home of Harold Bly. It’s his land you were trespassing on, and he’s the one who called us. He’s not too happy about this, but he’s a reasonable man. I’m hoping he’ll be satisfied with an apology and a promise that you’ll stay off his land so I won’t have to take you to jail. But that all depends on you.”

Tracy had pulled up in her Ranger and parked across the street. Even though she wasn’t in her uniform—she was wearing an oversized shirt and jeans—when she joined them on Bly’s front walk she was still acting like a cop. “Are we ready?”

“I’ve talked it over with him,” Collins answered.

Steve glared at Tracy. He was steaming.

But so was she. “I was right in the middle of dinner!”

“You should get paid overtime,” he quipped.

She just grabbed his arm and shoved him along. “Come on, let’s get this over with.” She led him up the front stairs, just a few steps behind Collins.

“So when do the cuffs come off?” he asked.

“We have to impress Harold first.”

Harold Bly answered their knock. He was expecting them, and he looked Steve over with a sly smile. “Well, lookie here!”

Collins answered, “Harold, this is Dr. Steve Benson. I think he was trying to help us out on that bear-attack case. He didn’t know he was trespassing.”

“Well, we’ll just see about that.”

So this was Harold Bly. Tough-looking character, Steve thought, with arms that could beat a gorilla in an arm wrestle. Steve could tell Bly was enjoying this moment, this chance to be Caesar with a man’s life in his hands: Thumbs up or thumbs down? You’re all mine, you poor jerk. Steve knew immediately he didn’t like this guy.

“Come on in,” said Bly, and they followed him through the house into his living room.

The house was furnished with antiques, all vestiges of the Hyde family’s glory days. In the living room, comfortable sofas and chairs were arranged on a Persian rug around the big stone fireplace. Steve noticed a handsome writing desk in one corner, and the ceiling-high bookshelves displayed antique collectibles as well as volumes of old, leather-bound books. On the mantel sat some gold nuggets in a glass case, and above the mantel was a large portrait of a distinguished-looking gentleman in suit and vest with a gold watch chain, his thumb cocked in his vest pocket, a stern, man-in-charge look on his bearded face. Maybe this was the way Harold Bly viewed himself, Steve thought.

“Come in, make yourselves comfortable,” said Bly, taking the wing chair by the fireplace with the air of a king taking his throne. “Oh, and—” He waved his hand toward Steve. “—let’s take those cuffs off, at least for now.”

Tracy used her key and set Steve loose. He rubbed his wrists, now creased by the cold metal.

“Have a seat,” Bly said. Steve sat down on the couch across the room from Bly, as did Tracy. Collins took the other wing chair near the fireplace. Now they all faced the man of the hour, ready to plead their case.

“So you’re the mighty hunter,” Bly said with unabashed sarcasm. “Seems the whole town’s been talking about you, wondering what you’re going to do next. I hear you started a big fight down at Charlie’s.”

Steve knew Bly was goading him, so he gave a careful, guarded response. “It was an unpleasant situation, something I neither expected nor intended. But there was no harm done.” Then he added, “Just as in this situation.”

“Well, I don’t know that for sure, now do I? I had to have you and Levi Cobb run out of there once before, and now here you are, back again. Either I’m not making myself clear or you’ve got one thick head.”

Steve knew this guy wouldn’t be too impressed with the anonymous “Frenchman” and hot tips about a dragon, or with the notion that another person had just vanished in the same way Maggie had. “It’s as Sheriff Collins was saying. I was hunting for a rogue grizzly. I had reason to believe it might be frequenting the ruins of Old Town.”

Sheriff Collins piped up, “But I need to make it clear, Harold, that Dr. Benson is not working for us and never was. His actions are all strictly voluntary, and I told him this morning the case was closed. This is all his own doing, you understand.”

Right, Collins, Steve thought. By all means, cover your rear.

Bly looked Steve over again and said, “I guess you don’t know how folks around here feel about that place. They have a lot of strong feelings, a lot of traditions—”

“And I used to have a brother before he was horribly mutilated by—by something,” Steve interrupted brusquely. “Of course I’m sorry for going on private land without permission, and I didn’t mean to offend the local traditions, but I’ll be blunt with you: There’s a predator of some kind out there killing people, and it has to be stopped.” Even if it’s you and your pals, he wanted to say.

Collins piped up again, “Steve, we’ve been through that. You already shot the bear, and the coroner says so—”

“The coroner took the word of the pathologist, and I don’t think the pathologist knew what to make of it. As for the bear, I did the autopsy on
318
, and I’m not convinced it was
318
that killed my brother.”

Bly waved his hand for a halt. “Hey, guys, I don’t really care if it was
318
or an overgrown raccoon. It’s you stomping around on my land that I care about. Besides, I don’t buy this idea of a grizzly hanging around down there. Why would a bear be in that area?”

“Well, I’m working on a theory,” Steve said. “It’s sketchy, but—” They were waiting to hear it, and he knew he had to be very careful. He drew a deep breath. “It’s, well, perhaps I could call it my Coincidence Theory. You see, I think maybe the town’s superstitions could be the key to this whole thing.”

Bly looked grim at that. His eyes seemed to be warning Steve to watch his step.

Steve tried to tread carefully. “If a bear finds a predictable food source, whether it’s a campground, a garbage dump, or a dumpster behind a restaurant—any place where food is easily available on a regular basis, the bear will frequent that spot, it’ll keep coming back. Well, if the—” Careful, Steve. “—traditions of Hyde River cause people to go out to Hyde Hall on any frequent or regular basis, then it’s possible that a predatory animal of some kind, a bear, could be viewing that as an easy, predictable food source. If the local superstitions have prevailed for any length of time, there could be several bears involved, not just one.” Even as this fumbling hypothesis crossed his lips, Steve knew that if he’d read it in a term paper he would have flunked it. Well, no one in the room was applauding the idea either. “Granted, what we’ve observed so far doesn’t sound like your typical bear, but that’s the theory I’ve been going on.”

Bly seemed dumbfounded. He looked at Steve, then Tracy, and then Collins. “Am I missing something somewhere? Who’s been eaten by this bear besides your brother?”

Well. Nothing like going out on a limb and having it snap off. “I was led to believe that your wife Maggie was missing, that she’d disappeared in Old Town.” Steve was careful not to look at Tracy when he said that. Hopefully she’d owe him a favor.

Harold snorted. “Who told you that?”

Steve ignored the question, hoping Bly wouldn’t ask it again. “And there was another person, someone named Vic Moore. I followed him into Old Town tonight. He was drunk, and I was concerned for his safety.”

“So, did anything happen to him?”

“I don’t know. He disappeared as well.” Steve looked at Collins. “But I did find a broken whiskey bottle in Hyde Hall.”

Collins laughed loudly, like he was making a point, and grinned at Bly.

Bly just shook his head. “Is that a fact? If a broken bottle means someone’s been killed, ooo-weee, there’s a lot of people being killed around here!”

Steve shot one quick look at Tracy. Her eyes met his, but then she turned away.

Bly was still amused as he explained, “Maggie’s visiting her mother in Denver right now. I talked to her on the phone just this evening. She’s fine. As for Vic Moore, listen, he does this kind of thing all the time: gets drunk, wanders off mad at the world, starts hollering and singing at the trees. Don’t worry about him. A couple of days’ll go by and he’ll be back, groveling and apologizing and picking up where he left off. Nobody’s been killed.”

“There’s my brother,” Steve replied.

“Was your brother killed on my property? Listen, Benson. If you think someone’s been killed in Old Town, show us a body. Give Maggie a call and ask if she’s dead; I don’t care. But she told me she’s doing fine, so I figure she’s still alive.”

“Doing fine?” Steve asked. “According to—”

“Harold, it’s Levi,” Tracy cut in—finally, to Steve’s relief. “Steve—Dr. Benson—has been going on information Levi gave him. That’s the problem.”

“Cobb!” Bly exclaimed.

“Well, you know Levi,” Tracy said. “He thinks the dragon killed Steve’s brother, and he thinks the dragon killed Maggie, and he’s been telling Steve all his stories, and that’s where Steve got his Coincidence Theory. He’s trying to, you know, find some connection between the stories, the things Levi’s saying and—”

Steve finished the thought, “And that’s why I was in Hyde Hall. I was following a lead. I have to check out everything I hear.”

Bly was not quite buying it. “I can’t believe you could be that stupid. You believe all that stuff about a dragon?”

“A predator,” Steve clarified. “Levi’s a little off the wall; I’ll give you that. To him it’s a dragon. I figure it’s a rogue grizzly. In any event, Levi’s information on a dragon seemed to coincide with my scenario of a habituated bear.”

Bly settled back in his chair. “Dr. Benson, you’ve got yourself a lame theory built out of nothing but lies. Anything Cobb says is worthless, understand? That guy’s the biggest liar in the valley.” Suddenly Bly exploded in a fresh burst of anger. “So he’s got Maggie eaten by the dragon, is that right?”

Tracy nodded.

Bly’s face was turning red with rage. “If Levi Cobb had his way, there really would be a dragon, and it’d be gobbling down anybody Cobb didn’t agree with! My wife, eaten by the dragon. Next thing you know, he’ll have the dragon eating me.” Bly leaned forward and pointed in Steve’s face. “Let me tell you something: That man’s an ex-con; did you know that? He killed a man, right here in Hyde River, knifed him in a big fight in a bar. You think a man like that is going to tell the truth about somebody he doesn’t like? Cobb’s got it in for me, always has. He’s a liar, Benson. He’s such a big liar he doesn’t even know he’s lying. He believes it himself.”

Steve was ready to play the reformed penitent. “Well, what can I say?” He spread his hands in a placating gesture. “I’m appalled. I’m embarrassed. I’ve been working with false information.”

“You got that right!”