Hunters (34 page)

No one was in the room, but a trail of blood
now ran to the closed bedroom door. Pinchot sniffed at it, then
scratched at the door, which swung slowly open.

Inside, lying in a pool of blood on the bed,
was a dead deer. It had been gutted, and the empty cavity yawned at
them like a pale, surprised mouth.

Ned looked at it for only a moment. "Come
on," he said, grabbing Megan's hand. He led her onto the porch and
across the space that separated the cabin from the Blazer. What
little he could see of it told him that the tires were nearly
covered in snow, but if Megan drove while he pushed, there might be
enough traction to get the Blazer moving. Once it was, he might be
able to
keep
it moving. It was a long shot, but he knew they
had to get out now.

Someone had been toying with them, playing
games with blood and gunfire, and he was afraid he knew who.

He body-plowed his way toward the Blazer, but
as he got nearer, he thought that the snow was covering the vehicle
more deeply than it should have, as if he had parked it in a hole.
Then he saw the reason why. Only the upper third of the tires was
visible, and into each of them someone had driven foot-long metal
spikes. He didn't even bother to look at the other side.

The cold had him now. He was shivering,
remembering what they had done and thinking about what they
would
do. His probable fate shook him hard, but that they
should harm Megan filled him with a far more intense combination of
terror, grief, and fury.

He would not let them. He would do whatever
he could, but he would not let them harm her.

He had not let go of her hand, and now he led
her back to the cabin. "We'll have to hole up in here," he said
breathlessly. "Keep the lights off so they can't see to shoot."

"Could they burn us out?" Megan said, panting
as they ran, Pinchot at their side.

"I don't think so, with all the snow...maybe,
I don't know, if they soaked the cabin with gas...God, I don't
know..."

They had left the door open when they fled,
and now they rushed back into the cabin, slamming and locking the
door behind them. Ned dragged the dead buck off the bed and through
the living room to the kitchen door, opened it, and pushed the
carcass out into the snow, then closed and locked the door.

Megan had drawn back one of the closed
curtains just far enough to peek out. "Ned," she said, "they could
break the windows..."

"They might break the separate panes, but
nobody can crawl through," he said. "Those frames are metal. They'd
have to twist them open with a crowbar to get through, and if they
try that I can shoot them. I've got two boxes of ammo. That's a
hundred shots."

"You didn't bring another gun?"

Ned shook his head. "No. Just the one." He
shrugged and smiled lamely. "Who would have thought we'd even need
this one?"

Megan shook her head. "How did they even get
back
here?"

"If you want something bad enough," Ned said,
"I guess you can get to it." Suddenly he raised his head.
"Listen..."

Above the whine of the wind, they could hear
a high-pitched buzzing, like a swarm of huge, angry bees. It grew
ever louder, and in another few seconds Ned knew what it was.

"Snowmobiles."

Ned dashed to the light switch and turned it
off. Then he and Megan went to the window near the fireplace,
inched back the curtain, and looked out.

Through the falling snow they could see dim
lights, like fireflies in fog. There were two of them, and they
were moving slowly, not at all like the Ski-doos that ripped
through the woods during non-hunting seasons.

Then, as the snowmobiles stopped near the
Blazer, Ned saw why. Each vehicle was carrying two people. That
meant that four crazies were out to kill them, twice the number Ned
had assumed when he saw the two lights. They must have left the
snowmobiles further out the access road, come in the rest of the
way on foot to play their little games of torment, then returned to
the snowmobiles to come back in and finish the fun. It made sense.
Walk in these woods in the dark, and you'd be lost in minutes. But
the snowmobiles' lights were strong. It would be easy to come in to
the tower on the Forestry Service road in the dark.

And easy to get back out again after they did
what they came to do.

The snowmobiles swung around so that the
lights were facing the cabin, and Ned drew back as the bright beam
illuminated the window from which he and Megan were watching. He
felt certain that the people outside had seen the curtain drift
back into place, and readied himself for the first shot of the
siege that he expected, pulling Megan with him down below the level
of the window.

But no shots came, and he scrambled over to
the front window, signaling Megan to stay where she was. The lights
through the windows made it easy to get around in the small room,
and easy to avoid Pinchot, who was trotting back and forth
nervously.

Ned could see them now, four of them, walking
toward the cabin. The lights weren't hitting the front window
directly, and he knew they couldn't see him watching them. He felt
ice pool in his stomach as he saw that they all carried guns. Two
had pistols, and the other two had small weapons that looked like
pistols, but had long, blocky magazines. Assault weapons, as if
things weren't bad enough.

As the four moved along, the largest of them
stopped and turned toward the tower, whose posts were dimly
illuminated by the spill from the headlights. He threw out his
arms, and Ned saw that in his other hand he was carrying a box with
a handle. Ned thought he heard a booming laugh, but wasn't sure.
Two of the others stopped and looked too, but the fourth figure
kept moving inexorably toward the cabin. After a moment, two of the
others turned and followed, but the big man was moving away from
the others, toward the tower. Ned could see a flashlight's beam
illuminating his path.

The person in front led the others around to
the side, just behind the cabin where Ned couldn't see them through
any of the windows, and his bullets couldn't reach them.
"
Craig!
" a voice called, and Ned thought it sounded like a
woman's.

"We know you're in there!" the voice shouted
over the storm. He looked at Megan, and she said softly, "A woman?"
Ned nodded.

"And we know who's in there with you!" the
woman went on. "We're armed. Heavily. We've got guns and we've got
explosives, and if you don't come out, we'll take this cabin down
around you!"

Ned held his fingers to his lips. Maybe, just
maybe if they thought no one was there...but then he realized that
the Blazer was a dead giveaway. There was no point in pretending
they weren't there. Maybe there was some way he could talk them out
of whatever they had planned. Maybe there was a way to save
Megan.

He went to the door, signaling Megan to stay
down, and opened the top part just far enough so to talk through
it. "It might be tough to get me!" he called. "I've got a gun. I'll
shoot anybody who tries to get in."

"You can try, Craig, but we've got guns too.
And there are four of us. All we have to do is come and shoot
through the different windows, and you and your woman are
dead."

"And get yourself in a crossfire?" he
yelled.

"That's a chance we'll take. We've taken a
lot already, as you well know. Give yourself up to us, Craig. You
can't escape."

"Give myself up to
you?
" Ned called.
"Who the hell
are
you?"

"We're the Wildlife Liberation Front. And you
murdered one of our brothers."

"I shot him in self-defense—while he was
mutilating his victim! Why should I make it easy for you?"

"To make it easy on your woman! It's just you
we want. You come out, and we'll let your woman live."

"No, Ned!" Megan said, too softly for them to
hear outside.

"Why should I believe you?" Ned said.

"You don't have much choice! And I don't lie!
What we do is for a purpose—we have a code of honor. You can take
my word."

Ned thought frantically. The woman was right.
There was no escape, and no way to contact anyone for help. Then he
thought about the cellar door.

There was a trap door to the basement. He had
found it earlier that day beneath a throw rug in the kitchen. He
hadn't gone down, but had opened the trap and peered into the
darkness, from which a dampness and a sharp, sour smell rose, as if
mice had died down there not long before.

Maybe there was another way out, an outside
entrance from the cellar that was buried under the snow. If so, and
if it were on the other side of the cabin, he might be able to push
it up and come around behind the killers. He didn't know if he
could shoot fast enough to down them before they could turn on him,
but it was worth a chance.

"Go in the bedroom," he said softly to Megan,
"and get a flashlight." She crab walked across the room and opened
the bedroom door. The smell of the dead deer hung heavily in the
air. "Give me some time to think about it!" Ned called through the
open door.

"Three minutes!" the cry came back. "Starting
now!"

He pulled the door shut, locked it, and
grabbed the flashlight Megan offered him. Then he glided into the
kitchen, threw back the carpet, and raised the trapdoor. Steep
wooden steps led down, and he descended them, Megan just behind
him. Pinchot remained at the top, whining.

"Close the trap door," he told Megan, and
when he heard it fall into place he flicked on the light and shone
it around desperately.

"
Yes!
" he whispered. There at the
eastern end of the cellar were six steps cut in the earth that led
to a double-trap cellar door. He ran to it, went up the steps so
that his head was nearly touching the rusted metal, and turned the
handle, pushing up.

The door moved upward for a fraction of an
inch, then held. At first Ned thought that the weight of snow was
pressing down on it, but another try brought a dull metallic click,
and a dry lump sat in his throat as he realized that the door was
padlocked from above, probably to keep out any prowlers who wanted
to break into the deserted cabin.

"Locked," he said, coming back down the
earthen steps. "God damn it, locked."

"Oh Ned," Megan shook her head. "We'll have
to fight them off, that's all. Maybe we can do it. They'll have to
come through the windows one at a time..."

"They can attack four different windows at
once. Shoot inside. With the guns they've got, we couldn't escape
being hit. It's like being in a box."

"Then we can stay down here. They'd have to
come through the trap door one at a time."

He shook his head. "They could shoot through
the floorboards, set the place on fire from the inside, hell, blow
the whole damn place up so that it falls in on us. No, Megan,
they've got us." He looked at her, trying to show her how much he
loved her. "I don't want you to die."

"I won't do this, Ned. I won't let them kill
you."

He opened the cylinder of his revolver,
pressed back on the release rod, and the five bullets fell to the
dirt floor. Then he dropped the pistol as well, and kicked the
bullets so that they scattered in different paths into the
darkness.

Her eyes widened as she realized what he
intended. "My God, Ned, you can't trust
them!
"

"We've got no choice. Maybe they'll let you
live. There's no reason they should want you dead." He looked
upward at the ceiling. "My time's up." Then he climbed the wooden
steps, threw open the trap door, and went up into the kitchen. He
crossed to the door and opened it. "All right," he called out.
"I'll give myself up to you. But give me your word you won't harm
Megan!"

"You have it," came the voice. "Now turn on the
lights inside and come out onto the porch. Both of you!"

C
huck Marriner saw
the lights go in the cabin before he heard Jean Catlett calling to
him. Her voice was nearly muffled by the howling of the wind, and
he ignored it. He'd make them come for him. He was having too much
fun, and he wasn't finished yet.

While Jeannie and her cronies were having a
little Mexican standoff with Ned Craig, Chuck had been wiring the
tower for its final bow. With his gloved hands, he had cleared the
snow away from the two legs of the tower nearest the edge of the
cliff, and placed small, waterproof cubes of plastic explosive
around the steel beams. He was just in the process of attaching a
#3 cap to the second leg he wanted to blow when Jean called his
name a second time.

And a second time he ignored her, trailing
the detonator cord from both charges around the side of the tower
and back toward the cabin. He was thirty yards from the tower when
he saw Jean plowing through the snow toward him.

"Dammit, Chuck! Didn't you hear me?"

"No, Jeannie, sorry, but I didn't." He looked
up and saw two people coming onto the porch of the cabin, their
figures casting long shadows mottled by the falling snow. "Got 'em
out, huh?" He stopped, tucked his Ingram under his arm, and cleared
a space in the snow for the detonator, a small plastic box with a
red button. "Hey, Jeannie, do me a favor—don't let anybody
accidentally push that button till I'm ready, okay?"

He grinned at the shocked expression on her
face. "What did you do?"

"I wired the tower for boom-boom. We waste
Craig, and then we drop the tower.
Gotterdammerung
, babe.
The tower and Craig, both to the bottom of the cliff."

"Well, do something to it," Jean said
nervously. "Fix it so it can't go off by accident."

"What, you think somebody's gonna run over it
with a beer truck? Coupla kids bump it rollerblading?"

"
Do
something to it, Chuck. You're the
only one who touches it anyway."