The Empire of Shadows (31 page)

From time to time Mitchell would stop to check for sign. He never seemed unsure or doubtful, not even when the trail led up a rocky creek bed where water gurgled unseen, rising up in little dark pools here and there. He'd stop and kneel to read the moss or leaves or rocks, as if he was reading a book at the library. He had the look of a scholar at these times, a man accustomed to a life of study and acute observation.

They walked hard, but rested frequently. The stops were only enough to catch their breath and perhaps chew on a bit of dried, smoked venison. They walked in silence, spread well apart, Mitchell first, Mike in the middle, and Tom behind. Tom often stopped to watch the trail, waiting hidden for Tupper to come stalking up behind. He'd wait behind cover until Mike and Mitchell were lost to sight. Sometimes the forest held its breath, sometimes it seemed to whisper. Tom's pistol grew hot in his hand, but he saw nothing.

As they walked deeper into the forest, Tom began to realize how lost he was. The trail had twisted and turned around swamps and streams, rocky ridges and tangled windfalls. The only thing he was at all sure of was that they were headed generally west. He began to appreciate how much they were depending on Mitchell. It was not a good feeling, considering what had happened to their last guide. At least on the water there were borders, ends and beginnings. Here all was the same, or so it seemed to Tom. The trees marched away in all directions, infinitely varied but essentially the same, one direction no different from the next. It was like a Coney Island house of mirrors, except the mirrors were trees.

The ground they crossed became low, with swampy areas thick with alder, balsam, and silver birch. Mitchell went on following an invisible trail as though he were on a city sidewalk. Though he'd stop to read the signs, he seemed to know exactly where he was going. He followed the trail through heavy brush, where the earth went from spongy loam to sucking mud. There, for the first time, Tom saw a clear footprint of the man they were after.

“This man has at least one wound,” Mitchell said, “maybe two. He's favoring the left leg. You can see by how he sets his feet and the depth of the tracks.” He pointed to a set of three and Tom could see, now that Mitchell had pointed it out, that indeed the left track was lighter, the right deeper.

“Not slowing him much,” Tom said. “We've been moving pretty fast.” Mitchell just nodded.

They waded a muddy, sluggish stream bordered by high grass dotted with delicate harebell and blind gentian, with its clusters of blue flowers. Tom went first, charging across the open space, while Mike and Mitchell covered him from hiding.

Tupper had been there, but he'd moved on. Clouds of thirsty mosquitoes were all they found. Tom and Mike slapped at them. Mitchell took no notice. After a while he stopped and fished in his pack.

“Try this,” he said. “Make it myself.”

He handed Tom a corked bottle half full of a viscous, black liquid that left a greasy ring on the inside of the glass. Tom pulled the cork and sniffed at it.

“Ach! For the love o' Christ, what's in this?”

Mitchell grinned. “Can't say. Keeps the skeeters off though.”

Tom and Mike daubed it on, trying to hold their breath.

“Smells like coal tar, turpentine, and bear shit,” Mike grumbled. He held his hands out at his sides not knowing what to do with them. He finally shrugged and wiped them on his pants.

“Pretty close,” Mitchell said, corking the bottle before putting it back. “Works,” he added with a shrug.

They started to climb then, going up a steady incline that got steeper as they went. The trail ran straight up and over a small mountain.

“What mountain is this?” Mike asked the next time they stopped.

“Got no name I know of,” Mitchell said.

“You know where you are?”

Mitchell didn't speak at first. He crunched some hard crackers as if he hadn't heard the question. “We are in the hunting ground of the Mohawk, keepers of the eastern door to the Iroquois nation,” Mitchell said at last, “Land that was theirs for as long as the stars were bright. My father, Captain Peter, fought here with the Yankees against the British. It is the land I've known since I was a boy.”

 

Mary sat on the verandah, Rebecca at her side. She fingered the bit of cloth in her pocket. Since Tom had started chasing Tupper, she'd kept it with her. It wasn't much, just a small patch of plaid flannel, with blue and green and brown threads hanging loose where it had been torn. When the sheriff had arrived, she wondered if she shouldn't turn it over. It was evidence, after all, but she worried what the reaction would be. Coming from her, a woman who'd never even seen the body, and whose son was the prime suspect, she thought she knew. Her word would never be respected, as much because of he sex as for the more obvious reasons.

The piece of cloth Tom had found in the Burman girl's mouth would mean nothing coming from her. It might even be “lost,” or dismissed outright, its value and meaning gone forever.

Mary prayed again that Tom and Mike would come back with the murderer in irons. It would be the only way to put all their worries to rest. Anything short of that left too much open, too many possibilities. If Tupper wasn't caught, the piece of flannel might be Mike's only defense. He had no such shirt, never had. Tom had told her to keep it safe. Safe it would stay until he returned.

“When are we going fishing, Mommy?” Rebecca said, shaking Mary out of her thoughts. “I see Mister Owens by the dock. See him? See? He's waving.” Rebecca waved back. “Let's go. I want to catch fishes now.”

They did catch fishes, “long ones with fins and little spots,” as 'Becca described them. Owens baited their hooks and told them what to do if they got a bite. He took care of everything else, netting when they got one in close, pulling hooks, and rowing the boat. Most of all, he was entertaining. He sang funny tunes, like “Bile 'em Cabbage Down”:

His voice was rough and his pitch was off, but it only seemed to add to the fun when he went into a rendition of “Blue-Tailed Fly”—

Rebecca caught a fish then. She squealed and clapped as Owens brought it in. She wanted to touch it, so Owens held it for her. She felt its side with just one finger.

“He's so smooth, Mommy, and he's cold,” she said with a giggle. She looked closely at the fluttering gills and open, doll-like eye.

“He looks sad, Mister Owens. Do you think he's sad?”

“Couldn't say. Never gave a thought to such a thing. Could be so, I guess,” Owens said with a look at the fish. “Plenty of things in this world to make a body sad.”

“We should throw him back,” Rebecca said in her gentlest voice. “Right, little fishy? You need your family, don't you? You miss your home and your Mommy.”

“Throw him back, Mister Owens,” Mary said. “Maybe he's sad at that.”

Owens smiled and let the fish slip into the water.

The hours passed, marked by stories and fish. Owens told how Robert Rogers made his slide down a cliff on Lake George to escape the Indians; how three men in a jamboat got swept away by a river full of logs, and then dug out of a sandbar days later and miles downstream; of how a famous Indian guide from Long Lake chased a mountain lion out of hiding, prodding him with a stick till his sport could get a shot, and when the sport missed, how he killed the lion himself.

“Every word's true,” Owens insisted more than once. There were tales of bears shot, fish caught, and men lost in logging accidents. Not once did Owens talk about Tupper. He never mentioned Mike or Tom. Mary was glad of it. For a few hours she had been made to forget. Rebecca had wonderful fun, even though they released almost all the fish they caught.

And Owens was a charming companion and storyteller. He had an eye for Mary, of that she was certain; and when, at the dock he gave her his hand to help her out of the boat and she'd slipped, he'd caught her waist. His hands had lingered ever so slightly. And when Mary raised her dark eyes to thank him for the day, he'd not looked away.

“Mary!” someone called. A waving figure from up on the verandah caught her eye. A moment later Chowder Kelly stumped down the lawn.

“Uncle Chowder!” Rebecca cried as she ran to him.

“'Becca. How's my favorite little daisy?” Chowder picked her up like a feather and whirled her about, skirts flying. “Oh, but you're gettin' so heavy. What're they feedin' you up here?” he said as he put her down. “Looks like you sprouted another inch, or I'm an Orangeman.”

“I eat pancakes every day,” Rebecca said. “They make them sooo big, and I can have as many as I want.”

“Chowder,” Mary said as she came up to them, “you are a sight for sore eyes. I'm so glad you've come.”

Chowder shrugged. “Gets me out of the city and away from the chief.”

Mary gave him a hug and a peck on the cheek.

“Are you going to find Mike, Uncle Chowder? He's with Daddy you know, and Daddy always knows where
he
is.”

Owens came up just then. Mary wondered with a start whether he'd heard what Rebecca said about Tom and Mike. Owens's expression didn't give anything away if he had. He carried Rebecca's bonnet in one hand, a string of trout in the other.

“The little miss forgot her bonnet,” he said, handing it to Rebecca. “I'll see these fish 're ready for dinner.”

Mary thanked him and turned to Chowder, who Owens had been eyeing.

“Detective Sergeant Kelly, at your service,” Chowder said, extending a hand.

“Owens's the name. You're up from the city to help find the killer, then?”

Chowder nodded.

“Yeah. Wish I could help s' more, but this is our busy time. Have to be off for Long Lake this evening. Got work up there tomorrow.”

“Mister Owens has been very helpful already,” Mary said to Chowder. “He helped Tom when they first went after Tupper.”

“Oh? You are to be thanked then, Mister Owens. I'm sure I speak for the commissioner himself when I give you your due on behalf of the department. It's a fine, hardy man who pitches in on the side of the law when there's a pinch.”

“Nothin' at all, Sergeant. Wish I could help more, like I say, but my idle afternoons 're scarce as hen's teeth now,” he said with a nod toward Mary, “but none more pleasantly spent, ma'am.”

They parted, Mary, Rebecca, and Chowder heading for the verandah. “Hell of a place, this,” Chowder said. “The very devil to get to, though.” He looked down the length of the verandah, then out at the lawns, the lake, and the boathouse. “Hardly a soul about. Them guides,” he said with a nod toward an idle group by the boathouse, “they don't look overbusy. Stage was near full heading out, too.”

“Can't blame people,” Mary said. “Everybody's jittery over the murder.”

“Oh, to be sure. I just wonder what's keepin' Mister Owens so busy, is all.”

Mary laughed. “Not here two minutes and you're busy detecting. Relax Chowder. Owens isn't your man.” The laugh faded, the smile too. “It's that lunatic, Tupper,” she said. “That's why nobody's around. Everybody's scared to death. Tommy would be, too, if he had any sense, which we both know he doesn't,” she said with a rueful smile that was still part pride.

Before Chowder could ask the obvious question, Mary answered it for him. “Mike's with him, just like 'Becca says,” she said in a low voice. “You don't know that, and I didn't tell you, but he is.” She fingered the swatch of cloth in her pocket. “Hmm,” Chowder rumbled. “We obviously need to talk.”

In low tones, Mary told Chowder all she knew. She even told him about the piece of cloth.

“I suppose you should have this,” she said, handing it to him.

“Bit it off the attacker?” Chowder mumbled, examining it closely. “Arm about the neck, she struggles, bites.”

“That's what Tommy thought.” Mary turned and called out, “'Becca! Stay where I can see you.”

Rebecca had strayed on the lawn while Mary and Chowder sat talking.

“I am, Mommy.”

Mary waved back.

Chowder waved too. “That sheriff you told me about, he doesn't know about this?”

“No. He hadn't arrived when Tom went after Tupper, so Tom left it with me. Tom didn't trust that doctor.”

“Where's the sheriff now?” Chowder wanted to know.

“Haven't seen him today at all. Out searching, I suppose.” Chowder stretched and got up from his chair. “Think I'll just go an' ask.”

Chowder came back a few minutes later, clumping fast down the echoing wooden verandah. “He's gone someplace called Long Lake with a party of deputies, according to the clerk at the desk. Got word there was lots o' firing on the lake last night, a regular battle.”

Mary jumped up. “I'm going with you!”

Chowder was about to protest, but hesitated a moment then shrugged and said, “Better pack some things.”

 

They had bushwhacked for hours since their early lunch, a stop that hadn't lasted more than ten minutes.

“He wasn't wounded bad,” Mitchell said. “No more blood on the trail.”

“How far ahead you think he is?” Tom asked. “We must've made up some distance on him.”

“Maybe,” Mitchell said. “A trail don't change much in a couple hours. Couple days is another tale. We're close, though.”

“Close enough to catch him today?”