Wild Country (19 page)

Quantrill stuck one hand behind his back. "Hey, Stearns," he said lazily, "guess what
I'm
holding up."

Behind him, Randy Matthews saw the upraised finger and covered his mouth to hide his smile.

Raising his arm, jabbing a forefinger to pace each word: "You're on a month's suspension, Quantrill. No pay, no commendation."

"Commend this," was the reply, with a suitable gesture. Quantrill got up and walked toward the door.

For one instant, the other men thought Steams would hurl the 'corder at his deputy's back. "
Six
months. The maximum," Steams said instead, choking on his rage.

"The maximum is forever. I like it better that way," said Quantrill. The room was very quiet, so quiet they heard the soft click of the doorlatch as Quantrill eased the door shut behind him.

He could not say why at first, but Quantrill put off telling Jess Marrow that he had drawn his last wages as a pan-time deputy marshal. It was not that he could still leave WCS land for days at a time without any explanation, though that was true enough. The fact was, Quantrill felt ashamed of the way he had taunted Marv Steams. The big man might be crooked as a dog's hind leg, or he might not; but he'd had the look of a man blindsided from ambush when Quantrill had walked out on him. As if, by refusing to play by the rules as Stearns understood them, Quantrill had taken unfair advantage.

There had been a time when Quantrill had taken unfairness for granted. When the government implants a radio monitor in your head and can detonate it for your slightest mistake, you tend to simplify your ethics. When they gave you a cheap shot, you took it; if they said "kill," you killed. In the few years since that implant was removed from his mastoid—and that government was removed from office—Quantrill had learned again to savor ideals: fairness, affection, trust. In a way, the government had been right. For a manhunter, ideals are shackles.

If you stayed in the hunt, those shackles would eventually get you killed.

On his second day back from Junction, Quantrill called Sandy on the open VHP line during his lunch break. "I really feel naked without my shoulder patch," he said. It was a hint.

She missed it. "I hate that thing anyway. But you can buy another one."

"Can't; it's illegal. My ID and belt video are gone, too; the whole nine yards."

"You mean somebody stole your—I don't believe it, Ted Quantrill, what are you hiding from me?"

He told her and grinned as she whooped with glee. Then, confusing him, she was crying. "Predictable as Texas weather," was all he could think to say.

"You go to hell, Ted, I can cry if I feel like it," she sniffled. A moment later she was suggesting that he come to her place and pat her shoulder—among other things.

"Nothing I'd like better, honey, but I'd better stick around here. I'm waiting for a call from, uh"—he remembered it was an open channel—"a friend who owes you. Besides, I need to stay up-to-date on the Brit's progress. He still talks to me, God knows why. And now he's using a chopper to canvass the big ranches around these pans. He's offering money for information, but so far, as he puts it, no joy."

Touched at his concern for Ba'al, she promised much in the way she murmured their special phrase: "Soon, love."

He agreed, said goodbye, shrugged into a denim jacket for the afternoon's work. He'd thought Marrow was joking when the job was first mentioned. Wild Country Safari boasted a lot of spooky animals, but only one kind that could be mentioned in the same breath with Ba'al. Neither tame nor game, the WCS rhinos were treated rather like moving monuments with bad eyes and dispositions to match.

He was gathering his gear behind Marrow's office when he heard a familiar voice raised in irritation. "My
dear
Marrow, I am prepared to indemnify you for it!" Wardrop.

Jess Marrow's voice was indistinct, but his tone was obvious: no dice. Quantrill strode to the office doorway wearing thick nylon brush chaps and carrying cartridges for the Nelson rifle. Marrow was saying, "Like you said, laissez-faire. You do like you want, and so do we." His voice got lower, with fewer highs and lows, with every sentence. His final statement came all in one breath, and it was low on volume, but it was a beaut. "That contract of yours don't say nothin' about loanin' you no friggin' transporter fer no friggin' horse, an' I won't, not even if you had that friggin' hawg in a hole out there, maybe 'specially not then, and now I'm sorry I didn't talk down this whole friggin' idea, but I was too goddamn friggin' broad-minded." Quantrill knew the signs; the madder Jess Marrow got, the less he sounded like a veterinarian.

Alec Wardrop did not know those signs and barked, "Broad-minded? Marrow—rhymes with narrow." He turned as if to go

"I know what rhymes with Brit, sonny boy," said Marrow, and Quantrill cleared his throat. Livid, Wardrop spun; saw who was behind him, and seemed unable to find words.

Quantrill found a few. "Why don't we take a walk, cool off." He made it sound like a question.

The long-legged Wardrop set such a pace that Quantrill was almost trotting as they neared the tack shed. Muttering, "Chance of a lifetime," and, "Paid a pretty penny—for what?" and, "Now that I have a fresh sighting…" he opened the little Spanish Barb's stall. He was in the kind of hurry that horses can sense, and the barb's ears went back a trifle.

Quantrill made it casual. "You say you've got a recent sighting of that boar?"

"His track, at least. Fellow named Cannon saw fresh signs this morning," Wardrop replied, checking his saddle. This was the traditional English leather affair that you could store in a breadbox with room to spare for a family of mice. Westerners called it a kidney pad; joked of its saddle tree and skirt that they were no more than a shrub and bloomers. But it took a fine rider to use an English saddle in rough country.

Quantrill asked where the sighting had been. Wardrop whisked a trim, folded polypaper chart from the side of his boot top and tapped a finger over an orange X, then continued saddling up while Quantrill opened the map one fold.

Quantrill saw the name of a township, whispered, "Shit," then refolded the map; handed it back. "Could his name have been Concannon? Wiry, thin hair, about forty?"

"Con? Yes, I believe so; Con Cannon." Wardrop flashed an almost friendly smile and kept cinching.

For one heartbeat, Quantrill considered a bad decision. No, a few broken ribs wouldn't deter Alec Wardrop for long, anyway. And it might land Quantrill in the slammer. "A hell of a long way from here," he said. Garner Ranch was over a half-day's ride on a horse.

"I'll manage. Those people may be more hospitable than this lot, and in any case I'm ready for bugger-all." Wardrop's kit looked like a good one, inflatable bag and all. The man was determined enough and loony enough to rough it out there, in country that had incredible flip-flops of weather, plus its own annual tarantula migration. But the tarantulas had made their march two months before, and Wardrop had a VHP handset. The barb would find forage, and just maybe Wardrop would find his quarry.

"These folks are only trying to keep you from killing yourself," Quantrill said reasonably. "Beats me why Marrow takes care of your gear."

"Because I have a signed contract," Wardrop said, "for which I'm paying a small fortune."

With undisguised hope: "You could go broke chasing this four-footed ghost."

"Oh, very likely," Wardrop drawled, amused. He added somewhat pointedly. "I certainly could, if I let a fresh spoor get cold. At least I know which point of the compass to face."

"Right; only thirty million acres to search. You could lose a herd of rhinos out there."

"Rhinoceri seem to lack strong herd instinct," Wardrop said acidly, leading the barb outside. "Take it from one who has hunted them with the Zulu."

Quantrill entertained one more slender hope: Perhaps the Brit could be diverted by another danger. "I've got to inoculate our white rhinos today, Wardrop. I can knock 'em out with syringe cartridges, but I have to do the inoculations up close. Thought you might enjoy the challenge."

"That's no challenge, it's a duffer's game; armchair sport," Wardrop said. He pulled a brilliant kerchief, which opened in a silent airburst the color of blood, from a pocket of his bush jacket; tied it around his throat.

Quantrill recalled the moment when Marianne Placidas had flung that kerchief at Wardrop in scorn. "Does the woman still want you to do this?"

"I wouldn't know. Saw that Ocelot of hers in San Antonio a few days ago, but I haven't seen her since the day…" He let his sentence trail off.

Quantrill met his glance; nodded. Alec Wardrop would seek the woman out when, and only when, he had answered her challenge. The Brit mounted up. the lance slung across his back, its point gleaming in autumn sunlight. He rode out toward the southwest, erect, undaunted, with no other weapons than the lance. Quantrill waited until the rider was out of sight before heading for Marrow's radiophone. With luck, Sandy might be able to keep Ba'al off the range for a day or so.

Felix Sorel checked the pace of his mare, frowning as he saw the way his companion mistreated a borrowed mount. This was supposed to be a pleasurable ride on his own turf, beyond the ears of his men. Yet it was difficult to enjoy with a companion like Jerome Garner. "
Cuidado
, careful," he called as the Anglo urged his big stallion down a talus slope.

Young Garner snapped the reins too hard, with the kind of overcontrol that could turn a good horse into a bad one. The Anglo sat a saddle well, but any fool could see that he had no respect for his mount. On shifting slopes, you didn't wheel your horse around if you gave a damn about broken legs—for horse and rider both.

But the Garner luck held, as it always seemed to hold. Somehow the big dun stallion obeyed with powerful lunges that brought Garner back to the promontory, where Sorel leaned on his saddle horn, patting the neck of his sorrel mare, enjoying his view.

Why lecture the
cabrdn
on the matter? Instead, Sorel smiled across at his guest. "A shame that you have no such mountains on Garner Ranch," he said. "We could move an army through here without detection."

"And it'd take a week," Garner replied. He swung down from the dun, snapping kinks from his legs, swinging his big shoulders so that his mount shied. "Whoa, goddammit," he barked, jerking the reins. Sorel judged the tall Anglo to be a couple of years under thirty. He wore his dark hair rather long, its curls falling over a broad forehead, almost to his brows. His deep-set eyes were a startling blue that seemed to skewer whatever they spotted. The nose was strong, the chin square: all he lacked, thought Sorel, was a dimple.

One day this strapping Anglo would probably grow soft with his excesses, but now he fairly hummed with vitality. It kept him trim, with the flat belly and tight buttocks of an athlete. Sorel, who worked hard to stay in shape, appreciated bodies like that; might have made a delicate proposal to the Anglo, but he knew better than to consider it seriously. For one thing, Jerome Garner saw other men only as opponents rather than friends—let alone potential lovers. For another, the man inside that charming body had no charm to speak of. Felix Sorel smiled again into the blue eyes: too bad,
lo siento mucho, querido
.

As if noting something sensuous in his host's glance, Garner nodded toward the small scatter of tile rooftops in the far distance. "How can you stand it here. Sorrel? There can't be much action in a dump like Mariposa."

"I bring the action," Sorel said. "I will shortly bring more action through your land than you have yet seen."

"That's what SanTone Rose promised, and that's why I'm here; you tryin' to spook me, Sorrel?"

Sorel maintained his calm. It was easy to ignore antagonism from a man he could outfight or outmaneuver at his whim. "Merely covering every base, Jerome. After our first few shipments, the border authorities may step up their surveillance. We cannot buy off all
the federates
in Wild Country. Do you have the manpower and the cover activities to handle five times the" traffic you have had in the past?"

Garner gave a silent whistle; scratched a bristly chin. He would have to make it look jake with the old man, but Mul Garner himself had often mentioned a private north-south road across the spread. It'd be stupid to build one, of course, since aerial recon might have the border cops sniffing around it. The existing route up through the Garner spread was useful only because it was
not
an obvious conduit. But with a few picked hands, he could pretend they were studying a route. The old man never left ranch headquarters anymore, so the ruse could be maintained. "I can hire more hands to guard your flanks. They're expensive people; shit, you oughta know, some of 'em have been on your payroll."

"I expected that. Who did you have in mind?"

"Longo, Slaughter; a few others that are coolin' off at the old south homestead."

Sorel knew the place: a frame house and barn with sheep pens and shearing shed, once served by chopper when fuel was cheap. It had fallen half to ruin since old Mul Garner's youth, but its well still pumped sweet water. The bam would hide several loaded hovervans if necessary. Sorel nodded. "If we travel at night, we must go slowly. Can we use ranch headquarters for a second stop?"

"No way," Garner replied quickly. "My old man would have more questions than a beef has ticks."

"A stopover toward the north border of your lands, then."

This time Garner thought about it longer. He knew a place all right, hardly more than a line shack and over a century old. It slumped near a small creek that Mul Garner had dubbed "Faithful" because, no matter how ferocious the summer, it always seeped a trickle of good water. Full of limestone minerals, it was "water so hard it'll bust your teeth out," but the shack was special for other reasons. Only a few people knew of its existence in a tree-choked ravine, and Jerome Garner did not intend to share its location with anybody else. Especially not with this slippery, smiling golden boy of a Mex soccer jock. "Nothin" but a few old deer blinds there. Half of those are in trees."