The Dark Place

'Then what do you think killed that unfortunate man?'

If the question kept coming up this often, he was going to have to find an answer. “I don't know,” he muttered lamely. He was anxious to leave. It was unlikely that the evening was going to improve, and the sooner it was over, the better. He looked over at Abe, but the old man was clearly enjoying himself, sitting up as straight and interested as an eager puppy.

Chace took a large swallow of the brandy and said, “Professor, I don't see how you can say there's no legitimate evidence. Have you ever seen the Rosten-Chapman film? That's indisputable.” He raised his glass and grinned. “In my poor opinion.'

Not in Gideon's. He had seen it—with Abe, as a matter of fact—ten years before, at the Milwaukee national conference of the American Society for Physical Anthropology. He could still recall his disappointment with the much-talked-about film. The focus had been poor, the action jerky. All that could be seen was a blurry, dark figure, more or less apelike, walking away from the camera—with what seemed to the assembled anthropologists to be an extremely exaggerated stride, less compatible with general anthropoid locomotion than with a poor actor's interpretation of a giant ape's manner of walking.

'We've seen it,” Abe said with a cheery smile. “Indisputable it ain't.'

Linger laughed heartily, and Abe beamed at him.

Chace was very serious. “All right, even if you don't accept the film—and you have that right—you can't just wish away the thousands of years of verified, responsible sightings of similar species like the yeti.'

'I'm afraid,” Gideon said, “that the Abominable Snowman doesn't seem to me any better verified—'

'It's not just the Abominable Snowman—which, incidentally, isn't abominable at all; the term is a misinterpretation of a Sherpa word meaning manlike wild thing.” Obviously, Chace was getting into a familiar speech. “No, it's much bigger than that. There's the wudenwasa seen and reported by the Anglo-Saxons; the Fomorians that inhabited Ireland when the Celts invaded it; and the hairy men of Broceliande in Brittany. What about Grendel? Knowledge of these beings goes back to Beowulf.'

'So does knowledge of griffins, and devils, and goats that fly.'

Chace laughed. “I guess we differ on the reliability of myth.'

I guess we do, Gideon thought.

'But what about scientists? Modern scientists with unimpeachable credentials? What about Ivan Sanderson? Bayanov? Bourtsev? Kravitz, right here at Washington State? How do you respond to them?'

Gideon could respond, all right, but he wasn't interested in an argument. He shrugged. “All I can do is look at the data and draw my own conclusions.'

'Professor Chace,” Abe said, “I'm a little curious. What does Sherry Washburn think about your theories? Or Howell?'

'I beg your pardon?'

'You don't know Washburn?...You're not with the University of California?'

'Yes, I am.'

Abe's eyes narrowed. “Sherwood Washburn is—'

Chace laughed easily. “Oh, I see. Are they on the biology faculty? Well—'

'Anthropology,” Gideon said.

'Yes, well, I'm in supervisory development.'

'Supervisory development?” said Abe. “This is a university department?'

Chace seemed to find that very funny. “No, goodness me, I'm not technically on the faculty, you see. I teach evening courses in Extension—public speaking for managers, office organization, that kind of thing. Just do it to keep my skills up.'

'You're not a professor, then?” Gideon asked.

Chace slapped his thigh and chuckled with the air of a man who was above overly fastidious distinctions of academic rank. “Never said I was.'

No, and never denied it either, Gideon thought.

'You got a Ph.D.?” Abe asked bluntly.

Chace's face became solemn. “I have a D.B.A., a doctorate of business administration. My formal education is in marketing and public relations.'

Gideon looked at his watch. “Mr. Linger, I've certainly enjoyed this evening, but I'm afraid I have to be up early tomorrow—'

Chace put down his glass with a thump. His expression had changed from solemn to earnest. He leaned tensely forward. “Gideon—may I call you Gideon?—I'm not one of your kooks, or one of these UFO nuts, or someone out to make big bucks. I'm a scientist like yourself, even if I'm self-taught, and I don't go off half cocked. But I'm sitting here telling you'—his first two fingers began tapping on the coffee table, keeping time with his words—'that I know Bigfoot exists.” His fingers curled into a fist, and he banged on the table. “I know it!'

'Dr. Chace,” Gideon said, “neither contemporary nor fossil evidence support you. No one has ever found an ape bone on this continent. The only primates that have ever lived in North America are people.'

Abe corrected him at once. “And what about the Eocene prosimians? They weren't primates?'

Gideon deferred. “All right, but they were gone by the middle Oligocene, thirty million years ago. Bigfoot's still supposed to be around. Does anyone have even a single tooth? One bone? One conclusive photograph?'