The Dark Place

us?'

John appealed to Gideon. “What do you think, Doc?'

What he thought was that he didn't want some grumpy, griping agent horning in on his night under the stars with Julie. “I think she's right,” he said. “There are thousands of hikers in the park all the time, and as far as we know there have been two murders in the last six years. Those are better odds than I get in San Francisco.'

'Damn it, let's not play games. You spent all morning with a guy with a big, ugly hole in his head. There's something skulking around in there with a Stone Age spear and murder on its mind. And superhuman strength, from what you tell us. Or an atlatl, which is just as bad.'

'John,” Julie cut in, “I have a sidearm, and I know how to use it, and I mean to carry it. We'll be all right.'

'Yeah,” John said, the fight draining out of him, “but—'

'She also has me. Don't worry about it, I'll protect her.'

'Protect me?” Julie said. “I'm going to have to hold his hand the entire time to make sure he doesn't get lost.'

'That,” said Gideon with a grin, “is far and away the best offer I've had all day.'

'Be right back,” Julie said, giving his hand a preliminary squeeze. “I want to change into civvies. Then I'll bring the truck around.'

After two miles on the trail, the crowds began to thin out. After three, they were alone. They walked steadily but gradually uphill, beneath giant limbs that blocked the sunlight a hundred and fifty feet above them, through translucent and ethereal archways of club moss that hung from the branches in exquisite, two-dimensional crescents and vaults. Indeed, it was like a haunted forest, Gideon thought, in which they'd shrunk to Lilliputian size. The ferns and herbs and flowers and mosses that covered the forest floor were all familiar, but grown to monstrous proportions. He half expected to see a house cat the size of an elephant poke its nose around a tree and leer at them.

They walked quietly for the most part, listening sometimes to the singing of far-off wrens and thrushes, but mostly absorbed in the dreamy, heavy silence that seemed to hang like a fog over them. Even their steps made no sound on the spongy trail. It had been a long while since Gideon had had a pack on his back, but he quickly fell into a hiker's steady, swinging stride. The incredible foliage and immense trunks enchanted him now, and he was comfortable and relaxed, enjoying the odd illusion that he was not walking, but floating through a green and dappled ocean, far below the surface, where the water was dark but pure and gloomily transparent.

After two hours...three?...four?...the pack began to weigh on him, his feet to drag. Julie seemed as fresh as ever.

'How are you doing?” she asked cheerfully as they paused at a rough wooden bridge.

'I'm doing fine,” he said. “Great. I could do this all day. It's fantastic.” Say you're tired, he willed her ferociously, so I can take this miserable pack off my back and rest for a while.

'That's fine,” she said, “because here's where it starts getting hard. We don't cross this bridge. Here's where we leave the trail. This is Pyrites Creek. We follow it up the hill.'

He swung his eyes to the left, up the nearly vertical waterfalls. “Hill?” he said weakly. “Good God, I hope we don't have to go up any mountains.'

Julie laughed. “If you think you've had it, there's no reason why we can't camp here and call it a day.'

'Not on your life,” he said grimly. “On we go.” Hopefully he added, “Unless you're really tired?'

'Oh, no. I could do this all day. Let's go.'

To climb the next half mile took them an hour of rugged scrambling. Sometimes they had to pull themselves up by grasping branches or exposed roots. When they came to a small cove made by a gravel shelf about ten feet wide at one of the creek's few level spots, Gideon flung his pack to the ground.

'That's it. As fresh as I am,” he said, gasping, “I have no right to subject you to this pace. Let's take a breather.'

Julie sat heavily down. “Foof,” she said. “I thought you'd never quit.'

For five minutes they lay back and caught their breath, looking at the tops of the trees waving against the bright sky and listening to the tumbling water. Julie pulled the map from her pack and studied it. “Gideon,” she said, “I think we're there. The ledge ought to be across the creek, about halfway up the other side.'

Gideon got to his elbows and stared. “Halfway up that?'

'What would you say,” Julie asked, “to stopping here for the night and going up there in the morning? We could leave our packs down here.'

'I would say yes, by all means, yes. It's nearly six anyway. And,” he said, suddenly realizing it, “I'm starving. We wouldn't have any powdered escalope de veau in those shiny little packets we've been lugging around, would we? Or a few freeze-dried quenelles?'

'It's beef stroganoff. And don't laugh. It's not bad, considering.'

It was awful, but they gobbled it down happily, leaning over the camp stove for warmth when the sun dropped behind the peaks at their backs and plunged the cove into shadow. Afterwards, they made a tiny campfire and drank several cups of hot cocoa out of tin mugs, using water from the creek, and talked and laughed for several hours.

There was a little awkwardness and uncertainty when it came time to bed down, but they agreed, after a dignified and objective discussion, that precocious sexual relations might damage a burgeoning friendship. They would, therefore, as mature and rational adults, sleep in their separate sleeping bags.

But there was nothing wrong with putting those sleeping bags side by side and holding hands, and it was thus that they drifted to sleep after talking another hour. Julie fell asleep first, and Gideon watched her for a while, hungry for her but happy, too, with the way things had gone.