The Dark Place

saltu stalked them again.

This time, however, there would be no bloodshed and mutilation. Not if he and John got there before the reward-seekers and the Bigfoot hunters. And they would, because Gideon knew where they were.

He went back into the cottage but stood at the open door to inhale the misty, salt-laden air one more time before he finally lay wearily down. He fell asleep quickly and slept through the gray dawn and long into the drizzly morning.

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Chapter 14

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When he awoke at ten he called John's number in Seattle, but the FBI agent wasn't in, so Gideon left a message asking him to return the call. It was raining—not heavily, but steadily, as if it were going to go on for a long time. He stood at the window awhile, sipping hot coffee from a mug and wondering what it would be like to huddle over a primitive drill trying to light a fire in weather like this.

He scrambled three eggs, fried some bacon, and toasted a few slices of bread in the oven. Then he sat down at the table, trying not to feel guilty, and propped the Yahi dictionary in front of him.

'Ya'a hushol,' he said between mouthfuls of eggs and bacon. “Hello.” He shook his head and tried it again. How were you supposed to pronounce apostrophes? The dictionary had been prepared before the invention of the international phonetic alphabet, and the explanation—'apostrophes may represent any number of concurrent glottalizations'—wasn't much help. 'Ai'niza ma'a wagai,' he said, trying to glottalize concurrently. “Me friend.” Verbs, cases, and other nonessentials he could do without.

The telephone rang, and John was already speaking as Gideon got it to his ear. “What's up, Doc?'

Gideon washed down a piece of toast with a gulp of coffee. 'Ya'a hushol,' he said.

'Yakahooshle to you, too. That was a good report on Hornick. Thanks. What did you want me to call you about?'

'When you come down to Quinault, you're planning to go in after those Indians, aren't you?'

'Sure. First thing I'm going to do is check out that ledge.'

'I want to go with you.” But they're not at that ledge, he almost added, then thought better of it. It would be best to see where John stood first.

'Doc, I can't do that. You know that.'

'I can speak their language,” Gideon said, feeling that a certain amount of overstatement was excusable under the circumstances. “And I know something about their customs.'

'No, Doc, no way. These guys are killers. I'm not taking you along. What would be the point, anyway?'

'I could talk to them, kind of ease the way, make sure there isn't any shooting—'

'Who's talking about shooting? This isn't cowboys and Indians. We're just going to bring them in. If we find them.'

'And if they don't want to come? If they start throwing spears? These are people from the Stone Age. They're not going to understand who you are, or what you are, or what you want to do to them, or why you want to do it. You're going to need someone—'

'For Christ's sake, Doc!” John was annoyed. “Do I tell you how to do your job?'

'Every goddamn chance you get.'

'Goddamn it...!” Then, as Gideon knew he would, John burst into his easy, childlike laughter, melodious and infectious. And as always, Gideon couldn't help smiling himself.

'Okay,” John said, “maybe I do a little. But this is different. Me and Minor and the others, we're a team. We can all predict what the other ones are going to do, you know what I mean? If we brought in someone who's not trained, who doesn't know the way we work, it'd be dangerous for everybody. Including the Indians.'

When Gideon didn't respond, John said, “Okay, what are you thinking?'

'Nothing. I'm just pouting.'

'No, you're not. You're hatching something. What do you want to do, find them yourself?'

'I was thinking about it, yes.'

'Well, what the hell for?'

'What do you mean, what the hell for? I want to talk to them, convince them we mean them no harm.'

It sounded lame to Gideon as he said it, and lame-brained too. It did to John as well; a disgusted snort and a muffled “Jesus Christ” were audible over the telephone. Gideon could imagine his eyes raised to the fluorescent ceiling of the office in Seattle.

'Look, Doc, they already killed three people. You think you're going to walk up to them and say, ‘How. Me friend,’ and they're going to fall all over you with joy? They'll spit you on one of those spears like a big barbecued chicken.'

'Now, look, John—” Gideon said crossly, stung by the brief but uncomfortably cogent dismissal of what was, after all, his only-begotten plan so far.

'Doc, you're not going with me. That's all there is to it.'