As they walked the three blocks from the bus stop to the old Baranof Hotel on this dreary, drizzly late afternoon, Juneau looked like the isolated outpost it was, huddled uneasily in its narrow fjord at the foot of hulking Mount Juneau. Great snowfields clung to the mountain's steep flanks directly above them, seemingly ready to break free and come down on their heads at the next stiff breeze. Even the heavy sky seemed to press down on the little town; rain dripped from a layer of lowering clouds that smothered the tops of the surrounding mountains, closing in the fjord like a pewter lid.
The city itself was appropriately subdued in the face of this sullen, menacing Nature. The turn-of-the-century street lamps on Franklin Street glowed a gloomy yellow, the tourist shops that were the main tenants of the false- front, frontier-style wooden buildings were closed and dark, the street traffic minimal, the rainswept sidewalks nearly empty. Only the bars were open—the Red Dog Saloon, the Sourdough, Mike's; open and rowdy, to judge from the sounds. An occasional group of two or three men, mostly in parkas and rubber boots, shoved their way through one set of swinging doors and wavered half a block to the next one.
'Never arrive in a strange place at night on an empty stomach” had been Abe Goldstein's first rule to his class on anthropological field technique. “In the dark and with a low blood-sugar level, new places don't look so hot.'
Well, it wasn't quite dark, just midway through the long northern twilight, but it had been six hours since lunch, and Juneau, famed for its beauty, didn't look so hot.
'Except for the concrete sidewalks,” Julie said, moving closer to him, “we could be in 1890.” She sounded a little low on blood sugar too.
They had splurged on a reservation at the Baranof, Juneau's grand old dowager of a hotel, and their spirits lifted when they walked in. Burnished wood paneling, Art Deco light fixtures, gold-framed mirrors, oil paintings, a grand piano in the lobby.
Civilization. Out of 1890 and into 1935.
They checked in, went up to their room (with a Mozart horn concerto playing sweetly over the elevator speaker), washed up, and came back down to the Bubble Lounge for a drink. Their order for dry Manhattans, which seemed just the thing for 1935, was taken by a tuxedoed waiter who bowed when he received it.
Julie laughed. “I was just thinking. This is exactly the kind of place John hates, isn't it?'
'John hates any place where the waiters dress better than the customers.'
The amber drinks, in cut-glass cocktail glasses, were placed carefully on the table with another bow.
'Getting back to Dr. Judd,” Julie said thoughtfully. “Suppose we change the premise just a little.'
'Fine. Did we have a premise?'
'What if Judd didn't kill him
'After the avalanche?” Gideon looked up from his first swallow. It was all right, but it made him remember why dry Manhattans had gone out of fashion. “But Fisk would have been dead already.'
'Why would he have been dead already? Tremaine was in the avalanche and he wasn't dead. Maybe Judd went up there, and he found Fisk unconscious or dying, and finished him off with the ax.” She shook her head wonderingly. “What did I talk about before I met you?'
'After the avalanche,” Gideon repeated slowly. “Now why didn't I think of that? Why didn't John?'
She grinned, pleased. “You didn't?'
'It never occurred to us. And it would answer a lot of questions. But—'
'Ah,” she said sadly.
'Well, there'd still be the question of why Tremaine kept it to himself all this time.'
'He wouldn't have known anything about it. He was probably unconscious. He fell into a crevasse, remember?'
For a moment Gideon almost thought she had something. “No. Why bother to kill Tremaine now if he hadn't seen anything?'
'Um. Yes, that's a problem. Maybe John can work that out.'
'And just what was Tremaine going to write about that was so sensational if he didn't know about the murder? Come to think of it, he did know about the murder because he mentioned it to his publisher.'
'Well,” Julie said glumly, “I don't see that you and John have come up with anything better.'
'You're sure right there,” he agreed, and took another pull, beginning to unwind.
They went over the possibilities again: a jealous Steven Fisk as murderer, with James Pratt as victim; a brooding, vengeful Pratt as murderer, with Fisk as victim; a humiliated Judd as killer, with Fisk as victim—or maybe Pratt as victim. Just because no motive had come to light yet didn't mean there wasn't one. And of course, Tremaine as murderer, with either Fisk or Pratt as murderee.
'A nice how-de-do,” he said.
'And don't forget about Jocelyn Yount,” said Julie. “If she was as big as her sister she could have swung a pretty mean ax.'
'That's true. And yes, she was big. But why would she want to kill anybody?'
'Because she was fed up. With a possessive, violent boyfriend on one side, and some creepy guy sniffing around her on the other, I wouldn't blame her. For being fed up, I mean.'
'It's possible,” Gideon said, for what felt like the fiftieth time that day. He rotated his glass slowly on the table. “We just need more data. We can't do any more with what we have.'
'You'll get it,” Julie said. “That's why we're here, right?'
