‘Actually, the idea is yours. If the sauna is too hot, then it can’t be in the sauna.’
‘So it’s outside the sauna.’
‘Well reasoned.’
Sheldon walks left and peers around the corner. He can see the house, and is pretty sure the house cannot see him. But there, as Bill suggested, is a second, small shack. There is no window. It stands about two-and-a-half metres tall, and is less than two metres wide and a metre deep. More of a closet than a shack. In these parts, given that the property is not a farm, it could not be mistaken for anything other than a wood-and-toolshed. It is an utterly unremarkable place worth no one’s attention.
It is a good place to store a weapon, Sheldon figures. It might grow cold, but the damage to the gun is far less than the risk of robbery from the main house. There is always the risk of accident, too. This is why Sheldon never owned a gun once he got back from Korea, unless one counts the old pirate gun that Saul used to play with in the antique shop.
Bill, meanwhile, had a decommissioned musket, so when the two of them started going at it there was no getting any work done.
The door to the shed is secured with an old-fashioned Master Lock in a red-rubber encasement. It was always a popular lock. There used to be a commercial on television of someone shooting the lock. Then, with the bullet hole shown in close-up, someone would try it and, lo and behold, it was still locked. The company even ran a second ad, claiming that the trigger-happy doubters weren’t able to open it. Sheldon always suspected he’d be able to, but the opportunity never arose.
Under other circumstances, this would have been an excellent occasion — if only the rifle he needed to test the theory wasn’t behind the lock he planned to test it on.
None of which, right now, is a helpful line of thought.
What is useful is that, when he tries it, the lock is actually open. The inverted U of the lock has been set into place but not pinched closed. There is little point now in wondering why, though. He has to go in. He can only hope that no one has been here before him, and taken what he needs.
The door hinge is on the right, and so it swings towards the house. Sheldon steps into the shed and closes the door behind him. It is dark inside, and warm. It is so confined that, for the first time, he can smell himself. His body odour reeks, he is smeared with dirt and fungus, and he is streaked with the excrement of birds and worms. Every part of him blends with the earth and the soil — everything but his blue eyes that still take in the sharp rays of light from the cracks in the roof.
There is a rake, and three shovels of different sizes. There is a paintbrush that is stiff from neglect, and a coil of rope that was once dependable but has been too long near the petrol fumes and is now suspect. There are archery targets and fishing tackle. And there, above him, hanging just off the shelf because it is too deep for the shelf itself, is a leather case half the length of a rifle.
Sheldon presses up on the case and tries to keep it from scraping as he pulls it off and down. It is heavier than it looks. Or perhaps he has grown weaker.
He wants to leave here immediately, but knows that a rifle without ammunition is useless to him. If he is caught here, he could be killed without a fight. It is too much of a risk, though, to leave and assemble the rifle, only to come back. It needs to be done here.
Trying not to knock anything over, he lays the case gently on the dusty floor, listening intently for any sound from outside. Still there is nothing. The case is old, and has a combination lock on the front with three digits that can be rotated by thumb. In the 1960s, a common code was 007 in honour of Sean Connery, and Sheldon tries it without success. The factory default on most cases is 000, and he tries this as well without success.
‘This could go on all day,’ says Bill.
‘Why’s it always Bill? Why not Mabel? Or Saul? Or Mario? Or someone I passed on a highway. Why do you come here dressed like the drunken Irish pawnbroker from next door?’
‘I thought he was dear to you.’
‘He was, and I miss him. Which is why I resent you dressing up like him. Over burning bushes, are you? Now you want to be Irish?’
‘It’s been a long time since we really spoke. I miss our conversations.’
‘I have no more to say to you than I did before. It’s you, if anyone, who has some explaining to do. So piss off, I’m busy.’
Sheldon silently turns the case around so the hinges face him. He wedges the knife blade under the first brass hinge. By inserting a small stone under the blade, he creates a fulcrum, and then he presses down hard on the hilt of the knife, successfully prying it off.
He repeats this on the second hinge, and they both come off without a fuss.
He checks his watch. More time has passed. That is all he’s prepared to admit.
Knowing it will creak slightly, he now lifts the case lid to expose the contents. To his surprise, there is only one rifle.
‘Which one are you? Moses or Aaron? The damaged one, or the brother who makes it to the Promised Land?’
Sheldon gently takes it from the case and feels its weight. It has been decades since he handled a rifle. He never intended to hold one again. But here, in the improvised Ghillie suit, on the floor of the dusty shack, he remembers who he once was, so long ago, with a confidence and clarity that has been missing for years.
The rifle is a Remington Model Seven with a 20-inch barrel that Donny wishes were a 22-inch, for added accuracy. Ammunition is supposed to be stored in a separate location, but Lars obviously trusted the hiding place and the lock box. There are five rounds of .308 Winchester, which look and feel familiar because they are about the same size as a NATO 7.62mm. They are the sort of rimless bottleneck round that he used to squeeze off — at a rate of 100 or 300 a day — back at New River.
The Remington, though, is a single-shot, bolt-action rifle. It is the sort of rifle that a father and son might own. Nothing fancy. Just a good, dense-wood deer hunter with a walnut stock and an old Bausch & Lomb scope.
Donny assembles the weapon, and then opens the bolt and slides it back. It is smooth and well oiled. With his finger, he checks the chamber to be sure it is empty, and then he slides in a round and presses forward — hard but quietly — on the bolt. He then locks it down into its groove.
With the safety on, he takes the remaining four rounds out of the box, and puts three of them in the breast pocket of his jacket under the suit. He places the final round above his right ear.
Sheldon checks the shed one last time to see whether he might be missing something — a clue, or the other rifle. There are paper targets and duck decoys, a pair of snow shoes and a set of skis, some odd strings dangling from a hook with brightly coloured ends, an empty tube of some kind that looks like it may have been used to carry architectural drawings, and two aged and worn-out tennis rackets probably used on days just like this to whack the ball around the mews.
He debates the merits of closing and replacing the box, and decides it is worth taking the few extra seconds involved. He is not used to working in a crisis situation like this. Not used to the pressures of a hostage situation. As a sniper, he worked alone or with a spotter. He was dropped off someplace, and then — usually in his own sweet time — made it to the objective and set up his position. He did not run around like a nervous cop wondering what to do like he had to do now.
Camouflaged and armed, Donny’s countenance changes. He stops sweating, and his back no longer feels pinched in the lumbar region. Even his hands feel looser.
And then the objective changes.
As he advances on the house from the shed, he sees two figures making their way up the mews towards the front door.
There is a tall one and a short one. The tall one is pulling or dragging the small one. They are more than one hundred and fifty metres away, through trees and bush.
How long has it been since he drank water? Could it be this morning? No, it was on the truck.
He stays low and hunched as he slips up the path towards the house.
It is a bad angle. A terrible angle. One of the worst possible angles. He is moving perpendicular to a possible target, giving it the longest time to detect his movement. They are converging on the same vortex. Sheldon is closer
