didn't feel like arguing.
It was less than fifty yards to the canyon bend but McKee had identified the sound before they reached it. He was almost certain it was a winch working. His first glance around the rocky point confirmed this guess. Some five hundred yards downstream the canyon bent sharply to the north through a narrow defile. Here a section of the undercut cliff had collapsed, tumbling huge blocks of rimrock to the canyon floor. Just beyond this pile of talus, McKee saw a gray Land-Rover parked. A cable from the winch reel on its front bumper was attached to a ponderosa pine carried into the canyon by the landslide. The massive trunk of the long-dead tree was being swung slowly across the canyon.
'Looks like we walk out,' McKee said softly.
'What in the world is he doing?'
'He's blocking us in with that tree.'
'He is, isn't he?' She said it in a very small voice.
McKee couldn't see the man in the Land-Rover very well. He was wearing a black hat and there was something which might be a rifle barrel jutting at an angle out of the side window. The high whining noise of the winching operation had apparently covered the sound of their approach.
'Let's go,' McKee said. 'We'll drive back up the canyon and find one of those run-in washes, and climb out of here.'
The sound of the winch stopped just as they reached the car. There was a long moment of silence as they climbed into the Volkswagen, and then the sound began again. McKee motioned for Miss Leon to start the motor.
'Quietly as you can,' he said. 'Don't race the motor and get it into second quick as possible.'
She said nothing, driving competently and, McKee noticed out of the side of his eye, occasionally biting her lower lip.
'But why would that man want to block the road?' she asked suddenly. 'Do you think we should just drive down there and ask him to let us through?'
'I don't think so,' McKee said. He felt very, very tired.
'Was that the man you saw last night? The man with the wolf skin?'
'I don't know. I guess it is.'
A half mile up the canyon he had her turn off the ignition. From far behind them there still came the high whine of the winch, a faint sound now.
'Anyway, he can't follow us,' Miss Leon said. She smiled at McKee. 'He's on the wrong side of his roadblock.'
'That's right,' McKee said. But he knew it wasn't right. He had to work the winch from the down side because the tree top was pointing upstream. He'll simply swing the trunk downstream far enough so he can drive past it and then re-attach his winch line from the upstream side and pull it back in place across the canyon. He'll drive in and close the gate behind him. McKee wondered if Land-Rovers had four-wheel drive. He was almost certain they did. The Land-Rover could go anyplace the Volks could go, and lots of places it couldn't. The sense of urgency returned, and his hand and cheekbone began throbbing in harmony.
'Is your hand broken?'
'No,' McKee said. 'Sprained my little finger.'
She looked at him. The sympathy in her eyes embarrassed him and he looked away. 'But it hurts a lot,' she said. 'It would feel better if you let me bandage it.'
'I think we better keep going,' McKee said. 'We'll drive up to our camp and get some water and stuff and find us a place we can climb out of here.'
'Maybe Dr. Canfield will be back now,' she said. 'That is, if he didn't go out to Shoemaker's.'
'Maybe so.'
She still thinks I'm imagining a lot of this, McKee thought. That was good, in a way. No reason to frighten her more than he already had as long as she would cooperate. And yet it would be easier, somehow, if she shared his knowledge of danger.
Canfield was not at the camp. Nor was there any sign he had been there since McKee had left it. McKee hurriedly filled his canteen. He couldn't find Canfield's. It was probably in the camper truck. His papers were still on the folding table in the tent. If the man had examined them he had taken some care not to disarrange them. He pushed two cans of meat into his pocket, pushed the canteen into the front of his shirt, and picked up a box of crackers. What else would they need? He thought of the can opener on his pocket knife, found it beside his typewriter, and dropped it into his shirt pocket. His pickup, it occurred to him suddenly, would be better than the Volks. They could run it much farther up a side canyon-maybe even get it to the top. He trotted to the truck, switched on the ignition and kicked the starter. Nothing happened. He kicked the starter again and then he remembered seeing the man raising the hood. He raised the hood himself and looked down at the motor. The spark-plug wires were missing. He may be crazy, McKee thought as he trotted back to the Volks, but he's sure efficient.
'O.K.,' he told Miss Leon, 'we'll drive up the canyon about a mile. There's a place up there we can turn up a side canyon. We'll drive up it as far as this Volks will go and then we'll climb out.'
Miss Leon was driving very slowly. McKee looked at her impatiently.
'Better speed it up.'
Miss Leon was biting her lip again.
'Dr. McKee. Really. Don't you think we should wait there at camp?' She looked at him, her face determined. 'I'm sure Dr. Canfield will be coming back soon, and if he doesn't… that man we saw down the canyon, I'm sure that man would help us.'
