Killer Mountain

“Yeah, but that wouldn’t...the chimney. It runs through the center of the house, doesn’t it. You were all damn lucky.”

He faced the wall again. There was silence for a very long time. “Go on. Get out of here.” The voice came muffled by the pillow.

Frances Ingalls rose from her chair and stood looking at Gold.

His head came back. “You hear me?”

She nodded and went out, shutting the door behind her. Hudson was in a room down the hall. As Ingalls entered, he was having a forceful speech from Dr. Evans.

“What is it with you?” demanded the doctor. “We have some of the finest accommodations in the Valley - where else do you get individual TV, not for each room but each bed - and you refuse to relax and enjoy them.”

Hudson grinned. “I’d have one hell of a time trying to see your personalized television lying on my face. Jim, I appreciate your hospital needs the money.” Evans made a face. “And if one has to get shot up, he couldn’t find a more convenient location in which to be ventilated. But I very much doubt if armed thugs roaming your corridors will improve your image.”

The doctor eyed him. “Armed thugs? What are you into now?” Evans considered the Rogers the most interesting of all his patients. The previous fall he’d patched bullet damage for one, and sewn up an arrow wound for the other. It was one of the most satisfying experiences for his insatiable curiosity to then be invited in on the end of the story. “You really believe whatever monster is after you - what do you do, advertise for them? – and that he’ll chase you right in here?”

“It could happen. Now bring me my clothes. Or point me to them.” He turned to Frances Ingalls. “Where’s John?”

“Gone back to Boston.”

“How’s Bob taking it?”

“How would you?”

Hudson nodded and turned back to the doctor. “Clothes.” Evans glared, then slapped his hands to his sides and left the room.

“Mr. Gold says it was a bazooka,” said Ingalls.

“Good Christ! You’d think we were in the Middle East! Someone’s got his geography mixed”.

A nurse came in with Hudson’s clothes and a reproving look. Changing in the bathroom, he had difficulty pulling trousers over the bandaging.

“Can I help,” inquired Ingalls, listening to his struggles.

“You could get the car warmed up and the others in it. I’m going to stop by Bob’s room and be right along.”

“It will be out front.”

Gold was still facing the wall and didn’t turn his head when Hudson opened the door.

“It’s Hudson, Bob.” He moved to the bed. “I can’t tell you how badly I feel about getting you into this.”

“Shit, I asked to come over, remember?” He turned to face the other. “I was headed for trouble of some sort anyway.” He shook his head. “Been a hermit too long.” He turned away. “Now I’ve a chance to see how I like it as a cripple. I’ll get to know all the places that take a wheelchair and fuss over those that don’t.”

“You’re not going to be in a wheelchair. You’ll start off on crutches, which can go most places, until they make you a prosthesis.”

“Gimping along.”

“Oh for Christ’s sakes! Where do you want to go in such a hurry? You don’t run anyway. At least I’ve never been able to get you to.”

“Your house gone?”

“Yeah. Just a pile of wood.”

“Where will you go, Wally’s?”

“That’s the plan.”

Gold was silent a moment. “It’s a military operation. Carver’s is a good site to defend, if you know what you’re doing...I could have...”

“Then get yourself in shape to travel. We can survive till you’re fit.”

Could they? Hudson limped down the hospital corridor. Against an opponent that didn’t hesitate to bring up heavy artillery? Did they know they’d almost murdered an FBI man? And woman. Was it possible they knew and considered it an acceptable risk? The stakes would have to be mighty high. This was no crazed psychopathic killer; this was a well-funded organization with contacts. You didn’t pick up a bazooka at the local hardware store. The Sturgis secret. Do they figure we know it now? Whatever it is, it’s so important they were willing to risk an FBI manhunt. He stopped. Or were they focusing attention on us while their plan took shape elsewhere? No, this wasn’t just a diversion. They think we know something and are trying to make sure it stops here.

One thing was clear. They’d made it us or them. And the advantage was clearly with them - whoever the hell `them’ was.

Six hours was normal, but three hours sleep and she was wide-awake, fully dressed in the Carver living room. What had happened to her life? The quiet security of the ashram to an attempted kidnapping, a blown-up house and a nanny-bodyguard. Well, it was not going to continue. She’d...the telephone rang. She snatched it off its cradle quickly so as not to wake the others. Who...?

“Yes?”

“You’re a survivor, I’ll give you that.” the quiet voice, almost a whisper.

Cilla froze. It was the voice of the man in the library. And the one she’d hung up on, asking for her father. Hang up now? He’d just call back and wake those who needed sleep. She waited.

“I mean what I say.”

She saw no point in response.

“Kitty got your tongue?”

She waited.

“I know he’s not your father. So give me Sturgis, Slim, and I’ll go away.”

“Sturgis is...” Damn you John Krestinski!

“Is where? Come on, you’ll tell me sooner or later.”

“Sturgis is gone. He didn’t tell us where. Massachusetts.”

“Then why do I see armed guards on Swallow Hill Road?”

He can see down this dead end road? From where? “You blew up my house. You expect we won’t defend ourselves?”

“Homo sapiens is an impermanent creature, Slim, who requires very little help to cease existence.” The quiet voice took on a lilt. “Even rose-lipt maidens like you are regularly laid by brooks too broad for leaping, as Housman might say.”

“What good will it do you to kill me?”

“Not you, Slim. Oh no. I learned long ago it was more effective, more...stimulating to take away the one sharing the bed.”

The cold spread from inside to the tips of her fingers and toes.

“I call it Empty Bed Syndrome. You can be protected by an army, but when the snow begins in the gloaming and busily all through the night to misquote Lowell, and there’s no one cuddling next to you on the cold winter’s night, it encourages…dialogue during the day.”

“And suppose Sturgis is dead.”

“The question then becomes who did he talk to before he slipped the mortal coil.”

“No one! He spoke to no one before he died!”

There was silence for a moment. “Slim, I’d like to believe you. I’ve learned one thing though: never trust anything anyone says until you’ve cut off one of their balls and have a knife over the other. In your case...”

The phone went dead.

There was a rustling behind her. Cilla swung around. Frances.

“How long have you been there?”