another who had blundered onto a she-bear and her cubs. But he’d never seen anything like this.
The arms and legs were lined up in a row, the hands and feet at one end, the stumps at the other. One of the hands was missing several fingers. The abdominal cavity had been ripped open and torn intestines lay in grisly coils. The neck had been bitten nearly in half. The face was intact but the crown of the head was attached by slivers of flesh and where the brains should be was a cavity.
“Merciful heavens,” a woman blurted, and vomited.
“Who was it?” someone asked the man holding the canvas.
“Ira Stoddard,” the man said. “He had a claim about two miles out. They found him near the creek. Or this that was left of him, anyhow.”
Rooster nudged Fargo. “Maybe we should go have a look-see before the horde shows up.”
“The horde?” Fargo said, and laughed. He didn’t find it so funny when they were barely out of town and found dozens of others ahead of them.
“I told you,” Rooster said. “Each time there’s a killing all of these so-called hunters want to be the first there in the hope they’ll spot the bear.”
Fargo was content to take his time. The grizzly would be long gone, anyway. They followed a rutted track pockmarked with hoofprints and had gone about half a mile when a black horse came up alongside the Ovaro and a shadow fell across him. “What the hell do you want?”
“Prickly, ain’t you?” Moose said. “I wanted to tell Rooster and you there ain’t no hard feelings about earlier.”
“That’s generous of you,” Rooster said, “seeing as how you were the one chucked me through the window.”
“You’re alive,” Moose said. “Or are you one of those sour folks who bellyaches over little stuff?”
“Little? By God, I have half a mind to—” Rooster stopped and shook his head. “No. You’re right. I shouldn’t have said what I did. You’re not entirely worthless as a bear hunter.”
“I’ve killed twenty-seven at one time or another,” Moose boasted, “and two of them were silvertips.”
“This one won’t be as easy as they were.”
“You don’t have to tell me.” Moose thrust his big hand at Fargo. “How about you, mister? Forgive and forget, as my ma used to say?”
“I never forget,” Fargo said, but he shook.
“Why, that’s what that British gent said about those ele-things he likes to hunt,” Moose said. “He claims they have two teeth as long as my arm and they wear a trunk on their face. But what would they need with a trunk when they don’t even wear clothes?” Moose guffawed as if he had told a joke.
Fargo decided to take advantage of the bear hunter’s friendliness. “You’ve been out after this griz before, I take it?”
“That I have,” Moose said somberly. “And he got the better of me every time.”
“Better how?”
“Brain Eater ain’t a normal bear. He’s got the painter gift of throwing a hunter off his scent. Hell, even hounds can’t bring him to bay.”
“How does Brain Eater throw you off?” Fargo keenly desired to know.
“He’s smart. He doubles back on himself. He sticks to rocky ground when he can. He goes up slopes too steep for a horse, knowing we have to go around. He sticks to water, too, and will stay in a stream for miles.”
“I’ve never heard of a bear doing all that,” Fargo admitted.
“Now you know why no one has caught him yet,” Moose said. “And why that bounty is as good as mine.”
“Putting the cart before the horse, ain’t you?” Rooster said.
“Listen. No one has been out after Brain Eater as often as me. And the more I do it, the more I learn of his ways and the more I get the feel of him. Won’t be long, I’ll know what he’s going to do before he does it. That’s the day I bring his hide into Gold Creek and collect the bounty.”
“If he doesn’t eat your brain first,” Rooster said.
They reached the site.
“Look at them all,” Moose said, and rode into the thick of them.
“It’d be funny if it wasn’t so damn pathetic,” Rooster remarked.
Fargo grunted in assent.
The small cabin and the ground around it literally crawled with bear hunters. Some were on their hands and knees looking for tracks. One man had climbed onto the roof and was looking for sign from up there. The woman with her three children had them poking around in some bushes that weren’t big enough to hide a turkey.
Moose dismounted and walked about bragging how Brain Eater’s days were numbered.
Fargo sat the saddle of the Ovaro and shook his head in mild disgust. Any tracks the bear had left would have been obliterated. He noticed that a finger of pines came close to the rear of the cabin, perfect cover for a stalking bear, and he was about to ride around and confirm his hunch when the Englishman with the fancy rifle that brought down elephants rode over.
“I say, Fargo, wasn’t it? Wendolyn Channing Mayal, remember? Although most people call me Wendy for short. What do you make of all these blighters?”
“They’re a herd of jackasses,” Rooster said.
“I quite agree, Mr. Strimm,” Wendy said. “They’ll bloody well spoil it for those of us who have a legitimate chance at this beast.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Rooster said. “That gun of yours, and your fine clothes and all. You don’t strike me as somebody who is in this for the money.”
“Most astute, Mr. Strimm.”
“Most what?”
“You are exactly right,” Wendy said. “I hunt for the thrill. For the sport of it. Elephants and water buffalo in Africa, tigers in India, jaguars in South America, I’ve hunted them all. I came to your marvelous country to add a grizzly to my tally, and as luck would have it, read in a newspaper about the bounty and this bear.”
“Maybe you do have a chance at him, then,” Rooster said.
“I can track and I can shoot and I have nerves of steel,” Wendy declared. “I should say I most certainly do.” He touched the cap he wore and rode toward the stream.
“Not a bad feller for a foreigner,” Rooster said.
Fargo motioned and circled around the cabin toward the pines.
Just then a farmer in bib overalls bawled that he had found a bear track near the outhouse and nearly everyone rushed over to see for themselves.
Moose was one of them, and got a laugh by bellowing, “Why, hell, you idiot. This ain’t no bear track. It’s a dog print, for crying out loud.”
Fargo glanced at Rooster. “Ira Stoddard had a dog?”
“Wouldn’t know. Never met the man.”
The pines closed around them and muffled much of the hubbub. Fargo bent his gaze to the carpet of needles and patches of bare earth. He hadn’t gone twenty feet when he came on the outline of a front paw. “I thought so,” he said, and pointed.
“Crafty critter,” Rooster said. “Snuck in close so he’d be on Ira before Ira could wet himself.”
“Or get off a shot,” Fargo said. Most meat-eaters did the same. They snuck as near as they could to their quarry before they pounced.
“You reckon this bear is gun savvy?”
“I’ve seen it before,” Fargo said. Bears and other animals were shot at or saw a man use a gun and equated firearms with danger and stayed away from those who carried them.
“We got us one smart bear here.”
“So everyone keeps saying.”
Fargo penetrated another hundred yards but didn’t find more prints. The pines rose in a series of slopes to a phalanx of firs. Above the firs reared a stark spire. “How about we go up and take a gander at the countryside?”
