10
“You blow one homicide, it looks like a mistake. You blow two, it starts looking like negligence. Or worse yet, stupidity.” T.J. hadn’t brought any investigators with her from Cheyenne, she knew me that well, but she had brought everything else in their mobile crime unit, including the kitchen sink, which was to my right.
“I thought I’d use that on the bumper stickers in the next election, VOTE LONGMIRE, HE’S STUPID.”
“Well, don’t worry about it. You blow this case, and you won’t have to bother about the next election; they’ll just run you out of town on a rail.”
I took a sip of her coffee and tried not to make a face. “No hard feelings?”
“Hey.” She smiled with the little wrinkle at the corner of her mouth. “It’s your county.”
Vic’s rolls of film and DCI’s digital camera sat on a table in the trailer next to the ballistic sample that Ferg had dug out of the hillside. It had flattened on impact to a mushroom-shaped disc about the size of the palm of my hand. I have a big hand. The feather was also there. I reached over and took the plastic-wrapped package from the table. “You mind?” She shook her head no, and I stuffed the piece of evidence in my jacket.
“You might get a phone call, later in the week.”
“I get lots of phone calls. I’m popular.”
The sun had overtaken a large breech in the storm, with blue skies and the odd snowflake that filtered down from high altitude. Digi-Sven, the computerized voice of NOAA, was warning that a real storm was on the way and would probably be here this evening. High wind and heavy snow. I was glad T. J. Sherwin had brought DCI’s mobile unit. I was going to go back down, but at least Vic would be comfortable here.
“So, what’s the story on George Esper?” she asked.
“There were two sets of fishing gear in Jacob’s truck.”
“Any possibility that he just hauls all that stuff around with him?”
“It’s possible, but fly fishermen are pretty careful about their vests, with the flies and all. I just don’t know if George would leave his vest in his brother’s truck.”
“Possibility they were together?”
“Contents of the cooler: two cleaned fish, one partially eaten cheese sandwich, and two empty cans of Busch Lite.”
“Not enough for two.”
“Not enough beer and probably not enough food. Besides, the passenger door was locked. It’s my experience that people in this county only lock their doors when they visit Cheyenne.” This got a sidelong glance. “Nobody was riding on the passenger side.”
“What’s your theory then?”
“I think that Jacob and George Esper were supposed to meet somewhere. That Jacob came up and spent the night, started his truck yesterday morning to go and meet his brother, and instead incurred a consummation devoutly to be wished.”
“Romeo and Juliet?”
“Hamlet. All the death ones are Hamlet, at least the contemplative death ones.” I unbuttoned my jacket a little; the propane heater in the camper continued to raise the temperature. “I suppose George could be with his parents, but we won’t know anything about that till we hear something from them. We’ve got an APB out on their vehicle in both Colorado and Wyoming. I’d call Trinidad and Tobago if I thought it would do any good.” We sat there, surrounded by all our technological wonders, hoping that some patrolman in Longmont would happen to drive by the right driveway. No matter how far you went into the modern age, it always seemed to come down to the guy on the beat. “I’ve also got the Forest Rangers, Smokey the Bear, and all God’s little animals out looking for a black Mazda Navajo with the plates, Tuff 1.”
She was watching me like a science experiment. “You look tired.” I sighed. “Yep, well… it’s truly all my worst nightmares come to life.” We sat there for a moment; “I’m 0 for 2.” I looked at her for a while and then got up, trying not to tread on her feet, and sidestepped to the door. “You don’t need me; Vic can be the primary again. You got ballistics stuff here in the Mystery Machine?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve got a rifle out in my truck that needs to be tested; I’ll leave it with Vic.”
“Where did this one come from?”
I paused, with my hand on the door handle. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Walt?”
I waited. “Yep?”
“You’re not being punished for your sins.”
The air outside felt good, and I started getting just a breath of my second wind. I could smell the lodgepole pines above everything else, a sharp smell that really doesn’t translate to air fresheners and cleaning products. It was also the altitude; the air just seemed to pull in a little more freely above ten thousand feet. I took a quick scope around, using the steps as a lookout, and called Vic over. “I’ve got another rifle in my truck that needs to be tested, and they’ve got facilities in the trailer.”
She caught up, and we walked along. “Where are you going?”
“I’m headed down. I’ll get things set up at the office, then I’ll be back.” I opened the door and took the Cheyenne Death Rifle from the seat of my truck and handed it to her.
She held it, carefully studying the sheath, then tightened her lips and looked up at me. “Henry?”
“Lonnie, by way of Henry.”
She slowly exhaled and then pulled the rifle out, holding it up in the morning light. “Fuck me running through the forest.”
“We already discussed that.”
She ignored me and continued. “I’ve got a really bad feeling about this.”
“That seems to be the general response to this particular weapon.”
“It’s beautiful.”
“It’s haunted. There are supposed to be Old Cheyenne hanging around the thing looking for people to abduct and take back to the Camp of the Dead.”
She studied it some more. “Cool.”
She went off to my truck, and I walked over to the back of one of the DCI Suburbans, where Ferg and Al Monroe were having an animated conversation concerning the relative advantages of the Bitch Creek Nymph over the Number Sixteen Elk Hair Cadis. I always wondered about men who spent their time trying to anticipate and know a fish in a world where man’s knowledge of each other could only be called scarce. It just seemed to be gratuitously ignorant for any man to think that he could think like a fish. Then there was the high deceit of the artificial fly; subtlety, guile, and sly deception created and instilled only to lure a cautious and tentative fish to its death. They were as bad as drug fiends, living in their shadowy world of aquatic intrigue.
I sometimes fly-fished, but it was catch and release, and I always brought a book. “Ferg, have you looked at the equipment he was carrying?”
“Yep.” He looked at Al for confirmation, and they nodded somberly to each other. “Yellow and Royal Humpies, Parachute Adams, Light Cahills, and a couple of wet flies, mostly Montana Stones.”
“Nothing like a Royal Humpie. Any ideas on where George might have gone?”
“Some.” I waited. “Meadowlark, West Tensleep Creek, Medicine Lodge, Crazy Woman, head of the Clear, maybe even north fork of the Powder.”
“Well, that should narrow it down to about 189,000 acres. How long do you think it’ll take you?”
Dejectedly, he looked at the skies west of us. “A little while.. ”
I followed his gaze to the dark lines of clouds converging across the Big Horn basin and the Wind River Range. This was the one that was going to signify that autumn was over. If you lived here long enough, you could sense them coming. The few leaves left on the aspens quaked, and you could almost feel the barometric undertow as the storm gathered momentum. The clouds looked flat and mean, and they stretched into the distance; it made my eyes hurt. I was having enough trouble operating a homicide investigation without a raging blizzard at ten thousand feet. As he started to go, I leaned over to him. “You got a rifle in your truck?”
He stopped dead and looked at me. “What?”
