‘My God! Keats, you’re alive!’ cried Ben. The old guide clung to the shoulder of Broken Wing as they hobbled out of the woods into the open. Ben rushed towards them, the gut-wrenching, plummeting sensation of fear he’d been experiencing a moment earlier replaced by an energetic surge of relief.
‘Oh bloody Christ!’ he yelled with a grin smeared across his face, as his feet carried him across the snow towards them. ‘I thought only the three of us had managed to esc—’
Then his eyes took in the pertinent detail. A broad strip of Keats’s long-faded, polka-dot shirt was crudely wrapped around his waist, soaked with his blood and almost as dark as ink. Keats looked up at Ben; his face, normally the rich golden tan of worn saddle leather, was now ashen.
Broken Wing helped him across to the fire, then gently laid him down. Keats groaned with the pain, holding his hands protectively against the front of his body. Several new dark blotches of crimson bloomed across the material, as beneath the wrap a large wound flexed and opened.
Ben looked up at the Shoshone, his face a question mark. Broken Wing understood and uttered a rapid burst of Ute, gesturing back at the dark apron of trees from which they’d emerged, his hands telling a story Ben couldn’t quite decipher.
Something back in there did this to Keats.
Ben needed to know more. ‘Keats, what happened?’
The old man breathed deeply, gathering his wits and what was left of his failing strength. ‘I seen it, Lambert. I seen the fuckin’ thing,’ he gasped desperately. His eyes, normally narrow flinty slits, were wide and dilated with fear. They flickered from Ben to the trees then back again.
‘Seen what?’
Keats puffed clouds and clenched his eyes shut, grimacing at the pain from his torso. Ben noticed there was even more blood coming down his left leg, soaking through the deerskin. A torn gash in the worn hide above his knee revealed a protruding tatter of bloodied skin.
Ben knelt down beside him, knowing instinctively there was not a lot his medical knowledge could do for the old man.
‘Let me have a look at this for you. The bandage needs re-wrapping. ’
Keats shook his head vigorously. ‘Leave it be!’ He held a hand out. ‘Only thing holdin’ me in one piece is this here bandage. ’ He looked down at it and grimaced. ‘You loosen that an’ everythin’ inside’ll come tumblin’ out.’
Ben suspected it was the same kind of wound he’d seen on the Paiute boy who had carried Emily into the camp. The same deep, horizontal gash that would have lacerated the organs, opened up the stomach lining and intestines, spilling digestive acids and faecal matter inside him. Even if he could completely staunch the flow of blood now, Keats was going to die painfully from the internal damage.
Looking at him now, however, it was obvious most of the dying was done.
‘What happened to you?’
Keats licked his lips, dry and chapped. ‘We heard them Mormons durin’ the early mornin’,’ he wheezed. ‘The ones followin’ after us. There was screamin’ an’ shootin’ behind . . . every now an’ then. Kept happenin’ through the dark hours. And we got to seein’ less an’ less of their torches. Until eventually there was none.’
Keats opened his eyes again, scanning the tree line. He panted like a winded beast, struggling with the effort of talking. ‘Me, Broken Wing and Weyland . . . kept movin’ uphill. Thought maybe it was others of our group . . . who had escaped, was fightin’ back or somethin’.’
Broken Wing squatted down and muttered something in his language, nodding towards Emily. Keats replied in the same language, falteringly, slowly.
‘What? What did he say?’
Keats shook his head, ignoring the question. ‘We was near the pass . . . when it happened . . . when it came right out the darkness at us.’
He closed his eyes again, panting rhythmically, replaying something in his head. Ben noticed he was shaking; his leathery, tobacco-stained lips trembled. The sight of that rattled Ben. He considered Keats unflappable, his gruff, unpolished demeanour impervious to anything. And yet here he was looking frail and frightened and, all of a sudden, a very old man.
He leaned closer to him. ‘Come on, what? Tell me, what was it?’
Keats’s eyes flickered open, focused on something a thousand miles away, then his gaze drifted across to Ben’s face, the here and now. ‘I saw it with my own eyes, Lambert. Ain’t no man . . . ain’t that son-of-a-whore Preston did those killin’s - like you was sayin’.’ He licked his dry lips again. ‘Saw somethin’ I can’t explain.’
Broken Wing spoke a word Ben had heard the Paiute men utter sombrely amongst themselves over the last few days.
Keats nodded weakly. ‘That’s right . . . Goddamn right. It ain’t nothin’ natural - nothin’ that by rights should be walkin’ this world.’
Ben heard Mrs Zimmerman gasp. ‘The angel,’ she whispered, ‘come down to punish us.’
‘White-face ssspirit,’ said Broken Wing.
‘That’s what I saw, Lambert,’ gasped Keats. ‘Goddamned fuckin’ demon - no angel. Came out of the trees and took Weyland’s head clean off.’
‘What did it look like?’
‘Bones, an’ a skull . . . Goddamned graveyard come to life,’ he snorted with a dry scaffold smile.
Bones.
‘Fuckin’ thing moved so fast. I got me a little powder, but no shot left . . . might’ve put a ball in it if I had. If I got me another few—’
Ben placed a hand on his shoulder. ‘Keats, listen to me. I think it might be Preston. It has to be.’ He looked around at the others. ‘Preston in some sort of . . . of a disguise.’
Keats grabbed his side and cackled. ‘Ain’t . . . that . . . fuckin’ zealot fool,’ he grunted. ‘Maybe them Paiutes was right . . . after all.’
‘What do you mean?’
Keats smiled. ‘Mebbe . . . we took a little madness into the woods with us.’ Keats grunted painfully, looking down at his seeping bandage. ‘Gonna have me a one helluva fuckin’ scar to show off.’
Broken Wing spoke, and gestured with some urgency towards Emily.
‘What? What’s that you’re saying?’ he said, looking up at the Indian.
He gestured to the trees. ‘It comess. Iss come for Am-ee-lee.’
‘What?’ Ben looked to Mrs Zimmerman. ‘Why? Why would Preston want her?’
She shook her head, confused. ‘Emily is his daughter . . . most of the children were his.’
Broken Wing shook his head. ‘Not Presss-ton.’
‘Then it’s the angel!’ whimpered Mrs Zimmerman. ‘The angel wants us all . . . all of th-those that followed Preston!’
‘It’s nothing of the sort!’ snapped Ben. ‘It’s a man, that’s all! And if it isn’t Preston, then it’s someone else amongst your group, someone who’s gone mad!’
‘It come,’ uttered Broken Wing, ‘it come this way.’
‘You’ve been followed?’
Broken Wing pointed to the fire, the column of smoke. ‘It seee sssmoke.’
‘Oh God have mercy on us,’ cried Mrs Zimmerman, burying her face in her hands and sobbing.
Ben turned back to Keats, perhaps the only other person here he felt he could engage with rationally. ‘Keats, what the hell do we do?’
There was no reply. The old man was lying perfectly still.
‘Keats?’
Broken Wing knelt down and held a hand above the guide’s nose and mouth, feeling tentatively for the warmth of his breath. Ben could see by the pallor of his skin that it was too late.
The Shoshone’s expressionless eyes met Ben’s. ‘Kee-eet . . . isss . . .’ He splayed the fingers of one hand. Instinctively, Ben comprehended the unfamiliar gesture.
Dead.
Broken Wing anxiously looked over his shoulder, back into the woods. Speaking rapidly in Ute he pointed at the fire, the rising smoke, and then gestured towards the trees. And Ben realised what he was pointing out.
The smoke will attract . . . him . . . it, to this
place.
‘We go . . . now!’ said Broken Wing, pointing towards the riverbank as he stepped around the fire towards Mrs Zimmerman, reaching out to grab an arm to lift her off the ground.
He’s right; we must stick to the riverbank. Stay in the open.
The apron of ground between where the trees petered out and the river flowed afforded them a chance to react if it attempted to rush them.
‘Come on,’ Ben said to Mrs Zimmerman, ‘we have to go now. He’s telling us this thing’s nearby and coming for us . . . for Emily. We have to move. Now.’
He bent down to pick up Emily, but she seemed no longer so listless and was able to pull herself up, as if inch by inch she was returning to this world.
‘Foll-ow ri-verrr,’ said Broken Wing, pulling Mrs Zimmerman to her feet.
All of a sudden, the stillness of the woods was shattered by something moving deep within, beyond sight - something moving too quickly to concern itself with stealth.
‘Oh shit!’ he whispered.
Emily looked towards the trees, no more than fifty yards away from where they stood on the riverbank. Her pale blue eyes came alive. She seemed to be almost back in this world with them. A small hand reached out for Ben’s poncho, and tugged on it.
‘Mr Lambert,’ she said in a quiet voice, ‘there really are angels.’
Broken Wing snapped out something in Ute and pulled a knife from his hide belt. He pointed along the bank, and Ben understood it was the only way for them to run.
Ben bent down and pulled Keats’s hunting knife out of its sheath. The heavy blade felt reassuring in his grasp. He placed a hand on Keats’s still-warm face. He would have liked to have a moment to assure the old man that he had brought his journal with him, that he’d make it out of the woods, eventually back to London, and Keats’s name would end up in print, immortalised. That would have given the guide something to smile about.
‘Goodbye, Keats,’ whispered Ben.
Broken Wing, meanwhile, pulling Mrs Zimmerman along with him, began to make his way close to the water’s edge, keeping his eyes on the tree line running parallel to the river.
‘Come on, Emily,’ Ben said, grabbing her hand. ‘We have to go.’
CHAPTER 83
Sunday
Sierra Nevada Mountains, California
Julian stared at the row of bunkhouses. They were utilitarian but robust; almost a century of abandonment, but they looked to be firmly intact and ready to face another. Nature had made good use of the last hundred years in reclaiming the land the drab wooden huts sat on. Small Christmas-tree-sized saplings sprang out of the ground in and around the buildings, whilst patches of briar, hip-high, tangled in and out of the support struts beneath each bunkhouse, pushing fronds of green up through loose and warped floorboards.
He’d naively hoped there might have been someone here, a lone caretaker in a Portakabin, some other hardy all-year-round trekkers, a party of Japanese tourists even.
And still no fucking cell phone signal.
‘At least it’s shelter,’ said Rose, shivering. She looked at him. ‘Do you think they’re still on our tail?’
‘God knows. I’d say they’re probably still picking their way through the trees in the other valley,’ he replied, giving Rose’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze. ‘I’m pretty sure we lost ’em,’ he added, hoping he sounded more confident than he felt.
The sun was fast approaching the jagged line of peaks on the far side of the valley, casting long, cool shadows that were sliding across the gentle valley floor towards the river and them. It was going to be cold tonight.
‘Come on, Rose, let’s get inside. See if we can’t find a cosy nook somewhere.’
They stepped up onto a wooden porch and pushed aside a thick wooden door that creaked dryly. Skylights in the sloping roof - one broken, the other fogged with a green filter of algae and moss - provided enough light for them to find their way around the dim interior.
The bunkhouse was one long communal space. A row of coarse wooden bunkbed frames lined each lengthways wall. An iron wood-burning stove sat against the far wall. Above them several thick gable beams ran across from one side to the other, protruding metal pegs from which dangled coils of heavy rope, a loop of twine tied from one beam to another - most probably, once upon a time, a clothes line - and several rusting tools including a band saw, a rotary saw.
‘Your basic two-star accommodation,’ he muttered and managed a humourless laugh that trailed off quickly.
Rose wandered over to a bunk in the corner and hunkered down on the floor beside it, pulling her knees up to her chin and wrapping her arms around them.
‘I’m shit scared, Jules.’
He reached up to one of the cross-beams and lifted a large, rusty canting hook off a peg. He held it by its wooden handle and examined the long, curved hook. He hefted it in his hand. It looked vicious but unwieldy. It felt good to hold.
He wandered across the floor towards her, examining the hook. ‘Yeah, got to admit I’m a little scared too.’
‘How scared? Am-I-going-to-die scared? Or just sort of a bit anxious?’
He laughed skittishly. ‘Remember the time we followed that candidate to the BNP rally?’
She nodded.
‘Or the time we got death threats from that Jihadi cleric?’
She nodded again.
‘Well, more scared than that,’ he replied, sliding down the wall to hunch up next to her.
They sat in silence a while, watching the coppery hue of the evening sun stream in through the fogged skylight windows, the shadows slowly climbing up the opposite wall.
‘Jules, when you came into my tent this morning, you definitely had something to say to me, didn’t you? But I was too busy yapping on about the photo. What were you going to say?’
He shook his head and laughed. ‘That I was beginning to have a bad feeling about things.’
Rose smiled. ‘Little earlier next time, hmm?’
‘Dr Griffith warned me about this. That insanity like Preston’s can carry down the line.’
Rose nodded. ‘I must have got it wrong, then,’ she sighed. ‘The Rag Man story, the survivor who emerged from the woods - I thought that was Lambert.’
‘Well, maybe it was.’ Julian leaned his head back against the rough wooden wall. ‘Perhaps Preston left behind some descendants in Iowa, before he set off with his followers, and Shepherd’s family link is to one of them.’
‘Yeah, I suppose.’
‘Either way, Shepherd’s unstable, right? Did you notice right before we ran how weird he was?’
‘No I didn’t really . . . it’s a bit of a blur.’
‘He seemed out of it, vacant, like he was slightly stoned.’
‘I don’t remember that.’
‘I wouldn’t be entirely surprised if he’s got a few skeletons of his own to hide somewhere.’
‘What . . . some bodies buried in his basement?’
Julian hugged his knees for warmth. ‘Who knows? Maybe he’s got himself a typical serial-killer basement complete with a Gothic well, where he’s been busy stitching together a woman-suit. ’
Rose snorted.
‘He seemed prepared to kill us just to bury a story about his . . . what? . . . his great-great-grandfather?’
‘It would have damaged his campaign. I can believe someone like that would do what he could to stop it.’
‘Maybe. But would you kill someone for that?’
Rose shrugged. ‘I wouldn’t.’
‘Would any normal politician murder someone just to bury a negative story?’
Shepherd looked up at the deep blue sky, robbed of the sun and left only with a stain of its memory on the horizon. It was going to be a freezing cold night; the thinly combed clouds stretched in front of a growing early audience of stars made that solemn promise.
Several paces ahead, a small piece of glowing technology was leading Carl forward. He held something no bigger than a slim cell phone, with a pale back
lit screen displaying a direction and a distance. He’d assured Shepherd that although the tracker was a few years out of date - CIA surplus - it was more than adequate for the job out here.
Tracker’s good for five to ten miles depending on line-of-sight obstructions. That had been Carl’s crisp and businesslike explanation of the gadget’s efficacy as they set out from the clearing after them.
‘Not so good for urban detection,’ he’d added. ‘Lot of walls and electrical interference, but more than good enough for the job out here. This’ll lead us right to them, Mr Shepherd.’
You disapprove?
Shepherd winced at the sudden intrusion of the voice in his head. It seemed a little louder than last time, more insistent, shrill even, certainly so much louder than any others he’d played host to.
We don’t need to kill any more people, he replied. It’s an unnecessary risk. We didn’t need to kill that old woman.
There was no response. He managed an edgy smile in the failing light. If Duncan knew . . . if any of his campaign sponsors knew, if those millions of voters out there knew that his mind played out such terrible dialogues, that suggestions - malicious ones, spiteful ones, murderous ones . . . genocidal ones - were quietly whispered to him every day and then cautiously argued down, well . . . he could imagine spilling it all to Dr Phil or Oprah on live TV.
What a release that would be, to share his burdens with someone.
They will talk.
I can persuade them not to.
Are you a good man?
Yes . . . yes, I think I am.
You are also a weak man.
The hectoring, disapproving tone in its voice sent a sharp pain through his head.
I’m not weak.
The voice was quiet again.
Several yards ahead of Shepherd, Carl suddenly cursed under his breath and stopped.
‘The damned signal keeps dropping. Hang on a second . . . we need to let it pick up again.’
While he waited for his tracker to sweep for the signal, he looked out at the wide, graceful valley below them, silently scanning it with sniper’s eyes for any signs of life. Evening was settling across it fast, and amidst the muted tones of dusk he was reassured to see no pin-pricks of light anywhere; just more endless wilderness and no one else around. No one for miles . . . and miles.