This was the spot. I was now facing our den window straightaway. Fired from this angle, the crossbow bolt would shatter the den window and lodge...
No, not here, either. The house was too far off now, two hundred yards or more. A crossbow could shoot that far, but Sinclair would have to tilt his weapon upward to compensate for the distance. If it had been fired from anywhere near here, the bolt would have been dropping sharply when it crashed through the window. Lodging in the floor, not the wall.
Sinclair must have gotten closer somehow. No problem. There were enough bushes to offer concealment for a cautious stalker, especially one crouched in a chair.
But he obviously hadn’t come this way. The earth was moist and spongy. Much too soft to support the weight of Sinclair’s wheelchair without leaving deep gouges. I knelt, scanning the ground closely for wheel tracks. No sign of any. But I did find tracks.
Footprints. Moving carefully, I traced the faint impressions to a small clump of underbrush at the edge of the field bordering the subdivision. The perfect spot. Easing down onto the moist earth, my elbows came to rest in two nearly invisible depressions. Steadying my weapon, I aimed it across the field. Directly at the shattered window of my own home.
I lay there for a time, thinking. Rethinking, actually. Applying a different template over the same set of facts. And realized I wasn’t dealing with a Hitler problem at all. More like a class struggle. Between the haves and the have-nots.
Any of a half-dozen Shakespearean plots dealt with this situation. Macbeth, for one. But there was nothing academic about this problem. The trap was very real, artfully laid. And I had blundered right into the middle of the killing zone. Like a lamb to the slaughter.
He could already have me centered in his sights, his finger poised on the crossbow's hair trigger. Ready to touch off that high-tech replica of medieval weaponry and slam a fletched shaft into me. The same way he killed Sparky.
No! I still didn’t have it right. I didn’t have to die for the plan to work. But my being out here made everything all too easy. And it would happen very quickly now.
Scrambling to my feet, I sprinted back into the forest, running flat out. Modern crossbows are lighter than the originals and their sights are deadly accurate, but they’re still too bulky to swing quickly. My only chance was to keep moving. Fast.
Forty yards into the forest, I flattened myself against an aspen, panting, expecting a crossbow bolt to punch into my guts at any second. But it didn’t. And as the moments passed, I gradually slowed my breathing, willing myself to calm down.
Listening.
Somewhere nearby I could hear the faint hum of Sinclair’s power wheelchair, and I knew I only had a few moments left.
Glimpsing him coming through the trees, I edged toward the sound of the chair, keeping low. But not low enough, not for a born hunter. The chair stopped.
“Come out of there,” Sinclair barked.
I stepped onto the path. His crossbow was mounted on a swivel attached to the chair. Centered on my heart, as near as I could tell. His sister was with him, both of them dressed in woodland military camouflage, ready for war.
“What are you doing out here?”
“Looking for you,” I said.
“He’s got a gun, Chan,” Dana said, moving up behind the chair.
“I see that,” Sinclair said. “Hunting, Professor?”
“Listen to me, Sinclair, this may sound crazy—”
“Kill him!” Dana hissed.
“What?” Chan said, stunned. “Are you off your rocker? He’s—”
“He’s here to kill us, you moron!” Grabbing the crossbow, she wrestled it out of her brother’s hands. Easily. Despite his bearish appearance, Chan obviously had very little manual strength. As she struggled to bring it to bear, I raised my shotgun—
“Hold it,” Jerry Landry shouted, his pistol at the ready. “Drop that gun, Dylan. Everybody just calm down half a second.”
“He knows,” Dana said, nodding at me.
“Knows what?” Chan Sinclair said, baffled. “What’s going on here?”
“They’re lovers, Sinclair. They mean to kill you. With you gone, Dana will inherit—”
“Shut your mouth!” Landry roared, raising his pistol to cover me.
I started inching backward.
“Don’t even think about it,” Landry warned.
“You’re the one who needs to think, Jerry,” I said, swallowing. “Your story only works if I’m killed with a crossbow.”
True or not, the thought froze him for a second. And I was off, sprinting into the trees as Dana sent a crossbow shaft whistling through the spot where I’d been standing a moment before. Landry’s shot followed a split-second later. Plan or no plan, they had to kill me now.
“Grab his shotgun,” Landry roared at her as he charged into the brush after me. “Do your brother!”
I kept moving, dodging from tree to tree as Landry came on, firing at me wildly, gaining ground as I ducked this way and that, trying to keep trees between us. Knowing I wasn’t going to make it. I was running out of cover. The trees were thinning out as we neared the edge of the wood and I’d have no chance at all in the open—Someone screamed behind us. A woman, I thought, but couldn’t be certain. It barely sounded human.
“Dana!” Landry shouted, freezing in his tracks, scanning the woods, trying to spot me. I stayed put, a poplar at my back. The last tree big enough to use for cover.
“Dana!” No answer. Only a bubbling moan.
“My God!” Landry wheeled, sprinting back to the clearing. I turned too, running parallel, trying to keep him in sight. If I could get deeper into the forest—Landry stopped suddenly, raising his weapon. I froze too, but it was too late! He had me dead to rights, caught in the open, flatfooted. My only chance was to—but suddenly Landry lowered his pistol...
He turned toward me, a look of utter amazement on his face. And even at that distance I could see the feathered butt of a crossbow bolt protruding from his chest below the armpit. And the crimson circle widening around it as he dropped slowly to his knees. For a moment he desperately tried to pull the shaft out with this free hand, then pitched forward, sprawling facedown in the golden leaves.
Dead? Couldn’t tell from here. Had no idea where the arrow came from or who shot it. From that angle, it could have been meant for me.
Keeping low, I circled warily around to Landry’s crumpled form, coming up behind him. Ready to bolt at the slightest move. But he wasn’t moving. Wasn’t breathing, either. I reached carefully around for the service revolver still in his fist.
“Leave it,” Sinclair said, humming his wheelchair into the clearing. His crossbow was back in its mount, loaded, and centered on my chest. Beyond him I could see the crumpled form of his sister, cowering against a tree, clutching her arm.
“What happened?” I asked, rising slowly.
“Dana tried to pick up the shotgun. I ran her down with the chair. I think her arm is broken. And you’ve got some explaining to do. Why did you come out here? With that gun?”
I thought about lying to him. Something in his eyes told me not to.
“I came to have it out with you. To kill you, if it came down to it.”
“Over your dog?” he said, disbelieving. “I told you I didn’t shoot it.”
“It was more than that. Landry and your sister were planning to get rid of you and lay the blame on me. To make it work, they vandalized my home, and one of them, probably Landry, fired a crossbow bolt through my den window. It could have killed somebody. And it was dusted with blue chalk.”