We landed in a downpour, spray flung up higher than the wings, the wheels skimming the surface water, and since he wouldn’t take no for an answer, even saying if there was no room at the lodge his wife would make up a bed for me in what they called the nursery, I accepted his offer of a lift. The prospect of company on the drive to Haines Junction was too good to refuse.
We hurried across the wet concrete, flung our cases into the big Parks vehicle and piled in. The interior of the truck was damp and cold, the surrounding country lost in the driving rain and the flat rectangle of Whitehorse only just visible like a toy town below us. The Alaska Highway,’ he said, as we swung north out of the airport, the asphalt road gleaming, the black of spruce closing in. Almost immediately we were into the settlement of Takhini and he turned right, down a dirt road that forced him into four-wheel drive. The surface was some sort of boulder clay. ‘Slippery as hell soon as there’s any rain.’ Ahead of us the river expanded into a small lake. Spruce everywhere. White spruce, he said, though the forest it made was funeral black.
The trailer court was wet and sticky with mud, nobody about, so I had a miserable time finding someone to direct me. The man I had come to see lived at the far end, a large home on wheels with the name Jonny Epinard painted on the door. A red Dodge pick-up stood beside it almost completely coated with a glistening layer of mud. Maybe it was the rain, or the fact that his wife was in hospital, but he was there, the door opening almost as soon as I banged on it. He was a wiry little man, rather Irish-looking, with a dark, screwed-up face. He hadn’t shaved that morning, the stubble showing grey, though his hair was black, jet black and very straight. In his faded bush shirt, open at the neck, and mud-stained jeans held up by braces as well as a thick leather belt, he had a wild, outlandish look.
His dark eyes switched from me to the Park warden, then back to me again. ‘Who are you?’ His grip on the door had tightened, his voice a little high. ‘What d’you want?’
‘Answers,’ I said. ‘To a few questions.’ I could hear the suck of his breath as I told him who I was and got my briefcase from the truck. I think he would have liked to close the door on me then, but Jim Edmundson called, ‘Back in about an hour, okay?’ and without waiting for an answer drove off. The man had no alternative then: ‘You’d better come in,’ he said, his voice reluctant.
The rear of the trailer was fitted out as a sitting-room, chintz curtains, imitation-leather chairs, pale wood cupboards and shelves. He waved me to a seat, but then remained standing, staring at the floor as though he didn’t know what to do about me. I let the silence run on until finally he said, ‘Well?’ The question hung in the air. He was nervous and I wondered why. ‘You like a beer?’
I shook my head.
His eyes darted about the room as though seeking some way of escape. Then abruptly he sat down. ‘You’re Tom Halliday’s lawyer, you say.’ His eyes fastened on the briefcase. I opened it and showed him copies of several letters that gave my firm’s address, but I could see he had already accepted my identity. ‘What do you want to know?’ His tongue flicked across his lips. ‘Sure you won’t have a beer?’
‘No thanks,’ I said. ‘I had a drink on the plane.’
He nodded, then got suddenly to his feet again. ‘Well, I think I will. Don’t mind, do you?’ He opened a cupboard, busying himself searching among the bottles and cans. ‘You come all the way from England?’
‘Yes,’ I said.
To see me? Or to see the mine? You going there?’ He looked round at me. There’s nothing to see. The mine’s finished.’ He had a can in his hand and he snapped the ring. ‘It ran out years back. But you know that, don’t you?’
‘How many years back?’
He stared at me, his eyes probing as though he was trying to decide whether the question was some sort of a trap. ‘Didn’t he tell you?’ I waited, and at last he sat down again, taking a swig direct from the can. ‘It didn’t happen all at once. The pay dirt just thinned out, yielding less and less each year.’
‘When did you first realize the gold was petering out?’
‘Hard to say exactly, but about seven years ago, I guess. Why? What do you want to know for? Because Tom’s broke, is that it?’
‘Did Mrs Halliday tell you that?’ I was thinking of her description of the man watching from across the road. ‘You spoke to her in the end, did you?’
But he was still thinking of Tom. ‘He’s been a good guy to work for.’ He was suddenly smiling. ‘Used to come out about once a year. Wasn’t much interested in mining, only the machinery — he liked that. What he really came for was the fishing. And camera stalking. Didn’t want to shoot anything. But if he could get a close-up with his camera, moose in part’c’lar — he’d stalk moose all day down in the swampland below Nine Mile Falls.’ He shook his head, still smiling — a slightly crooked, slightly uncertain smile.
‘You kept the mine running.’
That’s right.’
‘Why did you do that? It was losing money.’
‘He wanted it kept running, that’s why. Not flat out like it used to be, but ticking over.’
‘Why?’ I repeated.
He shrugged. ‘Why does any man do anything if he’s got the money? He liked it, liked the idea of being a mine owner, that’s what he told me. It was in the blood, I guess, his father finding gold there when everyone told him he’d been sold a dud. Reck’n Tom didn’t want anybody to know the gold had run out.’
‘It must have cost him quite a bit.’
‘Sure, but a rich man like him — ‘ He laughed. ‘Wish I were rich enough to run a mine just for the hell of it, just to keep up appearances. That’s what he was doing. Keeping up appearances. And now what?’ His eyes darted at me, anxious now and worried about the future. This was a young man’s country and he was certainly the wrong side of fifty. He leaned forward, ‘You’re his lawyer. If it turns out he’s dead, then what happens about the mine? There’s only myself and a young half-breed Indian, Jack McDonald, now, but we need to know.’
I didn’t answer him for a moment, wondering what line to take. ‘You’ll have to ask Mrs Halliday about that,’ I said. ‘In the event you speak of, the mine will belong to her.’
‘Mrs Halliday?’ He seemed suddenly confused.
‘You saw her here in Whitehorse, didn’t you? When she was staying at the Sheffield.’ Or had it been the half-breed Indian who had followed her? It had to be one of them. ‘She hired a car and drove down to a lake called Dezadeash.’
‘Dezdeesh.’ From the way he said it I knew his correction of my pronunciation was to give him time to think. ‘She stayed at Kevin McKie’s place — Lakeside.’
‘You spoke to her just as she was driving off, is that it?’
‘No.’
‘But you were watching her from across the road.’
He didn’t answer.
‘She said she was being followed when she was staying at the hotel. Was that you?’
He stared at me blankly, his face gone sullen, and in that moment he looked part Indian himself.
‘She wrote to me,’ I said. ‘Somebody was following her about, watching her. That was you, wasn’t it?’
He nodded, slowly ‘and reluctantly.
‘Why?’
He hesitated, shaking his head. And then suddenly he blurted out, ‘I was scared, you see. I couldn’t make up my mind.’ And he went on, the words coming in a rush, ‘Tom had talked of her like she was a princess. Not often, but sometimes — over the camp fire, when he was lonely. And the way he spoke of her …’ He paused, his mind remembering. ‘She never came out here with him, you see. I’d never met her, and when I saw her… well, I guess there was something about her — ’ He leaned suddenly forward, both hands clasped rightly round the beer can. ‘What would you have done? She looked so beautiful, and at the same time so remote — like ice, or a sunset seen across a frozen lake. I knew she must be here to find out about the mine — the same questions you bin asking. Was I to go right up to her and say What about my job — my wife’s sick and I haven’t had any money for over six months? Could I go right up to her and say that? Would you, if you were me?’