The man needed killing.
The thud against the rock had cracked the object lense of the scope. I dismounted it, checked the position of the windage on the supplementary V sight, stowed the scope in the shoulderbag after taking out the automatic and the clips for both weapons. I put the clips in my pockets, the automatic under my belt, then shoved the shoulderbag back under the rock. The last light of day was going fast. I wiggled off to where it was safe to stand. Then, bending low, I ran hard through the brush, ignoring the noise, heading due west. When my wind was nearly gone I dropped and lay still. With silence and care I angled left, drifting through the deepening shadows. When at last I felt the slope, I dropped to hands and knees and went more slowly. As the pitch grew steeper I flattened out, progressed by reaching the rifle far ahead with my right hand, worming my way up to it. The highest part of the wall overlooking the lake was ahead of me.
I picked one of the trees outlined against the sky and waited until it was black night. It took long minutes to work my way up the trunk into the crotch I had spotted. From here the first dawn light would silhouette anyone on the crest forty yards in front of me.
During the long, cold, miserable night I brought myself back up to the point of anger every time I felt it slipping away. Twice, wedged into the crotch, I managed to sleep for a little while, waking to rub feeling back into my legs. I knew I would be close enough to pick the shot. Smash the right shoulder. It would be enough. But four inches and four thousand dollars to the left was the base of the throat.
When the dawn began to grow, when the trees became ghostly visible, I edged around and brought the rifle up into position. Lighter and lighter. I searched the shadows under the pines for him, alert for any movement.
At last it was daylight, the stand of pines as empty as it had been a hundred years before that morning.
The crackle of brush, behind me, was alarmingly close. I twisted around with a great violent effort and saw a big man, crouched, moving slowly up the trail I had made the night before. Fear was quick, hot and fluid in my throat. He had outsmarted me by cutting my back trail at the first dawn’s light. As I tried to swing the rifle around to get in the first shot, the butt thumped the tree. With one oiled and perfect motion he brought the rifle up to his shoulder and fired.
I called myself a dead man as I fell. The smashing blow against the rifle numbed my arm, broke my hold and my balance. I floated down, naked and slow and alone in the air, down like a balloon to the ground so far below, yet always with the consciousness of which side was exposed to him, which side he would hit. I landed hard on my right shoulder and hip on the soft ground, clawing my way to the shelter of the trunk at the moment I landed, snatching the automatic from my belt. Something plucked at my thigh and there was a wetness there, a slow stinging. I threw one shot from the automatic at where he had been. The rifle was a yard and a half to my right, the foregrip splintered where his slug had hit it.
“Fournier!” I shouted. “Fournier!”
Alarmed birds scolded from the brush. There was no answer. The black flies found me again, fire needles on my wrists and throat. I knew I had to kill him or be killed, and all of the implications of the dirty mess struck me. I had been playing, never committing myself completely, thus making two mistakes. Either mistake could have killed me. The next one would. I had to decide what he would do.
In his position I would circle. Which way? Off to the right so as not to put the tree bole between me and the rifle. I listened to the bird sounds. Off to my right a bird made a sudden squawk of alarm. That was enough. To reach slowly for the rifle would be a guarantee to death. I prodded the nick in my thigh. It was bleeding slightly. A bit of flesh had been chewed away.
On the slow count of five I lunged for the rifle, gathered it up, rolled with it in my arms to the shelter of a rotting log, hearing the hard whack of the shot.
Keeping my head down I lifted the automatic and squeezed off three fast shots in his general direction. At the third shot I dropped the automatic, swung the rifle around and, with my finger on the trigger, I lifted my head cautiously and quickly above the log. I had to see him before he saw me. The slope was empty. I wanted to pull my head back down. He had to be out there. There were two places where he could have taken cover. The first was a tangled deadfall. I aimed at the densest part of it and shot twice, carefully. Silence. I swung the muzzle toward the second possible hiding place.
As I did so he burst out of the deadfall, heading upslope at a blundering run, his left hand, fingers spread, pressed hard against his belly. I kept the sights on him but I couldn’t pull the trigger. I am quick to shoot a gunshot animal, but Fournier was a man. He almost reached the pines and fell heavily, full length.
I stood up, shaking uncontrollably. I wanted to explain to Fournier. I wanted to tell him I didn’t want to kill him. He didn’t move. I walked by him to the brink of the rock wall. The morning sun was on the lodge roof. I could see Harry standing there, looking over toward me. They had heard a great deal of shooting.
“Hallo!” I called. “Hallo! It’s all over. Over!”
Medwell came out and stood beside Harry. Harry pointed toward me. They went down to the dock and climbed into the small boat, Harry in the bow, Medwell handling the outboard motor. The staccato sound came closer. They came in a wide curve to a spot far below me.
Medwell cut the motor and I heard the echoes off the far hills.
“You got him?” Medwell asked in a conversational tone.
“I killed him, damn you!”
“There’s no need to be emotional. You did very well. Push him over and Harry’ll put a line on him and we’ll tow him in.”
My voice shook and my eyes were stinging. “Come on up here and throw him over yourself.”
I heard the sound behind me. I spun around. Fournier, his face an agonized mask, was clawing his way toward the brink of the cliff. He pulled himself along by plunging his hard fingers deep into the bed of loam and pine needles that covered the rocks. I did not have time to see more. All I could feel was awe at the will that would not let him die. My weakened leg buckled under me and I fell to my hands and knees. The ground gave way under my right knee and I slid slowly over the brink.
“Watch it!” Medwell yelled.
There was no solid thing to grasp. I slipped backward. At the last moment I kicked myself away from the edge and fell. I hugged my knees and braced my shoulders. The fall was interminable and sickening. The water was as hard as a fist. I went down and down into green-black depths, my lungs tightening. Going back up was like climbing a soft green ladder. I broke through into the air, gasping.
I was thirty feet from the boat. The icy water was deadening my arms and legs. Medwell did an odd thing. He held a ridiculous looking target pistol in his right hand. With his free hand he yanked his shirt out of his pants, lifted it and stared down at a small black spot on the swelling expanse of white flesh at his waist. I saw that it was a hole. I had not heard the rifle.
Medwell slowly lifted the target pistol. I looked up. All I could see was the rifle barrel, Fournier’s blood-black hand on the foregrip.
Fournier fired again. The shot took Medwell high on the forehead, slamming his head back at a crazy angle. He slid sideways in the seat, lowered the pistol to the lake surface and let go of it. He let his thick white hand rest in the water. Harry sat huddled in the bow, making himself small. There was no need. Fournier’s rifle came down, turning once, end for end, in the sunlight. It hit muzzle first and disappeared with little splash.