Riley was sitting with his feet dangling over the edge of the aircraft, toes a few inches above the skids. Behind him was the sheriff's deputy, Lamb, holding tight onto his dog's leash. Riley scanned the terrain flashing by beneath them.
As they flew over a small trail, something caught Riley's eye. "Turn back," Riley spoke into the headset he wore. "There was someone on that trail back there with two horses."
"Roger," Captain Barret acknowledged and pulled the Huey around in a steep right-hand bank, reducing airspeed at the same time. In a few seconds the helicopter was in a hover at fifty feet above the ground.
Riley leaned out the left side and peered down at the ground. He saw a man trying to control two runaway horses, and waving one arm as though he was signaling them to land. Riley looked around the immediate area.
"Sir, you think you could set us down in the small clearing about fifty meters off our left side? This guy looks like he wants to talk to us. Maybe he saw something. Radio Search Base and tell them we'll be a few seconds late getting started."
"Roger, no problem."
Riley turned to the sheriff next to him and yelled in the man's ear: "Doc and I will take a look and be right back." Riley signaled to Caruso, Trustin, and Trovinsky to stay on board the helicopter.
The Huey sidled over and Barret lowered his collective, allowing the aircraft to settle straight down into the clearing. As soon as the skids touched, Riley jumped off, followed by Seay. He pushed through the undergrowth toward the trail, the whine of the helicopter behind them dropping down a notch as the pilot reduced throttle to idle.
Riley inspected the man on the horse as he got closer. The old fellow looked terrible; his face was pale and he was looking over his shoulder as if something were behind him.
"Thank God you're here." The man jumped off his jittery horse and tied it to a tree along with the other horse.
Riley looked around the immediate area. Nothing unusual that he could spot. "What's the matter?"
"One of my men's bodies is up there on the trail. Something tore the shit out of him. I don't know what the hell could have done it. He was guiding for a family from Nashville and I don't know where they are. I don't know what the fuck happened. What could do that to a man?"
"Are you sure he's dead?" Doc Seay asked.
The old man was close to going into shock, but he hadn't totally lost it. "I've seen dead people before in the war and Hapscomb is dead. He's torn to pieces. Only way I recognized him was by the boots he was wearing. Snake skin. He loved those goddamn boots. Thought he looked good in them. Damn, I never — "
"How far away is the body?" Riley cut in.
"About three hundred feet down the trail. Round that bend there. I was taking his horse back out — came back on its own last night, you see — and I knew my man needed it and then the horses got spooked and wouldn't go around — so I got off and walked around and then I saw him — and then I figured maybe I better get the hell out of there 'cause the horses, they wouldn't go that way anyway — so — "
Riley stopped the old man's ramblings by grabbing his arm. "You stay here. We'll go take a look. My friend here is a medic, so if your man isn't dead we can take care of him." He turned to Seay. "Let's go."
The old man wasn't impressed. "Medic ain't gonna do no good. He's tore up bad. There's blood all over the place, I tell you. There ain't — "
Riley left the old man behind. He flipped the selector lever on his M16A2 to semiautomatic. Seay slipped into place on the right side of the dirt road. They automatically adjusted the muzzles of their weapons to cover across each other's front.
Riley rounded the bend and came to an abrupt halt at the sight of the mangled body. He did a slow scan of the surrounding area — including the trees — before moving any closer. Satisfied that there was no threat in the immediate vicinity that he could see, he nodded for Doc Seay to follow him forward, up to the body.
"Well, he's dead for sure," Seay commented.
"Is that your expert medical opinion?" Riley returned, his words belying the surprise and shock he was feeling.
The sight was sickening, but Riley had seen similar ones. Most people were used to the clean killing shown on TV cop shows. In reality, the human body has a plethora of blood and guts packed into it, which tend to get thrown all over the place when hit with devastating physical trauma. The odor of emptied bowels competed with the sweet, sickly smell of blood and internal organs exposed to the air.
The man, if it was a man, had had his throat almost completely torn through. The chest and stomach cavity had been slashed to ribbons. The face was unidentifiable due to the cuts. If Riley didn't know any better, he'd swear that something had been dining on the man, since there were large chunks of muscle missing.
Doc Seay squatted down next to the body and poked at it with his knife, lifting up the few scraps of clothes. "It's a man. Looks like something wanted to make sure he was dead."
"What could have done that? Bear?"
Seay looked at some of the wounds. "I don't know. Possibly. Probably more than one of whatever it was."
Riley checked the ground for tracks. His eyes narrowed as he spotted one clear print in the dirt. "Son of a bitch." He pointed. "Check that out, Doc. Remind you of anything?"
"These are the same tracks we followed on the other side of the lake. Whatever we were tracking killed this guy. No monkey I ever heard of could do this."
Several thoughts struck Riley in a series of worsening implications. The old man had said something about this man guiding a family. Riley's thoughts flitted to the encounter last night. This had to be the same man they'd run into at the campsite. Which meant that this guide had been killed sometime after 9 P.M. Which also meant that this fellow had been going somewhere in the dark, running away from the campsite. Riley pulled his map out of his cargo pants pocket. The place they had landed the previous evening was less than half a klick away to the southeast.
Riley remembered the little girl he'd seen standing by the tent when he ran back toward the helicopter the previous evening. His face was drawn tight as he addressed Seay. "Doc, we need to get up to that campground ASAP."
Riley started running back down the trail, Doc Seay in hot pursuit. McClanahan was still standing around the bend with his two horses.
"Follow us," Riley yelled at the man as he sprinted by. Riley pushed through the trees into the small clearing where the Huey squatted, blades slowly turning. Riley halted short of the arc of the blades and signaled for Caruso and Trustin to get off the aircraft.
The two men responded to Riley's summons and ran over. Riley yelled into Caruso's ear. "Got the body of a man up the trail through those trees. I want you and Trustin to stay here with the old man. There's a campground we're going up to in the bird. You two hold in place here until someone comes back for you."
Caruso nodded. Riley increased the pressure of his grip on Caruso's arm. "Listen, Lou. I don't know what killed that man, but whatever it is tore the shit out of him. I think it's the same things we've been following the last two days. Whatever they are, they aren't monkeys. Don't hesitate if you see anything strange. Fire first."
"Roger that, chief."
Riley ran toward the helicopter, followed by Seay. He jumped on board and grabbed a headset. "Sir, this is Chief Riley. Remember that campground we landed at last night?"
A short laugh preceded Barret's reply. "How can I forget? You two came running out of there like chickens with your heads cut off."
"We need to get up there as quickly as possible."
"Roger."
The whine of the turbine engine increased and the aircraft shuddered with the increase in power. The skids separated from the ground. Barret increased altitude until he was clear of the trees and then nosed over to the southeast. In less than thirty seconds the clearing appeared dead ahead on top of the knoll.