IX
The senator just regarded his nephew over steepled fingers for a while after the conclusion of the tale, facing him across the card-sized table in the safe room. At length he said, slowly, “Boy, you should go back to Idaho or wherever and just stay them until we get all this sorted out, you know. Will you? If I arrange for you to fly out tonight, will you do that. for me?”
James shook his head. “I can’t, Uncle Taylor. I’ve some very important appointments in Dade County and other places. If you’re able to get us funding and if the Japanese investors come through, fine, but we need money now. We’ve somewhat less than four million, as it sits, and that’s simply not enough to tide us over until you or they can infuse bigger chunks of cash.
“That damned Harel/Markov is still costing us money, whether up there in the body or not. His precious yaks somehow knocked down enough Cyclone fencing to get loose on the higher end of the plateau, the whole pack of wisents followed them, and they all managed to make it down an almost vertical rock face into the woods down below without so much as a scratch, it would seem. Don’t ask me or anybody else just how they all did it—maybe the bastard taught them how to levitate.”
The senator chuckled. “Animals can do some truly remarkable things when they put their minds to it James, you of all people should be aware of that. Don’t you recall the story of Grandad’s—your great-grandfather’s—bay hunter? Of how he not only knew when the old man was near death, but got out of his paddock, into the house, up the stairs and into Granddad’s bedroom, all sixteen-plus hands of him through a yard and house crowded with servants, relatives and nurses on a twenty-four-hour basis … and no single soul could later recall having seen him do any of it?
“Now I don’t know spit about those wisents, other than that they look and act a lot like our native buffalo … bison, if you will … but I do recall having read somewhere that yaks are a mountain animal, even live high up in the Himalayan massif, so a puny little Rocky Mountain plateau was probably no obstacle—actually, more of a lighthearted romp to them.”
James grimaced and remarked, “Well, that lighthearted romp of those bovids has already taken a sizable chunk out of what little the group had of existing funds and will take more before it’s over and done. See, not only did they damage the fencing, they wandered around for a while near the plateau and then just seemingly disappeared from off the face of the earth. I had to hire on half a tribe of local Indians and actually put up cash bounties for their safe return before any of them turned up.”
“They were found, though, I take it?” asked the senator.
James grimaced again. “In a way, I wish they had really just disappeared from off the face of the globe, all things considered. Yes, they were found, but not by the Indians. Twenty-odd crow-flight miles away, some state rangers who were on the lookout for poachers saw buzzards and rode into some very rugged country to find a dead bison bull—one of the forest bison, rare and so valuable, worse luck for our group.
“The beast was breathing his last and his wounds were acrawl with maggots, but even so it was easy for the rangers to see that be hadn’t been done in by the hand of man but rather by another horned animal. They put him down with a bullet, took off his ID tag to turn in to the proper authority and set out to backtrack him, but had to turn back before they found what had been his herd.
“That night it started to rain, and it alternately rained, drizzled and threatened for three days, then came a weekend, so it was a total of five days before a larger number of men, with jeeps, horses and a chopper, went back up there to find what little the scavengers had left of the bull’s carcass. The chopper it was finally located the herd—five bison cows, two calves, three wisent cows and a calf, one bull wisent that had been in a recent fight, and one yak cow.
“The wisent bull apparently had driven off the smaller, lighter yak bull while they all still were fairly close to the plateau area, because the yak Look off in another direction, chanced across a pasture of a small dairy operation and decided this must be his new home and harem laid out for him. You can imagine the shock of the gentleman-rancher on finding a long-haired, long-horned and rather cantankerous wild bull among his prize cows; it’s a wonder he didn’t shoot the bastard out of hand, but he didn’t.
“When we were passed word of where the escapee was, we went down there with the big truck and brought him back. But now the owner of the cows is rumbling about suing the group for probable damages to his purebred, prize-winning cows … and if he does, he’ll probably win, be awarded a hefty settlement by any jury of locals, and we will be faced with the unhappy choice of either paying it or of paying more in the long run by going through the appeals process and, if we choose the latter, making local enemies we do not either need or want.”
Taylor Bedford shrugged. “Settle out of court—that’s the best way, I’ve found, in damage cases.”
His nephew made a rude noise. “Tried. The bastard wants a truly stupendous sum, more than I think his entire hashup up there is worth, seems to be under the impression that we’re a lavishly funded or endowed government project or, at least, a tax writeoff for some gigantic corporation or conglomerate. Gouging bastard!
“Even so, were that the only cost, I just might be able to do it, much as bowing to his demands would grate. But it’s not. No, far from it. When the rangers found the wisents and the yak cow, they notified the project, of course, announcing that if we wanted any of them back alive, we had better get up there and get them out, pronto. Seems the wisent bull had taken the whole of his new-won herd up into an area that was almost inaccessible to even a horse. The big fucker had already injured one saddle horse and treed its rider for some hours, and the rangers were seemingly anticipating shooting him with some relish.”
“So what did you do, James?” asked the senator. His nephew sighed and cracked a knuckle, “Zeppy … Dr. Baronian and I jeeped up there, borrowed a brace of horses and rode up fairly close to the herd, then went in—very cautiously, mind you—afoot to find that the rangers were right about that big wisent bull being as mean as a Kodiak bear with a toothache, as murderous as a great white shark. He came close to getting us, too, he and the wisent cow with the calf. It was on our ride back to the jeep track that we two decided the only feasible way of getting the brutes out alive was by drug gun, cargo net and copter, and that’s what we promised the rangers we’d do.
“Back at the project center, I phoned the outfit that had been providing us with copter services and explained the problem, and the next day, the president of the firm arrived aboard one of his smaller helicopters. He had been all smiles and cheery words when he first arrived—for after all, the group has been a really good, cash-on-the-barrelhead customer during our time up there—but after he had heard the details and had carefully studied the maps, seen exactly where he or one of his other pilots was going to have to take a copter large enough for the job—furthermore, take it up there and back for each of the animals—he became much cooler of manner and far more serious. After he had done some calculations, he came up with a figure that jarred me, nor would he budge from it, wouldn’t come down one red cent, telling me in effect to take it or leave it, though offering the names of a few other copter services that might be willing to undertake the work.
“As I continued to try to haggle him down, he finally took my arm, walked me out to his copter, strapped me into it and then flew us both up to the area in question. Uncle Taylor, I’ve heard you and others—racing yachtsmen—speak in the past of ‘living, prescient gales and storms,’ but I never then knew, could not really picture, just what any of you meant by the phrase; well, I do now, please believe me, I do.