The power line ran from a light pole at the edge of the parking apron to the corner of the building. A Bigfoot was pushing the pole out of the concrete, with hollow popping sounds.
“Got him, got him, got him,” Duane said to himself.
Sparks of released current shorted by snowflakes burst from the wires as they tore loose. One by one the lights blinked out in the lodge.
Duane slipped the rifle out the window and fired. He was certain he hit it. The ponderous head looked in surprise at him. The body quivered. But it turned and ran around the corner, out of range.
The pole descended in a tangle of wires to the eaves. The top crosspiece punched through the shingled roof in the lounge, sending down wooden bracing blocks, nails, and shingles that nearly hit Martha.
The fire was the only light in the lounge now. It illuminated Jack Helder’s sodden figure in the doorway, with the microphone still clutched in his hand. Woodard closed the shutters and lowered the window.
“What is going on here?” said Helder.
“Sssh!” Martha hissed at him. They could hear feet thumping outside. Past the chimney. More slowly toward the leading-entrance door.
“I will not be silent in my own lodge—”
Duane Woodard raised his rifle at Helder. That silenced him for a moment. They waited, barely breathing, as a log settled into the fire, flaring in a bright glow that receded immediately.
“I think I hit him,” Duane whispered in the lowest of tones to Martha.
“It might be a her . . .” she began.
“What are you whispering about!” Helder blared.
“Will you please shut up, Mr. Helder, it will hear us,” she said. Her voice was still low, but the tone was deafening.
Helder lurched across the floor, tripping over a shingle. “Oopsy,” he mumbled with a smirk. They formed a tight protective circle, with Helder as the swaying weak link.
Silence.
“I think it’s gone,” said Helder.
“I wouldn’t bet on it.”
“Young man, if you dig that rifle into me once more . . .”
Woodard clapped his hand over Helder’s mouth and shook his head. Helder straightened his tie and sighed with a guttural burp.
They waited some more. The quiet still held. Jack Helder became impatient again. “Is it the one without the toe?” he whispered.
Martha impatiently shrugged.
“ ’Cause if it is, it’s in no shape to do anything.” Helder put a finger to his lips and started tiptoeing toward the door.
“Get back here,” whispered Woodard.
“I just want a little peeky.” Helder grinned. “Especially if it’s going to put me out of business.”
“Helder . . .” Duane Woodard’s voice rose.
“It’s all a crock of . . . shit.” Helder pulled open the leading door. Nothing happened. He grinned at them and stuck his head outside.
In the black square of the door where the firelight did not penetrate, Martha saw an arm, large and bristly as a tree trunk, batter down in a single movement. The sound of Helder’s skull cracking merged with the rifle crack slashing around the confined room.
Helder collapsed to the floor. Hands clasped his ankles and pulled his body out the door. Duane Woodard rained shots around the door frame that sent splinters flying. The Bigfoot howled.
Duane waited, wary of rocks. After a moment he heard a thump, and Jack Helder’s head bounced through the open door like a basketball. Bile formed a nauseating soup in his stomach. On the sofa, Martha screamed as he kicked the head out and slammed the door.
“Shut up, shut up!” Woodard shouted into her face. He shook her shoulders, waggling her head back and forth like a rubber doll’s. “We got to listen for it.”
“You’ve got to get a doctor,” she babbled.
“He’s dead, so stop thinking about it.”
“He’s not dead!” She tried to squirm free, but Woodard slapped her into the sofa, where she curled up, a half-conscious ball of heaving delirium.
Duane Woodard ran into the office and returned with the box of shells. He shoved cartridges into the bolt and slammed them home. “You know what this is, lady? This is psychological warfare, that’s what this is! That’s how they win if they scare you. I read about that.”
The crosspiece vibrated in the hole, sending more debris clattering to the floor. The pole bounced against the eaves. The giant was ascending the pole to the roof.
“Just like a monkey,” said Woodard. “Monkeys are stupid. I read about monkeys.” Before Martha could scream at him, he was across the room and out the door.
The wind made his eyes water. He pulled his feet through snow around the corner and looked up to the chimney. He could make that out but not much else. Snow trickled in a continuous powdery stream from the roof.
It was not on the pole. Already the thing was on the roof. Duane could see firelight where the flames in the lounge filtered through the cracks of the roof.
The cold paralyzed every cell in his body. It covered him like a painful liquid that would not dry off. He raised his rifle toward the roof and found his hands shaking so badly he could not aim.
That was the ball game. He did not fancy wasting ammunition. Regretfully he shambled back to the door and latched it.
“Are there any lanterns in this place?”
“Yes. In the shop.”
“How about getting five or six of them?”
The gallery was dark. She looked at it and climbed to her feet. “I don’t want to go in there alone.”
“I don’t blame you,” said Woodard. “I’ll be right behind.”
They collected lanterns and filled them with kerosene while feet thumped against the roof. Duane Woodard pumped pressure into them and lit them one by one. They gave out a hard white glow that softened farther out from the filament. Duane placed them on tables and the floor so as to fill the lounge with some kind of light.
The chimney stones creaked. Some hit the roof and rolled down to the ground. Snow gushed down the chimney, dousing the fire into steaming odorous coals. After a second, chimney rocks tumbled down on top of them.
14
The Indian’s snowmobile bounced in swishing heaves, like a boat fighting waves. He felt himself to be on a planet that hated him, an insane world rippled with bone-shattering ridges of ground. The storm tried to entomb him into a block of ice as an oyster coats an irritant with the smooth glossy shell of pearl. The physical anchors of the engine’s heat, the pull of the handlebars, and the red glint of Jason’s taillight kept him oriented.
His faith was all but smashed to pieces. It had survived Jason’s assaults in the bungalow this morning, but the girl’s casual remarks had pried it a bit looser. The most savage blow had come from the words of the red-haired man minutes before. His spirit did not kill people! Jason would turn and ambush him at any moment. This was all an accident. His spirit had mistakenly led him into a place where devils dwelled. The cold, the storm, the night ride over this spine-compressing land was all a trap. The vanful of passengers was safe in town.
Yet the strongest assault came from his grandfather’s words. His faith could not sustain a betrayal. He would not believe that his “spirit” was a natliskeliguten—a devil. Everything—his life, his soul, his sanity—depended on what they found at the river.
They crossed the road well back from the bridge and headed down the lip of the gorge. Jason switched on his spotlight and swept it from side to side.
They stopped at the edge of the black river. Jason’s light found a brassiere swept up against a jutting rock. They forged up the shoreline into the gorge, the lights picking out pants, shirts, underwear, sweatshirts with Colby emblems, spilled toilet cases and flight bags mixed with toothpaste and ski poles.
A girl’s body undulated half in the water, half on shore, her arm wedged between rocks. The van lay on its back in the middle of the river, square columns of water gushing through the punched-out windows. Some bodies were still wedged in them; others lay against the rocks in the water as though being scrubbed clean for their final journey.