A deeper sleep (27 page)

Mutt trotted a couple of steps toward the Roadhouse and looked back, obviously puzzled. There was no point in driving all this way if they weren't going inside, where good things in shrink wrap waited for her.

"Did you think I was going to have to arrest Bernie?" he said.

"I knew you would if you had to."

Her words should have made him feel better. Instead, he felt worse. "Well, I don't have to."

One brow lifted. "I'm glad."

They stood in silence for a moment. "Any leads?" she said.

Glad to take refuge in shop talk, he shook his head. "Not a one. I talked to Howie first thing."

"You think Howie might have killed Deem?"

"Why would he? He's seriously lacking in motive. Louis was Howie's meal ticket. But it's the nearest and dearest—"

"—with the motive with the mostest," she finished.

He almost smiled. "Jack Morgan's First Law."

Neither one of them noticed how unselfconsciously they were able to speak the name of her dead lover out loud. Such would have not been the case a year ago. "What about Abigail?"

"Abigail." Without realizing it, Jim let out a sigh. "I went out there, told them what happened. They said none of them had left the homestead in the past week, and that they hadn't seen Louis since I locked him up."

She mulled it over. "I don't see Abigail killing Deem. But her father?"

"He's got eighteen eyewitnesses that put him ten miles away at the time of the murder."

"Too bad." She looked at the Roadhouse. "Well, at least you know for a fact Bernie didn't do it."

"At least."

"What?" She peered up at him. "Oh. You're worried about who did. Who you're going to have to arrest."

"At this point I don't have a single lead. I've got an imprint of Howie's right front tire at the scene, but hell, he's just like the rest of us, he never takes his keys out of the ignition. Anyone could have taken off with his Suburban and driven it to Fairbanks. To Whitehorse, to goddamn New York City if they wanted." He pulled his cap off and scratched his head. "I could probably beat a confession out of Willard. Willard would tell me where Jimmy Hoffa was buried if I held off long enough on the Fig Newtons."

"Always supposing he knew who the hell Jimmy Hoffa was to begin with." She touched his arm. "You know, Jim, it's not going to break anyone's heart if you don't find out who killed Louis Deem. Not even mine."

This was a serious statement, coming as it did from Kate Shugak, that pillar of rectitude some called the conscience of the Park. And others called the enforcer.

"I know," he said, a little drearily.

"What's wrong?"

He nodded toward the Roadhouse. "You should see them in there, you'd think it was the Fourth of July. Any minute now they're going to be setting off fireworks. No one mourns the passing of Louis Deem."

"You weren't really expecting any
nil nisi bonum,
were you? Come on. I'll buy you a beer."

"Another time," he said, disengaging himself with an almost unobtrusive tug. "I've got some stuff to finish up at the post. I'll see you later."

With a slight frown on her face, she watched him drive off. It wasn't like Jim Chopin to take a case too much to heart, especially when the deceased so richly deserved his demise, and when said demise so richly rewarded his community. The Park would be a safer place without Louis Deem alive and practicing mayhem in it.

Kate looked at the Roadhouse, where Mutt was still waiting at the door. The Fourth of July, huh?

Suddenly she didn't feel much like celebrating, either. "Let's go, girl," she said.

Mutt, ears twitching at the steadily increasing decibel level from the other side of the door, gave this arbitrary decision her consent, and beat Kate to the truck.

"I let you win," Kate told her.

Mutt climbed sedately up on the seat without assistance, curled her tail around her paws, and fixed Kate with a smug yellow eye.

Sure you did.

TWELVE

He didn't go back to the post. Instead, he drove out to the scene. There wasn't much left to see. Deem's body was in Anchorage. A moose had trampled the tire track. He'd already quartered the area looking for a crumpled shotgun shell, a cigarette butt. There was nothing else. This killer had been very neat.

What other questions could be asked that would need answering? Louis Deem had made himself unfit to live, and someone had taken vigilante action. All of the more recent suspects, Howie, Bernie, Abigail, Father Smith, had been questioned. All of them had alibis.

The only evidence Jim had from the scene implicated Howie, but as Howie's own statement showed, anyone could have taken off in Howie's truck, and Jim himself wouldn't have voted to convict on the evidence of the tire track alone, especially when he couldn't show motive.

Frank Rickard had gotten back to him finally. So far as Rickard knew, Louis Deem had died intestate. "Slippery son of a bitch probably thought he could get out of dying, too," the lawyer had said cheerfully. "Have to say I'll miss him. I never cross-examined better than I did when I was defending Louis Deem."

"My heart bleeds for you," Jim had said, and hung up.

So Howie had no expectation of inheriting. He frowned at the gravel road, hands tucked into his jacket pockets. What had he missed? He'd gathered all the evidence there was. He'd talked to anyone who'd had a motive.

Why was Louis Deem on this road?

He looked up, and in the lessening light saw the Quilaks hulking like the bullies they were against the eastern horizon. Halfway between earth and sky, from a flying wedge of rock, lights twinkled at him. Park headquarters.

Louis Deem's body had been found on the sole access road to Park headquarters. Beyond this point there was nothing else. From the blood he had been lying in, Deem had been shot at the scene, so he'd ridden out here with his killer. But what if he'd been on his way to the Step anyway?

Which prompted the question, What business would he have had there?

H
e
was
sitting
in
Dan's
office,
waiting,
when
Dan
got
back
from the Roadhouse an hour later.

"Jim," Dan said, startled. "What are you doing here?"

Jim pointed at the wall. "Looking at your map."

Dan followed Jim's finger while he took off his jacket and hung it up. "Oh. Well." He went back behind his desk and sat down.

"Whenever you need to." His grin looked a little stiff. "We serve at the pleasure of the taxpayer."

"Is it my imagination or are you granting a lot more exploratory leases on Park ground?"

Dan sat back. "I wouldn't say a lot more," he said warily. "Why?" Jim shook his head. "I'm just seeing a lot more brown on that map than I did the last time I looked at it. Kate was mentioning it the other day, so I thought I'd come take a look for myself."

They contemplated the map together in silence. "The thing is, Dan, I keep wondering why Louis Deem was found on the road up to the Step."

Dan fiddled with a pencil. "It's a pretty lonely piece of road, Jim. We fly out of here a lot more than we drive, and not many people live much past the Gette place."

"So you think the killer drove him up here because he could be pretty sure he wouldn't be seen, booted Louis out of the truck, shot him, and drove back down to town?"

Dan shrugged. "I guess."

"You're probably right," Jim said.

Dan shrugged again.

"But I wonder if maybe Louis wasn't headed up here to begin with," Jim said. "Howie and Willard said he didn't go home the morning I turned him loose. He didn't go up to the Smiths'. Nobody else saw him. There just aren't that many roads out of Niniltna, Dan."

Dan said nothing.

Jim leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and looked down at his clasped hands. "I was wondering if maybe you saw something at the scene that you forgot to mention."

"Forgot what?"

Jim looked over at the map. "Kate thinks Louis Deem had something going on with Father Smith, something to do with gold mining on Salmon Creek. I haven't had time to run a title search, but I figured you'd know. Do the Smiths own the subsurface mineral rights to their property?"

There was a long silence. At the end of it, Dan sighed. He reached into a drawer and pulled out a manila envelope. He held it out to Jim.

Jim took it. A corner of the envelope had a dried brown stain on one corner. He removed the document and unfolded it. It was in fact the title to a piece of property whose legal description as near as he could figure it matched the location of the Smiths' forty acres, and they did in fact retain subsurface mineral rights, grandfathered back to the first owners of the property, circa 1896.

The most interesting thing on the document was the fact that it listed co-owners. Aloysius Conrad Smith and Louis James Deem. He looked up at Dan. "You figure Louis was bringing this up here to apply for permission to dig for gold?"

Dan nodded miserably.

"You take this off the body?"

"Yes."

"Ah hell, Dan."

"I'm sorry, Jim," and indeed, Dan looked wretched. "It was sticking out of his jacket pocket, ready to fall out. I was half in the bag already, and I wasn't thinking. I picked it up, and when I did, I knew what it was right away."

"What," Jim said, disgusted, "you were afraid I'd think you'd shot him for it?"

"No!" Dan said, stung. He got up and went to stand in front of the window. Over his shoulder he said, "You don't know what it's like nowadays, Jim. The Park Service is barely holding its own against an administration that wants public lands wide open for resource extraction. It's a battle every goddamn day." He turned. "I don't want them digging for gold on Salmon Creek, Jim. I figured if I took the title, it'd take the Smiths a while to get a new one." He tried to smile. "You know the federal government. You can't get shit if you don't have all the proper forms properly filled out. I figured if I lost their title, it might slow them down a little bit. Give me some more time to figure out how to stop them."

"So Kate was right."

Dan nodded again. "I think it's always been about the gold. I think it's why Smith bought the land in the first place, and I think Louis Deem bankrolled the purchase. I think it's why Louis Deem proposed to Abigail, and I think it's why Smith let him. I think they were both a couple of get-rich-quick schemers out for the easy money. Well. Smith probably still is."

"Anyone who's ever mined for gold knows that gold mining is anything but easy," Jim said dryly.

"Would have been for Louis," Dan said. "Seventeen kids to do all the work for him, and Papa Smith to run the show. All Louis had to do was get married, and he was good at that."

They sat in silence for a moment. "Now what?" Dan said.

Jim refolded the title and put it back in the envelope. "I'll take this with me." He stood up. "Anything else you forgot to tell me?"

"No. Jim, I—"

Jim headed for the door. "You shouldn't have lied to me, Dan."

"I know, Jim, and I—"