The Glacier Gallows (15 page)

“Who else is going?”

“I'm talking with Rick Turcotte, Jessica Winters from Cool-it!, and Dr. Peter Talbot from the
USGS
.”

“And from the press?”

“If you agree, it will be just you on the hike. You get the exclusive. We'll do pre- and post-hike media in Ottawa, New York, Washington, and elsewhere.”

“When?”

“July.”

“JOE, IT'S BRIAN.”

“Oki, Brian.”

“Oki. How are things on the Blackfeet Nation this fine day?”

“Things are about the same as usual. We had another hearing last night about the fracking issue. Somebody is greasing their palms.”

“I know it, Joe. Listen, remember we talked about a hike? I wonder if you'd like to act in the official capacity of cultural heritage tour leader. I'm lining up some folks to come to your neck of the woods to see what's going on. Get some publicity for the cause.”

“When do we leave?”

“YOU DID WHAT?”
Cole Blackwater sounded like his usual skeptical self.

“I've invited some folks to go for a hike this summer. Waterton-Glacier. See what climate change is doing on the ground and talk about solutions.”

“Who?”

“Jessica Winters, Peter Talbot, Tara Sinclair, Joe Firstlight. I've got folks from the governor of Montana's shop. Maybe even Rick Turcotte.”

“Did the steering committee approve this? I don't remember hearing about this.”

“I was hoping you'd help me sell it to them.”

“What makes you think I'd do that?”

“Well, first off, I was hoping you'd lead this thing.”

“Keep talking.”

BRIAN MARRIOTT SAT
in his office. He opened his Internet browser and clicked on the bookmarked page of the fishing magazine in which there was a photo of the Minister of Natural Resources with the former
US
senator and China's ambassador to Canada.

Then he opened the email containing the death threat.

He sized both windows so that they appeared on the screen next to each other. Then he opened a third window, navigated to the home page of Green Earth, and found Charles Wendell's biography. He looked at the smiling photo of the young, idealistic man. He sized that window so that it too appeared on the same screen as the photo of the minister and his friends and the death-threat email.

He printed out the death threat, the bio page from Green Earth, and the photo from the online magazine and put them in an envelope addressed to himself. He slipped the envelope into his coat pocket. He had a place at home he could put it for safekeeping. Brian deleted the email from his computer and from his backup server.

EAST GLACIER, MONTANA. AUGUST 2.

“WHAT?” COLE WAS ON THE
phone with Perry Gilbert.

“Charlie Crowfoot is dead. He was transferred to the federal detention center in Great Falls, Montana, and he committed suicide.”

“How?”

“I don't know. They wouldn't tell me. We're going to meet with the
FBI
right now. Maybe they will have some answers.”

“What does this mean for us?”

“I don't know, Cole.”

“I mean, I don't want to speak ill of the dead, but this guy Crowfoot was the principal witness against me. Doesn't this mean—”

“I don't know. It could. The
FBI
likely has him videotaped picking you out of a photo lineup. That might be all they need. It's too early to tell.”

“Perry, you need to find out how he died.”

“I know, Cole.”

“Are you going to Great Falls?”

“We'll see. I'm not sure if that will help. I doubt very much they will let Walter or I anywhere near the body. I'll call the district attorney and find out.”

“This is a mess. We've now got three bodies.”

“Cole, only one of those was a murder.”

“I'm not so sure.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Well, it seems as if anybody who is involved with this fiasco ends up dead: first the guide, Blake Foreman, and now Charlie Crowfoot.”

Cole explained his speculation about being framed.

“It's a plausible theory, Cole. But right now we have to focus on the extradition. How are you and Nancy coming along? Have you made any headway on your list?”

“Yes and no. Perry, there weren't many people who saw me on the day the
FBI
says I bought the gun. I was out driving around the Rocky Mountain Front. I stopped for gas. I have that receipt. I was back in East Glacier that night. There's enough time between those events that if the feds want to suggest I picked up the handgun, I could have.

“We're also looking at this from another angle. Who on the hike might have had a reason to kill Brian? We've gone over a list of everybody else on the hike. Any one of these people
could
have killed Brian. It was only a matter of luring him out of the tent. But that's where the theory breaks down. Very few of these people
wanted
Brian dead. The climate scientist, the reporter, and the Montana bureaucrat had no reason that we can find. None. Joe Firstlight was a friend and would have been the last person to want Brian dead. That leaves Rick Turcotte. I think that Brian's supposed defection to the do-gooders riled Rick, as it did many people connected with industry, but I doubt it was enough to make a rising political star want to kill someone.”

“Unless Brian had something on Rick that could keep that star from rising,” said Perry.

“Right, that's what we need to find out. Brian and I talked a lot. What I'm starting to realize is that he was into a lot of things that we
didn't
talk about. I still have my suspicions about Brian.”

“What do you mean?”

“Did he really change sides? You hear about this sort of thing. A condo developer becomes a hard-core environmentalist and donates his money to charity and starts a successful green business; a politician changes his stripes overnight after he reads
The Weather Makers
. But really, how often does this happen?”

“You think Brian was playing for both teams?”

“I don't know. I'm not sure he had decided which team he was on. Nancy and I are onto something that might provide some answers.”

“Is it legal?”

“We hadn't thought of that.”

“I don't want to know about it.”

“Good, because I wasn't going to tell you anyway.”

“Just don't end up in jail before I can keep you out of jail, Cole.”

“It's nothing like that. Just some snooping. We haven't looked at the guides as suspects, and I think we need to. Derek McGrath operates East Glacier Guiding. Blake Foreman is dead. I don't think the
FBI
and the
RCMP
are taking the possibility that he was involved with Brian's death seriously. This guy turns up in East Glacier just as Derek is looking for help? Does that sound like a coincidence?”

“No, not really—”

“It doesn't to me either. I want to know where the original guide is. Was he really sick, or is he also missing?”

Perry was quiet a moment. “We'll find out more about what happened to Charlie Crowfoot first. Then we'll track down Derek McGrath and find out what happened with his guides. Okay?”

Cole made a sound at his end of the line.

“Hang in there and be careful.” Perry hung up. He turned to Walter Blackwater and smiled. “Your brother is a piece of work, man.”

“You should try being related to him. Where are we at?” Perry filled Walter in as the two men ordered. “I don't think we're in a position to visit with Charlie Crowfoot's mother today. I'll call Joe and let him know. Let's go over to the
FBI
instead and find out what the hell went wrong with Crowfoot. Then I say we take a drive over to East Glacier and have a chat with Derek McGrath, see if we can't get some answers about where Blake Foreman really came from.”

FBI SPECIAL AGENT
Steven McCallum lacked the contrition that Walter and Perry expected from a law-enforcement officer whose prisoner had died in custody. “He was in the hands of federal marshals,” he said by way of explanation.

“The marshals were holding him for
you
,” said Perry.

“Be that as it may, it's their problem, not ours.”

“You just lost your key witness against my client,” said Perry.

“We didn't lose anything,” said McCallum. “We have a signed confession. We have Mr. Crowfoot's signature on a photo lineup that indicates he sold the weapon that killed Brian Marriott to your client. That will suffice for the extradition hearing.”

“We'll see.”

“You're going to challenge this evidence?”

“You'll have to come to Canada to find out. I'd like to see the post-mortem on Mr. Crowfoot when it's done.”

“I don't think that will be part of the discovery in this case, Mr. Gilbert.”

“I think knowing how your key witness died will be very important to this case. I'll take it to a judge if I have to.”

“You think he killed himself to avoid testifying?” asked McCallum.

“I don't know why he killed himself, but I'd like to know how, and if there is any further evidence that relates to this case, I expect to see it. Now, gentlemen, let's turn our attention to the case of Blake Foreman. Please tell me what you know about
his
death.”

“Blunt force trauma caused by a fall from a ledge. He hit his head on a basketball-sized boulder and was killed instantly.” Special Agent McCallum presented the information in a matter-of-fact tone.

“Who found his body?”

“One of the
S&R
teams from Glacier Park.”

“Was the area treated as a crime scene?”

“Yes.”

“Forensic evidence?”

“There was none to speak of. The forensic team that was on site for the investigation into Mr. Marriott's murder went to the scene and conducted a thorough investigation. Nothing of consequence was found.”

“I'd like to see the report.”

McCallum agreed.

“You say he fell?”

“That's right, about twenty feet.”

“He was a guide.”

“I'm sure even mountain goats fall sometimes.”

“At first we all believed that Mr. Marriott fell too.”

“Well, as Mr. Blackwater here discovered, that wasn't the case,” McCallum said.

“Don't you think it a little odd that two days before this hike in the mountains, one of the regular guides calls in sick and this Foreman guy just shows up in a café in the middle of nowhere? Then, on the morning that a man is killed, he takes it upon himself to look for ‘evidence' and falls and hits his head on a rock?”

“No, I don't find it odd. I've consulted with Allan Doyle, the chief park ranger at Glacier, and he tells me that during
S&R
operations there is a very high degree of risk for the search team. We have concluded that this was a case of a young man, albeit with a lot of experience, who made a mistake that ended up killing him. It's unfortunate timing, that's all.”

“So you've got one murder, one accidental death, and one suicide, and you don't think that something suspicious is going on?”

Agent McCallum was silent for almost a minute, then said, “You might choose to view all of these events as related, Mr. Gilbert, but from our standpoint, having investigated each separate incident, they are all connected, but only one death is homicide.”

“How did Mr. Crowfoot die?” asked Walter.

“Mr. Blackwater,” said McCallum, “I was surprised to hear that you had quit your post with the Park Service. And now to find you here, with your brother's lawyer—”

“How did Mr. Crowfoot die?”

“He hung himself,” McCallum said.

“I thought you took precautions to protect against that.”

“He smuggled in a length of cord when he was transferred. It was threaded inside the waistband of his pants.”

Walter looked at Perry. Did he bring it with him, or was he given it?

OTTAWA, ONTARIO. JUNE 8.

“WE'RE ALL SET.” BRIAN MARRIOTT
walked down Wellington Street, the Parliament Buildings behind him. “I talked with the guiding company this morning, and they're good to go. We've got travel arranged for all of our invitees. I'm just waiting to hear back from Rick Turcotte as the final dignitary.”

“Not sure how dignified Rick Turcotte is,” said Cole on the other end of the phone.

“He'll do. We might change some minds.”

“We might end up beating each other to death with chunks of limestone,” quipped Cole.

“It's worth a shot.”

“What's this I read the other day about your taking on the Nuclear Power Commission now?”

Brian exhaled and glanced at the War Memorial. “The commission appeared before the Natural Resources Committee last Wednesday to argue that nuclear power should be reclassified as alternative energy. I think they have positioned themselves for a play to get into the tar sands.”

“It's bad enough that the tar sands have already given Canada a colossal black eye on the international stage. Now we have to worry about nukes powering the whole thing?”

“Well, in some ways I can see why the government would be all for it. Take natural gas out of the equation, and suddenly you reduce a lot of the greenhouse gas emissions associated with the tar sands.”

“Not much.”

“Some. Use nuclear to refine the bitumen and it's a cleaner product.”

“Except that you have to use nuclear to refine the bitumen,” Cole said sarcastically.

“That's right. Suddenly you've got a nuclear power plant in the middle of the boreal forest, with no safe way to dispose of the waste.”