Part 39 (1/2)

The stolen snow coach was parked in the trees at the edge of the firelight. McCann could see a reflection of flame in one of the side windows. The pain in his chest had steeled into a steady throb and he was just now able to speak. He recalled how he'd tried to shout as Olig attacked him earlier and hustled him out the front door of the Old Faithful Inn, but the impact of the bulletshad kicked not only the breath out of him but also his abilityto talk.

Finally, Olig walked over to where McCann was sitting.

”I've been thinking of you for a long time.”

McCann sighed. ”Why weren't you there that day?”

”Rick and I had a disagreement. I decided to pa.s.s on the reunionthis year. I wish I was there.”

McCann smiled malevolently. ”I wish you were there too.”

Olig said, ”I wondered for months what it could possibly feel like to kill someone. It's beyond my understanding how someone like you could be so cruel. Someone supposedly with education, like you.”

McCann thought about it for a moment. ”It isn't as hard as you think. It was a means to an end. Nothing personal, like I said earlier.”

Olig seemed to be studying him, his mouth curling with revulsion.

”That makes it worse,” he said.

”Maybe it does,” McCann conceded.

”Get up.”

McCann felt a trill of pain in his groin, and he squirmed. ”I'm sure we can work something out if you'll let me try.”

”Nope,” Olig said. ”No deals. Especially with a lawyer who killed my friends.”

”But you'll be a murderer,” McCann said. ”You'll be as bad as me.”

Olig smiled. ”I'll never be as bad as you.”

”I'm not moving.”

Olig reached out and grabbed McCann's good ear, asking, ”Do we have to go through this again?”

McCann felt the flames on his face as he was pulled toward the hot springs. He thought about running, thought about fighting,thought about trying to negotiate.

The surface of the water smoked with roils of steam, looked oddly inviting. He thought of Sheila, hoped he'd see her again wherever he was going, hoped she wasn't too angry with him.

He felt a ma.s.sive, two-handed shove on his back and he was flying forward. The water was so hot it seemed cold.

It was quick.

33.

Joe drove lars's pickup back toward mammoth with Ashby in the pa.s.senger seat. It was two-thirty in the morning,the snow had stopped, and the FBI agents had left an hour before with their prisoners en route to Jackson Hole. The snow was deep and soft, but the oversized tires bit well and Joe had no doubt that if he held the vehicle steady and kept it moving forward, he wouldn't get stuck.

As quickly as they'd come, the storm clouds dissipated, leaving a creamy wash of stars and an ice-blue slice of moon that lit the snow blue-white. Joe didn't even need his headlights.

He and Ashby hadn't talked about what happened. Ashby seemed lost in his own thoughts and loyalties, and Joe certainly was. Joe replayed his brief conversation with Ward. Of course course Ward was lying about the governor. If Rulon knew about the microbes and the motive for the murders, why would he have sent Joe to investigate? Ward was lying about the governor. If Rulon knew about the microbes and the motive for the murders, why would he have sent Joe to investigate?

Unless, Joe thought darkly, Ward and Rulon expected him to fail. Unless they figured Joe Pickett, shamed ex-game warden, was too b.u.mbling and incompetent to crack the case, thus givingthem the political cover of claiming it had been investigated but nothing was found. And, eventually, Ward would be rich personally and the State of Wyoming would have yet another source of revenue.

Could Rulon possibly be that manipulative? Yes, Joe thought, he could. But was he? Joe wasn't sure.

The only thing he was sure about, as he drove, was that he'd use the relations.h.i.+p he'd established with the governor to press for Nate Romanowski's release. The governor owed him that, Joe figured.

Joe was so deep into rehas.h.i.+ng his situation and what had happenedthat he didn't notice that Ashby was gesturing frantically, pointing at something through the window, sputtering as he tried to put words together. ”My G.o.d, Joe, look! It's Steamboat!”

Steamboat Geyser, which Cutler had said was by far the biggest and most unpredictable geyser in the world, was shootingup in a ma.s.sive white column of water and steam, the eruptionfar above the tops of the trees to their left. Joe didn't understand at first how big it was until he stopped the truck and realized that the geyser was miles away, that the eruption they could see pulsing white into the night sky was so huge it would drench-and possibly kill-anyone or anything around it.

”All my years up here,” Ashby said, ”and I've never seen Steamboat go off. Hardly anyone has. My G.o.d, just look at it.”

Joe ran his window down. The geyser speared into the sky, blocking out a vertical slice of stars. Its roar rolled across the landscape, a furious, powerful, guttural sound as if the earth itselfwas clearing its throat.

And that wasn't all, as the truck began to vibrate. A pair of Lars's sungla.s.ses on a lanyard started to swing back and forth from where they hung on the rearview mirror. Old cigarette b.u.t.ts danced out of the tray. Joe could feel the springs in the truck seat tremble, and ahead of them in the dark trees, snow came tumbling down from branches as the ground shook.

”Earthquake,” Ashby said, his voice thin.

”Big one,” Joe said, watching the snow crash from the trees to the ground like smoke pouring in the wrong direction.

”Jesus,” Ashby said, reaching out to steady himself on the dashboard. ”This is huge.”

Out on the sequined meadow, a herd of elk emerged from the trees and ran across the virgin snow, hoofbeats thumping, sets of antlers cracking against one another as the bulls scrambledto separate themselves. The herd, more than eighty of them, thundered across the road in front of the truck, leaving a wake of snow, s.n.a.t.c.hes of hair, and a dusky smell.

”Maybe this is it,” Ashby said.

Joe didn't want to think that.

”Something really upset the balance,” the ranger said, pointingtoward a sputtering spray of superheated water that was shooting through the snow in the meadow the elk had just vacated.”It's affecting the whole park. That geyser wasn't there even two minutes ago. Now look at it.”

Joe had an impulse to call Marybeth, wake her up, tell her that he loved her. Tell her good-bye.

But the trembling stopped.

As did Steamboat Geyser. The new little geyser in the meadow spat out a few more gouts of water, then simply smoked, as if exhausted.