Michael Slade - Headhunter

Suddenly Blake lashed out with the Enfield, striking the Cree in the mouth. With a sickening crack Iron-child's front teeth exploded in a spray of shattered enamel. His screams of shock and pain ran up and down the Rocky Mountains. Then Blake grabbed him by his braided hair and yanked his head up off the ground.

Iron-child choked on the fragments of teeth as the Mountie spat out his words.

"Herchmer says I'm excessive, lad, but you'll nae find a bad mark on my record. Cause, Cree, the Mounted Police need me much more than I need them. When there's a job of tracking, you know who they call on? And if they hadnae sent me away last year after that mess in Manitoba, they'd have had Almighty Voice just like they'll have you.

"A legend is born, lad, when a man beats the probabilities of life. And I'm the one that gets the ones that ought to get away. Believe me, Cree. The legacy of this Force will be the legacy of me!"

Blake let go of the Indian's hair and threw him back on the ground. Then Iron-child heard the hammer snap as the policeman cocked the Enfield. He watched as Blake once more stood up and began to rub his temple. He saw the pistol rise. He saw the bore of the muzzle. He saw the sunlight glint off the metal of the barrel.

"Dead or alive," Blake said, "it's all the same to them. But believe me laddie, it's nae the same to me."

Then Wilfred Blake pulled the trigger and shot Iron-child between the eyes.

The blast from the shot rang up one side of the valley and down the other.

Blake listened. Then he drew the Enfield muzzle close and sniffed gunsmoke into his lungs.

Thump… thump… thump… drip: sounds ran through his head.

After several minutes, Blake turned from the body of Iron-child and trudged through the snow across to the unhitched dogsled. He unpacked its contents, rearranged what he did not need, then he built a fire, filled the kettle with snow and put it on to boil.

While the sled dogs fed on dry moose meat, Blake ate biscuits and pemmican. Eventually he brewed some tea, hot and strong, and filled his pipe with tobacco. He sat in the snow drawing deep puffs of smoke into his lungs while he waited for the throbbing to cease.

Thump… thump… thump… thump…

It wouldn't go away.

What bothered him most of all was that each time the nightmare came, its aftermath took longer. And the dream was occurring more often. Always when he was alone. And always on the hunt.

That worried him.

This time it might have cost him his life, for the nightmare's echo had distracted him right when he required his wits. For almost a quarter century, Blake had lived with the occasional bout of malaria — but this was different. This was far more severe. First the nightmare, always the same. Then on and on, the throbbing. Then the echo daydream.

If only that damn echo would come, then the throbbing would cease.

Thump… thump… thump… thump…

He'd have to wait it out.

But the pressure in his head was worse, and getting worse each minute. A crushing weight was sending streaks of red pain whirling around his skull. With every beat of his heart, darts of agony like nails were rammed into his temples. Please, he thought, suffering, please let the echo come!

Drip… drip… thump… drip…

Blake buried his face in his hands… thump … He slammed the heel of his palm against one of his temples… drip… Then he bunched his fists, threw back his head, and let out a gut-tearing scream.

Thump… thump… thump… drip…

Suddenly Blake leapt to his feet. He had an uncontrollable urge to move. He kicked the fire savagely, sending sparks and flaming brush exploding across the snow. He trod to the unhitched sled and whistled for the dogs. Running from all directions, they came bounding through the drifts. As he attached the train to the sled, the huskies jumped on one another in play, tangling the traces and back-bands and collar-straps into knots and interlacings. Spanker and Cerf-vola began fighting over the lead.

Blake left them to their frolic, once the train was secure. He busied himself with breaking camp and packing up the sled. Finally, he trudged over to where Iron-child lay sprawled in the snow.

The Enfield had blown out an exit wound the size of a navel orange. Blood spread out like a halo from behind the Cree's head.

Blake grabbed hold of the two hair braids and dragged the corpse to the sled. He tied it securely diagonally with a crosshatch of leather lashings. Then climbing onto the rear runner skates he flicked a whip at the dogs.

With his head bent low, Cerf-vola tugged at the load.

The other dogs followed and the sled began to move.

For hours the huskies panted as they hauled the heavy load, biting frequent mouthfuls of the soft snow through which they toiled. At noon, clouds settled over the mountains; then the upper layer broke to reveal the outer spurs of the Rockies that now flanked Blake on both sides. Blake pulled in on the dog train and brought the sled to a halt.

This was it. They'd reached it, the Indian's "Bridge of the World." That hinge where the Rocky Mountains front on a thousand miles of plain.

Blake climbed off the sled.

Then while moving forward to take the lead for the stretch where a false step could mean a fall to the gorge beneath, the Inspector glanced at Iron-child. He saw the open skull, the shattered brain, the tissue hanging in bloody strands out of the cranium. Blood was dripping into the snow. A trail of crimson drops marked the route that the sled had taken. Drops dripping, dripping, dripping drips, drip… drip… drip…

Blake slammed his fists into his eyes as the nightmare came flooding back.

Drip… thump… thump… thump… thump…

It is not the throbbing that bothers him. Nor is it the dark. It is the bullet marks and knife hacks that slash and scar the walls.

For he knows this is a Hudson's Bay Company fort along the Saskatchewan River.

He knows it is a winter month in 1870.

And he knows this is the room in the fort where they conduct the Indian Trade.

For close to him are sacks of feed and crates of ammunition. All around the log walls — at least in that half of the room lit by the light of a single candle — are piles of fur stacked up to the ceiling. Buffalo and mink. Bear and otter. Beaver, blackfox, and marten. Off to one side, to trade for these pelts, are blankets, beads and colored cloths, handkerchiefs and ribbons. From the ceiling hangs the carcass of a deer, strung up to age, its head thrown back and its antlers pointing like fingers of crooked bone.

Wilfred Blake is sitting at a table near the door, his elbows on the tabletop, his chin cupped in his hands. He is watching the wick of the candle drown in a pool of its own melted wax. This candle casts the only light within the Indian Room.

Wilfred Blake is afraid of the part of the room he cannot see.

Outside, the pounding is closer now, as it begins to mix with another sound within this room.

Thump… drip… thump… drip… thump…

Suddenly there is a shriek of pain from just beyond the door.

Blake springs to his feet. He draws the bolt. He throws the barrier open.

Then he gasps and turns away — for what he has seen is far worse than he has imagined.

The fort is a five-sided structure with flanking bastions and a stockade twenty feet high. It stands high on a level bank one hundred feet above the Saskatchewan River. The gate is open. Through the gate. Blake can see the wigwam poles outside, can see a solitary horse far down in the river meadow. On both sides of the water, discolored by smoke and mud, stand rude and white crosses to mark the place of the dead.