Kirk Russell: Night Game

“Find anything?” she asked.

“Looking at the tire tracks. I’m going to check one more thing before leaving.”

“What else are you going to do out there?”

“I had an idea last night that no one checked the rafters. There’s a ladder in the barn. It won’t take me long.” Before she could ask, he added, “Because of the hunting shack.”

There was a long wooden ladder, its round rungs worn smooth by years of boots. The ladder had two metal hooks that slipped 334 over the bottom chord of the roof trusses. He slid the ladder along the barn wall, climbed up the sixteen feet, and used his flashlight, scanning the top plate where the roof trusses rested. It wouldn’t take another fifteen minutes to cover the perimeter of the barn, and then they’d be on their way to Nevada. A stronger gust blew rain in through the doors, and the big door swung shut with a loud noise. So far he’d found only cobwebs and bat guano, but now, as he climbed the ladder in the area above the empty cages, he shone the light on what looked like a rag or a towel. He had to climb down again and move the ladder before he was close enough to see it well. The towel was bloodstained.

He climbed down and retrieved latex gloves from his truck. Peeling one corner of the towel, he saw a knife hilt and part of a bloody blade, then let the cloth fall and stood frozen on the ladder. Below were the bear cages, the dark floor of the barn, above the sound of the rain on the roof. In the pocket of his coat his cell rang as he tried to imagine the mind that put this here.

He came down off the ladder and lowered it, leaving the towel and knife up there. He had to throw his shoulder into the barn door to get it open. He called Shauf from the truck after he’d relocked the barn and was on the road.

“They’ve got her,” she said. “I just called you. Or they’ve almost got her. She’s in the Crystal Basin with a string of police cars behind her, doesn’t seem to be trying to get away, doing kind of an OJ thing, driving slowly with the police behind her.”

“Alone?”

“No, there’s a man in the seat next to her.”

Going home, he thought. Going to where she’d always sought refuge . He stayed on the line with Shauf, telling her about the knife as he turned onto the highway and pushed his speed past eighty, heading to the Crystal Basin. By the time he got there Sophie was trapped by police vehicles on a dirt road outside Yellowjacket Camp. Durham had been identified as the passenger and was possibly wounded. He wasn’t moving. Neither had responded to orders to get out of the truck, and a debate was underway about what to do next.

Marquez argued his way toward the front where Kendall was crouched down behind a police door. A marksman had moved into a position where he could shoot either Sophie or Durham, but he had just reported that Durham was either unconscious or dead.

Kendall talked to Marquez with his eyes still on the pickup.

“She’s armed. She showed us a handgun. Durham may be dead. They’re saying it looks like his head is taped to the headrest.”

“She killed him?”

“That’s my guess.”

Sophie sat straight-backed in the pickup. There was another bullhorn attempt to reach her, and her head didn’t move.

“Anybody try walking up?” Marquez asked.

“She held a gun out the window and fired into the woods. She almost got herself shot.”

“I’ve been out at Johengen’s this morning. I was thinking about Nyland’s hunting shack last night, the watch and ring.

There’s a ladder in the barn, and I worked along each wall checking the top of the wall between each truss. I found a bloodstained towel with a knife in it. It’s out there sitting on top of the wall above the bear cages.” Now Kendall took his eyes from the truck and looked at Marquez. “I left it and drove here from the barn.”

“On the wall above the cages?”

“Yeah, and I also found a mark that could be one of the truck skids they rolled the Honda down.” He didn’t add that he thought they loaded the bear cages at the same time. Let Kendall come to that on his own . “How long has she been sitting there?”

“Forty minutes. Her father’s on the way.”

“Whose idea was that?”

“He volunteered and no one had a better one. Someone monitoring the police band got a hold of him.”

He listened as Kendall called for a county unit to block off and guard the entrance to Johengen’s. Ten minutes, a bullhorn warned her, they were going to shoot her tires out and she still had time to get away from the truck. She didn’t move, and a marksman shot her rear tires out. The pickup sagged, then Sophie’s door swung open and she got out holding a rifle that must have been behind the passenger seat. She kept the barrel pointed at the road, though ordered by bullhorn to drop the weapon. Officers scrambled for better cover, but she didn’t move.

“I’ll go out there,” Marquez said, because she stood paralyzed as though guarding the road from intruders. “Troy’s the wrong guy, keep him back.”

“You’re a fucking nut,” Kendall said and picked up a bullhorn. “This is Detective Kendall, Sophie. I understand your situation and want to help you. But you need to put the rifle down.”

Instead, the rifle barrel rose slightly and Sophie stared in his direction. Officers near Marquez sighted on her, fingers on triggers.

“Do not lift the rifle any farther,” Kendall ordered, and clicking the bullhorn off said, “Oh, fuck.”

But it wasn’t Kendall she was looking at. Troy was coming up from behind them. He passed Marquez, muttering, “Goddamn her,” and with his booted pigeon-toed steps strode away from the deputy escorting him and toward her as though nothing could happen. “She’s mine, I’ll take care of it,” was all he said and stopped only when she ordered him to a second time. The steel and anger in her voice carried to where they were, and Marquez heard weapons adjusted again.

Troy raised a hand perhaps to try to convince or reassure her, and maybe she saw the hand that had struck her as a child or maybe she knew the bullhorn promises were lies. Her gun rose abruptly and Marquez stood and yelled across the police line, “Don’t shoot her.” He yelled to Sophie, “Wait,” and stepped out in front of the cruiser onto the road. He raised his hands shoulder high to show Sophie and turned back at the police vehicles and lights, calling, “Don’t shoot her.”

Her eyes were on Marquez, watching his slow advance toward where Troy stood frozen. “Sophie,” Marquez said. “It won’t make anything better. It won’t change anything.”

He thought he heard her say, “It’s already over.” Her eyes returned to Troy, and Marquez heard her say, “I should kill you, you bastard.”

“Put the goddamn gun down,” Troy said.

“Shut up!” Her yell carried down through the police lines, the fierce anger in it unmistakable. Marquez saw it happening but before he could reach her she kicked the shoe off of one foot, dropped the rifle stock on the other foot, and put her mouth over the barrel. With the shoeless toe she found the trigger.

Blood and brain blew across the wet road.

When she crumpled Marquez went to her, but Troy, for reasons only he could explain, spat on the ground near his feet and walked back toward the police cruisers. A piece of skull with hair attached lay in the mud ten feet away, and Marquez gripped the arm of a deputy who simply didn’t see it and almost stepped on it in the hurry to get to the truck. Marquez moved back to Sophie, knelt near her, curiously unsure of himself, stunned by what she’d done. He heard Kendall backing people off and asking him to get away from her body.