"Make her shut up, or I'll do it," Toomer growled at him.
"Leave her alone," McCann said.
"Don't you tell me what to do."
McCann could tell the ex-sheriff meant it.
"Okay," McCann said. "Let's all settle down, please." He tried to catch Sheila's eye in the rearview. When he did she displayedher middle finger at him. Mccann had heard nothing from Layton Barron. That alone told him all he needed to know. If Barron and his partner were playing straight with him, there would have been at least a call that morning. And if Barron had been unable to reach his man on the inside, he should have let McCann know he was working on it and beg him not to carry out his threat.
And when his banker told him no money had been deposited into his account, McCann knew Barron had talked to his partner,and they'd decided not to pay up, but to take another course of action. Either they didn't believe he'd go to the police or they had plans for him. He guessed the latter.
Which meant, McCann decided, that his situation was desperate.And desperate men, well… they hire lawyers to think of ways to use the law to save themselves. Fortunately, he had that part covered. The road got narrower, more rural. Straightaways turned into meandering turns through farmland. The Tetons sparkled in the distance, looking clean, white, and fake.
Toomer said, "It always pisses me off that the snooty bastardsover there in Jackson Hole always refer to our side of the mountains as 'the back side of the Tetons.' Who in the hell gave them the 'front'?"
McCann watched for the turnoff and ignored Toomer. Sheila had seemed to make it her mission to ignore both of them now. Instead, she kept sighing.
"I need a drink," she said, breaking her silence. "Are there any bars ahead?"
"This is Mormon country," Toomer said. "No bars."
"Mormons drink," she said. "Especially if there's just one of them. I've seen 'em go at it at Rocky's. If there's two, they watch each other and neither one will drink. It cracks me up."
"That's what they always say in elk camp," Toomer said, laughing with loud guffaws. "If a Mormon comes and he's alone, hide the whiskey!"
They seemed to be getting along so well, McCann thought, neither noticed he had turned off the main road toward the east. Or that the bridge that crossed Boundary Creek was just ahead. Or that despite the absence of a sign or a gate, they were officiallyin Yellowstone Park.
With his left hand, McCann pushed the button on the door handle that lowered the passenger window by Toomer's head.
"Hey," Toomer said, "why'd you do that? Did you fart or something?" He looked back to see if Sheila, his new pal, would laugh at his joke.
"No," McCann said, pulling the.38 out of his jacket, "so your brains won't splash all over the glass."
Toomer's mouth made an O and McCann fired into the left lens of his sunglasses, and then the right. The sounds were sharp and deafening. The ex-sheriff slumped back, his mouth still open, a string of saliva connecting his upper and lower teeth.
Sheila screamed, "Clay! Clay! Clay! Oh my God!" her hands to her face, her knees clamped together.
McCann said, "I'm really sorry, honey," and shot her three times. One bullet passed through her necklace and sent pearls flying all over the inside of the car. At dusk, ten minutes before he'd close the office for the night, B. Stevens heard the clump of a shoe on the wooden stairs outside the Bechler ranger station and looked up as Clay McCann opened the door and came in. He looked flushed.
The ranger was stunned. "You…" he said.
"It happened again, can you believe it?" McCann said as he wearily dropped a snub-nosed revolver on the counter. "I was giving a couple of locals a ride to Idaho Falls and they pulled this damned gun on me."
Stevens was speechless.
McCann held his arms out, wrists together, making it as easy as possible to put cuffs on them. The lawyer shook his head, said, "They're out there in the car. I guess they didn't realize who they were dealing with."
19
Del ashby and eric layborn drove joe and Demming back to Mammoth after the initial crime-scene procedureswere accomplished at Sunburst Hot Springs. They left at mid-afternoon while more and more rangers arrived until the basin was packed with them. The flood of vehicles to the scene attracted what few visitors were still in the park, who assumed that so much ranger action must mean bears had been spotted. Families in cars and RVs lined the narrow road into the area, causing a snarl of traffic that forced Ashby to break regulations and drive on the side of the road.
Joe listened as Ashby and Layborn complained about the quality of the crime scene, how the pathway had been trampled by Joe and Demming, thus obscuring the footprints of the killer or killers, how the condition of Cutler's body was such that it would be nearly impossible to tell if he fell, was pushed, or was murdered and then thrown in.
Demming defended their actions. "We did nothing wrong," she said.
"Of course not," Layborn said, rolling his eyes. "It's just the small things. You know, like getting into a confrontation with an Iowa mountain man who gets shot up and flown to the hospital at our expense. Or getting forced off the road by the likely killers, not getting a description or a plate number, walking all over the crime scene throwing up, getting your vehicledestroyed, not giving chase or calling it in, letting the third member of your party go on a walkabout, and delaying the initial investigation of the crime scene by three hours becauseyou had to hitch a ride with a road maintenance crew. Other than that, you did real well. Did I forget anything, Del?"
"I think you covered it," Ashby said. "Except maybe the fact that Joe Pickett and his mystery buddy have been flashing their weaponry out in the open every place they go against Park Servicepolicy."
"Oh, that too," Layborn said.
"You two are poised to become media stars," Ashby said, biting off his words. "We've got more calls for comment than all of us can handle. Just exactly what we didn't want-more attentionon the Zone of Death and now a fully cooked Zephyr employee."
"I think you're out of line," Joe said. "Both of you." He wonderedwhich of them, or if both, had sent the black SUV to interceptCutler that morning.
Layborn fixed him with a cop stare, except that one of his eyes peered at something to the side of Joe's face. "We might just have to pull over and settle this."
"Maybe so."
"Let it go, Joe," Demming said. "This is a Park Service thing, you know?"
"That's right," Ashby said. "You have no say here. In fact, I'm thinking of punching your ticket and sending you back home to your governor."
Demming shot Joe a desperation glance, pleading with her eyes for him to keep quiet. For her sake, he did. He thought that while he could go home, she couldn't. As they pulled into the parking lot of the Pagoda at dark, Joe was plotting his moves that evening. Call Chuck Ward, tell him what was going on and what had happened, let him in on his suspicions. Beg for a new vehicle. Apologize for the last one. Call Marybeth. Drink.
"I want your full written statements by tomorrow morning," Ashby said. "I'm meeting with the chief ranger and want to be fully briefed. Plus, I would expect we'll be getting some calls from Washington wanting to know just what in the hell is happeningto our park."
Ashby said to Demming, "When I asked you to come back yesterday, I meant it. But no, you wanted to continue to play cowgirl to John Wayne here. If you would have, maybe Cutler would still be alive."
Demming turned ashen.
Joe said, "That was low." He sort of liked being compared to John Wayne, though. He and demming followed Ashby and Layborn into the Pagoda. Demming looked pale and on the verge of tears she was fighting to hold back. Joe resisted the impulse to put his hand on her shoulder, to reassure her. He thought if he did that it would make her look weak to Ashby and Layborn.
The night dispatcher threw open the door to the lobby, his headset dangling from where he'd jerked it out of his phone. His eyes were wild.