Skip O'Rourke was an editor straight from the dinosaur school. In these times of Video Display Terminals (VDTs to those in the know), cold process web-offset, and computer pasteups, O'Rourke still longed for the old days of yellow copy and hot metal type. To the Skipper the word "scoop" meant more than an ice-cream cone. Thank God, at least the page proofs still came down like before.
Page proofs were the first take before a print was run — and each day O'Rourke read them almost religiously. You never knew what embarrassments a typographical error could throw up.
Completed, the Skipper sat back and put his Hush Puppies up on his desk. He lit a wooden match with his thumbnail and passed it back and forth across the end of the cigar. Then he thought about the bodies and how to handle the story. He was looking for a connection.
In this city, both The Vancouver Sun and The Province were owned by Pacific Press. This was just a minor monopoly in a world of shrinking presses — and nothing to worry about. Besides, who cares if bad news comes from one or many sources? Bad news is bad news, right, no matter how you print it.
That morning both papers had used an identical headline. In 96-point type they had asked their readers: IS SOMEONE HUNTING HEADS? Skip O'Rourke had decided that the final edition of the Sun should be different. It would ask commuters: HEADHUNTER ON THE LOOSE?
Once you're dead you're dead, O'Rourke thought philosophically. What's the difference to the victims, may they rest in peace? But a homicidal psychopath — ah, that would sell some papers.
The Skipper was an editor, true, blue and — well, tattooed.
His job was selling newsprint. And that was what he'd do.
Satisfied, O'Rourke sat up and reached for the envelope that Edna had found in the mail. He ripped it open with a letter knife and dumped the contents onto his desk. All that fell out were two photographs and a magazine clipping. The pictures landed face down.
O'Rourke picked up the clipping and shook his head in wonder. It was a printed subscription form for a sophisticated men's publication called Buns and Boobs Bonanza. At the top of the form was depicted a. woman naked to the waist. She had the biggest pair of breasts he had ever seen. The caption under the picture read simply: Looking for These?
O'Rourke shook his head once more and picked up the photographs. He turned them over. Then the cigar dropped abruptly from his lips and the Skipper yelled out those magic words at every editor's heart: "Jesus Christ, somebody stop the bloody presses!"
For each picture was of a woman's head, severed at the neck and stuck on an upright wooden pole.
The Seed
Medicine Lake, Alberta, 1897
When Iron-child emerged from the shock of his wounds he found himself staring down the barrel of a gun.
"Aye, lad," Blake said softly in English, "I can see that you're alive. Are you in pain now… lad?"
Blake was standing between the Cree and the blazing ball of the sun. Around his neck he wore a high black scarf. With his left hand he was rubbing his temple as if it caused him agony. Yet strangely he was smiling. His head was large and his forehead, square-cut and massive, was almost hidden by bushy white eyebrows. His skin was ruddy and weathered from years of exposure to the elements, but his eyes were pale and gray and steady above a snow-white moustache. From a thong around his neck his gloves hung at his sides, while numb and naked in the cold his right hand held the pistol.
"One dinnae fight because there is hope of winning. It is much finer to fight when it is nae use. That's Cyrano de Bergerac, lad. Would thet be your philosophy?"
Iron-child did not understand a word that the white man was saying, but he sensed that it would not be safe for him to make a sound. So the Cree said nothing. Blake pulled the black scarf down from his chin, then he squatted on his heels. The muzzle of the Enfield was four feet from Iron-child's head.
"Aye, you dinnae understand English? Or is it the clout to your head that the bullet gave you? It dinnae matter to me. laddie, for we're going to have a wee talk anyway while we got the time."
Just then one of the Eskimo sled dogs came trotting over to sniff at the blood that had spread over Iron-child's face. The Cree did not move, for numbness was seeping through his body. The mountain air was beginning to warm as the sun reflected off the dazzling snow. Blake shook his head and once more rubbed his temple. Then he removed the scarf and loosened the throat of his buffalo coat. In the V at Blake's neck Iron-child could now see the scarlet uniform and one shiny button.
"Ye see, lad, I've been trackin' you for a long time now, and I want you to know the trouble that you and your red brother Almighty Voice have caused. And it's a wee bit of trouble indeed.
"Now I can see how the Crees on Chief One Arrow's Reserve dinnae like being boxed into sixteen square miles when they once had a thousand miles of prairie to roam. And I can see how they dinnae like starving because there are nae buffalo. But laddie, that's part of the price you Crees must pay for backing Riel in his Rebellion against the Government. You cannae stop th' settlers from coming.
"This Almighty Voice, he was a piss poor leader for you to follow in your recent escapade. What did you three young Cree think, that he'd bring back the old days and drive the white man from your land? Well, lad, it's our land now: that's a lesson for your learning."
Iron-child's body was now racked by shivering and his broken leg-bones had begun to rattle one against the other. He hoped that shock would take him soon and set his spirit free, that he could die with dignity and cross the Bridge of the World. For the pain and the cold and the loss of blood were beginning to make him weak. As he listened to the words that meant nothing as they rolled off the white man's tongue, he found himself being mesmerized by the sound of the Scotsman's rumbling r.
"Now laddie, I'm nae saying that Sergeant Colebrook was the best of officers. True, he had a checkered record and had been up for breaches o' discipline. But when he caught up with Almighty Voice that morning just as he was breakin' camp, he dinnae draw his pistol. This is nae Tombstone nor Dodge City, lad, and the Mounted Police are nae Yankee barbarians. So you tell me, why did Almighty Voice have to shoot Sergeant Colebrook through the neck with a double barreled shotgun?"
Blake let the question hang in the air for a moment.
"That put pressure on us, aye. But the real pressure, Cree, that came from within. It came from the Force itself. Cause, laddie, no one — Indian or white — gets away with the murder of one of our own."
Suddenly Blake stopped talking and his eyes lost their focus. Almost hypnotically he was staring at a scatter of blood drops spattered across the snow. Drip… drip… drip. He began to hear sounds in his head. His left hand went to his temple. Then when he resumed talking his voice seemed far away.
"Do ye think I'm ramblin', lad? Well I'll tell ye something. I once picked up a spot of malaria in the tropics, the Ashanti War it was. And it still bothers me every now and then, though it's been twenty-five years."
Without warning, Blake lashed out with his left hand and yanked the buffalo horn cap from Iron-child's head. In doing so he smeared blood across the heel of his palm. As he brought his arm slowly back he stared at the liquid red. Then with his tongue he began to lick the blood from his hand.