“All of this ground in front of us is part of the park?”
“Aye,” Lang said. “Or it was. There’s another fence over to the north with a hole in it as big as this. And all the rest of the bloody deer and bison that were in this enclosure have fucked off and away through it. It’s going to take days to round all the buggers up — if it’s even possible.”
“Did any of your predators escape?”
“Thankfully, no. The last thing the people of Kingussie need is to pop out for a fag and meet a Siberian tiger on their driveway or a pack of wolves at the chippie.”
“Just another Saturday night in town,” Wiggins said, then went quiet when Banks gave him a look to remind him they were on the clock.
“This other hole? How far is it?”
“Almost a mile away across the moor,” Lang said. “There’s nothing to see you haven’t seen here. But if you need to see it, you can get your van along the track, just turn left up the hill outside the car park. It’s usually open for the public to drive ‘round. We’re lucky this happened late in the season; we’re going to be shut for weeks dealing with this shite.”
“Okay, lads,” Banks said. “Back to the van. Let’s see what there is to see over there.”
Lang didn’t want to go with them; Banks saw it in his eyes. He guessed that it would be because there were more dead beasts to be found in the open area, and that guess was proved right five minutes later as Wiggins drove the four of them along the rutted track that circumnavigated the open area of the park.
The hole in the fence to the north was immediately obvious, as were the corpses of more slaughtered beasts scattered around the new opening. They were unidentifiable until Banks got out of the SUV and stepped up close. What had once been deer were identifiable only by antlers or ears and the distinctive red hair. Similarly, a huge hairy head and wide horns told him there had been a bison killed here. But the meat had been stripped, almost surgically, from the bones and there was little left but bloody skeletons and heads.
“Fuck me, Cap,” Hynd said. “Something was hungry. What are we into this time?”
“I don’t know, Sarge,” Banks replied. “But whatever it was, it went this way. Let’s take a wee shufti through the fence and see if there’s anything else to see.”
The colonel had told them not to go out in public tooled up, and Banks had obeyed him that far. But heading across rough ground wasn’t public, and he’d feel a lot safer with a gun in his hand, especially if there was still a hungry beastie in the area.
“Cally, get the boot open and let’s get at the pistols. If we’re going hunting, we need something to shoot with.”
Corporal McCally handed them each a service pistol and two magazines each; regs said that any higher-caliber weaponry needed top-level authorization, and thus far, they didn’t have that on this jaunt. The pistol felt too light in Banks’ hand, not enough if they had to try to take down something capable of so easily bending iron and taking down a polar bear.
It was obvious that the men felt the same way.
“Maybe we should go back to the watchman and get a lend of yon shotgun?” Wiggins said.
“Nope. We’ve spent enough time fannying about already,” Banks replied. “We’re going to have a quick shufti through the gap in the fence, and if we find nowt, then it’s back to the squad room for a pie and a pint.”
“I vote we find nowt,” Wiggins said, then went quiet as Banks led them off the road and across the wet ground to the torn and tumbled remnants of the fence.
“Can we have a fag, Cap?” Wiggins asked as they walked up to the mangled fencing. “I’m gasping here.”
Technically, they were on the clock, but Banks nodded, and took one when the private shared his pack around. He’d started the habit up again on the Amazon trip, and despite several tries hadn’t managed to shake it off in the intervening months. Now it had him gripped again, as strong as it had ever been, and he gave in to it with barely a regret, lighting up with a Zippo he’d kept in a drawer at his desk. The click-rasp-clack as it opened, fired, and closed was another part of the almost comforting ritual. He sucked a long draw, enjoying the hit on an empty stomach, and only then turned his attention to the damaged perimeter fence.
It was as equally torn asunder as the one up at the main park had been, with bent stanchions and flattened mesh. This time, there was something else besides the streaks of gore on the trampled ground. There were definite tracks, several of them, but Banks was at a loss to explain them. His sergeant crouched down beside him for a look.
“What in Hell’s name have we got here, Cap? Could another big bear have escaped that they’re not telling us about?” Hynd asked.
The tracks certainly looked something like bear, but they were huge, each the size of two large hands outstretched while touching thumb to thumb, and almost circular, a large pad with four distinct toe-marks at the front, with a hint of a fifth. Each toe mark was topped with a sharply delineated line where long claws had dug into the muck.
“Have you ever seen a bear that big?” Banks asked.
“Well,” Wiggins replied at his back, “there was that time when the sarge’s wife had on a bikini.”
Hynd gave Wiggins a two-fingered salute and turned back to Banks.
“Seriously, Cap, what are we looking at here?”
“All we can say for sure right now is that it looks to be a large, a very large, mammal of some sort. It’s got four legs if I’m reading the tracks right, and it’s a predator,” Banks replied.
“Thank fuck for that,” Wiggins said with a grin. “I was worried we were going after a giant fucking kangaroo. They’re bloody lethal.”
One look from Banks was enough to silence the private. Banks led the squad forward, stepping over the wrecked fencing and looking over the rough moorland beyond.
They stood at a high spot, looking over a mile-wide basin dotted with black peaty pools. Clouds of midges swarmed lazily, but nothing else moved. The tracks they’d seen led down into the basin then were lost again in churned mud at a low wet point. Banks gauged his position from the sun.
“It’s heading almost directly northwest. There’s nowt over there but rough ground until the hills and the Ness.”
“And even after you get through yon bog, there are plenty of copses and areas of thin woodland where a beastie could be hiding,” Hynd replied. “We’re not equipped for a yomp or a hunt, Cap.”
“Don’t fash yourself bout that, Sarge,” Banks replied. “Our orders were just to do a reccy and not upset the locals. Job done on both fronts. We go back, tell the colonel we don’t have a Scooby, and then get that pie and pint I mentioned.”
Banks knew in his heart it wasn’t going to be that easy — in this job it never was — but there was nothing to be gained by tramping over a wet bog in the wrong gear chasing after what might be a dangerous animal.
“Back to the van, lads,” he said. “We’ll check in with the park manager and see if anything’s changed, then head back up the road for our dinner.”
- 2 -
The park manager had nothing new to report, and didn’t even seem to notice them leave. He stood, cigarette burning unnoticed in his fingers, at the door of the deserted visitor’s center, staring blankly out over the car park that lay empty apart from the squad’s van and four other cars. Banks guessed they belonged to the few staff that remained in the facility. Banks couldn’t tell from the distance, but he got the impression that Lang might be crying again.
“Maybe we should stay and see what we can do to help, Cap?” McCally said as Wiggins drove them out of the car park and took the turn downhill to the main road.