But Steve Ricks had driven his own car through the park entrance, paid his two dollars, and in his innocence identified himself. The error had cost him his life.
Collins looked across the fire at the quart of whisky. There must be a message here, information of some kind. What?
It was ludicrously simple — self-evident, in fact. So obvious that Collins had almost passed it by.
Whoever had instructed Ricks to bury the whisky under the pointed rock must previously have visited Persimmon Lake.
Collins poured out the last of the coffee. Why would anyone conceivably involved have made a previous visit to Persimmon Lake — except to locate the optimum site for ambush?
Collins brooded over the matter while the fire flickered in a breeze. The lake shuddered; the reflection of the afterglow dulled.
The killer had visited Persimmon Lake; he had gone on until he came to Lomax Meadow. Why had he chosen that spot? There was cover in the thick grove of firs and cedar, but along the trail there were dozens of spots where the cover was even denser.
True, at Lomax Meadow the roar of the falls would tend to muffle sounds of flight — but the sound was really not that loud; it was, in fact, hardly more than a murmur. Lomax Meadow seemed far from ideal. The forest here, though dense, was narrow; and it quickly gave way to the mountainside. The murderer would be forced to leave swiftly, unless he counted on caution among the survivors to give him the time he needed... A fair enough assumption, Collins decided.
He replenished the fire, and boiled more coffee. The sleeping bag beckoned, but sitting before the fire and watching the twilight fade over the mountains held him fast. His mind wandered at random across the years. Good times and bad, nothing fixed, nothing permanent until the house at Morningside Heights and Lorna.
Had Steve Ricks mused along the same lines as he sat staring into his fire? Probably not, thought Collins. Steve would have been thinking about the two hundred dollars he was earning. He would have been thinking about the Clover Club, maybe working out new tunes in his mind, maybe thinking about Belva Didrick or Molly Wilkerson. One thing was certain — Steve would not have been cogitating the death that was waiting for him three days in the future. Probably when he went to collect his second hundred dollars. Collins grimaced. Poor guitar player. He would have thrown up at what was about to happen to his hands.
Collins jumped to his feet and threw more fuel on the fire. The thought was uncomfortable up here.
Suddenly Collins thought he saw why Lomax Meadow had been the scene of the crime; and if this was so, then there was only one person... Collins grinned now, a humorless grin that showed his teeth. What of the previous visit to Persimmon Lake and Lomax Meadow? He tested the question against his suspect and found no disjuncture. Motive? Collins’ grin faded. Why had Earl Genneman been killed?
He got up and began to pace back and forth. First thing, visit Lomax Meadow. He might find what he sought. If he did not, then his theory of the case must remain strictly theory. And the murderer might well escape.
Collins walked down to the lake to wash his face. The fire, with no one sitting beside it, was a lonesome sight. A breath of icy air came down from the snow. Collins shivered and walked back to the fire. For another ten minutes he sat there, then undressed and zipped himself into his sleeping bag.
The night passed. Collins awoke several times to stare up at the stars.
The morning was bright and cold; he lay in the sleeping bag until the sun was fairly up in the sky. At last he dragged himself from the sleeping bag, dressed, built a fire, fixed bacon and eggs, fed the horses grain.
At nine o’clock he broke camp and rode north along the trail. About ten o’clock he saw Lomax Falls ahead and came into Lomax Meadow.
He dismounted and tied the horses to a tree.
The area was as he had recalled it: a pleasant little flat bisected by Lomax Creek, with a strip of forest pressing in upon the trail to the north. Except for the hushed roar of the waterfall, the meadow was quiet.
He walked slowly up the trail and came to the clearing where Earl Genneman had lost his life. The stain still showed dark in the dirt, and Collins’ neck prickled as if a shotgun were aimed at it.
He stood for a moment where Genneman had stood, and looked toward the clump of four cedars from which the gun had been discharged. Then he walked to the clump of cedars, and beyond, to where the mountain fell away to the valley floor.
Collins looked down with distaste. It was a long way to the bottom. He tied a handkerchief to the limb of a bushy fir, then began scrambling down the slope, keeping as nearly as possible directly below the handkerchief.
The mountainside was bare and barren, with coarse sand or loose pebbles occasionally layered over the granite. Rarely a stunted tree had secured a roothold. For the most part the mountain was exposed to the glare of the sun. There might be rattlesnakes among the rocks; it would be unpleasant to be bitten so far from the trail.
Down, down, down — always below the white speck of handkerchief. The descent was hard work; the climb back would be worse.
He came to a little clump of pines growing from bare rock. Below him, to Collins’ dismay, the mountainside became cliff, dropping almost sheer to the valley floor three or four hundred yards below. To get to the valley floor meant a long traverse along the steep mountainside. His theory at this moment seemed bootless... It was at that moment, looking at the base of the pines, that he noticed what seemed to be a crooked stick about three feet long.
There was the shotgun.
Collins descended the last few feet. He looked cautiously over the verge of the rocks far below. Then he picked up the shotgun.
It trailed three lengths of cord. One, of light strong fishline, was tied to a pair of clothespins. The second was also of fishline, and was tied to the trigger guard. The third cord looped through a hole in the stock, and this was soft-braided nylon — very strong and elastic. This last cord dangled over the edge of the cliff and was about fifty feet long. The end was frayed, broken off.
Collins examined the shotgun, an inexpensive 12-gauge, double-barrel model which might be bought from any mail-order house for fifty dollars. Both barrels had been fired. Collins was not disposed to sneer at the quality of the weapon. It had done its work, and Earl Genneman was as dead as if he had been killed by a two thousand dollar Purdey.
The inspector wrapped the cords around the gun. Now the long climb back. It would be hot, and hard on his legs. The little white speck of handkerchief seemed a long, long way above.
He flung himself down in the meadow beside Lomax Creek and drank, then rolled back in the tar-weed. His legs were numb, his hands scraped; his face was lobster-red from sunburn. Never in his recollection had he felt so tired. But he was far from unhappy. He had the shotgun. He knew how Earl Genneman had been killed, and it had not been by a homicidal maniac — unless all murderers were, by definition, unbalanced.
Collins groaned and sat up. He must mount his horse and return down trail. He consulted his watch. It was already almost one o’clock. He would be riding until long after dark.