Then, turning on to a secondary trail, I found myself face to face with Claymore.
“A splendid hall, this,” he said.
I nodded. Somehow, seeing Claymore, my thoughts left the artificial wilderness and returned to reality . . . to the crimes we had discussed before. I mentioned I’d just come from the hospital where Bill was and Claymore appeared interested.
“Ah yes. The blind gentleman. How is he?”
“Recovering.”
“Ah. The newspapers stated his condition as critical. But then, one learns never to have faith in journalism.”
“He’s a tough one,” I said.
“Tough? Yes. Yes, I should imagine so. Obviously he had the will to survive. Admirable and natural. He will undoubtedly live until his time to die.”
“Unlike the others.”
“Others?”
“The other victims.”
“Oh. Oh, no doubt it was their time to die.”
I made no comment. Claymore nodded. “No doubt,” he said again and then turned and strolled on. I followed. The path was too narrow to walk side by side and I trailed behind him. His limp seemed more noticeable and he seemed very interested in the exhibits, very alert, as if this were truly a wilderness and he were keeping an eye out for dangers or prey. From time to time he paused and used his walking stick to part the growth, revealing some secreted animal I hadn’t even noticed, looking up and down. Fox and wolverine and badger lurked on every side. Presently the path opened into a clearing and Claymore halted. He sighed. A deer was bounding tangen-tially from us, white tail bobbed in graceful flight. At first glance I imagined the deer had been positioned as if fleeing from the visitors’ approach down the path, but then I looked sideways and saw differently. Emerging from the opposite side of the clearing charged a pack of timber wolves, frozen in an instant of action, lean and fierce. I was about to point them out to Claymore when he spoke.
“Ah, it makes me long for the wilds,” he said. “Books . . . books can only teach what other men have learned, not what each man must learn for himself . . . the sensations, the moods, the tone of nature. The totality.”
He leaned on his stick.
“Well, I’m just as pleased these brutes are stuffed,” I said, jokingly. “How would you like to face that lot in the flesh?”
Claymore turned, his eyebrows lifting. He saw the wolves. His reaction was startling. He cried out and took a staggering step backwards, raising his walking stick like a club. I stepped forward, afraid he would fall, but he caught his balance: lowered the stick. His face was white and he was sweating.
“Good heavens, man. What is it?” I asked.
Gradually he relaxed. The blood returned to his face and he looked embarrassed.
“Forgive me. A thoughtless reaction.”
“What’s wrong?”
He shook his head; moved towards the wolves and regarded them, then motioned at the pack with his stick, holding it like a fencer.
“You ask if I should like to face them,” he said.
“A silly comment,” I said.
“Ah, but I have,” said Claymore.
I waited, hoping he would continue, sensing the past trauma in his sudden reaction. I noticed he had raised his stick more in a position of attack than defence and that even now his eyes were bright as he looked at the wolves.
He said, “They are fine specimens. Very fine. That big fellow must have weighed well over a hundred pounds, I should think. It saddens me to see a wolf which has been killed in his ferocious prime. I love wolves. I hate them but I love them for they have taught me so much. Everything is there to be learned in canis lupis. Territorial instinct, the pack urge, monogamy. And mystery. People have always thought the wolf as different from other predators. Finer somehow, and yet inspiring fear far greater than its size and strength should warrant. Why, there is even a disease in which one believes himself to be a wolf. Lycorexia. I wonder if there is a philosophy, as well?”
He shrugged.
“You have been attacked by wolves?” I asked, hoping to hear the tale.
“No. Not attacked. But I have faced them. I faced the pack and therefore they did not attack me, you understand? And facing them, I learned to face all – to face the past as well as the future and to see myself with humility, a small part of existence, of little importance in the total scheme of life . . . and of great importance in that I learned to act as nature intended.”
“You stared them down, you mean?”
He gestured vaguely.
“Oh, one might say that. But it was far more than that.”
“You interest me greatly.”
“Ah, it was . . . interesting. You wish to hear the story?”
“Very much. If it won’t disturb you to remember . . .”
“No, not at all. I constantly remember it. You take your knowledge from books – from still lives, as it were – and perhaps you should know how my knowledge came to me.”
“I should like to know.”
He nodded and glanced at the wolves once more. Then he moved away with a sideward step. A fallen tree had been propped against a stump across the clearing and Claymore took a seat on the log. I sat beside him. For some time he collected his thoughts while I waited. A man passed, pausing to look at the wolves and then looking at us. Then a middle-aged woman with three children crossed the clearing. They, too, observed us for a moment. We must have looked as out of place as they did. But our ectopia was of a different nature, and I felt I belonged there, listening to Claymore as a sceptic might have listened to Socrates, knowing one need not agree to learn. The taped sounds played on and the waterfall rustled and presently Claymore spoke.
“Several months after publication of my book I returned to the north,” he said. “The book – I believe you mentioned reading it? – dealt with ecology in general and now I had decided to make a study in depth on a specific relationship. For several reasons I selected that existing between wolves and moose. The most important reason was expediency, for both are territorial animals. The wolf pack sticks within its own boundaries and will tolerate no others there and the moose, in deep snow at least, remains in his own small area or yard. Well, this territorial instinct enables an observer to define the limits of the area and use the square miles within as a field laboratory with checks and controls far more accurately than if the observer had selected his own boundaries at random. I have little patience with those who set aside a tract of land without regard for the animals’ own limits . . . less with the modern practice of observing from aeroplanes. This may be a scientific prejudice on my part, and I’ve considered that sort of work since losing my leg, but cannot see it leading to accurate conclusions. However, I didn’t have that problem. All my research was done on snowshoes with a pack on my back, far from the world of society. It would have been difficult to be farther. It was a world of true desolation and abandoned beauty, and my base camp was a little cabin of rough logs beside a stream which opened out, some miles below, into a river. The river was ringed by fir trees and frozen in winter. I had but one companion – my guide – a man of dubious ancestry called Charles. He had spent his life in the wilderness and was a rough, silent man with vast practical knowledge and experience. He hadn’t the faintest idea what I was studying and did not care at all. He was paid and that was sufficient. That was the way I wanted it, as well, for all men are susceptible and I might well have let my conclusions be affected by a companion who understood the subject. I could ask Charles questions and he would answer from his experience, accurate and precise, not knowing what answer I sought and therefore unable to commit the common error of slanting the answer to give me satisfaction. We carried all our supplies with us and relied on Charles to provide fresh meat. I have always believed in travelling light and Charles was the sort to regard even my meagre equipment as luxury.