52

PENRY SCUDDED THROUGH THE BULRUSHES ON THE NORTH shore and beached his canoe, three hundred fifty, four hundred yards up from Munson. He climbed the slope of broken granite scree, not paying any attention to the noise it made, a rough clattering, the girl, the girl, he just had to get to her first. Everything depended on that, and he had his knife out, in his fist, rushing now, and mounted the rise of the granite ridge and, coming over it, all those old instincts from football working, he looked for the smoke, there was plenty of it, the idiots, they deserved what they got, he thought, and he powerfully moved toward the ledge and the sink, in the red willow and pines, his knife out, and coming around the front, he was ready for them, and he saw with some shock the canoe was gone, a jagged line torn in the lichen, the line rising along the spine of the island into the pines. They’d seen them coming, he and Munson, and must have run to the west end, dragging the canoe, he thought, and he spun around, Munson coming on behind him and passing him, having walked in from the east, as Penry’d told him to, but the doctor gone, west, so that Penry knocked by Munson, desperate. He could only think they were still on the island but had portaged the canoe up the steep slope of the spine, had left the fire going to bring them around to the east, all the while, going up the spine and away, and Penry ran, following the hull sign, this jagged cut in the lichen, until it was just footprints he followed, block after block after block of pine, and stone, and the rise of it killing, and now the footprints pressed in the snow angled off to a great ledge, sure, sure, they were hiding here, Penry thought, and he felt in himself this great pleasure, could see them cowering, behind the ridge, and he swelled with the thought of it, jacked up, blood pumping, but when he came around the ledge and saw the cedar stumps, he shouted, “Goddammit!,” understood in an instant they were gone, and he burst back to the path, almost colliding with Munson, Munson confused for a second, Penry smacking right into him, but going by again. He had to get to the girl first, had to stay ahead of Munson, now dashing east again, and Munson behind him.

Munson, following, felt this dark something rise up in him. It was all going wrong again, and he forced himself after Penry, whose squat, powerful figure crashed through the sumac ahead, a shortcut, and then they were both charging down the steep slope, nearly a quarter mile of it, brush and willow tearing at his face and hands, and at the bottom, here was the rock ledge and the fire again, still smoking tremendously.

Penry circled there, and as Munson came up behind, Penry lifted his fists over his head and shouted, “Dammit!”

And Munson saw then what Penry saw. To the south side of the island, just yards away and over the ridge, were another set of tracks, and he went down to them, and he counted out the distance between the footprints, each paces apart.

The son of a bitch had gone right by them, on the south side of the ridge, running east as they were going west up the spine.

The son of a bitch could run—God, but could this guy run. He wouldn’t have thought it possible unless he’d seen it himself in the tracks.

He’d passed them, all right. And there he began to wonder. The doctor’d done that?

“Dammit!” Penry said, and he strode to the slope back of the spine, but halfway, slowed, setting his hands on his knees, Munson behind him, both breathing hard and their lungs burning.

“Ran right up this hill,” Munson said, “doubled around by us on the south side.”

Penry didn’t answer. He knew they couldn’t be far. If he could just see them. He needed some elevation, they couldn’t be far, but, again, they could have gone in any direction, and the ridge worked against them, he and Munson, now.

He got to the top of the ridge and turned a full circle, Munson coming up slowly behind him. They could see to the west, and south, but the east way out of the lake was blocked by an island, a channel behind it.

Penry thought, There, but didn’t say it. The doctor had, what—twenty minutes on them? Thirty?

But now he’d seen this enervating fatalism in Munson, and he’d have to change that. Throgmorton had told him, You’ve gotta get Munson and Lawton in it with you if this is going to work. I don’t know if Munson’s got it in him. Motivation’s going to be a problem, and, surprised, Penry’d said, You think so?

But now he wondered. Munson was going down already, he could see it in the set of Munson’s shoulders, stooped, but Penry wasn’t about to let him quit. He needed Munson now, and he’d need him later.

Penry cursed. Here were the prints again, out from the cedars they’d cut. The boy had dragged something, to make it look like they were moving in this direction with the canoe. He didn’t want to say it, that he’d been fooled, especially since Munson would think it was the doctor who had done it.

You couldn’t understand the sole of my fucking shoe.

Penry saw Munson’s brows gather, and he stooped to examine the prints.

Penry didn’t want that—he didn’t want Munson, who was seeing something already, to get wise to there being somebody else with them, the doctor and the girl.

But the kid had big shoes, Penry saw.

“Let’s go,” Penry said.

“I don’t want to take them on the water,” Munson shot back. It was the first time he’d said anything against it all, really, had crossed what Penry was thinking.

“Why not?”

“We capsize without a fire nearby, we’re as good as dead.”

“No need to,” Penry said. But he didn’t like the way Munson was thinking. He’d just said it—what Penry’d seen in him earlier. We’re as good as dead.

“Come on, you fuckin’ pussy,” Penry told him, “the only direction they could have gone now is east,” and he went down to the canoes, and he got in his, and moved away across the water, and Munson, sheathing his knife, followed.