The Madman Theory (3 page)

“It averages out to absolute comfort,” Buck James told him.

“That may be so,” Kershaw retorted, “but my skin can't figure like that. And while I don't consider myself a drinking man, a shot or two of good whisky does wonders toward improving the climate.” He rubbed the stubble of his chin. “Somebody was going to produce whisky, I forget just who. It's like a dream …”

“Here,” said Retwig, “have a cup of coffee. It'll take your mind off your troubles.”

They stood gratefully around the fire for a moment or two, then went down to the stream. When they returned Retwig had breakfast ready: chunks of compressed bacon, scrambled eggs, and applesauce. As they ate, Retwig pointed toward the south. “Somebody is camping just over the ridge. See the smoke?”

Buck said, “You have good eyes. I can't see it.”

“It's there. Just a wisp.”

Genneman tossed the dregs of his coffee into the fire. “Let's get moving. We want to make Persimmon Lake by evening.”

“If it means walking, I'm against it,” said Kershaw. But he put on his pack good-naturedly enough, and presently the five men left Suggs Meadow.

The trail once again rose, though in a somewhat gentler slope.

At noon they reached a ridge which afforded a spectacular view over a great valley to the north. For a brief period after that the trail descended, then it cut back on itself and rose sharply toward Dutchman's Pass. Lungs ached and hearts pounded in the thin cold air. Banks of snow lay on the granite slopes; immense peaks and harsh spires thrust into dark blue sky; it was impossible not to feel awe at the sheer elemental clarity of their surroundings.

At two o'clock the trail slanted through Dutchman's Pass across fields of snow blazing in the sunlight. At three it passed between a pair of astonishing needles of granite; from there it descended to Persimmon Flat, in the center of which lay Persimmon Lake, an irregular oval perhaps five hundred yards across. While camp was being set up Retwig tried the lake for trout; and in an hour he caught fourteen, which he fried for dinner. Afterward, as the group sat around the fire watching dusk reflected in the lake, even Red Kershaw acknowledged beneficial aspects to the situation. “I don't say all this is making me a nobler man, but there sure aren't many temptations to succumb to.”

Bob Vega agreed wistfully. “I wonder what Lila is up to.”

“You should have brought her along, if you can't trust her out of your sight.”

Vega smiled sadly. Earl Genneman said, “My daughter wanted to come. She's a good hiker, too; she'd keep up with any of us.” He looked sidewise at Buck James. “What's the trouble between you two? Don't you want to marry the boss's daughter?”

Buck for once looked uncomfortable. “Oh—things will probably work themselves out. We've got a few differences of opinion.” He sat up, tossed a rock toward the lake. “Who's for a swim?”

Genneman refused to be sidetracked. “Such as what?”

“One thing and another. She won't live in Wisconsin.”

“Nonsense,” declared Genneman. “She's never mentioned that to me.”

“Why don't you send Bob here back to Madison? He has more experience; he'd be far more competent at running a new plant.”

“Here!” protested Bob Vega. “I can't go running back to Wisconsin. All my family, all my wife's family lives in San Jose.”

“Not to mention all your ex-wives and their families,” grinned Red Kershaw.

“I couldn't begin to think of moving to Madison,” declared Vega peevishly. And he told Buck: “It's your hometown; you go.”

Genneman surveyed Vega with his lids half-closed, so that he looked remarkably like Josef Stalin. Then he turned to Buck, who flipped another rock toward the lake. “If all you're worrying about is Jean, she'll go to Wisconsin fast enough. She'd be a fool not to—and she's no fool.”

Buck glumly picked up another pebble.

“It's time for you to start knuckling down,” said Genneman. “You've had it too easy, Buck. Westco-Wisconsin is a challenge, but it's also a real opportunity.”

“No question of that. I'm not afraid of the job, and I know the territory. But …”

“But what?”

“They don't have things like this in Wisconsin.”

“It won't be forever. You get Westco-Wisconsin going well, keep your nose clean, don't rob your future father-in-law, stay away from the goof-ball trade, and you'll be sitting pretty.”

“I realise this. I just wonder whether—well, whether I deserve it,” young James said lamely.

“‘Deserve it'?” Genneman's roar of laughter shattered the dusk. “I never thought I'd see you become self-effacing. Well, well, well.”

Retwig pointed with his pipe. “Look. Across the lake.”

About two hundred yards off, a campfire flickered. Barely visible, a shape crouched beside the fire.

Genneman jumped up, staring through the darkness. “I wish I'd brought my binoculars.”

For half a minute he watched the orange flicker and the shape beside it. Then, slowly, he seated himself once more.

Tonight no one was in a hurry to retire. The sky was absolute black, spangled with stars that reflected, star for star, in the mirror of the lake. “Yes,” said Genneman heavily, “sometimes you come up here to these mountains and it seems a crime to go back. You wonder which is the real world.”

“Essentially,” said Retwig, “both are real worlds.”

“We'd starve up here,” said Buck James shortly.

“The world of nature here is a single world—I mean, all of us react to it in about the same way. But the other world—well, there are as many worlds as there are people. In the mountains we don't have differences; in a sense, we're all brainwashed by this environment. Down below we keep trying to force our world on one another. The result—” Retwig shrugged. “It's better this way.”

No one said anything. Then Buck jumped to his feet, tramped off into the darkness, and presently could be heard breaking dead branches for firewood.

“That's a real moody fellow,” said Kershaw. “He fools you. Most of the time you think he doesn't have a care in the world, then you look at him and suddenly you don't know what he's thinking.”

Genneman remarked, “Buck is the best natural salesman I've ever seen. Probably because he doesn't care whether he sells or not.”

“He knows the business inside out,” said Vega. “He's ideal for Madison.”

Buck came back with an armload of wood and refueled the fire. The campfire across the lake had dwindled to a spark. The camper himself could no longer be seen. The five men sat by the fire in near silence for almost ten minutes.

Genneman said suddenly, “By golly, I've got an idea for a new layout.”

Retwig looked at the big man with interest. “Mountains?”

“Yep. Big rocks, canyons, some lakes, a forest, maybe a mine; in fact, what about a whole process? The gondolas take ore to a recovery plant, flat cars take ingots away.”

Retwig considered. “A possibility. If I were doing it, I'd omit the mine and the mill.”

“You guys and your model railroads,” Kershaw said in a voice of deep disgust. “Talk about real worlds. How can grown men play with toys?”

Retwig puffed placidly at his pipe. “It's a cheap way to play God.”

“It's harmless,” said Genneman. “I enjoy it. But it's not cheap.”

“You change your layout too often, Earl,” said Retwig in mild rebuke. “You've never yet finished one.”

“I'm careful not to,” said Genneman. He rose and stretched. “I'm going to turn in. Tomorrow's going to be rough.” He glanced once more across the lake and went to his sleeping bag.

The others sat staring into the fire, each absorbed in his thoughts. Then, one by one, they went off into the darkness, leaving the fire to flicker out.

When the five men woke up the next morning the ground was covered with frost. As before, Myron Retwig was first out of the sleeping bag. He seemed in no hurry to rebuild the fire. One by one the others joined him. Genneman pointed across the lake. “Whoever was there is gone.”

Retwig nodded. “He was gone when I got up.”

Genneman shook his massive head. With tousled hair and unshaven cheeks he looked more leonine than ever. “Funny,” he muttered.

Breakfast was not companionable. Later, Genneman snapped at Kershaw, who had taken a long time assembling his pack. For a moment Kershaw seemed on the verge of snapping back. But he restrained himself.

The party set off up the trail, soon leaving Persimmon Lake behind. Buck James, bringing up the rear, paused to make a survey of Persimmon Flat before moving on through the trees. Kershaw, just ahead of him, asked, “See anybody?”

“No one at all.”

The trail swung around a spur and came out on a mountainside. There was snow and scree high above and a stream running through a belt of trees far below. The mountain itself was all but naked rock, clothed here and there with sand or rubble, and a few stunted cedars and pine which somehow had found footholds.

Ahead Lomax Falls appeared, plunging two hundred yards to a little meadow walled by trees. A few minutes later they reached the meadow. Genneman jumped the stream, followed by Retwig, Vega, Kershaw and James. For a few hundred feet the trail passed through the forest. Genneman stepped out into a small clearing, and something exploded in the stillness. Earl Genneman fell twitching to the trail, his head a red, spouting mess.

2

Someone gave a thin wail of horror; all dropped flat on the trail.

Each heard a sound or sounds which he afterward described differently. Buck James was the first to rid himself of his pack; Myron Retwig did the same seconds later. Together they sprang, crouching, for the cover of the trees. Sheltered, they looked at each other. Retwig's owlish placidity was gone; he moved with feline alertness. Buck was white as a death's-head, his eyes the color of cocktail olives.

They listened. All they could hear was Bob Vega's whimper of horror.

Buck peered cautiously around the tree trunk. Seeing nothing, he slipped forward to the protection of another tree, with Retwig close behind. The ground sloped rapidly and became barren mountainside. Ahead the strip of forest continued. If anyone had fled, it was into the shadow of these dark firs.

Assured that no one stood nearby with gun poised for a second shot, Retwig ran back to where Genneman lay, half on his side. He peered into the ghastly ruin of a face. Genneman was dead. Retwig rose and returned to the grove. Buck was studying the ground. “He stood about there.” Buck pointed to a little copse. “You can see some footprints. He must have lain the gun down on that branch.”

Retwig motioned him back. “Let's not tramp up the area. The police, or rangers, or whoever handles things will want to study all this.”

They went back to the trail. Kershaw, his back to the body, stood with tears streaming down his face. Vega was crouched by the side of the trail, scanning the hillside, mouth open.

Retwig said in a low voice, “We've got to notify the authorities as quickly as possible.”

“Who would do a thing like this?” asked Kershaw. “He must be some kind of lunatic! It couldn't have been a hunter.”

Bob Vega kept whimpering. “Oh, Lord, what a terrible thing. What a terrible thing!”

Kershaw peered along the trail. “I have a queer feeling somebody's standing close by. Watching, maybe picking out his next target.”

There was no sign of movement in the trees ahead, or along the precipitous mountainside above them.

“That was a shotgun,” muttered young James. “It must have been buckshot.”

Vega said in a hurried voice, “We're none of us safe. We'd better get the hell out of here.”

“What about poor Earl?” demanded Kershaw. “We can't leave him lying here in the trail!”

“We can't carry him out,” argued Buck.

“Here's what we can do,” said Retwig. “We can wrap Earl in one of the tube-tents and hang him under a tree. He'll be—at least he'll be off the ground.”

“But why? I can't understand
why
,” protested Kershaw. “It's got to be a madman.”

“Somebody who followed us in,” said Vega in a hiss so sibilant as to be almost feminine.

“Let's get to work,” said Retwig shortly. “The police can figure out who did it and why. That's what they're paid for.”

Gingerly the pack was removed from Genneman's body. Retwig and Buck did most of the work. From the pack they took the tube-tent and a spare shirt with which they covered the shattered head. Now came the stomach-turning job of pulling Genneman's bulk into the tube. This was accomplished by lifting his legs, slipping the plastic under his hips, then tugging and sliding him back into the tube. Tied at both ends, the tube was dragged underneath a stout fir, and after much effort suspended from a branch ten feet from the ground.

Then the four men started south along the trail, the way they had come.

Back along the mountainside, up over the saddle, and down into Persimmon Flat, with Persimmon Lake gleaming in the center. Buck James, who was in the lead, turned to Retwig. “Do you think we'd better look over that camp across the lake? Maybe we might learn something.”

“Leave it for the police,” advised Retwig. “They won't want us tracking all over the place.”

So they continued, past their own campsite of the night before, up over Dutchman's Pass. Now the trail led downhill. With no need for rest-halts they went down at least twice as fast as they had come up. Still, it seemed an interminable trek to Suggs Meadow, the first night's camp. They reached it at dusk.

At the stream they paused to rest and to take stock. Retwig said, “It took us about three hours to make it up from the car—” He stopped short. “The car! Damn it, it's Earl's car and he's got the keys in his pocket.”