The Valley of the Wendigo Page 8

  “Bury him, Albert. Boot hill. No marking.”

  “Sure thing, Sheriff.”

  Dekker shook his head and left. If a Wendigo had not killed this man, it was sure a hell of a coincidence that a big cat would come around now.

  TWENTY-NINE

  One thing Clint noticed was that Dakota had great eyes. Great-looking eyes, sure, but also great eyesight. She spotted sign well before he did, and often had to point it out to him.

  This time she didn’t spot something on the ground—but something above them.

  “There!” she said for a third time, pointing. “Come on, Clint, can’t you see? It’s Fiddler. He’s climbing the rock face.”

  “That’s a long way off, Dakota,” he said. “How can you be sure it’s Fiddler?”

  “Because nobody else would be that darin’,” she said, “or stupid. That old man is gonna kill himself.”

  As they quickened their pace to reach him, Clint said, “He must think there’s a cave up there.”

  “There’s caves all over,” she said. “He thinks the Wendigo is up there.”

  “So the Wendigo can also scale a rock wall?” Clint asked. “This thing is getting more and more talented as we go along.”

  Dakota said something that Clint didn’t catch.

  “What was that?”

  “You probably don’t want to hear this,” she said, “but Fiddler says they can probably . . . fly.”

  “Fly,” Clint said. “As in . . . like a bird?”

  “Yeah.”

  “How the hell did he ever kill fourteen of them?” Clint wondered aloud.

  The wall Fiddler was climbing was steep, without many opportunities for a good handhold and foothold at the same time. He’d had to attach his belt to his rifle and loop it over his neck, and the gun stuck in his belt was getting in the way. It was a dangerous ascent, for more reasons than one. If the Wendigo came for him now, he would be as good as dead. There was no way he could kill it while clinging to the rock wall. Also, there was always the possibility he’d lose his grip and fall. But even then he had confidence that his magic would keep him alive.

  And just at that moment a jutting formation he grabbed onto broke away from the wall, crumbling in his hand, and it happened.

  He fell.

  “Oh, my God!” Dakota said. Clint saw. Fiddler had lost his grip on the wall and was plummeting his arms, windmilling as if he thought he could fly.

  “Come on!” she exhorted, and started running.

  When they reached the area, she looked around.

  “He must’ve fallen here,” she said.

  “Are you sure you got the right spot?” Clint asked.

  “Yeah,” she said, looking up and shading her eyes. “He was climbing the wall here.”

  “Well, let’s look around,” Clint said. “He’s got to be here someplace.”

  There were all sorts of rock formations and some brush that could be hiding Fiddler’s battered and broken body. They split up to look around. As Clint came around a particularly large rock, he saw Fiddler. The man was standing there, brushing himself off as if he’d just tripped over a rock—but he had fallen almost fifty feet!

  “Fiddler?”

  The Cree hunter looked up at Clint and smiled.

  “Clumsy,” he said.

  Eric Keller rode into Rosesu that afternoon, straight down Main Street, easy as you please. Dekker was standing outside in front of his office. When he saw Keller, he stepped into the street. Keller reined his horse in. He looked the same, a hard case with a granite jaw and some gray hair that made him look older than forty.

  “Whataya want here, Keller?” Dekker asked.

  “Why, Sheriff,” Keller said. “Come out to greet me all by yourself? Where’s your deputy?”

  “I ain’t had a deputy since you killed the last one,” Dekker said. “Four months ago.”

  “He called me out, Dekker,” Keller said. “If you didn’t believe that, I’d be behind bars by now.”

  “But I told you never to come back here.”

  “I know,” Keller said, “and it was my intention to stay away—until I heard about this bounty.”

  “You don’t hunt game, Keller,” Dekker said with distaste, “you hunt men.”

  “I hunt, period,” Keller said. “Are you tellin’ me I can’t go for this bounty?”

  “Go ahead,” Dekker said. “The forest is swarming with amateurs with guns. I hope one of them takes your head off by accident.”

  “Nice to see you, too, Troy,” Keller said, and rode on.

  THIRTY

  “Dakota!”

  Clint called out and she came running. When she reached him, she gaped at Fiddler, who was still slapping rock dust from his clothing.

  “Fiddler!” she exclaimed. “Goddamn it. Fiddler! But . . . but how?”

  “I think she means . . . why aren’t you dead?”

  The old man looked at both of them, then smiled and touched the leather bag around his neck.

  “This.”

  “That’s your medicine bag, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “And that saved you?” she asked.

  “It slowed my fall.”

  “So you did fall?” she asked. “We didn’t imagine it?”

  “Oh, no, I fell,” he said. “I landed very hard, too.” He stretched, put his hand to his lower back.

  “But not hard enough to kill you,” Clint said.

  Fiddler looked at Clint.

  “I was certain Dakota would have told you.”

  “That you can’t die?”

  “Oh, I can die,” Fiddler said. “Years from now I will die of old age, like most people.”

  "But ...”

  “But I cannot be killed.”

  “And that’s because of what’s in your medicine bag?”

  “Yes.”

  Clint looked at Dakota, who looked up at the face of the wall.

  “What were you doin’ up there, Fiddler?”

  “I believe there is a cave up there,” he said, “where the Wendigo rested last night.”

  “Two hunters were killed last night in their camp,” Clint told him. “Torn to pieces.”

  “Yes,” Fiddler said. “I heard the shots . . . and the scream.”

  “So if the Wendigo made a kill last night, it would rest?” Clint asked.

  “It would rest in any case.”

  Now Clint looked up.

  “There’s got to be an easier way up there.”

  “There probably is,” Fiddler said, “but it’ll be dark soon. We should wait for daylight before we look for it.”

  “And you should rest,” Dakota said.

  “Yes,” Fiddler said, “you are probably right. We can make camp right here.”

  “Right below the Wendigo’s cave?” Clint asked.

  "Why not?” Fiddler asked. “We are looking for it, aren’t we?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Don’t worry,” Fiddler said. “The chances are slim that it would come back to the same place.”

  “Then why did you want to get into it?” Clint asked.

  “It is the last place the Wendigo was,” Fiddler said.

  “It would help me to get inside.”

  “And what if it stays somewhere else tonight?” Clint asked. “Then that would be the last place it stayed. Will you still want to get up there tomorrow morning?”

  “Every little bit helps, Mr. Adams,” Fiddler said.

  “If we’re gonna make camp, we better get a fire going,” Dakota said.

  Fiddler looked around, located his rifle lying on the ground. Then he continued looking.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “My pistol fell from my belt.”

  “I’ll help you find it.”

  “No,” he said, “you help Dakota. I will find it.”

  “All right,” Clint said. “We’ll get a fire going. Do you have any food?”

  “Some beef jerky.”

  “I do
, too,” Clint said. “And water. That’ll have to do.”

  “It will do very well,” Fiddler assured him.

  “What is it now?” Mayor Payne asked Dekker.

  “Keller’s in town.”

  “You told him not to come back.”

  “Apparently, he didn’t listen.”

  “Why’s he here?”

  “He says for the bounty.”

  “He doesn’t hunt animals.”

  “I know.”

  “Then why do you think he’s here?”

  “Keller doesn’t do anythin’ without a reason.”

  “And what do you think his reason is this time?”

  “There’s only one reason I can think he would’ve come back,” Dekker said.

  “And what’s that? Or do I have to guess?”

  Dekker looked at Payne and said, “Clint Adams.”

  THIRTY-ONE

  They were all seated around the fire. Clint realized this had to be his and Dakota’s last night in the canyon. They couldn’t go on without more provisions. He would have thought the same was true of Fiddler, but the old Cree hunter seemed to be doing much better than the two of them, despite his fall.

  As they’d collected wood for the fire earlier, Dakota had said, “I don’t believe he could’ve fallen from that height and not gotten killed, or hurt.”

  “Maybe he landed on some brush,” Clint said. “Maybe it broke his fall.”

  “And maybe he really does have some magic,” she said.

  Clint didn’t have an answer for that.

  He and Dakota were chewing beef jerky and taking small sips of water. Fiddler had one swallow of water, and that was it.

  “I am used to going without food and water for long periods of time,” he told them. “It is what I must do to be able to continue to hunt.”

  “We’ll have to go back in the morning,” Clint said.

  “I understand.”

  “We have to find another way into the canyon,” he said. “So we can bring horses and provisions.”

  “You do that, and I will continue to look.”

  Clint figured Fiddler wanted to get them out of the way—probably to get Dakota out of harm’s way.

  “Fiddler, wouldn’t it be better to look outside the canyon than in?” he asked. “I mean, that’s where this thing is doing its killing, right?”

  “It would be impossible,” Fiddler said, “to kill it while it is killing. I have to find it at rest.”

  “That would be at night,” Clint said. “How are you going to find it at night?”

  “Early morning would be good enough,” Fiddler said. “At first light is the best time.”

  “And what if it finds you?” Dakota asked.

  “That is just as good.”

  “Clint, we have to stay,” she said.

  “I don’t know about you, Dakota, but I’m hungry, and I need more than the sips of water we’ve been taking. We have to go and get supplies, but we can come back.”

  Dakota turned and looked at Fiddler.

  “Come with us, Fiddler,” she said. “We’ll all come back.”

  “I will be fine here, child,” he told her. “I will be here when you get back.”

  “Alive?” she asked.

  “Very much alive,” he promised.

  “You’d better be.”

  Later, while Dakota slept and Fiddler was supposed to be on watch, Clint came and sat with him at the fire.

  “You are not weary?” the Cree asked.

  “Weary to my bones, Fiddler,” Clint said. “I just wanted to talk to you while Dakota was asleep.”

  “What about?”

  “The Wendigo.”

  “Why?”

  “I like to know about what I’m hunting for,” Clint said. “The more I know, the better chance I have.”

  “That is not the case, here.”

  “Why not?”

  “You have no chance,” Fiddler said, “and neither does she.”

  “Why not?”

  “You do not have the magic.”

  “Your medicine bag?”

  Fiddler took the bag into his hand.

  “This is my medicine, not my magic,” he said. “The magic is here.” He touched his chest. “Inside. The medicine bag helps me to focus it. You do not have either.”

  “And you really do think this is a mythical beast called the Wendigo?”

  Fiddler looked at him and shook his head.

  “You have even less than no chance if you do not believe,” he said.

  “Well,” Clint said, “I have to admit you have a point there.”

  “You have seen what it can do?” Fiddler asked.

  “Yes,” Clint said. “We went to the camp that was attacked last night, found the two men . . . dismembered.”

  “And still you do not believe?”

  “It’s . . . hard.”

  “I will tell you what is even harder.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Killin’ somethin’ you do not believe in.”

  THIRTY-TWO

  In the morning, Clint and Dakota left Fiddler to find another way up the rock wall.

  “If I didn’t have such an open mind,” Clint said to her, as they walked away, “I might think that he was crazy. Just a little.”

  “A little?”

  After they had walked for a while, she turned and looked back, shielding her eyes.

  “I’d say he’s a lot crazy,” she said.

  Clint turned and looked.

  “Is that—”

  “Yup,” she said, “he’s scalin’ the wall . . . again.”

  In the afternoon, they made their way out of the canyon. It didn’t take them as long walking back because they weren’t trying to follow a trail. When they came out, the horses were all still standing there.

  “We’ll have to water them before we ride them too long,” Clint said.

  “Are we goin’ back to town?” she asked.

  “No,” Clint said. “We have supplies in our saddlebags. Fiddler’s got some on his horses. We’ll take from him what we can carry, and then start looking for another way into the canyon.

  “Do you think there’s another way?” she asked.

  “We can probably work our way to the top,” he said. “You can get in from there.”

  “But a way to get in with the horses?”

  “That’s what I’m hoping for.”

  They raided Fiddler’s horses, found that there wasn’t much on the packhorse they could use. They did get some beef jerky from his saddlebags, as well as some coffee.

  “We should leave some of it here, in case he comes back out this way,” Clint said.

  “He needs very little,” she said.

  "Still ...”

  They left some coffee and food in the saddlebags of Horse.

  “Too bad we can’t water his horses,” Clint said.

  “We can give them what’s in our canteen,” she offered. “I can find us more water.”

  Clint thought it over, then decided to go ahead. Using his hat, they gave water first to Horse and then to the pack animal. That left them with very little at the bottom of one of their canteens.

  “We’ll have to find water first thing,” she said. “The horses need it, and we can fill our canteens.”

  “Okay,” he said as they mounted up. “Lead the way.”

  That afternoon, Dekker found Keller sitting at a table in the saloon.

  “You’re not here for the bounty,” Dekker said.

  “What makes you say that?” Keller asked, looking up at the lawman.

  “If you were, you’d be out searching.”

  “You ain’t much of a hunter, are you, Sheriff?”

  “Whataya mean?”

  “I’m waitin’ for the next one or two amateur hunters to be killed,” Keller said. “That’s where I’ll start lookin’, at the site of the most recent kill.”

  “That’s cold-blooded.”

  “That’s huntin�
�. You want a drink?”

  “Not with you.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  “I’m thinkin’ you’re here for another reason.”

  “And what would that be?”

  “Reputation.”

  “Whose?”

  “Clint Adams’s.”

  “The Gunsmith? Is he in town?”

  “You know he was,” Dekker said. “Now he’s out there, hunting for the Wendigo.”

  Keller laughed.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “They got you really believin’ there’s somethin’ out there called a Windy-go?”

  “Well, somethin’s out there killin’ people.”

  “An animal,” Keller said, “pure and simple.”

  “Not simple,” Dekker said. “There’s nothin’ simple about this.”

  “So,” Keller said, sitting back in his chair, “Clint Adams is in town, huh?”

  THIRTY-THREE

  Dakota found a water source fairly quickly, a creek that was running clear. The horses drank while Clint filled both canteens and handed one to her.

  “I wonder if that old man made it to the top?” she said.

  “He wasn’t going to the top, just to the cave,” Clint reminded her.

  “I’m just wonderin’ if he fell again,” she said. “If he’d even survive another fall.”

  “Well, apparently he can’t be killed, can he?”

  She shook her head.

  “I guess I never believed it until I saw it with my own eyes.”

  “But we didn’t see it,” Clint said. “We didn’t see him land, did we?”

  “We saw him fall.”

  “Did we? Was that really him?”

  “Who else could it have been?”

  “I don’t know,” Clint said. “I just can’t fully accept that he fell from that wall and didn’t suffer even a scratch.”

  “The medicine bag.”

  “What about it?”

  “Some people say it helps the wearer heal.”

  “Heal?” Clint asked. “He didn’t have time to heal. No, he didn’t have a scratch on him.”

  “Unbelievable, either way,” she said.

  They placed their canteens on their saddles, led the horses away from the water before they could gorge themselves.

  “Where to?” she asked.

  “You’re asking me?” he said. “I’m not in charge here.”

  “I don’t know what to do, Clint,” she said. “I don’t want to be in charge anymore.”