Wolf Lake. John Verdon

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СКАЧАТЬ indecipherable look changed to obvious concern. “When are you going to pack?”

      “Christ, we’re only going away for three days.”

      “Four.”

      “What’s the difference?”

      As Gurney left the den in search of his cell phone, Madeleine’s voice followed him. “Did it occur to you that the porcupine might be totally harmless and that the reason he’s walking back and forth on the branch might be none of your business?”

       CHAPTER 2

      A half hour later the morning sun was well above the eastern ridge. Its rays slanting through the ice crystals in the dry, frigid air were creating random microscopic sparkles.

      Largely oblivious to this phenomenon, Gurney was standing by the French doors in the breakfast nook of their farmhouse kitchen. He was gazing down over the low pasture toward the red barn, the point at which the narrow town road dead-ended into their fifty-acre property—once upon a time a functioning hill farm, a use long since abandoned in the collapse of the upstate dairy industry.

      After retiring early from their careers in the city, he and Madeleine had moved to that pastoral part of the western Catskill Mountains because the countryside was breathtakingly beautiful despite its economic depression. Her enthusiasm for the place was obvious from the beginning. Her energetic, unpretentious character; her positive fascination with the natural world; and her visceral delight in simply being outdoors in any season—canoeing, berry-picking, or just wandering along old forest trails—suited her for country life. Adapting to their new environment had been for her an easy, happy process.

      He, nearly three years later, was still working on it.

      But that sometimes divisive issue was not what was preoccupying him at the moment. He was pondering the disconcerting phone conversation he’d just had with Jack Hardwick.

      Hardwick had answered the phone quite pleasantly with none of his customary jibes. He’d sounded so friendly that Gurney had suspected it was a parody of cordiality to be replaced at any moment by some cynical remark. But that didn’t happen. Hardwick had responded to Gurney’s request for the loan of a couple of trail cams with eagerness—not only to provide them but to deliver them. And not only to deliver them, but to do so immediately.

      As Gurney stood by the glass doors mulling over this uncharacteristic rush to be helpful, Madeleine came down from an upstairs room carrying two nylon duffel bags—one blue, one green. She set them down on the floor by his feet.

      “Do you have a preference?”

      He glanced at the bags and shook his head. “Whichever.”

      “What’s the matter?”

      He told her about the phone call.

      Her eyes narrowed. “He’s coming . . . here? Now?”

      “Apparently.”

      “What’s his big hurry?”

      “Good question. I assume we’ll find out when he arrives.”

      On cue, from somewhere down the road below the barn, came the throaty rumble of a big V-8 engine. Half a minute later Hardwick’s classic muscle car, a red 1970 Pontiac GTO, was making its way up the snow-covered lane through the overgrown pasture.

      “He’s got someone with him,” said Madeleine.

      Gurney wasn’t fond of surprises. He went out past the mud room to the side door, opened it and watched while Hardwick parked the loud, angular GTO next to his own dusty, anonymous Outback.

      Hardwick got out first, his thin-lipped grin exhibiting, as usual, more determination than warmth—the same message conveyed by his ice-blue eyes and aggressively colorless clothes: black jeans, black sweater, black windbreaker.

      Gurney’s attention, however, was on the person emerging from the passenger side. His first impression was of a different kind of colorlessness—a drab anonymity. A large, plain woman, she was wearing a quilted winter coat and shapeless wool ski hat, perhaps in her early forties.

      When she arrived at the door, Gurney offered her a pleasant smile and turned an inquisitive glance toward Hardwick—which seemed to make the man’s grin grow brighter.

      “You’re asking yourself, ‘Where’s that camera equipment he was supposed to be bringing me?’ Am I right?”

      Gurney waited, smiled patiently, said nothing.

      “As your trusty guardian angel . . .” Hardwick inserted a dramatic pause before proceeding with relish, “I decided to bring you something of far greater value than a fucking trail cam. May we come in?”

      Gurney led them into the kitchen end of the long open room that also included a dining area and, at the far end, a sitting area arranged around a fieldstone fireplace.

      Madeleine’s fraught smile seemed to reflect Gurney’s history with his sometime colleague—a difficult man with whom he’d shared a series of near-fatal law enforcement experiences.

      Hardwick’s grin widened. “Madeleine. You look fantastic.”

      “Can I take your jackets?”

      “Absolutely.” He helped the bulky woman beside him remove hers. He did this with a flourish, as if he were unveiling something grand. “Dave, Madeleine, may I introduce . . . Jane Hammond.”

      Madeleine smiled and said hello. Gurney extended his hand, but the woman shook her head. “Very happy to meet you, but I won’t shake your hand, I’m full of germs.” She pulled off her knitted cap, revealing a shapeless, low-maintenance hairstyle.

      Evidently sensing the absence of any recognition, Hardwick added, “Jane is the sister of Richard Hammond.”

      Gurney’s expression suggested nothing but ongoing curiosity.

      “Richard Hammond,” repeated Hardwick. “The Richard Hammond—the one in every major newscast for the past month.”

      Madeleine showed a twinge of concern. “The hypnotist?”

      Jane Hammond’s reaction was emphatic. “Not hypnotist—hypnotherapist. Any charlatan can call himself a hypnotist, dangle a pendulum, and pretend he’s doing something profound. My brother is a Harvard-trained psychologist who utilizes very sophisticated techniques.”

      Madeleine nodded sympathetically, as though she were dealing with a touchy client at the mental health clinic where she worked. “But isn’t ‘hypnotist’ what they’re calling him in the news reports?”

      “That’s not all they’re calling him. The so-called news programs today are nothing but trash! They don’t care how unfair they are, how full of lies—” She broke off in a brief fit of coughing. “Allergies,” she explained. “I seem to have a different one for every season.”

      Hardwick spoke up. “Actually, could we sit down?”

      Before Gurney could СКАЧАТЬ