The Dinosaur Hunter(77)

“That Russian guy? Is he dead?”

“Tanya didn’t tell you?”

“Tell me what?”

And here I thought women shared everything with their women buds! Once more, I went through the litany on how I found Toby and his various wounds. “I’m surprised Tanya didn’t tell you,” I concluded.

She looked over her shoulder to where Tanya stood, shovel in hand. She was watching us. Laura turned back to me. “Did you and Tanya spend the night together?”

That was a sore subject and I may have winced. “No. How was your Texas cowboy?”

“Married. His wife showed up during the last dance and took him away.”

“Too bad.”

“Well, too bad about you and Tanya. I’m surprised it didn’t work out. We drew straws for you, by the way.”

“I’m afraid to ask. Did she win or lose?”

Laura laughed. “Won, silly.” She looked me over. “You look pretty stressed.”

“I am. Some very bad guys may be on their way to Fillmore County.”

She gave that some thought. “Most likely, they’ll visit Cade Morgan first.”

“That’s what everybody thinks. I think so, too. But he could send them here.”

“Why would he do that?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know, Laura. None of this makes any sense. Is there anything you can tell me?”

She pondered my question, then looked over at Brian and Philip who were trying to lever loose a big slab of sandstone. “How about those two? I didn’t pay much attention to them at the dance. They came back with Jeanette, I think.”

I considered the brothers, then shook my head. “Maybe they only act like idiots. Maybe they aren’t even brothers. Who knows?”

Laura touched my arm. “I’m worried about you, Mike. You need to take better care of yourself.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just know that I care,” she said and then went back to work.

As I watched her go, I noticed that Brian and Philip, resting on the sandstone slab, were looking over in my direction. So was Tanya, still rooted in the same spot she’d been when I climbed the hill. When I looked at the brothers, they suddenly got engrossed in sharing a canteen, then got up to lever at the huge slab some more. When I looked at Tanya, she gave me a cheerful smile. What the hell did that mean? I thought about going over and interrogating the brothers and maybe Tanya again but then decided nobody was going to give me straight answers. Hell, maybe there were no straight answers. Sometimes, things are just the way they are. For all I knew, maybe Pick was right. Maybe Toby bashed himself in the head, cut his own throat, staggered down to the lake, and fell in. Worst case of suicide I’d ever seen.

I got busy, taking on the big jackhammer to break up the sandstone the Marsh brothers were trying to move. It was hot, sweaty, bruising work and I needed it. At least, something was getting done, something I could see, feel, and even taste considering the dust that jackhammer raised. All day I hammered, shoveled, picked, and levered. That night, Laura, Tanya, and I cooked dinner but we did so without anything much past polite conversation. Afterward, there was no camaraderie around the fire pit. We just took to our tents. The next day was much the same except that night, Ray woke me up, saying, “Do you hear that, Mike?”

I crawled out of my tent. It was that same stupid engine noise. I was pretty much convinced now it was coming off the lake and said so. “I don’t think that’s right,” Ray said. “I think it’s not more than a mile away.”

“Nothing we can do,” I said, stretching and yawning.

“We could go out and look for it.”

“Ray,” I said, “whatever is out there has been out there for at least a month. It doesn’t seem interested in us. Let’s just let it be.”

Ray took my advice and went back to bed. But I looked out in the darkness, listening and thinking. If there was a two plus two to add up, I couldn’t figure out what it was. I wearily climbed back into my tent. My sleep was restless, my dream a nightmare. I found myself back on that night of the storm when Jeanette cut open the little heifer. Instead of a calf, only entrails spilled out of her, nasty and flopping and hissing like snakes. When I looked over at Jeanette, she wasn’t there. Instead, it was old Bill Coulter. He looked at me, held up his bloody scalpel, then nodded back at the heifer. When I looked down at it, it wasn’t the heifer at all but Toby grinning at me with two grins, one below his chin.





25




It took us the rest of the week but we got most of the top of that butte down to just a few feet above where bones had already been found. When we got there, we all stood around, covered with dust and sweat, looking for all the world like soldiers who’d just finished a battle. In a way, I guess we were the veterans of the battle of Blackie Butte. Finally, the story of what had happened to these creatures lay just below our boots. At least, that was the hope. The only way to find out was to dig some more, this time without the jackhammers. Laura said this had to be much finer work, digging one scoop and one scrape at a time because the baby bones were so tiny. I could see days were going to tick by before we got everything uncovered, days that might give Toby’s people time to get here if they were coming. It was a big if and there was nothing I could do about it, anyway. If they did—well, we had the guns. If they didn’t, then we’d bag our dinosaurs and get the hell out of the badlands. After that, I would tell Jeanette I quit and go cowboying somewhere else. I would miss Ray but that was about it.