Suddenly, he raised his left fingertips to his forehead. “Oh-oh,” he said then. “Merle, the keys are in the ignition. Get in the car and drive back to the hotel right away. Leave me here. Hurry!”
“What’s going on? What-“
He raised his weapon, a snub-nosed automatic, and pointed it at me.
“Now! Shut up and go!”
“But-“
He lowered the muzzle and put a bullet into the ground between my feet.
Then he aimed it squarely at my abdomen. “Merlin, son of Corwin,” he said through clenched teeth, “if you don’t start running right now you’re a dead man!” I followed his advice, raising a shower of gravel and laying some streaks of rubber coming out of the U-turn I spun the wagon through. I roared down the hill and skidded around the curve to my right. I braked for the next one to my left. Then I slowed.
I pulled off to the left, at the foot of a bluff, near some shrubbery. I killed the engine and the lights and put on the parking brake. I opened the door quietly and did not close it fully after I’d slipped out. Sounds carry too well in places like this.
I started back, keeping to the darker, righthand side of the road. It was very quiet. I rounded the first turn and headed for the next one. Something flew from one tree – to another. An owl, I think. I moved more slowly than I wanted to, for the sake of silence, as I neared the second turning.
I made my way around that final corner on all fours, taking advantage of the cover provided by rocks and foliage. I halted then and studied the area we had occupied. Nothing in sight. I advanced slowly, cautiously, ready to freeze, drop, dive, or spring up into a run as the situation required.
Nothing stirred, save branches in the wind. No one in sight.
I rose into a crouch and continued, still more slowly; still hugging the cover.
Not there. He had taken off for somewhere. I moved nearer, halted again and listened for at least a minute. No sounds betrayed any moving presences.
I crossed to the place where Martinez had fallen. The body was gone. I paced about the area but could locate nothing to give me any sort of clue as to what might have occurred following my departure. I could think of no reason for calling out, so I didn’t.
I walked back to the car without misadventure, got in and headed for town. I couldn’t even speculate as to what the hell was going on.
I left the wagon in the hotel lot, near to the spot where it had been parked earlier. Then I went inside, walked to Luke’s room, and knocked on the door. I didn’t really expect a response; but it seemed the proper thing to do preparatory to breaking and entering.
I was careful to snap only the lock, leaving the door and the fame intact, because Mr. Brazda had seemed a nice guy. It took a little longer, but there was no one in sight. I reached in and turned on the light, did a quick survey, then slipped inside quickly. I stood listening for a few minutes but heard no sounds of activity from the hall.
Tight ship. Suitcase on luggage rack, empty. Clothing hung in closet-nothing in the pockets except for two matchbooks, and a pen and pencil. A few other garments and some undergarments in a drawer, nothing with them. Toiletries in shaving kit or neatly arrayed on countertop. Nothing peculiar there. A copy of B . H. Liddell Hart’s Strategy lay upon the bedside table, a bookmark about three-quarters of the way into it.
His fatigues had been thrown onto a chair, his dusty boots stood next to it, socks beside them. Nothing inside the boots but a pair of blousing bands. I checked the shirt pockets, which at first seemed empty, but my fingertips then discovered a number of small white paper pellets in one of them. Puzzled, I unfolded a few. Bizarre secret messages? No . . . No sense getting completely paranoid, when a few brown flecks on a paper answered the question. Tobacco. They were pieces of cigarette paper: Obviously he stripped his butts when he was hiking in the wilderness. I recalled a few past hikes with him. He hadn’t always been that neat.