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"Though I may not agree with your conclusions, you've been thorough, A
"Then you'll stop the hunt."
Mathers took off her glasses-aviator style with gold rims-and pinched the bridge of her nose as if the little red marks there pained her. "It's not as simple as that, A
"It's as simple as that. Just call off the dogs."
The Chief Ranger replaced the glasses and leaned across the desk. Her hands were folded on the legal pad, on the two ignored slides. "No. It's not." Deliberately, as if she wanted A
6
Up on the Permian Ridge two miles north of Middle McKittrick Canyon a lioness had been shot and killed. Harland Roberts, Cori
A
The kittens were not found.
The following day A
Perched on an outcropping of limestone, she called down into the forested recesses of the ravines. "Come on kittens, here kitty, kitties. Come on."
The pathetic absurdity of it stung her eyes but she hoped, her heart in her voice, it would trigger some response; a sound from the cougar kittens. For an instant, as the call died away, swallowed by the trees, she thought she heard something. Not mewing, but a strange bird's call, or the wind on a stony bottleneck: four notes from a half-remembered song.
Again and again she called but never heard the sound a second time. Finally she came to doubt she'd really heard anything. Hope was such a creative companion.
Till the moon rose to light their way, Gideon had to pick his way down the mountain in darkness.
That had been nearly a week past. The moon was waning now, the nights dark till after midnight, the moon still up at nine a.m.
A
Carpeted half-walls corralled the two clericals in the central area of the administrative offices. The rooms with windows were parceled out to the higher-ups. Government Service and Private Industry did not differ in all respects.
Marta Freeman, the superintendent's secretary, was in the area furthest away. Marta, a determinedly blond, well-endowed woman in her fifties, was given to cleavage, knowing looks, and i
In the next corral, Christina Walters, the clerk-typist, bent over a computer terminal. Her pale brown hair, nearly the color of the oak veneer on the desk tops, fell in a curtain hiding her face. A
A
Walters was good-looking with a brand of prettiness that was rare in the Park Service. She looked soft. Her hair curled softly, arms and neck and breasts rounded with a softness that somehow fell short of fat. Her muscles weren't corded from carrying a pack, her hands not calloused from shooting or riding or climbing. Her skin wasn't burned brown and creased by the sun and wind.
Urban, A
It crossed A
"Do you need something?" Christina was asking in a low voice with a hint of a drawl and A
"Do I look that desperate?" she answered with a laugh.
Christina Walters studied her gravely. "Yes."
"I'm afraid I'm fouling up in triplicate here." A
"Let me see." Christina walked around the low wall and looked over A
"It's the 343 on the Drury Lion Kill," A
"Sony," A
Christina straightened up, her hair falling to hide her eyes. When she smoothed it back her face was working again. "I didn't know her that well. Here-" she pulled the form out of the typewriter "-it'll only take me a minute." Smiling with what looked like genuine warmth, she fluttered a manicured hand. "Magic fingers."
A
"Go ahead, Paul.
"Are you near a phone?"
"Ten-four."
"Call me at Frijole. Three-eleven clear."
A
"I'll need a vehicle. I'm in that damned jeep."
"Take mine," Paul said. "Leave the keys in the jeep. I'll use it."
A
"I'll be there in about ten minutes, Paul."
"Ranger Drury's pack will be in the back of the truck. And thanks, A