Killer View

To Walt’s disappointment, he found no signs of recent activity around the pools. No mud. With no tracks leading to the pools, and no sign of the telltale mud, Walt had to rethink his theory.

Another mile out Warm Springs Road, they reached Randy’s cabin. It had been part of the Board Ranch, a cattle-and-horse operation that had gone bust in the 1960s. The owners had wisely retained the property, selling off fifty-year leases, most of which had been sublet a dozen times by now. Its eight hundred acres lay directly in the shadow of Bald Mountain. A satellite dish hung beneath the south-facing eave, and somehow broke the romanticism of the setting. Walt and Fiona followed tracks-fresh tracks-to the cabin’s door. They found it unlocked, which was not at all surprising. Until recently, locals had commonly left their keys in the ignition while at the grocery store. On frigid days, cars were left ru

“Start shooting when you’re ready,” Walt said, banging the snow off his boots and stepping inside. “I’m going to look around. I want everything in here documented. Anything and everything.”

They stood in a single open room, with a woodstove in the righthand corner, a small love seat facing it. A TV, on a low table, viewable from the couch. Bookshelves along the near wall, crowded with videos, DVDs, and books. A small kitchen was just beyond, its U-shaped countertops framing a butcher-block island. A small table for two that backed up to the love seat. The bedroom and bath were to the left. Electric baseboard heat fought to keep the temperature in the low sixties, the woodstove no doubt contributing when lit. Walt kept his coat zipped but removed his winter gloves in favor of a pair of latex.

“Looking for anything in particular?” Fiona asked.

He shrugged. “We’ll know when we find it.”

She started making pictures, her camera flashes a

More flashes.

“Don’t you think it’s a little weird for a veterinarian to have animal heads on his walls?” There was a bull elk, a buck deer, and, more of a surprise, the head of a mountain goat, a protected animal.

“Anyone local-and the Akers are local-hunt. They do it for food. For tradition. Because their granddads taught them to.”

“I still think it’s strange,” she said. “They heal them Monday through Friday and kill them on the weekends?”

“I doubt they’d see it that way,” Walt said, having trouble taking his eyes off the goat head. Mountain goat hunts were by lottery, with only a few tags sold each year. And they were the most expensive tags offered, along with bighorn sheep and moose. He thought he would have heard from Mark if Randy had bagged a goat. Considering the dust on the elk and deer, the goat was a recent trophy.

He searched all the kitchen cabinets, the refrigerator and oven, knowing people hid things in strange places. He tapped the plank flooring, listening carefully for a hollow sound. If the rumors about Randy’s illegal poaching were true, Walt expected to find some evidence. The goat head wasn’t proof of anything. He wanted a bank account, checkbook, or a cashbox. He pla

“You know anything about radio collar hunting?” he asked Fiona, as she clicked off more shots.

“Isn’t that where these rich golfer types hire someone to tree a cougar, then fly out to shoot it?”

“Exactly. The guide uses dogs to hunt down the game. It can take days. When the dogs get a cougar treed, they look up at it, barking, and keeping it there. The poachers follow the signal to the tree. They phone their client-it can take most of a day for him to get there-then he climbs out of the helicopter and is handed a rifle. He shoots the cougar, then flies off. Single shot. Ten minutes, max. The cat is taxidermied and shipped to him a few months later.”

“And that’s called hunting?”

“It’s called poaching. The collars are illegal to use, and the cats require a tag from Fish and Game. So the whole thing is one violation after another. A hundred-thousand-dollar fine, and up to five years in prison. So it’s an expensive way to hunt. The client pays about ten grand an animal.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Randy’s name surfaced in a bust in eastern Washington. It reached me through a friend. Word was, he’d begun taking clients on his own. And that kind of thing can get a man killed out here.”

“And Mark?”

“Probably knew. He has his ear to the ground.”

“That couldn’t have been easy. And you’re looking for a possible co

“We are. Yes.”

“That’s right: I’m deputized.”

“Don’t let it go to your head.”

“You want the contents of the kitchen cabinets?” she asked.

“Why not?” he answered.

Walt searched the tiny bedroom and small bath while Fiona sparked flashes in the kitchen. Frustrated by a lack of evidence, or even anything interesting, he climbed on a chair and lifted up all three game heads in succession, hoping an envelope or paperwork might have been hidden behind the trophies. All he got was dusty.

“Here’s a curiosity,” Fiona called out.

Walt joined her in the kitchen.

She pointed to the kitchen cabinets. “Box of nongluten pancake mix. Several boxes of pasta, also gluten-free. And a breakfast cereal- all corn. Lots of rice and rice noodles. No pretzels or chips.”

“So he’s gluten-intolerant,” Walt said. “Where’s the crime in that?”

“Check it out, Sherlock.” The toe of her boot pointed at an open drawer. There were some potatoes, a bag of onions, and a loaf of bread. “What’s he doing with the loaf of bread if he can’t eat gluten?”

“Just because he doesn’t eat it doesn’t mean he doesn’t serve it.” But she’d raised his curiosity. He bent down and retrieved the loaf from the drawer. “And it’s moldy, to boot. Probably forgot he even had it.”

He balanced and bounced the loaf in his hand a couple of times, weighing it. Unusually heavy. “I want a record of this,” he said as he placed the loaf on the cutting board. He didn’t like that he had missed this; liked it even less that she had pointed it out to him. But there was no changing that now; and he wasn’t going to ignore it simply because she had brought it to his attention, though the thought crossed his mind.

“Pictures of you opening a loaf of bread? Seriously?”

“Just shoot it, please.”

She ran off a series of shots, as Walt unfastened the plastic clip and opened the wrapper. His gloved hand reached in and pulled out the first few slices.

The center of the loaf had been hollowed out. A brick of money wrapped in stretch plastic wrap filled the cavity.

Click, click. Fiona gasped while ru

Walt peeled back the stretch wrap, revealing one-hundred-dollar bills. Three inches high.

Walt whistled. “There’s got to be thirty or forty thousand dollars here.”

“Good Lord,” she said. “I’ve never seen that much cash.”

“His own little in-joke. Bread? Dough? And that’s where he hid it.”

“Poaching?”

“It’s got to be dirty,” Walt said. “But he’s a doctor, don’t forget. It could be poaching. It could be drugs. Abortions. Blackmail, I suppose.”

“And we’ll never know,” she said.

“What are you talking about?” Walt said irritably. “Of course we’ll know! It’s my job to know. To find out. Don’t say things like that, you’ll jinx it.”