скачать книгу бесплатно
‘Huh. That’s what you get for not using what God gave you,’ Guthrie said.
The dog had joined them at the threshold now, and was growling loudly. Not at Will this time, but at whatever lay out there in the night. Guthrie didn’t hush her, but stared out at the darkness. ‘She smells bears. You’d better not hang around.’
‘I won’t,’ Will said, offering his hand to Guthrie The man looked down at it in puzzlement for a moment, as though he’d forgotten this simple ritual. Then he took it.
‘You should think about what I told you,’ he said. ‘About poisoning the bears. You’d be doing them a favour.’
‘I’d be doing Jacob’s work for him,’ Will replied. ‘That’s not what I was put on the planet to do.’
‘We’re all doing his work just being alive,’ Guthrie replied. ‘Adding to the trash-heap.’
‘Well at least I won’t be adding to the population,’ Will said, and started from the threshold towards his jeep.
‘You and Sister Ruth both,’ Guthrie called after him. There was a sudden eruption of fresh barking from his dog, a shrillness in its din which Will knew all too well. He’d heard camp dogs raise a similar row at the approach of lions. There was warning in it, and Will took heed. Scanning the darkness to left and right of him he was at the jeep in half a dozen quickened heartbeats.
On the step behind him, Guthrie was yelling something – whether he was summoning his guest back inside or urging him to pick up his pace Will couldn’t make out; the dog was too loud. He blocked out the sound of both voices, man and animal, and concentrated on making his fingers perform the simple function of slipping the key into the lock. They played the fool. He fumbled, and the key slipped out of his hand. He went down on his haunches, the dog’s barking shriller by the moment, to pluck it out of the snow. Something moved at the limit of his vision. He looked around, his fingers digging blindly for the key. He could see only the rocks, but that was little comfort. The animal could be in hiding now and on him in five seconds. He’d seen them attack, and they were fast when they needed to be, moving like locomotives to take their quarry. He knew the drill if a bear elected to charge him: drop to his knees, arms over his head, face to ground. Present as small a target as possible, and on no account make eye contact with the animal. Don’t speak. Don’t move. The less alive you were, the better chance you had of living. There was probably a lesson in that somewhere, though it was a bitter one. Live like a stone and death might pass you by.
His fingers had found the dropped key. He stood up, chancing a backward glance as he did so. Guthrie was still in the doorway, his dog, her hackles raised, now silenced at his side. Will hadn’t heard Guthrie hush her; she’d simply given up on this damn fool man who couldn’t come out of the snow when he was told.
On the third time of trying, the key went into the lock. Will hauled open the door. As he did so he heard the bear’s roar for the first time. And there it was, barrelling out between the rocks. There was no doubting its intention. It had him in its sights. He flung himself into the driver’s seat, horribly aware of how vulnerable his legs were, and reached back to slam the door behind him.
The roar came again, very close. He locked the door, put the key into the ignition and turned it. The headlamps came on instantly, flooding the icy ground as far as the rocks, which looked as flat as stage scenery in their glare. Of the bear there was no sign. He glanced back towards Guthrie’s shack. Man and dog had retreated behind the locked door. He put the jeep in gear and started to swing it round. As he did so he heard the roar again, followed by a thump. The bear had charged the vehicle in its frustration, and was rising up on its hind legs to strike it a second time. Will caught only a glimpse of its shaggy white bulk from the corner of his eye. It was a huge animal, no doubt of that: nine hundred pounds and counting. If it damaged the jeep badly enough to halt his escape, he’d be in trouble. The bear wanted him, and it had the means to get him if he didn’t outpace it. Claws and teeth enough to pry the vehicle open like a can of human meat.
He put his foot on the accelerator, and swung the vehicle around to head it back down the street. As he did so the bear changed tactics and direction, dropping back onto all fours to overtake the jeep, then cutting in front of it.
For an instant the animal was there in the sear of the headlamps, its wedge-snouted head pointing directly at the vehicle. It was not one of the pitiful clan Guthrie had described, their ferality dimmed by their addiction to human refuse. It was a piece of the wilderness still; defying the blaze and speed of the vehicle in whose path it had put itself. In the instant before it was struck, it was gone, disappearing with such speed that its departure seemed almost miraculous; as though it had been a vision conjured by the cold, then snatched away.
As he drove back to the house, he felt for the first time the poverty of his craft. He had taken tens of thousands of photographs in his professional lifetime, in some of the wildest regions of the planet: the Torres de Paine, the plateaus of Tibet, the Gunung Leuser in Indonesia. There he had photographed species that were in their last desperate days, rogues and man-eaters. But he had never come close to capturing what he had seen in the jeep’s headlamps minutes before: the power and the glory of the bear, risking death to defy him. Perhaps it was beyond his talents to do so; in which case it was probably beyond anybody’s talents. He was, by general consensus, the best of the best. But the wild was better. Just as it was his genius to wait upon his subject until it revealed itself, so it was the genius of the wild to make that revelation less than complete. The rogues and man-eaters were dying out, one by one, but the mystery continued, undisclosed. And would continue. Will suspected, until the end of the rogues and mysteries and the men who were fools for them both.
III (#ulink_9f25840c-fc57-5872-9cbe-78325c647897)
Cornelius Botham sat at the table with a hand-rolled cigarette lolling from beneath his blond feather moustache, his third beer of the morning set at his elbow, and surveyed the disembowelled Pentax laid out before him.
‘What’s wrong with it?’ Will wanted to know.
‘It’s broken,’ Cornelius dead-panned. ‘I say we hack a hole in the ice, wrap it in a pair of Adrianna’s knickers and bury it for future generations to discover.’
‘You can’t fix it?’
‘Yes, I can fix it,’ Cornelius said. ‘That is why I’m here. I can fix everything. But I would prefer to hack a hole in the ice, wrap it in a pair of Adrianna’s knickers—’
‘It’s given good service, that camera.’
‘So have we all. But sooner or later, if we’re lucky, we’ll be wrapped in a pair of Adrianna’s knickers—’
Will was at the stove, making himself a ragged omelette. ‘You’re obsessing.’
‘I am not.’
Will slid his breakfast onto a plate, tossed two slices of stale bread on top of it, and came to sit at the table opposite Cornelius.
‘You know what’s wrong with this town?’ Cornelius asked.
‘Give me an A, B or C.’
This was a popular guessing game amongst the trio, the trick being to dream up alternatives more believable than the truth.
‘No problem,’ Cornelius said. He sipped a mouthful of beer and then said: ‘Okay. A, right? There aren’t any good-looking women in two hundred miles, besides Adrianna, and that’d be like fucking my sister. Okay? So, B. You can’t get any decent acid. And C—’
‘It’s B.’
‘Wait, I haven’t finished.’
‘You don’t have to.’
‘Fuck, man. I got a great C
‘It’s the acid,’ Will said. He leaned towards Cornelius. ‘Right?’
‘Yeah.’ He peered at Will’s plate. ‘What the hell’s that?’
‘Omelette.’
‘What did you make it with? Penguin eggs?’
Will laughed, and was still laughing when Adrianna came in out of the cold. ‘Hey, we got more bears at the dump,’ she said, her Southern drawl perfectly mismatched with every other detail of her appearance and manner, from her badly trimmed bangs to her heavy-booted stomp. ‘At least four of ‘em. Two adolescents, a female and a huge male.’ She looked first at Will, then at Cornelius, then back at Will. ‘A little enthusiasm, please?’
‘Just give me a few minutes,’ Will said, ‘I need a couple of cups of coffee first.’
‘You’ve got to see this male. I mean—’ she was struggling for the words ‘—this is the biggest damn bear I ever saw.’
‘Maybe the one I saw last night,’ Will said. ‘Actually we saw each other. Outside Guthrie’s place.’
Adrianna unzipped her parka and sat down on the beaten-up sofa, flinging aside a pillow and blanket to do so. ‘He kept you talking for quite a while,’ she said. ‘What was the old fuck like?’
‘No more crazy than anybody’d be. living in a shack in the middle of nowhere.’
‘On his own?’
‘He had a dog. Lucy.’
‘Hey…’ Cornelius cooed. ‘Does that sound like a man with a supply or what?’ He grinned, his eyes popping. ‘Only a guy with a habit would name his dog Lucy.’
‘Christ!’ Adrianna shouted. ‘I am so thoroughly sick of hearing you talk about getting high.’
Cornelius shrugged. ‘Whatever,’ he said.
‘We came here to do a job of work.’
‘And we’ve done it,’ Cornelius said. ‘Every damn undignified, pitiful thing a polar bear can do we’ve got on film. Bears playing around the broken sewage pipes. Bears trying fucky-fucky in the middle of the dump.’
‘Okay, okay,’ Adrianna said, ‘we did good.’ She turned to Will. ‘I still want you to see my bear,’ she said.
‘ Your bear now, is it?’ Cornelius said.
She ignored him. ‘Just one last shoot,’ she implored Will. ‘You won’t be disappointed.’
‘Jeez,’ Cornelius remarked, putting his legs up on the table. ‘Leave the man alone. He doesn’t want to see the fucking bear. Haven’t you got the message?’
‘Keep out of this,’ Adrianna snapped.
‘You’re so fucking pushy,’ Cornelius replied. ‘It’s just a bear.’
Adrianna was up from the couch and over to Cornelius in two strides. ‘I told you: keep out of this,’ she said, and shoved Cornelius’ shoulder just hard enough to tip him over. Down he went, clearing half of the doomed Pentax from the table with his boot-heel as he went.
‘Come on,’ Will said, setting down his omelette in case there was an escalation in hostilities. If there was, it wouldn’t be the first time. Nine days out of every ten Cornelius and Adrianna worked side by side like brother and sister. And on the tenth they fought, like brother and sister. Today, however, Cornelius wasn’t in the mood for insults or fisticuffs. He got to his feet, brushing his hippielength hair back out of his eyes, and stumbled to the door, picking up his anorak on his way. ‘See you later,’ he said to Will. ‘I’m going to go look at the water.’
‘Sorry about that,’ Adrianna said when he’d gone. ‘It was my fault. I’ll make peace when he gets back.’
‘Whatever.’
Adrianna went to the stove and poured herself a cup of coffee. ‘So what did Guthrie have to say?’
‘Not a lot.’
‘Why did you even go see him?’
Will shrugged. ‘Just…some stuff from my childhood…’ he said.
‘Big secret?’
Will offered her a slow smile. ‘Huge.’
‘So you’re not going to tell me?’
‘It’s nothing to do with us being here. Well, it is and it isn’t. I knew Guthrie lived on the Bay, so I kind of killed two birds…’ the words grew soft ‘…with one stone.’
‘Are you going to photograph him?’ she said, crossing to the window. The Tegelstrom children, who lived across the street, were out playing in the snow, their laughter loud. She peered out at them.
‘No,’ Will said. ‘I already invaded his privacy.’
‘Like I’m invading yours?’
‘I didn’t mean that.’
That’s right though, isn’t it?’ she said gently. ‘I never get to hear what life was like for little Willy Rabjohns.’
‘That’s because—’
‘—you don’t want to tell me.’ She was warming to her thesis now. ‘You know…this is how you used to be with Patrick.’
‘Unfair.’
‘You used to drive him crazy. He’d call me up sometimes and vent these streams of abuse—’
‘He is a melodramatic queen,’ Will said, fondly.
‘He said you were cryptic. You are. He said you were secretive. You’re that too.’
‘Isn’t that the same thing?’
‘Don’t get intellectual. It pisses me off.’
‘Have you spoken to him recently?’
‘Now you’re changing the subject.’
‘I am not. You were talking about Patrick and now I’m talking about Patrick.’
‘I was talking about you.’
‘I’m bored with me. Have you talked to Patrick recently?’
Sure.’
‘And how is he?’
‘Up and down. He tried to sell the apartment but he couldn’t get the price he wanted so he’s staying put. He says it depresses him, living in the middle of the Castro. So many widowers, he says. But I think it’s better he’s there. Especially if he gets sicker. He’s got a strong support group of friends.’
‘Is whatsisname still around? The kid with the dyed eyelashes?’
‘You know his name, Will,’ Adrianna said, turning and narrowing her eyes.
‘Carlos,’ Will said.
‘Rafael.’
‘Close enough.’
‘Yes, he’s still around. And he doesn’t dye his eyelashes. He’s got beautiful eyes. In fact he’s a wonderful kid. I surely wasn’t as giving or as loving as he is at nineteen. And I’m damn sure you weren’t.’
‘I don’t remember nineteen,’ Will said. ‘Or twenty, come to that. I have a very vague recollection of twenty-one—’ He laughed. ‘But you get to a place when you’re so high you’re not high any more.’
‘And that was twenty-one?’
‘It was a very fine year for acid tabs.’
‘Do you regret it?’
