Flight Fishing

by L.M.Lewis

It's an art, not a science.

Disclaimer: "I write not to get money, but for pleasure." I. Walton

This is a work of fiction, as are all of the characters within.

Rated: K+

Author's Note: In a previous story of mine (Fugue) Dr. Phillip Westerfield unknowingly ran afoul of a mobster named Cartori. That's really all the back story needed here though, at the risk of repeating myself, I will also say that Westerfield is the shrink from All Things Change but Truth, and the never-ending story, Sessions.

Fishing and the consequences thereof, arise three times in the Canon ('The Long Ago Girl,' 'She Ain't Deep but She Sure Runs Fast,' and 'The Career Breaker'), with the impression that Hardcastle is devoted to the art and McCormick considerably less so.

The leprechaun incident is from the episode 'In the Eye of the Beholder'.

Thanks for the beta-work, Owl.

Flight Fishing

By L. M. Lewis

"Good company and good discourse are the very sinews of virtue."
Izaac Walton The Compleat Angler

It was Saturday morning, and Philip Westerfield, feeling only the slightest twinge of guilt, had turned off the ringer on his phone. His beeper was off, too; he had a colleague covering him for the weekend. It was the first time in nearly a year. The uninterrupted silence was perhaps even a little unsettling, but he thought he would get used to it fairly quickly.

And then the doorbell rang.

He briefly considered ignoring it, but some deeper, almost subconscious response took over, and he was on his feet, abandoning the coffee and the newspaper, almost before he fully realized what he was doing. It rang again, insistently, as he covered the short distance between the kitchen and the foyer, and when he opened the door he saw his visitor, finger poised over the ringer, ready to strike again.

"Oh, hi, Doc," Milt Hardcastle grinned. There was a slight edge of nervous expectation, as though he wasn't exactly certain how he'd be received. "Can we come in?"

'We', of course—behind him was Mark McCormick, half turned away, looking over his shoulder like a man who was keeping watch for something. Westerfield felt as though he'd barely stepped back in unspoken invitation before both men breezed past him and into the living room.

McCormick went directly to the front window, adjusting the blinds to mostly obstruct the view in. Then he moved off to the side a little, so that he could still scan a portion of the street without himself being seen. The judge was still smiling in the way that Westerfield associated with being told that what was coming next might be worrisome.

"Glad we caught ya; had a little news this morning." Hardcastle frowned; he glanced over at Mark.

"Just tell him," the younger man said impatiently.

"Tell me what?"

The judge cleared his throat. "Got a phone call. It was from a very reliable source. Word is Cartori may have hired another hit man to finish the job that William Tunis botched. He's got nothing to lose, really, with his trial coming up next week. Things are looking bad for him unless he takes out some witnesses."

"Me?"

"Yeah," Hardcastle nodded. "You and McCormick both. The DA hadn't contacted you yet?"

Westerfield shot a guilty look at his phone and shook his head. To his surprise, this got a broader smile from Hardcastle.

"Good," the judge said with an air of relief.

Westerfield gave him a puzzled glance. "It's been off, though—my phone."

McCormick turned away from the window. "Might not have much time, then. They might be here any minute."

"Who?"

"Somebody from the DA, and a detail from the sheriff's office," Hardcastle explained quickly. "They're gonna want their star witnesses where they can keep an eye on them."

"A safe house." Mark had a look of disgust on his face. "Four walls. Cold pizza. Bad coffee."

"But if there's a hit-man running around—"

"Yeah," the judge nodded, "the DA most likely won't give you much choice. They can lean pretty hard. But—"

"You've got something else in mind?"

"A little getaway," Hardcastle smiled expansively. "Cold beer. All the trout you can eat."

"I said Las Vegas," Mark added glumly.

"Too high-profile."

"It's a big town."

"Full of guys who owe Cartori a favor. Anyway, fishing is more relaxing."

"I don't even know how to fish," Westerfield interjected.

"Hah, neither does McCormick. He's just lucky, that's all," the judge said with a shake of his head. "Anyway, I can show you the ropes. I got a great little spot up in the mountains. Quiet. Real beautiful this time of year. Got all the camping stuff loaded up. We can head up there for the weekend; get back here just in time for the trial. Once you've testified, the heat is off."

"But—"

"Cold pizza that wasn't any good before it got cold," McCormick intoned.

"Just throw some stuff in a bag. You don't even need a razor."

"They're gonna be here any minute." Mark said grimly. He was back at the window, lifting a blind slightly. "Better hustle."

Westerfield gave it about three seconds of thought before pivoting and heading for the bedroom, and the closet where he kept a duffle bag. If these two were worried then he was inclined to believe that measures were justified, though it seemed that McCormick, at least, was more in dread of confinement with cold pizza than anything Cartori might be sending after them.

Milt had followed him as far as the doorway of the bedroom and was offering tips. "Layers, might be a little brisk in the evenings. Lots of pairs of dry socks—wool if ya got 'em. Flannel shirts are good."

He'd barely gotten the last drawer closed, thrown a couple of books into the bag for good measure, and had the whole thing zipped up, when he heard Mark again, sounding impatient.

"Come on, guys."

Then they were heading out the front door, McCormick taking the lead and heading for the driver's side with a look of determination. Milt didn't argue with him, just threw the duffle into the back and started to clamber into the cab as well. All-in-all, Westerfield doubted that fifteen minutes had elapsed since the unexpected interruption of his morning paper and now Mark looked up into the rearview mirror and uttered a quiet, "See," just as they turned the corner at the end of the block.

The doc glanced over his shoulder; the judge was doing the same. Two vehicles had pulled up in front of the house, one of them obviously a black-and-white, though there'd been no lights or sirens.

"The nick of time," Mark sighed. "Might still need some evasive maneuvers."

"Frank said they were pretty determined," Hardcastle muttered.

"The lieutenant? He's your 'source'?"

"Uh-huh. And I told him to give us an hour's start and then tell 'em to call off the dogs. Don't want 'em wasting too much effort." The judge had turned frontward again and settled back in with a smile of satisfaction on his face. "Fishing," he said, "nothing like it to clear the mind and relax a guy."

"Vegas is pretty relaxing," Mark replied. "It's not too late."

"Nah. Flannel shirts, wool socks. We'd look goofy."

00000

No evasive maneuvers were required, though the man at the wheel shot frequent glances behind him and stayed off the interstate until they were well out of town. Hardcastle kept up a steady patter on the subject of fishing, which was probably meant to be calming. Westerfield nodded when required and at one point had a thought that required interrupting.

"Where's your wife?" He'd leaned forward to address that one to Mark.

"With her mom," he gestured one-handed, vaguely in the direction of north. "Up in Oregon at her aunt's. Told her to just stay there till the dust settles." He shot a quick lateral glance at the judge. "Woulda told her to meet us in Las Vegas."

Hardcastle shrugged lightly. "Couple of days. You take the stand, then you're in the clear. Kathy thought the fishing was a good idea, remember?'

McCormick nodded glumly.

00000

The exurban landscape gave way to desert, and eventually to the foothills of the Sierras. The roads became ever more winding and obscure but Mark seemed to require no directions. They'd made one stop at a general store in a town called Clear Lake, for ice, and beer, and fishing licenses. It was mid-afternoon, though, before they finally negotiated one last twisting stretch, and emerged past a rocky narrows into a wooded stretch with the sound of active water not far away.

They parked, and got out, grateful to finally stretch. Westerfield looked around with appreciation. There were aspen, and pine, with a feeling of higher altitude. He was trying to remember when he'd last been out of the city.

Mark already had the tailgate down, and was off-loading gear. He seemed to approach the whole project with more energy than would be expected from mere resignation. Westerfield suspected the pointed references comparing Vegas to a trout stream were more out of habit than conviction.

They seemed to have the division of labor down fairly cold and a system that didn't require much discussion. Westerfield was allowed to make himself useful, and the whole thing was set up, complete with the beginnings of a campfire, in under forty-five minutes.

"Lunch," Mark said, finally straightening up and eyeing the fire judiciously.

"Gimme a hour, I'll have ya a couple of nice ones."

"Aw, come on, Judge, you know the only way that's gonna happen is if I go ahead and start the burgers. Besides, you give the doc here a fishing lesson, and then I'll give him a cleaning lesson, and we'll have the fillets for dinner."

"Can't make him clean fish," Hardcastle protested. "He's company."

"I don't mind," Westerfield said.

"See," Mark grinned, "he's volunteering. Anyway, you know what they say. 'Give a man a fish and he's got dinner. Teach a man to clean fish, and he's got something to do while you catch them'—besides, I've been waiting six years to have seniority over somebody on one of these trips." He bent over, placing another middling-sized piece of wood on the fire, then set to work, rummaging in the cooler for what he needed.

Westerfield wandered over to the rock where Hardcastle had seated himself, rods propped alongside and tackle box open at his feet. The man was looking out over the water, giving it an apparent close study. Then he looked back down at the tackle box and retrieved something.

"Doesn't look much like a fly."

"That," the judge said, "is because you're not a trout." He smiled as he attached his choice to the leader, then he stepped over to the bank. "We'll try from here, till you've got the hang of it."

Westerfield nodded, standing to the side, hands in his pockets.

He listened to the other man explain about reading the river, figuring out where the fish might be, which, for the sound of it, was just about anywhere, depending on a whole series of variables with greater and lesser weights. As to the nature of the fly, that depended on what the fish would be in a mood to eat, and another series of possibilities and probabilities.

The doc looked back over his shoulder for a moment and finally said, "Hamburger seems like more of a sure thing."

"Yeah," Hardcastle grinned, "but what's the fun in that? Now, casting . . ."

He observed carefully as the judge demonstrated the basic techniques. Eventually Hardcastle proved there were fish out there, bringing in a decent-sized trout before the younger man's summons interrupted their activity.

They moseyed back up to camp. Mark took the creel and inspected the catch.

"See," he said, "I knew the hamburgers would be good luck." He set the creel aside and started dishing up food.

"Hah," Hardcastle grinned, "you've finally found a way to take credit for them without even putting a hook in the water." He accepted a plate in trade for one of the beers he'd liberated from the cooler.

They settled themselves, beers and burgers to hand, along with chips, and coleslaw, and potato salad. The river provided a steady comforting noise while off to the north a solitary hawk soared on the thermals.

"Come on now, tell me this isn't better than a noisy casino."

Mark took another bit of food, chewed thoughtfully for a moment, and then finally said, "Well, this bit's okay, but there's a whole lot of loading up, and unloading, and stake driving, and air mattress blowing up, and fish gutting that goes along with it. All you have to do in Vegas is figure out which buffet you want to eat at."

"Yeah, and the fish isn't as fresh."

"But you don't have to pull all those little pin bones out yourself, and nobody tries to talk you into eating trout for breakfast."

"All right," Hardcastle huffed, "bacon and eggs tomorrow. But you don't know what you'll be missing."

"Yes I do." Mark said mildly. "I've had it a whole bunch of times and I just think three meals of it a day is one too many."

Westerfield had gone to only half-listening; it was almost as much background noise as the wind in the aspens. There was a moment or two more before it startled him, the idea of not-listening. He blinked once and then frowned slightly.

"You okay?" Mark asked him.

"Ah . . . yeah." He thought that one over for a bit and then added, "Just relaxed, I think."

"Well don't think about it too much," the judge interjected. "Kinda ruins the whole relaxing thing if you do." He made short work of the rest of his burger, one eye clearly still on the stream.

"Oh, go on," Mark shooed him away with a free hand. "Leave the cleaning up and fish-gutting to the expert."

Hardcastle didn't wait to be told twice. He finished the last swig of beer and was on his feet, scraping his plate into the fire.

"I was just kidding about the fish-cleaning," Mark added to Westerfield, when he made no immediate moves to join the other man on the bank.

"Actually, sounded like it might be sort of interesting."

McCormick made a face. "Nope. Not a bit. Not even if you've never seen the inside of a fish before. And there's just the one . . . so far. Won't take me long. No reason for us both to wind up with fishy hands. You go ahead and practice casting."

He gave in politely, scraping his plate and stacking it with Hardcastle's. Mark was already standing, scooping the catch out and handing the empty creel to him. He took it, and wandered back down to the stream.

This time the judge was attaching something to the second line. Westerfield watched the process for a moment and then said, "Well, that one looks like a fly. I mean, it has a head, and wings at least."

"Ah, sorry," Hardcastle glanced up then grinned and went back to his knot, "it's supposed to be a sculpin—that's a little fish. We're gonna start you out with it. Only for you it'll be a dead sculpin. You'll just cast it in out there about twenty feet or so, and let it drift down on the surface."

He finished the tying-off, and handed the rod over. "Remember all the steps I showed you?"

"Theoretically."

"Well, you won't get it till you do it."

"Stand back."

Hardcastle wisely did, still smiling. The first one went in a little short. The second was a slight improvement. He kept at it, steadily, unhindered by anything actually molesting his line.

"You sure you didn't catch the last one out there?"

"It's not supposed to be easy," the judge said encouragingly. "What'd be the fun in that?"

Westerfield frowned, nodded, and went back at it. McCormick wandered over. He sat down, back against a rock, staying out of harm's way and appearing to study the river in a manner that was strikingly reminiscent of what the judge had been doing earlier.

After an interval that might have included a nap, he got up, stretched indolently, and then stooped and poked around in the tackle box.

"Don't mess it all up," Hardcastle growled, and then, in a tone of barely concealed curiosity, "Whatcha gonna use?"

Mark held up a small fly. "The one with the orange fuzzy stuff on one side."

"They've got proper names, ya know."

"Yeah," McCormick grinned as he reached for the third rod. "Ya got your wooly-headed thingamabobs, and your peacock zug bugs."

He pulled the tippet down and quickly tied off, picked up a net, then clambered to his feet and strolled off along the bank, downstream, passing out of sight around a piney bend.

The judge shook his head, muttering, "Thing is, he'll drop the orange fuzzy thingamabob in the water and some damn twelve-pounder will rise to it, sure as shootin'."

Westerfield had hauled his line in and was staring at a knot that had mysteriously appeared in it. "Well, there's probably more to it than that."

"Think so?"

The doc shrugged and studied the knot a little closer, "There's got to be something he's as good at as you are, but it wouldn't count if he looked like he was working at it too hard."

"Huh?" Hardcastle looked over his shoulder, downriver, then back at the other man. "There's lots of things he's good at." He frowned and then added, "Locks, he's real good with locks."

"Hmm," Westerfield picked at the knot, "yes, but it has to be something you think is important or it wouldn't really count."

"It's not like it's some sort of competition," Hardcastle protested. "I mean, it's not like we've got money riding on it or something—least not most of the time—" He shook his head and then stepped over to where the doc was standing. "You just cut it off above the knot and tie the leader back on." He'd fished out a pocket knife. "See?" He trimmed the section out and retied.

"You want to take over for a while?" Westerfield straightened up slowly. "I think I'm gonna feel this tomorrow."

"Ah . . . sure," the judge looked briefly concerned. "I shoulda asked you if the shoulder was okay."

"Mostly it is." He handed the rod over then reached up and rubbed the spot thoughtfully. "Great excuse when I'm down a few points in racquetball, though—'The old gunshot wound's acting up some,'" the doc drawled, then grinned crookedly. He stepped back, out of the way, and settled himself near the rock.

Hardcastle took over, casting further out, and upstream, letting the fly float with the current. He made it look easy, only a little too focused to be considered contemplative. Still, he appeared to be contemplating something, and after a while he said, with a fair degree of firmness, "Ya know, fishing really isn't about catching fish."

"But it's a pretty good way of keeping score." Mark announced, having just sauntered back around the bend again. He held up a good-sized rainbow for Hardcastle's inspection. "Just one, but I figure we've got enough for dinner."

He laid the fish in the creel and lifted the thing by its strap. "Gotta go clean it." He offered Westerfield the rod. "You want to give it another try? The orange fuzzy thingamajig is hot."

"No," Westerfield clutched his shoulder, "The old gunshot wound is acting up some."

The smile obviously belied the words and Mark gave him a quick return grin and said, "I'll have to remember that one. Whaddaya think, Judge?"

Hardcastle looked over his shoulder and hmmphed. "You're never in too weakened a condition to roll a set of dice, though, and what do you ever have to show for it?"

"Gambling really isn't about winning money." McCormick's grin stayed in place as he set the rod carefully against the rock. He looked up at the sun, now casting longer shadows through the pines on the opposite bank, then down at this watch. "I'll call ya when it's ready."

"You gonna do that thing with the onions and the aluminum foil?" The judge asked eagerly.

The younger man nodded absently and then turned and carried the creel back up to camp.

"Maybe I should go give him a hand," Westerfield said, without actually moving from what had become a very comfortable spot.

"Nah," Hardcastle cast again, "if he doesn't do it all by himself, he won't have as much to complain about later on."

The doc thought about this and gave it a nod. The sun was still above the western peaks with a hint of cloud cover coming up. The sound of the river was very soothing. He thought he might close his eyes, just for a moment.

"Hey, dinnertime."

Westerfield blinked a couple of times. "Didn't we finish lunch about an hour ago?" But he could smell the onions, carried on a deeper odor of wood smoke. The wind had changed direction. And, more surprisingly, he was hungry.

The river lay in shadows and the mountains were silhouetted black against the last red-gold rays. The judge was stooping; he sorted out something in the tackle-box and flipped the lid shut, latching it.

"I fell asleep, huh?"

"Yeah, for a bit."

"Must be the fresh air." Westerfield stifled a yawn and got to his feet.

They gathered up the gear—he heard Mark hollering something about it 'not getting any doner'—and headed up the slope. There was a camp lantern hanging from a low branch. It shed a circle of light in the deepening shadows. The fire was down to cooking coals. Mark pulled the grill off and reached for more wood.

He already had the beers out, and the foil-wrapped packages sorted on three plates, atop the cooler. "Careful," he said, "they're hot, 'specially the potatoes."

"Smells great."

"Secret recipe." Mark sat down, cross-legged, and opened a steaming package. "Onions in everything—"

"And garlic," Hardcastle added, reaching for a plate.

"Yup, keeps the mosquitoes away." McCormick grinned. "Vampires, too."

The judge shook his head. "Now, that's just an old wives' tale."

"Hah, when's the last time we went fishing and got attacked by vampires?"

"Leeches," Hardcastle speared a piece of trout and munched thoughtfully. "There were leeches up in Lost Lake. Remember those?"

Mark frowned. "I think that was before the secret recipe. Anyway, a leech is not a vampire. I think you use salt for leeches."

"Yes," Westerfield said quietly, "salt works, though it might not be such a good idea to aggravate a leech."

"Isn't that the point?" McCormick asked. "I mean, what else is it going to do? It's already biting you and sucking out your blood."

"Yeah," the doc shrugged, "but if you aggravate it while it's in the middle of feeding, it can regurgitate into the wound."

Mark stared at him for a moment.

"You mean," he swallowed hard, "leech puke?"

"More or less."

Hardcastle frowned, still chewing steadily. "We used to use Zippo lighters, unless we were worried about drawing fire, then we'd just pull 'em off. I never heard that thing about 'em puking."

McCormick set his plate down, reached over and put another piece of wood into the now brightly-burning fire. "If you think it needs salt or pepper," he said quietly, "we've got some."

"No," Westerfield shook his head, "it's perfect."

"You learn a lot of weird stuff in medical school, I guess," the younger man added casually.

"Well," the doc frowned, "yes, but I think I might've missed the leech lecture. It wasn't really what I was interested in back then. But I picked up a lot of applied leech theory in Viet Nam. Shared a hooch with an infectious disease guy who specialized in parasitology. He loved his work. Leeches were just a sideline for him, though. What he used to talk about incessantly was flukes."

"Flukes?"

"Yes." The doc took another bite, nodded and swallowed. "Giant intestinal flukes."

"How giant?"

Westerfield held his thumb and finger up, about three inches apart. "Kind of flashy. Most of the common species were smaller. Chinese liver flukes—lots of those and not just in China. People get them from eating undercooked fish."

McCormick stared down at his half-eaten plate of trout with a look that might have been a twinge of worry.

"Of course flukes are just the tip of the iceberg. There's a tape worm that starts out in fish, too."

Mark stared for a moment and then asked, almost hesitantly, "How big?"

Westerfield squinted a moment in concentration and then said, "I think thirty-five feet would be close to a record catch."

"Southeast Asia, though, right?" Mark asked hopefully.

"Ah . . . no, that one is found in North America. Had an outbreak in LA about ten years ago as a matter of fact."

"Ugh," McCormick said. "Like snakes, only on the inside." He nudged his plate slightly further away.

"There's a medication for it. You take it by mouth, and it kills the tapeworm on contact. Very simple."

Mark thought about that. "And then . . ." he frowned, "then—" Even by firelight, he looked pale.

"You're right," Hardcastle interjected, "better than ghost stories." He picked up another forkful of trout and shoveled it in.

McCormick shot him a look, which quickly tracked back to the other man. His eyes suddenly narrowed. "I'm being had, huh?" He shook his head and picked up his plate. "Bet you're a lot of fun at dinner parties, doc."

"Well," Westerfield smiled very sincerely, "it's all absolutely true. That's what makes it so ghastly. Hey, how do you think I wound up sharing quarters with a chatty parasitologist? The rest of them figured a shrink would have good coping mechanisms."

"Hah," Mark muttered, taking another determined bite.

Hardcastle, who seemed to be elsewhere, thought-wise, stopped chewing briefly and said, "How do you get a thirty-five foot tape worm into a fish? I mean, even a decent-sized salmon."

"Oh," Westerfield shrugged, "in the fish they're just—"

"No," Mark interrupted sternly. "No more fish stories."

The doc subsided, looking a little guilty. He leaned slightly in Hardcastle's direction and said, sotto voce, "I can explain to you later." The judge nodded wisely.

"You two," Mark huffed, then paused, as if he hadn't gotten any further than that in terms of recrimination. Then he brightened. "It's fish envy, that's what it is. One tiny little spot of good luck in my otherwise weirdly unfortunate life, and you guys—"

"You think you have bad luck?" The judge looked at him in innocent puzzlement.

McCormick stared back at him. "Well, yeah, I'd say so."

"I dunno," Hardcastle shook his head. "You got to be a racecar driver, won some races, walked away from all the crashes; then you got me as a judge—"

"Twice," Mark interjected in smiling exasperation.

"Yeah, see? And you got shot a couple times but they missed anything vital."

McCormick looked down and muttered, "I kinda value my intestines."

"Yes, well, they're fairly vital," Westerfield nodded once then added, "but they can lop out a few inches and no harm done. Just that much less habitat for the—"

"Doc."

"And you finished law school at the top of your class," Hardcastle mulled on, as if he hadn't been interrupted.

"That was not luck," Mark said a little sharply.

"Okay," the judge furrowed his brow. "Not that. But all the rest of it, you've gotta admit—"

"I dunno, Judge, an awful lot of weird stuff happens to me."

"Weird stuff happens to everybody."

Mark looked dubious. "What about the leprechauns?"

"Leprechauns?" One of Westerfield's eyebrows was up.

"Little people," Hardcastle retorted firmly.

"Midget landscape specialists and auto mechanics," Mark stabbed the air with his fork. "They did a great job on the Coyote. And," he raised an eyebrow of his own, "what about Milly?"

Hardcastle fidgeted as though he didn't quite have an answer for that one.

"Leprechauns?" Westerfield was still frowning in bafflement.

"No," Mark shook his head. "She was a psychic. And who the heck did she pick up the vibes on? Lucky ol'Mark." He nodded once, sharply.

"Psychic, as in extra-sensory perception?" Westerfield said. "No one's ever been able to demonstrate that under laboratory conditions."

"Well, it's a good thing I wasn't shot in a laboratory then, I guess."

"She predicted it?" The doc asked.

"Yeah," Mark shrugged, "she said something bad would happen if I went to this party."

"But, considering your track record—"

"See," McCormick turned back to the judge while waving his fork in Westerfield's direction, "even the doc admits I'm unlucky."

"Well, I didn't exactly—" Westerfield paused, frowning, then started up again, "What did this woman predict, precisely?"

"Um . . ." McCormick looked momentarily flustered, as if he regretted bringing the whole thing up. The judge was no longer eating. "Well," Mark finally said, "she told me she saw a gun, and I'd be killed . . . and that's what happened; I got shot."

"But quite evidently you didn't die," Westerfield said. "So, she was only half-right."

"No wonder they never prove this stuff under laboratory conditions," Mark muttered, shaking his head. "Anyway, the reason I didn't die is that Milly figured out where I was."

Westerfield's eyebrow was up again, and he shot a questioning look at the judge. "That was the place at the bottom of the hill, that incident you told me about, when you first started getting your memory back? A psychic told you to go there?"

"Yeah," Hardcastle nodded. "Well, not exactly. I mean, we were out driving around, Milly and me, looking, and she kept saying the visions had stopped and—"

"Why were you driving where you were driving?"

The judge's brow was furrowed, as though it was something that he hadn't thought about in so many words.

"Proximity, mostly," he said. "I knew about how long the guys who attacked McCormick had been gone—how far they could have gotten. I figured they wanted to get him off their hands as quick as they could, so they wouldn't be missing from the party for too long. And seclusion—they had to hide him quick, but it couldn't be too far from the road." He grimaced. "They probably figured they'd go back later on and do a proper job of it."

"You told me it was daylight when you found him. How long had you been looking?"

"Hours," Hardcastle said, now grimly quiet. "Five, maybe six."

"And you were talking that whole time to this woman; telling her what you were doing, what you thought might have happened?"

"Ah," the judge thought about that one for a moment, "some, I guess. And then she told me about seeing a rock by the side of the road."

"Makes sense," Westerfield nodded. "Like you said, if they were going to return later and do something more definitive, they'd have picked a spot that was easy to find the second time."

"I suppose." The older man appeared almost lost in the recollection. "We even almost got run off the road by one of the guys. He'd already come back."

"Well, that had to be a pretty good sign that you were on the right track."

The judge nodded. "And right after that we saw a boulder alongside the road, and I had this feeling—"

"You, or her?"

Hardcastle frowned. "Both of us, I guess. I pulled over; she was saying to pull over."

"It met all your criteria: secluded, close to the party, just off the road, and easy to find again?"

"Yeah," Hardcastle admitted.

"So Milly might not have been psychic?" Mark asked. His expression was a mixture of relief and disappointment.

"Can't say. 'There are more things in heaven and earth . . .' Precognition, or just a very perceptive woman and a guy with good cop instincts? And they did have five hours to get it right. Either way," Westerfield grinned, "I'd say you were pretty lucky, Mark."

"You know," Hardcastle said to the younger man after a moment's silence, "you ought to let him have a whack at the leprechauns."

"Uh-uh," Mark said decisively, in the face of Westerfield's obvious curiosity, "I'm keeping them. Anybody want another beer?"

Bottles were handed out, plates got scraped, and the unburnable bits were bagged up and stowed safely in the bear-proof cab of the truck. Mark laid a couple more pieces of wood onto the merrily-blazing fire and settled back down again.

"We've got marshmallows, and peanuts. Anybody?"

"I dunno how you can eat another bite," the judge muttered. "It's like you've got a tapeworm or something."

Mark scowled, reached into the marshmallow bag, pulled one out and skewered it in a way that suggested he meant business.

"Got a spare stick?" Westerfield asked cheerfully.

00000

"But that seems like an awful lot of work." Mark pulled the blackened crust off and contemplated going for a second burn. "I mean, digging up every single body, just to make sure they were rotting properly. Ugh."

"Obsession on a grand scale." Westerfield rotated his stick slowly, methodically. He was going for the darkest possible brown that did not involve actual ignition. It called for patience and concentration. "Maybe they took it to extremes, but the vampire phobia is present in so many cultures that it appears to be an archetype, in the Jungian sense."

"Or based on reality," McCormick speculated.

The doc lifted one eyebrow. "Hardly that. Who needs real blood-sucking denizens of the night when we've got our own darker impulses to deal with? Jung would say that imagining evil is a way of externalizing it."

He shook his head, and very purposefully pushed the stick an inch further toward the fire. The result was an immediate and impressive immolation, a fireball of molten sugar and corn syrup. He pulled it out again and watched it shrink as the flames died, leaving a warty, shrunken, blackened crust.

"You gonna eat that?" Mark said doubtfully.

Westerfield waved it in the cooler air a few times, then tapped it on a rock. "I think not."

"I think you maybe need a new stick," Hardcastle added, cracking another peanut shell and tossing it into the fire.

"So," Mark said, returning relentlessly to the original discussion, "if they found one that wasn't, um, decomposing on schedule, then what? Put a stake through it?"

"I think that's more of a nineteenth century concept," Westerfield replied thoughtfully. "And it's psychoanalysis 101 to figure out what the staking business is all about."

They gave that a silent moment of group thought. McCormick finished peeling the bark off a new stick and handed it over. Westerfield accepted it, gazed at it for a moment and then put it down.

"Maybe I'll just eat them raw." He reached for the bag, pulled one out, bit into it. "But," he said, "digging up dead people is nothing compared to the way some cultures obsess. Things like vegetable vampires—"

"Come on." Hardcastle chucked another peanut shell into the fire and smiled.

"Not that dangerous, of course," Westerfield admitted, "lacking teeth, but annoying as heck rattling around in the root cellar at night. And then there are fears of inanimate objects becoming vampiric." He shrugged. "I'll admit that one's a little hard to explain."

Mark shook his head. "No, not really. We've got a copier at the clinic. Got it used," he frowned in the judge's direction, "because somebody was too cheap to spring for a new one. Who knows where this one has been, and it eats paper. I was trying to un-jam it the other day and it definitely bit me." He leaned forward to lay another piece of wood on the fire. There was a band-aid sticking out from under the cuff.

"I'd noticed it," the doc smiled, "but I was afraid to ask."

The judge snorted, and almost choked on a peanut. "Just the smoke," he said, as soon as he'd gotten his breath back.

"Sure," McCormick muttered. "Lemme know if you need the Heimlich maneuver." He let out a long slow sigh. "Okay, like I said, I'm not exactly lucky."

"I didn't say that," Hardcastle protested. "Besides, listen to the doc, here, everything has a rational explanation. There's no such thing as bad luck, or ESP, or any of that weird stuff."

Mark poked at the fire with a stick, the flames caught the edge of the new piece and the smoke cleared. Embers swirled up on the cool night breeze. He was still frowning.

"Maybe," he added slowly, "it's easier to be rational if weird stuff never happens to you."

There was more resignation than resentment in the statement. Silence followed it and eventually Mark lifted his gaze, as if to make certain he hadn't been misinterpreted.

Westerfield became gradually aware that he was being stared at with some concern by both men. From this he gathered that the silence might have gone on a bit longer than he'd realized and that there might be something in his expression that—

"Ya look like you saw a ghost," the judge said. "You okay?"

He nodded, reached for his beer and took a quick swig. "Maybe one too many marshmallows." He tried a smile.

It didn't impress anybody. Hardcastle was looking doubtful, Mark even more so, but it was he who said, "It's okay." And then, more as an aside to Hardcastle, "Some people don't like to talk about stuff."

It took a moment for the absurdity to strike Westerfield. The laugh that followed must have been a little sharp, though, or maybe just unexpected. Mark looked mildly embarrassed.

"Might be something to that," the doc said consideringly. "It's like the guy who always brings the camera to the party," he explained. "That way he never gets his picture taken. He's in control."

"Yeah, well, it's okay," Mark said quietly, giving the judge a sharp look. "Nobody has to have their picture taken."

"It's not that big a deal," Westerfield shrugged with a nonchalance that felt a little studied. "It was something that happened a long time ago. Almost twenty years now."

"'Nam?" Hardcastle was looking into the fire, ignoring all signals from the younger man.

The doc nodded once and added, "Of course war in general is a strange thing—all the ordinary rules of human engagement temporarily suspended."

"Like prison," Mark murmured.

Westerfield cocked his head just briefly and then nodded again. "Yes . . . and it would be more surprising if it didn't feel odd to be in a situation like that." He settled back a little against the log and took another swig from his bottle. He realized he was still talking in generalities. More of a group photograph. He swallowed and put the bottle down. "And you have to understand, it wasn't all that stressful. Not like combat. Rocket attacks now and then, and you didn't want to be out on the roads at night. But the rest of it was just heat, and sometimes rain, but mostly dust."

Still the generalities. He considered leaving it at that, but it was like starting out on a journey, and realizing, with sudden certainty, that though you didn't particularly want to continue on, you'd already gone too far to turn back.

He sighed and said, "I'd only been in country for about a month and I got a request for a consult—a guy in Long Binh Stockade. I could have had them ship him to me, but it was a good excuse to get off the medical base and go into Saigon." He looked up for a moment. "There were some great French restaurants there. Wine. Air conditioning." He smiled.

"So I got a jeep, and one of the technicians to drive, and I headed up the road. Just supposed to be a day trip. We hooked up with a convoy. Got there, did my consult. Pretty routine. Had my technician drop me off at a restaurant that had been recommended to me—had a nice meal." Westerfield frowned. "He was supposed to be back in two hours; he didn't show up for three and a half. I was pretty steamed, but it was mostly a sense of inconvenience at that point. Like I said, I'd only been over there a month or so.

"But when he finally did show up, he was contrite as hell. 'Trouble with the engine.' So we headed out. It was still light, but later than I'd planned. Still, I didn't think I could milk one consult for a two-day vacation.

"But by that time there weren't any convoys headed in our direction and once we were out of town, there were hardly any vehicles. It was a little worrisome; at least the driver seemed concerned. Still, I thought we'd make it back before dark.

"And then we had a flat, and by the time we got that fixed, it was pretty well into dusk. There wasn't any traffic on the road." Westerfield frowned. "And my tech was starting to look nervous, which ought to have been a clue. That, and then the jeep wouldn't start.

"We dug out a flashlight, and he poked around under the hood, and he finally got it to turn over again, but by then it was dark—really dark, the kind that you get when there's a jungle on both sides of you." The doc shook his head. "That and the jeep's headlights weren't working anymore."

"Electrical system," Mark said absently.

"I suppose." Westerfield shrugged. "But we'd already gone way past half-way, there was no point turning back. We decided we were only about five miles from camp. So we drove. Maybe another mile or two. I heard a noise, an engine, something big like a half-track—I wasn't even sure which direction the sound was coming from—and then suddenly there was a lot of light from behind, bright enough to read by. My driver jerked the wheel to get us out of the way.

"There was a thud. I think it clipped us on the right rear quarter as it went by. We were flipped off the road. I must've been thrown clear. Next thing I knew, I was on my back in the ditch. The other truck was gone—probably never even realized he'd hit us. Maybe he didn't even know we'd been there." He shook his head. "And I still felt just . . . very inconvenienced. Nothing really hurt. I could move everything.

"I got up, waited for my eyes to get used to the dark again. I saw the outline of the jeep and realized it was wheels up. I think that's when I realized we were really in trouble.

"I saw some movement, further up the ditch; I thought it was my driver. Then I realized it was more than one person, and one of them said something, and it wasn't in English. I only knew a couple dozen phrases in Vietnamese, and what I'd heard said wasn't one of them.

"There were three of them. They must've heard the accident. They were headed for the jeep." He frowned, staring into the fire. He was pretty sure he'd never put the next part into words, at least not out loud.

"I could see that at least one of them had a weapon, an automatic rifle. I didn't know if my driver was still under the jeep, and what condition he'd be in, if he was." He lifted his gaze for a moment. "Anyway, I knew they didn't have the luxury of taking prisoners."

Hardcastle gave that a slow nod.

"I stayed hunkered down, holding my breath, maybe twenty feet away, with just enough foliage to give me cover. And then, God, I almost jumped. Something had touched me on the arm, just above my elbow. I turned and saw Landers, Orrie Landers—my tech, the driver. I realized he must have been thrown out of the vehicle before I was, wound up even further back in the ditch. He looked okay. It took me a while to start breathing again, though." Westerfield half-smiled.

"So I never found out what I would have done if the VC had hauled him out from under that jeep."

"What could ya have done?" Hardcastle grunted. "One against three and did you even have a weapon?"

"No," Westerfield shook his head. "We had an M-16 in the jeep, but I wasn't holding onto it when we went into the ditch. Besides, firearms training for medical officers consisted mainly of teaching us how not to kill ourselves by accident."

"So there was nothing you could have done exceptget yourself killed," the judge insisted.

"Yes, probably," he nodded. "And of course I'll never know if it would have come to that. If I would have just stood by and let them kill him. Instead, Landers pointed over his shoulder, back toward the jungle. Seemed like a good idea. Once they saw the jeep was empty, they'd probably head up the ditch, looking for survivors. And I figured if he'd been able to make his way down to me from where he'd ended up, then we could probably slip away without those other guys knowing we'd been there."

"Makes sense," the judge said.

"So we snuck off, him in front, neither one of us saying a word. I noticed he didn't have the M-16 either. We were up into the jungle, and had maybe gone another twenty yards, when I heard a couple of shots. I dropped back down but Landers looked over his shoulder at me and said, 'Uh-uh, keep going. If they saw anything moving, they'll head right up here.' It made perfect sense, and the closer they got, the more likely they were to hit us.

"The moon was up. It was still pretty dark though. I kept tripping over roots, sounded to me like I was making a helluva racket. Orrie wasn't doing so bad. I knew he was younger, in better shape. I felt like I was slowing him down, and eventually, when I had to stop and catch my breath, I told him that. I said maybe he should go on ahead. He just smiled and said, 'Hell no, Captain, if I come back without the wizard the Commander's gonna chew me a new—'"

"'Wizard'?" Mark interrupted.

"That's Army for shrink," Hardcastle replied. "And he was right, they woulda."

"Rank has its privileges," Westerfield nodded solemnly. "And wizards are really useful for making problem soldiers disappear—a general administrative discharge and 'poof', your troubles are gone, back to civilian life." He smiled. "Almost as useful as a parasitologist."

Mark smiled thinly.

"And, anyway, we'd seemed to have shaken off our pursuers. I didn't hear any more shots and we slowed down, though we kept going, moving quietly, trying to stay oriented. We made a big circle around that would get us back to the camp. Eventually we decided we'd lost them completely, and I was thinking maybe we were lost, too.

"Landers didn't seem too worried though, not like he had been before. He even started talking a little, very quiet. It was funny, even though I'd been there for a month, and he'd been under my command—" Westerfield stopped on that word, paused, then said, "You have to understand, I've never really functioned in the authoritarian mode."

This got him two nods.

"Well, like I said, a month working with the guy, and I'd never actually gotten beyond the basic stuff. I knew he was good with the patients, strong enough to handle the violent ones, and he always stayed calm, which is a big help. But I'd never got much past day-to-day business when I talked to him.

"But now, picking our way through the jungle, maybe not while we were walking, but every time we stopped to rest, and to try and orient ourselves—whenever there was a bit of clearing in the trees—he talked. I didn't say much. I thought maybe he was still pretty nervous; I knew I was. Maybe his talking settled me down some. It was just everyday stuff, like guys in military talk about—what they were going to do when they got back, what they missed.

"Eventually we broke through to the road again, and this time I recognized it was not too far from the wire—the perimeter of camp. I checked my watch and realized we'd been at it almost all night. I was exhausted, too tired to be scared even. I started to climb back up onto the road but Landers said, hell, it was stupid to have come all that way, pull a fast one on the VC, and then get shot by one of our own half-asleep sentries."

Hardcastle frowned and nodded again. "That kid had a lot of street smarts."

Westerfield smiled. "Good thing one of us did. I was tired enough to sleep just about anywhere then, even after all the informal lectures on parasites that I'd been subjected to, so I just sat down in the ditch. Landers said he'd keep watch for a while, which didn't seem exactly fair but I was also too tired to argue."

He paused. The story could end right there, he supposed. It was a good place, though not the actual end of it. The fire was settling, the open flames diminished to the occasional flicker, but Mark hadn't reached for another log.

Westerfield took a slow breath. He remembered the oddness of it, to close your eyes one moment, into absolute exhausted oblivion, and open them the next, to broad daylight, voices, cussing, confusion. More than sleep, it had felt as though hours had been surgically removed from his life. And people kept asking him if he was all right.

"And the next thing I knew, it was morning." He exhaled slowly. "A squad had been going down the road; one of them must have noticed something. I was trying to explain about the jeep, and what had happened. Maybe I wasn't making as much sense as usual, because they got one of the medics there and they were talking about stretchers. I said I could see the gate from where we were, and if I'd walked this far way, I could walk the rest. I'd never hear the end of it if I went in flat on my back.

"But at least they made me climb in the truck. I was a little pissed, because they'd let Landers walk. That's what I kept thinking. If he could walk, so could I. And I finally said it to the medic, who was still next to me.

"He was looking like he really wanted to get me off his hands—give me to the real doctors, let them deal with it. He just gritted his teeth and told the guy driving the truck to hustle.

"They got me to the triage tent. I still wouldn't lie down, but one of the surgical guys pointed out that I had a scalp contusion and probably a concussion, and said I shouldn't be telling him his business, so I shut up. And in the end, all they really wanted to do about it was keep an eye on me, and they figured even my hooch-mate could tear himself away from his microscope once every couple of hours to do a neuro-check, so they let me go.

"And as I was leaving I saw them bringing the jeep back in. They'd uprighted it, and they were hauling it behind a truck. They pulled up. I stepped around to take a look at the front-end damage. It was pretty smashed up. I was thinking it was a good thing we'd been thrown clear. They unhooked it from the chain and the truck pulled forward a few feet. That was when I noticed the crew inside the truck. They were lifting a stretcher.

"'Somebody got hurt cleaning this mess up.' That's what I thought. And then I realized they were using a body bag."

"Landers?" Mark said quietly.

"Well," Westerfield said flatly, "you knew it was a ghost story."

"How?"

"Oh, that's what I wanted to know, but I just stood there, while they carried him over to the morgue tent. I was too startled to move. I did eventually asked the guy driving the truck where they'd found him. He said under the jeep.

"And I did finally follow them over to the tent because, well, that was one of my jobs. When there were casualties, I got to check the body bags and make sure everybody was dead. They figured even a shrink could do that." He smiled grimly. "So I looked at Landers, who was very dead, with an unstable cervical fracture, and a bullet wound to the right temple. Hard to say which killed him. I hope the VC were just being thorough."

"Lander's . . . ghost," Mark frowned, "he was already standing by you when you heard the shots."

"You mean my stress-induced transient hallucination?"

"He talked to you. He told you stuff."

"I thought about it. I really did. I even went back to my tent, sat down, and wrote up a list of the things I'd heard him say. I read it over when I was done. There wasn't one thing on it that I could legitimately call a verifiable fact, that I might not have subconsciously overheard sometime in the previous month."

Mark sat back, still frowning. "But how—?"

"Hallucination, false memory, post-traumatic stress, and a heavy dose of the super-ego trying to shield itself from the unfortunate, id-like truth," Westerfield said with a sad smile. "Never underestimate the power of the human mind to hide the truth from itself."

"Not one thing on the list?" Mark said in disbelief.

"Well," the doc admitted, "Maybe a couple, and I did try to check those out, once I got back."

"What happened?"

"Dead ends." He paused, wincing at the unintended play on words. "Orrie Landers was elusive. He'd moved around a bit and both his parents were deceased, too."

"No next-of-kin?" Hardcastle asked.

"None on his record. Just a cousin, and I couldn't find him. Landers is a common name."

"You remember him," Mark said. "You remember the stuff you wrote on that list?"

"A lot of it, yes, but as I said—"

"He was alone. He didn't have anybody to remember him," Mark said slowly. "He didn't have anyone to remember the stuff that was important to him . . . so he told you, and he hung around to make sure that you survived, so you'd remember."

"It doesn't work that way," Westerfield said kindly.

"But it did."

He sat there pondering for a moment, and then finally decided that he was never going to discuss leprechauns with Mark McCormick. But, despite that concession, he actually felt at peace, reconciled.

He smiled. He reached for the stick and the bag of marshmallows.

00000

They had watched two more logs burn down to coals and discussed everything from the origin of the universe to that funny noise Westerfield's car made between second and third gear, but only on uphill grades steeper than ten degrees. Mark's opinion was that the second question might prove more of a challenge.

Only Hardcastle got up early the next morning but fish were elusive. Mark eventually stumbled out of the tent to start making breakfast, but Westerfield didn't make a showing until the smell of coffee was wafting through the camp.

"I will learn how to clean a fish today," he said firmly.

"No you won't," Mark assured him. "Nothing's biting."

Westerfield looked over his shoulder in the direction of the river. Then he turned back, leaned in a bit, lowered his voice, and asked, "Have you tried yet?"

"Uh-uh." Mark shook his head, grabbed a coffee mug and poured. "That would be mean. Besides," he smiled, "I eventually have to go back home and work with the guy. I'm not putting a line in the water today."

00000

In the end, even that temptation was removed. A low-lying cloud cover moved in over the western peaks and, after a hurried conference and a quick packing up, they climbed into the cab of the truck just as the first few fat drops began to hit the windshield.

The town of Clear Lake had a nice motel—cabins, but not too rustic—and a cozy diner. Mark looked askance at the extensive seafood menu. There was a TV on. behind them over the bar, and the Sunday evening news opened with the late-breaking story that alleged mobster Arnold Cartori had negotiated a last-minute plea bargain on multiple charges including attempted murder and solicitation for murder.

They were all half-turned, and looking up at the screen.

"Slow news day," Hardcastle muttered, and then, "Say what you want about Thompson; he won't let this guy swing a deal for less than fifteen years. He'll be eligible for social security before he gets out."

"That's it, then?" Westerfield asked. "No trial?"

"Well, there's Mrs. C. But that's a separate matter, and I'm guessing her attorney is already dialing the D.A.'s. after-hours number, looking to arrange a little sit-down chat. Anyway, it's all over for us."

"I was going to have the Porterhouse," Mark said, with a disappointed frown.

"Aw, no rush or nothing. Might as well have a nice dinner, get some sleep. I hate driving at night."

"Me, too," Westerfield said.