This seemed a somber end to their first day on the job.
The next morning Cormac called the hospital and a couple of local clinics to find out if there’d been any illnesses related to starvation or malnourishment. Since he wasn’t asking about specific patients—he didn’t bring up Weber’s death—he hoped officials could tell him about broad trends. But no, the couple of administrators he managed to get on the line didn’t think such a thing was possible. Eating disorders didn’t generally come in waves, like he was suggesting. He couldn’t get them to understand that he wasn’t talking abou
t eating disorders—this was something else. But didn’t that generally happen, trying to talk about the supernatural? It didn’t fit in the regular categories, so people didn’t know what to think. They didn’t have a paradigm to follow, and so what he described didn’t—couldn’t—exist.
I have heard of starvation magic being used in battle, Amelia offered. A siege tactic, to hasten the suffering within a holding under attack. But spells of that type are usually directed at the food and water supplies—foul the wells, rot the food, the people will starve as a result. That isn’t what happened here.
So much magic worked slantwise—not directly at a thing, but near it. Sympathetic relations. That Weber just starved, within reach of food, for no medically obvious reason, was throwing them off.
Their next stop was back to Weber’s cabin, to place Amelia’s warning system. In the parking lot on the way to the Jeep, Cormac slowed, listened. Trina was standing outside the office, talking loudly on her phone. Her back was to him; he stayed hidden by the wall of the office.
“. . .yeah, right. I don’t know why he’s here, he’s asking a lot of questions. . . . Of course I’m keeping an eye on him! Well I don’t know. I asked Mag at the diner and she said she talked to Mary over at the park, and Mary says Annie Domingo hired him for something. You think it has something to do with Arty? Between this guy asking questions and the Hollywood people it’s like someone rigged this whole thing up as a publicity stunt. . .right? And it wouldn’t even bother me that much except, you know, what actually happened? It’s some sick joke, I’m telling you. Do I think this guy has something to do with it? Well, I don’t know. . . . Yeah, he’s cute—”
Cormac sidled away without a word, however fun it might be to tap her on the shoulder and watch her squirm. The Jeep was waiting at the other end of the parking lot.
Well, you are.
“What?”
Never mind.
The gate at the end of the dirt road to Weber’s cabin was already open, so Cormac wasn’t entirely surprised when he drove up and found a couple of SUVs and a utility van blocking the drive. At least a dozen people milled in the clearing in front of the cabin. Cormac pulled over and got out for a look around. Then he saw the cameras, the historical costumes, and a woman consulting a clipboard and marshalling forces—the one who’d yelled at him yesterday. The same film crew.
Cormac stood back to watch as some kind of order emerged from the chaos. The director, wearing a different set of slick clothes but with the same polished urgency, shouted, “Places!” and the camera operators took up positions, pointing toward a canvas lean-to set up under a stand of trees, near a weathered cabin wall. Two male actors in homespun trousers, shirts, boots, and large beards, arranged themselves in front of the cameras. One held an axe, and the two were arguing, presumably about the weather since they occasionally looked up at the sky with anguished expressions.
“If we don’t cross the pass now, we’ll never cross!” one actor solemnly told the other.
“But we can’t go on! The storm’s too bad. We’ll. . .we’ll have to wait it out.”
“Then we’re doomed!”
Both actors again gazed forlornly at the clear blue sky. The axe didn’t seem to serve much purpose. Nobody in the Donner Party had axed another member, after all. It mostly seemed to be there to show that yes, these were pioneers. Or something.
“Cut!” the director called out, and the actors sagged. One of them walked over to an assistant who offered him a cigarette.
The caution tape was still up around the cabin. Didn’t seem to bother anyone on the crew. A Forest Service pickup truck was parked across the way, hidden by the film crew’s vehicles. Annie Domingo leaned on the hood, arms crossed, scowling. She must have been the one to open the gate.
The director spotted him and moved to intercept. However much he wanted to, Cormac couldn’t ignore him. The guy was right there. He stood with his hand outstretched, and didn’t miss a beat when Cormac refused to shake it.
“Hi, I’m Ford Bellamy. And I hear you’re Cormac Bennett? Is that right? You have a couple minutes to talk?”
Cormac bristled. Small town—he could make a couple of guesses how Bellamy knew his name. “I’m busy, sorry.” He couldn’t imagine what Bellamy could have to say to him. Cormac walked around the guy, giving him a wide berth. Bellamy chased after him, still talking, like he was used to chasing after people who didn’t want to talk to him.
“Um, so. . .I understand you’re a detective investigating the Donner Party tragedy?”
Nothing obligated Cormac to talk to anyone he didn’t want to. This basic fact made his life so much easier. People so often relied on the basic politeness of others to get what they wanted, and they always seemed so surprised that Cormac just didn’t care.
Bellamy wouldn’t take the hint. “Our company produces recreations of historical events, and right now we’re making a documentary of the Donner Party. We’re interviewing local experts for the show, and we’d love to get your perspective, to maybe talk about some of the more unexplained aspects of the tragedy—”
Cormac stopped, and the guy smiled, victorious. He probably thought everyone wanted to get on film.
Cormac said, “You going to recreate that scene where Betsy Donner fed her children flesh from their own father without telling them what it was?” Amelia had floated that tidbit up from the back of his mind, and he delivered it deadpan.
What did it say about Bellamy that his smile remained fixed? “Inspiring, isn’t it, the lengths a mother will go to to ensure her children’s survival?”
“I’m not a historian, I’m not investigating the Donner Party. You don’t want to talk to me.” Again, he turned away, and again Bellamy followed. He was reaching out, like he might grab Cormac’s arm. The whole time, Domingo was watching from her truck with a kind of wide-eyed appreciation.
“But Mr. Bennett, I think you could really add something to our production. You’ll be compensated of course.”