‘Are you English?’ Guthrie said, still not looking at Will.
‘Born in Manchester. But I was brought up in the Yorkshire Dales.’
‘England’s always been a little too cosy for me.’
‘I wouldn’t call the moors cosy,’ Will said. ‘I mean, it’s not wild like this, but when the mists come down and you’re out on the hills—’
‘That’s where you met them then.’
‘Yes. That’s where I met them.’
‘English bastard,’ Guthrie said. Then, finally looking at Will: ‘Not you. Steep. Chilly, English bastard.’ He spoke the three words as if cursing the man, wherever he was. ‘You know what he called himself?’ Will knew. But it would serve him better, he suspected, if he let his host have the moment. ‘The Killer of Last Things,’ Guthrie said. ‘He was proud of it. I swear. Proud of it.’ He emptied the remnants of the whisky into his mug but didn’t drink. ‘So you met Ruth in Mauritius, huh? What were you doing there?’
‘Taking pictures. There’s a kestrel there looks like it’s going to be extinct some time soon.’
‘I’m sure it was grateful for your attention,’ Guthrie said dryly. ‘So what do you want from me? I can’t tell you anything about Steep or McGee. I don’t know anything, and if I ever did I put it out of my head. I’m an old man and I don’t want the pain.’ He looked at Will. ‘How old are you? Forty?’
‘Good guess. Forty-one.’
‘Married?’
‘No.’
‘Don’t. It’s a rat-trap.’
‘It’s not likely, believe me.’
‘Are you queer then?’ Guthrie said, with a little tilt of his head.
‘As it happens, yes.’
‘A queer Englishman. Surprise, surprise. No wonder you got on so well with Sister Ruth. She Who Must Not Be Touched. And you came all this way to see me?’
‘Yes and no. I’m here to photograph the bears.’
‘Of course, the fucking bears.’ What little trace of warmth or humour his voice had contained had suddenly vanished. ‘Most people just go to Churchill, don’t they? Aren’t there tours now, so you can watch them performing?’ He shook his head. ‘Degrading themselves.’
They just go where they can find a free meal,’ Will said.
Guthrie looked down at the dog, who had not moved from his side since her reprimand. Her bone was still in her mouth. That’s what you do, isn’t it?’ The dog, happy she was being addressed, whatever the subject, thumped her tail on the bare floor. ‘Little brown-noser.’ Guthrie reached down as if to take the bone. The dog’s ragged black lips curled back in warning. ‘She’s too bright to bite me and too stupid not to growl. Give it to me, you mutt.’ Guthrie tugged the bone from her jaws. She let him take it. He scratched her behind her ear and tossed the bone back on the floor in front of her. ‘I expect dogs to be sycophants,’ he said, ‘we made ‘em that way. But bears – Jesus, bears shouldn’t be fucking nosing around in our garbage. They should stay out there –’ he vaguely waved in the direction of the Bay ‘ – where they can be whatever God intended them to be.’
‘Is that why you’re here?’
‘What, to admire the animal life? Christ no. I’m here because being with people makes me vomit. I don’t like ‘em. I never did.’
‘Not even Steep?’ Will said.
Guthrie shot him a poisonous look. ‘What in Christ’s name kind of question is that?’
‘Just asking.’
‘Fucking stupid question,’ Guthrie muttered. Then, softening somewhat, he said: ‘They were something to look at, both of them, and that’s the truth. I mean, Christ, Rosa was beautiful. I only put up with talking to Steep to get to her. But he said once I was too old for her.’
‘How old were you?’ Will asked him, thinking as he did so that Guthrie’s story was changing slightly. He’d claimed only to know Steep; but apparently he’d known them both.
‘I was thirty. Way too old for Rosa. She liked ‘em real young. And of course she liked Steep. I mean the two of them, they were like husband and wife and brother and sister and fuck knows what else all rolled into one. I didn’t stand a chance with her.’ He let the subject trail away, and picked up another. ‘You want to do some good for these bears?’ he said. ‘Get out there on the dump and poison ‘em. Teach ‘em not to come back. Maybe it’ll take five seasons, and that’ll be a lot of dead bears, but they’ll get the message sooner or later.’ Finally he downed the contents of his glass, and while the liquor still burned his throat said: ‘I try not to think about them, but I do—’ He wasn’t talking about the bears now. Will knew. ‘I can see both of them, like it was yesterday.’ He shook his head. ‘Both of them so beautiful. So…pure.’ His lip curled at the word, as though he meant its antithesis. ‘It must be terrible for them.’
‘What must be terrible?’
‘Living in this filthy world.’ He looked up at Will. ‘That’s the worst part for me,’ he said. ‘That the older I get, the more I understand ‘em.’ Were those tears in his eyes. Will wondered, or simply rheum? ‘And I hate myself for it so fucking much.’ He put down his empty glass, and with sudden determination announced: That’s all you’re getting from me.’ He crossed to the door and unbolted it. ‘So you may as well just get the hell out of here.’
‘Well, thank you for your time,’ Will said, stepping past the old man and into the freezing air.
Guthrie waved the courtesy away. ‘If you see Sister Ruth again—’
‘I won’t,’ Will said. ‘She died last February.’
‘What of?’
‘Ovarian cancer.’
‘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