“What are you doing awake at this hour?” Brandon asked.
“I could ask the same thing.”
“You aren’t lying in a bed with a hose stuck in your chest.”
“No, but I feel like it. How you doing, other than the hose?” Walt asked.
“Appreciate your hanging around here. Gail told me.”
“Was worried about you, Tommy.”
“Doing fine. They’re going to fill up the flat tire, and I’m walking out of here. Like maybe tomorrow, if I’m lucky. Any sign of my shooter?”
“We’re on it.”
“So, nothing.”
“He took off. I’m optimistic. Forest Service is scouring the camps west of the highway below Cold Springs. Guys like this, they get in a rut. He won’t go far.”
“Smack him around for me when you catch him.”
“Yeah, that’s my style,” Walt quipped. “What’s up, Tommy?”
“Wanted you to check the property room.”
“For?”
“Not much to do here but watch the tube or stare out the window.”
“Yeah . . . ?”
“So I was looking out the window and saw this hawk circling.”
“Tommy, I don’t mind the call, but it is late.”
“So you suppose there’s any chance that’s what the truck was about? Not a deer, but the hawk?”
Walt heard the sounds of the night like a hum in his head.
“Not sure where you’re going with this, Tommy.”
“Hawks feed on carrion. Like roadkill. Wouldn’t be the first time we’ve seen a wreck caused by mowing over a hawk or eagle.”
“Does that change anything?” Walt asked.
“Truck hits a hawk and skids off the road.”
“So what?” Walt asked. He checked his watch, suddenly feeling extremely tired.
“The driver knows what he hit,” Brandon said, speculating. “Maybe there’s some of it smeared on the windshield. He skids off the road, but gets out. Your witness gave us that.”
“I’m listening.” Indeed, Walt was perched forward on the edge of the bench.
“The truck, the tracks we found, had nothing to do with Gale,” Brandon proposed. “He never saw the body. His attention was on finding that bird.”
“The bird . . .”
“Flight feathers,” Brandon said.
“I’d like to say I’m following you, Tommy, but I’m afraid I’m not.”
“Who gives a shit about a dead bird?” Brandon asked. “Sure, maybe he wanted to go back and stomp the thing for sending him off the road like that. But I don’t think so. I think he wanted the flight feathers.”
Walt shifted the phone to his left ear. “Flight feathers,” he repeated.
“Light rack on the roof of the pickup. What kind of fool is that?”
“Search and Rescue, maybe.” Walt said, taking issue with his description. “A volunteer firefighter.”
“Or just your basic backwoods asshole.”
“Lovely.”
“A tricked-out pickup truck? A backwoods yahoo.”
“A hunter?”
“Now don’t go putting down hunters,” Brandon said.
“This is your theory, Tommy. Whatever it is.”
“Not your everyday hunter: a bow hunter.”
Walt heard himself breathing into the phone. “The feathers.”
“Dude!” Brandon said. “The hawk runs the guy off the road. Driver knows what he hit. Finds himself off-road, maybe sees the hawk flapping away in the mirror. Heads back to check out his victim—”
“Our witness confirmed that,” Walt said, recalling the woman at the nursery.
“Any bow hunter knows it’s a felony to collect feathers from a wild bird. But this one ran him off the road. This one asked for it. He isn’t about to risk the fine by taking the whole bird, but he lifts a couple feathers. Who’s going to notice?”
“You are,” Walt said.
“We can check it. Right? I collected that bird. It’s in the property room fridge.”
“So the BOLO should include an inspection of the front grille.”
“Could be easier than that. A pickup sucks a bird in the grille, it’s not going off the road. But if the bird hits the windshield, that’s another story.”
“A broken windshield.”
“A red-tailed hawk? Going fifty or sixty, it’s like hitting a freaking rock.”
“Window welders. Window repair shops.”
“A pickup with a light rack,” Brandon said. “That ought to narrow it down. We catch this guy, maybe he saw Gale, maybe not. But he’s someone we want to talk to.”
“It’ll be good to have you back,” Walt said. The first raindrops fell in huge splashes on his front walkway. Lightning flashed high in the sky to the north.
“Keep me posted, Sheriff. And just in case anyone asks: daytime TV sucks.”
“I’ll pass that along.”
Walt was at the foot of his bed. He had his shirt off and was stripping down to his shorts when he heard the distant grind of heavy machinery. Living just two blocks from the town’s firehouse, he knew exactly what it was. He crossed the room, grabbed his radio off the