This time there was no chance that Gus was going to lose sight of the rest of the hiking party. Shawn hadn’t even needed to bring up his notion of roping them all together; no one moved out of anyone else’s view. Gwendolyn and Balowsky walked together, staring at each other. At one point, Gwendolyn, her eyes fixed firmly on Balowsky’s face, hit a rock with her foot and tripped. She fell to the ground, rolled, and popped back up-never looking away from the other lawyer.
Even though there were two people on watch all night long, one of them had managed to slip away in the night and set the trap that took out Savage. If the killer could strike this quickly and this invisibly, what hope did the rest of them have?
From their place at the end of the pack, Gus and Shawn examined Gwendolyn and Balowsky. They both seemed completely consumed in studying each other for treachery.
“One of them is a pretty good actor,” Shawn said. “I wonder if Helstrom needs a new member in his troupe.”
“If only I had shared my watch with someone besides Savage, since he clearly wan’t the killer,” Gus said. “I would have known if whoever was staying up with me had sneaked off to set a snare. That would have narrowed the suspect pool down to one.”
“How much could you actually see when you were on watch?” Shawn said.
“I could see you sleeping,” Gus said. “I could see you sleeping peacefully all night long.”
“You mean you could see whatever was in the direct firelight,” Shawn said.
“That, too,” Gus said. “But mostly I could see you sleeping.”
“Yes, the clever and subtle dig has been heard and now acknowledged,” Shawn said. “But my greater point was that it was really dark in the camp. If Savage had slipped away on your watch, are you sure you wouldn’t have seen him?”
“I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have stepped into his own snare,” Gus said.
“You’re getting awfully literal all of a sudden,” Shawn said.
“I’m getting scared,” Gus said. “No, I take that back. I am scared.”
“Okay, there’s a killer out there picking us off one by one,” Shawn said. “But look at the bright side. One more murder and we’ll know for sure who it is. And that’s halfway to safety right there.”
“Unless one of us is the victim,” Gus said.
Shawn stopped to think this over, as if the thought had never occurred to him. “That would be a problem,” he said. “Because if the killer took out you or me, that wouldn’t bring us any closer to knowing who it is.”
“And because I’d be dead,” Gus said, panic rising in his chest. “Or you would. Or we both would.”
“That wouldn’t make any sense,” Shawn said. “If we were both out of the running, then there wouldn’t be any question who the killer was. No, the next murder has to be a single, unless said killer is willing to take all three out at once.”
“What if she is?” Gus said.
“She?”
“Oh, come on,” Gus said. “Only Gwendolyn could have set that trap. She’s the one with all the jungle lore at her fingertips. She’s the one who is obviously willing to kill without even blinking. And she’s coming after us next.”
“It’s a good argument, but if we guess wrong-”
“I’m not guessing,” Gus said. “I know. I know from my dreams. Because the thing that’s chasing me is always female. I just never realized until right now that it was a female human.”
“This is based on your dream?” Shawn said. “Haven’t you learned anything from working for a fake psychic-detective agency?”
“I know something has been trying to warn me of this day for almost as long as I’ve been alive,” Gus said. “I know that I’ve lived what happens next again and again-and I’ve never survived it.”
“If you give in to panic and superstition, we are never going to make it home,” Shawn said. “We need to be intelligent. Rational.”
“Says the psychic,” Gus said.
“Exactly,” Shawn said. “We can get away with almost anything by claiming I’m psychic-because people aren’t intelligent and rational. They believe that stuff. We don’t.”
“Then maybe you should start using that brain of yours,” Gus snapped.
“I am,” Shawn said.
“You’re using your feet,” Gus said. “You’re using your mouth. But you’re not using your brain. You’re walking along this trail, waiting for the killer to reveal herself, gambling that her preferred method of doing so won’t involve our decapitation. But what you’re not doing is the one thing you do well-putting together a series of microscopic clues and solving the case.”
Shawn stopped, scowling angrily. “Have you considered maybe I’m doing this for you?”
Gus stopped, too. “You’re keeping me stranded in the wilderness with an insane killer for my own good?”
“Immersion therapy,” Shawn said. “You’ve got to get over this bizarre, superstitious fear of a silly dream.”
“Even if it kills me.”
“At least you’ll be cured,” Shawn said and started down the trail.
Gus grabbed the top of Shawn’s pack and pulled him back. “Don’t you dare blame this on me,” he said through clenched teeth. “People are dead. We could be dead. You can’t be doing this to help me with my recurring dream. Even if you do have one of-”
Gus broke off, realization dawning on him. Shawn saw it coming and tried to get away.
“If that’s the way you feel, I apologize,” Shawn said as he took a step down the trail again.
But Gus wouldn’t let go of his pack, and Shawn was jerked back like a marionette whose puppeteer suffered from Parkinson’s. “You never told me what your recurring dream was,” Gus said.
“It’s really not important now,” Shawn said. “If you want me to solve this crime now and leave you emotionally crippled, then that’s what I’ll do.”
“ This is your recurring dream,” Gus said.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Shawn said. “This is your recurring dream. See? Wilderness? Lost? Big scary monster in the trees?”
Again Shawn tried to get away, and again Gus held him back. “In your recurring dream, people are dying, there’s a killer right in front of you, and you can’t figure out who it is,” Gus said. “That’s your deepest fear, isn’t it?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Shawn said with a complete lack of conviction.
He did. Gus could see it in his eyes. Shawn was afraid, and it wasn’t of the killer. He was afraid of a vision he’d seen in a dream over and over again. Gus let go of his pack and took him by the shoulders.
“You can do this, Shawn,” Gus said. “You know you can. I know you can. It’s just another case, just another set of clues.”
“It’s not!” Shawn said loudly enough for Gwendolyn and Balowsky to hear-and to stop walking. He moved in closer to Gus and whispered, “I don’t have clues here. I don’t know who the killer is, and I won’t until one of them is kind enough to eliminate the other one from suspicion.”
“You only think there aren’t any clues,” Gus said. “But there are. There have to be. You’ve seen them, you’ve heard them. You just didn’t notice at the time. But they’re all in your head. All you have to do is put them together. And you’ve got to do it now.”
Shawn still looked shaken. “Why now?”
“I’ve seen you solve enough crimes to know that there are two elements you need before you can swing into action,” Gus said. “You need the clues-and you need an audience. If you wait much longer, there won’t be anyone left to be stunned by your revelations. And then you might never be able to pull it together.”
Shawn looked up the trail at Gwendolyn and Balowsky, who were staring back at them. “They’re not much of an audience.”
“Next time we’ll book the State Theater,” Gus said. “Right now this is what we’ve got. So go dazzle ’em.”
Shawn took a deep breath. Then another one. Then he plastered a broad smile across his face.
“Wait up, guys,” he called to the lawyers. “Let’s take a break and unmask a killer.”