Fade to White by Wendy Clinch

“what makes you so sure I was out of bounds to begin with?”
    “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist. You see a person coming back in bounds, you figure that person’s been out of bounds.”
    “Well, I had to get to the lift.”
    “I could see that.”
    “I sure wasn’t going to hike up.”
    “I guess not.” He pulled his goggles back down, too.
    “So there you go.”
    “There you go.” One after another, he clapped his skis on the hardpack to knock the snow loose. “So tell me,” he said just as he was looking about ready to take off. “How was it over there?”
    “It was gorgeous,” she said. “And there was nobody. That was the main thing.”
    “You sure about that?”
    “About what?”
    “About there being no people?”
    “Sure I’m sure.”
    “Because ticket-pulling isn’t the worst that could happen.”
    “I know.”
    “A person goes over there, he could ski into a tree and knock himself out and nobody’d ever find him.”
    Stacey grinned at Chip. “Maybe you’d better go check, huh?”
    Chip permitted himself a tiny smile.
    “Maybe you’d better go see if somebody’s in trouble over there,” she said.
    “You know,” said Chip, “I think maybe I’d better.”
    “Just to be on the safe side.”
    “Right.”
    “I mean, what if?”
    “What if indeed.”
    “You need some help?”
    “I’d hate to involve a nonprofessional,” he said, “but the buddy system is always the safe way to go. Come to think of it, you’d be doing the Patrol a great service.”
    “Am I invited?”
    “Would you mind?”
    “It’d be my pleasure.”
    “When we get near the bottom,” he said as they pushed off, “I can show you a much less conspicuous way out of the trees and back to the lift.”
    *   *   *
    Manny and Guy were in a booth at Judge Roy Beans. The place was empty except for the two of them. Even the counterman was gone, having slipped outside to grab a smoke while the crowd was light.
    “So anyway,” said Guy, “since you’re still here and all, I was wondering.”
    “What?”
    “You heard anything from that guy Stone?”
    “Nah.”
    “Nothing?”
    “Nothing.”
    “No call?”
    “I’m the last person he’d call.” Manny took a sip of his coffee and winced. He put it down in front of him and looked at it as if it were poison.
    “I guess,” said Guy. “Why call the director, huh?” He was giving Manny a look that Manny wasn’t going to like much.
    “You don’t understand. The director isn’t in charge of anything, except on the set. He doesn’t run the project. Not by a million miles.”
    “Is that so?” Guy looked surprised and a little bit impressed. The world was full of arcane knowledge.
    “Absolutely. The director’s a hired hand, just like everybody else.”
    “Just like Stone.”
    “Try telling that to him.”
    “How do you mean?”
    Manny sat without saying anything for a minute. His gaze flicked over to the window and back again. He looked like a man who wanted something and couldn’t have it.
    Finally it occurred to Guy that that’s just what he was, and that what he wanted was a cigarette. Manny clearly envied the counterman, outside in the cold wind in just his shirtsleeves, enjoying a smoke. Guy could have invited him to go on out and satisfy the urge—he could have gone out with him—but he didn’t. He just kept thinking about Stone and Manny and the relationship between them, and he waited a beat or two. “You don’t seem to like the fellow very much,” he said at last, when Manny didn’t seem to feel like telling him anything more. Like that might jog him a little.
    “Who does? He’s a schmuck.”
    “Really.”
    “First class. Top shelf.”
    “Is that so?”
    “Absolutely,” said Manny. “He always has been.”
    Guy pulled at his lip and didn’t make any other response.
    If Manny thought he’d said too much with that last, he didn’t show it. Then again the sheriff didn’t look like he’d noticed it either. After a