The Loop

by Nicholas Evans

  The clock that ticked in the womb of the white wolf, however, would brook no such delay. Three weeks ago, she had found a deserted coyote den at the foot of a clearcut and while her two surviving pups looked on bemused, she had dug for hours on end until it was remodeled to her taste.

  Her belly bagged heavily now and in the melting snow she found it ever harder to hunt. The two pups were now full-grown yearlings. But although they had the weight of adults, they lacked the wiles and wisdom. They had helped in many a kill but never until now had to clinch one themselves. And with their mother grown so slow they were a poor match even for the weakest winter-wasted deer.

  Together, a dozen times a day, they stalked and tested and chased and failed. Sometimes they would catch a rabbit or a snowshoe hare and share it with their mother, but the meal was rarely worth the energy it cost. Rangy and restless, they would follow the scent of carrion and plunder food from lesser predators.

  It was a different scent one day that led them to the drifted edge of a clearing where an old man sat propped against a tree. His bare toes poked through the snow which was marked at a wary distance by the tracks of coyotes and bobcats. The wolves were warier still for there was something fearful yet familiar in his smell and something worse by far in the air of the place where they had found him. They slunk away with their ears flat and their tails tucked beneath them and left his carcass for the waking bears.

  The smell that wafted on the warming air from the valley ranches was more tempting by far. The main herds were calving now and the wolves had already found those places where the ranchers dumped their dead. They had chased off coyotes and eaten undisturbed. Traveling the cracks and coulees of the land, they witnessed the birth of these creatures whose flesh they had sampled and they saw how slow-witted and vulnerable they seemed.

  Now the white wolf’s hour was approaching and she disappeared alone into her den. The two yearlings waited all night and all the next day for her to emerge. They paced to and fro and lay for hours with their heads on their paws, watching the mouth of the den. Sometimes they would put their heads into the hole and whine and a growl from below would warn them to keep out. And on the second evening, when still she failed to emerge, hungry and impatient, they wandered off.

  And while their mother bore six new pups, they followed in their dead father’s footsteps, stole down from the forest and, with consummate ease, slew their first calf.

  Their choice was impeccable: purebred Calder Black Angus.

  It had seemed like a good idea when she set off from the cabin. But now, as she parked and looked across the street toward the gift store, Helen wanted to turn right around and drive off again. It was probably too late. Luke’s mother might have already seen her through the shop window.

  She had told Luke she was coming into town to pick up some supplies from Iverson’s. She was pretty sure he wouldn’t like the idea of her going to see his mother. But Helen felt she owed the woman some kind of explanation. Quite what she was going to say, she didn’t know. Sorry I stole your son, perhaps? Sorry I stole his virginity? She found it hard enough to explain it to herself, let alone anyone else.

  How could anyone begin to understand how she’d felt that day, when he’d shown up at the cabin with those two big bags and said he’d left home and could he maybe ‘stay for a few days’? She had just put her arms around him and they’d stood there for a long time, holding on to each other.

  ‘You’ll be safe now,’ he’d said. And that’s how she felt.

  And to be living with him in that tiny place, which was their world and no one else’s, seemed the most natural thing imaginable. Luke joked that they lived like wolves. And in a way it was true, for there was a kind of unashamed animality about them. At night, before they went to bed, they would often heat a tub of water on the stove, then take off their clothes and wash each other’s bodies with a cloth. Never had she known a lover so tender and never, even with Joel, had she felt so physically needful.

  With Joel, there had been passion and pleasure, and friendship too, but only now did she realize that there had never been real intimacy of the kind that she shared with Luke. With Joel, she had become watchful of herself, careful at all times to be the kind of woman she thought he wanted and would want to keep.

  It seemed to her now that true intimacy was only possible when two people were simply themselves, not constantly monitoring. And with Luke, that’s how she could be. He made her feel wanted and beautiful and, most important of all, for the first time in her life, completely unjudged.

  But how could she begin to say anything remotely like this to his mother, for heavensakes? Maybe, after all, she should give it a miss and drive home. Instead, she mentally crossed herself and got out of the pickup.

  Its freshly painted door looked almost as bad as it had with the writing on it. Luke had found the right shade at a Toyota dealer in Helena and done a great job painting it out. The trouble was, the rest of the vehicle was so faded and rusty that the door stood out like a bare billboard, tempting someone to do it again.

  The door of Paragon clanked loudly as she went in. Thank God there were no customers, just Ruth Michaels at the till.

  ‘Helen, hi! How’re you doing?’

  ‘I’m fine thanks. You?’

  ‘You bet. Now all that snow’s gone.’

  ‘I know. Is Mrs Calder here?’

  ‘Sure, she’s out back. I’ll go get her. Want a coffee?’

  ‘No thanks.’

  Helen waited, humming a nervy little tune under her breath. She could hear the two women talking, but not what they were saying. Ruth came back, putting on her coat.

  ‘I have to go out for awhile. I’ll see you later Helen, okay?’

  ‘Okay.’

  The door clanked again and she noticed that, as Ruth went out, she flipped over the OPEN/CLOSED sign and clicked the catch.

  ‘Hello, Helen.’

  ‘Hi, Mrs Calder.’

  Helen hadn’t seen her since Thanksgiving and she was struck again by how like Luke she looked; the same pale skin and beautiful green eyes. She smiled.

  ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘Uh. Well, I ...’

  ‘Come back here and we can sit down where no one can see us.’

  Helen followed her to the little coffee bar and perched herself on one of the stools. Eleanor Calder went behind the counter.

  ‘Can I make you a coffee?’

  ‘Not unless you’re going to have one.’

  ‘I think I’ll have a Why Bother.’

  ‘Then I’ll have a Bother. A large one, with an extra shot.’

  Helen was still trying to figure out where to start. She watched in silence while Luke’s mother deftly made their coffees. She marveled at how a woman could be married to a man like Buck Calder for so long and yet retain such grace and dignity.

  ‘I came to explain about me and Luke - not explain exactly, just . . . let you know that . . . oh, shit.’

  Mrs Calder smiled. ‘Let me make it easier for you.’ She put Helen’s coffee in front of her and went on making her own. ‘You’ve made Luke very happy. As far as I’m concerned, you’ve done him nothing but good.’

  She came around the counter and sat down, thoughtfully stirring her coffee. Helen was stunned.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, fatuously.

  ‘As to him moving in with you, all I’d say is, some of the folk around here are a little old-fashioned. But that’s your decision. And in all honesty, I don’t know where else he’d go.’

  ‘You moved out too, Luke says.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be sorry. I should have done it years ago. I guess I only stayed because of Luke.’

  They talked for awhile about Luke’s college application and then about the wolves. Helen said there were probably only three or four of them left now. Out of superstition, she didn’t mention that only yesterday they’d lost the alpha female’s signal too. Though, with l
uck, that might mean she was denning.

  ‘What’s happened to the others?’

  ‘Don’t know. Someone’s killing them off, maybe.’

  Eleanor Calder frowned.

  ‘You know, I forgot to tell Luke and maybe I shouldn’t say a word. But my son-in-law has got someone working for him up at his place, called Lovelace. I couldn’t figure out where I’d heard the name, but then I remembered. There was a famous old trapper called Lovelace used to live here in Hope. A “wolfer”, they called him.’

  Dan could see straight away that this time Calder and his son-in-law had followed the stockgrowers’ association guidelines to the letter. They had covered the two dead calves with weighted tarpaulins and then carefully laid lengths of plywood over the tracks and the scat that the wolves had left as a calling card.

  Luckily, this time they hadn’t called the TV station, but Clyde Hicks was doing a pretty good job himself. He’d had his video camera rolling as soon as Dan and Bill Rimmer drove into the pasture. As usual, Dan had brought his camera along to shoot the necropsy, but Hicks wasn’t taking any chances.

  ‘You government people can edit stuff in and out and have the pictures say whatever you want,’ he said. ‘We’re gonna make sure we got our own record.’

  He clearly fancied himself as something of an artist and kept panning and zooming and changing angles so that he could film not only the necropsy but Dan filming it too. All he needed was a third camera and he’d have himself a film-within a film-within a film.

  Calder hadn’t even said hello. His silence was deafening. When he’d called Dan at the office to tell him what had happened, he’d stuck to cold facts. The only thing he’d added was a warning to Dan not to bring Helen Ross. He didn’t want her on his property, he said. Dan had left a message on her voice mail, telling her.

  Now Rimmer had the second calf skinned out on the tailgate of his truck. The teeth marks and hemorrhaging left no doubt that the first had been killed by a wolf or wolves.

  Calder stood watching, with his arms folded. There was none of the crocodile charm he’d oozed on the two previous occasions they’d been summoned to his ranch. He looked pale and drawn and he had the dark rings under his eyes that most ranchers got during calving time. He kept clenching the muscles in his jaw. It was like a finger itching on a trigger.

  Dan knew something was wrong when Bill Rimmer went quiet. There were teeth marks but almost no hemorrhaging. He was opening up the calf’s chest now.

  ‘Well,’ he said at last. ‘They certainly fed on this little fella too.’ He straightened up and shot a glance at Dan before turning to face Calder. ‘But they didn’t kill him.’

  ‘What?’ Calder said.

  ‘The calf was stillborn.’

  Calder looked at him for a moment.

  ‘We don’t have stillborn calves,’ he said icily.

  ‘Well, sir, I’m afraid this one was. His lungs haven’t opened, I can show you, if—’

  ‘Get out of here.’

  Dan tried to mediate. ‘I’m sure there’d be no problem getting full fall market price compensation for them both, sir. Defenders of Wildlife are very understanding—’

  ‘You think I’d touch their blood money?’

  ‘Sir, I—’

  ‘Now get the hell off my property.’

  Luke almost got lost in the labyrinth of logging roads. He didn’t dare risk driving up past the ranch in case anyone saw him. The only other way was through the forest and it was a long time since he’d used it.

  He had set off as soon as Helen got back and told him. It was midday and Kathy would be down at the big house, cooking lunch for the calving crew. But time was ticking away fast. She normally went home about three. He only had about half an hour.

  At last he found the trail he was looking for. It was muddy and potholed and once he had to stop and haul a fallen tree out of the way. But at last he knew, from the lie of the land, that he was above Kathy’s house and he parked and went the rest of the way on foot.

  From the top of the pasture there didn’t seem to be anyone around. There was a silver trailer and an old gray Chevy tucked away behind the barn. He knew neither belonged to Clyde and Kathy. When he got down to Prince’s grave, Maddie, the old collie, came barking around the side of the house, then recognized him and came, squirming and wagging her tail, toward him. While he bent down to make a fuss of her, he kept an eye out to see if anyone had been alerted by her hollering. Everything was quiet.

  Just to make sure, he knocked on the kitchen door and called out around the barn. There was nobody there. He walked quickly around the back to the trailer and knocked on the door and when there was no reply he tried the handle. It wasn’t locked.

  It didn’t take him long to figure out that it wasn’t the home of any carpenter. The smell alone told you. There was a wolfskin on the bed, though that didn’t mean much. Then he found the hidden cupboards. Two were packed with traps and wires and snares and things he’d never seen before. In another one he found bottles, all numbered but not named. He uncorked one and sniffed it. It smelled just like the stuff Helen had. Wolf pee.

  Then he heard a car pulling up.

  He quickly put the bottle and one of the snares in his coat pocket and put everything back as he’d found it. He stepped down from the trailer and tried to shut the door quietly, but it made a loud click.

  ‘Mr Lovelace?’

  Luke froze and cussed under his breath. It was Clyde. He was coming around the barn.

  ‘Mr Lovelace?’

  When he saw Luke, his face switched in an instant from friendly to hostile. Kathy appeared behind him, holding the baby.

  ‘Luke!’ she said.

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Clyde said.

  ‘I w-wanted to see my sister.’

  ‘Oh, yeah? How did you get here, fly?’

  Luke nodded up toward the forest. ‘I p-parked up there.’

  ‘You’ve got a nerve, snooping around other people’s property. ’

  ‘Clyde, for pete’s sake,’ Kathy said.

  Clyde’s eyes flicked to the trailer.

  ‘You been snooping in there too?’

  ‘No, I j-just knocked. There’s n-nobody there.’

  He felt himself flushing. When the hell was he going to learn how to lie properly?

  Clyde nodded. ‘Is that so?’

  Luke shrugged. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Get your ass out of here.’

  ‘Clyde!’ Kathy said ‘He came to see me!’

  ‘Well? He’s seen you, ain’t he?’

  ‘Don’t you dare speak to me like—’

  ‘Shut up.’

  Luke saw his sister flinch.

  ‘It’s okay, Kathy. I’ll g-go.’

  He walked past them and gave Kathy and the baby as brave a smile as he could manage. She seemed close to tears and she turned and walked away. When he reached the dog’s grave, Luke started to run. And he didn’t stop till he’d got all the way back to his car.

  It didn’t take him as long to get back to the cabin and when he arrived he saw Dan Prior’s car parked outside next to Helen’s pickup. Buzz came bounding through the mud to greet him.

  From the tense silence, he knew as soon as he stepped inside that they had been arguing. Dan nodded to him.

  ‘Hi Luke.’

  ‘Hi.’

  Luke looked at Helen. She seemed very upset.

  ‘Dan wants to kill the rest of the wolves,’ she said.

  ‘Helen, come on—’

  ‘Well, it’s true, isn’t it? Or are we all supposed to call it, what was it? Oh yeah, “lethal control”.’

  Luke looked from one to the other. ‘Why?’

  Dan sighed. ‘They killed one of your father’s calves.’

  ‘So Dan’s going to let himself be bullied into doing exactly what your father wants: get rid of the wolves. No wolves, no way - all you have to do is shout loud enough.’

  ‘Helen, you just don’t unde
rstand simple politics do you?’

  ‘Politics!’

  ‘Yeah, politics. Let this thing get any worse and the whole wolf recovery program could get knocked back years! These wolves have had enough goddamn chances already. Sometimes you have to lose a battle to win the war.’

  ‘That’s bullshit, Dan. You’re just letting Calder push you around. Remember what you said? About Hope being the real test? If you don’t take a stand against people like him, you’ll never win the war.’

  ‘Helen, you’ve just got to face it. Hope isn’t ready for wolves.’

  ‘You do this and it never will be. I don’t know why the hell you ever asked me to come here in the first place.’

  ‘You know something? I ask myself the same question.’

  ‘You used to have balls.’

  ‘You used to have brains.’

  They stood glaring at each other. Luke reached into his pocket and brought out the snare and the bottle of wolf pee. He put them on the table.

  ‘Does this m-make any difference?’

  Buck had driven right up as soon as Clyde called him. The two of them went straight to Lovelace’s trailer.

  ‘How long since you last saw him?’ Buck asked.

  ‘Must be near on three weeks. Kathy saw him going off on his snowmobile in the middle of the night. She’s been worrying about him because he’s never been gone that long before. She thinks something’s happened to him.’

  If it had, Buck wasn’t going to grieve too much. It had taken the old fool a hell of a long time to kill a handful of wolves and cost Buck a small fortune. And still the damn things were killing cattle.

  They checked inside the trailer. It didn’t look as if Luke had touched anything. If he had, he’d been real careful.

  ‘You’re sure he was in here?’

  ‘I think so.’

  Buck thought a moment. For Luke to have come sneaking around, he must have had his suspicions. For all Buck knew, the boy might go right back, tell Dan Prior and in no time at all there’d be a bunch of feds coming up the driveway.