Mike Nelson's Death Rat!

by Michael J. Nelson

  “So, Ralph, where are we going to get these turkeys?” said Ponty.

  “Oh, just a little farther now, to a place I know near Round Lake. You got to go where the turkeys are, you know?”

  “That’s for sure,” said Ponty confidently.

  “Have you hunted them before?”

  “No.”

  “You’ve handled a bow, though, haven’t you?”

  “Oh, yeah. A little,” he said, thinking back to a suction-cup bow-and-arrow set he’d had as a child.

  “It’s a little tricky with turkeys. They’ve got keen eyesight for movement, so a lot of times you’ll have to hold the draw a good while before you’ve got a clean shot.”

  “Right,” said Ponty, without having a basic understanding of what was just said.

  “And you’ll want to go for a shot at his spine, or else they can just run off, and you’ll never find ’em.”

  “So spine shots?” said Ponty, rubbing his hands on his knees.

  “That’s right. The good thing is that in the spring those toms are looking to find themselves a nice hen, so if we call ’em close enough, they’ll strut their stuff with their backs to us, and it’s easier to get a shot at the base of the spine.”

  “Call ’em? How do we call ’em?”

  “You never . . . ? oh, that’s right. I’ve got a turkey call. We do a couple of hen calls—some purrs, a yelp or two—and with any luck those big toms’ll come running. Then bam.”

  Ponty hadn’t realized how dire was the situation. He was venturing into the remotest woods with a virtual stranger about to imitate the call of a large, sexually excited fowl and then shoot its romantically charged mate through like St. Sebastian. Another upsetting thought came to mind:

  “Do we have to rub on turkey-gland oil, anything from their giblets or the like? Don’t they do that for deer hunting?”

  “Doe urine, yeah. But, no, we don’t have to do that. They got no sense of smell.”

  Here was a small consolation: He would not be asked to splash on turkey pee. Then another thought:

  “Do I need to buy a license?”

  “I got you one.”

  “Really? Well, thanks, Ralph.” Despite his reservations, Ponty felt a measure of pride that he was now a fully licensed turkey killer.

  “You just have to pretend to be my brother if we get stopped,” Ralph said.

  “What? How do I do that?”

  “You don’t have to imitate his voice or anything,” Ralph said, trying to quell Ponty’s obvious alarm. “If we get stopped, just say your name is Brian Wrobleski.”

  “But what if he asks for my driver’s license?”

  “Just tell him you lost it.”

  “What if he frisks me and gets it out of my pocket?”

  “I don’t think the DNR has the right to frisk you. Lawsuits, I think.” He paused. “I don’t know—maybe they can frisk you, but if he does that, I’ll pay your fine for you.”

  “What is the fine for illegally hunting turkeys?”

  “If you have to ask, you can’t afford it. We just have to make sure not to get caught.”

  They drove another twenty minutes or so and pulled over onto the shoulder of a deserted dirt road. Ralph opened the topper of his truck and began pulling out gear, handing Ponty a camouflage jacket and hat and what looked to Ponty like an enormously complex bow. He had remembered them as being bent-wood objects with a string connecting the two ends. Ralph’s old bow was strung this way and that like a cat’s cradle—the string passing over cams and wheels—and had a quiver attached to its right side that was bristling with broad-head studded arrows.

  “This is your old bow?” Ponty asked.

  “Yeah, but there ain’t a turkey alive that wouldn’t die after being hit by it.”

  “Oh, no. I don’t doubt it. What I meant is, it doesn’t look old.”

  “No, it’s not. But here’s my new one.” Ralph pulled out a more complex-looking model with even more pulleys and levers and some sort of extension and what looked like a laser sight. “Got this with the money you guys paid us,” he said.

  Ponty whistled. “Wow. That’s a peach,” he said, and then he realized how effete the word “peach” sounded when applied to hunting tackle.

  “Okay, here’s what we do: We’re gonna drive alongside this stand of trees up here and just listen for the call of a crow, okay?”

  “A crow? Not a turkey?”

  “A crow. We’ll blast this—”

  “Now, hang on. You keep saying ‘crow.’ You know that, right?”

  “Yeah. When we hear the crows, we blast the crow call, and then—”

  “I hate to be a pest,” Ponty interrupted, “but bothering the crows seems a little off mission for a turkey hunt.”

  “Would you let me finish? When we hear the crows, we blast the crow caller real loud, and if there are any turkeys around, they’ll gobble when they hear it.”

  “Really?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Brilliant. Let’s do it.”

  They drove slowly up and down the dirt roads in the area and listened, Ralph leaning forward and looking to his right, Ponty concentrating hard. They did this for some time. Ponty did not keep track of the minutes, but, had he been on his own, he would have lost patience with the search some 700 percent earlier than Ralph did. The sun was fairly high in the sky when Ralph made the official announcement that they had been skunked. “Well. I s’pose,” he said.

  “Yup,” Ponty seconded.

  “Let’s make one more pass down this side,” said Ralph, swinging the truck around.

  “Yup,” Ponty agreed, for he was now a turkey hunter.

  As he had previously, Ralph sounded the call when he heard some crows in the tall oaks. It was Ponty who heard the gobble.

  “Hey, hey. Turkey,” he said excitedly.

  “You sure?”

  “They gobble, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Something gobbled.”

  “Probably a turkey,” said Ralph.

  “That’s what I’m saying.”

  They jumped out and collected their gear, Ralph restraining Ponty from dashing haphazardly into the woods like an excited child. They walked slowly and as quietly as possible down into a thicket of poplar, and when they were about a hundred yards from the road, they crouched low for cover and Ralph produced two small boxes of the same size, one with what looked like a piece of chalk protruding from one of its short sides, and began drawing the chalklike protrusion over the broad side of the other box (Ponty later learned that the chalklike protrusion was chalk). Against all logic, it produced a sound that Ponty could easily believe was similar to that made by a randy turkey. At first there was no reaction. But after a few calls they heard a response from an interested suitor.

  “Go ahead and draw back an arrow,” Ralph whispered.

  Ponty gingerly removed an arrow from the bow’s onboard quiver and, with only a basic sense of physics as his guide, successfully loaded it into the arrow rest and nocked it to the bowstring. Then he began to draw it back. This was harder than he might have imagined, and he had quite forgotten about the turkey as he concentrated all his might on simply pulling as hard as he could. Ralph gave his elbow a prodding squeeze, and Ponty redoubled his efforts to get the arrow back.

  “C’mon, c’mon!” Ralph frantically whispered, and then he sounded off another turkey call. Ponty had the bow halfway back, with little confidence in moving it the rest of the way. Suddenly, frustrated with his own lack of strength, he made one last attempt to bully his trembling muscles into giving it another go. Just as he was about to abandon it all and suffer the inevitable contumely from Ralph, the effort of drawing it back diminished greatly and the arrow seemed to fly back to its ready position. Ponty, without realizing it, was taking sweet advantage of the “eccentric cam” system of a compound bow, and his first experience with “let-off,” or the diminished resistance at the end of the draw, would always be his favorite.r />
  Unfortunately, the feeling of elation was short-lived. Oxygen debt in the muscles of his right arm and shoulder was currently being paid with lactic acid, and this would not do. A slight spasm in his biceps caused the whole system to break down. His elbow unlocked, his fingers lost their grip on the string, and the arrow jumped from the bow, realizing all at once its potential energy. Ponty gave a little cry of panic, which mingled with the cry of a randy tom as an arrow pierced its spine.

  “Yeah!” cried Ralph. “What a shot! Come on!” He grabbed Ponty by the coat and pulled him through the underbrush to where the poor trusting turkey lay, quite dead.

  Ponty stared numbly at the noble creature, strange and beautiful at once, its gorgeous iridescent feathers so at odds with its bald blue head and grotesque dangling snood and wattles, stilled forever by Ponty’s cruel arrow. He watched in silence as Ralph bent down and pulled the shaft from its limp body. Ralph whistled with his tongue. “This is a beaut, Ponty. Just a beaut.”

  Ponty did not answer. He was thinking about Benjamin Franklin and how he’d been so impressed by wild turkeys that he wanted them to be a symbol of the new country. Ponty had just killed the runner-up to the bald eagle, a poor, helpless beast that had gone looking for l’amour and was betrayed to la mort.

  “Man,” said Ralph, hefting it by its legs, “I’d say sixteen pounds. That’s decent. Nicely done.”

  Ralph’s words were sinking in.

  “Really?” Ponty managed to say. He only now realized that he was trembling. “That’s good, huh?”

  “Oh, that’s a real nice tom. Nice beard, good-looking spurs,” Ralph said, pawing roughly over the corpse. “Here.”

  Ralph handed the turkey to Ponty, who was amazed at the weight and size of the thing. “Man,” he said. “That is a nice one, isn’t it?”

  “Oh, yeah. Real nice. Heck of a shot there. Heck of a shot.”

  “Yeah, yeah, it was, wasn’t it?” The heady rush of Ralph’s praise, the buildup of adrenaline, and the sheer thrill of the hunt combined to wipe away all of Ponty’s reservations about his kill. “Are we gonna get another?” he asked.

  “Well, we could, I s’pose,” said Ralph. “We got two permits.”

  “Darn right. Let’s do it,” said Ponty.

  “Okay,” said Ralph, and they trudged back toward the truck.

  “Am I supposed to eat his liver raw or anything like that?” asked Ponty.

  “I wouldn’t think so. I’ve got some jerky in the glove box if you’re really that hungry,” said Ralph, smiling.

  “I just thought I’d heard something about that.”

  “No, that’s deer. And only crazy fellas do that.”

  “Let’s just have some jerky,” said Ponty, slinging the turkey over his back. In the course of a morning, he had become a turkey hunter.

  CHAPTER 12

  I’ll tell you what. I don’t see that Danish ham is anything to write home about,” Bromstad said, baiting his three traveling companions. “Watery. No flavor. Not a spice to be seen anywhere in it, or on it, even near it.” No one responded, so Bromstad was encouraged. “And those open-faced sandwiches you Danish like—what are they called, sauerbraten or or s’mores, or what is it?”

  Vagns caved in. “Smørrebrød,” he said thickly.

  “Smørrebrød. That’s it. It seems to me the need for an open-faced sandwich was obviated by the development of the second slice of bread placed on top in the traditional sandwich, holding everything together, and—let’s face it—preventing you from having to stick your hand into all that ham and dill sauce and what-have-you. Have regular sandwiches made it to Denmark yet?” There was no response. “Well, doesn’t matter. And those Danish pastries: sure they’re good, but I don’t know that we have to keep referring to them as ‘Danish.’ Unless I’m wrong, it’s just a buttery dough with some sort of wet filling, right? There’s no reason a person of any nationality—say, a Lithuanian or . . . or a Pole—couldn’t make it. I don’t know, you guys are Danish—you tell me if I’m wrong.” There was silence, so Bromstad looked out the window. The Volvo was following the Funkabus expertly, a discreet twenty car lengths behind. Bromstad sighed. “I’m particularly mystified by herring. Raw fish soaked in sugary vinegar? Tiny balls of . . . what, exactly? Floating in that cloudy brine. Is it bits of fish dust making it cloudy? Or is there—”

  “Stop it!” screamed Jørgen. “Shut your mouth right now! I will not have herring maligned! You may taunt us all you want, and your prattling does not bother me. But you leave the herring out of it.” The overtones of his vociferous rant bounced around the interior of the Volvo for a second, and then all was silent. Bromstad, who, probably because of his staggering narcissism, was not easily cowable, was now nearly completely cowed.

  “Herring is good,” said Ülo, coming out in strong support of Jørgen.

  “Ja,” said Vagns, backing them up.

  “Whatever you say,” said Bromstad quietly.

  “Ridiculous,” averred Jørgen. “We shouldn’t even be helping this . . . American.”

  “Ja,” said Vagns.

  “It is part of my job that now and again I am forced to suffer fools, but I don’t have to do it gladly,” said Jørgen. “I don’t have to tolerate such personal attacks.”

  “And not from an author,” said Ülo with disgust.

  Bromstad had not had anyone refer to him as a fool—and one who needed to be suffered, at that—for some thirteen years. At least within earshot. With some effort, he forced his dander up.

  “Now, hold on,” he said, but couldn’t for the life of him think of how to follow it up. “You . . .” he ended weakly.

  How had he fallen so precipitously in such a short time? he wondered. Not long ago, on even his least energetic days, he could make ten people cry, not even counting those in the service industry. Now he was thoroughly beholden to a small squadron of viciously passionate pickled-fish apologists.

  And it was all Jack Ryback’s fault, he of the big, handsome head, the well-modulated voice, and, as Bromstad had noticed during an appearance by Ryback on the local-events program Dill Morton’s Tuesday Wrap-Up, the absurdly large feet. Though Bromstad was well aware that television added several pounds to one’s perceived size, by his reckoning that couldn’t amount to more than a centimeter of apparent foot lengthening, and he felt confident guessing that Ryback strode around atop silverbacklike feet in the neighborhood of a size thirteen (forty-eight, in European sizing, he noted with empty triumph, upon converting it later). He picked up Vagns’s copy of Death Rat off the seat next to him where it lay, actively mocking him. There it was on the back cover, that outsize, rugged head perched confidently atop a well-used fisherman’s sweater (big fat thief!), the face careworn and perfectly unshaven. What, he thought, are we being asked to make of that growth? That its owner was too busy being rugged to bother with anything so prissy as scraping whiskers off his chin? That he had been felling redwoods and wrestling b’ar all day and plumb forgotten about the photo shoot for his only book? “That’s today? Why, can we make this quick, fellas? I’ve got an oxcart full of rails to split before I break camp.”

  Bromstad decided to do something he had not yet done: actually look between the covers of Death Rat. He opened it gingerly, with a look of distaste, as though he were a vegan and the book were constructed wholly of room-temperature raw bacon. He thumbed randomly to a page somewhere near the middle and reluctantly allowed himself to comprehend small groups of words: “toe box” was one set, followed by “not known to have,” and, after letting a few more pages slip past his thumb, a phrase that without benefit of context seemed especially irritating to its reader, “cornmeal in burlap sacks.” Bromstad knew that it would be unfair to condemn Ryback’s prose on the basis of such a sparse reading of it, but he decided to anyway.

  “Phhhhttt,” he said. “What a load of manure.”

  “What is it you are comparing with manure, Mr. Bromstad?” Jørgen snapped.

  “No, don
’t worry Jørgen. I wasn’t talking to you,” he said petulantly.

  “If you have any complaints about our arrangement, you should speak them in the open, as a man might, not in the whispered tones of a schoolgirl.”

  “Is that how it works in Denmark—schoolgirls must exclusively whisper their complaints?” Bromstad asked, allowing his voice to drift toward the sarcasm it went to naturally in times of stress. He was in the process of constructing a follow-up riposte involving a critique of constitutional monarchies and how they often lead to the development of draconian rules with regard to the voicing of complaints by matriculating young ladies—but he lost his nerve.

  “You are childish in the extreme,” noted Jørgen. “From now on I shall not speak to you directly. If you want to address me, ask Vagns or Ülo, and they will speak for you.”

  Bromstad sighed deeply and readjusted his cap, partially replacing the stale, abused hat air that had been trapped beneath it for more than ten hours.

  “It is now dark enough, with enough contrasting light in the passenger cabin of the bus, that I believe we can get some passable photos of Mr. Ryback and this King Leo,” Jørgen said, closing the distance between the Volvo and the Funkabus. “Ülo, please tell Mr. Bromstad that because of where he is seated, he will have to make himself useful and snap the shots as we pull abreast of the bus.”

  “Mr. Bromstad, Jørgen wishes me to tell you that your assistance is required in getting the shots as we pull aside the funk star’s bus,” said Ülo dutifully.

  “Ülo, will you tell Vagns to tell Jørgen that I’d be more than happy to do that?” said Bromstad.

  “I will not,” said Ülo, “because as you well know, Vagns heard you and can do it himself.”

  “Ja,” said Vagns. “Jørgen, Mr. Bromstad said he would be more than happy to take the pictures.”

  Ülo gave him a brief lesson on the proper use of his rather expensive and complicated camera. “Here,” he said, “is the button,” pointing to a button, “that you press to take the picture.”