by Stephen Frey
I could have roadblocked Maggie easily, but I didn’t. And that one simple fact has Bear as nervous as a coyote at a wolf kill.
I’m sure he’s always suspected that I haven’t completely closed the book on Karen’s disappearance. I’m sure the dark recesses of his active imagination wonder if I think he put the barrel of his Dakota County pistol to her head—literally—and forced her to write that note on Christmas Eve telling him she didn’t want to be found, then did away with her in some cold-blooded way because he was drunk and in that state he couldn’t take her constant nagging and bitching and the awful arguments that followed anymore. But our interaction of an hour ago beside that fallen branch must have absolutely confirmed any suspicion he had.
I’m not sure it’s ever crossed Bear’s mind before today that I might also suspect him of having something to do with Gus and Trudy’s deaths, with their hurtling into that grove of pine trees at sixty miles an hour because they were suspicious of his doing something to their daughter, too, but I bet he’s thinking about it now. I bet his brain’s spinning with possibilities and suspicions as he hurls shovelful after shovelful of fresh powder from my driveway. Maybe all that’s the real reason he’s willing to keep my secret. Maybe he figures if he promises to keep his mouth shut about last night and not tell anyone else what his answer to my question of a little while ago was, I’ll just go through the motions with Maggie, that I won’t be diligent about my search for Karen because it’s a search that could end up very close to home—his home.
Vivian could tell people what I did to her last night, but no one would ever believe her, not for a second. Like they wouldn’t believe that I put my gun to her head the night I saved Cindy from Caleb Jenkins and his crew on 681. But if Bear backed up her story in front of the town council and added a few juicy spitballs of exaggeration to it, I’d be in trouble, real trouble. I wouldn’t be sheriff for long. In fact, I’d probably be ordered to give up my badge and gun on the spot.
In turn, I could open the spigot about Karen and her parents, about Bear’s involvement in their deaths.
So what we have here is an old-fashioned game of chicken—except we aren’t playing for some stupid car title. The stakes are much higher.
Bear knows full well that if I’m fired as sheriff of Dakota County I don’t have anywhere else to go, not as a cop, anyway. We talk about it every once in a while, usually after he’s been drinking. He knows I’m at the last station stop on the law enforcement line. He knows I really would have to flip burgers to earn a living after that and I probably wouldn’t even be able to do it in Bruner. That I might end up doing exactly what I’m trying desperately to avoid: following my father’s footsteps out of this world by putting a bullet through my head.
At least I won’t do it in front of my son the way my father did.
Experienced people always warn friends never to go into business together, but I didn’t understand why they did it so adamantly—until a few minutes ago, until I suddenly found myself up to my neck in alligators with my best friend. But now I get it, God, do I get it.
I slog through the trees, thinking about Bear and Karen as I check the branches above me every so often for the avalanche that could come tumbling down on me at any moment. Karen was a tough woman to get along with. As nice as Maggie is, Karen was a constant whiner and sometimes she was worse than that. I saw a lot of that side of her during the last couple of years. For a while she kept up that fake, polite facade when I was at their house. But then one day I heard the beast inside her roar when she didn’t know I was in the kitchen making quick work of a turkey leg I’d lifted from their refrigerator. Bear yelled at her that I was in the house and she quieted right down. But after that she didn’t hold back when she got mad and I was around.
Not that Bear sported a halo in their marriage, either—far from it. I don’t think he always asked for sex, I don’t think it was always a mutual roll in the hay for those two, especially on cold winter nights after he got into the vodka. I never saw any marks on her, but that doesn’t mean things were always consensual.
I lean against a tree, breathing hard. Walking in snowshoes is tough. The snow isn’t as deep here as it is on my driveway, because the canopy of needles arching cathedral-like over my head has temporarily intercepted some of the blizzard. But I still sink in a few inches with each step, and going up and down these hills has me huffing and puffing.
I push off the tree and start plodding through the woods again, wondering what’s going on with my driveway. Perhaps there was another, darker reason Bear was so quick to head home. Maybe instead of clearing my driveway he and Vivian are going at it the way she and I did yesterday. Well, I ought to be able to tell what’s happened by how much of the driveway has—or hasn’t—been cleared when I get home.
Then there’s that video camera I set up in the bedroom closet. I’m not stupid and I’d rather be paranoid than naive, even if my suspicions involve my best friend and my wife.
“Hi.”
I spin around, shocked by the sound of a voice from nowhere. I’m forced to grab a low-hanging branch to keep my balance when my snowshoes get crossed, I’m so surprised. “Jesus,” I gasp when I recognize the face, “what are you doing out here?”
I’ve just reached the edge of a clearing that’s bathed in sunlight and Sara is standing twenty feet away. My first instinct is that she’s been following me, but then I spot her tracks coming from the other side of the clearing. Along with a tan parka and snow pants, she’s wearing snowshoes as well, but hers look like something the first pair ever made probably looked like. In fact, they look like antique tennis racquets, catgut strings and all. They wouldn’t support me for a second, but Sara doesn’t weigh much. At five-seven she’s tall and wispy thin, unlike her Chippewa ancestors. Maybe she’s not as pure as she claims to be.
She isn’t wearing a hat and her long, jet-black hair is perched on the back of her head in a wild bun. She looks very pretty, even more so than usual. Exotic, too, which I’ve always found fascinating. Of course, I’ve never been subjected to that crazy, wolverine temper of hers. I’ve only heard about it. Experiencing that kind of rage can change the way a man looks at a woman. It’s certainly changed the way I look at Vivian. And Vivian just talks a big game when it really comes down to it. Sara actually goes for it—hard.
“What are you doing out here?” My heart’s still thumping from the shock of hearing her voice.
“It seemed like a nice morning to take a walk in the woods. I like being out here after a big storm.” She hesitates. “And Ike was being a jerk.”
“What do you mean?” I ask quickly, slipping into what the locals call my “precinct tone.”
She shakes her head and that bun of long, silky, jet-black hair tumbles down her back like the frothy water of the Boulder River tumbles down a rocky set of rapids. The move’s enough to take a man’s breath away and I’m sure it has. More than once, because it just stole mine.
“It’s nothing like that, Sheriff,” she assures me, “but thanks for asking. So, what are you doing out here?”
“I don’t know,” I answer lamely. “I really don’t.”
“I figured things in your house had gotten better,” Sara says, “after what happened to Cindy Harrison the other day.”
I put up one hand. “I can’t talk about—”
“I figured you and Vivian would have spent yesterday and today rechristening every room in the house,” she interrupts as she cuts the distance between us in half with a few agile steps on her snowshoes. “Frankly, it surprises me that you’re out here in the middle of the woods when there’s a willing woman at home and three feet of new snow on the ground.”
I grin self-consciously. I can’t help it. Ever since I moved back here four years ago Sara and I have had this sexual tension shimmering between us like the air above a blistering-hot pavement shimmers on a summer day. I’ve known enough women to recognize it’s there for her, too. It’s not just me feeling it. “You would t
hink that, wouldn’t you?”
Sara takes two more steps toward me. Now the tips of our snowshoes are touching. “Am I wrong?”
“Well, I—”
“Maybe Vivian’s not so willing.”
“Oh, she’s willing.”
“Or is she still as cold as ever? Even with her competition dead.” Sara’s eyes flash. “At least, the woman she thinks was her competition.”
This is crazy. “Sara—”
“Or maybe you’re tired of Vivian,” Sara keeps going, “maybe you need someone else, someone more exciting.”
Despite a flash of guilt, the image of Sara and me entwined in a naked embrace races through my mind. It’s a mesmerizing image, and we stare at each other for what seems like forever. Finally I manage to push my pesky male curiosity to the side.
“This is a long way for you to walk,” I finally say.
“Does it make you uncomfortable to talk about sex with another woman?” she asks slyly.
I can’t tell if Sara means talking about sex in a general way with a woman other than my wife, or actually having sex with another woman. That male curiosity’s back, but still I manage to resist it. “My house is seven miles from town,” I say, ignoring her right back. Now I’ve sparked her interest in something else, I can tell. She likes distances and topography. She always has.
“So what?”
“Seven miles is a long way to walk.” I point down at her snowshoes. “Especially in those.”
“What makes you think we’re seven miles from town?”
“I’ve been going east since I left my house, straight away from 681, and Bruner’s seven miles from my house.” I shrug. “I’m no geometry whiz, but, hey, maybe that makes us even farther than seven miles from town.”
Sara laughs. “You’ve been going mostly north since you left your house, Sheriff.” She points to her right. “Six-eighty-one’s not far that way. We’re actually about halfway between your house and town.”
I don’t argue because I’m sure she’s right. She knows these woods a lot better than I do. I meant to go straight back into the woods from 681, I meant to go east. But, as I’ve been walking, whenever I haven’t been sure of which side of a tree to take, I’ve always gone left of it because that seemed like the safest thing to do. It seemed like the best way to make sure I didn’t get too lost.
“It’s easy to get turned around out here, especially with all this snow.” She laughs again. “Especially for you palefaces.”
I don’t know about everybody else but she’s right about this paleface. Without a trail it’s slip-slide easy for me to get turned around out here. Back when we were kids, Bear and I got lost one summer for several days. Ben Sanderson, the Bruner sheriff back then, had to call in the state boys with their K-9 teams and choppers. They finally found us five miles northeast of Hayward, but it wasn’t like we were hurting. Bear shot a deer on the third morning out, then quartered it, started a fire, and cooked it. It was delicious and we were actually surviving pretty well when the troopers found us.
In fact, I’m not sure Bear was ever really lost. Like Sara, he knows these woods damn well, and it’s occurred to me over the years that he might have been just having a good time. Maybe he didn’t want to go home because being lost was a lot better than being beaten by his dad. Maybe he felt more lost at home than he did in the woods. Maybe he liked seeing me scared, too. At that age guys like to see other guys scared, even their best friend.
“Is this Lewis Prescott’s land?” I ask. The question’s out of left field but I can’t think of anything else to say. Sara’s looking at me all doe-eyed, like she wants something to happen. I’m trying to think of anything to keep the conversation going. “I heard he’s the biggest landowner in Dakota County.”
“He is,” she confirms, “other than the Feds,” she adds with a curl of her upper lip, like she’s just sucked on a lemon wedge. “They’ve stolen a lot more of my forest than Lew Prescott has.”
That was stupid of me. She hates the federal government very much. I should have remembered that and anticipated how my question would lead her right to them. Sometimes I can be pretty insensitive. I don’t mean to be but I can. But then Sara can turn almost any conversation into a bash on Washington.
“Of course,” she keeps going, “that’s where you and I have a major difference of opinion. You probably think Lewis Prescott’s a bigger jerk than the Feds by a long shot.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Come on, Sheriff. Everybody knows how you felt about Cindy, and how her father feels about you.”
“Yeah, well, I—”
“I want to show you something,” she interrupts. She points east, the way I had originally meant to go. “It’s something you need to see.”
“What is it?”
“Just trust me.”
“Sara, I don’t want to—”
“Trust me.”
“How far is it?”
“We’ve got plenty of time to get there and back before dark.”
That dream I had last night about Bear and Vivian flickers through my mind again. Maybe it was actually a premonition and not a dream. Maybe I should turn around and get back to my house to protect what’s mine. Or maybe it’s too late and I should go with Sara.
“Let’s go.” Sara moves beside me and touches her glove to mine. “Come on.”
I gaze into her mahogany eyes with the gold flecks, hoping to decode the degree of her desire and therefore the truth of her intent. Finally, I nod. “Okay, but this better be good.”
With Sara in the lead, we hug the edge of the clearing for a short distance, then turn into the woods going east. At least, that’s the direction she tells me we’re going. I wouldn’t know at this point because even when we can see it, the sun’s in the middle of its arc across the sky. Without being able to use it as an indicator I’ve got no idea where we are or which way we’re going. I think Sara senses that I’m lost and it wouldn’t surprise me if she likes that. The same way Bear probably did all those years ago.
We climb up and down four ridges and it’s a lot of work. At least, it is for me. Near the top of the fifth ridge she stops, turns around, and puts a finger to her lips. “Stay here and be quiet. I’ll be right back.”
She’ll get no argument from me. I was about to tell her I needed a break anyway, and I’m glad I didn’t have to so I can save a little of my male pride. I nod, then glance around uneasily as she moves off. I start feeling like Custer must have felt on that Montana hillside. Why do I need to be quiet?
Sara vanishes among the trees at the crest of the ridge, then reappears a few minutes later. “Come on,” she calls in a low voice, waving for me to come up. “Hurry up.”
I expect her to be smirking at how I’m plodding up the slope, but she isn’t. Her expression’s grave and her eyes keep darting around. “What’s the matter?”
“Just come on.”
We retrace her steps of a few minutes ago, grabbing low branches to keep from falling as we head down the other side of the hill and the going gets treacherous. As I’m about to ask her again what this is all about, I spot something through the pines at the base of the slope. It’s a log cabin, and if I wasn’t looking for something to begin with, I doubt I would have noticed it. One side of it is tucked into a cut in the hillside and it’s set in amongst some big trees. I assume it’s a hunting cabin, but it’s awfully big to be that. Hunting cabins in these woods are usually like ice-fishing houses on the lakes, only large enough to squeeze a few people and a stove inside. Mostly just places to get warm and cook something. This place looks like it might be big enough to have a couple of rooms.
“Is that what you brought me out here to see?”
“Yes.”
“What’s so special about it?”
“I’m pretty sure this is federal land, not Prescott’s,” she says, not answering my question. “Prescott doesn’t own that much land on this side of 681. Most of his is over on the west side of th
e road, across the river and back behind the other estates.” She points at the cabin. “And that isn’t a Forest Service building.”
“How do you know?” The Feds never tell me what they’re doing in my woods. Hell, they rarely tell the state so why would they tell me?
“There’d be something on it identifying it as federal government property,” she answers. “They tag everything with some sort of ID number. I looked all around the last time I was out here, but I didn’t find anything.”
She’s right about that. The Feds usually do tag their assets with ID numbers no matter what they are. I guess that directive comes from the General Accountability Office. “Big deal. People build hunting cabins all over these woods without getting the landowner’s okay.”
People up here in the north-country figure it’s their God-given right to hunt or fish wherever they want to no matter whose land or water it is. The Gorges is the only place in Dakota County where I’m able to really enforce no-trespassing laws, and that’s only because the River Families can snap pictures from up on the bluffs and email them to the precinct. And because there’s no place for the offender to take his canoe out of the water other than the Route 7 bridge where we can lie in wait.
“You know that,” I add.
“But as big as this one?” she asks as we near the place. “I don’t think so.”
“It is bigger than the ones I usually see, I’ll give you that. But I still don’t get why I slogged all the way out here.”
She’s quiet for a few moments, then she points at the cabin again. “There were bones on the ground last time I was out here and they were all over the place. Mostly on the other side of the cabin from here where there’s a clearing. You’ll see when we get down there. And, yeah, they were animal bones. And, no, I didn’t see anything human,” she says, anticipating what I’m thinking. “But they were everywhere. Some of them were chopped up and burned bad and it was crazy, I’ll tell you. You won’t be able to see them now because of the new snow, but they’re all around. I wasn’t out here that long ago, either. A month maybe, that’s all.” She hesitates. “Some of them were on top of the snow that was here then. On top of the snow,” she repeats. “That’s what made me think it wasn’t that long ago when the bones were burned. It wasn’t last summer or anything.”