It was dinner time and his stomach told him as much. He knocked off for the day and went inside. Rummaging through the pantry he decided on something easy tonight. He found some pasta and a jar of spaghetti sauce. Once he put the noodles in a pot of water and set it on the stove, he cut up some onions, peppers and mushrooms and put them in a pan with some olive oil. He would add them all to the jar of store bought sauce that he started in another pan. The smell of the onions and peppers was tantalizing and made him realize that he had hadn’t eaten anything all day and he was starving. It wasn’t anything like his mother’s homemade spaghetti sauce, but it would do for a bachelor. He wasn’t a gourmet chef by any stretch of the imagination, but he liked to be in the kitchen. He was good with creating dishes from whatever he had on hand at the time. He referred to it as cupboard cooking.
After dinner he decided to check his emails and turn on the TV. While surfing channels he deleted junk email and flagged others that he intended to read later. He flipped the channel just as a news reporter was signing off from a story about an 18-wheeler that had wrecked out on the interstate. No injuries reported, but it shut the highway down for a few hours, and had traffic backed up. The next channel a weather reporter was standing in front of a map talking about what to expect over the next few days. The meteorologist said to expect an early season snowstorm that shouldn’t be much to worry about at this time. Not surprising and he didn’t pay much attention to it. Snow would be in the forecast now until spring. He pushed the button on the remote control again and continued to surf until he found a movie that he wanted to watch. It wasn’t going to come on for a few minutes so he turned back to his emails. He opened another email from his publisher reminding him that he still hasn’t called him back. He deleted it. I’ll call him tomorrow, he thought, just as a vibrating buzz began in his jeans pocket alerting him to the fact that he had a call. There was no cell tower nearby so the phone could only work when the wireless internet router was open. He left it on all the time, but it only worked about fifty yards out from the house. Past that distance, it was too weak for a phone call to go out or come through. He reached in his pocket and looked at the caller id to see who it was. A big smile came over his face. It was his friend Craig so he slid the green square on the touch screen to answer.
“Hey, Craig, how are ya?” Troy asked.
He hadn’t seen Craig in a few years, but the friends kept in touch regularly. It had been more than twenty years past now since they had roomed together in the athlete’s dorm. Both were good players and had much in common even though they came from different backgrounds. Craig’s family was farmers and he grew up knowing that hard work sometimes paid off, but many times didn’t. He knew heartache and struggle and worked for everything he ever had. He worked so that he could live whereas, it seemed to him, that many people simply live to work. Troy, on the other hand, came from a family of white collar professionals. His father was an electrical engineer for a large company that built military wiring harnesses. His mother was a physician’s assistant at the local hospital and volunteered regularly at a downtown mission that fed and housed the homeless population. The family lived in a moderate home in the Cincinnati suburbs.
“I’m doing good, Troy boy. How’s life in the big woods?” his friend asked.
Troy replied, “Quite honestly, Craig, it’s incredible out here! You should see the lake. Deep blue and crystal clear and the fish practically jump in your boat.”
Troy laughed out loud as he excitedly talked about the beautiful setting in the mountains. It made Craig all the readier to pack up and head out on the road. Ever since Troy first told him about the place, he had wanted to visit and see it for himself. He imagined the views were spectacular and he knew were mostly unseen by people as the road to the lake and the cabin wasn’t heavily travelled. His friend had told him before the road was built a few years back, the only way in was either on a four wheeler or snow mobile. Some hunters that may have ventured into the area could have walked or ridden hunting mules, but it was rare they would go into that area since all of the public hunting lands had much easier access.
“Man, that’s what I’m talking about! How’s the deer population? You ready to let me help you manage the herds yet?” his friend asked.
“Are you not packed yet,” Troy joked. “What about Phil, he coming too?”
Craig laughed, “You know he stays packed and sitting on go.”
The men were always ready for a big game hunt, and the mountains where Troy lived certainly provided their fair share of big game. The men had spent many hunting seasons together and had traveled to several places for camping and hunting. They spent another hour on the phone talking about everything from hunting to work and just catching up. Troy told him what to expect as far as the terrain and winter clothing.
“I bet I can manage that. I’ll give Phil a call and make plans to be there sometime on Friday. Opening day is that Saturday so we’ll be ready. I’ll load the Razor up too and a couple of Yeti coolers for all that meat I’ll be bringing back. I can’t wait to see some of them big northern whitetails and muleys,” Craig said.
Troy knew how much his buddies loved the outdoors and neither of them would miss an opportunity to hunt whitetail deer here and possibly be mentioned in one of Troy’s freelance stories that he wrote for various outdoor magazines. There weren’t many places that out of state hunters could get access to that wasn’t public hunting. Public hunting meant camping and roughing it which wasn’t all that bad of an experience, but it also meant several other hunters could be in the area. What Troy offered was a nice warm cabin, hot food, and hot showers every night. It would be like staying at a Holiday Inn for them.
Craig and Phil would arrive at the end of the week before the opening day. Back in Oklahoma, the deer were relatively small and lucky to weigh more than a hundred pounds dressed; they didn’t provide much meat to put away for the winter. Up here in the north, the deer were much larger and could weigh upwards of 200 pounds dressed with some going well over 250. Mule deer could weigh as much as 300 pounds. Troy was getting excited about his friends’ visit and ready for the hunt. He had spent so much time talking to Craig that the movie he had set to watch was almost over. He clicked over to the old west channel and found a rerun of Gun Smoke on and settled in.
Chapter 4
When the show was over, Troy was getting sleepy. He turned the TV off and went to make sure everything was locked up for the night. The front door had a huge security bar lock on it that could only be used from the inside. It had to be lifted up and dropped into two iron braces on each side of the door. This was bear country. Though they rarely attacked humans, it was still entirely possible. He placed the heavy board into the metal pocket braces and then made his way to the back door to bolt it. Once he felt the house was secure he turned in.
The next few days passed without incident and he felt much better about being alone at the cabin, though he didn’t venture far, and he always took a gun with him when he was outside. Occasionally, he glimpsed a deer in the meadow behind the house. There seemed to be an abundant mule deer and white tail population here in the mountains, though He had only seen a few elk since he moved in. He was told that in some instances a Shiras moose may be spotted, but a rarity. He had never seen one.
Early Friday morning he was startled awake by a honking horn. He rolled over and looked at the clock - 6:37a.m.; the sun wasn’t even up yet. He groaned as he rolled out of bed and walked to the veranda doors. He opened the door and walked outside to see who it was - it was freezing cold. The wind was blowing down from the mountain and along the lake chilling the cove with a wintry blast. He quickly ran back in and grabbed a coat. When he came back out he could see a black Ford F-250 with a camper and trailer hauling a Polaris RZR tied down on the back. The RZR, also called a Razor, was a four door all-terrain vehicle more than capable of traversing incredibly diverse and rugged environments. The Razor was Craig’s baby. The doors opened and two men stepped
out of the truck.
“Hey there you lazy, good for nothing,” Craig shouted with a huge smile on his face when he saw his friend on the top deck. “Rise and shine and cook us some breakfast! We just drove eighteen hours straight through with nothing more than truck stop sandwiches along the way. We’re starving.”
“How about I go back to bed and let you sit outside and wait until I’m ready to get up,” Troy sleepily replied, but he was genuinely happy to see that his friends had arrived. They always had a good time together.
Phil laughed and joined in, “Well, there ya go, Craig, that’s what you get for waking a man up out of his obviously much needed beauty sleep. Starvation!”
Troy laughed and told the men to grab their gear and he would be down to let them in. He turned and went back in, found his socks and slid them on, then pulled on his jeans and boots. He found a gray flannel and buttoned it up while he walked downstairs, unlocked the front door and greeted the two men just as they climbed to the top of the steps of the porch.
“Good to see you boys! It’s been way too long. Come on in out of the cold.”
Troy stepped back out of the doorway, reached down and grabbed a couple of their bags. Carrying them inside, he asked about their drive up. Craig said that he had done most of the driving and the weather was good all the way. They made exceptionally good time once they were packed up and loaded. This wasn’t their first hunting trip and had it down to a well-oiled system. They stopped as soon as they crossed the state line to buy their out of state hunting licenses and tags.
“Right this way, fellas, and I’ll show you where you’re bunking. You can stow your gear while I get some grub on. Coffee will be ready in a jiff. I might even be persuaded to make some biscuits and gravy.”
Troy helped the men get their gear stowed away in their rooms. Craig would be sleeping in the front bedroom just off the kitchen facing the lake and Phil would take the room in the back. Each bedroom had a three-quarter bath and plenty of room for them to lay out all of their gear. The closets were large and the men were able to get all of their hunting clothes hung up and put away by the time Troy had breakfast started.
Phil Jackson was the first to arrive back in the kitchen and helped himself to a cup of coffee. The shortest of the three men, he was still a large man at two-hundred and twenty pounds and a little over six feet tall. He had a dark brown complexion and black hair cut short to reveal his brown eyes, eyes that seemed to have a permanent squint due to the many long days in the Midwest sun. He was Native American, and of the A-ni-a-wi Clan of the Cherokee. A-ni-a-wi means deer in his native language and the clan was known as fast runners and hunters. He was very proud of his heritage and was, indeed, a very skilled hunter.
The two men talked about the area and the layout while Troy got out plates and silverware. Phil said that he and Craig had used Google Earth before they left and printed out a few maps of the area that they could use. Troy also wrote down the Wi-Fi code for them and explained how the telephone worked. They could both set their cell phones to use his internet in order to get service for texting or for using their built in GPS. Without the satellite receiver dish, neither would work.
“Your cell phones won’t get any reception here until you get out to the state highway, but as long as the Wi-Fi is on, you can use the Wi-Fi cell phone app to make calls,” Troy said.
Craig had just walked into the room as Troy was explaining how the system worked. He opened his cell phone and tapped in the code for the Wi-Fi and the connection was made. He tested it and then closed it out. No reason for using it now, he thought. Neither Craig nor Phil were married or had families they needed to contact. Craig always insisted that he would never get married and miss out on all the fun of these hunting trips. He referred to himself as a professional bachelor.
“Man that sure smells good! This is quite the setup, Troy boy. That lake is incredible.”
Troy finished cooking eggs, hash browns, and biscuits and gravy for the men and told them to help themselves, they all dug in ravenously.
“If for some reason the weather turns bad, we’ll probably be out of luck with the internet. You may have seen the satellite dish on the house when you drove in. It looks good, but when it’s snowing, iced over, or storming hard, the signal fades to nothing. I’ve called the phone company and they said it wouldn’t be anytime soon that they get a land-line out this way. One house just isn’t a priority to ‘em I suppose,” he laughed.
Craig Morton was a tall man standing just over six foot four inches with broad shoulders and was strong as a bull. In college, Craig played tight end for the Wildcats and even though that was several years ago, he certainly maintained himself well with a strict workout routine. He walked back to the counter and refilled his coffee cup. When he sat back down on one of the bar stools he asked Troy about the fishing in the lake and mentioned that he’d love to have some fish for dinner. Troy told the men that he had some catfish in the freezer, but he had planned on going back out one day and catching a few steelheads.
“Sounds good to me,” Phil said, as he looked to Craig for agreement. “Though I wouldn’t mind dropping a line myself while I’m here. That lake sure looks tempting.”
“Just one thing I need to tell you fellas,” Troy said. He went on to explain to them about the rock throwing incident and what the sheriff’s deputy had told him. After listening to the story both men wanted to check it out. Troy took them outside and pointed out the damage on the side of the cabin where the rock had hit it.
“Wow,” Craig exclaimed. “That’s freaking crazy! That’s obviously what shook the house and knocked the picture off the wall. Was anything else torn up?”
The men looked around the house and all through the yard for any indication of the intruder, but came up empty. Coming back around to the front of the house Troy said, “I’ll tell you, it was a little spooky. ‘Course I had my Colt and I loaded every other gun I have in the house and had all of my ammo handy,” he laughed.
Phil asked, “Have you recently pissed anyone off enough to try and scare you or do you think it might have been some punk kids being jackasses?”
“I really don’t think it was any kids because that rock must’ve weighed ten pounds and I never heard any voices. I’ve not been here in this town long enough to have pissed anyone off, let alone enough for someone to drive all the way out here, sneak into the woods and throw rocks at the house in these freezing temperatures in the middle of the night. I turned the lights on and never seen anyone or anything and the lights around the place will light up the entire yard all the way out to the tree line,” Troy explained.
Craig asked, “I’m curious now, how far do you think it is to the trees from this side of the house?”
“I don’t know, maybe a hundred feet or so, why?” Troy replied.
Craig turned and jogged to the house saying over his shoulder, “I’ll be right back.”
While Craig went off on his sudden errand, Troy pointed out a few things to Phil around the place such as the fish cleaning station he had set up in the back and the shed where he still had all of his things stored from the move. He was explaining the backup generator to him just as Craig came back around and held something up to his eye.
“Living out here like this, it’s a smart idea to have one of these bad boys hooked up on the system. Grid ever goes down, I still have power. Fifteen kilowatts and it’ll run the entire house on propane with no problems. That tank sitting out there is fifteen hundred gallons and it’ll last me all winter. Expensive as hell, but I wasn’t taking any chances,” Troy explained.
Craig shifted a few more times before moving back over to the other two men.
“Boys, I gotta tell ya. I just used my range finder and at the closest point, it’s fifty-three yards to the house.”
“Yeah. So what,” Troy asked.
“Think of it like this, you can throw a baseball that far with no problem right?” Craig began explaining.
The others nodded
in agreement.
“But throwing a ten-pound rock a hundred and fifty feet? That’s not freaking possible even for an Olympic athlete throwing a shotput! Whoever threw that rock had to be standing only a few feet away, but if so, why didn’t they leave any tracks. You said that what woke you up was when the big rock hit the house and shook it, but the next morning when you looked around you didn’t see any tracks and neither did the deputy when he came out. I’m sure you must have spooked them off when you got up and turned on the lights. I think it was some kids like Phil said that were just messing with you and then when you fired a couple of rounds off they knew the joke went far enough and got out of here in a hurry.” Craig said.
“Could be,” Troy pondered. “I’ve not heard anything else the last few nights, so maybe.”
Phil pointed out that daylight was wasting and he wanted to do some scouting before deer season opened the next day. The men went back inside and the two visitors pulled out the aerial photographs and maps to pin point some locations for scouting.
“So, Troy boy, what are your property border lines here?” Craig asked.
Troy explained to the men that he had more than twelve hundred acres that surrounded the lake area. He showed them on the map and pointed out the fence that surrounded the bottom meadow where the previous owner kept some cattle and horses. The men mentioned that they had seen a lean-to and a couple of loafing sheds on the way in and then, of course, the hay barn with the corral.
“From the hay meadow, the boundaries go up to the ridge and basically wrap around the mountain to swing back to the lake on the eastern edge. Even though my property stops at the ridge, you can hunt just about as far as you would like to have to drag a deer back because the land that butts up against me is federal and it’s public hunting. You’re just not allowed to build any permanent structures or have any motorized vehicles up there,” Troy explained. “There are trails that go all over my property and you can see it better from the Jeep or your Razor if you’re ready to go look. I’ll show you where the main section lines run and from there we can scout some good locations.”
Siege at Hawthorn Lake: Murder on the Mountain Page 3