Northwest Angle co-11

by William Kent Krueger

  In her brief sleep during the night before, she’d had a dream. It had been so terrible that she didn’t even share it with Mal, but it had jarred her awake and left her fearful of closing her eyes again.

  In the nightmare, Rose had seen them all—every one of the O’Connors and her and Mal—standing in a clearing surrounded by bodies. None of the bodies was whole. They’d all been torn into bloody pieces. Rose and the people she loved most in the world huddled together and fearfully eyed the edges of the clearing, where amid the dark, unfathomable shadows of the trees, things moved. She couldn’t make out what lurked there, human or beast, but whatever it was, it was preparing to come at them and tear them apart in exactly the way it had torn apart all those bodies around them. Rose was not just afraid, she was terrified. And worst of all, she had the sense that they were absolutely alone in that clearing, that God had abandoned them completely. It was this that scared her most. That somehow she—they—had done something that had made even God turn his back on them.

  As soon as Mal and Anne left, she went to the kitchen, but rather than rummage through the refrigerator and cupboards, she stood awhile with her eyes closed. She prayed silently that, in whatever lay ahead, God would be with them and would stay their hands from doing anything that might, in his eyes, be unforgivable. Was there such a thing, she wondered, even as she prayed, something so terrible that even God could not offer pardon?

  Her eyes were still closed and her mind focused on prayer when she felt a strong arm wrap around her chest and the blade of a knife press against her neck, and the coldest voice she’d ever heard whispered, “One sound and I’ll slit your throat.”

  Rose stood paralyzed, and the feel of the nightmare, of being alone in the clearing abandoned by God, overwhelmed her.

  “Who are you?” the cold voice asked.

  She barely managed to speak. “Rose,” she said. “Thorne.”

  “I don’t care about your name. I want to know who you are. Are you one of them?”

  One of whom? she wanted to ask.

  Before she could reply, the whisperer from behind demanded, “Where’s the baby?”

  This she would not answer.

  “Tell me where the baby is, or I’ll kill you now.”

  Her heart beat so hard and fast she could feel the pound of it in her throat beneath the blade of the knife. Somehow, she found words and stammered, “Now or later, you’ll kill me anyway.”

  “Maybe not, if you give me the baby.”

  “So you can kill him like you killed his mother? No.”

  The man stayed at her back, his body pressed so tightly to hers that she could feel the iron of every muscle. “Move,” he said and forced her from the kitchen to the front door of the lodge. “Call them in.”

  She made no effort to comply. She felt the knife cut into her flesh and blood trickle down her neck.

  “Call them in.”

  “If I call them in,” she said, nearly breathless, “you’ll kill them, too.”

  “Maybe not,” he whispered. “Or maybe I’ll do it whether you call them or not.”

  She didn’t reply, nor did she call out to Mal and Anne.

  “Be afraid, woman. You will die.”

  “We all die eventually.”

  He was quiet, his breath hot against her ear. “You’re not afraid?”

  “Yes.”

  “All I want is the baby.”

  “I’ll die before I give you that child.”

  “He’s not yours to give.” It was said with anger as sharp as the blade he held.

  At that moment, Mal and Anne stood up and started for the lodge. Rose thought of crying out, of sacrificing herself for them, but before she could speak, the man at her back released the arm he’d wrapped around her chest, brought it up and clamped his hand over her mouth, and drew her forcefully back into the kitchen, where they stood together.

  All Rose could do was pray, which she did with her whole being. She heard the door open and two voices and a little laughter from Anne.

  “Rose?” Mal called.

  The man moved her to the kitchen doorway. Rose saw her husband’s face, stunned as if a horse had kicked him. The rifle was held in his right hand, but he did nothing to bring it to the ready. Whether this was a conscious choice or simply that Mal had never used a firearm and his mind didn’t naturally leap in that direction, Rose couldn’t say. Nor could she say whether or not she was relieved by her husband’s inaction.

  “Noah Smalldog,” Mal said.

  “Tell me where the baby is, and I’ll let her go.”

  “We know what you did to your sister,” Mal said quietly, reasonably. “Even if I could tell you where that baby is, I wouldn’t. None of us would.”

  “What I did to my sister?” The man sounded at the edge of mania, and Rose felt his body begin to shake with rage. “I’ve seen your boats coming and going from Stump Island. Are you part of them?”

  “No,” Mal said. “We have nothing to do with those people, except insofar as they can answer the questions we have about your sister and her baby.”

  “Why do you care?”

  Before anyone could speak further, the sound of a boat engine came from the lake. Through the windows behind Mal and Anne, Rose saw Kretsch’s boat arrive at the dock. They tied up, and Cork and Kretsch and a woman walked toward the lodge. No one inside moved an inch.

  The woman stepped in first. She stopped so abruptly that Cork nearly ran into her. He looked past Mal and Anne, who stood statue still; his eyes took in the situation, and he came forward slowly. Kretsch entered last. As soon as he saw Smalldog, he cleared his handgun from its holster and brought it up. He wavered, uncertain, and Rose understood that it was because he couldn’t fire without being sure that she would not be hit. For what seemed like forever, they faced one another in that standoff, and no one said a word.

  “I know you.”

  It was Smalldog speaking to Cork.

  “No,” Cork said. “You’ve only seen me. You don’t know me.”

  “You threw rocks at me.”

  “I didn’t have anything else.”

  “Still got the bruise on my rib. David and Goliath,” Smalldog said.

  “That’s pretty much the same thought I had out there,” Cork said. “I was kind of desperate.”

  Something in Smalldog’s voice had changed, and Rose felt the rage ebbing from his body. She wasn’t sure what was happening, but for some reason, the man had responded positively to Cork.

  “The woman who was with you?” Smalldog asked.

  “My daughter.”

  Smalldog was quiet a moment, putting things together. “She took the baby, trying to get to safety, and you stayed back to throw rocks and give them both a fighting chance.”

  “That’s the size of it,” Cork said.

  “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why risk your lives for a child not even yours?”

  “We saw what was done to your sister.”

  “And you thought it was me and that I’d do something like that to her baby?” Smalldog sounded as if all the pieces were falling into place for him.

  “I didn’t know who you were, only that you were hunting us.”

  “And when you found out who I was, you still believed I could have done it.” Anger had returned to his voice and tension to his body. “You thought because I’m Indian I would do a thing like that to my own sister? Chimook.” He spat out the unkind Ojibwe word for a white man.

  “Anishinaabe indaaw,” Cork said. I am Anishinaabe.

  “You’re Shinnob?”

  “My grandmother was true-blood Iron Lake Ojibwe.”

  “You don’t look Shinnob.”

  “And you look like a man who might have killed his own sister. How can either of us be sure?” Cork waited a moment. “It’s clear to me now that you thought we were the ones who killed Lily. Why would we do that?”

  “I didn’t know. I only knew she was dead, and there were two stran
gers out there with her baby. You tell me what you would have thought.”

  The tone of the conversation had become more reasonable, Rose believed, but the man still held the knife to her throat.

  “Did you think that we were part of the Seven Trumpets people?” Cork asked.

  “Or sent by them. You’ve been out to their island a lot the last couple of days.”

  “Put that knife down and we’ll talk,” Cork said. “I think we all want the same thing here, the safety of the child, and there’s a great deal we need to know.”

  The man didn’t move. Rose continued to feel the trickle of her blood. The room was deathly quiet, and she could hear the pound of her heart in her ears. She prayed silently, Dear Lord, please let this end well.

  At last, the blade came away. She felt the jerk of Smalldog’s body as he threw the knife. She watched it somersault in the air, and the blade sank deeply into the floorboard at Cork’s feet. The knife, frightfully large, quivered a moment, then was still.

  In the instant that followed, Rose heard the sound of boots fast at her back, and the grunt of Smalldog, and the man dropped beside her. Rose turned. Seth Bascombe stood behind her, his rifle poised in a way that made it clear he’d used the butt to take down the Ojibwe.

  “Spotted his boat in a cove the other side of the island,” Bascombe said. “Found his tracks on the trail there, headed this way. Figured he’d try something like this, sneak up and slit your throats. The son of a bitch.” The big man spat. He glared down where Smalldog lay on the floor, unmoving. “Hope I killed him.”

  FORTY-FOUR

  Smalldog lay unconscious across the cushions of the sofa Bascombe kept in the small open area of the lodge. Anne, who’d received some nursing training during her stay with the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur in El Salvador, cleaned his wound and said, “We should get him to a hospital and have his head X-rayed. He’s got substantial swelling back there.”

  “Ice’ll take care of that,” Bascombe said without sympathy. “I think we should tie him up before he comes to.”

  Cork said, “I know your heart was in the right place, Seth, but you may have killed any hope we had of getting through to this man.”

  “We don’t need to get through to him,” Bascombe said. “We got him right where we want him. Now all we need to do is call the sheriff and have this piece of crap hauled away. Except I can’t do that.”

  “Why?” Mal asked.

  “I came in the back way, same as Smalldog. I saw that he cut my phone line. Tom, maybe you better get to the Angle, give your boss a holler.”

  Kretsch nodded. “If nothing else, we’ve got Smalldog on assault.”

  “He didn’t hurt me,” Rose threw in quickly. “I think he was only concerned about the safety of the child, same as us.”

  Cork held up the knife that Smalldog had pressed against Rose’s throat. “He let her go, Tom. He threw this away. To me, that says we need to talk to him and listen to what he has to say.”

  Bascombe looked astounded, stared at them all as if he were dealing with a group of imbeciles. “You may be Ojibwe, Cork, but you’re also former law enforcement. Can’t you tell a manipulative, psychopathic liar when you meet one? I say Tom and me haul him to the mainland, call the sheriff, and turn him over.”

  “He’s injured,” Anne said.

  “Let the sheriff worry about that,” Bascombe shot back. “We need to cuff him and transport him before he wakes up. When he opens his eyes, he’ll be plenty mad and not easy to control.”

  “Before we move him, we should let him wake up,” Anne argued. “We should make sure he’s in shape to travel.”

  “What if he doesn’t wake up?” Bascombe spoke as if the idea appealed to him.

  Cork said, “Tom, maybe you should head to the Angle and bring Lynn Belgea back so she can take a good look at Smalldog. You could call the sheriff while you’re at it.”

  “Cuff him first,” Bascombe said.

  “Probably a good idea,” Kretsch agreed. He took the handcuffs from his duty belt and clamped them over the Ojibwe’s wrists. He handed the key to Cork. “Until we have a chance to talk to him, we ought to assume the worst, so keep a good eye on him, okay?”

  “Will do,” Cork said.

  “I’ll go with you,” Bascombe offered.

  “No need,” Kretsch told him.

  “I want to get someone out here to fix my phone ASAP,” Bascombe replied. “And we’re getting low on food. I’ll pick up a few necessities while I’m there.”

  Kretsch shrugged. “All right.”

  Sarah stood quietly in a corner, as if trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. Cork had briefly introduced her but hadn’t had time to fill the others in on the reason for her presence.

  Bascombe nodded in her direction. “Maybe we should bring her along. Get her safely to the Angle and out of reach of those religious zealots.”

  “No,” the woman said. “I want to stay here.”

  “Suit yourself,” Bascombe said. “Ready, Tom?”

  “We’ll be back as soon as we can,” Kretsch promised.

  The two men headed out, and Cork watched them pull away in Kretsch’s boat. At his back, he heard Rose ask, “Would you like some coffee?” He turned and saw that she’d approached Sarah and was smiling gently at the woman.

  Sarah looked Rose over carefully and finally said in a soft voice, “Yes.”

  Rose went to fetch the pot from the kitchen.

  Cork said, “Sarah, why don’t you sit down and tell the others your story, if you’re willing.”

  She moved like a ghost, silently and as if she had no substance. She seemed to Cork a woman used to being invisible. She sat in one of the chairs at the table, and Rose set a mug in front of her and filled it from the pot. She picked it up, closed her eyes, and sipped, then drank greedily.

  “I haven’t tasted coffee in years,” she said. “Those people, they believe it’s an evil.”

  “Those people?” Rose said. “Isn’t one of them your husband?”

  Cork said, “Why don’t you tell them everything, Sarah?”

  And he listened as she told again the story he’d first heard on Kretsch’s boat. She stared down at her hands and began hesitantly, in a way that made Cork think she was unused to speaking to so many people at once.

  “My father, see, he was a pretty hard man, real disappointed in life. My mother died when I was a kid, and my father and me, we just kind of drifted around. He was a drunk. He’d earn a little, drink a lot, get mad at the world, beat me up. He blamed me and everyone and everything else for what he called his misfortune.”

  She risked a look up, as if to gauge some criticism she thought might be leveled at her for being that kind of victim. Cork hoped what she saw in their faces would only comfort her.

  “Go on, Sarah,” he said gently. “Well, when I was sixteen, we found ourselves in Spokane, Washington, listening to a man named Reverend Jerusalem Hornett talk about the end of the world, which he believed was right around the corner. He said it was the responsibility of the righteous to be prepared to fight the armies of Satan. In his mind, that was the government and the Jews and the liberals and pretty much anybody who wasn’t a member of his church. For a preacher, he didn’t say hardly nothing about love. Everything he read from the Bible was all about killing and vengeance. My father, he just ate that up. Before you could snap your fingers, we were signed up with Reverend Hornett’s church.”

  She stopped and drank the last of the coffee in her mug and asked timidly, “Could I have some more?”

  Rose obliged, and Sarah watched the coffee pour as if it were gold.

  “So you joined the church,” Cork said.

  She nodded. “The Reverend had three sons. Joshua, he was youngest, was real good-looking and quiet and sweet, not like the other Hornetts, and if I didn’t particularly like the kind of people Reverend Hornett’s sermons drew to his church, I sure liked the look of his son. And he liked me, I could tell. The Reverend was
married to a woman just as hate-filled as him, sharp-eyed and sharp-tongued and sharp-witted like some kind of, I don’t know, vicious hunting animal. I’m telling you, she had a razor blade for a soul. It was like somebody broke a chunk off the hard rock that was her husband and used it to make her, too.”

  “Any idea why they were like that?” Cork asked.

  “The Reverend, he spent time in prison early on, which is where he claimed he had his vision of the End Times and was tapped by God to be some kind of general in the holy army. Abigail, hell, I believe she was born purely evil. Some people are like that.”

  “I don’t believe that’s true,” Rose said quietly but firmly.

  “Well, maybe she had a rough childhood then or something, I don’t know. By the time I met her, her heart was dead to anything except the Reverend and bringing about his vision of Armageddon.”

  “You and Joshua fell in love?” Cork said, encouraging her to continue her story.

  She shook her head. “More like we fell in lust. He was pretty ripe for picking. But Abigail was dead set against it. She had another girl chose for Josh, homely as tree bark but real strong and real set in her belief in all the crap the Reverend slung around. Long and short of it, I got pregnant, and Josh and me had to get married, and Abigail, I swear, hated my guts.”

  “That must have been uncomfortable,” Rose offered.

  “I thought I could handle her,” Sarah said. “I didn’t understand how heartless that woman could be.”

  “Tell them what happened that summer,” Cork said.

  Sarah drank from her mug and wiped the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand.

  “The Reverend moved a bunch of the church folks up to a wilderness area real near the border with Canada, where he had a kind of compound. It was real basic. No running water. No indoor toilets. No electricity. I don’t think it was ever meant to be a permanent place, just somewhere safe and isolated where he could make plans for another place he called the Citadel, which was supposed to be some sort of fortress for Christian soldiers to gather and ride out Armageddon. He had pretty elaborate ideas.”