Northwest Angle

by William Kent Krueger

  The name Barney Fife came to mind, but Cork said nothing. He moved back to the seat next to Jenny.

  “How’re you doing, kiddo?” he asked.

  She looked at his face and said, “Better than you, I think. You’re pretty green.”

  “I’ll be all right. And your boyo?”

  She smiled down at the baby, who despite the wild rock of the boat and the whip of the wind and the noise of the hull against rough water, was sleeping. “He’s doing great,” she said.

  “This is the most tolerant kid I’ve ever seen.”

  A darkness came over Jenny’s face. “I wonder about that. I wonder if his ordeal has affected him somehow. Tempered his natural inclinations, maybe. He doesn’t cry much, not like the babies I’ve been around in the nursery down in Iowa City, anyway.”

  “He’s only a few weeks old,” Cork said. “He’s malleable, right? And resilient. He’ll bounce back.”

  “I hope so,” she said.

  Cork leaned back and closed his eyes and concentrated on keeping what was kicking inside his stomach corralled there.

  The clouds came up fast, black horses galloping wildly out of the west across the sky. Because his eyes had been closed for a long time, Cork didn’t see them. It was Jenny who alerted her father to the danger.

  “Dad?”

  When he heard the urgency in her voice, his eyes popped wide, and he looked where her finger pointed.

  “Tom!” he called.

  “I see it,” Kretsch said. “Nothing we can do now but ride it out. You better cover the baby. Looks like the rain’ll be heavy for a bit.”

  Jenny had brought a windbreaker, and she draped it over the open ice chest, then peeked inside.

  “What’s the verdict?” Cork called to her above the wind.

  She shook her head in amazement. “Dead to the world, thank God.”

  “Brace yourselves,” Kretsch said. “Here it comes.”

  It was as if a dam had split open and everything held in the reservoir behind spilled out. The wind, already strong, became a rage, and the rain struck Cork’s face hard as bullets. Jenny had angled the lid of the ice chest to keep as much water off the windbreaker as possible, and she hunched protectively over the makeshift cradle. Kretsch turned the bow of the boat directly into the storm and held the wheel steady against the full force of all that came at them. The sky above was black and boiling, but Cork could see the edges of the storm system a few miles off. Beyond it was blue sky. They just had to hang tough for a while.

  The squall passed, and as quickly as the sky had turned threatening, it cleared again.

  Kretsch turned back to them from the helm and patted the dash of his boat. “Tough old girl. Knew she’d get us through.”

  Jenny pulled the windbreaker from the ice chest, and the sun hit the baby’s face. He began to wake and make fussing noises.

  “Want me to put together a bottle?” Cork asked.

  Jenny had brought a clean bottle and formula. Rose had heated water and put it in a thermos.

  Jenny shook her head. “He shouldn’t be hungry yet. Just needs a little reassurance, I think.”

  She picked him up from the bedding in the ice chest, cradled him in her arms, and began talking to him softly. His eyes fastened on her face, and he seemed mesmerized.

  Cork returned to the seat beside the deputy.

  Kretsch smiled at him, clearly pleased. “I’ll have us there in no time.”

  * * *

  And he did. As soon as they came in sight of land, Cork felt the weight of worry lift from him. He could have hugged Tom Kretsch.

  It was evening by then. The sun was low in the western sky. The wind had relaxed just a little, and although the lake was still restless, the whitecaps had all but disappeared. Kretsch kept an eye on the GPS display and guided the boat to a tiny cove lined with poplars where a cabin with a small dock stood. The trees looked beaten and ragged; a number of them lay on their sides with the roots torn from the ground, the result of the derecho two days earlier.

  “There they are,” Jenny said, her voice a song of relief.

  At the end of the dock, Stephen and Aaron stood waving. Kretsch motored up, eased back on the throttle, and drifted in. Cork went forward and picked up the bow line. He tossed it to Stephen, who secured the rope to a cleat. Aaron tied off the stern line. Jenny lifted the ice chest with the baby inside and delivered it into his waiting hands.

  “You two okay?” he asked.

  “He did great,” Jenny replied.

  Aaron peered inside the chest and said with surprise, “My God, he’s smiling.”

  “Took to it like a duck to water,” Cork said. “Where are you parked?”

  “In front of the cabin,” Aaron replied. “It was a little hairy getting here. Trees still down over the roads everywhere. Looks like a nuclear blast in some places. I understand why the sheriff couldn’t spare any help up on the Angle. Major highways are clear, though.”

  “Good. Let’s get you guys gone.”

  They left the dock and skirted the cabin, a small and unremarkable affair that had lost shingles in the storm and sustained a couple of broken windows. Aaron’s truck, a new-looking black Dodge Dakota with a crew cab, was parked on the dirt road in front, which dead-ended at the cove. They put the baby in the rear seat, and before she climbed in beside him, Jenny turned to her father. “You’re going back in the dark?”

  “Tom says he can navigate by the stars.”

  Kretsch shook his head and grinned. “GPS, actually. It’s much more reliable.”

  Jenny took the deputy’s hand. “Thank you. For everything.”

  Kretsch looked down, as if embarrassed, and Cork thought he was going to say, “Ah, shucks.” Instead, he said, “I’m just glad I could help.”

  “You get yourself and my father back to Oak Island in one piece,” she said seriously.

  “We’ll be fine, sweetheart,” Cork told her. “You just get safely to Henry. I’ll feel a lot better when I know you’re there. And give a call to Bascombe’s place, let everyone know you’re safe.”

  Cork gave her a long hug, then turned to Stephen. “Tell Henry boozhoo for me, and thank him. And take care of your sister and the boyo, okay?”

  “I’m on it, Dad.”

  Stephen tolerated Cork’s hug, even gave him a quick squeeze of his own in return.

  He turned to Aaron and shook his hand earnestly. “When this is all over, we’ll sit down with a couple of beers and really get to know each other.”

  “I’d like that.”

  Cork nodded toward the truck that held his daughter and the baby. “Thank you.”

  “I’ll make sure we get to your friend’s place safely,” Aaron promised.

  Cork stood back and watched them climb into the cab. Aaron kicked the engine over and turned the truck around. As they headed into the waning light of evening, they gave him a last wave of good-bye.

  “They’ll be fine,” Kretsch said.

  “From your mouth to God’s ear.” Cork turned back toward the cove. “Let’s get ourselves on that lake before I lose my nerve.”

  “We’ll be home before midnight,” Kretsch said.

  “I don’t think so,” Cork replied.

  “No? Why not?”

  “Because we’re going to make a stop before we get there.”

  “Where?”

  “I’ll tell you on the way,” Cork said.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  For a good long while, they drove in silence. The baby slept. Aaron had the radio turned low, listening to Minnesota Public Radio broadcast out of Roseau. Stephen stared out the window at the passing landscape, a mosaic of dark evening colors. Jenny was thinking. She thought about all that had happened in only two days, a kind of frenzy that was difficult to put together in a way that felt believable, though she’d been there through it all. She thought about the people she loved whom she’d left behind on the Angle, still in danger, perhaps, and she worried. She thought about the roads ahea
d: the one that led to Henry Meloux, which she knew well, and the more difficult road she would have to navigate at some point that led through a bureaucratic minefield to a place where the fate of the baby would be decided. Of all the unknowns ahead, that was the one that made her feel most helpless.

  They had dinner in International Falls. Jenny left the ice chest in the truck and carried the baby in her arms. She changed his diaper in the restroom and prepared a bottle, which she handed to the waitress and asked her to heat. When the woman saw the baby’s cleft lip, she didn’t look horrified at all. She was thin, maybe fifty, with hair that was drugstore blond, and too much eye shadow, and ruby-colored nails, and an empty ring finger. She smiled with a genuineness that made Jenny love her instantly.

  “I’ll have them put a pan of water on the stove and heat it up for you, hon. What’s his name?”

  Jenny hesitated, awkwardly.

  It was Stephen who replied. “Waaboozoons.”

  “Waaboozoons? Never heard that one before. Is it foreign?”

  “It’s Ojibwe,” Stephen said. “It means ‘little rabbit.’ We call him Waaboo for short.”

  “Don’t that beat all,” she said. “Well, I’ll have the little rabbit’s bottle for you in two shakes.”

  “Where’d that come from?” Jenny asked her brother when the waitress had gone.

  Stephen stared at his menu and shrugged. “I don’t know. It just came to me, and it sounded right.”

  Jenny could have told him that the term “harelip” came from the resemblance a cleft lip bore to that of a rabbit’s divided upper lip, but she didn’t. The truth was she liked the name.

  It was hard dark when they headed south on U.S. 53 toward Tamarack County. Jenny was exhausted and sat quietly in back, listening to Aaron and Stephen talk up front. They seemed to have warmed to each other as the miles went past.

  “How come you’re not in school this week?” Aaron asked.

  “Most schools in Minnesota don’t start until after Labor Day. It’s like a law or something. And Labor Day’s late this year.”

  “Do you play any sports? Football or run cross-country?”

  “Football in the fall.”

  “What position?”

  “End.”

  “Offense or defense?”

  “Both. What about you? Did you play football in high school?”

  Jenny could see Aaron’s face, his profile hazy from the glow of the dash lights. It was a handsome face. His voice, when he spoke, had a deep timbre that made her think of some rich, dark wood, like teak or mahogany. He could be extremely gentle, and his poetry was stunning in its sensitivity to relationships in life, especially those between nature and humans. There was so much to like about him. And yet, in the last few weeks, she’d found herself holding back more and more, and the why of it was something she hadn’t been able to put her finger on.

  “Lacrosse,” Aaron said.

  “Lacrosse?” Stephen seemed surprised and pleased. “I’ve never played, but it looks pretty cool. An Indian game, right?”

  “Right. Those Indians were pretty creative and competitive.”

  “We still are,” Stephen said.

  Aaron glanced at him and gave a serious nod. “Of course.”

  “Were you any good?”

  “We took state my senior year.”

  Stephen gave a low whistle to show that he was impressed. They drove through Ray and Ash Lake and Orr, dark little towns surrounded by deep woods and with a few lights in the windows.

  “I read a book of your poems.” Stephen sounded as though he were making a kind of confession.

  “No kidding? Which one?”

  “The Heart’s Divide.”

  “Where’d you get it?”

  “Bought it off Amazon.”

  They crossed a bridge that spanned a channel between two lakes. The moon was up, and the channel was a brilliant, iridescent spill between two vats of silver.

  “Okay,” Aaron said, “the suspense is killing me. Did you like my poems?”

  Stephen stared out at the lake, then glanced at Aaron. “I liked the ones where you talked about the land. I could see what you were getting at. Some of the others, well, I didn’t understand them.”

  Aaron nodded. “Fair enough.”

  At last they turned east and entered Tamarack County. A sense of gratitude overwhelmed Jenny. She’d thought, years ago, when she left for the University of Iowa, that she was leaving Aurora and the house on Gooseberry Lane behind for good, but now it felt wonderful to be coming home. It felt safe.

  “Tell me about this Henry Meloux,” Aaron said.

  “I’m not sure I can,” Stephen replied. “I think you have to meet him. He’s . . .” Stephen seemed to be searching for the right word. “Unique.” A few moments later, he added, “And important.”

  “Dad says he’s not well,” Jenny said from the backseat.

  Stephen half-turned. “He told me that, too, when I came home from Texas. He said there’s someone staying with Henry. She’s like a nurse or something.”

  “His great-niece. Dad says her name is Rainy Bisonette. She wants to become a Mide, like Henry.”

  “I’m going to be a Mide someday,” Stephen said with certainty.

  “What’s a Mide?” Aaron asked.

  “A member of the Grand Medicine Society,” Stephen explained. “A healer. Somebody who understands the harmony of life and how to use nature to restore harmony when it’s been lost.”

  “You seem to know Henry Meloux well.”

  Stephen hesitated before replying. He glanced back at Jenny, who nodded that it was okay. “Some pretty horrible things happened to me a long time ago, and he helped me heal. He’s helped us all at one time or another.”

  Aaron considered this for a moment, then said quietly, “Maybe if there’d been a Henry Meloux around when I was a kid, my family wouldn’t be so screwed up.”

  It was past midnight when they came into Aurora. The houses were dark, and the streets, too, except where the streetlamps threw down circles of light. Jenny didn’t need light to know this town. She could have guided Aaron around every corner with her eyes closed.

  “Let’s go past the house,” she said.

  “Why?” Stephen asked.

  “I want Aaron to see it.”

  Stephen shrugged. “Turn right on Walnut,” he said to Aaron. “Two more blocks.”

  In a couple of minutes, they were parked in front of the two-story on Gooseberry Lane. It was white wood with green shutters and a roofed porch that ran along the front. The big elm that had been there even when her father was a boy cast moon shadows across the yard and the house. There was a porch swing, and Jenny remembered how her parents used to sit and talk after she and Anne and Stephen had gone to bed. Her room was just above, and she could often hear them conversing below in the quiet, intimate voices of people who’ve loved each other for a long time. It had made her feel safe. And now, for some reason, it made her feel lonely.

  “Where’s Trixie?” she asked Stephen, speaking of the family dog.

  “Staying with the O’Loughlins across the street.” Stephen turned back to her. “We shouldn’t be here. Dad wanted us to go straight to Henry’s. Somebody might, I don’t know, be watching or something.” He peered carefully up and down Gooseberry Lane, which was quite lifeless.

  “All right,” she said reluctantly. “Let’s go.”

  They drove north out of Aurora, along a county road that paralleled Iron Lake. Occasionally, among the thick growth of evergreens, they could see a light from a cabin or one of the small resorts that sat on the shoreline, but mostly there was just the dark of night and the splash of moonlight between black shadows. They turned onto an unpaved road, and after a couple of miles, Stephen directed Aaron to pull off and stop near a double-trunk birch tree.

  “This is where the path to Henry Meloux’s cabin begins,” he explained.

  They got out of the truck and took with them the items they’d need: the
ice chest with the baby inside, no longer sleeping but making no sound; two packs, one with all the baby supplies inside and one with a change of clothing for each of them; a flashlight; and three sleeping bags. Aaron and Stephen each shouldered a pack. Jenny took one handle of the ice chest and Aaron took the other. Each of them gripped a sleeping bag. Stephen walked ahead with the flashlight.

  “How far is it?” Aaron asked.

  “About a mile and a half,” Stephen said.

  “We’re in the Superior National Forest right now. In a little while, we cross onto Iron Lake Reservation land. Just beyond that is the cabin. It’s an easy hike, you’ll see.”

  Jenny hadn’t been to Meloux’s cabin in a very long time. Stephen had been a more frequent visitor, a special visitor in many ways. What her father had said about him was true: He had a unique relationship with the old Mide. She was glad he’d agreed to come along.

  The way led through deep forest lit by moonlight. Although it was the middle of night, the woods were alive with the chirr of crickets and tree frogs. Occasionally, Jenny heard the crackle of something in the underbrush to the right or left, some small animal startled by their presence and scurrying away in the dark. The path was soft with fallen pine needles, and all around her was the good, fresh scent of evergreen. On the small farm in Iowa where she lived with Aaron, the land had a different smell, heavy and earthy, and she realized how much she missed the cleansing scent of pine pitch.

  They crossed a small stream—Stephen said that white people called it Wine Creek; the Ojibwe called it Miskwi, which meant “blood”—and, not far beyond, they broke from the trees and stepped into a meadow that lay white under the moon.

  “This is Crow Point,” Stephen told Aaron. “Henry’s cabin is over there.”

  He gestured across the meadow to a low structure that was partly illuminated by the moon and lay partly in shadow. Beyond it was the silver shimmer of Iron Lake. As they stood there, Jenny heard a lazy barking come from the direction of the cabin.

  “That’ll be Walleye,” Stephen said.

  Aaron asked, “Walleye?”

  “Henry’s mutt. He’s a great old dog, with an emphasis on ‘old.’ ”