by Karen Harper
“Oh, Quinn knows I love berries, and these Spruce men don’t so much,” Mary said, and moved to take the pack and open it. “Guess you like them, too—juice on your chin. So where’s Quinn?”
“He went to get ready for a lecture. As you can see, he found my dog, and I’m so grateful.”
“Sure he’d find him,” Mary said as Sam turned back to the big porcelain stove and Josh kept lifting plates of pancakes onto the pass-through. “Anyone taught by Trapper Jake—he was a good tracker, too—can find anything in the dark.” She tipped the backpack into a large bowl, and the red avalanche of berries tumbled out.
Alex thanked them and was almost out the door when Quinn bounded in. He’d evidently washed hastily because his face looked wet. He wore fresh jeans and a red and black plaid shirt.
“So, you like the berries?” he asked Mary. “You said lately you were craving them.”
“Probably going to be craving all kinds of things now,” she said with a shy smile and a glance at Sam.
Sam broke into a big grin. “Gonna need an extra room on our cabin, Quinn.”
“Hey, that’s great!” Quinn exploded. He hugged Mary and high-fived Sam.
Maybe Josh didn’t really want to be an uncle, because he just headed out the kitchen door back into the main room—or maybe he had a job to do and had celebrated with them earlier. But here Alex stood, tears in her eyes because people she hardly knew were going to have a baby. This was a moment for these friends to celebrate, so she backed out of the room and quietly opened the door and went out.
As she hurried to her truck, she saw Josh striding through the area with the sample tracks protected in raised beds. She watched, frowning, as he scuffed through two of them.
Jealous that his brother would have a child? Tired of doing the menial work around here and at the lodge? She had the strangest sense that Josh wanted to really contribute in a big way but did not know how.
She put Spenser in her truck and got in beside him before she saw Quinn had come out. He strode toward her.
“They’ve been trying for a long time,” he said, leaning down with his arms on the top of her truck cab. “She wishes she had more family members to tell. She still misses her grandparents who died in the Falls Lake flood. She’s always been so protective of this area, of Sam—even of me. Well, gotta get back inside. Busy week.”
“Which I will try not to mess up again. Thank you so, so much,” she said, and extended her hand up to him, which he took and held for a long minute, then stepped back.
“And hold that thought,” he said.
She nodded and he gave her a quick wave as she drove away. She’d certainly hold other thoughts of their time together. He’d held her all night, and she’d never felt safer, wild animals, weird voices or her own fears be damned. She had decided, if possible, to hold on to this man—as a friend. For now, that’s what they had to be.
* * *
Alex’s cousins and Chip were ecstatic to see her with Spenser. Even Buffy seemed glad to see her. They sat her down to a breakfast while she told them what had happened, including that Mary Spruce was pregnant.
“Glad to hear that,” Suze said as she perched across the table from her. “I think it may help her. She has moments when she seems so depressed.”
“Have you ever heard the scary Falls Lake night voice here at the lodge?” Alex asked. “I—we—heard it last night.”
“Guests have asked that before. Truth is, we’ve always wanted to, but I think we keep the place pretty closed up at night—and its sounds are supposedly out more toward the lake. What did you think about it?”
“That must be something real—or someone. Can’t say I believe in hauntings, even with the tragedy of lost lives so close there. But it was really eerie.”
“To be here such a short time and hear it—wow. Wait till I tell Meg. But we won’t mention it to Chip. That’s all he needs to hear is a spirit ghost when he thinks his father’s a ghost flying planes.”
Alex devoured the scrambled eggs and toast Suze fixed, while Chip and Meg washed Spenser in the tub in the back room. Ready for a shower herself, she took Spenser to their room, then decided she’d better email her parents first. A message from Ginger Baldwin came up right on top of her inbox.
She skimmed the message. More good news! Ginger had included the email address of a man she knew in New York who could switch Alex’s website to a different address with perhaps a different name and links. She would have to change her private email and Facebook pages, then contact her customers separately to tell them of the new site, or they might not find it. And he would charge her nothing because Ginger was a friend and had said she was going to help sell her products.
“Whew. What luck!” she told Spenser.
She was thrilled she could do all that even though she’d never considered herself really knowledgeable on social media. Even now she scolded herself for not immediately changing her web address, but when Lyle hadn’t used it during her cross-country trek, she’d let it go for now. She was worried about her Facebook page, too, because it had pictures of them together on it, and wouldn’t those just hang around like—like a ghost? Maybe this contact of Ginger’s could help her erase all that, too, wipe her personal footprint off the web. She hoped that Lyle would just avoid her in his no-doubt-wounded pride.
She skimmed the long list of emails that had come in. Still nothing directly from him, thank heavens. She was starting to feel even safer here in the arms of the Falls Lake forest and mountains, though not as safe as she’d felt in Quinn’s embrace.
She sighed and took a fast shower. As exhausted as she was, a rush of adrenaline kept her going. She didn’t want to let Meg and Suze down by not opening the shop today. She’d go out, take Spenser, but be sure he was always, always, securely leashed and that the handle end of the leash was tied to something if she opened the door for fresh air.
Someone knocked hard on her bedroom door. Tucking her shirt in her jeans, she opened it to find Suze standing there.
“Before you go out to the store, I want to show you something,” she said. She looked and sounded shaken. Her face was pale. “Chip—he just found something outside we thought you should see. Just so you know.”
She grabbed a jacket she threw around her shoulders. Not willing to leave Spenser alone now, even in their room, she scooped up him and his leash before following Suze out the back door.
“Tell me. What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Better just look. I mean, since you had trouble with your ex-fiancé and all.”
“Did he send something?” She gasped. “He—he’s not here?”
“No, weirder than that. Maybe not related at all—just weird.”
Suze led Alex around the back of the lodge, to the north wall, outside her big bedroom window. She could tell it was her window, front corner. She could also see the curtains she’d partially opened just now over the window seat.
Chip and Meg stood there, staring at the window. Not looking in but at something on the outside.
“Maybe it was a bear, a big one,” Chip said, sounding awed, before Alex realized what they were looking at. It was hard to see from the side, but unmistakable closer up. The boy went on. “I think it’s a sign Dad’s spirit came back, only he got the wrong window, ’cause this room used to be mine when we visited and he was alive.”
Alex gasped, but so did Meg at what he’d said. Meg put in, “Don’t say things like that, honey. I told you that is not true that he comes back.”
Alex saw huge cuts—no, something like claw marks—incised vertically, deep into the log wall on both sides of her window. Spenser growled just the way he used to when Lyle was near. Her head started to pound, and her heartbeat picked up.
When Meg said nothing else, Suze told the boy, “We don’t agree with that, Chip. I mean, we don’t know what did this, but not your father’
s spirit—or ghost.”
“Do you see any footprints?” Alex asked, realizing that’s what Quinn would have said.
“When Chip brought us out to see this,” Suze said, “well, he’d already kind of stepped all over here. I cleaned these windows outside to help Josh’s workload the other day, so my prints are here, too—a mess.”
Tearing her gaze from the massive claw marks, Alex looked down. Yes, unfortunately, Chip’s distinctive sneaker prints were here. Also she saw a woman’s prints, smaller, narrower.
So was this even from last night when she wasn’t here, or before when she was inside? Why hadn’t she or Spenser heard something, or had she when she thought the wind made branches scrape along the walls and roof?
Although she was a rank amateur at this, she also saw two blurred animal prints she thought she could recognize. A large triangular-shaped central pad and five toes with claws—big claws. Surely a bear’s, like that print Quinn had showed her in the forest. She thought of the little sandbox-type squares of wild-animal prints over at his camp and how Josh had angrily scuffed through them.
She studied again the huge scratch marks raked along both sides of the window as if the animal had been trying to get in. It seemed as if the animal had looked in her window and wanted to tear something or someone apart—even as a bear had done to Quinn’s dad and dog.
Should she dare to ask Quinn to take a look at this?
13
Alex, Suze and Meg stood staring wordless at the bear claw marks. Chip brooded and fidgeted. Alex couldn’t believe that the picture that leaped into her head was the scratching post she’d made for cats at the vet clinic.
“Do bears sharpen their claws on trees—on wood?” she asked. “And this one just happened to choose here? I don’t know, maybe smelled or saw Spenser through the window, which means it wasn’t done last night.”
“I guess, anything’s possible,” Suze said in a shaky whisper.
“Even though the ground here has been disturbed,” Alex told them, “I’m going in to get my cell phone to take some pictures. Quinn’s busy and has been bothered enough, but maybe I can show him later.”
They heard a whine that became a roar. The women looked up, but Chip took off toward the backyard clearing.
“It’s a bush plane!” he shouted. “It’s coming over, flying low! Remember how they found a bear near where Dad’s plane crashed? That bear that came here might have been the same one! I’m gonna wave to the plane! Come on, Mom!”
“Chip, come back here!” Meg yelled, and ran after him. “I told you that you’re letting your imagination go crazy. Chip!”
They both disappeared around the back corner of the lodge while Spenser barked to be put down so he could follow, but Alex held him tight.
Suze shook her head, then wiped a tear from under one eye. “Chip just won’t let go of his father,” she said with a sniff as she dug a smashed tissue out of her shirt pocket. “It’s normal to miss him, of course, but he keeps coming up with these far-out ideas that Ryan is trying to reach him. I try to bolster Meg, but—but with my support or not, she’s mourning Ryan, too, and is really shook about how Chip’s handling this loss—or not handling it. She’s had him talk to our pastor, who’s a young guy, and he thinks it’s Chip’s guilt behind it all.”
“I understand. I really do,” Alex said, putting her arm around Suze’s shoulders. “I’ve felt guilty for a long time about something I didn’t really cause, but feel I did.”
Suze turned to face her. “You mean falling for an abuser, not reading the signs until it was too late?”
“Something back farther than that. I’ll—I’ll tell you both together, another time. It’s just—”
They looked up as the same plane looped back and made another pass over the house. They could hear Chip yelling so they both ran into the backyard where Meg was shading her eyes and the boy was jumping up and down, waving, screaming, “See—it’s him!”
“Honey,” Meg cried, “the pilot just saw you waving and is giving you a little fly-around.”
“No way! Pastor Todd told me about the holy ghost inside people, even if they die. If that’s not him, it’s his holy ghost, just like those bear scratches showed! He was trying to get in to see me ’cause he thinks I might still be in that room!”
Alex saw Meg lift her hands in frustration and bite her lower lip. Suze was sniffling. Alex felt caught between them—with her own regrets and fears—wanting to help but helpless. And here, she’d pictured this deep woods lodge as a haven of rest, of freedom from her problems, of learning to be guilt free.
The plane flew off toward town. Meg took Chip inside. Suze said, “I hate to think what Chip’s talk will be about in class if they are assigned ‘What I Liked Best on My Summer Vacation.’”
Alex heaved a huge sigh. It did not help to know others had problems, too, especially not the people she loved. They’d just have to find a way to help Chip. But if she thought trying to change the mood would help, that was dashed when Josh came outside from the back door of the lodge.
“Hey,” Suze called to him. “I thought you weren’t working this morning, that they needed you at camp.”
“Already served breakfast. Gotta go back but came to pick up my pay a day early. That okay?”
“Sure, but I’ve got to go cut the check. Be right back. Maybe you can look at something around the corner there. Alex can show you. I know you don’t track like Sam and Quinn, but—”
“Never wanted to learn,” he said, frowning. “Too—well, old-fashioned. Just not me. I’m still part of the tracking team. But take a look at what?” he asked, turning toward Alex.
She was still a little miffed and puzzled about him. He might claim to be part of Quinn’s team, but just this morning he’d scuffed through several of the animal track boxes at the camp. She didn’t want him to damage the tracks here before she could get some photos. She was tempted to say, “Never mind, I’ll just show Quinn later,” but she still felt sorry for Josh. He was a hard worker, and she admired that.
“There are some animal tracks around the side of the house that look like a bear’s—and some big scratch marks outside my window,” she told him, bouncing Spenser. “Chip found them and got all excited, then went crazy when a bush plane flew over.”
“Yeah, seen him do that before with planes. But if he’s into tracks, maybe he’s the next tracker, huh? I’ll take a good look later at all that.” He turned away and headed back into the lodge.
She called after him. “Don’t clean it up in case Quinn wants to check it out.”
He kept going but nodded and raised one quick hand, which, she thought, either meant I hear you or Don’t tell me what to do.
Alex was surprised he wasn’t going to look now. Why didn’t he seem more curious? Or...could he have seen it already? But then, why didn’t he say so?
She put Spenser down, checked his leash and walked back to the window. With her cell phone, she took pictures of the claw marks on the logs. Wishing she’d asked for a flashlight to put the tracks in sharper relief like Quinn had mentioned, she took flash photos of them from several angles as well as the footprints, however scrambled now.
She wouldn’t bother Quinn, knowing how busy he was, but she thought he might want to see bear claw marks and tracks. Maybe she’d risk it soon.
“Come on, my wandering friend,” she said to Spenser as they walked around the lodge again toward the store she’d meant to open a good half hour ago. “Everyone has problems, not just us, right?”
The little guy’s single bark was a definite “Yes!”
* * *
On Friday afternoon, Alex figured she’d had a pretty good day. She had Skyped with Ginger’s techie guy in New York, and he’d set up a plan to close her old website—which had thirty-three standing orders on it she planned to fill—and shut down her personal Facebook page and set up a
new business page. She’d chosen to rename her new business Nature’s Naturals instead of Natural Beauty.
Then the next huge step would be—as Quinn had suggested—to create new products with new labels, using the updated business name and more local plants instead of the warmer temp ones. She’d have some time because she’d brought products to fill orders until she could switch things over by next spring. She was going to take advantage of a double-mailing her contact also suggested—that is, mail her products to someplace like Seattle so they would not be mailed with an Anchorage postmark or Falls Lake return address.
Meanwhile, despite trying to cover her tracks online, she hoped to scout around in town to find a greenhouse or garden space—unless Quinn really did want to go into that endeavor with her. She needed her print shop back east to make new labels, maybe find new suppliers for jars and tubes, though she might keep her original supplier for that if she had to.
But all that excitement paled next to a phone call from Quinn. “Sorry to track you down, but I’m good at that,” he said with a little laugh. “I called the lodge and talked Meg into giving me your cell number.”
“Oh, that’s fine. I should have given it to you. How are things going with your trainees?”
“They all think they know more than they do and are ready to take on the world—the forest, at least, which they’ll venture into tomorrow. Actually, the female students are a lot savvier than the men in some ways. The three of them run a hiking business near Denver and wanted to know more about getting off the beaten path. Listen, tonight Sam and Mary hold sway, talking about the history of this area. Mary’s still feeling a little queasy, but I think she’ll do okay. So anyway, that’s a big night off for me as I’ve heard their spiel before.”
She almost mentioned the bear tracks and scratches, but decided to hold off. As she checked to make sure Spenser was secure since she had the door open and several mosquito smoke pots going, she said, “I’m glad she’s doing okay. I’m going into town to look around tomorrow so let me know if there’s anything I can get for her.”
