Ghosts of Manitowish Waters

by G. M. Moore

  “I-I-I did it so you could rest,” he repeated. “Wash up. Do whatever girls do in a bathroom. Please, no silent treatment.”

  She reluctantly turned to him. “I wanted to go, too.”

  “I know, but … but.” He held his palms out. “Your hair is wet. It’s cold out there. You were exhausted. It was a long walk. And, well, you were starting to smell.”

  “What? Me?”

  He flashed an impish grin. “Just kidding about the last thing. But seriously, you were tired. I could tell.”

  She bristled. “Yeah, right.”

  “Come on. I bought hotdogs, chips, Cokes, and marshmallows.” He raised his eyebrows up and down to coax her. In the shadows of the fire, his expression looked more menacing than inviting, and she couldn’t help but laugh.

  “OK. I guess I can forgive you.” Standing up, she sighed with exasperation and pointed a finger at him. “But don’t do it again.” Tess moved the finger to her nose. “Speaking of smelling.”

  “Oh, ouch. That hurts.” He clutched his heart, then sniffed the air. “There is something odoriferous in the air. Sure it’s not the fawn?”

  “I’m thinking skunk. And odoriferous? Did you seriously just use the word odoriferous?”

  “Word of the day.”

  “Whatever.” She pushed him toward the bathroom.

  “Hey, easy. I’m on it. I’m on it.”

  Cain was much faster in the bathroom than she had been. He was out before the first two hotdogs were finished roasting. He knelt down next to Tess, taking one of the hotdog sticks and slowly turned it round and round.

  “So how was the store?” Tess asked.

  He shrugged. “All right.”

  “What was it like? Were any people there?” She hadn’t realized how isolated she had felt the last few days, and she longed for information, any information, about the rest of the world.

  “I don’t know. A clerk. One other guy. It was nothing special. There was a little restaurant too, I think.”

  “Can we go?” she chirped.

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “We’ve got other places to be.”

  “We can stop in Butternut then—for a late breakfast or maybe lunch? I’ve got some money.”

  “I don’t think that’s such a good idea anymore. I think we will make better time bypassing Butternut.”

  Tess’s brow furrowed, and she eyed him skeptically. “Does this have anything to do with Mr. Lay Chilly?”

  Cain started to speak, then stopped.

  “What happened out there? Is Mr. Lay Chilly OK?”

  “No. No, he’s not. But there’s nothing we can do about it. At least not right now.”

  The finality of Cain’s words silenced her, and the pair finished cooking their dinner without speaking. As they began to eat, Tess tentatively broke the silence, her voice stilted.

  “Why are you doing all this? Why is it so important?”

  He took his time, chewing his food slowly before answering. “My heritage is important to me. I think my ancestors got it right. The world is a mystical, mysterious place, and I want to live in it. I don’t want to live in a microchip.” He paused. “Don’t get me wrong. Technology is way cool. I need my cell phone, my laptop, my iPod—all that, but it is about balance. That’s what my people taught. Balance in all things. We’ve lost that. Somewhere along the way we all lost that. I want to find it and bring it back. This journey is a big part of that.”

  Tess gently nodded.

  “What about you? Why are you putting up with all this?” He snorted. “With me?”

  She sighed pensively, choosing her words carefully as well. “My reasons aren’t quite so noble. I guess I want to show my dad—” She swallowed hard. “Myself. And myself that life has to be lived. It can’t always be contained or guarded. Sometimes it will take you places you don’t want to go, but you have to live it, go forward and live it.”

  “I don’t think our reasons are so very different,” Cain said.

  The glow of the fireplace made his mouth and eyes appear to smolder, and she quickly looked to her lap as embarrassment rushed through her.

  She cringed inwardly. Oh, yes they are.

  ****

  It was almost midnight when a noise woke Cain from a very deep sleep. He forced his heavy head up and shook it vigorously to clear away the grogginess. He rubbed his eyes and looked around the dark cabin. The fireplace held only embers now, and in their faint light he saw a flicker of movement by the couch. His eyes darted to it and to Tess who slept there. He saw nothing amiss. She lay perfectly still. And he could hear nothing but the steady rhythm of her breathing. I’ve got to relax, he told himself. He was glad to be sleeping in the cabin tonight. Just being surrounded by walls made him feel safer and more at ease. He had been able to sleep without his dreams being haunted by the vacant, lifeless eyes of Mr. Lay Chilly.

  Or had he?

  Maybe the noise I heard was actually me? he questioned, then shrugged it off. It didn’t matter what had woken him, he was just glad it did, because during his deep sleep he had neglected the fire and it was close to going out. Cain pushed stiffly up out of the chair he had been sleeping in and stoked the fire, adding wood until it burned bright again. As he turned back to the chair, a flicker of white caught his eye. He gasped with a start, slipped on their stockpile of wood, and quickly sat down to avoid falling. When he landed, his eyes locked on a pair of fiery red ones hovering in a ghostly mist at the foot of the couch, just below Tess’s head. The mist covered the entire cabin floor, stopping only where the fire cast its light.

  “No,” Cain muttered. “Not possible. I am not seeing this.”

  He squinted his eyes tightly shut and kept them that way for a moment. When he opened them all he saw in the firelight were hardwood floors and the soft pink eyes of the albino fawn looking quizzically at him.

  “You have got to stop doing that,” he scolded. The fawn had obviously moved sometime during the night from his perch in the armchair to the floor beside Tess. Cain laughed at himself. I really need to relax, he thought, marveling at how fragile and innocent the animal looked curled up in its protective ball. “No one needs to know about this, little guy. What happens in the cabin stays in the cabin.” The fawn’s pink ears twitched back and forth. “I’ll take that as your word,” the teen said as he began to stand.

  “It’s coming!” Tess suddenly screamed and sat bolt upright on the couch.

  Cain croaked out a curse before slipping and falling back to the floor with a thud. “Are you two in on this or what? Good God, you—”

  “It’s so hot. So hot. It hurts,” Tess moaned.

  “What?” he asked looking in puzzlement at her and then at the fire before realizing she was talking in her sleep. It’s that dream, he thought. That same bad dream she’s been having. He went to her, hesitating as she twisted feverishly on the couch before scooping her up and into his lap. He tried to calm her, holding her awkwardly in his arms and shushing her in a soft voice.

  “Wake up, Mom. Tara. Wake up,” she begged over and over until she stopped moving and whispered, “It’s coming.” He felt her body calm in his arms but then her eyes flew open.

  “They’re dead,” she said flatly, staring vacantly up at him. “Already dead.” Her eyes shut as quickly as they had opened, and she became peaceful again, nestling her head against his chest.

  Cain sat frozen, afraid to move, not knowing what to expect next. Was it over? After a few minutes of feeling Tess’s calm, steady breathing against him, he thought it was and relaxed. He gently brushed hair off her sweaty forehead and sat very still for several minutes more. He shifted his weight slightly, worried if he moved too much he would wake her or bring the strange, frightening dream back. He watched the fawn get up, saunter over to the armchair, hop up, and snuggle cozily into its worn cu
shion.

  “Nice,” Cain smirked. “That’s real nice. What am I supposed to do here?”

  He carefully dropped and twisted his hip trying to get comfortable when he spied a piece of paper on the floor. He cursed under his breath and looked around for some way to retrieve it. He saw nothing. His only option was to stretch for it. He stuck one leg out, slowly slipping his butt off the couch, and stretching as far as he could until he was able to pin it with his foot. As he dragged it across the floor, the paper unfolded. When he reached down to pick it up, the big bold word MISSING greeted him along with the smiling face of Tess O’Brien. He refolded the paper, tucked it into the back of his jeans, settled as best he could into the couch, and slowly drifted into sleep.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The door of Angler’s Bar and Grill flew open as a burly, middle-aged man burst into the room. The commotion pulled Wesley Thayer’s eyes from his beer bottle, and he immediately shrank a little lower in his seat.

  What’s got him all worked up now? the young man grumbled as his father scanned the bar with an intensity that made him squirm. Clyde was seething over something—that much was obvious—at least to Wes. Clyde offered an approaching waitress a broad smile, quickly recovering his air of calm control, but Wes knew behind that façade an inferno raged. He watched Clyde politely dismissing the girl, then waving gregariously to a patron before his gaze found Wes and locked on him. His smile faltered for a second, but like a pro he recovered quickly, patting the girl reassuringly on the arm and pointing, all smiles, to his son. “Found him!” the happy expression on his face said. Wes muttered a curse and hunkered lower over his beer as his father strode toward him. It seemed to take him all of two seconds to reach the middle of the bar where Wes sat. Hot breath instantly filled the young man’s ear.

  “Get up.”

  The order came in a staccato whisper, and a meaty hand clamped on Wes’s elbow, pulling him off the stool. Clyde, all smiles for the audience, ushered him to the empty back room and into a booth. Wes slid in all the way to the wall, staring blankly at the knotty pine panels as Clyde leaned over the table. Wes could feel his glare and reluctantly turned his head to meet his father face-to-face.

  “Wha—” he started, but Clyde bulldozed over his words, finishing the sentence in a hushed rage.

  “—the hell is going on?”

  Wes turned back to the wall. “I-I.” He heaved with frustration. “I don’t know wha—”

  “What are you up to?” his father demanded.

  Wes snapped his head away from the wall. “Me?” he questioned, now defiantly holding Clyde’s stare. “Me? I’m up to drinking a beer here.” He raised his drink, sneered, and tilted the bottle toward Clyde, who lunged forward, then abruptly pulled back, regaining composure, and settling into the booth’s cushioned seat. Spying the waitress, he eased his posture as she neared the table.

  “Can I get you anything, Coach Thayer?” she asked.

  “You sure can, Missy.” He casually draped one arm across the back of the booth. “I’ll take what my son here is having.”

  She gave a confirmation nod and left.

  “Don’t get smart with me,” Clyde hissed as soon as the waitress was out of earshot. “T-Rex. What happened to him?”

  “T-Rex? This is about T-Rex?” Wes tapped a finger to his temple. “A lot has happened to T-Rex.” He shrugged. “Besides Vietnam, I don’t know.”

  “He’s missing.”

  Wes snorted. “So what? Ol’ T-Rex will turn up. Always does. He looks for trouble, trouble doesn’t look for him.”

  Clyde shook his head. “No. This is different. He knew to stay in contact with me. He knew. Twenty thousand dollars is on this. It’s on his head. He knew.”

  Wes leaned in. “You mean he didn’t get the fawn? You don’t have it?”

  “No, not yet.”

  “That boy and girl. Did he do anything to them? Where are they?”

  “What?” Clyde made a face. “No.” He paused, heaving with exasperation. “I don’t know, and I don’t give a rat’s ass.”

  “OK,” Wes sighed. “Where was he when he last checked in?”

  “Following the Chippewa River, nearing the county line.”

  “Those kids are up in Ashland?”

  “Yes. They got a canoe somehow and took it up river.”

  “With the albino fawn?”

  “Yes, with the albino fawn,” Clyde hissed.

  “What albino fawn?” a cheerful voice asked from behind Wes.

  Startled, both men jerked their heads upward as the newcomer tapped Wes on the shoulder and slid into the booth next to him. “You moved,” he said.

  Clyde leaned all the way back in the booth, staring dumbfounded at the two younger men sitting across from him. The waitress returned, placing a bottle of beer in front of Clyde. The newcomer pointed to Wes and himself. “Another round here—when you can.”

  As the waitress left, Clyde raised his eyebrows in question.

  “He’s here with me,” Wes replied. “What’s the big deal?”

  “The big deal is that we are having a private conversation. And Ben here,” he turned his attention to the other man, “shouldn’t be sneaking up on private family conversations.”

  Ben’s eyes grew larger. “No sir, Coach. Didn’t mean to.”

  “What did you hear?”

  “Not a lot. Just that someone’s got an albino fawn and is heading up the Chippewa with it. That’s it.”

  Clyde slapped the tabletop with his hands. “That’s it, huh? That’s enough.” He glared at Wes as confusion spread across the other man’s face.

  “It’s OK,” Wes said. “He’s OK. Ben’s cool. He knows.”

  “He knows. Oh, good. Why don’t we just get the whole town involved here.” Clyde waved to the empty room. “Let everyone in on it.”

  “He knows about albino deer,” Wes clarified. “That’s all.” He snorted. “Or that was all.”

  “Watch it, boy,” Clyde ordered.

  Ben held up his hands. “Whoa. Whoa, Coach. Come on.” He looked to Wes, his face all apologies, then back to Clyde. “I’ve been friends with Wes forever, since grade school. You’ve got nothing to worry about here. Whatever’s going on, like Wes said, I’m cool with it.”

  “Really?” Clyde barked. “You little piece of—”

  “Dad.” Urgency filled Wes’s hushed voice. “You should listen to him—about the albino deer. We’ve got three men down. We should let this one go.” He nodded to his friend encouraging him to speak. “Ben’s Ojibwe, you know.”

  “Yeah, I know. So what?”

  Ben swallowed hard. “So, um, there are many legends involving albino deer. One is a curse on anyone who harms them.” He paused, waiting for the older man’s reaction.

  Clyde narrowed his eyes. “Go on.”

  “Albino deer are sacred. A hunter who kills—or shoots—one will be cursed with bad luck or even death.”

  “Sound familiar?” Wes asked. “You know what happened to Uncle Earl. We don’t know what happened to Butch, and now T-Rex.”

  Clyde made a dismissive face. “Where are you getting this?” he asked Ben.

  “Um, my grandfather. He was a member of some sort of secret society.” The young man shrugged. “I don’t remember much about it, my grandfather died years ago, but if those kids start heading east, they are likely going to Manitowish Waters.” He paused again.

  Clyde moved his arm in a circle like a base coach. “Yes, yes. Go on. Why?”

  “A herd of albino deer is said to roam the area. My grandfather took me up there as a kid.” His eyes grew large again. “It’s really spooky. That’s what I remember most. I think he took me there as some sort of test. I must have failed it, whatever it was. He never took me there again. It was a long time ago, but I remember fog, a really strange fog. Freaked me out.
I didn’t see any deer. That’s for sure.”

  “Then why are you telling me this?”

  “Because he saw them. My grandfather saw them—at least a dozen he said. I saw fog, he saw deer.” He pursed his lips and looked to the ceiling in thought. “I could hear stomping and snorting, but I could see nothing but fog.” He looked back to the table. “He saw them. I know he did.”

  The table fell silent for a moment. The younger men fidgeted with their beers as Clyde steadily nodded his head. When he stopped, he reached into his pocket and handed Ben a twenty-dollar bill.

  “Why don’t you go see what’s taking that waitress so long.”

  Ben’s brow wrinkled. “Um, OK.” He looked to his friend. Wes tilted his head toward the bar. “Yeah, all right,” Ben reluctantly agreed and pushed out of the booth.

  Wes watched him walk away then leaned over the table. “Do you believe him about the curse?”

  “About as much as I believe in the boogie man.”

  “Well, it fits. Butch, Uncle Earl, T-Rex.”

  “Maybe, but I’m more interested in that albino herd.”

  Wes sneered. “It’s not likely that there’s a herd of albino deer roaming around out there. We’d have heard about it before now.”

  “Maybe, maybe not. That area is very remote, and the inner ranks of the Ojibwe are very secretive. It’s worth checking out.”

  “What?” Wes croaked.

  Clyde silenced him with a stern look. “I don’t put much stock in curses, but I do in the almighty dollar, and I’m seeing dollar signs. Big green dollar signs. I want you up there.”

  “Me?” Wes protested. “No. No. We need to let this go. It’s getting too dangerous, too weird, too—”

  Clyde raised a hand, stopping him short. “I want you and Ben up there. You say you trust him.” He snorted. “You better ‘cause he’s going to have your back out there. There’s a curse, you know.” He chuckled at that and slid out of the booth. “Stop in the Lac du Flambeau reservation. Ben’s Ojibwe, so someone there will talk to him. If ol’ Ben balks, tell him he’ll be well paid.” The man stood up and took one last swallow of beer. “My time’s up. Athletic banquet is tonight. We’ll talk later.”