by Kathryn Hoff
On the porch, Sera met Estelle with a worried frown. “It’s Annie,” she whispered. “She’s getting cold feet.”
Annie huddled in her sitting-room chair. “I don’t know,” she said. “I think of Rufus and I can’t get easy in my mind. The Good Book tells us everything has a time, living and dying both. Maybe it’s my time to let go of this life. And if it’s my time to pass over, I’d like to spend my last days here in my home.”
Estelle let the silence abide for a few ticks of the mantel clock.
“Any medical procedure has risks,” she said. “Valve replacement is pretty safe. I wouldn’t recommend it if I didn’t truly believe that you will survive to enjoy a better life. But it’s not without risk. You’re not that old, Annie, but already you’re living the life of an old woman. If that’s enough for you, then you’re right—you should stay here, and I won’t say a word against it if that’s your choice.”
“I hate being old,” Annie muttered. “I hate having to ask folks to help me.” She gazed out the window, seated in the overstuffed chair where she’d been spending day and night. She looked up, her brow furrowed in grief. “But suppose I go all the way to Fairbanks and die there? Would I be buried there, away from everyone I know?”
At least that was one fear Estelle could ease. She took Annie’s gnarled hand in hers. “I’ll make you a promise, Annie. If for any reason things don’t go well, I’ll see that your body is brought back to Rainbow. You’ll have your funeral here, among all your friends and relatives. They’ll sing the old hymns, and the people who love you will stand up and share their memories. There will be a feast and gifts. And you’ll be laid to rest next to your husband and your son.”
Annie’s eyes blinked away tears. “You promise?”
Estelle crossed herself. “I promise.”
Annie took a deep breath. “All right then. You take me to Fairbanks, and I’ll come back a new woman.”
Sera peeked in the door. “Aunt Estelle? You should see this—they’ve fixed up a parade.”
Lined up before the house were six ATVs and a crowd of villagers ready to see Annie off.
Ready hands took the suitcases and helped Annie down her front steps. Annie led the way, perched sidesaddle behind her husband’s sister’s son, and Estelle and Sera clung to sturdy village lads who carried them to the airstrip with maximum noise.
As a precaution, Estelle dosed both her passengers with ginger capsules to ward off nausea. A final check of the weather with Flight Service and she filed her flight plan, two hours south to Fairbanks. While she completed the preflight checks and stowed the luggage, two dozen villagers joked and laughed and wished Annie well.
Sera helped strap Annie into the copilot seat and showed her how to put on the headset. She snapped photos and promised her new friends that she’d post them to the internet as soon as she got home.
When Estelle was ready, Sera climbed into the rear seat. Estelle revved the engine, and with plenty of bumps and waving goodbye, the Cessna took to the air, only an hour later than planned.
Annie blinked, gazing at her village laid out below. “I pray I’ll live to see it again.”
Estelle took her thin hand and squeezed it. “I’ll do everything I can to see that you do. Now just sit back and relax. We’ll be on the ground again in two hours.”
Wildlife Trooper Kanut had quickly given up on the idea of a posse—the time-wasters at the Cody general store had just been waiting for the bar to open.
Of the various Bigfoot descriptions he’d gotten out of the witnesses, the thin woman’s description of her ravaged garden and the photo of the circular footprint were the most intriguing. It could be a print from one of Major Butterick’s “small, hairy elephants”—or the imprint left by a bucket or a beer keg, for that matter. But it was something to follow up on, so Kanut donned his backpack of essentials and his Browning rifle and set off upstream.
On the way, he got a response from base on his satphone: the names given by “Lou” and “Bran” didn’t check out. The Wasilla address they’d given was a fake. No surprise there.
Hiking upriver following Minnie’s directions, he found Jerry’s homestead without difficulty. He assured Jerry that his woman and child were safe in Cody, got another vague description of “something big,” viewed the ruined garden, and issued Jerry an official warning that his structure on protected land was in violation of federal regulations.
When Jerry had stalked off in a huff, Kanut hiked upstream a little farther, figuring that a big animal, whether bear, elephant, or Sasquatch, would choose to visit water at least once a day.
Two miles from Jerry’s homestead, where the river’s tributary was no more than a stream, Kanut was rewarded with footprints—lots of them.
Kanut was an Inupiaq—three-quarters, anyway—but he was no native tracker. He didn’t need to be: the prints were deep and wide, rough circles as big as his hand with fingers splayed. In a couple of places, he even found imprints of the toenails—nails and not claws.
The animal had left behind other spoor: giant turds of partially digested vegetation, and trees scarred where branches had been ripped off.
No bear or moose had left those signs.
Little elephants. These, I’ve got to see.
Kanut took photos and used his satphone to note the GPS location. It was getting late in the afternoon, but he walked upstream a little farther, driven by an itch to see these animals in the flesh.
He was about to turn back when he noticed the pale exposed wood where a fresh blaze—a hiker’s trail mark—had been chopped into a tree.
Tugging on vegetation, Kanut pulled himself to the top of the bank. A few steps farther in, behind a screen of brush, he came to a flattened rectangle showing where a tent had been pitched within the last few days. From a nearby tree hung bags of the type used by campers to keep their food safe from bears.
He unknotted the ropes and lowered the bags. The heap inside was expensive freeze-dried stuff, enough to keep two men going for weeks. There was even a portable wind-powered generator.
Valuable stuff. Whoever left it would be back.
With satisfaction, Kanut re-hoisted the bags. He settled into a comfortable position beside a nearby boulder. He had a feeling he’d be seeing Bran and Lou again, real soon.
CHAPTER 19
Dominance
Brandon had stalked away as soon as he was packed. Maybe he expects me to run after him, Luis had thought. If so, Brandon didn’t know Luis as well as he should.
Luis’s pack was heavier with the addition of the tent and camp stove. Just in case the cop was still hanging around, he headed downstream from Cody as if he were following Brandon to Mankeeta before circling back upstream toward the cache of supplies.
Damn Brandon anyway. Leaving Luis to wrangle the mammoths on his own. He wouldn’t miss the company—Luis was always a loner—but it would be damn inconvenient to have to do the loading and unloading without help. And he was already two days behind schedule.
Brandon’s defection also increased Luis’s risk a hundredfold. A sprained ankle or a bout of food poisoning could be deadly out in the bush with no one to help him.
I’ll just have to be careful, that’s all. Self-reliant. He’d come out of this experience a seasoned woodsman.
Belatedly, it occurred to Luis that Brandon had a key to his Fairbanks apartment. Damn it. Ten to one Luis would get home and find his TV and laptop gone.
At least the overnight stay in Cody had ensured that he had a full charge on the satphone and tablet. As soon as he was away from prying eyes, he checked the location of the mammoths. Most of them were still near Jerry’s homestead, between Cody and the campsite where he and Brandon had cached the supplies. He picked up the pace.
By midafternoon when Luis approached the homestead, he was bushed. He stopped where he could observe the hut—he didn’t fancy another run-in with gun-toting Jerry. It was a good thing, too: the wildlife trooper was there, rifle in hand, talking to the
homesteader. Damn, Minnie must have pointed the cop straight to where the mammoths were hanging out.
According to the blips on Luis’s tablet, several of the mammoths were nearby. He struck out overland, giving the homestead a wide berth. If he could mount one of the girls, he would save himself some hiking and make a good start on gathering the herd to move on. Once he got the supplies loaded, he’d lead the mammoths away. They could walk all night, taking advantage of the midnight sun. He’d snooze atop Ruby, letting her swaying gait rock him to sleep.
He found Ruby and her yearling Jet with Opal in a copse of new growth on the side of a hill. It was amazing how well they blended into the surroundings. If it hadn’t been for following their blips on the tablet, he might never have seen them.
He approached slowly, making the deep-throated call he’d used when they were small. Brum-rum, brum-rum, brum-rum.
The three stood stock-still, trunks in the air.
“Just me, girls.” He wondered if, in their short time of freedom, they’d learned to be wary of strangers. “Hey-up, Ruby. Opal, Jet, hey-up.”
Ruby came, sniffing and snorting and feeling him with her trunk. He blew out breaths of greeting and soon was surrounded by mammoths, jostling him, snuffling, and blowing.
On command, Ruby knelt and let him mount her. He scratched her woolly head and pressed his feet forward. With Jet and Opal following behind, he urged Ruby east to where the other herd members loitered.
God, it felt good to be riding instead of walking.
Up ridges, across creeks, through stands of aspen, the three mammoths made their stately way—until Ruby paused, trunk in air.
“What is it, girl?” But then Luis heard it, too. Angry trumpeting and crashing of trees.
Without urging, Ruby turned toward the ruckus, wasting no time.
It can’t be the cop, Luis thought. He couldn’t have made it so far from Jerry’s homestead on foot. A hunter, maybe? That could be bad news for both the mammoths and the hunter.
He urged Ruby to go faster.
She made an abrupt stop at the edge of a clearing. It might not have been a clearing a few hours ago, but now a few small trees had been toppled and the whole area trampled. At the edge of the clearing, Emerald and Topaz absently gathered tender twigs to crunch while watching the drama before them.
The young bull Turq, flanks heaving, faced the much bigger Diamond.
Over to the side, Pearl swayed with nervous excitement.
Luis relaxed. No Bigfoot-tracking cop, no avid hunter, just a little masculine scuffle to impress a girl.
The mammoth newcomers spread out, eager to watch the action and take advantage of the tasty browse. Jet watched avidly, peeking out from behind his mother.
Luis remained perched atop Ruby—that would be safer as well as affording Luis a better view.
Turq stamped a foot: a warning.
“Risky, Turq,” Luis murmured. Turquoise was a thousand pounds smaller than Diamond. But what young male didn’t relish the idea of taking on the reigning champion?
What Diamond couldn’t know was that, small as he was, Turq had an inborn advantage—he was the first of Anjou’s engineered hybrids to have the ancestral mammoths’ aggression.
For the first generation of mammoths, Anjou had inserted Asian elephant genes for mild temperament and domesticability, making them relatively easy to handle. But beginning with Turq, Anjou had engineered all the younger mammoths to be truer to the ancient lineage. If the first mammoths were dogs, then the new herd members would be wolves: bigger, untamable, reverting to the fierce nature of the original mammoths. And as each generation grew to maturity, natural selection would do its work. Females would choose the most powerful and aggressive mates. Within a few generations, mammoths would be as they once were, towering in height and strength, intolerant of any attempt to control.
Diamond had greater size and longer tusks, but he was about to be tested by a genetically superior adversary.
Di took a step forward: an invitation to fight or to flee.
Turq accepted the challenge, charging in with a roar.
Tusks clashed. Forehead to forehead they pushed, feet scrabbling for purchase among the forest litter.
Turq used his shorter stature to his advantage: with his tusks locked with Di’s, Turq raised his head, forcing Di’s head back and up.
Luis held his breath. Clever Turq.
A twist, and Turq’s tusk slashed perilously close to Di’s throat.
But Di’s strength gave him the advantage. He forced the young bull’s head back down and shoved, pushing Turq into the brush.
Turq stepped back, disengaging—but not running.
Could Luis stop the fight? Possibly, but sparring for rank was natural behavior. There would be no peace in the herd until the two males worked it out.
On the other hand, bull elephants could do this sort of thing for days, and Luis needed to get the herd moving.
Di solved the dilemma for him by roaring out his frustration and rushing toward the upstart.
Turq had had enough. He turned and scampered out of sight, chastened—for the moment.
Honor satisfied, Di sealed his victory by mounting a complacent Pearl, to the great interest—admiration?—of the assembled females.
Luis hoped Pearl would get past estrus soon—this sort of conflict was getting in the way of the herd’s migration.
“Tcha.” He urged Ruby to move out, steering toward the encampment he and Brandon had used two nights before. Excitement over, the herd fell into line, dutifully following the matriarch.
As Ruby plodded and swayed, Luis found himself nodding off. Damn, he was tired. But he couldn’t sleep yet—he had to move the herd away from the river, away from homesteads.
Another hour brought him to the cache where the saddlebags were still suspended from the trees. All he needed to do was load up the girls and take them away.
Then Alaska State Wildlife Trooper Kanut stepped out of the trees, casually cradling his rifle.
“Well, I’ll be damned. If it ain’t Lou—or is it Bran? Along with a goddamn small, hairy elephant.”
CHAPTER 20
Small, hairy elephants
Ruby jerked to a stop, trumpeting in alarm, nearly toppling Luis off her back.
Hell, it was that nosy trooper, Kanut. Smokey Bear hat, flak jacket, and his damn rifle cradled in his arms.
Luis raked his heels down Ruby’s sides. “Back, Ruby. Back.”
No good. She sidled left, keeping her eye on the trooper. She stamped, ears flared. Prelude to a charge.
“Put that rifle out of sight,” Luis called. “They don’t like them.”
“They?” Kanut took a step back. His eyes widened as he appeared to register for the first time that Ruby was not alone. “Holy Moses, how many you got there?”
At his movement, Ruby shied skittishly.
“I’ll answer all your questions once you put your rifle away. You can see I’m not armed.”
That wasn’t precisely true. Luis had trained the mammoths to recognize a rifle the same way he’d trained them to recognize a dog or wolf: as something to be wary of, something to avoid.
Something to attack, if need be.
The idiot cop just stood there gaping, as if his badge would protect him from four thousand pounds of angry mammoth.
Ruby raised her trunk with another alarm cry, showing off her scimitar-curved tusks.
Luis had only to give the protect call, and the mammoths would come together in the instinctive urge to destroy a predator.
Or—and for a moment he contemplated the possibility—he could urge Ruby forward, letting Kanut choose whether to shoot, run, or get trampled.
But his mammoths were no killers. “The rifle!” Luis called. “Put it down!”
The trooper just smirked. “Did you think I wouldn’t . . .”
In a single movement, Ruby stepped forward and snatched the rifle, curling her trunk around the barrel. She held it over her head
like a trophy, trumpeting loudly.
“Give that back!” Kanut demanded.
Luis slipped off Ruby’s neck, landing with a thump. With arms outstretched, he rushed to place himself in front of the trooper. “Good girl. Good Ruby. Drop it. Drop.”
She handed the rifle to Luis, as docile as a Labrador.
“Good girl.” He unclipped the magazine and emptied the chamber, letting the firearm, cartridges, and magazine fall to the ground. “All gone. Move out now. Tcha! Tcha!”
In a moment, the mammoths scattered, crashing into the brush and gone.
Luis turned to face the furious trooper.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Kanut shouted.
Cold as ice, Luis overrode him. “Saving your life. Would you startle a grizzly that way? Jumping out right in front of him? You could have been killed.”
Kanut said tightly, “Give. Me. My. Rifle.”
Luis stepped aside and let him collect his armaments.
“Where’s your partner?” Kanut peered into the barrel to see if it was clear.
“Probably in Mankeeta by now. He’d had enough, decided to leave.” Luis crossed his arms and leaned against a tree. “So . . . Officer Kanut, right? You tracked me down. What do you want to talk about?”
Kanut swore under his breath. “Let’s start with your real name and an ID this time.”
Luis fished a driver’s license out of his jeans. “Luis Cortez. You don’t seem as surprised by my hairy friends as I’d expect.”
“Where’s Dr. Henry Anjou?”
“Henri,” Luis corrected, giving it the French inflection. “He’s very particular about his name. As to where he is, he has a lab outside Fairbanks.”
“Yeah, I’ve been there,” Kanut said. “The place has been cleaned out.”
“Cleaned out?” Luis let his eyes go wide to mimic surprise. “You must be mistaken. It’s about eighty miles northwest of town, out in the woods.”
