Ice Hunter

by Joseph Heywood

  “Only if they have minds,” Service said. “Be in touch, Bird.”

  Near Assinins, Keweenaw Bay nearly touches Old Des Rochers Road, now a segment of US 41. The morning was sunny with some clouds, the wind calm. Cloud shadows moved majestically over the calm water of the bay. As Service drove south he looked toward the water’s edge and saw a man walking with a rifle. He parked immediately, got out, and walked down to the gravelly beach.

  The rifle had a scope. The man carried the weapon in one hand; the sling drooped, dragging the stock along the gravel. The man was stark naked, moving slowly. Service used his handheld radio to call the state police post in Baraga, identified himself, told the dispatcher the situation and location, and requested backup. “Tell them no bells and whistles.” A naked man stumbling along a beach suggested mental illness, perhaps even a potential suicide. A siren might push him over the edge. Take no chances, he warned himself, stumbling along.

  Backup on the way, Service paralleled the man’s route and observed. The man’s feet were bloody from the sharp edges of the rocks, and he walked stiff legged.

  When the man halted, Service stopped and looked back to see if backup had arrived. It hadn’t.

  A seagull soaring overhead let out a grating squawk. The man fumbled with the rifle and aimed it in the air. He tried to pull the trigger several times, but the weapon didn’t discharge. Drunk, Service decided. The rifle’s safety was on and the man couldn’t figure it out. This was good.

  A glance told him that backup was still not there.

  “Sir?”

  The man didn’t react.

  “Sir?”

  The man looked over his shoulder at the conservation officer. “What the fuck do you want?”

  “Sir, please put the rifle on the ground and step away from it.”

  “My rifle.”

  “Place the rifle on the ground, please.”

  Another seagull sound caused the man to swing the rifle skyward again.

  “Sir, don’t shoot. Just put the rifle down.”

  The man jerked at the trigger and, when nothing happened, took the rifle by the barrel and flung it spinning into the water.

  At least he was unarmed now. “Sir, I want to help you.”

  “Got mead?” the man asked.

  Mead? “No sir, just sit down. Your feet are bleeding.”

  The man lifted a foot and looked at the blood. “Who took my shoes?” he asked.

  “Sir, sit down so you don’t cut them anymore.”

  Service looked back and saw a state trooper jogging toward them. Service moved cautiously toward the man on the cobbled beach. “Sir?”

  “Okay, okay.” He bent his knees to sit and fell backward. His head hit the rocks with a loud thunk and the man’s arms spread out.

  The trooper caught up. Service pointed. “He had a rifle and threw it in the water.”

  “I saw.”

  Service nodded and approached the prone man.

  “Sir?”

  “Yah, I can hear.”

  Service knelt nearby but did not get close. The trooper traipsed into the water, found the rifle, and picked it up. He stomped over to Service. “I hate getting wet. Now I’ll have to change uniforms.”

  “Call EMS. He’s cut bad on the feet.” The trooper talked into the radio microphone attached near his collar while Service spoke calmly to the man.

  “We’re gonna get you a doctor, sir.”

  “Got no insurance,” the man said.

  “Don’t worry about that now.”

  The trooper stood behind Service. “I don’t need this today.”

  “You know him?”

  “Unfortunately. Name’s George Stix. He used to be a lawyer, but he lost his license. He’s psychotic. Last we knew he was in a rubber room in Grand Rapids. Let’s get cuffs on him. He can be unpredictable. Don’t let his age fool you.”

  The naked man suddenly sat up. “You may not touch royalty.”

  Service looked at the trooper, who said, “He thinks he’s a king.”

  “George the Forty-Third,” the man said haughtily.

  “Your Highness,” the trooper said, “roll over on your stomach and put your hands behind you.”

  “I only obey God,” George said.

  “Which god?” the trooper said.

  “What day is this?”

  “Roll over, George.”

  The prone man exhaled deeply and started to roll, but he quickly changed positions and shot forward like a crab, catching the trooper just below the knee and knocking him down.

  Service grabbed the man by the hair and dropped on top of him, but the man pulled away and head-butted the conservation officer in the face. The pain blinded Service, but he still had hold of the man and pushed him down. The trooper yelled, “Roll him over!”

  When the man was over, the trooper cuffed him and stood up.

  Service was still seeing stars when the trooper said, “Shit,” and fell beside him.

  “My fucking ankle,” the trooper hissed. “I think the bastard broke it.”

  Service rubbed his face. His hand came away covered by bright red blood. He felt his nose and knew it was broken and off center. The pain in his face was not relenting. He pulled up the trooper’s wet pant leg and felt along the bones. The man winced.

  “We’ll let EMS take care of it,” Service said. “Don’t move.”

  The trooper said, “Your faced is fucked up.”

  When the Bay Ambulance Service vehicle arrived, the techs gave Service a towel to hold against his face while they worked on George the Forty-Third and strapped him onto a stretcher. One of the emergency techs went for another stretcher for the trooper.

  The EMS team wanted Service to ride in the ambulance, but he refused. The blood had stopped flowing. Now he felt numbness in his cheek and a headache taking root. He followed the ambulance to Baraga County Memorial Hospital on Main Street in L’Anse. When he got inside, the trooper and George were already in examining rooms. A nurse looked at Service and shook her head sympathetically. “Bad day?”

  “It’s just beginning,” he said.

  “A doctor will be right here.” She showed him to a small room, sat him on the examining table, and attached a blood pressure sleeve. “We’re going to need some X rays.”

  “I’ve had broken noses before.”

  “It’s your cheek I’m worried about,” she said. “Your blood pressure’s up,” she added, storing the sphygmomanometer after she had taken his pressure.

  The red-haired doctor wore a pale green smock and sandals with no socks. The exam took about fifteen minutes. “I need to get moving,” Service said.

  “Let’s just get some pictures, then we can talk, okay? Meanwhile, stay still and remain here.”

  “What about the trooper?”

  “His ankle’s broken. We’re setting it now.”

  While Service was in X ray, a logger was brought in. He had severed his hand with a saw. The entire emergency team focused on that.

  Service was taken back to the exam room, where he lay down. His headache got progressively worse. He lost track of time and felt sleepy.

  The next thing he knew, he was on a gurney and being taken somewhere. He tried to ask questions, but words wouldn’t come out.

  When he awoke, the doctor was beside his bed. “You’re back.”

  Service looked around. “When did I leave?” The doctor laughed. Service looked around the room, which was a sterile white. There was an IV stand beside the bed. A clear plastic line snaked down into his arm. “What happened?”

  “Concussion,” the doctor said. “Moderate. Your nose is broken, but that should heal if you don’t bang it again. There’s a hairline crack in your cheek. You’re gonna need to stand d
own for a few days.”

  Service lifted the arm with the IV. “Get it out.”

  The doctor nodded to a nurse and she set about freeing him.

  “When you get home, see your own physician,” the doctor said. He placed two prescription sheets on the table by the bed. “Get those filled. They’re for pain. If headaches persist, get to your physician. Concussions aren’t minor injuries.”

  When Service got outside, the sky looked wrong. He checked his watch. It was the next morning. “Shit,” was all he could say.

  On his way east, he called Sergeant Parker and explained what had happened.

  “You’re okay to drive?”

  “I am driving.”

  “You will see another doctor before you return to duty.”

  “Right,” Service said, signing off.

  Kira was going to be worried.

  Newf raced out of the house when Kira opened the door and Kira came flying right behind the dog. She stopped when she looked at his face. “My God, Grady!”

  “I had a problem,” he said.

  She showered him with gentle kisses. “You’ve been gone a month. No, a year!”

  “It was just two nights.”

  “I was worried,” she said in a tone he couldn’t read. Was she criticizing him?

  She insisted he go to bed and made an ice pack from plastic bags.

  After his nap, she made a salad of romaine lettuce, arugula, and avocado, and a small pizza with yellow squash, mozzarella, and lemon thyme on a crust no thicker than paper. He took a couple of sips of a glass of beer, then pushed the glass away.

  He told her about the mother wolf and her pups and eating fresh trout. He was about to tell her about his encounters with the grandmother, teacher, Lemich, and all the rest, but the telephone interrupted him.

  It was McKower. “Rollie Harris died this afternoon.”

  Service felt weak and grabbed the chair for support. Harris was the district’s lieutenant, a forty-year-old who led his people intelligently and held his ground against the muck-a-mucks in Lansing with diplomacy, never selling out his COs.

  “What happened?” Rollie had been a fanatic about conditioning and was always on everybody’s ass to keep in shape.

  “He was fishing with Lanny and had a heart attack. They were up on the Yellow Dog. Lanny used their cellular to call for help and gave him mouth-to-mouth, but he was dead when the emergency team got there. Poor girl,” McKower added.

  “Damn,” was all Service could say. Lanny was Harris’s fourteen-year old daughter, his only child. “How’s Jean?” Rollie’s wife.

  “Strong for the moment. You know how she is. The burial will be at Big Bay the day after tomorrow, no church service. Jean and Lanny want you and me to be pallbearers.”

  “They can count on me,” Service said.

  “We all count on you, Grady.”

  Why did she have to say that? As long as he had known McKower she had always put him on a pedestal and tried to make him out to be more than he was.

  Kira asked, “What’s wrong?” after he hung up.

  “Rollie Harris died today. Heart attack.”

  She looked shocked. “He’s so young.”

  “His number came up.”

  “Fatalism,” she said sarcastically, “from the same fool who jumped in front of his grandmother’s shotgun.”

  He said, “I’m going to let Newf out,” He needed time alone.

  Kira didn’t object.

  Rollie had been a grunt at Khe Sanh and had seen men killed for nothing. As an LT in the DNR, he would not allow history to repeat itself, even when his people were eager to take chances. Survey after survey showed that COs were eight to ten times more likely than any other kinds of cops in the country to be assaulted and injured in the line of duty, and the inherent risk was high enough without his people pushing the envelope. Service didn’t doubt the surveys. He touched his face, which served as a reminder of the uncertainties the job held.

  Rollie Harris would be hard to replace, as a boss and as a friend.

  Service wondered when his number would come up. Newf watched him for a while, then loped into the woods with her nose down, sniffing everything until she halted in the darkness and began snarling and barking.

  Service made his way to the dog, found her staring up, and and saw three black bear cubs on branches. They were staring down like live teddy bears.

  “Shit,” he said out loud. “Newf.” The dog looked over at him. “Come!” he said. The dog obeyed. His head ached and he looked around carefully before backing slowly away. He was certain the sow was nearby, and if she thought he was threatening her cubs she could get aggressive.

  Sows were unpredictable. Male bears, like male gorillas, put up an aggressive front but rarely attacked. Females with cubs attacked without warning—maternal instinct at its deadliest.

  They got back to the house without incident and Service made sure that Newf was inside. The bear would take her cubs and move on. He needed time to think, but he was tired and dozed off in his chair, only to be awakened by a motorcycle roaring by the house and headed down the trail where he had seen the bear.

  Christ almighty! He grabbed a 12-gauge shotgun and a spotlight and ran after the dirt bike. He found it in a heap not far from where he had seen the cubs. The motorcyle was on its side, the front fender bent, handlebars twisted, front tire popped.

  “Help me,” a voice called weakly.

  Service pointed his light up and saw a young man in the tree, frantically trying to climb. A large bear was behind him. Oh fuck, Service thought. Was this day never going to end?

  Service moved closer to the tree and shone the light up, but the bear ignored him. He checked the ground, found a rock, and threw it, hitting the bear in the rump. She looked down and clacked her jaws angrily, a warning for him to butt out.

  Then the animal turned and came straight down the tree. Service backed away.

  “Help!” the man shouted again from above.

  “Be quiet!” Service ordered.

  The female landed hard on the ground and shook as she looked at him. Her eyes were red in his light beam. He braced the light against the forestock of his shotgun and fired into the dirt under the bear, spraying her with dirt fragments. As dry as it was, the bits would sting like shrapnel. The bear took a couple of steps toward him, shaking her head from side to side, then pivoted suddenly, cut sharply right, and crashed through tag alders. He heard her land in the creek with a splash as loud as a depth charge. And as deadly.

  “Climb down fast,” he told the climber. “Now.”

  Before the man got most of the way down, he fell and collapsed on the ground. He was bleeding from the head and whimpering. Service couldn’t tell if the bear had gotten to him or if the injuries came from the accident and the fall. This was no place or time to make an assessment; he had to get the guy to safety. Now.

  “I hurt,” the man said.

  Service grabbed him by the collar, lifted him up, and dragged and helped him toward the cabin. When they got there, Kira took his flashlight, took one look, and went into action rendering first aid while Service called the county sheriff and an ambulance. The man was bleeding badly from slashes from the bear’s claws, but worse from a compound fracture in his leg. An hour later the man had a ticket for riding without a helmet, trespassing, riding off a designated trail, and reckless driving; he was on the way to the hospital. It would take the surgeons hours to put his leg together, but at least he was alive.

  “My God,” Kira said. “What happened out there?”

  “Tomorrow,” he mumbled wearily, waving her off. No time to even mourn Rollie. He was exhausted, and he would worry about the bears and the broken motorcycle when he had daylight and backup. Right now, he needed sleep. Just sleep.

&nbs
p; As soon as he felt himself sliding into deep sleep, an ORV roared up his driveway and he was up again, dressing and out to his truck and following at breakneck speed, but he lost the trail within a mile. Goddamn assholes. North woods summer fever was setting in.

  Back to bed again. The phone rang. This time it was central dispatch at the county. A deputy had a B&E and a possible intruder at a house near Skandia and needed backup. He was closest. Service got dressed again, drove down to the house four miles away, and met up with the cop, a man named Avery. Service took the back of the house and Avery went to the front door. Minutes later, Avery was yelling for him. Service went back to the front and found the deputy shaking his head and lighting up a smoke.

  “No B&E,” Avery said. “The woman’s granddaughter came home late from bowling and the old lady panicked. Sorry.”

  “No problem,” Service said. It was always something in this job.

  Less than a mile away from his cabin a van raced up behind him, fishtailing back and forth. Service pulled to the right and slowed, and when the van finally passed it was swerving all over the road ahead of him.

  Not my day, he thought angrily. He turned on his blue lights and followed, careful not to press too close. No siren. That could spook anybody on a dark, country dirt road. The van didn’t get far. Rounding a tight curve, Service saw dust rising and headlights pointed up into some oak trees and blue spruces. The damn thing had flipped on its side. A wheel spun lazily. The van was baby shit brown and badly rusted. Dust hung in the air.

  Service scrambled up on the van and jerked a door open. He could smell gas and fumes. Not good. The engine was still running.

  “Shut the motor off,” Service barked.

  A male voice said, “I know, I know, I shunt drink an’ drive. Jus’ had one, I swear.”

  One: a bottle, a keg, a tanker off the back of an eighteen-wheeler?

  At least he got the engine off. Service helped the man out and down. He stank of alcohol and had a nasty cut on his forehead. He was seeing a year’s worth of blood today, and summer was just starting up. The man tried to stand but fell.

  “Are you alone?”

  “Yup.”