The Lumberjack

by Erik Martin Willén

  * * * * *

  TED HAGGLUND had returned to Skull Creek to finish up some unfinished business. He had strolled in the forest and mountains for hours, preparing his plan of action. He was dressed like any average jogger out on a run. He pushed himself to the limit, feeling aroused from the tough physical training, and he kept pushing himself. He loved PT, and he could go on for hours without any water or rest, having trained this way ever since he was a young child. He was careful with his footing, and made sure that he stayed as quiet as possible. Now and then, he stopped to take his bearings. Wherever he ran there was silence: no sounds from birds or insects, not even warning sounds. He was used to that, being a superior being and all. Carnivores loved him, while all others feared him. The animal kingdom could sense him for what he was: an angry apex predator.

  A light breeze through the terrain brought a faint sound of something that did not belong in the forest: engines. He altered his direction and increased his speed; it was a steep uphill run, with many large boulders to navigate. Nero listened to a mix of classics as he ran: Chopin, Mozart, Bach, and of course his favorite, Beethoven, from his left and only earphone.

  He had to climb a rocky surface to reach the top of a cliff. There he could look down on the landscape below, at two great plateaus with a narrow line of forest dividing them. Further ahead was the mountaintop, far above where he stood. He wanted to get to the top, but looking down below, he realized that wasn’t going to happen today. He looked in horror on the devastation that had been visited on the land by the gold miners. There were huge vehicles driving all over the once-virgin forest, leaving their dreadful marks as deep, rutted tracks. There were bulldozers shoveling away, tearing up the ground, pushing trees to the side, roots and all. Giant machines ate chunks from the land. The fresh, clean air was filled with the stink of diesel engines, the huge gold plant itself making a horrible sound.

  He sat down on a large rock and did nothing to keep his tears from pouring down. He just sat there, staring at the devastation caused by man ruining nature, crying like a child, shoulders trembling, holding his face in his hands and once in a while looking up. He was well aware of the gold miners’ existence, fighting for land against the many lumberjack crews, but he hadn’t been focusing on them; his primary prey for the season had taken all his time, and the fuck-up with the witnesses had stalled him. Unlike the lumberjacks who actually helped nature, despite what a bunch of tree-hugging assholes might think, the miners did not.

  Now he was happy he had found this spot, because he had found more prey. The gold miners must die. A message must be sent to the idiots, scaring them so that they would stop their desecration of the land. But sadly, that had to wait until next year. The primary target, once destroyed, would call for more trouble and much investigation. Oh well; he had time, all the time in the world. He smiled sadly at the site below.

  “Why are you crying, mister?”

  Completely caught off guard, Nero jumped up from his seated position on the rock. Someone being able to sneak up on him was unheard of! He turned, facing a little girl who held some poorly-picked flowers in her hands.

  “He cries because he’s a pussy, sis, not like our dad, who would never cry. Adults don’t cry, just like me.”

  Nero tilted his head as he turned it towards the new voice, which came from a young boy a few years older than his sister, who stared at him tauntingly.

  He blew his nose and said, “So, little children, tell me: who is your father, the one who never cries?”

  The little girl looked curiously at him, then she pointed towards one of the gold mines below. “He’s down there working.”

  “Yeah, and he owns the mine, him being the boss, and he ain’t no crying sissy like you.”

  Tarben Nero Hammond, a.k.a. Ted Hagglund, observed the young children, and before they walked away, the little girl handed him her flowers.

  “Mister, please don’t cry. Take these, maybe it will make you feel better.”

  “Come on, sis, we ain’t allowed to talk to strangers. Let’s go kill something.”

  Nero cleared his throat as he noticed the small rifle on the boy’s shoulder. Suddenly, a plan developed in his mind; and it was a very good plan, he thought. He stopped crying and turned his head towards the children. He blinked his eyes while smiling at them very awkwardly, shaking his head side to side; and then the Beast inside of him took over his body, and the Beast was furious.

  He said quietly, but in an extremely unpleasant voice, “Little children, I’ll bet I can get your father to cry.”

  The children stopped and looked at him, surprised; and then both of them met the one person all parents warn their children about. The boogeyman.

  A shadow covered them, followed by darkness.

  * * * * *

  SITTING ON a branch on a tree a hundred yards away an owl let out a strange yowl, then took off and flew in a circle, sending out what sounded like a warning cry before it disappeared, flying away down towards the valley far below. Hovering far above in the sky, an eagle did the same. A strange silence fell over the land, but no one in the mining camp noticed Mother Nature’s sudden mood swing, because they were all too busy tearing her up in search of a dream.

  Hold it right there, Shaka Zulu. You’re no longer in charge. The chief is back, so you just wait your turn.”

  “What the hell did you call me, woman?”

  “Again, the name is Ruth. Better learn it real fast, boy.”

  Malik stopped in his tracks, staring in disbelief at the unpleasant old woman as she began her morning ritual of walking to Carlos’s office with the help of her cane. He shook his head, staring at the old woman, and then his eyeballs practically popped out as she muttered to the man in the office, “Kunta Kinte here to see ya.”

  “Watch your mouth, Ruth,” Carlos said tiredly.

  Pointing his thumb over his shoulder at the closed door behind him, Malik demanded, “Where the hell did you dig up the Klan grandmother? She’s never uttered a word to me before.”

  Carlos, his head stuck in a report, only waved his hand for Malik to have a seat. After a moment, he muttered, “Long story. Don’t mind her, she’s no racist, just likes to push people’s buttons is all. And once in a while she brings in a pie or two. Her key lime is the best ever. Probably why I haven’t sent her packing already.”

  Malik observed his best friend with the eyes of a predator, looking for anything out of the ordinary, but when he saw Carlos being himself, he calmed down.

  “So, what did you think of my basement?”

  Malik froze. Busted.

  “I…we did…”

  Carlos held up his hand for Malik to stop. “We go back, Malik, don’t we?”

  Malik nodded. “Way back.”

  “Seen a lot of shit working in the big cities, yeah?”

  Again, Malik nodded.

  “So—do you believe in destiny?”

  “No. You know I don’t, Carlos.”

  “Do you believe in history?”

  “Some of it. I definitely don’t believe in everything. The winners have the luxury of writing their own history at their leisure.”

  “Agreed.” Carlos leaned back in his seat and observed his friend; and as usual, he could read nothing from Malik Washington’s body language or expression. Carlos smiled. “What about a history that has never been written down by anyone, but has been going on for a long time?” He paused, allowing his words to sink in before he continued. “One thing I never told you. Or anyone. When I was very young, I witnessed something horrible.”

  It took an hour for Carlos to summarize everything for Malik, who during the entire hour never changed his position in his chair. After a time, he spoke. “Special Agent Perez is right; you don’t have any evidence, only a theory. I would be the last person to question what you saw that night, during the storm, through darkness, lightning, and rain…but it could be a form of hallucination, triggered by post-traumatic stress from your past. The shadow of the grizz
ly and the lightning might have been the cause of it, too.”

  “True. You’re absolutely right, but what if it wasn’t a grizzly bear, but a person?”

  Malik raised his eyebrows, “Who looks like a bear?”

  “Who dresses like one.”

  “But why?”

  “Because the person is insane, and thinks he or she really is an animal.”

  Malik nodded. “I’ve heard of weirder. But why here in Skull Creek, and why now?”

  “Because I was the only witness to that massacre over fifty years ago.”

  “Carlos, it’s a bit farfetched, even for a drug cartel, to go so far in looking for a last witness. And remember, all the cartels from back then have been replaced by new ones, and you also need to take into consideration that Perez and his partner never believed the final official report they were more or less forced to sign. I’ve worked with what I believe are the best, and that includes you, Carlos. Sometimes there are things that are a challenge to explain, or there’s simply no rational explanation at all.”

  “You’re referring to your time with the Air Force, that covert unit you belonged to.”

  Malik nodded. “At times, even the best of us see things because of the stressful work we do. But if you’re right….”

  Carlos looked up hopefully.

  “Then whatever this thing is will be back. I doubt it, but if it does return to our town, Carlos, then I’ll be right there by your side to fight it.”

  “Thank you, Malik.”

  “Any time. Probably just a grizzly, though.”

  Carlos leaned back in his chair, knowing that saying any more about his monster theory would be pointless; from now on he was on his own. “So, I read and heard that you guys got two suspects for the homicide at the lumber camp.”

  “Pretty much Adrianna did that. One hell of a woman; you sure know how to pick ‘em. I took her off duty; there are some investigations Internal Affairs will be doing, and they should be here today from the state capital, talking with her.”

  “I read her statement, and I think the arrests will hold.”

  “I agree with you, Carlos. It looks like a rescue attempt, even though it might not have been one, and the suspect who took a shot at Adrianna only tried to get away.”

  “About the stun gun…?”

  Malik smiled.

  “Yeah, that might be a tougher nut for her to crack, but to be perfectly honest with you, Adrianna was under a lot of stress, this being her first shoot-out and all. And the fat toad apparently got out of the seatbelt and did disturb her.”

  “Yeah, well, the testimony from the other gold miners insists that he was a crybaby, and didn’t have it in him to taunt any police officer.”

  Malik just shrugged.

  “So, which one of them admitted it first?”

  “Butch, and eventually Vern.”

  “They did all this shit just to scare the lumberjacks so they could prospect gold there?”

  “Yeah, and to play a joke by scaring the crap out of them. It worked, too. Some joke. But for the most part, they needed the truck; neither of them had any wheels. We might talk with the park rangers, because we’ve had a lot of complaints from locals that the miners were on their land, drilling in the ground and looking for new places to dig for gold come next season. Some idiots have even their claim flags inside the national park, and it drives the rangers nuts. By the way, has the medical report gotten back on the homicide victim?”

  Carlos grabbed a folder from his desk and handed it to Malik.

  “Crap. Says here that the body was dead before the decapitation.”

  “Yeah, that’s what the two morons said; they found him that way. But they’ll still go away for a while. A long while, I hope.”

  Malik kept eyeing the report.

  “And they have reliable alibis for that evening. They left their camp, hitchhiking, and then took a shortcut through the wood. Checks out.”

  “Says in the report that the vic had been hit several times, very hard…scratch marks, lacerations, possible cause of death…a bear attack. Damn.”

  Malik looked up and glanced at Carlos, who smiled back at him.

  “Probably just a grizzly.”

  Malik didn’t fail to notice something dark in Carlos’s voice and stare.

  * * * * *

  TED HAGGLUND had his eyes closed, and he stood on top of a huge boulder lying on the edge of a cliff, with a steep drop to the base hundreds of feet below him. Just like a Kapellmeister, Nero moved his hands and head with the music from his earphone; Beethoven’s Ode to Joy. With his right ear, he could hear the footsteps approaching from behind.

  Beethoven was calming him down.

  Nero knew that he had gone too far when he had killed the little girl; she didn’t fit his profile. The boy, however, did. He also knew that the last thing he had to do before he could no longer control the Beast was to take care of the last witness and follow protocol, but first he had to put his new, perfect plan in motion.

  “Say, mister, you seen a couple of kids? A young girl eight years old, and a boy, her brother, going on twelve?”

  Ted Hagglund, still with his eyes closed and moving his hands to the sound of the music, nodded his head; and then he pointed below the cliff edge. A few frustrated minutes later, a fat man with a goatee finally manage to climb up next to him. He was out of breath.

  “Name’s Bob. So, you seen them? They’re late for dinner, and…”

  Bob paused when he saw into the dead stare of the stranger on the cliff. “Children should be in school during the day.”

  “Yeah, well, ever hear of homeschooling? What’s it to you, anyway?”

  Nero inhaled the beautiful music and moved his body in time to it, in ways that would make a ballerina jealous. “And I suppose that you’re their father, the tough man who doesn’t cry, as they put it.”

  Bob looked suspiciously at the stranger.

  “I decided to test that theory, Man Who Doesn’t Cry. Look below, and I suspect you will feel overwhelming and truly horrible sorrow.”He stopped dancing around Bob and he waved his finger in the air: no, no. “But you must not cry, oh no, you must not cry…you see?”

  A few minutes later, Bob screamed the entire six hundred feet down. He hit the ground face-first and cracked his skull, splattering brain matter all over the bodies of his children, who lay where they had fallen.

  Bob’s son had been wrong about his father. He had cried like a forlorn child when he saw them down there, twisted and broken.

  * * * * *

  WHEN CHRISTINA and Kevin returned home several hours later, there were three more trucks parked by her new home. She recognized Frank’s and Robert’s, but not the third one. They parked Christina’s new truck underneath the carport, and there were a few stares—at the truck. Peter was talking to Frank, Robert, and some guy Christina had never met. The moment Christina set foot on the ground, Hunter appeared from nowhere, sitting down while mopping the ground with his tail. She kneeled and let him lick her face, while talking to him in that baby talk dogs are supposed to like. A soft bark made her raise her head, and there was a bandaged Nugget limping towards her, his tail swinging back and forth. He approached slowly and carefully, trying to get between Hunter and Christina. Christina moved and kneeled next to Nugget, who immediately lay on his side, allowing her to carefully pet him.

  “Christina, this is Boris, a friend who sometimes he helps me out.”

  Christina looked up at Robert, and then stood up and shook the giant’s hand. Immediately the huge man, who had a full beard and a large, round nose, blushed; it reminded her of a scene from Snow White.

  “I haven’t taken care of your land yet, Christina, you being in the hospital and all…” Robert began.

  “Thank you for the flowers,” Christina interrupted.

  Robert looked bewildered. “Don’t think I send you any.” He trailed off, looking a bit ashamed.

  Christina looked at him seriously and waited.
>
  Robert could sense the hostility in the air, and ignored it. “Anyway, there are still a lot of trees and branches that need to be taken care of from the storm. You still want me to do the job for you?”

  “Sure, you do that.” She turned to the giant next to Robert. “Nice to meet you, Boris.” Again the giant was quiet, and blushed some more.

  Christina ignored the two lumberjacks as they picked up their gear and headed along the path. Soon the roar of their chainsaws echoed throughout the forest. Frank walked up next to her, looking in the direction of the sound. “He’s a good man, if a bit stubborn.”

  “All men are stubborn.”

  Frank just smiled, not wanting to get involved if there was something between Robert and Christina. He handed Christina’s old suitcase to her, and nodded for her to open it. Inside were her favorite but very ugly sandals; everything had been cleaned and repaired. She gave Frank a long, hard hug, thanking him.

  “I should’ve called, but figure I’d take Nugget and Hunter for a ride. Nugget needs to work up his muscles again.”

  “I’m so happy he made it, and at the same time I’m truly sorry for that K-9 that died.”

  “And that’s the reason I’m here.”

  Christina looked at Frank, questioning. Meanwhile, Hunter and Nugget found the tree with the owl sitting in it, and both stood on their back legs while leaning on the trunk, barking at it once in a while. The owl couldn’t care less, apparently.

  “Well, Whitney, the police officer that lost his dog in the hunt or attack, whatever, he’s gotten himself a new German Shepherd, and it’s a cute little guy.”

  “Yeah? I don’t follow, Frank.”

  “Winter is coming soon, and Claire and I will travel to our place in Florida, as you know.”

  “Yes, I remembered you guys mentioning that. Or maybe it was Tom Billing, I can’t remember.”

  “Whenever we do go, we only bring Winston, and Whitney usually takes care of Nugget and Hunter. But with him training up a new dog that hopefully will become his next K-9 partner, having Nugget and Hunter around won’t do him any favors, so I…”