Robert B. Parker

by Wilderness

  “We’ll stay close to the shore,” Hood said, “like we’re just canoeing.”

  “Can we stay with them, paddling?” Janet said.

  “Yeah,” Hood said. “The outboards are only little ones. They’re not going to leave us.”

  “Lake’s not that big,” Newman said.

  “But there’s an outlet,” Hood said. “According to my map the ponds connect and there’s access to the Saco River.”

  “So we could be in for a long trip,” Janet said.

  “If we have to trail them for long they’ll get suspicious,” Newman said.

  Hood didn’t say anything. The canoe moved easily in the water. Behind them something broke in the water. They could hear the splash. A loon dived between them and the outboards. The sun moved higher. Newman could feel the sweat begin to break on his forehead and the muscles starting to loosen. Hood guided the canoe easily. Newman was a strong paddle in the bow.

  “Chris,” Newman said. “What the hell did you mean, ‘they’re running’?”

  “They’re moving out,” Hood said.

  “But they aren’t running from us, specifically. That is, there’s nothing as far as they know chasing them.”

  “No. They weren’t hurrying. They weren’t running. It was just an expression.”

  A painted turtle slipped off a semisubmerged log and hung motionless in the water, only its head exposed as the canoe passed. Hood guided the canoe out farther from the lake shore. In close the shore was thick with the snags of fallen timber. There were slick black branches just below the surface.

  The packs and the long guns were on the floor of the canoe.

  “We’re going to run out of lake pretty soon,” Newman said. The lake water was the color of strong tea. Looking down Newman could see swarms of fry moving below the eddy of his paddle. Janet Newman had the field glasses on the two rowboats. “They’re turning,” she said.

  The two boats moved slowly in an arc to the left and moved at right angles to the east end of the lake shore.

  “We’ll keep paddling along the shoreline,” Hood said. “If they keep going around the edge of the lake like that we can see them and we can cut across and catch up if we have to. This way it doesn’t look like we’re following them and we’re still keeping them in sight.” Hood wore a gray woolen shirt with the sleeves rolled up past the elbows, denim pants, and hiking boots. Newman had on a blue woolen shirt with the sleeves rolled, cream-colored corduroy pants, and hiking boots. They continued to paddle along the shoreline, slowly curving north.

  The sun was almost straight overhead when Janet said, “They’re landing.” Hood and Newman let the canoe drift as they looked back and across the lake. The two boats were near shore, and they could make out one of the men wading ashore.

  “The great big one has gotten out,” Janet said, watching through the binoculars. “He’s pulling both boats up onto a little beach.”

  As they drifted, the canoe paddles laid across the gunnels of the canoe, they watched the two rowboats across the lake empty. There were the same five people. Karl, his two sons, and Tate and Marriott.

  “They each have a pack,” Janet said. “And rifles. The packs are a lot larger than ours. They have, what are they called, packboards.”

  The five men walked away from the boats and into the woods.

  “What now?” Newman said.

  “We’ll follow them,” Hood said. “Let’s paddle.”

  Both men dug the paddle blades hard into the water, turning their bodies, bending their backs. The canoe slid forward. As they paddled they fell into rhythm with each other, their bodies bending steadily and together, the paddles digging into the dark water. Newman felt the sweat running along his back. Cutting across the foot of the lake they were a hundred yards down-lake of the rowboats in half an hour.

  “We’ll go in here,” Hood said, and turned the canoe into a cove. A single mink frog plopped off a stone into the water. Hood guided the canoe between two large rocks. Newman reached out and balanced the canoe with a hand on each rock and stepped out. He was in calf-deep water. He pulled the canoe through so that its forward third rested on the bank. Janet handed his rifle and pack to him, picked up her own and, carefully balancing in the half-steady canoe, came out after him and stepped ashore. Hood followed.

  “Secure the canoe,” he said. He leaned the Springfield against a tree and moved off into the woods at a silent trot; as he went he took out the .45 and thumbed back the hammer. Newman leaned his Winchester beside the Springfield. He took Janet’s carbine and put it against the same rock. Then he and Janet pulled the canoe up onto the small beach of pebbles and coarse sand at the foot of the cut bank. Newman tied the bow to a black birch sapling with the mooring line.

  Then each of them slipped on their knapsacks and waited, listening. There were birds. They must have been in the woods all the time, but in the tense silence as they listened for danger Newman heard them as he had not before. He saw every flutter among the trees as possible danger, and his senses sharpened to them. He picked up the Winchester. Janet held the carbine.

  “Pull the bolt,” he said.

  It snicked loudly in the thick green shadows. Thick stands of white pine mingled with the oak and maple. He worked the lever on the Winchester. The sound was loud and metallic.

  “Christ, you can hear that in Quebec,” Newman said. He was whispering.

  The birds moved in the trees, darting, fluttering, their voices in various pitches and speeds. He saw bluejays and once a grosbeak with a faint rosy blush on its breast. He heard what he thought from childhood memory was a catbird. The lake made motion noise as it eddied slightly against the small grainy beach.

  A red-winged blackbird flashed across the brief opening between two trees. Newman jumped very slightly. Then he heard the sound of something larger moving through the woods. It was to his right. He turned, bringing the rifle up as something moved in the bushes. As he aimed he moved his body between Janet and the movement. He didn’t know he was doing it. The movement clarified and Chris Hood came out of the woods. Newman exhaled and put his hand behind him and touched Janet.

  Shit, he thought. I’m shielding her. He felt brave. I did it involuntarily. My instincts are good.

  “They’ve moved out,” Hood said. “There’s a trail leads up from where they beached the boats, and they’ve followed it. Come on.”

  They followed him to the place where the boats were beached, empty, the motors tilted up.

  “Do you know where they’re going?” Janet said.

  “Deeper into the woods,” Hood said. “Look.” He brought out a detailed map of the area. “I picked this up at the sporting goods store in town. We’re about here, I figure. We were going east into the sunrise all morning and then we turned here, and I figure this is the cove we passed back there.”

  Newman looked at the map. “There’s nothing but woods forever,” he said.

  “Then we have them this time,” Janet said.

  Newman looked up from the map.

  Hood said, “Yes.”

  Newman said, “You’ve got five armed men trapped in a thousand miles of woods. I’m not sure we’ve got them cornered.”

  “Help me with the boats,” Hood said. He overturned one of them and with his hatchet chopped a hole in the bottom. “Do the other one,” he said.

  “If they didn’t know something was up,” Newman said, “they will when they get back here.”

  “They’ll head back here if we don’t get them first, and when they get here we’ll have them trapped against the lake.” Hood was excited. His movements were quick. Newman turned the second boat over and sank the hatchet blade into the plywood bottom. He chopped a hole several inches around in the bottom, prying the splintering plywood with the hatchet blade.

  “Better hide the canoe,” he said.

  “Yes,” Hood said. “I’ll take it down-lake a little ways and hide it and come back up here. You and Janet wait here and watch. You better get out of sig
ht.”

  They helped him push the canoe back off the beach, and they watched him paddle from the stern, turning the paddle blade after each stroke to hold the canoe steady. When he went around the near curve of the lake, Newman turned and looked for a place to hide.

  “Under the big pine tree,” he said to Janet, “behind those rocks. I hope they don’t come back while Chris is gone.”

  “Me too,” Janet said. They slipped under the tree and lay on their stomachs behind the gray rocks.

  “You too?” Newman said. “You sound scared.”

  “I am.”

  “I thought you weren’t,” he said.

  “I wasn’t. But I am now.”

  “How come?”

  “It’s the woods, I think. It’s so alien.”

  “Or we are,” he said.

  The rocks behind which they lay were gray, granite flecked with quartz. Grayish lichen grew over parts of them. The dead pine-needles had made a thick, soft blanket around the base of the tree and no vegetation had been able to push up through it.

  “Aaron, destoying those boats has really committed us.”

  “I know.”

  “If they come back they’ll know.”

  “They’ll know something,” Newman said. “But they won’t necessarily know what.”

  “But they’ll be very much more wary, and there are five to our three.”

  “Right. It’s better if we surprise them before they see the boats.”

  There was a locust keen in the air, and the noise of a woodpecker.

  “You seem better, Aaron.”

  “How so?”

  “Less—what?—ambivalent, I guess. Less tied in a knot, more ready, looser.”

  “If rape is inevitable, lay back and enjoy it,” Newman said.

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning I’m committed. It’s too late to agonize. I’m scared, but I’m not uncertain, you know.”

  “I guess so.”

  “You’re kind of nice yourself,” he said.

  “Like what?”

  “Like not so bossy, not so controlling. Softer, maybe.”

  “I just react to you,” she said. “If you don’t push at me, I don’t have to push back.”

  Newman made a harsh, derisive sound. “Family that kills together stays together,” he said.

  There was movement along the lake and Chris Hood appeared, walking quietly.

  Janet said, “Over here, Chris.”

  Hood slid under the tree with them. “Canoe’s in the cover just around the point,” he said. “I put some rocks in it and sank it in about three feet of water. It’s under the water at the base of the only big rocks in the cove.”

  Newman nodded.

  “Remember where it is,” Hood said. “In case I don’t come back with you.”

  “Maybe none of us will come back,” Newman said.

  “Then it won’t matter,” Hood said.

  23

  The trail was little more than a continuous opening in the thick forest. It was laced with greenbrier and slow going. But all around them the greenbrier was thicker, and brush and second-growth saplings were dense and difficult.

  Occasionally there were the soft summer droppings of whitetail deer. “In winter,” Hood said softly, “the droppings are much more like pellets because the feed is different. In the winter they’re eating bark, stuff like that.”

  Hood was first as they went single file, the Springfield cradled across his left arm, his right hanging free. Janet came next and Newman was third. They smelled of insect repellent and perspiration. But Newman wasn’t tired.

  “I’m not that taken up with deer shit, Chris,” Newman said in a loud whisper.

  Hood smiled. “You’re in the woods, Aaron, its good to know a little about them.”

  It was late afternoon. The sun was still high but the deep woods were dim. They had been walking for three and a half hours.

  “You okay, Janet?” Hood said.

  “I’m fine,” she said.

  Newman smiled to himself. “She’s in shape, Chris. She runs three miles a day.”

  Hood nodded. Janet looked back at Newman. He winked at her and made the double-time gesture with his clenched fist. Ahead there were gunshots. Hood stopped, raised his right hand. They stood motionless.

  “Deer maybe,” Newman said.

  “Out of season,” Hood said.

  “Christ, so am I,” Newman said. “That didn’t seem to sweat them.”

  “Yeah, maybe. I guess they wouldn’t be nervous about the game laws, would they?”

  They were quiet. No more shots. No sounds. No locust hum. No birdsong. Newman could hear Janet breathing in front of him. Her shirt below the pack was soaked with sweat, and he could smell the perspiration odor mingled with perfume and insect repellent. He liked it.

  A woodpecker began to drum in the darkening trees above them. There was locust hum again. Hood motioned with his hand and they went forward behind him walking with very little noise. The forest was deep with the accumulated leaf-fall of timeless autumns, and the footing was soft. They walked carefully, watching where they walked, not stepping on dead branches.

  It must have been like this, Newman thought, when the Saint Francis Indians would raid down into Maine and take prisoners back up to Canada and Rogers’ Rangers would chase them. In his imagination he could sense the single file of coppery men and the long-dressed women captives with mop hats on moving in silence, the women stumbling sometimes, and behind them the lank men in fringed buckskins and loose-sleeved shirts moving grimly at the trot, carrying long rifles. Like us, Newman thought, in pursuit.

  The trail opened slightly by a small stream. Newman could smell faintly the acrid edge of gunpowder, a dim nasal memory of Korea. At the stream edge was the buff-colored short body of a groundhog. Where its head had been was a scramble of blood, bone, and tissue. They stopped. They spoke softly.

  “Shot it with a big gun,” Hood said.

  “No season on these things,” Newman said. “Guess you can shoot them anytime.”

  “Not a lot of sport to it,” Hood said.

  “Why shoot a groundhog?” Janet said.

  “Cause it was there,” Newman said.

  “They’re not choosy,” Hood said. “Remember that.”

  They went on. It was nearly dark now and they went more slowly, Hood ahead, listening hard, watching closely, slowing at each trail turn. For the last hour the trail had meandered, rising slowly. Newman could feel the rise and the added stress of it. He watched Janet carefully. She did not seem more tired that he was. They’d canoed and walked all day without eating. He was hungry. It wasn’t an insistent hunger, he was too intent on the pursuit and the trail ahead of them to be preoccupied with hunger, but the knowledge that he’d like to eat was always a part of his consciousness.

  In front of them, Hood stopped and put his hand up. He made an exaggerated sniffing gesture with his head. Newman smelled smoke. Hood looked at him; Newman nodded. They could barely see each other now that the evening had gathered. Hood came back and stood close to Janet and Newman.

  “I’d guess they’re making camp for the night,” he said.

  “What do we do?” Janet said.

  “We’ll find a place to squat and then reconnoiter. If they are making camp we ought to be able to do what we came for tonight and walk out of here.”

  “With the rest of them chasing us,” Newman said.

  “Kill them all,” Hood said.

  “No,” Newman said. “Five people, Jesus Christ.”

  “Aaron, this is like a war,” Janet said.

  Newman shook his head. “I’ll murder Karl,” he said. “Because we have to, because it’s right and necessary. But I won’t ambush and kill five sleeping men. I can’t.”

  “Aaron,” Janet began.

  Hood said, “Shhh. First we find a place to locate. Then we’ll work out a plan.” He moved off the trail into the thickets. It was impossible to be silent, but they moved q
uietly. It was fully dark now and they held hands as they moved off the trail. Newman held the Winchester upright before his face as a shield against the branches he could no longer see. He heard Janet yip with pain in front of him.

  “Put the gun straight up and down in front of your nose,” he whispered. “Keep the branches from hitting you in the eye.” She did as he told her.

  They found some space where a granite outcropping rose eight feet above them. Newman could see the stars, and in their light he could see around him a short way. They took the packs off and put them down.

  “I’m going to eat a granola bar,” Newman said.

  “Just one,” Hood said. “We don’t know how long we’ll be.”

  Newman nodded and bit into the bar.

  Hood said, “Janet, you stick here with the packs; Aaron and I will sneak over for a look, and then when we know what the situation is we’ll come back and talk it out.”

  “I’ll come with you,” she said.

  “There’s no need,” Hood said. “And someone has to watch the packs.”

  “I’m going to come,” Janet said. “If you get lost or have to run or something I won’t be stuck here alone. Wear the packs.”

  “She’s right, Chris. She should come. Besides, we might need her gun.”

  “A woman doesn’t belong on patrol, Aaron.” Hood was looking at the ground.

  Newman didn’t say anything. He looked at Janet. She opened her mouth. Closed it. Opened it again, breathed in quickly and out quickly and said, “For my protection, Chris. I need you to get me out of here. I’m afraid to be alone.”

  Hood still looked at the ground. He nodded three times. “Yeah. Okay, I guess you do. Remember we came uphill to get here. If we get separated, the lake is downhill. Facing uphill the trail is to our left now. Listen to my signal.” Hood whistled through his teeth, the first syllable long, the second rounder: see soo. He repeated it. “It’s a kind of night-hawk sound. If there’s a woodsman among them. When I make it that’s the time to come back here; if we get separated I’ll make it periodically. You try.”

  Newman whistled see soo. Janet whistled.

  Hood shook his head. “Sounds too human. Whistle through your teeth.”