KS00 - Nooses Give

by Dana Stabenow

  George’s voice sounded over her shoulder. “What are you looking for?”

  She dropped her hand. “Just wanted to check something, and my maps are all about fifty years out of date.”

  “So are mine.” He paused. “Dan O’Brien’s bunch just did a new survey of the Kanuyaq. Source to delta, Copper Glacier to Kolinhenik Bar. They did the whole thing this summer. I thought those fucking—excuse me, Mutt—those frigging choppers never would leave.”

  “Have they got the new maps yet?” Though her voice was still harsh and broken, and according to the doctors always would be, the more she talked, the less it hurt. The realization brought her no joy.

  He shook his head. “They’re printing ‘em this winter. They’ll be selling ‘em in the spring.” He paused. “Dan’s probably got the originals at Park Headquarters.”

  She drained her mug and set it on the desk. “Can I bum a ride up to the Step?”

  He set his mug next to hers. “Sure. The Cub’s prepped and ready to fly.”

  · · ·

  George took off hot, as straight up as he could with only 150 horsepower under the hood. The sky was clear and the air was still and it was CAVU all the way from the Quilak Mountains to the Gulf of Alaska. He climbed to 2,000 feet and stayed there, the throttle all the way out, a typical taxi driver whose sole interest was in there and back again. All rubbernecking did was burn gas. Twenty minutes later they landed on a small plateau in almost the exact geographical center of the Park. The north end of the airstrip began at the base of a Quilak mountain; the south end fell off the tip of a Teglliq foothill into the long river valley below. The airstrip on the Step was approximately 3,800 feet shorter than the one in Niniltna, and George cut the throttle the instant the Super Cub touched down. They roared to a halt ten feet from the front door of the largest building in the group of prefabricated buildings huddled together at the side of the runway. They climbed out, and Mutt vanished into the trees. “I won’t be long,” Kate said.

  George nodded. “I’ll go down to the mess hall and scare up a free meal.”

  Dan O’Brien had dodged alligators in the Everglades and a‘a in Kilauea with enough success to be transferred to the Park on December 3, 1980, the day after Jimmy Carter signed the d-2 lands bill, which added over a hundred million acres to already existing park lands in Alaska. Dan was fiercely protective of the region under his jurisdiction, and at the same time respectful of the rights of the people around whose homesteads and fish camps and mines and villages the Park had been created, which was why he was the only national park ranger in the history of the state never to get shot at, at least not while on duty. Ranger by day, he was a notorious rounder by night. He’d known Kate since she was in college, and he’d been trying to lay her for at least that long.

  The news of her return hadn’t reached the Step, and he started around the desk with a big grin and open arms, only to skid to a halt as she unzipped her parka and he saw the scar. “Jesus Christ, Shugak,” he said in a shaken voice, “what the hell did you do to your neck?”

  She shrugged open the parka but kept it on. “George Perry tells me your boys have been making some new maps of the Kanuyaq.”

  Her harsh voice grated on his ears. He remembered the guitar, and thought of all the long winter evenings spent singing sea chanteys, and he turned his back on the subject and walked away. It might be the only thing he could do for an old friend, but he would by God do it and do it right. He did ask one question. “Mutt okay?”

  “She’s fine. She’s chasing lunch down outside. About those maps.”

  “Maps?” he said brightly. “You bet we got maps. We got a map that shows every hump and bump from Eagle to Anchorage. We got a census map that shows the location of every moose bull, cow, and calf from here to the Kanuyaq River delta. We got maps that show where every miner with a pickax sunk a hole more than a foot deep anywhere within two hundred miles. We got maps that show the spread of spruce beetles north of Ikaluq. We got—”

  “I need a map that shows me any airstrips there might be around Beaver Creek.”

  “Pete Liverakos’ place? Sure, he’s got a strip. About twelve hundred feet, I think. Plenty long enough for his Cessna, but he lands her at Niniltna.” His brow puckered. “Been curious about that myself. Why walk a mile downriver in winter when you can land on your own front doorstep?”

  She nodded, although she wasn’t curious. She knew why. “Is there another airstrip further up the creek, say halfway between his homestead and Ahtna?”

  He thought. “Yeah, I think there’s an old mine up there somewheres. Let’s take a look.” He led the way into a map room, a place of large tables and cabinets with long, wide, shallow drawers. He consulted a key, went to a drawer and produced a map three feet square, laying it out on a table with a double-jointed lamp bolted to the side. He switched on the light, and they leaned over the map. A stubby forefinger found Niniltna and traced the river from the village to Beaver Creek, and from there up the creek to the homestead. He tapped once. “Here’s Pete’s place. A twelve-hundred-foot strip just sitting there going to waste. And Ahtna’s up this way, to the northwest, about a hundred miles from Niniltna,” adding apologetically, “The scale’s too large to show it on this map.” He marked the spot with an eraser and produced a yardstick, laying it on the map, one end pointing at Beaver Creek, the other at the eraser. With his hand he traced the length of the yardstick. “And presto chango, there it is. Like I thought, it’s an airstrip next to a gold mine. Two thousand footer. Probably needed the extra to land heavy equipment. Abandoned in… oh, hell, ‘long about ‘78? Probably about the time Carter declared most of the state an antiquity.” He patted her on the ass and leered when her head snapped up. “Just think what you’d be missing if he hadn’t.”

  “Just think,” she agreed, moving the target out of range. “Is the strip maintained?”

  He made a face. “I doubt it. Never was much gold there to begin with, and too fine to get out in commercial quantities anyway. Myself, I think the mine was just an excuse to come in and poach moose.”

  Her finger came back down the yardstick. “Beaver Creek runs right up to it.”

  “Uh-huh.” He produced another map, with a flourish worthy of Mandrake the Magician. “This shows the estimated animal population in the same area.” They studied it. “Neat, huh? A couple moose moved in five years ago, been real good about dropping a calf or two every spring. There’s half a dozen pairs of eagles. Beaver, mostly, on the creek.” He snapped his fingers. “Sure. I remember one time I was at the Roadhouse and Pete brought in a beaver hide. Said he was running a trapline up the creek.” His lip lifted in a sneer. “Said he’d cured it himself. Shape it was in, nobody doubted it for a minute.”

  He looked up from the map. The hazel eyes had an edge sharp enough to cut. He remembered a time when those eyes could laugh. “Hell of a trapper and hunter,” he said, “that Pete. That is, if you don’t count him joining in that wolf hunt the state had last year.” He grinned. “Nobody else does.”

  “Why not?”

  “He shot three inches off the prop of his plane, leaning out to draw a bead on a running female.”

  “He wreck the plane?” Dan shook his head. “Too bad. Okay, Dan. Thanks.”

  He followed her out of the room. “‘Okay’? ‘Thanks’? Is that it? Is that all I get? Of all the ungrateful—”

  The front door shut on the rest of it.

  George flew back to Niniltna by way of a stop at Ahtna to pick up the mail, fresh off the daily MarkAir flight from Anchorage. Kate waited by the Cub, watching cargo unload from the 737. Ahtna, at the junction of the Park road with the Richardson Highway, was a wet town, with a population of a thousand, and three flourishing bars. An entire pallet of Olympia beer was marked for the Polar Bar, a case of Jose Cuervo Gold and another of assorted liqueurs for the Midnight Sun Lounge. The 737 took off, and a Northern Air Cargo DC-6 landed in its place, off loading an igloo of building supplies from Spenard Lu
mber and a pallet of Rainier beer, this one marked for the Riverside Inn.

  No Windsor Canadian in either cargo, but then she didn’t see Pete or his 50 Papa around anywhere, either. Once a week, Bernie had said. This wasn’t the day.

  Ahtna, like Niniltna, was on the Kanuyaq. Downriver was Niniltna. Farther downriver was Prince William Sound. Upriver was a state highway maintenance camp. Last year during a spring storm a corner of the yard had crumbled into the river, taking a barrel of methanol with it. The barrel had floated downriver, to wash ashore outside Ahtna. Four high school kids, two sixteen, one fifteen, one fourteen, already drunk, had literally stumbled across it and instead of falling in the river and drowning tapped the barrel and died of poisoning.

  George returned with the bag as the pallet of Rainier was loaded onto the back of a flatbed. He read her silence correctly and said, “They’re a common carrier, Kate, just like me. We fly anything, anywhere, anytime, for cash money. That’s how we make a living.”

  “You don’t fly booze.”

  He shrugged. “Not up to me. The town voted to go dry.”

  “And if it hadn’t?”

  He shrugged again. A half hour later they were back in Niniltna.

  · · ·

  The land, low and flat near the river, began to rise soon after she left it. Blueberry bushes, cottonwoods, and scrub spruce were left behind for currants, birches, and hemlocks. The snow was so deep and was packed down so well beneath its own weight that the Polaris skimmed over it, doing better than forty miles an hour. In spite of the wide swing to avoid the homestead, she reached the abandoned gold mine at four thirty, with more than an hour of twilight left.

  She ran the machine into some birches. the nose pointing downhill, and cut branches for camouflage and to sweep the snow free of tracks. Strapping on the snowshoes that were part of the standard winter survival kit she kept beneath the Polaris seat she shouldered her pack, shouldered the 30.06, and hiked the quarter of a mile to the mine entrance that gaped blackly from halfway up the hill next to the creek. It was dark inside until she got out the flashlight. The snow in the entrance was solidly packed down, as if something heavy had been stacked there.

  Kate explored and found a branching tunnel, where she pitched the tent and unrolled the sleeping bag. Taking the ax and a collapsible bucket, she went down to the creek and chopped a hole in the ice beneath an overhanging bush. She filled the bucket with ice and water. Back at the tent, she lit the Sterno stove. The exertion and the cold had left her hungry, and she ate two packages of Top Ramen noodles sitting at the entrance to the mine, surveying the terrain in the fading light.

  The airstrip ran parallel to the creek, which ran southeast-northwest around the hill of the mine. A narrow footpath led from the mine to one end of the airstrip. She squinted. A second, wider trail started at the other end of the strip, going in the opposite direction. Birches and scrub spruce clustered thickly at the edges of the strip and both trails. The creek was lined with cottonwoods and diamond willow. Mutt visited them all, sniffing, marking territory.

  Kate went back for a Chunky and sat again at the mine entrance, gnawing at the cold, hard chocolate as she waited for the moon to come up. An hour later it did, full and bright. By Agudar’s light she walked down the footpath. Mutt trotted out of the woods and met her on the strip. It was as hard and smooth as the strip at Niniltna. The second, wider trail was a snow machine track. It followed the creek southeast, dodging back and forth, taking the easiest way through the trees and undergrowth without coming too close to the bank.

  The creek itself was frozen over. No snares. No holes cut into the ice in any of the likelier places Kate spotted for snares.

  She went back up to the mine and crawled into her sleeping bag, Mutt next to her. Mutt didn’t dream. Kate did, the same dream as always, children in pain. In the night she moved, restless, half waking, moaning a little. In the night Mutt moved closer to her, the animal’s 140-pound weight warm and solid. Kate slept again.

  The next morning the sun was up by nine, and Kate and Mutt were on the creek trail as the first rays hit and slid off the hard surface of the frozen landscape. Kate kept to the trail to minimize the track she left behind. She moved slowly, ears cocked for the sound of an airplane engine, eyes on the creek side of the trail. Again there were no holes, and no snares for holes. There was nothing more to see. Old habits are hard to break, especially the habit of verification instinctive in every good investigator. It had compelled her to give Pete the benefit of the doubt. Now there was none. She went back to the mine.

  They waited, camping in the tunnel, carrying water from the creek, Mutt grazing the local rabbit population, for three days. Every morning she broke down the camp and packed it down the hill to the Polaris, and every evening she packed it back up again.

  She’d had worse stakeouts. The first morning a pair of eagles cruised by overhead, flying low and slow, eyes alert for any movement on the ground. A gaunt and edgy moose cow and her two calves passed through the area on the second day, moving like they had a purpose. That night they heard the long drawn-out howl of a wolf. Purpose enough. Down by the creek, a gnawed stand of diamond willow confirmed the presence of Dan’s beavers, although the winter’s heavy snowfall kept Kate from spotting the dam until the second day. The third afternoon a fat black raven croaked at them contemptuously on his way to make mischief elsewhere. That evening Kate ran out of Top Ramen and had to fall back on reconstituted freeze-dried spaghetti. Some prices are almost too high to pay.

  Late on the afternoon of the fourth day, as she was thinking about fetching her camp up again from the Polaris, Mutt’s ears went forward and she got to her feet and pointed her muzzle west. Kate faded back into the mine, one hand knotted in Mutt’s ruff, the other gripping the handle of her ax, as the Cessna 180 with the tail numbers marking 50 Papa came into view over the trees. It touched down and used up all of the strip on the runout, bright shiny new in its fresh-off-the-assembly-line coat of red and white. Only bootleggers could afford new planes in the Alaskan bush.

  The pilot was tall and rangy and well-muscled, and the unloading was easy and practiced. All the seats save the pilot’s had been removed and the remaining space filled up with case after case of Windsor Canadian whiskey, in the plastic bottles. Glass bottles weighed more and took more gas to get into the air. Glass bottles cut into the profit margin.

  When he had all the boxes out on the ground, he tucked one box beneath each arm and started up the path toward the mine. Kate and Mutt retreated farther into the darkness.

  He made the trip up and back six times, twelve cases in all, stacking them inside the mouth of the mine where the snow was packed down all nice and hard, where he’d stacked different cases many times before. He whistled while he worked, and when he was done he paused in the mine entrance to remove his cap and wipe his forehead on his sleeve. In the thin sun of an Arctic afternoon, his fifty-year-old face was handsome, although his nose and chin were a little too sharp, like his smile.

  He replaced his cap and started down the hill, whistling again. He wasn’t halfway to the plane before he heard it, and the sound spun him around on his heels.

  Kate stood in front of the stack of boxes, swinging from the hips. The blade of the ax bit deep. A dark-brown liquid spurted out when she pulled it free. The smell of alcohol cut through the air like a knife.

  “Hey!” he yelled. “What the hell!” He started back up the slope. Without a break in her swing, Kate said one word. “Mutt.”

  A gray blur streaked out of the mine to intercept him, and he skidded to a halt and almost fell. “Shit!”

  The blade bit into another case. More whiskey gushed out. “Goddamn it! Kate!”

  “Hello, Pete,” she said, and swung.

  “Kate, for chrissake cut that out—that stuff’s worth a hundred bucks a bottle to me!”

  The ax struck again. He made as if to move, but Mutt stood between them, lips drawn back from her teeth, head held low, body quivering
with the eagerness to attack.

  “You fly to Ahtna and pick up your shipment,” Kate said, torn voice harsh in the still afternoon air. The ax bit into the sixth case. “You drop it here and store it in the mine entrance. You fly back to Niniltna, landing at the village strip so the tribal policemen can see how squeaky clean you are. You hike back down to your homestead and spend the next week running your trapline. You were catching beavers, you told everybody at the Roadhouse one night. You even showed them a pelt.”

  Cardboard and plastic crunched. “Only you don’t have a trapline. There isn’t a hole in the ice between here and your homestead, or a single snare to drop down a hole. You’re not trapping beaver—you’re using your snow machine to bring the booze down a case at a time.”

  He shifted from one foot to the other and tried a disarming smile. “Well, shit, Kate. Guy’s got to make a living. Listen, can we talk about this? Don’t!” he shouted when she swung again. “Goddamn it, I’ll just buy more!”

  “No, you won’t.”

  “You can’t stop me!”

  “No?” She swung. The ax chunked.

  It took fifteen minutes in all. Kate had always been very good with an ax. He cursed her through every second of it, unable to walk away. When she was finished, she struck a wooden match on the thigh of her jeans and tossed it into the pile of broken boxes. There was a whoosh of air and a burst of flame. She shouldered the ax and walked down the hill. Mutt followed, keeping between Kate and Pete, hard, bright gaze watching him carefully.

  When she approached the Cessna, Pete’s voice rose to a scream. “You fucking bitch, you lay a hand on that plane and I’ll—

  Mutt snarled. He shut up. Kate raised the ax and swung with all her strength. The blade bit deep into the airframe just above the gear where the controls were located. She pulled the blade free, raised the ax for another swing, and several things happened at once.