North Woods Law (The Great North Woods Pack Book 5)

by Shawn Underhill

  He stepped off the machine and waded through snow. It was pouring into his clothing from every angle. He leaned forward over the snowmobile’s hood and pried open the cowling and raised it up, directing the headlight down to the trail. The machine’s motor and exhaust pipe were hot to the touch. He held his outstretched hands as close to the motor as he could. He could smell the thin fibers of frayed wool being scorched from the edges of his gloves. Something like burning hair.

  While he stood making fists and flexing his fingers, his aching hands warmed and tingled. But no sooner had he started to enjoy relief, his attention shifted to the growing ache in his lower legs and feet. The warmth trapped in his heavy pack boots was melting the sugary snow that found its way between his pant legs and boots liners and socks. Wiggling his toes would help, he knew, but in the back of his mind, behind the panic, he understood with absolute clarity that he couldn’t stand there for much longer. Already he could feel the dampness at his ankles. Once it reached his toes, it would be all over but the crying.

  The warmth of the engine was only a temporary fix to save his fingers, not a solution to save his life.

  You know the rules, he told himself. You’ve got to stay calm and you’ve got to think. You can’t stay here like this and you sure can’t dare to hope for help. Kerry won’t come looking for you. You made damn sure of that before you left. So let that idea go. It’s just you now. Nobody else can get here quickly, even if you call now. Face it. You’re alone out here. It’s up to you whether you live or die.

  He leaned over the motor and touched his hands to his cheeks and nose. The cheeks burned and tingled. The nose was numb. He could picture it looking bloodless, dead. Then he pictured himself without any nose at all. He shuddered and shook his head to dispel the image.

  He stood straight and clapped his hands together hard and then clapped his cheeks and lightly slapped his nose. Then he turned to face the trail, planning to begin the long walk to the station.

  The snowmobile’s headlight, now facing down, cast a strange glowing ring over the otherwise silvery surface of the trail. By that glow Robert Jones beheld the outline of something large. Something animate. An animal. A wolf, to be exact. A monster of a wolf. The size of a colt, with a plush coat that was darker than night. Setting back on its haunches, casually observing him. The eyes most unusual. Faintly glowing the colors of sunset.

  The image of the lost shotgun passed quickly through his mind. Confusion passed soon after, and he stood there for a moment like a statue, making sure that he was seeing correctly in the strange light. His heart pumped suddenly like a bass drum, tightening his already tight chest, and before he realized what he was doing he found himself running up the trail in sheer terror.

  “You fool,” Erica growled as she quickly overtook him and blocked the trail ahead of him. “You are running the wrong way!”

  Jones understood nothing but the urge to escape as he spun, staggered, and ran back by the snowmobile again. It was the sloppy run of a man who had not run in many years. Now weighed down with heavy clothing and thick boots. His mind consumed with panic.

  Within twenty yards he tripped over his own feet. He staggered up and fell forward and jogged along awkwardly headfirst, like a drunken man. From the corner of his eye he saw the wolf running at his side, its head raised alertly, staring at him intently. He kept on trying to run, panting, until the wolf jumped out ahead and blocked the trail again.

  Wheezing, Jones dropped to his knees. He had sweat from his panic and now he felt himself shivering all over. His arms and legs ached and trembled. Numb hands. Numb face. He leaned forward with his arms crossed. Closed his eyes and waited for a horrible death.

  “Get up,” Erica growled. “You are a two-legged worm, but you are a fighter. Get up!”

  He didn’t budge. Just knelt there shivering all over.

  She growled again in frustration and jumped off trail and stood against a tall pine tree. With her jaws she snapped off several dead branches, collected them and then carried them to the trail and dropped the collection before the shivering man.

  “Build a fire. That or die.”

  Jones couldn’t think straight. He certainly couldn’t remember the old Jack London story that might save his life. He sensed the animal before him and opened his eyes. Between himself and it, a small pile of dead branches. He had reached the point of misery where it felt there was nothing left to do but roll over and quit. Hope for death to be quick. He saw the sticks there before him, but he did not yet understand.

  The wolf went around behind him and pushed his back with one paw. It was like a mild punch to the shoulder blade, softened by a heavy parka. She watched him flop forward and catch himself instinctively with both hands, though clumsily, like a small child.

  The hands were freezing. But they were not yet completely frozen.

  Jones understood this fact at the exact moment. Though his fingertips were numb, there was still some feeling in the hands. Feeling meant use, despite the discomfort. He saw the sticks. His mind shifted back from despair to ideas of warmth and comfort. It was not rational to accept that a wolf had brought him provisions and happily go about building a nice fire. He did it slowly, automatically, because deep down he understood that there was nothing left to do. It was that or die.

  Erica stepped around in front of him. She lowered her belly to the trail and lay there watching his every move.

  I despise you for shooting at me, she thought. Yet I’m rooting for you. I hate so much about you. And yet there is something small I respect. To die for those old bones is needless. You know that now. You know you’ve lost. That part is over. I can respect such dedication. I understand it. That much relates us. Now, if you can survive this, you are well beyond an average man. I will respect that.

  Wincing, Jones removed his liner gloves and unbuttoned the top of his parka. He reached in. Felt for the book of matches in the inner chest pocket. Felt the dry paper against the inner sides of his fingers, using them like lobster claws. He placed the matches on the trail, open and standing upright, and pulled the gloves back on.

  The gloves felt like nothing. They practically were. But they did cushion the snapping as he broke up some of the pine sticks and tried to make an organized little pile. Then he pulled them off again to light the matches.

  “Careful,” Erica growled, barely audibly.

  “Careful,” Jones muttered. He had not heard her directly, but he understood the intent.

  The first match fizzled out almost instantly. Cheap junk. Frozen. A low and steady wind. He hadn’t the time to try to warm the matches in his hands. He wished he’d kept them in his pants pocket, close to skin, rather than in the parka. But how often did he need paper matches?

  The second match caught and Jones held it to the thinnest sticks with a trembling hand. The small flame looked mesmerizing to his eyes. Like a vision of hope.

  Then it smoldered.

  He tried to count the matches in the low light and then clumsily separated a group of four or five matches. Only two or three remained after. He scraped the little group on the striking pad and it flared up. He stared. Lowered it shakily to the thin tinder.

  Finally it caught. Jones exhaled heavily and broke up another stick and carefully added the dry tinder to the flickering little flame. The flames climbed and snapped. His whole body was trembling beyond his control.

  The freezing man exhaled, almost smiling, and looked at the wolf.

  “Careful,” she said.

  “You helped me,” he said.

  “Pay attention, fool.”

  He didn’t like the tone of the growl, so he looked back down and gave his attention to the weak fire that would spare his life. It was barely burning. Such a cool little flame against frozen wood.

  He leaned over and tried to shield the fire from the wind. At the back of his mind he recalled hearing about the approaching clipper. The wind might gust and soon the air would be full of flurries. The fire flickered. Faded. The fro
zen tinder glowed red and began to smolder.

  “No,” he groaned, struggling with the final few matches.

  “Hurry!” growled the wolf.

  The last cluster of matches flamed up. He held them to the smoldering tinder, cupping his right hand with his left. The flames climbed up, licking at the brittle pine sticks and crackling. He tried to make a little teepee of the thinnest sticks, his hands shaking as he struggled to manipulate them.

  It was all for not.

  Within a few minutes he lost the fire. Then all he could do was raise his freezing eyes and gaze at the vastly superior creature before him.

  Chapter 32

  At a junction of trails the trio of Snows halted, all three scenting the air.

  “We are close,” Abel said, and tipped back his head and sent a deep call echoing through the night.

  They sat silently, listening, and soon a familiar voice called back to them. There was no distress in her tone. It was merely a response from several miles away.

  Here I am.

  As the three Snows started off to meet her, Erica looked at the despondent man before her. He had lost all hope along with the fire. He had unbuttoned his parka and awkwardly removed the revolver from his belt. He regarded the weapon thoughtfully for a painfully long moment, then let the thought go and dropped the revolver on the trail at his side. He hadn’t bothered to close the parka again.

  “Move,” she growled. “Move or you will die.”

  Jones was slipping fast into hopelessness. The frantic urge to survive had given way to the strange apathy of hypothermia he had heard of but never quite experienced. He did not feel the urge to shed clothing, as some did, but merely to relax. Cease the bitter struggle. To lay back and rest. Perhaps to sleep.

  Yes, he though. Sleep would be wonderful. It’s been a long, long day. In the morning all will be well.

  Erica went around him and hit him with her paw. He groaned but did not move. She hit him harder and harder. Then lowered her head and rammed him, knocking him over. She circled back around him and tugged at the hood of his parka. He only groaned and lay there limp.

  “You must run now. That is your last hope. Get off the cold ground. It will kill you.”

  But her growling had no more effect on him. She sensed him at the end of himself. Passing out of himself. No amount of antagonism could move him now. All she could do was grab his parka and move the man about like a ragdoll. She flipped him over and roughly propped him up, leaning his back against the low banking of the trail.

  He made no more sounds.

  Strange, Jones thought, now looking the wolf in the face as it sat across from him. It’s not so cold anymore. Only I wish my legs were straight. They feel like I’ve been sitting cross legged for hours. All prickly and unresponsive.

  In time he asked if he had heard a call. His frozen lips did not move.

  The wolf nodded in response.

  More like you?

  My family.

  I suppose you must go, then, if they’ve called to you.

  I will wait, she replied.

  I’d like that, he said. I’d like not to be alone here in the dark.

  I will stay.

  How sad, he said.

  All die, she said.

  No, he said. I understand you now. Only now. At the end. Why?

  I cannot explain. There are many mysteries in this world.

  We can’t hope to understand them all.

  Not all.

  You must have had your reasons for killing that man.

  We did, she confirmed.

  Then I was wrong, he said. I thought I was right, but I was wrong.

  She said nothing. There was no joy in gloating over a remorseful man.

  And that business with the shotgun, he said. I regret that now.

  You were afraid.

  Not anymore. How cliché.

  Few are perfect.

  I trust that.

  Has the pain gone?

  I feel fine now. Never better. Good of you to ask. It’s not so cold.

  I have been where you are and have come back. To return is very hard.

  I don’t want to go back, he said. I’m comfortable here.

  That might be best.

  Good of you to stay, he said.

  She nodded and watched him. He soon fell silent, his eyes freezing over. She scented his lifeless body and then stood and looked away, facing east.

  His eyes were partly closed and he could feel himself going completely out of himself. His vision blurred and then cleared again and he saw with a changed perspective himself slumped against the side of the trail.

  He saw the wolf moving up the trail and greeting three others like herself. Two were larger, maybe older. All spectacular creatures. The two larger ones seemed to be mildly scolding her after the initial greetings. He heard their sounds and understood them communicating, but none of their words seemed to concern him. He was eavesdropping from a distance.

  And then nothing mattered to him anymore. Nothing at all. He forgot the slumped figure in the parka and focused on the four wolves moving up the trail in their smooth and effortless gait. It was a beautiful movement. He did not know factually but somehow understood that they would run that way all through the remainder of the night. Running for the sunrise with the storm at their backs. Winding their way back through the frozen wilderness to that northeastern corner of the state.

  He watched them for what felt like a long time.

  Then, very faintly he heard the low buzzing sounds of two engines from a vast distance. He recognized the sounds as snowmobiles, but he paid them no mind. His focus was on the wolves as they moved so exquisitely across that beautifully frozen landscape under the starlight.

  Chapter 33

  Boyd and Davidson stopped their snowmobiles, cutting the engines but leaving the headlights on. It was Davidson, the younger of the two wardens, who knelt and removed his glove to check Jones for a pulse.

  “Nothing,” he said quietly.

  “Damn it all,” Boyd exhaled.

  Davidson stood again and took a long breath.

  “What the heck’ve we got here?” said Boyd, who was now shining his flashlight along the trail.

  “He tried to build a fire.”

  “And it looks like he weren’t alone, neither. Look at this here impression in the trail. Like something warm settled down here for a bit. Wouldn’t you say?”

  Davidson looked but said nothing.

  “I know,” Boyd said. “We’ve got the best darn job in the world most days. Now and then, one of the worst.”

  “Yeah.”

  “We gotta take the bad with the good.”

  “Yeah,” Davidson said. “Guess we should take some pictures, get him in the bag and on the sled. Before we freeze along with him.”

  “There’s more snow on the way,” Boyd said.

  “Damn,” Davidson exhaled. “If this whole deal ain’t gonna make things hard on Kerry.”

  “I know. She’s a good kid.”

  “And Dorothy, for that matter.”

  “True,” Boyd agreed. “She’s been working with him for years.”

  “Thank goodness Jones ain’t got a wife to go talk to.”

  “House calls are about the worst.”

  Davidson said nothing. He bent down and picked up the discarded pistol. He checked the cylinder and said, “Never fired a shot.”

  “Set it back where it was for the time,” Boyd said.

  He set it back and they took pictures with their phones, and then Davidson picked up the revolver and put it in the pouch pocket of his parka. They walked ahead to where the buried snowmobile was idling off the trailside. Davidson killed the motor and dropped the cowling in place while Boyd scanned around with his flashlight.

  “There’s been some activity off the trail,” Boyd said. “Quite a bit, by the looks.”

  “What do you suppose happened?” Davidson asked.

  “Hard saying, not knowing.”

/>   “Looks strange. I’ll venture that much.”

  “Strange,” Boyd repeated, and he was quiet a moment before saying, “You remember that boy from two summers ago?”

  “The kid that got lost in the park?”

  “Jimmy Davis,” Boyd said. “I’ll tell you something true. I won’t forget that boy’s name as long as I live.”

  “I should think not. You found him.”

  “Sure I did,” Boyd said. “You remember the rest? The part that didn’t make the news?”

  Davidson tried to mask a sigh. He recalled a cool August night. High forties and low fifties. A scrawny little kid, six years old, wearing nothing but shorts and a shirt and little rubber shoes on his feet. Not even socks.

  “Remember?”

  “Yeah,”

  “Do you?”

  Davidson nodded.

  “Then tell me exactly how that boy kept warm all night, before I found him in the morning.”

  “Can’t,” mumbled Davidson.

  “He was in a perfect spot,” Boyd said. “The early sun was shining over that field on the opposite side of the river. You know what he told me? You know what he told his parents?”

  Davidson was quiet. He had hoped to forget.

  “Said the big monster found him. Kept him warm with his fur all night. Brought him to that riverbank and told him to stay there in that morning sunshine.”

  “Kids,” Davidson muttered.

  “I’ll say it again, just between us. That whole area had been searched and cleared the prior evening. Dogs hit on the scent well away from the river. That’s what gave us all hope that he hadn’t fallen in and drowned. We knew he wasn’t near that river. All those dogs weren’t lying, just following their noses. Well, I’m telling you now, I’m getting that same strange feeling as I had that nice summer morning. Like something peculiar is afoot.”

  Davidson looked at him in the dark.

  “Think I’m nuts?”

  “No. I’m just cold.”

  “You think that little kid went bushwhacking through the boonies for two miles? Found his way to the river in a nice straight line from the spot where the dogs quit on his scent? All this knowing there’s a road nearby and he’d sure to be found come sunup?”