A Solitude of Wolverines

by ALICE HENDERSON

  If people were going out of their way to drive up here and threaten her, she couldn’t imagine what they were going to be like in town when she was on her own. She was not looking forward to it, but she had to go there for supplies.

  Returning inside, she brushed her teeth and packed her small daypack with a bottle of water and a couple of peanut butter granola bars.

  Then she climbed into the old wagon and headed toward Bitterroot to get all the supplies she needed to build the wolverine camera traps. While most of it she could get at a hardware store, she needed one thing that was going to be awkward to get. Meat. And it had to be meat that wolverines would normally eat in the wild.

  She preferred to use roadkill or an animal seized from poachers. At least that way, the death could have some good use in the end, some meaning to a terrible demise. If parts of the animal could be used to help conserve another, then maybe a tiny gleam of good could come out of a bad situation.

  Alex pulled out onto the main road that led to the town, retracing the way she’d come the day before with Ben. Snow clung to the high peaks in the north, and the scent of sagebrush filled the valley she passed through. A few darker clouds had gathered above the peaks, the mountains creating their own weather system.

  The old truck performed wonderfully, purring down the highway, and she bounced around a little on the bench seat when she hit patches in the asphalt where frost heaving had created holes.

  She rolled the window down, sticking one elbow out, easing into the rhythm of the drive. It certainly was a pretty trek to the town, even if it was a bit long. She had just leaned back in her seat and was considering switching on the old radio when a dark blue pickup revved up behind her.

  She expected it to pass, so she drove a little closer to the shoulder to give it room. No traffic was visible in the oncoming lane for more than a mile before the road bent away out of sight.

  But the beat-up truck didn’t pass. It revved its engine, moving up dangerously close to her rear bumper. She looked in the rearview mirror at the driver, but the morning sun was hitting the windshield in such a way that all she could see was the sky reflected back to her.

  She slowed a little, in case the driver was nervous about going around her for some reason. But the truck just crept closer. It wasn’t going to pass.

  She accelerated back to fifty-five, and still the truck stayed on her tail. No other cars were visible in any direction. The truck swerved dangerously behind her, fishtailing, and sped up into the oncoming lane.

  Good. They did want to pass.

  In its haste, the truck overcompensated, shooting onto the shoulder of the opposite lane, sending up a spray of loose rocks that pinged off the side of her wagon. Then the truck corrected and swerved into the oncoming lane, but remained driving just behind her.

  She slowed, giving it time to overtake her car. The bend in the road was coming up fast, and she couldn’t tell if any cars were coming in the opposite direction.

  But the blue pickup didn’t speed up to pass. It crept up alongside her and stayed there, driving in the oncoming lane.

  She chanced a look at the driver, but once again the glare on the window was too bright to see much. She thought she could make out a lone driver. The truck sped up until it was just ahead of her, still in the oncoming lane. She could see there was indeed a single driver, no passenger, but due to the quarter angle, she couldn’t get a look at his face. She thought of the man who’d put the note on her car, but this driver had a light brown cowboy hat and a beige suede jacket. She didn’t think it was the same person.

  Just as she expected him to pull ahead of her and merge back into the correct lane, he slowed again. The bend was just ahead. It was now or never if this guy was going to pass her before he had no view of the oncoming lane.

  But he didn’t pass.

  He swerved suddenly back toward her, and she had to slam on the brakes and veer onto the rocky shoulder to narrowly avoid being hit.

  She cursed, the loose rocks on the shoulder jarring, dirt flying up in a dust cloud behind her. She slowed to a stop and the truck decelerated, staying in the right-hand lane a little ahead of her.

  “Damn drunk,” she said aloud, waiting for him to go along his way. But the pickup came to a complete halt, idling in the right-hand lane. Slowly it started to back up. For a second she wondered if he wanted to apologize, but then he was veering straight backward, aiming for her on the shoulder, going way too fast to just want a friendly chat.

  She slammed her wagon into reverse and angled back onto the roadway. When her tires hit the pavement, she changed gears and gunned the engine, hoping to steer clear of him and pass. But he gunned his truck, too, matching her speed, cutting her off.

  “What the hell?” Alex breathed. She stopped again in the right-hand lane, and the other truck stopped just in front of her. She tried to pull around him and again he matched her moves, blocking her from moving forward.

  “Enough of this shit,” she cursed, swinging around him onto the grass just off the shoulder.

  She gunned the wagon, getting ahead of him and racing toward town. Maybe they’d pass another car, and he’d lose his nerve in front of a witness. She reached a bend in the road and took it fast, sliding along the bench seat. Ahead lay another straightaway, and the newer truck had no problem overtaking her. It raced up behind her, then swerved into the passing lane.

  No other vehicles were on the road. So much for witnesses. Reaching into her pack, she felt around for her phone. She pulled it out and dared a glance at the screen. No signal. She didn’t think there would be, but it was worth checking if this jerk was planning to run her off the road.

  Wrenching his wheel to the right, he swerved into her lane. She slammed on her brakes and moved toward the shoulder, evading him. He slowed down, too, staying abreast of her, and tugged sharply at his wheel again. She sped up, hitting the shoulder, her tires spinning in the loose gravel there. This time he stayed in her lane, driving her more and more onto the shoulder. Her tires spun, slowing her down. The man swerved his truck to the side, almost hitting her fender. She slammed on the brakes and steered off the shoulder, bumping down a sloped embankment covered in sagebrush. A gravelly wash paralleled the road, and she came to a stop nose down into it.

  Staring up the embankment, she saw the pickup stop above her. Quickly she steered her wagon into the wash. The pickup idled above her, then gunned its engine a few times. She was ahead of it enough now to see the license plate, and she made a mental note of it.

  Part of her expected him to step out with a shotgun and start blasting away. Who the hell was this guy?

  The truck revved its engine a few more times and then sped off. She sat, stunned, listening to the sound of its engine fading away. Her heart hammered in her chest and she realized she’d been breathing so hard her throat was parched. She stared up at the road, listening for sounds of the man’s engine. He was gone.

  The last thing she wanted was to be sitting here, stuck in her car, if that scumbag came back, or worse, came back with friends, so she decided to get out of there as quickly as possible. Gripping the wheel, she aimed the wagon down the wash and started rumbling along parallel to the road. Up ahead she saw a gravel road that intersected with the main road. The wash led right to it. At least she wouldn’t have to call a tow.

  Reaching in her pack, she pulled out her water bottle and took a long grateful drink, her shaking hands making it difficult to manage without spilling. Water dribbled down the front of her shirt.

  Heart still pounding, she reached the gravel road. She steered onto it, bumping along the washboard surface until she angled up back toward the main road.

  All the way to town, she worried the truck would reappear, try to finish what it had started. Someone definitely didn’t want her here, but she didn’t know why.

  Five

  Arriving in town, Alex couldn’t believe it when she saw the dark blue pickup parked on a side street. No one was inside. She found the sheri
ff’s station and headed there first. Inside, the sheriff’s office was abuzz with activity. A woman with long white hair pulled back in a ponytail was putting people on hold at the front desk, while a dispatcher radioed with a deputy out in the field. Something about “graffiti again.” Toward the back of the station, another deputy wrestled a belligerent drunk toward a hallway with a sign that read this way to cells. The drunk tried to spit in the deputy’s face, and she forcibly shoved the man toward the cells.

  A frosted glass door in the back of the room had Sheriff William Makepeace etched on it. Wow. With a name like that, did he have any choice but to go into law enforcement? It was like Edward Gorey, who of course ended up creating wonderfully gruesome books. She waited to see if the office manager would address her, but the woman was too busy scribbling down notes and punching buttons on the phone. She was in her seventies, Alex guessed, with a peach face that had taken on hints of gray, likely caused by work stress, given how she never paused once in her duties. Dressed in a flannel shirt and jeans, she sat amid myriad photos and plants and trinkets that told Alex she’d worked there a long time. At last Alex just moved past her desk, toward the sheriff’s door.

  She rapped lightly on the glass.

  “Come in,” growled a gruff voice.

  She turned the knob and entered, finding a man in his fifties seated behind the desk. An enormous white cowboy hat sat atop a grizzled, umber face. Dark eyes, so deep brown they were almost black, stared out from a shrewd, unsmiling face.

  “Sheriff Makepeace?” she asked.

  “That’s what it says on the door.” He looked her up and down with a disapproving glance.

  Nice. Friendly. She decided to ignore his unwelcoming attitude and smiled warmly. “I’m Alex Carter, the wildlife biologist who’s doing a wolverine study over at the old Snowline Resort.”

  Now he outright frowned, looking at her with fresh eyes. If the cold stare he was shooting at her had been weaponized, he might have a shot at becoming a supervillain. He leaned back in his chair, pushing his cowboy hat back farther on his head with the tip of a rough finger. “I heard they were sending someone.”

  She smiled again, trying to crack his rough exterior. “That’s me. Anyway, something happened on my way into town. Someone ran me off the road.”

  “That so?” he asked, a bland look on his face.

  “It was a blue pickup, license plate 49 2841A.” She hooked her thumb toward the street. “I saw it just now when I was driving into town. It’s parked on a side street.”

  “A beat-up thing, over on Moose Street?”

  She nodded. “That’s the one.”

  “That’s old Jim’s truck. Thing doesn’t even run. It just sits on that street corner, where it broke down five years ago.”

  “Someone must have fixed it then,” she said, “because that is definitely the truck that ran me off the road.”

  “Must have gotten the plate wrong,” the sheriff said, and looked back down at his desk.

  “I did not get the plate wrong.”

  He lifted his head, exhaling impatiently. “Sorry to tell you, but that truck needs a whole new engine. And old Jim ain’t got the money to fix a thing like that. Man’s nigh on eighty-six, and these days he’s too busy spending time with the widow Humphreys next door to need a vehicle to get around much.”

  Exasperated, Alex just stared at him. “So you’re not going to do anything about it?”

  “I would do something if you had the plate number right. As it is, it was probably just some local boys having a bit of fun.”

  Alex’s mouth fell open. “A bit of fun? They could have killed me. Or themselves. It was no ‘bit of fun.’”

  He smiled in a careless “aw, shucks” kind of way. “I think you’ll find our idea of fun around here is a little different than it is in the big city. Whoever it was probably just wanted to blow off a little steam.”

  Alex couldn’t believe this. She clamped her teeth together so tightly that they ached. She reached into her pocket, pulling out the note she’d found on her windshield. “Then there’s this.” She handed it to him.

  “And what’s this?” he asked, unfolding the note. He read it and handed it back.

  “A man left that on my truck windshield at the lodge.”

  “Sounds like your arrival ain’t too popular.”

  “Don’t you think it’s related? This threat and then someone trying to run me off the road?”

  “Think it could have been the same man?” the sheriff asked.

  She thought of the glimpse she’d had of the man’s hat and jacket. “No,” she confessed, “but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t related.”

  He waved a dismissive hand in the air. “The land trust just ain’t very popular around here. That’s all. Don’t take it personal.”

  “Don’t take it personal?” she repeated, trying to keep her voice sounding calm. “It’s hard not to take it personally when someone finds it amusing to run you off the road.”

  “Just consider it boys having some fun,” he said again, as if she were silly to make anything out of it. He returned to his papers, but when she continued to stand there, he sighed and looked back up at her. “Was there something else?”

  “Actually, Sheriff, there is.” She cleared her throat. “I’m going to be setting up remotely triggered camera traps to capture images of wolverines, if they’re out there. And I need meat for the traps.”

  His mouth turned into a displeased frown. “There’s a supermarket down on Main Street. What do we look like, a soup kitchen?” He moved some folders around impatiently on his desk.

  “Yes, I saw the market. But what I need is wild game. Deer, elk. I was hoping you might let me know when there’s been a road-killed animal before your deputies clear it off the road. Or if you seize any game from poachers, I could use that, too.”

  He narrowed his eyes, his lips pursed into a thin slash. “Could you now.”

  She plowed on. “It would be especially great if the piece contained a long bone. Wolverines have incredible bite power, so I’ll have to run a bolt through the bait and hang it on a cable.” Now she was rambling, uncomfortable.

  He studied her in silence, then leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. He made a little shrug and his features softened. “We don’t have any poaching cases right now. But Deputy Remar just radioed in to say that a deer’s been hit out on the North Fork Road. Normally we’d just move it off the road, leave it for the coyotes or mountain lions. But if you want to drive out there now, I’ll tell him to wait and load it into your car.”

  “That would be great, Sheriff.”

  “But I suppose you drive a little Toyota Prius. Can’t fit a deer in a Toyota Prius.”

  “It’s a ’47 Willys Wagon, actually.” She felt joy at the little jab.

  He snorted. “I’ll see what I can do. He’s out near mile marker 22. I’ll tell him to wait.” He picked up his radio, but then paused, watching her and her expectant smile. “You ever butcher an animal before?”

  “No, sir. I’m a vegetarian.”

  He looked at her distastefully and sniffed, as if she were an affront to common decency. “It’s hard work. You think you can handle it?”

  “I guess I’ll have to.”

  “You staying up at that old lodge?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t envy you that. That place is creepy as hell. You know folks were murdered up there, right?”

  She nodded, surprised at his sudden conversational tone, and wanted to change the subject. “Yes, Jolene Baker told me about them.”

  “The guy just went nuts. Took a gun and killed about eight guests.”

  She shifted uncomfortably on her feet. “I thought he took them out there one by one.”

  The sheriff shook his head. “You must be thinking of the Highway Murders. No, this was a few years before that, in ’67, when the place was still open. Guy was up there on business, meeting with some clients to close a big deal with his partner
s, and whammo! He just lost his head and shot up eight innocent people, including the clients, his partners, and some unlucky hotel guests in the lobby.”

  “Oh.” She was beginning to realize the wisdom in Brightwell’s telling her not to watch The Shining before she headed out.

  “It was a grisly scene. My predecessor was on the case. He worked the force for forty years and said he’d never seen anything like it.”

  “Sounds terrible,” she said, shifting her weight again. “Well, I better go if I’m going to meet your deputy.”

  He looked at her a little sympathetically then, and his features softened even more. “Tell you what. Don’t bother to go out there. I’ll have Joe take it to the butcher. You can pick it up there. Consider it a ‘welcome to the neighborhood’ gift.”

  Because nothing says “welcome to the neighborhood” like butchered deer parts. “That’s really nice of you.”

  “No problem. Have a nice day.” His expression returned to vaguely disapproving.

  She walked toward the door. “You too.”

  She waited in town until the butcher had finished, returning to the little pub to have a cup of tea. Pulling out her phone, she discovered she had service there and checked for messages from Brad. Nothing. She guessed that wasn’t too unusual. Since their split, he often took days to call her back, and he had no idea such a big change had happened in her life.

  She brought up Boston news on her browser, relieved to see that the reporter was in stable condition following the shooting. They still hadn’t found the second shooter. Just reading about the incident, remembering the feeling of the gun pointed at her, made her heart beat faster. Her mind flashed to her feet sinking in the mud as she’d tried to run, the feel of Christine’s cold, trembling hand in hers. She took a deep breath, trying to still her shaking hands.

  She wondered if Brad had seen the news of the shooting. If he had, she liked to think he would have called. So maybe he hadn’t seen it.

  After she finished her tea, she stepped outside, trying to root herself in the present and not dwell on the horror of the shooting. She spotted the post office across the street. The building looked historic and grand, a marble edifice that harkened back to the late 1800s. Deciding to put in a change of address form, she crossed to it. The inside still felt Victorian, with wooden molding and elaborate metal scrollwork at the postal window. The clerk there told her that mail wouldn’t be delivered all the way up to the lodge’s door. Instead, it would arrive in a box at the base of the resort’s driveway. He gave her the necessary form and she filled it out, handing it back.