Manitou Canyon (20 page)

Krystal stood sobbing, looking so forlorn and so broken and so alone that Rose couldn't help herself. She left the sofa, put her arms around this frightened mother, and said, “It will be all right. It will all work out fine. That's my promise to you.”

“I don't want to lose Libby,” Krystal said.

Rose made a promise she had no business making but every intention of keeping. “That will happen only over my dead body.”

* * *

Sheriff Marsha Dross had returned that afternoon from the Search and Rescue operation at Raspberry Lake. Daniel and Rose found her in her office, working on a tuna-fish sandwich and potato chips and drinking a Diet Coke. She listened as they laid everything out for her, the sandwich sitting half eaten on the plate.

When they'd finished, she shoved her chair away from the desk. “A lot to do now.”

Before she stood up, her phone rang. She picked up the receiver and answered, “Sheriff Dross.” She listened, and Rose saw her eyes widen. “Thank God.” She put her phone down and said with great relief, “Cork and Lindsay Harris have been spotted. They're alive.”

C
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36

T
hey were dog tired, all of them. Bird had dropped off first, right after he ate some of the meal Mrs. Gray had prepared from dehydrated vegetable soup base and wild mushrooms she'd found on the island. She'd also made biscuits. Whatever negative he might have said about her—and there was plenty of that—Cork had to admit she knew her way around a campfire. Before Bird slept, Lindsay Harris had sat with him, and Cork had heard her repeat what she'd told him before:
Spirit is at the heart of everything. Trust your spirit.
Which was something Henry Meloux himself might have told the kid.

Lindsay was the next to go. She climbed into her sleeping bag, and in less than a minute, Cork heard soft, deep breathing. The sour woman cleaned up the meal things, then crawled into her own sleeping bag. Which left Cork and the tall man eyeing each other across the flames.

“Who is she to you?” the tall man finally asked.

“What do you mean?”

“You've had chances to run, but you haven't.”

“You made it clear what would happen to me. And I get the feeling you're a man of your word.”

The tall man studied him. “I have the same feeling about you. Will you smoke with me?”

“I will.”

The tall man stood and went to one of the packs. He bent and drew out a beaded pouch. He walked to the edge of the island, and
Cork followed after him. The wind had not abated, and Cork could hear the waves washing restlessly against the rocks all along the shoreline. The tall man pulled a clay pipe from a pocket of his coat and dipped it into the pouch.

“Let's sit,” he said.

They settled themselves on the hard ground with the glow of the fire at their backs and the dark of the lake before them. The tall man hunched himself over the pipe to shield it from the wind and lit the tobacco with a wooden match. They shared the smoke in silence.

“What do you hold on to?” the tall man asked. His eyes were on the lake, though because of the dark there was nothing to see. “When you face the worst you can imagine, what keeps you from folding?”

“Belief, I suppose,” Cork said.

“What belief?”

“In what I am.”

“What are you?”

“Ogichidaa
.”

“Warrior,” the tall man said.

“That's one interpretation. To Shinnobs in my neck of the woods, it means one who stands between evil and his people.”

The tall man said, “You can't always stand against evil. Sometimes the evil is too great.”

“Then a man dies trying.”

“Yes,” the tall man said. “A man dies trying.”

“Manitou River,” Cork said. “This is what you're willing to die for?”

“The river and the land it runs through.”

Of a sudden, the wind seemed to double itself, and both men felt the shove of it at their backs. Sparks from the fire flew past them and died above the lake, where the water roared as if it were an animal enraged. Cork felt the cold driving through his coat and hunched himself against it.

“None of us might make it out of here,” he said. “But unless
he gets help, your nephew certainly won't. Mrs. Gray is right, you know. If you left him, we'd make better time.”

“If you were me, would you leave him?”

“If I were you, I'd understand all the risks and how to weigh them.”

The tall man shook his head. “The dangers we anticipated were very different from what Kitchimanidoo has thrown at us.”

“Are you Mide?” Cork asked.

“Me? No. I don't have the spirit of a healer. Like you, I've always believed myself
ogichidaa
.”

The wind let up a bit, and the tall man and Cork sat straight again.

“The dam, is that the evil you're trying to stand against?”

“The evil is greed. The dam is the result.”

“John Harris, is he part of the evil?”

“He built the dam.”

“What do you want from him?”

“The key to killing that dam.”

“And you're willing to kill him and his granddaughter and me to get it?”

“Would you die for your home and for those you love?”

“Yes.”

“Would you kill to protect them?”

“I already have.”

“Then you should understand.” The tall man stared into the darkness a long time before he spoke again. “It's not up to me alone.”

“Who, then? Mrs. Gray?”

“Not her. You'll know soon enough.” He turned and looked into Cork's eyes, and even in the dark, Cork could see the sadness there. “I hope none of you have to die, O'Connor.”

“Not as much as we do,” Cork replied.

C
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37

T
hey gathered at the O'Connor house on Gooseberry Lane. Marsha Dross joined them, and they sat around the dining room table with sandwiches that Jenny had put together. Little Waaboo had gone to bed. The feeling in the room was the most hopeful and energetic it had been since Cork and Lindsay Harris disappeared. In fact, it felt to Rose like a war council.

“We got the report from a DNR guy who's in the Boundary Waters conducting some kind of wolf survey,” Dross explained. “He ran into them this morning. But he didn't realize who they were until he stopped for the night and did a radio check-in. He indicated he spotted them here.”

She'd laid a topographical map of the area on the table, and she pointed to a lake called Emerald, which was very near the Canadian border.

“Charlie Bender, that's the DNR guy, said there were four people, two women and two men. One of the men fit Cork's description and one of the women fit Lindsay's. Bender reported that they had, in fact, given him those names. Neither of them appeared to be in any danger or seemed threatened. Except for the fact that it was odd to find anyone so deep in the Boundary Waters at this point in the season, Bender didn't think much about it.”

“Couldn't we send a plane out for them now?” Stephen asked.

“Too dark,” Dross said. “The floatplane will go out first thing in the morning, weather permitting. And the report for tomorrow looks hopeful.”

“What the hell is Dad doing out there?” Jenny asked. “Why didn't he say anything to this Bender?”

Dross said, “My best guess is that there were more people involved than Bender saw. Probably someone hiding, probably someone with a firearm. I can't think of another reason Cork wouldn't have spoken up.”

“How many more people?” Stephen asked.

“Bender reported two canoes, so probably no more than a couple. But he also reported that the canoes were beautiful birch-bark creations. Which is a little odd, and maybe something that when we dig deeper will tell us more.” Dross sat back and took a sip from a mugful of coffee. “Azevedo's the IC on this case.”

“IC?” Jenny said.

“Incident commander. He's in charge of the search at Raspberry Lake. When I contacted him, I told him not to say anything to the other searchers. Until he hears from me, I want him to continue as if we don't have this information.”

“Why?” Stephen said.

“Because I'm concerned someone here is in communication with the people who abducted Cork and Lindsay Harris.”

“Ben Trudeau?” Daniel said.

Dross shrugged. “Who knows? There may be others.”

Rose said, “Stephen, did you learn anything from the Daychilds?”

“We saw Trudeau with Marlee and her mom at the Broiler this evening,” Stephen explained. “After Trudeau took off, I talked to them. Stella's worked at the casino for years, you know. In the last few weeks, Trudeau's been hitting on her, having dinner with Stella pretty regularly. He usually invites Marlee to join them. Says he doesn't have family here and claims it keeps him from feeling too lonely. Marlee thinks he really likes her mom, but he's too shy to actually date her. Me, I think there's something else going on.”

“What?” Dross said.

There was an edge to Stephen's voice. “He's been asking a lot of questions about us.”

“Us?” Jenny said.

“Dad, me, you. Rainy, too. You know how Marlee loves to talk. So she's told him a lot. She said Trudeau seemed especially interested in how I sometimes see and feel things. Bottom line, he's been pumping them for information.”

“Why?” Daniel asked.

Stephen said, “I think he fed that information to Trevor Harris, who used it creating that crap vision of his. That's how he knew I was in Arizona and about ‘monthterth under the bed.' ”

“I've got a couple of deputies out right now bringing Harris in for questioning,” Dross said. “If I can break him, we'll know a lot more.”

“I'd love to be there for that,” Daniel said.

“I want to be on that floatplane tomorrow,” Stephen said.

Dross shook her head. “The only people on that plane will be the pilot, me, and some of my CIRT team.” She looked them all over and finally allowed herself a little smile. “We've got a shot at bringing this to a good end.”

She stood up, and as she folded the map, her cell phone rang. She pulled it out and looked at the number. “Pender,” she told them. “One of the deputies I sent to pick up Harris.” She put the phone to her ear. “Dross here. Did you get him?” She listened, and Rose saw her face go stony. “Keep on it and keep me informed.” She slid the phone into her pocket and gave them the word. “Seems that Trevor Harris has gone AWOL.”

* * *

Rainy stood alone on the dark shoreline at the end of Crow Point. The wind was a torrent out of the northwest, and Iron Lake an angry beast. She'd brought a kerosene lantern with her. Despite the protection of the glass, the flame still flickered in the currents that forced their way through the tiniest gaps. She was cold, even in her wool-lined jacket and stocking cap and gloves. But she'd been relieved of a great burden of worry. Cork was alive.

Jenny had called with the news. He'd been spotted, along
with Lindsay Harris, somewhere far north. She didn't know the Boundary Waters, not like Cork, so she had no idea where exactly Emerald Lake was. But she couldn't help thinking of it as a little like the Emerald City in
The Wizard of Oz,
a place of glittering promise. Cork was there and he was alive.

People were with him, but he didn't seem to be in any danger. She didn't know what to make of that. She'd never met a man who seemed so able to take care of himself and others. So she trusted that whatever the reason, it was Cork's choice to be there and to be with them.

The great spill of blood they'd found on Raspberry Island was still perplexing. No one seemed to have an explanation for it. But that was a mystery that would be cleared up the next day, when the sheriff and her people flew out to Emerald Lake and brought Cork and Lindsay Harris back. Rainy was a practical woman. Her belief in the power of her herbal preparations and the traditional ceremonies she took part in was based on her observations of their ability to heal the ailing body and the broken spirit. Because she was practical, she reminded herself that Cork was not out of the woods yet, quite literally, but she believed that he would be, and soon.

And then what?

With one great burden off her shoulders, another had settled in its place.

More and more since Leah's arrival, Rainy had begun to sense from her great-uncle an encouragement to move on in her own life, perhaps even to put Crow Point behind her. Uncle Henry, it seemed, believed he'd given her all he could. It was true, what he'd said, that when she came to him, she'd been in much the same predicament as Leah, so terribly lost and alone. Although she'd thought at the time that she was coming to help take care of a relative nearing the century mark, in truth, Uncle Henry had done the caring. He'd taught her more about real healing than she'd learned in any of her nursing classes. She'd hoped that with time she might come to understand how to heal herself. But that was a lesson she'd somehow missed. And now it was too late.

She was surprised when Ember gave a
woof
in warning. She turned from the lake and put her back to the wind. Her great-uncle stood at the far edge of the circle of light cast by the lantern at her feet. He looked at her calmly, but there was something about him that wasn't quite right.

“Uncle Henry?” she said.

That's when she saw the other figure, a dark shape that stayed beyond the reach of the light. All she could see of it clearly was the arm extended toward her great-uncle's back, the hand at the end of it, and the gun that hand was holding.

C
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C
ork's wrists and ankles had been bound with duct tape before he rolled himself in the two blankets for the cold night. He waited until the others all slept soundly, waited especially long to be certain the tall man had slipped off. Then he reached carefully into the pocket of his coat and brought out a small, walnut-handled pocket-­knife. When the packs had gone into the water along with Bird, Cork had hauled them out. While the others saw to the freezing young man, he'd taken the knife, which he'd seen the kid put into his pack. He'd been waiting until the right moment to try another escape, but he'd finally decided there would never be a right moment. His plan was to slip away with Lindsay in one of the canoes, then head west. West would take them out of the Boundary Waters within two days. There would be roads, towns, civilization.

He'd also decided this: if the escape was unsuccessful, Lindsay would not be killed. She was too important. And Cork? Well, that would be a calculated risk. With Bird so ill and not able to help them move, he hoped the tall man would be forced to grant him a reprieve, at least until they were out of the wilderness. And how much worse off could he be then?

He worked the knife blade open and shifted the handle to his mouth, where he gripped it hard between his teeth. It took a while, but he finally cut through the tape on his wrists. He drew his legs up and sliced through the tape around his ankles. Then he folded the blade, returned it to his coat pocket, and lay for a few minutes, breathing hard, listening to be certain no one had been disturbed.

The wind had finally died. The lake had calmed itself. Only a dim light came from the coals of the banked fire. Cork rolled his head and caught sight of movement, a shade on the far side of the fire glow, a gray creep against the darker backdrop of the island pines. It wasn't the pace of someone heading off to relieve himself, as often happened in a night. The movement was like that of a hunting cat: step, pause, step.

The figure crept to where Bird lay in his sleeping bag, tossing restlessly in his fever, groaning softly. The figure knelt beside him.

It could have been nothing. The tall man, maybe, worried and checking on his nephew. But Cork didn't think so. The cat creep signaled another intention.

He threw off his blankets and leaped over the fire. He hit the kneeling figure, and together they rolled across the hard ground, away from Bird, who cried out. Cork and the figure grappled, and he felt a sting across the side of his chest. He parried the next blow with his forearm and managed to grab the wrist. He could feel the fisted hand and understood that it gripped a knife. He slammed the hand to the ground and pinned the figure under him.

“Enough!” the tall man shouted.

Beneath Cork, the woman went slack. He saw the fist open and the hand jerk away from the knife it had released. He pushed himself up and off the woman and stood.

“What's going on?” The tall man held the rifle ready.

“He was going to cut Bird's throat,” Mrs. Gray said from where she lay on the ground.

“That's not true,” Cork said.

“Then what's that?” The woman pointed toward the four-inch blade of a hunting knife lying near.

Bird had sat up. He looked at Mrs. Gray and he looked at Cork.

“Do you know what happened?” the tall man asked him.

“Uh-uh.” Bird shook his head weakly.

Lindsay Harris lay in her sleeping bag, wide awake and watching with interest.

“I told you,” the sour woman said, finally standing. She pointed
toward the ground. “He was going to cut Bird's throat with that knife. He would have if I hadn't stopped him.”

The tall man eyed Cork. “Well?”

“Why would I want to kill Bird?” he said. “He's slowing us down. Everyone keeps telling me I'm going to die when we get out of these woods. Why would I want to get there faster?”

“He's lying,” the woman said. “He's a lying
chimook
.”

“You're bleeding,” the tall man said to him.

Cork glanced down where he'd felt the sting. The knife had cut through his coat, and the heavy material was staining dark. He said, “I sure didn't do that to myself.”

“I did,” Mrs. Gray said triumphantly. “This
chimook
doesn't know how to handle a knife. I took it from him easily.”

Cork said, “If I'd wanted to cut Bird's throat, I would have used this.” He dug into the pocket of his coat and brought out the little pocketknife. It was obvious he'd cut himself free, and they'd take the knife from him anyway.

“That's Bird's,” the tall man said. “Where did you get it?”

“I stole it when his pack went into the water.”

The tall man's eyes swung to the woman, who took a step back.

“You would kill my nephew?” He spoke quietly, but his look burned and his voice was acid. “To the enemy we are nothing. Less than nothing. They kill us with no regard. But if we kill each other, we become worse than them. Because we should matter to each other.”

“The Manitou River is what matters,” the woman shot back. “Not you or me or him.”

“If you give your life, that's your choice,” the tall man said. “But you have no right to make that choice for Bird or anyone else.”

“You've been plenty ready to kill O'Connor.”

“I was.”

“Was?” The sour woman looked even more sour, if that were possible.

“He isn't the enemy,” the tall man said.

“He sure as hell isn't going to help us save the Manitou River, now is he?”

“I don't know.” The tall man looked at Cork. “I haven't asked him.”

“You say one word to him, you spill the plan, and I'll kill both of you the first chance I get. You don't know what it's like, losing everything and everyone you care about. But I do. And this is my chance to make those Caldecott bastards pay.” Mrs. Gray said it with such fury that spittle flew from her mouth. She turned her anger on Cork. “
Chimooks
lie to us. Steal from us. Rape us. Kill us. We don't trust
chimooks.
We kill
chimooks
.”

Cork could have argued, but what would have been the use? That kind of hatred was a wall he couldn't break through, not with words anyway. He understood where some of it came from, the long, deep history of betrayal and brutality. Slaughter that approached genocide. Cultural trauma across generations. But the depth of her anger seemed to come from something more recent and personal. It wasn't just her brother's death. Somehow, she'd lost everything.

The tall man gave Mrs. Gray a penetrating look. “You try anything like that again, with Bird or O'Connor or the Harris woman, we'll leave you and you can try to get out of this wilderness alone. You understand?”

The woman met his eyes but didn't speak quickly enough.

“O'Connor,” the tall man said. “There's duct tape in my pack. Get it and tape her hands.”

“You wouldn't.” And now the woman's eyes were like his, burning.

“One more word and I'll have him tape your mouth as well,” he said.

The woman started to speak, but thought better of it.

When her wrists were bound, the tall man stepped to the knife on the ground and picked it up. He closed the blade and put the knife into his pocket. He held out his hand.

“Yours,” he said.

Cork gave it over. The tall man went to one of the packs, cut pieces of gauze and tape, and gave them to Cork to bandage the knife wound.

“Uncle Aaron?”

“What is it, Bird?”

“You can leave me. I'll understand.”

“And when I walk the Path of Souls and see your father, what do I tell him? That I abandoned you? No. We'll do what we came to do, and you'll be a part of it.”

Bird gave a weak nod and lay back down. The sour woman returned to her sleeping bag, and the tall man sat Cork down on the blankets and bound him once again with duct tape.

Cork lay awake a long time thinking about what had just happened. He'd tried again to stand between Lindsay Harris and danger. What he'd done instead was save Bird's life. He believed the tall man would not forget that. And if it was the tall man's call, Cork thought he and Lindsay and even John Harris might stand a chance. But apparently it wasn't up to the tall man alone. There were others involved. And if they were anything like Mrs. Gray, Cork was afraid he didn't have a prayer.