No Man's Dog (8 page)

“Will it be soon?” Fedima pressed him. “This man was very . . .” she hesitated, frowning as she tried to find a word.

“Very what?” Joe said.

“Very dark,” she said, lamely. “A very dark heart. They called him ‘al-Qaeda.’ After he left. It was a . . . what do you say? . . . a nix-name.”

“A nickname. Al-Qaeda? That, I’m sure, the Colonel will like to know. Especially the fact that he knew Jammie Sanders.”

A half hour later, as he pulled up to to the stop sign at the highway, Joe thought for a second or two—left or right? The right led to Butte, the left to Helena. For no reason that he could think of, he took the left turn.

A few minutes later when the car was up to highway speed, his road thoughts resumed. How can you kill someone if you start imagining what they think, if you see things with their eyes? He was glad he hadn’t killed her. Things would work out, they were on the same page. And—he couldn’t repress the thought—he would see her again. Who knows, they might even be lovers. Anyway, if he’d killed her the Colonel would be pissed. Perhaps, he thought, I’ll kill this Hook.

5

A Dog's Luck

“M
ore is less” was not a byword with Mulheisen, especially when it came to information. But sometimes, he thought, what you already know can influence what you think about what you don't yet know. Still, he felt light on information about this case. On the other hand, he'd been out of the loop long enough that he felt quite refreshed. It had been a mistake to poke around in the task force, he thought, although it was important to have heard a little from Wunney. The name M. P. Luck, for instance, that was good to know.

Mul had no intention of rejoining anybody's force, at least not yet, despite his mother's suggestion. At this point, his lack of official status served him as well as being on the payroll. He looked in the various telephone books he'd kept when he left the DPD and quickly found Luck. Queensleap was a little town more than two hundred miles from Detroit, up near Kalkaska, between Traverse City and Cadillac. He had some familiarity with that north woods country, from when he'd belatedly investigated the death of Jimmy Hoffa.

From what Mulheisen could find out from atlases and guides now somewhat out of date, the town had a population of five hundred
or so. It had apparently been a part of the potato boom early in the twentieth century, after the great stands of white pine had been logged off. Now it was little more than a bedroom community for larger towns like Traverse City, about fifteen miles north.

He drove up there on a cool autumn day, listening to CDs of Coleman Hawkins and Benny Carter while he drove, smoking cigars. The fall foliage was spectacular, especially north of Midland, the last outpost of industrialism in the lower Michigan peninsula. This was rolling country, more pronounced as one drove north. He'd left the freeway for the blue highways, two-lane roads that led through one small town after another. It was farm country, but the corn was harvested, the vegetable stands closed and shuttered for the winter. It was orchard country too, however, and here and there were farm trucks parked at crossroads, offering fresh McIntosh for sale, with occasional bushels of rarer apples like Sweet Sixteen, Jonathan, Winesap, and Northern Spy. Mulheisen stopped to buy a peck of incredibly crisp and juicy hybrids called Jonamacs.

Deer were abundant; he had to keep his eye out for them. There were also orchards that offered something called “deer apples, all you can pick, $5.” Apparently, it was legal to bait deer with apples, an idea that struck Mul as goofy, considering that there were plenty of apples in the older orchards, just lying on the ground or still hanging, for the deer to eat. But he wasn't a hunter. Perhaps there was an angle he didn't know about.

An old-timer with “Charlie” embroidered on his greasy overalls pumped gas at a Sinclair station in Queensleap and wiped the windshield. He admired Mul's old Checker. “I thought they quit making these,” he said. “What year is it? Seventy-two?”

Mulheisen informed Charlie that Checker had gone out of business in 1982, mostly because the plant was so outmoded that it would have cost millions to bring it up to a competitive state. But
there were still mechanics who worked on Checkers and kept them running. This one had a sturdy old Chevrolet V-8 engine.

“I worked on a million of ‘em,” Charlie said. “The Chevy engines, anyways.”

Mul asked how the town had gotten its name. Charlie said that he'd heard it was named after some Indian woman, sort of a wise woman, or maybe even the chief—who knew? These were farmer Indians, Potawatomie, maybe. They were pretty well off, not dependent on hunting so much, or the fur trade. They'd naturally been at odds with some other tribes, or bands, who were hunters and in need of food in the winter. These hunting Indians had attacked the village. The queen, or whatever she was, had escaped being murdered by leaping across the little creek that ran through the town, Fox Creek.

“The creek must of been bigger in them days,” Charlie said. “It wouldn't be an Olympic leap, nowadays. Anyways, the later settlers must of heard the story and liked it. They named it after her instead of old man Luckenbach, which is why it wasn't called—thank god—Luckenbach.”

“Who is Luckenbach?” Mulheisen asked.

“Oh, he was in the timber business,” Charlie said. “He made a lot of money logging off the country and then he got into the bank racket, and a bunch of other things.”

Mulheisen asked if there were any Luckenbachs still around.

“No,” Charlie said. “They went the way of the Indians. But there's some Lucks. They're half-ass Luckenbachs, just shortened the name.”

“I'm looking for a Luck,” Mul said. “M. P. Luck. You know him?”

Charlie's eyes narrowed. “Yeah, I know Imp. Known him all my life, so far. You a friend of his?”

“Not really,” Mul said. “I just want to talk to him.”

“He lives out quite a ways. Not so easy to find the place. Does he know you're comin'?”

Mul admitted that he didn't. Was that a problem?

“Could be,” Charlie said. “Imp's gotten to be a solitary cuss. Since his old lady died, a couple years back. You a cop? Or one of these patriot fellows?”

Mulheisen replied rather cautiously that he wasn't a cop, but while he'd always thought of himself as a patriot, that wasn't why he wanted to talk to Luck.

That seemed to be the right answer. Charlie observed, “Seems like Imp don't care for unannounced visitors these days. He's got some signs and stuff, warning folks not to trespass. You might better call him.”

This wasn't good news. Mulheisen had hoped that he could just drop in. But he went to the pay phone and called the number in the book. There was no answer.

Charlie said that he was pretty sure Luck was around, although he was often in and out of the area, traveling. He might be hunting, or maybe just out in the yard. He gave complicated instructions on how to find the place. It involved driving several miles west, past various farms that would have signs indicating who lived there or had barns one could recognize.

“Go on out past the old Grange hall,” Charlie explained, “to where the blacktop ends. The cross road is gravel. Hang a left and go about a quarter mile—you'll see Imp's mailbox—take that two-track that runs back into the woods. There's a locked gate down there a ways.” He cautioned Mulheisen about wandering around in the woods out there. Luck didn't like strangers wandering around. He had a tendency to shoot.

“Has he ever shot anyone?” Mulheisen asked.

“Not that I know of, but he's threatened to. He's had some problems with the law. The law don't go in there without they tell him they're coming.”

Mulheisen said he'd be careful and took off. He had a cell phone, just in case, but he wasn't confident about using it. He wasn't that familiar with it. As he drove he was surprised by the number of new houses that had been built back in these hills. They were amazingly large houses—some of them with absurd pillars, in some kind of faux neo-Greek or antebellum mode—but all with huge lawns well mowed, long drives, fancy cars or SUVs parked in the drives. This was side by side with dilapidated farmhouses, some of them occupied, with numerous dogs in elaborate kennels, pickup trucks and abandoned farm machinery standing about, enormous stacks of firewood. There were also the more prosperous old farms that Charlie had mentioned, with big barns and signs advertising various enterprises like hay or grain, apples or maple syrup.

Mulheisen followed the directions scrupulously and soon came to the graveled county road. A short way along this he spotted the large mailbox with the name
M. P. LUCK
painted on it. Despite a prominent sign warning that this was a private road and
NO TRESPASSING
, he turned onto the narrow two-track that led back in the brush toward the woods. It was at least a half mile down this road to a gate that had some kind of electric or electronic lock. That was as far as he could drive. He was surrounded by thick sumac and a mixture of mature hardwoods and dense scrub pine.

Mulheisen got out the phone and, with the aid of the instruction booklet he'd wisely remembered to bring along, he managed to dial the right number. It rang and rang. No answering machine and no one picked up the phone.

Mulheisen got: out of the car and walked along the fence that ran into the woods. The fence posts were steel, sunk in concrete with frequent bracing, the four strands of barbed wire very taut. No
good place to get over. He returned to the car and sat there, eating one of his apples, which was so juicy that he had to dig out some paper toweling and wipe his sticky hands. He'd left Detroit that morning but it had been a long drive. It was getting late. He had seen school buses on the road on his way out from town. It had been a sunny day but now that the sun was going down it was cool. He tried the phone again. No answer. He decided to go back to Queensleap, find a motel, and try to contact Luck later.

There was no place to turn around. He began to back up the car, an awkward process, the road twisty and hemmed in by the brush. He looked for a little clearing, or at least a wide spot, but none offered. He was halfway back to the county road when a large, four-wheel-drive pickup truck with a massive steel brush guard came hustling up in his rear and stopped just in time. Mulheisen slammed on his brakes. The two men he could see in the cab of the pickup were bearded and wore dark baseball caps. They just sat in the vehicle and waited.

“Well, now what?” Mulheisen thought. He started to get out, but when he turned back to the wheel he realized that, unheard, another truck had come up from the other direction. It had stopped barely a couple of feet from his bumper. He was trapped, with heavy brush on either side, barely enough room to open a door. But he managed, squeezing out and deciding that the later arrival was more likely to be Luck, still sitting behind the wheel of the pickup in front of him.

It was a peculiar impasse, he thought. It appeared that the custom in these parts was to just sit in one's vehicle and wait for the stranger to make a move. Like the other vehicle, the new arrival was one of those high-riding, monster pickups with four-wheel drive and a sturdy brush guard. It was a fairly new Dodge Ram, he noticed, a little smaller than a B-17 and covered with mud and dirt.

Mulheisen approached the truck. The window rolled down electrically and the driver peered down. He was a mild-looking fellow, clean-shaven, wearing photo-sensitive glasses that just retained a shadow of tint. He had steel-gray hair under a canvas waterproof field hat.

Mulheisen's cop mind registered this as:
handsome man, and conscious of it . . . strong, straight nose, firm mouth, prominent chin . . . late middle age but could pass for much younger . . . could be a businessman, more likely an executive in a large corporation rather than an entrepreneur.

“Having trouble reading?” the man said. He didn't smile, but he didn't frown either.

“Are you M. P. Luck?”

“I am, and you're on my land. Who might you be?”

“The name is Mulheisen. I'm from Detroit. I came up here to see you.”

“Mulheisen?” The man's calm gaze turned to a speculative frown. “Are you a cop?” he asked, not suspiciously so much as mildly curious.

“No,” Mulheisen said.

“Funny, you look like a cop,” Luck said. From his tone, he might have been teasing.

“Well, the truth is, I used to be. But I quit.”

“How come?”

“Personal problems,” Mulheisen said. “My mother was . . . injured. She needed my help.”

Luck nodded, thoughtfully. “Was? She's better now?”

Mulheisen nodded. “She's much improved.”

“What happened to her?”

Mulheisen glanced around. It seemed inappropriate to be having this kind of conversation out here in the woods, in this odd situation. Perhaps it didn't seem odd to country people, although
he didn't have the impression that Luck was any kind of bucolic character. “She got blown up,” he said.

“Blown up? Your mother was blown up? What the—? You mean she was in an explosion? Was she hurt bad?”

“Pretty bad,” Mulheisen said. “She's pretty much recovered now, after six months. But she was dazed and confused . . . it was more like a walking coma. She didn't say anything for quite a while.”

“But now she's all right?”

“Pretty much,” Mulheisen said. “She doesn't remember what happened, but she appears to be okay physically.”

“Well that's good,” Luck said. “I'm glad to hear it. And you're Mulheisen? Where did this happen?”

“The explosion? It was in a suburb, outside of Detroit, a little town called Wards Cove.”

“I heard about that. It was a city hall, or something?”

“That's right,” Mulheisen said, nodding. Luck seemed genuinely interested, looking at him more keenly.

“Mulheisen,” Luck said, appearing to savor the name. “That's German. I'm from German stock myself.”

“You are? Luck—,” Mulheisen started to say.

Luck interrupted him. “It doesn't sound German. It was originally Luckenbach—
loukenbock,
they pronounce it in the old country. The brook at Lucken. That's where my people are from.”

“Is that so?” Mulheisen said. “I've heard of Luckenwalde. In fact, I was there once. It's near Berlin.”

“That's right,” Luck said. “I've never been to Germany myself. What's it like?”

“Luckenwalde? Oh, I don't recall much about it. It's kind of flat country, I think.” Mulheisen was just guessing. His memory of Luckenwalde was dim. Was it the village with the ancient stone church? He wasn't sure. Was there a brook? He seemed to recall an old stone bridge, but he wasn't positive and didn't mention it to Luck.

Mulheisen glanced about him. Evening was upon them, the darkness seemingly welling up out of the woods. He could no longer see the two men in the other truck, who in any case had not gotten out or made any sign of impatience.