The End of The Road (13 page)

Jessie will be delighted,
I thought with a smile as I reached down to give Stretch a reassuring pat, for he had heard me rise and come to join me.

“Back to sleep, bitser,” I told him, going back to bed myself. “It’s not time to get up yet.”

Satisfied, he lay down again on the rug and soon I could hear him snoring contentedly.

For me, sleep didn’t come quite so fast or easily.

Thoughts of the woman I thought I had seen in the shop at Meta Rose Square kept me awake and wondering if it had been my imagination working overtime. But I didn’t really think so. It was simply too much of a coincidence to have come out of nowhere to startle and worry me. Why in the world would she be following me around? And who was she?

For a few minutes I questioned it, found no answers, then gave myself a mental shake and decided to think about the upcoming holidays that were approaching rapidly and would require some early planning.

There should be at least one evening gathering of people we know and love, so I had to remember to ask Joe who he would like added to that invitation list. Rather than a sit-down dinner that would limit the number of friends we could invite, I decided that it should be a drop-in evening and would have food and drinks available for folks to help themselves.

Joe had told me that he and Sharon had already made their reservations with Alaska Airlines and Grant Aviation to arrive two days before Christmas and stay until just before New Year’s for their trip back to Seattle. No, I remembered, they would be headed for Portland instead this time.

It would be fine to have them both for more than a weekend. I was pleased with Joe’s choice of a future wife, knowing Sharon fit in easily and well, and was a kind and generous person who approached the world realistically and with a great sense of humor that suited my son—and me.

I wanted to ask her if she had any wishes or ideas for the gathering I was planning, as well as things she would like to see and do in Homer. Perhaps her family, like ours, had had holiday traditions she would like to add. I had to get a stocking made with her name on it to hang with Joe’s on the mantel, for instance.

Besides Christmas, this visit would have wedding plans to be discussed and made. I would need to pursue the feasibility of having the ceremony on Niqa Island. How delightful, I thought, to anticipate a wedding for my son and his fine selection of spouse.

I don’t remember when I drifted off, but when I woke again it was just growing light outside, as usual in Alaska that time of year, when the window of daylight narrows considerably, doesn’t show up till midmorning, and is gone again in midafternoon.

The splash of the shower running in the bathroom between my room and Alex and Jessie’s told me it was time to get up. But, knowing that Stretch was probably more than ready to be taken outside for his morning constitutional, I put on my fleece robe and took him downstairs, where I slipped my bare feet into my boots and went out with him.

The snow had clearly continued to fall through the night and was still falling, so there was quite a bit on the ground. Each of the dog boxes in the yard had a five- or six-inch white addition crowning its roof and most of the dogs were content to stay dry and warmer inside those shelters.

A few, however, including Tank, were already up and out. Straining at the end of the tether that attached to his, he made it clear that he wanted to greet his small friend. Stretch, being much shorter legged, exhibited no desire to plow his way through the snow. So, while he piddled in the shelter of the stairs to the porch, I waded across to Tank and released him from the restraint that held him to his box.

As I followed him back, trying to walk in the prints I had made and failing, almost losing my balance once but somehow avoiding a fall into the deepening snow, the door opened and Jessie appeared on the porch.

“Good morning,” she called from the top step. “Are you sure you’ve chosen the proper attire for playing in the snow this early?”

“I’m growing more certain by the moment that I haven’t. But Stretch needed to go out and Tank wanted loose.”

“Well, I was thinking that after breakfast I’d hitch up a team and take you for a ride on the sled, if you’d like that.”

“I’d love it,” I told her. “I’ve never been on a dog sled ride and I’ve lived here all my life. Can you imagine that?”

“Time to cure that situation, I think.”

So after breakfast we dressed warmly and I watched while Jessie hitched ten of her dogs to one of her smaller sleds, into which she had put two pillows for me to sit on. She tucked me in with a wool blanket and we were soon heading down the driveway toward the road. With Tank in the lead the dogs pulled enthusiastically, clearly excited to be back in harness and going somewhere.

At the end of the drive we turned right onto a trail that paral leled and was a bit below the road. The track had been broken earlier by snow machines and other dog sleds, so we went swiftly and smoothly along.

In about a mile Jessie turned the team onto a trail that gradually rose up a hill to the ridgeline, where we soon met another that she told me had been made by local mushers and was used for training away from the automobile traffic below.

It was lovely to be gliding along with snow-covered spruce mixed among the bare white trunks of birch on either side, the only sounds being the susurrus of the sled runners and the soft footfalls of the dogs on the snowy trail to break the silence of the winter woods.

“Oh, Jessie, thank you. This is wonderful,” I told her over my shoulder to where she was riding the runners at the back of the sled. “No wonder you love it so much.”

“Well,” she said, “it’s not always so nice, but days like this with lots of new snow sure do make it worthwhile. You should be along sometime when I take the mutts out on a trail through country that’s really empty.

“Once, between here and Denali Park, we were traveling alone on a trail miles from any road. It was late and should have been dark, but the sky was bright with stars shining through an aurora display that spread green and red curtains across it like a net to hold their twinkling lights, and the light was refle cted off the snow. That was one of the best ever! Sometimes you get lucky.”

We soon came to a trail that led downhill and in minutes were coming back into Jessie’s yard past the kennel sheds and the house. She called the dogs to a halt in the spot from which we had started, accompanied by the welcoming barks and howls from those that had been left behind in the yard and were clearly anxious for a turn of their own.

“They really do love to run, don’t they,” I said, climbing out of the sled reluctantly.

Jessie grinned and nodded. “As much as I do,” she said. “Go ahead inside and warm up. I’m going to switch a couple of these guys and make another, longer run, but Alex will keep you provided with entertainment, I’m sure.”

By the time I reached the door she had quickly traded two of the dogs in harness for others and was already in motion toward the road. Watching her over my shoulder, my hand on the doorknob, I was startled when Alex opened the door.

“Come on in,” he invited, swinging it wide. “She’s in her element and off for a couple of hours’ run, I would guess. There’s a fresh pot of coffee ready.”

I removed my boots, coat, hat, and mittens, gave Stretch, who had come to greet me, a pat, and took Alex up on the coffee offer.

“I called again about those fingerprints,” he told me, when we were seated at the table. “They’ve found absolutely no match in the system anywhere. Sorry.”

“Well, it was worth a try. But isn’t it a bit unusual in this day and age not to have your fingerprints somewhere?”

“Yes, but not unheard of. He’s evidently never been arrested, applied for a government job, any other that required prints, or any one of a number of reasons he would have had them taken and, therefore, on file.”

“A dead end, then,” I said thoughtfully, and looked up to see a grin on his face as he shook his head. “No pun intended, I assure you.”

“The world, and particularly the United States, has changed radically since nine-eleven,” he said seriously. “We’re so security-conscious that sometimes it makes me tired, even knowing most of it’s necessary. Certainly makes my job more complicated at times. It’s almost essential to have identification of some official kind—driver’s license, passport, birth certificate . . . something.”

“I can imagine. I just keep wondering why and how he would come all the way to Alaska to commit suicide, and make sure that there was no way at all to establish his identity. Doesn’t everybody leave a trail somewhere?”

“It clearly can be done with minute attention to details,” Alex said, frowning. “I spoke to Alan Nelson in Anchor Point and they found nothing that would identify him as anything but the obviously false name he took.”

“Why?” I said finally in frustration. “What could make anyone want to die anonymously, far from where he came from—wherever that was—and all alone?”

Alex simply shrugged and shook his head sadly at the idea.

“It must have made sense to him, I guess. But I can’t fathom it.”

Neither could I.

THIRTEEN

JESSIE CAME BACK A COUPLE OF HOURS LATER, traded most of her team for other dogs, took a sandwich and a thermos of hot coffee, and headed out again for another run. Late that afternoon she returned with a spring in her step and roses in her cheeks from the cold, a smile of satisfaction on her face as she came through the door after taking care of her dogs.

“What a great day,” she said, shedding elbow-length mitts, parka, and boots by the door and coming sock-footed across the room. “I went all the way out to the airstrip at the end of Knik Road. Ran into half the racing community there or on the way. Everyone’s taking advantage of the new snow.”

Sinking into a chair at the table, she reached across for the Jameson bottle Alex had brought from the kitchen along with three glasses. She poured for each of us and raised hers in a toast. “Here’s to winter showing up . . . finally. Now, what’s making that great food smell coming from the kitchen? I’m starved.”

“Onions, potatoes, and carrots, along with a small beef roast I dug out of the freezer this morning,” Alex told her with a grin. “I had a hunch you’d be pleased to have dinner almost ready.”

“You are a rare treasure of a man,” she told him. “I think I’ll keep you around a bit, if that suits you.”

“Better wait and see how the food turns out,” he teased.