Dead Water

Get hooked on the Loon Lake mysteries
from Victoria Houston …

Dead Water

“[Victoria Houston] puts me right there in the Wisconsin heat and cold, lets me know what the fish are biting on, lets me spy on the interesting characters of Loon Lake, and, most of all, spins an intelligent and captivating tale. I look forward to more and more."

—T. Jefferson Parker,
author of
Silent Joe

“Victoria Houston’s love for her Wisconsin setting—and her wonderful characters—is evident on every page of her fine series. Loon Lake is a great get-away, even if it does keep me up at nights."

—Laura Lippman

Dead Creek

“Fans of a well-drawn regional police procedural will want to read this novel. All the subplots smoothly return to the main theme and there are plenty of suspects to keep the audience guessing about what is going on and who is the mastermind behind the mysterious events. With this fine novel, Victoria Houston will hook readers and make them seek her previous stories."

—
Painted Rock Reviews

“What a great story! A book that fishermen of all ages (and species) are sure to enjoy.”

—Tony Rizzo, legendary Northwoods fishing guide and author of
Secrets of a Muskie Guide

“Murder mystery muskies! The
X-Files
comes to Packer Land."

—John Krga, dedicated Northwoods
“catch-and-release” muskie fisherman

Dead Angler

“Who would have thought that fly-fishing could be such fun? Victoria Houston makes you want to dash for rod and reel. [She] cleverly blends the love of the outdoors with the thrill of catching a serial killer.”

—The Orlando Sentinel

“As exciting as fishing a tournament—and you don’t know the result until the end.”

—Norb Wallock, North American Walleye Anglers’ 1997 Angler of the Year

“Houston introduces us to a cast of characters with whom we quickly bond—as fly-fishers and as good citizens—in the first of what I hope will be a long series.”

—Joan Wulff, world-class fly caster, and cofounder of the Wulff School of Fly-Fishing

“A compelling thriller … populated with three-dimensional characters who reveal some of their secrets of trout fishing the dark waters of the northern forests.”

—Tom Wiench, dedicated fly-fisherman and member of Trout Unlimited

“Should net lots of fans … a good catch.”

—The Star Press

Dead
Water

VICTORIA HOUSTON

For Judith Cooke,
the kindest and dearest of friends

one

“The true trout fisherman is like a drug addict; he dwells in a tight little dream world all his own….”

Robert Traver

Lost
Lake. June 15, a Tuesday. Eight-twenty A.M.

The sky was peach that day. Peach scudded with wisps of periwinkle blue. An innocent sky. A sky that assured Paul Osborne nothing was wrong in the world.
You dummkopf
he would find himself saying before eleven that morning,
never trust a sky.

The sea kayak was taking some getting used to, and he wasn’t sure yet that he liked it. Of course he could never tell his daughters that. They must have shelled out a thousand bucks or more for the boat, a Father’s Day gift handmade of red cedar and trucked to the backwoods of northern Wisconsin from Swan Lake, Montana. Osborne knew he was lucky: No one in Loon Lake had ever seen such an elegant two-cockpit seventeen-footer.

Still, he felt awkward: waist-deep in water but wearing a skirt, not waders, legs immobilized with only his upper body free to move, hands occupied but no fishing rod, not even his five-weight fly rod. Nothing about the damn thing felt natural.

Maybe it was being imprisoned below water level that bothered him. Maybe it was knowing the kayak was allowing him to cruise into wilderness where even canoes couldn’t go that made him feel he was violating nature. Or maybe it was instinct. Whatever it was, he felt uneasy. Uneasy yet compelled to keep pushing deeper and deeper into the swamp guarding the lakeshore.

“Ease up, bud, this is what a kayak is meant to do,” Osborne told himself, thrusting aside the sense that he was disturbing something he shouldn’t.

Dipping one end of his paddle and ignoring the rustled warnings of the weed bed underneath the calm surface, he slid the kayak over menacing shadows of submerged boulders. His eyes scanned the dense underbrush. What made the bog impervious to any other boat also made it a safe haven for nesting loons and the blue heron. A sighting of either would make his morning.

Osborne inhaled deeply. The air, fragrant with pine and spring grass, made him feel alive, alert, and exquisitely tuned to the signs and murmurs around him. He spotted a break in the wall of brush off to his right and let the kayak drift toward it. The water deepened as protective branches of tamarack fell away to expose a creek of good width. Something familiar in the pattern of trees and rocks tugged at the back of his mind. When had he fished here?

Suddenly he swung back on his paddle, pulling the kayak hard to the right, nose pointing north. Seeing the shore from that angle jarred loose the memory. That massive boulder to the east of the opening—he knew that rock, even though it had to be over twenty years since he had accidentally drifted into this watery trail. Suddenly, as if it were just yesterday, he remembered boosting his two young daughters out of the old wooden canoe so the three of them could sit on the big rock and eat bologna sandwiches, the sun easy on their cheeks and foreheads.

Maneuvering the kayak so he could see upstream, he studied the opening. The cedar and spruce hiding the entrance had grown and changed, but the same gap in the marshy border exposed the same creek, the same heartbreaking beauty of a path that shimmered as it twined north between spires of tamarack and skeletal fingers of dead pine. That year, he and the girls had canoed north to where the stream ended in a spring-fed pool tucked so deep into the tamarack forest that Erin, his youngest, had named it Lost Lake. Hard to believe she was over thirty now with children of her own.

Only an exceptionally high water level from the spring runoff of a heavy snow that year had made it possible for the three of them to reach the tiny circle of perfect water. Osborne edged the kayak upstream. Was Lost Lake still there? Or had beavers reworked nature? Erin would be tickled to death if he could bring her and the kids back in here. Osborne felt a grin spread across his face.

A flash over his left shoulder caught his eye and he ducked, rocking the kayak. But it was only a great blue heron not expecting visitors. As he watched, the gaunt, gangling bird unfolded like a giant origami sculpture coming undone. Then, tucking in its loopy neck, the great blue circled up and over to disappear behind the tamarack tips just as Osborne realized he was holding his breath. He exhaled. Fifty years of fishing the Northwoods, and that was as close as he had ever gotten to one of the prehistoric-looking birds. Jeez, he thought, maybe this kayak wasn’t such a bad idea.

He glided forward, feeling at one with the boat for the first time that morning. The solitude was bordered with a soft trill of birdcalls and a burbling of water. Fishing had addicted him to this kind of peace, a peace he was learning to substitute for the seduction of single-malt scotch, a peace he could find only near water. It restored his spirit when he felt the clutch of loneliness.

Sunlight and shadows drew him deeper, and the kayak slid through the rusted arch of an old culvert. Osborne ducked to avoid wolf spiders nesting in the dark recesses overhead. Nearing the end of the tunnel, he could see, less than a hundred yards upstream, the rusting girders of an abandoned railroad trestle that marked the entrance to Lost Lake.

As the kayak emerged into a patch of sun, dragonfly wings caught the light bouncing off the water. Hold on there. Was that a green stone fly hatch? Tiny helicopters with double sets of wings whirred overhead. No … maybe little yellow sallies? Osborne peered up intently, regretting again the lack of a fly rod, not to mention his polarized sunglasses. He looked down but all he could see were a few dead mayflies drifting on the surface. If the bug life was tantalizing any trout, the water, dark from the tannin of pine needles, was hiding its treasures. He’d have to come back with his waders to be sure.

What a shame
, he thought, but he grinned, marveling for the umpteenth time at how his belated return to fly-fishing was changing his life.

Raising his paddle to let the kayak drift, he studied the insects. He was determined to learn the Latin names of the damn things. First, of course, he had to learn to recognize them in plain English. One, then another fish slurped. One splashed behind him. He spun around. A trout? A brown? Or a brookie? He sat rock still, not even breathing, hoping it would jump again. His eyes raked the surface for a betraying dimple. The water ranged from one to three feet deep here. That splash was loud. Could a young muskie be feeding in such cold water?

Letting his breath out slowly, he lifted the paddle from the water. Tamarack crowded his peripheral vision, spilling their spring needles in frothy strands studded with cones. What a juicy moment: He could feel the dark water alive beneath him, charged with larva hatching and fish feasting. Overhead, the peach sky had morphed into a crisp new blue. White clouds scudded. Utter quiet prevailed.

“Peace and solitude, bud, life don’t get no better than this,” whispered Osborne, relishing the bad grammar of his fisherman’s mantra as he let the kayak drift.

A scream split the silence wide open. A full-throttle human scream.

two

“Only dead fish swim with the stream.”

Anonymous

Osborne
froze, blood drumming in his ears.

“Hel-l-o-o,” he hollered, once he recovered from the shock of the scream. Had someone fallen out of their boat? Who could possibly be back in here?

No answer.

“Hel-l-o-o-o,” he tried again, his voice booming into the silence of the woods around him. The scream still reverberated in his head. Whoever it was sounded terrified. But no one answered his calls.

Just as Osborne thrust the kayak forward, a slash of orange rounded a curve beyond the trestle. Another instant and the slash became a kayak moving swiftly toward him. Above the cockpit, a woman’s face twisted with fear and exertion as she pushed over the still water. Mouth gaping, shoulders heaving, she looked like she was strangling on her own breath. Behind her sat a small child in a bright blue life jacket.

As the kayak neared and slowed, Osborne recognized the strong-boned Swedish face under the short frizzy hair.

“Marlene! What on earth—?” He pulled his kayak toward her.

“Oh, Doctor … Dr. Osborne.” She slowed to a stop, heaving as she spoke. Tears were streaming down her cheeks.

“What is it, kiddo? Is someone hurt? How can I help?” Even as he offered assistance, Osborne felt inadequate, his legs locked in place in the damn kayak. He couldn’t jump out to help if he had to.

Marlene Johnson was the same age as his oldest daughter, Mallory. She and her parents had been patients of his years ago, but the elder Johnsons were now dead a good ten years or more. Marlene had not lived in Loon Lake since her marriage to a man from Stevens Point. Osborne vaguely remembered Mallory saying she had seen Marlene, now divorced, at a recent high school reunion.

“Oh my God, oh thank God,” Marlene gasped, looking back as if she were being chased. “Someone’s dead. Back there.” She pointed toward the trestle with her paddle. “We’ve got to get out of here. The face … it’s too awful … it’s …”

“Marlene,” Osborne spoke sternly. The woman was on the verge of hysteria. “Settle down. Now take a deep breath.” At the look on her face, he repeated himself louder. “I mean it,” he said, “take … a deep … breath.”

Osborne may have retired from his practice, but he hadn’t lost his skills. Years of dentistry had vested him with a tone of authority designed to stun frightened patients into stillness. Early on he had learned that adults calmed quickly when treated like a child.

Marlene was no exception. She relaxed ever so slightly.

“Okay,” said Osborne, as if rewarding her, “I will go back and see what the story is, but first I want you and your youngster here to take it easy. Can you do that?” His eyes fixed on hers for an answer. She nodded.

“You’re safe, Marlene, nothing is going to happen. If you found a dead person, they’re dead. That means they’re not moving.” His tone softened.

“You’re absolutely right, Dr. Osborne,” she said, smiling at his little joke and breathing easier as she wiped the wetness from her face. Then her eyes widened again. “But what if the killer saw me?”