Murder Grins and Bears It (11 page)

I paused with my fork halfway to my
mouth.

I hadn’t thought to talk to him. Rolly was
the local laughingstock. There were more stories about Rolly’s
wardening skills then there were Polish and dumb blonde jokes.

Rolly’s been known to lie down in front of
vehicles so his alleged hunting violators can’t drive off. He says
he has a dangerous job, but I say he makes it that way with his own
stupidity. One day he’ll become road kill, crushed under the tire
of someone who’s had his fill of the government.

I’d have to talk to him.

Blaze removed his fork from his mouth and
shifted pasty to the side of his cheek. “Rolly doesn’t know a
thing.”

“
And that crazed dog by the
door,” Grandma Johnson said sharply. “Wouldn’t be surprised if it
kills us all. Barney’s turning over in his grave for sure. I’m
afraid to come down the hall, it’s got so bad. Pretty soon I won’t
be able to leave my bedroom.” Her teeth snapped and she glared my
way.

That, I didn’t dare inform her, was my
plan.

****

I’m not sure I slept at all. Tossing and
turning, I watched the alarm clock roll through the early hours of
the morning. Two o’clock, three, four-fifteen. At five I pulled my
sixty-six-year-old body from bed, my muscles stiff and bunched from
stress, with the taste of fear in my mouth.

On this frost-covered dawn morning, I faced
the possibility that something awful and unspeakable had happened
to Little Donny. With the entire Upper Peninsula searching, how
could he still be missing? If he was alive without shelter, last
night’s freeze would have killed him. When last I’d seen him he was
dressed for hunting in the warmth of the day, not for overnight
camping. And what about food? Little Donny couldn’t make it an hour
and a half without filling up, let alone four days.

I huddled over my cup of coffee as the sun
rose over the east field, wondering where to turn next. Fred
stretched out at my feet, and I buried my toes in the warmth of his
coat, my usually optimistic mind filled with serious doubt.

****

“
I got the job,” I said
into the phone.

“
What job?” Cora Mae
asked.

“
Remember,” I said,
impatient from lack of sleep. “The census taker job I applied for
last month.”

My first job application and interview in
over thirty years and I’d landed it. It was only a temporary
position but it would bring in a little cash to supplement my
Social Security.

“
Aren’t you a little busy
to take on a new job?” Cora Mae said.

“
No, no, this is perfect
timing. I can get inside people’s homes and question them about
Little Donny. This gives me carte blanche to handle the
investigation any way I want to.”

“
When do you
start?”

“
Today. A trainer’s coming
right to my house to get me started with the paperwork. She’ll be
here any minute.”

****

Rolly Akkala liked to cover his tracks. As
our local game warden he managed to rile a lot of people who grew
up with weapons, so he kept on the move and changed his routine
often. Nobody had been able to find out where he lived, but a few
locals had worked for years to discover that pertinent bit of
information.

He wouldn’t be easy to track down without
help.

The Deer Horn Restaurant was my first stop.
Fred howled from the passenger seat as soon as I opened the door to
the restaurant. Ruthie, frazzled as usual because she couldn’t keep
good help and did most of the work alone, managed to function as
hostess, waitress, and supervisor of the cooking help when she
lucked out and found someone who could actually cook. Otherwise she
did that, too.

“
Be right with you,
Gertie,” she said, trotting for the kitchen.

“
Just a cup of coffee when
you have a spare minute,” I called after her and took a stool at
the counter.

“
What’s that noise
outside,” someone said.

“
Sounds like a coyote or a
wolf,” someone else said.

“
In broad daylight? They
sure are getting bold.”

I didn’t say a word, knowing the howling
would soon die down, like it usually did when Fred lost sight of me
long enough.

“
I’m looking for Rolly,” I
said to Otis Knutson, who spends his life driving freight trains up
and down the tracks. Occasionally he stops the train on Stonely’s
tracks for a quick bite and to catch up on the local gossip. He sat
at the counter next to Carl. Both were munching on the daily
special, meatloaf and mashed potatoes.

Otis chuckled. “Last I heard he was letting
the air out of one of those out-of-stater’s tires to slow him down
for questioning. He’s fiddling with the valve and while he’s doin’
that the guy gets in his car, doesn’t even know Rolly’s crouched
down back there, and he throws it in reverse, runnin’ right over
Rolly’s foot. Crushed all the bones. Rolly’s limpin’ around
somethin’ awful.”

Carl laughed until he began to snort, even
though I’m sure he’d heard the story more than once. “Last I heard
he set up a roadblock over on Rock Road and he’s checking for
violators. He’s already arrested some goof dragging a buck out of
the brush. The fella said it looked like a bear to him when he shot
it, but on closer inspection he realized it was a deer and he was
draggin’ it out to report it.”

We all knew how dumb city people could be.
“Sounds reasonable to me,” I said.

“
Only mistake the guy made
was he had it all gutted out and ready to hang. And it had a rack
on it the size of a young tamarack tree. Would’a been hard to
mistake for a bear.”

Ruthie poured coffee all around and whisked
off.

“
Any word on Little Donny?”
Otis asked, scraping the last of the potatoes into his
mouth.

I shook my head. “No. I don’t know what to
think anymore. Blaze works twenty-four hours a day, organizing
search parties. They’ve trampled the woods for miles in every
direction and he’s not showing up. Heather hasn’t heard a word.
You’d think he’d call her if he’s okay…”

“
He’ll turn up sooner or
later,” Carl said and stood up. Ruthie brought him a carryout bag.
He picked up his check and slowly counted out a few
bills.

I eyed the bag and Carl noticed. “Another
round of meat loaf for later,” he explained. “You know I hate to
cook.”

After Carl left, Otis said, “It’s a good
sign, Gertie. If they’re combing the woods without finding him,
it’s a good sign.”

“
You’re right,” I agreed.
“At least they aren’t finding a body.”

“
Right.”

The silence between us grew. Otis picked up
his check and fumbled through his back pocket for his wallet.

“
Time to find Rolly,” I
said, draining my coffee and patting Otis on the back. “Anyone know
where our local warden’s hiding out?”

A few customers gave me ideas, places to
start, but no one knew for sure.

****

I found Rolly’s truck parked on the side of
Rock Road. After I put Fred on a leash, we walked around the truck
while he sniffed away. He caught a scent and hauled me down a deer
trail at a faster clip than I was used to. I’d have to teach Fred
how to walk on a leash instead of dragging me on my knees or my
face. About the time I thought my arm would disconnect from its
socket, we found Rolly. He had a hunter cornered in a tree. Or at
least that’s what I thought at first.

Rolly eyed Fred as we pulled up, and Fred,
thrilled that he had his man cornered, pulled off his usual drill
by howling and going for a grip on Rolly’s pants. I yanked him away
at the last second, although I considered letting Fred go about his
business. It would have been one small victory over our local
government.

“
Sit,” I said to Fred, and
to my amazement he sat. But he didn’t take his red devil eyes off
of the warden.

Rolly had his hands on his hips, exposing
his sidearm. “They find that murdering grandson of yours yet?”

“
I thought that was your
job. You should be out searching for him instead of running
innocent hunters up trees.”

We both looked up and so did Fred. The guy
was about fifteen feet off the ground.

“
He’s stuck up there,”
Rolly said.

“
Quit standing there doing
nothing,” the hunter called out. “Help me down.”

The thing that amazed me was that the
hunter’s aluminum tree stand was in a different tree than he was.
He was clutching the side of an enormous oak tree, and his tree
stand, or what was left of it, sat in a maple about four feet away.
Part of the stand lay in a heap on the ground.

“
How’d you get over there?”
I asked.

“
The bottom part of my tree
stand fell to the ground when I was inching up and I got stuck in
the maple for the longest time on what was left of it.” He had his
face plastered against the tree limb and his legs were contorted,
one stuck into the crook of a small branch, the other twisted
around the enormous tree. “I yelled and yelled, and when nobody
came I thought I’d have a better chance of getting down by jumping
to this tree.”

He chanced a glimpse at a smaller branch
five feet below where he was hanging. “I missed,” he explained.

“
I hate my job,” Rolly
muttered under his breath.

“
Jump,” I called. “I think
you can make it without breaking anything.”

“
Are you nuts?” the hunter
shouted.

“
Shimmy down, then,” Rolly
said. “Go on, clamp your legs around the tree just like you’re
doing now and bear hug your way down.”

With enough encouragement and a final threat
of being abandoned in the woods for the night, the hunter managed
to climb out of the tree.

“
Where you going?” Rolly
shouted as the man bolted for the trail. “Get back here and get
this tree stand out of my woods, and while you’re at it, I’ll take
a look at your bear license.”

After Rolly assured himself that everything
was nice and legal, Fred and I followed him to his truck. Rolly had
a bulldog’s waddle, the result of thick short legs and a barrel
chest. His jaw covered half his head. A pronounced limp reminded me
of Otis’ story.

“
What happened to your
leg?”

“
Charlie horse, is all,”
Rolly muttered.

“
Did you know Warden
Hendricks?” I asked when we arrived at the road.

“’
Course I did. We’re all
like family.”

“
Why do you think he was
shot?”

“
Your grandson was up to
something illegal, is why.”

I gave Rolly a squinty-eyed, stern look.
“I’m not going to get into it with you over whether Little Donny
did it or not. I’m asking you if you know something that would
help.”

“
Help what?”

“
Help me figure this all
out and help me find Little Donny.”

“
We’d all like to find that
kid.” Rolly opened his truck door and pulled himself in. I wedged
my body between him and the door so he couldn’t close
it.

“
I hear Hendrick’s vehicle
was back in Marquette. How’d he get down here?”

Rolly stuck a key in the ignition but didn’t
turn it. “Stay out of our business, Gertie. The kid did it and it’s
that simple.”

“
If you know so much, you
can explain why he is supposed to have also killed Billy
Lundberg.”

“
Sure, I can answer that,
but you aren’t going to like it. He killed one man and had his
first taste of human blood. He’s on a rampage and he’ll kill again,
just you wait and see.”

Rolly is perfect for his job -
narrow-minded, obsessed with his own book of rules, and a true
backwoods fanatic. He doesn’t seem to mind that he’s ridiculed and
reviled all across Tamarack County.

“
One more thing,” I said.
“Tell me about trapping birds.”

“
What do you
mean?”

“
Raptors. If I want one for
a pet can I go and trap one?”

“
No! No! No!”

I finally had his attention. He gripped the
steering wheel and pulled himself around to get a better look at
me. “You have to have a special license and to get that you need a
sponsor and--”

“
Maybe I can buy a
bird.”

“
No! No! No! They’re
protected and you can’t buy them. Get yourself a
parrot.”

“
Can’t I buy one from
someone around here?”

Rolly sighed and began reciting the rules.
“The only people that can have raptors are licensed falconers and
they can only have two birds unless they’re masters - then they can
have three. It’s illegal to buy or sell raptors or their eggs.
Every bird has a marker around its leg with a federal
identification bearing a serial number and if I catch you with one,
I’ll arrest you.”

“
Who around here has a
bunch of them?”

“
I just explained it to
you. No one has a bunch of them. It’s illegal.” Rolly started his
truck and I moved away so he could close the door.

“
I hate my job,” I heard
him mutter before the door slammed shut.

chapter 8

Kitty and I were seated at Cora Mae’s
kitchen table comparing notes and planning the next step in our
quest to find Little Donny and the real killer. We were on our
third pot of coffee and I’d had my two’s-the-limit sugar
doughnuts.