West Of Here Part 36

"Sitka. Up girl!" said Mather.

But the dog did not lift an eye.

"Up!"

This time the dog slowly exhaled, but her black eyes were frozen. When she finally blinked, it was sluggishly.

Mather issued a staccato whistle, and still the dog would not budge. Runnells approached her as though to rouse her, but Mather stopped him with an outstretched arm.

"No. Leave her in peace."

"We could hoist her with ropes," Reese suggested.

Mather shook his head grimly and ran a hand through his s.h.a.ggy beard. "No. She's out of fight."

Mather almost envied the dog. Looking at her there on the frozen ground, the pale flame of her spirit all but spent, he felt a welling of emotion for which he was grateful. Even in her present condition, she was, by his estimation, a n.o.bler beast than he. He squatted down next to her and ran his hand over the dog's head, past her ears, and she exhaled once more with a wheeze. He could not bear to look at the washboard of her rib cage or look her in the eyes. He could not bear to feel her spine running like a row of gravestones down her back. The best he could do was pat her head.

"Rest now," he whispered.

Rising to his feet, he turned to face the cliff, doing everything in his power not to look back at her as, hand over hand, he began climbing ahead of the party. The going was exceedingly slow and measured, and the rock was given to crumbling under the force of their toeholds. Mather paused at each crevice to lower a cod line. Halfway up, he could not help but look back at the dog and immediately wished he had not. She was lying just as he'd left her, head on forepaws, staring straight ahead, at nothing. Part of him wished he was lying there beside her.

Along with the precarious ascent itself, the jangling of nerves had taken a toll on the men by the time they reached the flat narrow shelf, which hung as though suspended just below the ridge, not a hundred feet above the wispy cloud tops. The sky was deep blue again, though Mather could hardly see it through the blinding sun as he approached the final stretch, where, just below the crest, the face gave way to a series of natural steps, not unlike a ziggurat. A final step brought Mather's head above the sharp wedgelike saddle, and the curtain rose from before the unknown region, and there before them, wide and green and pristine, lay the valley of the Quinault. Mather might have fallen to his knees and wept then and there were it not for his impatience to put it all behind him.

After grueling months in the wilderness, through the most perilous winter on record, having traversed some of the most rugged terrain in North America, ever in the shadow of death, the Mather expedition had reached the central divide at long last. From this vista, they could see to the west, un.o.bstructed, all that lay between them and the Pacific. Beyond the first range lay a wide, handsome valley. The thickly wooded bottomlands gave way gently on either side to a range of mountains that rose gradually, green about the waist and capped with snow. The river, visible some two thousand feet below, where it emerged out of a dark funnel of rock, appeared to run wider and generally straighter than the Elwha.

Bountiful country, there could be no doubt, a generous watershed running right to the very edge of the world. Endless resources. Boundless timber in every direction and a wide, navigable waterway to move it. Yet standing on the divide, with the wind whistling past his ears, Mather could not shake a certain disillusion in knowing that what lay in front of him had already been discovered, had no doubt seen the restless footsteps of other men. Paradise, if it existed, lay somewhere behind them - perhaps they'd trudged right through its midst without recognizing it. Mather would not be the man to discover it. He'd known that this day was coming, or at least sensed it, the day when everything before him had yielded to discovery. Thus, it felt to Mather less like he had arrived here and more like this place had been following him all along.

"We can reach bottom by sundown," he said. "There, we can camp."

"Onward," said Haywood wearily.

Thus the party gave pause but momentarily before they began their zigzagging descent down the wayward side of the divide. And even the fitful past gave way to Mather's footsteps, as he plodded through the thick snow, while behind him, the men strung out in a crooked line, trudging onward one ragged step at a time. n.o.body said a word.

In a day's time, they dove into the dense bottomlands and began fighting their way westward. Haywood would describe a high-canopied forest fecund with rot, a brackish cathedral festooned with moss. He would describe the biggest timber he'd ever laid eyes on, spruce wider than train cars, colonnades of hemlock so ma.s.sive that "the wingspan of three men stretched finger to finger could not match the diameter of these giants." He would describe a soft and yielding forest floor, presenting a crust so brittle with rot that the casual footfall would break through the surface. He would describe the party's perilous crossing of the the raging gray Quinault, whose swift current they forded some fifty yards across. Late in the afternoon, in a sloping valley br.i.m.m.i.n.g with maple and spruce, they would come upon the first evidence of human activity in two months - blazes consisting of two sets of slanting lines conjoined at an apex in the manner of a chevron. Like their own blazes, they were relatively fresh and notched high on the trunks of the great gnarled trees, suggesting deep snowpack in the recent past.

Awash in silence as he trudged through the fertile bottomlands, Mather scarcely paused to observe the wonders he pa.s.sed, which might have taken his breath away were he still the man he was when he left Port Bonita. Perhaps, with enough rest, he would be that man again. Perhaps a few months spent in the relative ease of society would reawaken that restless urge to discover. But for now, he was no longer that man nor certain what man he might become. Perhaps his days of discovery were not over after all. More than anything else, with each muddy step westward, Mather was eager to get home - wherever that was.

In three days' time, over the foothills and through the bottomlands, the party would come upon a squat little cabin with a smoking chimney on the wooded edge of a small glen, where, standing beside a woodpile with one leg propped on a chop log, and a rifle slung at his hip, a skinny stooping figure with a long gray beard would finally move Mather to speech.

"G.o.d help his plug of tobacco," he said.

make it stop OCTOBER 1890 1890.

On the bluff to the northeast came the baying of hounds, maybe a half dozen, maybe more. Even before Adam crested the hogback on Lord Jim's mare, a cloud of black smoke unfurled into the moonlight. He could hear the distant shouting. Already the air was thick with the acrid stink of creosote and burned timber. Ascending the rise, first at a canter, then at a trot, Adam felt the frantic heat of panic rising all around him. There was sure to be chaos on the other side. Finding the boy might be impossible under the circ.u.mstances.

The mare reared back on two legs and whinnied at the first sight of the flames, and Adam eased her down on all fours. Dismounting, he settled the horse with an expert hand, surveying the scene below as colonists hurried past him down the hill. The flames were fanning out in both directions along the south side of Front Street, though the prevailing wind was doing its best to push them southeasterly. Furious bucket brigades were strung out on all sides, heaving and splashing vainly at the blaze. The Belvedere, its fiery roof caving in on itself, was nearest to the center of the inferno.

The horse nickered and balked, worrying her head all around the bit as Adam led her down the hogback slowly toward the center of town, with a hot, ashy wind blowing into his face. Front Street was littered with rubble, burning shingles and scattered brick amid shattered gla.s.s. From the back lot of the leather works, a phalanx of fifty or sixty men drove the flames back. Others scurried about madly in the street to no apparent purpose. Dogs skulked in the shadows. Doc Newnham darted across the street in front of Adam, flanked by a pair of teenage boys; he clutched his leather bag in his right hand as he ran. Flames consumed the hardware store, lapping at the roof of P. G. Rhinehalter. Old man Rhinehalter, in spite of the advices of a half-dozen screaming men, scrambled to save his inventory, heaving tack and leather into the street with desperate haste. The mare fought Adam harder and harder as they drew closer to the center of town, continually rearing her head back in the halter. Adam ran a comforting hand over her damp withers and coaxed her along gently.

The muddy street pulsed wildly with shadows. Chaos cut through the night on wings, breathing fire. Suddenly there came a commotion from up the street as the frantic crowd dispersed, and right through their midst with a furious clopping came a pair of frenzied black geldings. .h.i.tched to a flaming carriage. The mare pitched, landing on stiff forelegs as the carriage shot past like a cannonball. Then, from the east end, came an explosion of plate gla.s.s, followed by the staccato cries of a dozen or more voices as a column of flames flared thirty feet into the air, roaring at the center like a great furnace. A tethered mule brayed in earnest before the Olympic Hotel, where luggage of all shapes and sizes was cloistered in the mud nearby. They came upon the gutted Belvedere, a dozen splayed timbers and a collapsed roof and a row of blistered piles still flaming. The boardwalk, too, had collapsed, running like a black shattered spine west down Front Street. In front of a charred splintered section of railing, Adam came upon a human torso, charred blood red and black beyond recognition. The second body was draped with a blanket, but even so, by its very configuration Adam could guess at the brutality of its repose. Up ahead, he could see several other bodies in a line, even as another was being dragged into their midst by a man Adam recognized as the druggist's son. On the west end of town, near the foot of Morse Dock, women and children gathered, their faces at turns stunned and terrified in the firelight. Some of the children were crying. One child, charcoal-streaked and tear-soaked, clung tightly to her mother's waist.

"Make it stop," Adam heard her say.

He cut through the crowd to Hollywood Beach, where up and down the sh.o.r.eline the Klallam huddled in cl.u.s.ters of five and ten, murmuring. Adam led the mare through their midst, searching for a familiar face. He came upon Abe Charles clutching his rifle as he stood in a small group before his shack. Another rifle was propped against a saw log.

"I'm looking for Hoko King's boy," said Adam.

"They've gone after him," said Abe.

"Who?"

"Tobin and maybe a dozen others. With dogs and rifles. They're headed east along the bluff."

A chill washed over Adam. "Give me your rifle."

No sooner did Abe surrender his rifle than Adam mounted his horse and galloped east down Hollywood Beach.

GEORGE STOOD LIKE a statue in the shadow of Morse Dock, still perplexed by Storm King's puzzling revelations. What did it mean to hold nothing in your hand? What did it mean, this strange song? Even as the flames threw long shadows down the length of Front Street, even as George heard the frantic shouting and the clanging of bells from all quarters, he sang softly under his breath: a statue in the shadow of Morse Dock, still perplexed by Storm King's puzzling revelations. What did it mean to hold nothing in your hand? What did it mean, this strange song? Even as the flames threw long shadows down the length of Front Street, even as George heard the frantic shouting and the clanging of bells from all quarters, he sang softly under his breath: doon-doon, doon-doon doon-doon, doon-doon A dozen Siwash brothers streaked past him, headed toward the blaze, clutching buckets and hatchets. A dozen horses whinnied crazily in the night. A black and terrible cloud threatened to blot out the moon. And still George puzzled and pondered. What did it mean, the fingers? Why did it matter how many he held up? While others huddled in whispering groups up and down Hollywood Beach, George stood alone and turned toward the sh.o.r.e, with one hand holding nothing and the other holding up three fingers, singing louder now as the flames reared up behind him: doon-doon, doon-doon doon-doon, doon-doon His trance was broken when a young woman, whom he soon recognized as Hoko, wandered dazedly into his midst, moving like a ghost between worlds. Stopping a short distance in front of George, she swayed faintly side to side, wide-eyed like a blind person, open-mouthed but silent like a mute, with one hand out in front of her, reaching toward nothing.

And when it seemed that she was totally without voice, she spoke, not to George, but to no one.

"They," she said. "Them."

MINERVA WAS SCARCELY three days in the ground when Ethan came down the mountain for the first time since the funeral in a rickety old carriage bursting with caged chickens, driven hard by an old white-beard named Lofall who lived just downriver of the gorge. As they began their descent of Homestead Hill, Ethan could see the pale yellow nimbus of fire glowing on the horizon. He wondered if it was already a lost cause. They rattled in on the east end of town, where Ethan jumped from the moving carriage and began fighting his way west down Front Street toward the center of town, through the frenetic crowd of onlookers, through the mad scramble of bucket brigades. He claimed a station squarely in front of the post office, where driven slantwise by the wind, a tongue of flame lapped at its roof and clapboard walls. Wresting a bucket from a confusion of hands, Ethan attacked the fire with furious haste, ducking low under tentacles of flame. Narrowing his silver eyes against the heat, which seemed almost liquid itself, he heaved bucketful upon bucketful of water at the fiery onslaught. The post office must be saved, above all else - it was the address of Port Bonita, the very proof of its existence, its link to the outer world. Without an address, Port Bonita was no longer a destination. Without an address, Port Bonita was not a place. To what purpose would the great twin turbines of Ethan's conception hum without a town to power, without a place to light? three days in the ground when Ethan came down the mountain for the first time since the funeral in a rickety old carriage bursting with caged chickens, driven hard by an old white-beard named Lofall who lived just downriver of the gorge. As they began their descent of Homestead Hill, Ethan could see the pale yellow nimbus of fire glowing on the horizon. He wondered if it was already a lost cause. They rattled in on the east end of town, where Ethan jumped from the moving carriage and began fighting his way west down Front Street toward the center of town, through the frenetic crowd of onlookers, through the mad scramble of bucket brigades. He claimed a station squarely in front of the post office, where driven slantwise by the wind, a tongue of flame lapped at its roof and clapboard walls. Wresting a bucket from a confusion of hands, Ethan attacked the fire with furious haste, ducking low under tentacles of flame. Narrowing his silver eyes against the heat, which seemed almost liquid itself, he heaved bucketful upon bucketful of water at the fiery onslaught. The post office must be saved, above all else - it was the address of Port Bonita, the very proof of its existence, its link to the outer world. Without an address, Port Bonita was no longer a destination. Without an address, Port Bonita was not a place. To what purpose would the great twin turbines of Ethan's conception hum without a town to power, without a place to light?

Beside him at the front, where the heat singed and chafed, a squarish, dough-faced man, slick with perspiration and ruddy about the cheeks, called out instructions to the mob.

"Heave!" shouted Dalton Krigstadt. "To the left, to the left! Heave!" Heave!"

Preceded by an ominous creaking, then a great yawn, an interior wall came crashing down, and a burst of flames roared from the center of the blaze, swelling to a forty-foot crescendo. The men in front recoiled breathlessly. From behind them in the muddy street came a collective gasp.

"Heave!" Dalton spurred them on. "She's jumping the break. Cut her off at the break! "She's jumping the break. Cut her off at the break! Heave! Heave! You there, shift to the left You there, shift to the left! Heave! To the left, to the left, you!" To the left, to the left, you!"

Shifting to the left, Ethan was grateful for the instruction, grateful to be a cog in a machine greater than himself.

RIDING LOW AGAINST the wind, Adam pushed the mare to her limit, and she was responsive to the reins, galloping gracefully on sure hooves through the long gra.s.s. Adam's thoughts, however, did not gallop so gracefully but scrambled madly to order themselves. How was this happening? How did this come to be? He was almost upon the hounds now and gaining fast. He could see the shadowy mob strung out behind them in the purple moonlight. Even from a distance, he sensed the danger coursing through them and knew he could not reason with them, though he must try. When it seemed the mare had no more to give, Adam pushed her harder and she obliged in spite of the rutty terrain. He came up fast on the bluff side of the mob, overtaking them at the crest of a gentle gra.s.sy slope, where swinging the gray mare around in a half crescent, he stopped them in their tracks. the wind, Adam pushed the mare to her limit, and she was responsive to the reins, galloping gracefully on sure hooves through the long gra.s.s. Adam's thoughts, however, did not gallop so gracefully but scrambled madly to order themselves. How was this happening? How did this come to be? He was almost upon the hounds now and gaining fast. He could see the shadowy mob strung out behind them in the purple moonlight. Even from a distance, he sensed the danger coursing through them and knew he could not reason with them, though he must try. When it seemed the mare had no more to give, Adam pushed her harder and she obliged in spite of the rutty terrain. He came up fast on the bluff side of the mob, overtaking them at the crest of a gentle gra.s.sy slope, where swinging the gray mare around in a half crescent, he stopped them in their tracks.

Sure enough, Tobin was among them with an oil lamp and a rifle. The Makah also had a rifle. He was sneering in the purple moonlight. As always, his tiny companion was there beside him. The tethered dogs were all but pulling over the postmaster's son, who leaned back on his heels. Adam did not recognize the others. He spoke forcefully to be heard over the cacophony of hounds.

"Best leave matters to the law, John."

"We'll have justice, Adam. The boy started this, and I intend to finish it. Now, stand aside."

"I can't do that, John."

Tobin smiled cruelly in the moonlight. The tethered hounds continued pulling at their leads, baying frantically.

"C'mon, boys," said Tobin. "We're losing ground."

Adam leveled his rifle.

Tobin's smile did not budge. "Somehow I don't think you'll be using that," said Tobin. "That would be out of character for you."

"Maybe, maybe not."

"Release the dogs!" Tobin shouted. And with that, the tall boy let go of the leads, and the hounds bounded off furiously down the hill. Adam gave chase on the mare and was soon running abreast of the pack, all but stumbling over themselves in their haste. At the bottom of the hill, the gra.s.sland leveled out for several hundred yards before diving into a wooded gulley. Halfway across the flat expanse, Adam caught his first glimpse of the boy bathed in the eerie purple light. Apparently, Tobin saw him, too, for a shot rang out in the night. Adam rode straight for the boy, and when he was beside him, he pulled hard on the reins with his left hand, and when the mare had managed a gait, Adam swung side saddle, sweeping the boy up in his arms. When he heard a terrible yelp, Adam knew he'd crushed one of the hounds, but still the others kept after them. The boy weighed little more than a sack of feed. Adam swung him onto the saddle front, just as another shot rang out. Without looking back, he drove the mare toward the tree line and blindly down into the gulley; to her credit, she didn't balk or falter once. Within ten strides, they hit the creek at a trot and galloped up the far side of the gulley through dense brush. With the cold limbs stinging their faces like razors in the darkness, they thundered up the far side of the ravine and back into the moonlight. The boy could feel his father's heart thumping between his shoulder blades.

SHORTLY BEFORE MIDNIGHT the blaze jumped the break completely, and within minutes thirsty flames were consuming the clapboard walls of the post office, and the tower of flames reared to new heights, and a plume of soot black smoke rippled a hundred feet upward before it began to mushroom. Within minutes the post office was a lost cause, and yet, to Ethan, the defeat proved nothing less than thrilling. That the heaving brigades did not surrender, that they did not step back awestricken into the muddy street and defer to the flames - did not, in fact, so much as break their rhythm - sent a n.o.ble chill running up Ethan's spine. That's when he knew all was not lost, that there was something to be gained by the fight itself. And Ethan crept closer still under the fingers of flame, threw himself that much harder into the fiery heart of destruction, as the dough-faced Krigstadt led the charge. the blaze jumped the break completely, and within minutes thirsty flames were consuming the clapboard walls of the post office, and the tower of flames reared to new heights, and a plume of soot black smoke rippled a hundred feet upward before it began to mushroom. Within minutes the post office was a lost cause, and yet, to Ethan, the defeat proved nothing less than thrilling. That the heaving brigades did not surrender, that they did not step back awestricken into the muddy street and defer to the flames - did not, in fact, so much as break their rhythm - sent a n.o.ble chill running up Ethan's spine. That's when he knew all was not lost, that there was something to be gained by the fight itself. And Ethan crept closer still under the fingers of flame, threw himself that much harder into the fiery heart of destruction, as the dough-faced Krigstadt led the charge.

"Heave!"

The heat of the battle was glorious, the glow of the flames cleansing. The machine was unstoppable - feeding, it seemed, on the very flames themselves. Even the gritty spoils of defeat tasted sooty and delicious on Ethan's tongue as he heaved, and heaved, and heaved, untold times, tired but unflagging. The heat melted in his mouth and ran down his throat like fuel.

"Heave!"

As the brigade fought for precious momentum in the early morning hours, a sudden and fortuitous change of winds arrived from the west to push the flames back upon themselves. And emboldened by the wind, the brigades took the offensive, putting their shoulders straight to the flames and heaving, heaving, heaving with the persistence of a steam engine as they drove the flames back, hour after hour after hour, inch by hard-won inch, until shortly after dawn they had managed to contain it. From there, it was only a matter of hours before they had reduced the inferno to a broken patchwork of smoldering heaps.

And as the thinning mob spread out to wander amid the wreckage, Ethan straggled west down Front Street in the full light of day, with the ground smoking and hissing all around him. He gravitated toward Morse Dock, where he propped his weary elbows on the rail and gazed back toward the gutted center of town. All that was left of Port Bonita was a railroad office, long vacated, a sundries store run by an old deaf woman, and two real estate offices - one of them bearing the name LAMBERT AND SON.

With a limp mustache draping over the corners of his thin mouth, and his shirt dangling in blackened tatters, Ethan knew in his bones that something had been born in the fire, though it was hard to pin down what, and harder still to measure. Perhaps Port Bonita was not an address, after all, not even a place, but a spirit, an essence, a pulse - a future still unfolding.

THE SKY WAS the color of oyster sh.e.l.ls at daybreak, and it was drizzling, and Thomas was cold, and a lone plume of smoke unfurled from Lord Jim's chimney on the horizon. The mare beneath him was slick with rain and sweat, her gait a tired saunter. The boy's eyes were burning, and a cool aching weariness dripped down the back of his throat. He knew beyond all certainty that his father was dead in the saddle behind him. the color of oyster sh.e.l.ls at daybreak, and it was drizzling, and Thomas was cold, and a lone plume of smoke unfurled from Lord Jim's chimney on the horizon. The mare beneath him was slick with rain and sweat, her gait a tired saunter. The boy's eyes were burning, and a cool aching weariness dripped down the back of his throat. He knew beyond all certainty that his father was dead in the saddle behind him.

In a few minutes time, Thomas would bring the news of Adam's death to Lord Jim, who lay pale and weak on the mattress on what would prove to be the eve of his own death. And Thomas sat with the old man late into the evening, by candlelight, as the wind off the strait rattled the windows, until Lord Jim said unto to Thomas the last words he would ever speak - words that Thomas himself would later say unto the people at Jamestown, as they laid Lord Jim to rest.

"We are born haunted," he said, his voice weak, but still clear. "Haunted by our fathers and mothers and daughters, and by people we don't remember. We are haunted by otherness, by the path not taken, by the life unlived. We are haunted by the changing winds and the ebbing tides of history. And even as our own flame burns brightest, we are haunted by the embers of the first dying fire. But mostly," said Lord Jim, "we are haunted by ourselves."

wooly bully SEPTEMBER 2006 2006.

Silently, Timmon and Franklin broke camp shortly after dawn, amid a fog so thick that it clung to the forest like a cool curtain of mist. A fitful night's sleep and one more night of hunger had left Timmon restless and precariously on edge, a state of affairs further aggravated by the fact that Franklin was forced to proceed cautiously over the b.u.mpy path, lifting his knees ever so slightly with a grimace each step of the way. Progress was so slow that Timmon could hardly contain a frenetic impulse to forge ahead and leave Franklin behind. With a steady pace, he could be out of here in a day and a half tops. But with Bell holding him back, he might never get out of here. h.e.l.l, he might starve at this pace.

Two miles in, following a stretch of moguls on a downhill course, Franklin felt the cold tug of a rip cord beneath his lower spine, and progress was halted altogether as Timmon ministered for twenty minutes to Franklin's knotted psoas. When at last they resumed the trail, Franklin was forced to rely heavily on Timmon's shoulder for support, slowing their pace still further. Finally, resigning himself to the futility of his pairing with Bell, Timmon ceased wrestling with hunger and impatience and gave into his better instincts. What was an extra day? Hadn't he decided that he would dare to give a s.h.i.t? Why not start with Bell? Christ, the guy hauled his a.s.s all the way out here to look for him, right? The guy was a Boy Scout.

Franklin's condition only worsened as the day wore on and the terrain grew rougher. Stops became more frequent. Bell's steps only seemed to get smaller. But Timmon remained steadfast in his patience.

"Hold steady, Bell. We'll get you out of here, man. May take a while, but we'll get you out."

Late in the afternoon, on the backside of Deception Divide, Timmon was forced to lift Franklin up and over a washout, sidling cautiously over the uneven grade, as he strained under the weight of his companion.

"Looks like I owe you one, Tillman."

"Don't sweat it," grunted Timmon. "Call it even."

In eleven hours, they covered just under eight miles, rejoining the Elwha in early evening at the head of Press Valley, where they set up camp beneath a stand of giant hemlock.

That night, as the chill air of early autumn settled into the moonlit valley, the two men lay on their backs by the glow of the fire, staring up at the treetops while Rupert lay curled between them. Timmon found himself compelled to talk more than usual. Maybe it was the c.u.mulative effect of being alone all those weeks. Maybe he was just warding off the hunger. Or maybe Frank Bell was just disarming - maybe something about his salt-and-pepper hair and his sad, slowmoving eyes inspired candor. Franklin, for his part, was more than content to listen.

"Yeah, well," Timmon said. "Mostly, I was sick of s.h.i.t comin' down on me, you know? s.h.i.t I didn't have any control over - other people's s.h.i.t - my old man's, that idiot in the White House, some guy in a suit in Minneapolis."

Timmon folded his arms behind his head and gazed harder than ever into the canopy, as though some answer might be waiting for him up there. "But you can't escape it, man. s.h.i.t doesn't just roll downhill, it rolls all over the place."

"How's that?"

Timmon shifted over onto one elbow and looked at Franklin. "Well, for starters, let's talk about survival. Used to be that a guy could live off the land out here, just on fishing alone. And I know how to fish, Bell. I've been fishing for twenty years. I fished like h.e.l.l out here. For weeks on end I fished - from the right bank, from the left bank, from the riffle. And I never caught a G.o.dd.a.m.n thing. Nothing. Zilch. And it didn't occur to me once - not until maybe twenty minutes before I found your black a.s.s out here in the woods - that it had nothing to do with my luck. It was because of that f.u.c.king dam down there. A guy's got about as much chance of catchin' a fish in this river as he does of catchin' Jennifer Lopez."

"That right?"

"You're d.a.m.n right, that's right. The real question is, why the h.e.l.l didn't I see that coming? Why didn't I put two and two together in the first place? You see what I'm saying? I didn't make the connection."

"Forest for the trees," said Franklin. "Forest for the trees."

Both men fell silent. The fire was down to coals, now, hissing softly. The trees swayed ever so slightly above, swishing side to side with each breath of wind. Occasionally, a tree trunk issued a plaintive creak in the darkness. And each creak seemed only to make the silence more implacable.

Suddenly, the silence was shattered by an otherworldly howl. Both men felt their scalps tighten.

"What the f.u.c.k was that?" said Franklin, breathlessly.

"An owl," said Timmon, unconvincingly.

Rupert began to whimper.

"That's a loud-a.s.s owl, Tillman. And Rupert ain't scared of no bird."

No sooner had they started speculating than another hair-raising series of hoots came from deep in the forest behind them.

"Okay, Tillman. If that's an owl, it must have mated with a hillbilly."

"That ain't no owl. Shhh."

"Well, it ain't a bear," whispered Franklin. "I been face to face with one of those, and he was -"

Before Franklin could finish, there came a series of four very loud whoop-howls from no more than a hundred yards away. Rupert began to pace the campsite nervously, whimpering.

When Timmon looked at Franklin in the darkness, he felt his skin crawl.