Page 17 of God’s Country

“You want the first watch?”

“Think you can sleep?”

“Not quite there yet,” he said. “How’s your heart?”

I knew Stephen had been keeping an eye on me, watching for signs of distress. I hadn’t felt any of the physical discomfort, the galloping that had marked the arrhythmia that hit me at the cemetery. With the concerning evidence we’d found on our arrival at the campsite, all thoughts of my heart had gone onto my back burner. I had other worries now.

“My heart is just fine,” I assured him.

“I keep thinking about the big wolf. It’s scary that Waaboo and I both saw it.”

“Henry didn’t seem all that concerned.”

“I still don’t get why he suggested that maybe you’re the wolf.”

“Neither do I,” I confessed, then changed the subject. “How’s law school?”

“Hard. But I have Belle, who’s so damn smart when it comes to the law. I’m not sure where I’d be without her.”

“You’ve been blessed.”

“Funny, the turns your life takes. I always thought I was destined to be a Mide, like Henry and Rainy. Then I met Belle and she changed everything.”

I was going to say something about what a good woman can do for a man, probably from some country song I’d listened to on the radio, but before I could speak, a distant howl rose out of the night. In the Boundary Waters, it’s not unusual to hear wolves calling to one another, but this was different.

“I don’t think that was a wolf,” Stephen said. “It sounded more like someone in pain.”

A waxing moon was just now topping the trees on the far eastern shoreline. Already a broad stretch of silver lay across the surface of the lake, like a road of moonlight. Wolves often hunted in the night, and although howling at the moon seems a cliché, that’s what they do. But like Stephen, I didn’t think what we’d heard had come from a four-legged animal. I’d brought binoculars, and I got them from the tent I shared with Stephen. I scanned the lake for any sign of another camp—the flames of a fire or the beam of a flashlight. I didn’t see anything, but that meant almost nothing. Shrike is a big lake with lots of inlets, points, and islands.

“Cordell’s bunch?” Stephen ventured.

“Too little info,” I said. “It was a single noise. I don’t like jumping to conclusions.”

“But I know you like to err on the side of caution, especially with Waaboo and Luke along.”

I stood up.

“What are you going to do?” Stephen asked.

“Take a canoe out, reconnoiter a little.”

“I’ll go with you.”

I shook my head. “Stay here. It’s probably nothing, but if I don’t come back, let the others know, and as soon as it’s light, get yourselves out of the Boundary Waters.”

“Dad—”

“No argument on this, Stephen. One of us needs to stay and, if necessary, alert the others. I’m not going to do anything stupid.”

“I don’t like this.”

“I’m not doing cartwheels myself, but I’d rather know what’s going on. Especially…” I nodded toward the tents where the two boys slept.

My son gave in, although reluctantly. I retrieved a headlamp from the tent, even though I didn’t think I’d use it. If there was someone or something out there to be concerned about, I didn’t want them spotting the light. Still, as the Boy Scouts have always said, be prepared. For a moment, I wished I’d brought a firearm of some kind. I own a Smith & Wesson .38 that was my father’s and that I’d carried when I wore a badge, and a Winchester that was also his. But I keep them locked away these days with the hope that the violence that had been so much a part of my earlier life is well and truly behind me.

Stephen accompanied me down to the canoes and helped me shove off. I backpaddled a dozen yards out, leaving silver ripples in the black water in my wake, then turned the canoe to the east. I glanced back and saw my son standing in a pool of moonlight, his hand lifted in parting. For some reason, that simple gesture felt to me like a final farewell.

I’ve journeyed into the Boundary Waters all my life. I know much of it intimately. But the route I’d chosen for this outing was one not well known to many, and so not well traveled, even by me. When we’d put in on Shrike Lake, I knew the two essentials—the locations of the official campsites and those of the two portages that could take us to other lakes. We’d passed three campsites before we reached the point where we’d set up our own camp. There were three campsites still ahead. The first lay on a small island a quarter mile east. Because it was on the far side of the island, if a campfire had been built there, we wouldn’t have been able to see it from the point. I moved quickly. The breeze that had helped keep the mosquitoes and blackflies from being a nuisance had died, and the lake was a great well of silence in which the smallest sound carried far. In that deep quiet, the swirl of the water as I dipped my paddle and moved the canoe forward seemed like the gurgle of a lake beast. The drips of the runoff as I brought the paddle up and poised it for the next stroke sounded like the plops of pebbles that could be heard for miles. Exaggeration, I know, but it was a strange night, and I was on a strange mission, and every sound seemed heightened.