Page 28 of God’s Country

“What are you going to do?”

I studied the campsite and the canoe landing and gave our situation some thought.

“Okay, first I’m going to check their gear, see if they’ve left a firearm behind. If they did, we’re good.”

“And if they didn’t?”

“I’ll find something for leverage.” I balled my hand into a fist and swung it as if I was holding a club so that Cordell got the idea. “Then I’ll jump them when they’re most vulnerable, as they’re getting out of their canoe.”

“There are two of them, and they’re carrying.”

“Got a better idea?”

“Yeah, like I said, you get the hell out of here.”

“Ain’t gonna happen,” I told him. “Let’s get you out of sight.”

“Nope. Whatever we do, we do together.”

“How’re you going to help me?”

“I can fall on one of them, hold him down while you take care of the other.”

“No wonder we lost that last game. That’s a terrible plan.”

“You got a better idea?” he said, echoing the question I’d put to him moments before.

“Let’s see what I find in their gear, then go from there.”

I started for the campsite. A quarter mile away, I saw the canoe coming back, the two men battling against the current through the narrows. Even though their focus was on their own situation, I moved among the trees to make sure I wasn’t seen.

I reached the tents and slipped inside the first. It was a mess—discarded clothing, a rumpled sleeping bag atop a thin foam mattress, a camp pillow, a Duluth pack fallen forward, the contents spilling out. Worse, there was an opened food canister with some granola bar wrappers around it, a perfect invitation for a bear intrusion. I figured these guys must’ve been raised by a family of rats. I rummaged through the mess but found no firearm. I did the same with the second tent. Whatever firepower they’d brought, they’d taken it with them.

I found nothing that I could use as a club. Then the obvious hit me.

I left the tent and crawled toward where the second canoe had been drawn up. I moved to the side away from the approaching men and reached over the gunwale. I located one of the paddles, grabbed it, and crawled back behind one of the tents, where I crouched out of sight.

My plan was simple. I was ten yards from where the two men would land. After one of them had disembarked and was steadying the canoe for his partner, I would leap from my cover, bash the first one with the blade of the paddle, then bash the other. It actually seemed like it might work.

I watched them coming, zigzagging across the bay because the big guy in the stern, Ollie, who should have been responsible for keeping to a course, had no idea how to handle that canoe. They were maybe seventy yards out when I heard the grunting behind me and turned to find Cordell falling in a heap at my back.

“Christ, what are you doing here?” I whispered harshly.

“You didn’t come back. So I came to you.”

There was no color in his face, and I could see there was no real strength left in his body. The effort to reach me had drained him completely.

“What… what’s the plan?” he wheezed.

I explained to him what I intended to do.

“You… you take the lead… I’ll be right behind you.” His words came out more gasped than spoken.

No use arguing at that point. I hunkered down and waited.

CHAPTER 18

I could hear them talking as they came.