Meloux squinted at the bird and said with a note of sadness, “That my eyes aren’t what they used to be.”
Cork knew that Meloux’s physical senses weren’t those of a young man, but it was a different sense he’d hoped for from the old Mide, something that came from a lifetime not just of hunting but of understanding the nature of human beings. He prayed that this sense was still sharp.
The Cutthroat took them to Sugar Bowl Lake a mile north of Bruno. It was a round lake ringed by high hills, hence its name. The sun was at their backs. Their shadows moved ahead of them across the water, and behind followed a deep, rippling wake. Cork watched the slopes carefully. On top of his pack, which was situated directly in front of him, was a pair of Leitz binoculars. Beside the pack rested a Remington Model 700 police rifle. Morgan had brought an M40A1 sniper rifle and scope, and Fineday, who’d hunted all his life, had brought his own Winchester. Before embarking, they’d held a conference regarding the wearing of the Kevlar vests each man had been issued. Meloux and Fineday, neither of whom had ever worn body armor, were clearly not thrilled with the prospect of the stiff armature. Morgan commented that the vests were generally uncomfortable and would be particularly so during the kind of prolonged physical activity that the canoeing and portaging would demand. He also pointed out that they had every reason to believe that Stone, if he fired at them, would use armor-piercing rounds. Cork told them he’d prefer it if they wore the armor, but he understood their objections and drew up shy of insisting. They were, however, to keep the armor handy at all times and not hesitate if he gave the order to suit up.
The afternoon was still, the only sound the burble of water that swirled with each dip of the paddle.
“Should we be concerned yet, Henry?” Cork said.
The old Mide scratched his head and thought an unusually long time. “Not here. Not yet.”
The Cutthroat left Sugar Bowl via a series of rapids too shallow for the canoes. One followed the Cutthroat, the other veered west toward a little lake called Snail.
“Which way, Henry?” Cork said.
Meloux walked the trail along the Cutthroat, came back, and followed the other portage for a distance. He studied the rocky soil carefully, shaking his head with uncertainty. “Hard ground, no tracks,” he said.
Morgan spoke quietly. “Up here, it’s all hard ground and no tracks.”
Meloux stood where the trails diverged, looking west, north. Finally he pointed along the Cutthroat. “I think Stone would go this way.”
“You’re sure?”
“He would go quickly and far enough so that you would not bring the dogs. So north.”
“How far, Henry?”
Meloux shrugged. “We will see.”
Morgan gave Cork a look of concern, but held his tongue. The men hefted their canoes and began to walk.
Sunset found them at Lamb Lake, hitting the end of a short thirty-rod portage as the light turned blazing orange and ignited a wildfire of color that swept over the aspen on the hills. Cork and the others stood in the shadow of tamaracks on the western shore of the lake, the water dark at their feet. Already they could sense the cold that would descend with the fall of night.
The afternoon had not gone well. At every juncture, every point where a decision about direction had to be made, Meloux seemed uncertain. He spent a long time studying each trail. He knelt, his old bones cracking, and peered at the ground. He rubbed his eyes with his gnarled knuckles and afterward seemed to have a bewildered look. Each time he finally pointed the way, Cork wanted to ask, “Are you sure?” But what would have been the use?
In Morgan’s face, the concern was obvious. Had they put their faith in a man too old? He said nothing. Fineday, too, held his tongue, but Cork could imagine his worry. Were they losing his daughter?
Still, none of them had been able to say that Meloux was wrong, that Stone had gone a different way. But were they, Cork wondered, the blind following the blind?
Beyond Lamb Lake, their way would lie to the east, along a narrow flow called Carson Creek that fed out of the far shoreline. It would take them to Hornby, a huge lake with dozens of inlets. The most direct route across Lamb was through a channel between two small islands. Although it was difficult from a distance to judge their size, Cork recalled from the map that both islands were shaped roughly like bread loaves, the larger approximately one hundred yards long, the other half that size. It appeared that at one time they’d been connected, but the natural bridge had collapsed, its ruin apparent in the great stone slabs that broke the surface in the channel. On the larger island, a few jack pines had managed to put down roots, but they were ragged-looking trees, like beggars huddled against a cold night. The southern end of the island was dominated by a sharp rise thick with blood-red sumac.
“Do we go on?” Morgan asked.
“Hell yes, we go on,” Fineday said. “We haven’t found Lizzie yet.”
“Henry?” Cork turned to Meloux.
“I would like to sit and smoke,” the old man said.
Fineday spoke urgently, but not without respect. “We don’t have time. She’s still with him out there somewhere.”
“Stone knows we’re coming,” Meloux said. “He will be patient now. We should be patient, too.”
“I’ll go on alone if I have to.”
“If you have to. But consider how much more eight eyes can see than two. And there’s one more thing.” Meloux settled his bony rump on the trunk of a fallen tamarack. “I am tired.”
“We’ll break for a while,” Cork said. “Then decide.”
Not far off the trail, in a stand of quaking aspen, was an official Boundary Waters campsite. While Meloux smoked and ruminated, Cork checked the camp. When he came back, he sat beside Meloux on the fallen tamarack, rolled a cigarette, and smoked with the old man in silence. Morgan lay with his back propped against an overturned canoe, his eyes closed. Fineday paced the shoreline.
“How’re you doing, Henry?” Cork asked.
“When I was a young man, I could read a trail across a face of rock. Now…” He took a deep, ragged breath.
Cork was concerned. It was obvious the day had taken a heavy toll on Meloux. He looked ready to buckle.
What had he been thinking, bringing an old man, a man of parchment skin and matchstick bones, on such a difficult journey, such a dangerous mission? Had he put the others at risk, and Lizzie Fineday as well? Should he have mounted an army of deputies and volunteers, swept into the woods hoping to catch Stone in a huge net? Would anything he tried have worked?
Meloux finally said, “We are near the end, I think.”
“How do you know, Henry?”
“He knows he has gone beyond the dogs. The next lake is Asabikeshiinh.”
Spider. The Anishinaabe name for the lake. Because of all the inlets like legs, Cork knew.
“It is a big lake, easy to lose someone who follows him,” Meloux said. “But he does not want to lose us.”
“What do you think he’ll do?”
“He will set a trap. Or he will circle.”
“Come up on us from behind?” Morgan’s eyes were open now.
“It is a trick of bears, a good trick. So maybe that is what he will do.” He spoke to Fineday. “Put your restless walking to use. Look carefully along the shoreline, in the soft dirt, for boot prints. Go that way.” He pointed to his right. “You, Corcoran, go the other way.”
“What about me?” Morgan asked.
“Go back down the trail and look for signs of his turning there.”
Fifteen minutes later, they regrouped at the overturned canoes. None of them had found any indication that Stone had ever been that way. Another disappointment.
“It’s getting dark,” Fineday said. “We should keep moving. We can make Lake Hornby before nightfall.”
