'You called about a package today,' the woman said.
'I saw it come in Tuesday and it went to Game Biology. Then it disappeared.'
'What do you mean it disappeared?' Joe asked.
'It disappeared.'
Joe thought about it, saying nothing. The woman again said that it had disappeared. She clipped her words, and he could sense the caution in her voice, as if someone might walk in on her any minute.
'Who are you?' Joe asked.
'Never mind,' she said. 'I've got two kids and a husband who's out of work. I'm a state employee with benefits. I need this job.'
'I've got a couple of kids, too,' Joe said. 'And another one on the way.'
'Then you had best just forget about that package,' the woman said sharply, not wanting to establish any kind of common interest. 'Just forget about it and go on with your life.'
Joe frowned. It was the second time he had received that advice. While she talked, he slid open his desk drawer. The other envelope, the one with the last few pieces of scat, was still there.
She paused briefly, then continued. 'Let me put it this way: anything you send us will get lost.'
'Why are you doing this?' Joe asked. There was a hint of exasperation on the other end of the phone.
'I don't know,' she said. 'I just felt that I had to. I have to go now.'
'Thank you,' Joe said but she had already hung up.
Joe thought about what to do. Still holding the receiver, he sifted through his desk until he found his old address book and then dialed his friend Dave Avery.
Joe and Dave had gone to college together and Dave now worked as a game biologist for the Montana Fish and Game Department in Helena. After they had caught up (Dave had divorced but was engaged again), Joe asked him if he could send him a sample for an independent analysis.
'Where was it found?'
'My backyard.'
'And my Wyoming colleagues can't decide what squeezed it out?'
'There's some dispute,' Joe hedged. He didn't want to go into the story of the lost sample. There wasn't any need to.
'Sound's like you're challenging me,' Dave said. 'Name That Shit.'
'I am,' Joe said, forcing a laugh. Dave agreed to take a look at it, whatever it was, and to keep both the sample and the results in confidence.
Joe sat back in his swivel chair. He thought about what the woman at the lab had told him. He wondered how he could go about finding out who she was and if he even should. He believed she had told him the truth about the missing sample. He wished she hadn't, because things had suddenly become a lot more complicated.
***
The tires Of Joe Pickett's pickup made a sizzling sound as he drove through the wet streets of Saddlestring to the county sheriff's office. It was still raining, and there were very few people out on the streets. Those who were out were scurrying from one door to another holding their hands on top of their heads. Joe thought how strange it was that the rain had continued throughout the day. Rain was a rarity this time of year; in fact, it was a rarity, period.
Wyomingites, Joe had observed, didn't know what to do when it rained except get out of it, watch it through the window, and wait for it to go away. The same people who chained up all four tires and drove through horizontal snowstorms and bucked snowdrifts just to go have lunch in town during the winter had no clue what to do when it rained. A few ranchers stretched plastic covers, sometimes referred to as 'cowboy condoms,' over their John B. Stetsons but few people owned umbrellas. Fewer yet would let themselves be seen with an umbrella open because it would appear urban and pretentious, and the only rain slickers he ever saw were rolled up neatly and tied to the backs of saddles, where they generally remained. But Joe liked rain and wished there were more of it.
Vern had been right. Saddlestring was dying. A decade ago the coal mines in the county were operational and the Twelve Sleep Oil Field was pumping, but now both were silent. Only a reclamation crew still worked at the mine, and the oil wells had since been capped, waiting in vain for the price of a barrel of oil to rise.
Even the agricultural jobs had shrunk as out-of-state wealth bought local ranches for tax write-offs and in some cases took them out of production. Cattle prices were the lowest in a decade. A quarter of the storefronts on the main street were boarded up. In the past five years, the population of the town had decreased by 30 percent. Houses were available in all parts of town, and the prices were cheap. Saddlestring's one radio station had announced it was going off the air as of the first of next month. Unemployment was high and getting higher. Vern's pipeline would pump not only natural gas but new blood and dollars back into the community.
Saddlestring was a classic western town borne of promise due to its location on the railroad, but that promise never really played out. In the 1880s, a magnificent hotel was built by a mining magnate, but it had faded into disrepair. The main street, called Main Street, snaked north and south and had a total of four stoplights that had never been synchronized. The two-block 'downtown' still retained the snooty air of Victorian storefronts designed to be the keystones of a fine city, but beyond those buildings, the rest of Main Street looked like any other American strip mall, punctuated by gun shops, sporting goods stores, fishing stores, bars, and restaurants that served steak.
Joe entered the sheriff's office and hung his jacket and hat on a rack.
'Still raining?' asked Deputy McLanahan from his desk behind the counter. Joe said it was and asked if Sheriff Barnum was available. Wendy, the receptionist/dispatcher, eyed Joe coldly, long enough to remind him that she still didn't like him after their telephone conversation on Sunday. But then she relented and buzzed Barnum on the intercom, saying 'Game Warden Joe' was here to see him.
