wondering who the criminal is here and who isn’t.”
Joe climbed down quickly and tied Buddy to a tree. He said to Caleb, “Let’s go.”
Caleb grinned. Same teeth as Camish. “Pissed you off, didn’t he?”
Joe set his jaw and made a wide arc around Camish, who looked amused.
JOE FOLLOWED Caleb Grim on a nearly imperceptible trail through the pine trees. The trees were so thick that several times Joe had to turn his shoulders and sidle through the trunks to get through. The footing was rough because of the roots that broke the surface. Not that Caleb was slowed down, though. Joe found it remarkable how a man of his size could glide through the forest as if on a cushion of air.
“So,” Joe said to Caleb’s back, “where are you boys from?”
“More questions,” Caleb grunted.
“Just being friendly.”
“I don’t need no friends.”
“Everybody needs friends.”
“Not me. Not Camish.”
“Because you’ve got each other.”
“I don’t think I appreciate that remark.”
“Sorry,” Joe said. “So where do you guys hail from?”
“You ever heard of the UP?”
Joe said, “The Union Pacific?”
Caleb spat. His voice was laced with contempt. “Yeah, game warden, the Union Pacific. Okay, here we are.”
The trail had descended and on the right side of it was a flat granite wall with large vertical cracks. Caleb removed a gnarled piece of pitchwood from one of the cracks and reached inside to his armpit. He came out with a handful of crumpled papers.
Joe tried to see what they were. They looked like unopened mail that had been wadded up and stuffed in the crack. He saw a canceled stamp on the edge of an envelope. When Caleb caught Joe looking, he quickly stuffed the wad back into the rock.
“Nope,” he said. “No license here.”
“Is this a joke?” Joe asked. “You didn’t even look.”
“The hell I didn’t.”
Joe shook his head. “If you’ve got a valid license, I can look it up when I can get to a computer. In the meanwhile, though, I’m giving you another citation. The law is you’ve got to have your license in your possession. Not in some rock hidden away.”
Caleb said, “You’re giving me another ticket?”
“Yup.”
He laughed and shook his head from side to side.
“There’ll be a court date,” Joe said, unnerved from Caleb’s casual contempt. “If you want to protest, you can show up with your license and make your case.”
“Okay,” Caleb said, as if placating Joe.
“And I’m going to write up both of you for wanton destruction of game animals. I saw all the bones back there. You’ve been poaching game all summer.”
Caleb said, “Okay.”
“So why don’t we get back,” Joe said.
Caleb nodded, shouldered around Joe, and strode back up the trail.
As Joe followed, he wondered if he’d been suckered, and why.
CAMISH WAS STILL on his seat on the log and he watched with no expression on his face as Joe emerged from the woods. A cloud had finally passed in front of the sun and further muted the light. While they were gone, Camish had started a small fire in a fire pit near his feet and had cleaned and laid out the trout Caleb had brought back.
“Guess what,” Caleb said to Camish, “he’s going to give us
“Tickets?” Camish said, placing his big hand over his heart as if pretending to ward off a stroke.
Joe felt his ears get hot from the humiliation, but said, “Wanton destruction of game animals, for starters. But we’ve also got hunting and fishing without licenses, and exceeding the legal limit of fish.”
Again, Joe caught the brothers exchanging information through their eyes.
Joe wrote out the citations while the Grim Brothers watched him and smirked.
Caleb said to his brother, “You’re gonna get mad, but I told him we were from the UP. And you know what he said? He said,
Camish laughed out loud and slapped his thigh.
“Oh, and earlier, you know what he asked me?”
“What?”
