Nowhere to Run

“I don’t see a license,” Joe said, stealing a look at the journal while the fisherman kept his back to him. There were hundreds of short entries made in a tiny crimped hand. Joe read a few of them and noted the dates went back to March. He felt the hairs rise on the back of his neck. Was it possible this man had been in the mountains for six months?

“Don’t be reading my work,” the fisherman said.

On a smudged card inside the Bible was a note: FOR CALEB ON HIS 14TH BIRTHDAY FROM AUNT ELAINE.

“Are you Caleb?” Joe asked.

Pause. “Yeah.”

“Got a last name?”

“Yeah.”

Joe waited a beat and the man said nothing. “So, what is it?”

“Grimmengruber.”

“What?”

“Grimmengruber. Most people just say ‘Grim’ cause they can’t pronounce it.”

“Who is Camish?” Joe asked. “I keep seeing that name in this journal.”

“I told you not to read it,” Caleb Grimmengruber said, displaying a flash of impatience.

“I was looking for your license,” Joe said. “I can’t find it. So who is Camish?”

Caleb sighed. “My brother.”

“Where is he? Is he up here with you?”

“None of your business.”

“You wrote that he was with you yesterday. It says, ‘Camish went down and got some supplies. He ran into some trouble along the way.’ What trouble?” Joe asked, recalling what Farkus had said at the trailhead.

Caleb Grim lowered his fishing rod and slowly turned around. He had close-set dark eyes, a tiny pinched mouth glistening with fish blood, a stubbled chin sequined with scales, and a long, thin nose sunburned so badly that the skin was mottled gray and had peeled away revealing the place where chalk-white bone joined yellow cartilage. Joe’s stomach clenched, and he felt his toes curl in his boots.

“What trouble?” Joe repeated, trying to keep his voice strong.

“You can ask him yourself.”

“He’s at your camp?”

“I ain’t in charge of his movements, but I think so.”

“Where’s your camp?”

Caleb chinned to the south, but all Joe could see was a woodstudded slope that angled up nearly a thousand feet.

“Up there in the trees?” Joe asked.

“Over the top,” the man said. “Down the other side and up and down another mountain.”

Joe surveyed the terrain. He estimated the camp to be at least three miles the hard way. Three miles.

“Lead on,” Joe said.

“What you gonna do if I don’t?”

Joe thought, There’s not much I can do. He said, “We won’t even need to worry about that if you cooperate. You can show me your license, I can have a word with Camish, and if everything’s on the level, I’ll be on my way and I’ll leave you with a citation for too many fish in your possession.”

Caleb appeared to be thinking it over although his hard dark eyes never blinked. He raised his rod and hooked the lure on an eyelet so it wouldn’t swing around. After a moment, Grim waded out of the lake. As he neared, Joe was taken aback at how tall he was, maybe six-foot-five. He was glad he hadn’t gone into the lake after him. Joe could smell him approaching. Rancid—like rotten animal fat. Without a glance toward Joe, Caleb took the daypack and threw it over his shoulders and started up the mountain. Joe mounted up, breathed in a gulp of clean, thin air, and clucked at Buddy and Blue Roanie to get them moving.

A quarter mile up the mountain, Caleb stopped and turned around. His tiny dark eyes settled on Joe. He said, “You coulda just rode away.”

NEARLY TO THE TOP, Joe prodded on his pack animals. They were laboring on the steep mountainside. Caleb Grim wasn’t. The man long-strided up the slope at a pace that was as determined as it was unnatural.

Joe said, “The Brothers Grim?”

Caleb, obviously annoyed, said, “We prefer the Grim Brothers.”

Later, Joe asked, “Where are you boys from?”

No response.

“How long have you been up here? This is tough country.”

Nothing.

“Why just the Old Testament?”