As it turned out, Williams was right, of course. The farmers in the Lower Valley were excellent at growing row crops, and for just a few bucks, you could have fresh-grown veggies, sweet corn and melons all summer long. Best of all, you didn’t have to hoe one row or pull one weed.
McCain fed Jack and fixed himself a ham sandwich. Like the dog, McCain ate quickly. Then he called Jack, and the two were off to the river.
Being within walking distance of the Naches River was another reason he liked living where he did. His road led to a public access to the river, and many evenings during the summer he and Jack would walk down there and fish for trout. During the spring, when the river was closed to fishing, McCain still enjoyed spending time along the stream. McCain would work with Jack on his retrieving and commands, and McCain would spend time thinking about things as he watched and listened to the river roll along.
When he and Jack made it to the river, he wasn’t surprised when a mule deer doe and last year’s fawn jumped out of some wild roses. The deer bounced a couple of times and then stopped and stared at him and the dog.
Many people didn’t realize just how many deer lived this close to town year-round. McCain had even seen elk in the trees along the river a few times. McCain thought it was a shame that people rushed by on the freeway day-in and day-out and never saw the wildlife that lived along the river corridor.
As they walked along the stream, McCain threw a retrieving dummy for Jack to fetch. He threw it into the river and, after giving the dog the command to fetch, Jack leaped from the bank, flying through the air. The dog splashed down hard, almost dunking his head, before he swam to the dummy that was rapidly floating downstream with the current. Jack was a strong swimmer and had the dummy back to McCain in no time. Then, for a change of pace, McCain threw the dummy into a big clump of brush. Jack, not-so-patiently but obediently, sat by McCain’s side until he gave the command to fetch. When he heard his name, the big yellow dog tore off toward the brush and searched hard until he found the dummy. As with just about every other Labrador retriever McCain had ever known, Jack loved to play fetch.
As they played and walked, McCain thought about meeting the new FBI agent. Sara Sinclair was definitely attractive. Hargraves had that right. And she was obviously smart. McCain hadn’t seen a wedding ring on her finger, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t in a relationship.
After a couple major catastrophes in his love life, McCain was more than a little gun-shy about jumping into another relationship any time soon. But a woman like Sinclair, well, he thought that just might change his mind about trying it again.
He was thinking about the FBI agent when he heard the whistling of wood ducks from above. He searched the skies and saw a pair of the beautiful ducks swing overhead and settle into a slow spot in the river across from them. McCain looked at Jack, and the dog was at full alert. He’d heard and seen the ducks too, and was now quivering in anticipation, waiting for McCain to tell him to fetch the birds.
“Settle down,” McCain said to the dog. “We won’t be hunting ducks for another six months.”
He told the dog to come, and they continued their walk up the river. Along the way they jumped a small flock of mallards and a pair of Canada geese, and when McCain noticed that Jack had stopped and was looking intently at something across the river, he saw a mink slinking along the water’s edge
“Good eyes there, mister,” McCain said to Jack, who ignored the comment and watched the little animal as it searched along the riverbank for a crawdad or something else to eat.
He threw the dummy a few more times for Jack and thought about the woman they had found in the mountains. How did she die and why was she there? As the investigation progressed, he wondered if he’d get to spend more time working with Sara Sinclair. He smiled at the prospect. He definitely hoped so.
Chapter 5
Asecond woman’s body was discovered in the Cascades west of Yakima in mid-May. A young couple hunting shed antlers with their dogs had discovered the remains at the edge of a small meadow.
Every spring as the weather warms and the snowline recedes, people head into the woods looking for deer and elk antlers that had been shed by the bucks and bulls in January, February and March. While deer antlers are always gladly scooped up, it is the much larger elk antlers that are the real trophies of the shed hunters.
Some shed hunters use looking for them as an excuse to be in the mountains, getting some good exercise and fresh air, while others are in it strictly for the money. There is a good market for shed antlers as buyers will resell them into some of the Asian markets. There the antlers are ground down and used for medicinal purposes. Antlers have been used for over 2,000 years in China, where they are believed to strengthen bones and muscles, benefit the kidneys and spleen, and promote blood flow.
McCain had been called out several times in the past few years when reports came in that shed hunters were jumping the elk fences on state lands. They came in under the cover of darkness to be the first to check out the lands near the WDFW elk feeding stations. He figured there must really be some good money in selling
