Windigo fire, p.7
Windigo Fire, page 7
“That’s right. Only sheep, like you, Santa.”
Logan and the kid had left the counter and were making for the door. Good, Corazon thought. She had enough problems. At six four, Logan could be a handful.
“Bloody hell, look who’s emerged from his cave,” Santa muttered, then yelled: “You’re too early for the pub, Mate.”
Logan stared at him.
“Who’s the little Lolita?”
“My granddaughter,” Logan said.
“Really. Where’s your other wife? The nice one with the black fur coat.”
Logan’s stillness stifled all sounds in the place. Joseph and the kitchen staff stared through the order window.
“Ah, John Logan, the man who loved animals,” Santa went on. “Too hard and too often.”
A rush of movement. Corazon felt herself roughly shoved aside. She crashed into the wall next to her dress-code sign.
Logan was leaning over Santa’s table. The kid stood behind him, tugging on his leather jacket.
“Please, John, go sit down,” Mayor Fortin said. “He’s just jerking your chain.”
“Shut up, Maurice,” Logan said. He seized Santa by his short white beard.
Edgar and Mayor Fortin shouted in protest. Logan twisted his grip, dragging Santa up from the bench despite his struggles. And judging by Santa’s shrieks of pain, the beard was real, not part of the costume.
“Please, John, don’t go crazy now. Santa was making a joke,”
Fortin pleaded. “A bad joke, but he meant nothing.”
“Sure.” Logan’s eyes were remote, his face stony.
Edgar the elf stared as though his eggs had stuck halfway down.
Joseph had stepped out of the kitchen. “Take it easy, Maskwa,” he called out. Corazon signalled to him frantically.
“Let me go, you wet maggot.” Santa’s hands flailed uselessly against Logan’s arm.
“Please, Mr. Logan, stop,” the kid said.
Logan snatched up the steaming coffee pot with his free hand. Calmly, he dropped a gout of boiling coffee onto Santa’s round cheek.
Santa screamed in outrage. “Help me, you bastards!”
“Sancta Maria,” Corazon said. “Constable Michael comes in for his coffee in two seconds. Logan, put him down. You got enough problems.”
Logan raised his arm again and poured. Everyone cried out.
“He’s trying to kill me,” Santa screamed, twisting madly to shield his face. “Stop him for Christ’s sake.”
“John Logan,” said a quiet voice. “Listen to me. Let him go.”
“Look, Odile, I’ve got him.” Logan squeezed Santa’s whiskers more tightly. “I’ve caught him by the beard.”
“Yes, I see. We all see.” A smooth dark hand reached over and touched Logan’s bare wrist. “Put down that coffee, Bear Man. Listen to me now. Someone will get hurt.”
Logan released Santa so abruptly he bounced down on the bench as though he’d fallen through a trap door.
Santa clutched his cheek, face crimson. “You bloody psychotic. Who let you out of Penetang loony bin?”
“Shut up,” Corazon barked and pried the coffee pot out of Logan’s grip. She turned her blazing eyes on him. “Behave yourself, Bear Man. You’re scaring the kid. Go sit down.”
Logan stared at her. He tore off his hat, slapped it against his thigh, but did as she said, the kid trailing after him.
Corazon nodded to the small silent woman in the black waitress uniform. “Odile, get Santa some ice. Then take Logan’s order.”
“Yes, Madame.” Odile moved back to the counter as quietly as she had appeared.
“Take his order? What the hell’s wrong with you?” Santa said. “Throw him out on his arse!”
“This is my place and don’t you forget it,” Corazon said. “John’s a local. He gets served.”
“Obviously, I’m not a local. You hear that, Maurice?” Santa said to the mayor. “According to that Filo illegal, I’m not a local, but she is.”
“She married a local guy.” Fortin shrugged and smiled sheepishly at Corazon. Edgar the elf tried hard to stare at nothing.
“Tell you what, Santa,” Corazon said. “When Constable Michael drops by for his coffee and blueberry muffin, I’ll tell him you got a complaint and send him over.”
Santa muttered and picked up his fork.
Didn’t think so. You don’t like cops any better than I do.
She headed for the cash, shouting at Joseph and the others to get back to work. A black and white Ontario Provincial Police cruiser had appeared in the parking lot. Constable Michael was early. Good thing those two had settled down.
A figure in a dark navy uniform stepped in.
Corazon took in the glossy black wing of hair, the gravely perfect features and flawless olive skin.
Not Constable Michael. A new cop. A woman.
They’ve found me.
The glass carafe slipped from her fingers. Crashed and shattered on the linoleum tiles.
11
Danny sank. Down in the dark to the detritus on the lake bottom: rusting beer cans, twists of fish line, mud-encrusted bottles. His flesh dissolving, translucent …
A giant force seized him by the scruff of the neck. Yanked him up into a burst of light and wind. A brutal blow to the cheekbone punched him back into the world.
The side of the canoe.
He grabbed at it and swore, but all that came out was an anguished wheeze. Something kicked him in the face – his runners, bobbing around his neck. The laces were caught in his hair.
“For God’s sake, hang on,” Ricky said beside him. He flopped Danny’s arms over the side of the boat.
Danny coughed and retched as reason slowly returned. The canoe was full of water. The waves must have swamped it when it tossed them out.
“I thought you knew how to paddle one of these things,” Ricky said.
“You stood up in the canoe, you jerk,” Danny panted. “You’re certifiable, trying to bring down a plane with a hunting rifle.”
“That is a Dragunov SV-137 Russian sniper rifle, Baby. Semiautomatic and gas-operated.” Ricky worked his way round to the front of the canoe, hanging onto the gunwale. His combat vest was sodden.
The canoe breached another glassy wave. Danny’s arms were shuddering. His soaked jeans were pulling him under. Had to get them off. He clutched the side with one hand and fumbled with his zipper with the other, struggling to free his legs. With a great heave, he chucked the sopping mess of cloth into the drowned canoe.
“Ricky, get your clothes off,” he shouted through the wind, but the American had already figured that out for himself. His black combat vest flew into the canoe followed by his saturated pants and the crash of his heavy combat boots. Ricky’s shaved head and heavy white shoulders surfaced near the bow.
“Which way is land?” he yelled back at Danny.
Truly Danny had no idea. All he could see was water, rising up in one mountain after another. The sun, find the sun. There, burning a hole through the gathering smoke, right at mid-sky.
Danny took a guess. “Keep going, this direction.”
Ricky grunted in reply. He slung the yellow painter over one beefy shoulder and swam, using the breaststroke. Danny kicked his legs, to propel them forward. His teeth were chattering. Had to stay warm, had to keep moving. Ricky looked like a powerful swimmer, but how long before the cold water leached away his strength?
Got to help us move, got to. He kicked, counting to thirty, then drifted for a brief rest, counted and drifted, counted and drifted …
“Wake up!” Ricky had surfaced beside him, shuddering with cold.
“Sorry,” Danny mumbled.
“Did you hear what I said? Did you see where that damn plane went?”
Focused on survival, Danny had heard nothing. He shook his head.
“Speak up,” Ricky shouted.
“No, I didn’t see where it went,” Danny yelled back. “Maybe they gave up. The waves are too high. Landing’s too risky.” A distant throbbing motor above the tumbling slap and hiss of water. “They’re coming back.”
“No kidding.”
“If they buzz us again, they’ll fly too low. They’ll catch a pontoon and flip over. Crash and die. They can’t be that stupid.”
“Heads up.”
The plane was roaring down to land on top of them.
“Get under!” Ricky dived down, a white whale flashing in the murky water. Danny clung to the canoe, not daring to let go.
The plane droned over them, skimming across the waves like a skipping stone. He heard its engine pitch higher as it climbed to clear the trees on the far shore.
Ricky broke through the surface. Hurled his arms over the side of the canoe, breathing heavily. “Is it gone?”
Danny nodded.
“Only way to make them stop … is to … play dead. Next time go under and stay under.”
“No. I’ll lose the boat.”
“Do it or we’re finished.”
“I don’t hear the plane any more. Maybe they won’t come back.”
“Hendrix never gives up.”
“Hendrix died on the island.”
“You think?” Ricky swam back to the front end of the canoe and started pulling again.
Danny was too tired to argue. A large wave heaved over him and the canoe. His nostrils filled with the smell of dead weeds, drifting sediment and mud.
Kick, drift, kick, drift … Above the slosh of water, a faint throb. “The plane … it’s back.”
Ricky kept swimming, an elephant fording a river. Couldn’t hear. Danny’s ears were sharper, younger. “He’s coming back again,” Danny cried.
“Dive down,” Ricky yelled as the roar of the engine approached. “Do what I tell you.” He vanished.
Thwack! A stone, burrowing through the water. Hail pelted the lake surface.
Bullets – they’re shooting at us!
Danny let the water take him. He sank down, ears throbbing, lungs burning. He forced his eyes open. A blurry grey everywhere. The water closed round him in a thick suffocating jelly …
Thrashing and screaming, he broke through into the air. Alone in a desert of water. No canoe and no Ricky. Nothing but waves and the sky.
The plane had vanished. He couldn’t hear the engine.
Didn’t matter, he was going to drown.
He shouted Ricky’s name, frantically treading water. He bobbed up the surface of an oncoming wave. There in the trough, Ricky hauling the canoe. He paddled madly after them but when the next wave flung him up, they’d disappeared.
Every instant he was losing strength. His arms and legs churned uselessly.
The gym teacher claimed he lacked willpower. Didn’t matter what he screamed at his limbs. They wouldn’t obey him, couldn’t move, couldn’t …
He was drifting again, sinking …
He coughed back up, in one last pathetic struggle … Sank… and felt a rock.
He fought back up to the surface. The waves had eased. About one hundred yards in front of him, trees and thick bush pushed down to the water’s edge.
The mainland.
He’d been lucky, damn lucky.
Slowly, a few strokes at a time, he paddled toward the trees. At last his bare feet were sliding on the slippery rocks. He sloshed toward the bushes, biting back the pain in his feet as he trudged over the black shale.
No sight of Ricky or the canoe anywhere.
He stopped, gasping for air, and called out Ricky’s name.
“I’m right behind you.” Ricky stumbled past him, hauling the canoe. Water tracked rivulets through the sea growth of his body hair. He dragged the canoe onto the rocks of the beach and collapsed beside it.
Danny followed, the wind blowing his skin into goose bumps. He fell down next to Ricky, thanking all his grandmother’s saints and spirits that he was free of the water.
He stared back at the island. Even this far away, he could see the flames eating through the trees, breaking through to the shoreline. “The wind,” he panted. “It’s blowing this way. It’ll carry the fire over here.”
“Great,” Ricky said. “Any more good news?”
“They tried to kill us. Why?”
“Hendrix is a whack job.” Ricky poked a thick finger through a round bullet hole in the side of the canoe. “Hates witnesses. Scorched earth, clean the house, that’s his creed.”
“Hendrix died on the island.”
“No, uh-uh.” Ricky shifted on the stones. “The guy on the island wasn’t Hendrix. That was Curtis, Hendrix’s bodyguard. Curtis bought it on the island.”
“I don’t get it. Why would Curtis pretend to be Hendrix?”
“Hendrix switches ID’s with Curtis when he gets antsy.” Ricky stood up. “Come on. We gotta get our stuff out of the canoe.”
Danny lurched over with him to the boat. Anderson’s Russian sniper rifle had vanished. The paddle, too.
He gathered up his wet clothes and the Aussie’s black pack, heavy and streaming with water.
Ricky untied his crossbow from the thwart and shovelled his clothes and gear together. He dumped everything into the weeds and splashed back into the water. “Give me a hand. We’ve gotta push this sucker back out into the lake.”
“No way. I nearly drowned. I’m not going back in.”
“Drowning’s gonna look like nirvana after Hendrix gets finished with you.”
“The wind will blow the canoe back here. Stash it in the bushes.”
“It’s metal. He’ll see it.”
“I don’t hear the plane any more. Maybe he gave up.”
“You don’t get it, do you? Hendrix is a pit bull.”
Ricky waded out into the water, dragging the canoe. A moment later he was swimming, towing it back out into the lake.
“Ricky, this is crazy. Come back.”
Danny waited, straining to hear the sound of the airplane engine over the wind and the water. Nothing. He grabbed his clothes, wrung out his jeans and shirt and spread them over a bush. Last night he’d felt the first bite of autumn in the night air and caught the first glint of gold in the birch trees. He kept telling himself you couldn’t die of hypothermia in August.
He rubbed his numb arms, trying to keep sight of Ricky. He saw the silver canoe flip over like a breaching dolphin and the small pale dot that was Ricky start swimming back to shore. What a stupid waste of energy, he thought.
Fighting through the water had made him desperately hungry, but there was nothing to eat except pine sap and birch bark. That might ease his stomach pains but would provide no energy. He needed fat, protein.
A loud roar. Ricky stood up in the water and sloshed back to shore, swearing at the rocks underfoot. He staggered over to weeds where he’d thrown his gear and seized his precious crossbow, fingers probing the wires and mechanism. Grunting, he set it down and foraged through the pockets of his combat vest, pulling out a crumpled foil ball. He tore it open with his teeth, ripped off a chunk and tossed it at Danny.
“Protein bar. Better eat up,” Ricky said.
Danny stared at the gooey yellow mess, the soggy remains of a dried-out cereal bar, the kind southern hikers and cross-country skiers liked to eat. He chewed it down, trying not to gag.
The shiny metal bottom of the canoe bobbed in the lake about one hundred yards off shore. He listened again for the plane. Nothing. Smoke was drifting out over the water from the island. How long did they have before the wind blew the fire over here?
“I’m not going to sit around waiting to get burned up and shot,” he said.
“You got no choice, Sunshine,” Ricky said. “Better pray I can fix my bow.”
“Remember when we flew out here, Corazon took us over an old mine.”
“So what?”
“It’s the old Archangel uranium mine. People say the tailings poisoned Fire Lake and the groundwater round here.”
“So now I’m gonna glow in the dark. What’s your point?”
“The mine isn’t that far away. We could walk to it.”
“You mean tromp through the bush in the middle of nowhere trying to find a mine that’s been closed down for years? Just so some hunter can stumble across my bones. Forget it.”
“I can find it.”
“And if we did get to this stupid mine, is there any food? A phone?”
“Probably not.”
“Great idea. Real bright.”
“Listen to me. That mine’s got something better than food.”
“What?”
“A road out to the highway.”
That got Ricky’s attention.
12
Barry called that lady cop, Rachel thought. She shrank down next to Logan who sat still as a rock.
The lady cop had impressive gear: a stick, a bulletproof vest and a gun. Her uniform was dark navy blue with a gold badge pinned to her chest. She stood in the middle of the diner, scanning the booths and the counter. Corazon, the Cobra Queen, looked like she was going to throw up.
“I’ll get that mess cleared away for you, Madame,” Joseph said to Corazon through the order window. And it was a real mess, too – shining glass and mud brown liquid everywhere. He came out of the kitchen carrying a brush, dustpan and mop.
Corazon muttered her thanks, moved back to the cash register and sat down behind it.
Dead quiet. Down at the far end Mayor Fortin crumpled his paper napkin and tossed it over his unfinished eggs, fidgeting to squeeze past Edgar the elf. Santa attacked his meal with diligence.
“Hi there, Raven,” Joseph said to the cop. “Been a long time. Thought you worked out of OPP headquarters in Orillia.”
“Yes,” the lady cop said, but she didn’t sound friendly. “I see you’re still here in Red Dog Lake. Heard you quit law school.”
“It’s not a waste,” Joseph said without heat. “I like it up here. Got a family now.”
“Heard that, too.” She stepped aside to get out of the way of his cleanup. “I need to speak to Mrs. Corazon Sinclair. That’s you, isn’t it?” she said to Corazon. She went over to the cash, flipped open a small black leather folder and showed it to her. Rachel caught the glint of a gold shield.
“Sergeant Raven McKenna of the Ontario Provincial Police,” Corazon read out loud. She made a face as though the ID was a dirty bandage. “Impressive. Up to now in Red Dog Lake we’ve only had one junior constable for fifty thousand square miles. How come the government’s spending money on a big sergeant? Where’s Constable Michael?”
