Steve Hamilton - Blood is the Sky

“You need a donut?” I said.

He shook his head.

“You gonna be this way all the way up there?”

He closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the seat. “You know how it is with us Indians,” he said. “One bad night and we’re down for the count.”

We took 17 north, out of the city and up the Lake Superior coastline. The fog was still heavy on the water as we rounded Batchawana Bay. An hour later, we passed through a small town called Montreal River, and then it was another hour to make our way through the Lake Superior Provincial Park. There was nothing but trees and an occasional glimpse of the lake, stretching out beyond the fog.

“Anytime you want to speak up,” I said. “Telling me where we’re going, for instance.”

Vinnie opened his eyes. “Go to White River,” he said. “Then take a right.”

“White River’s another two hours away.”

“What time is it?” he said.

“Little after nine.”

He picked up my cell phone. “We still get a signal up here?”

“I imagine,” I said. “On this road, anyway. Try it.”

He turned it on and dialed a number. “I’m gonna try Albright’s number again.” He listened for a short while, then he hung up.

“No dice?”

“He’s not picking up.”

“You said you left a message last time?”

“Yeah, I asked him to call my mother’s number. I said I was a member of Vinnie’s family, and was wondering why he hadn’t come back home yet.”

“You don’t think this has gotten to the point where you should come clean?”

“Does it really matter who they think he is? Either way, they should have brought him back three days ago.”

“I just don’t see how this lie is gonna help.”

He didn’t say anything.

“Tell me again. You don’t know anything else about this Albright guy? Where he works?”

“No, I really don’t. Tom didn’t tell me, anyway.”

“What’s his first name?”

“Red.”

“Sounds more like a nickname.”

“I know. Tom said his name was Red Albright, and he had four other guys, all experienced hunters, that they were heading for this lodge on Lake Peetwaniquot, and that they’d pick him up on the way.”

“Where, at his house?”

“They met him at the duty-free shop by the bridge. They said they’d be driving a black Chevy Suburban. I drove him over there.”

“But you didn’t see them. I mean, you weren’t there at the duty-free, hiding behind the cigarettes or anything.”

“No, Alex. I was not hiding behind the cigarettes.”

“You don’t know anything else about these men, other than the fact that they were going to pay your brother three thousand dollars?”

“Every one of my cousins has asked me that,” he said. “Every one of my uncles, two of my aunts, and, of course, my mother has asked me that maybe seven times on her own. The answer is no, I don’t know anything else. And I’ll give you the answer to your next question before you even ask it. Yes. Yes, I’m an idiot.”

“That one I didn’t need to ask,” I said. “So try the lodge again. Maybe their phone works today.”

“Maybe it does,” he said, punching in the number. After a moment, he hit the End button. “It still doesn’t go through.”

We rode on another few minutes, through more trees, then over a small bridge. I could see a large bird, maybe a hawk, circling over the road ahead.

“So when do you call the police?” I said. “I mean, I’m just wondering.”

He looked out the window. “I want to find him and bring him back home. Without getting him in big trouble.”

“If you can.”

“Yeah, if I can.”

“And if you can’t?”

“Then I call the police.”

“Okay,” I said.

“We take one shot at it,” he said. “That’s all I want to do.”

“Fair enough.”

We kept going. Four hours had passed. As we left the park, we saw signs for Wawa, the closest thing to a real town we’d see for the rest of the day, if you didn’t mind the name.

“You getting hungry yet?” he said.

“You read my mind. We’ll stop in Wawa, get some gas. See if they have a decent place to eat.”

The first thing we saw was a goose. It was a good twenty feet tall, and it was standing on a pedestal that had to be another ten feet. A giant goose head thirty feet in the air, looking down at you-that’s apparently how you know you’re in Wawa. There was another goose, this one only five feet tall, in front of the first store we saw, then another goose about the same size in front of the motel.

“They seem to have a thing about geese in this town,” I said.

“Where do you think the name comes from?”

I thought about it. “Wawa means goose?”

“In Ojibwa, yes.”

“Now I know.” I drove by a couple of fast-food places and pulled up in front of a place that didn’t seem to have a name. “You don’t mind stopping at a bar, do you?”

I knew Vinnie didn’t drink, but I’d be damned if I came all this way up into Canada without having a Molson. We got out of the truck and stretched, looking and sounding like two men who’d been driving since well before the sun came up. There were only two other vehicles in the parking lot-one truck that looked about as old as mine, and an Impala that may have been white one day, a long, long time ago. Apparently, this place didn’t draw much of a lunch crowd.

When we stepped inside, we saw a bar and six empty stools. The man behind the stick looked up at us and put down his magazine. Besides him, there were two men on the other side of the room, playing one of those barroom bowling games where you slide the metal puck down the wooden chute. There was a pool table in the middle of the room with two cues crossed in a large X on the green felt, and a jukebox that, thankfully, wasn’t making a sound.

Everywhere else, there were photographs. On every wall, on every available surface on which you could hang a picture, there was nothing but men standing next to dead animals, mostly deer, all of them strung up by the back legs and hanging upside down, tongues falling out of open mouths. Suddenly I didn’t feel so hungry.

“Come on in, gentlemen,” the man at the bar said. He was a big one. He had passed three hundred pounds a long time ago, and wasn’t heading back anytime soon. “What can I get ya, eh?”

“You serve food in here?”

“Damn right we do. You in the mood for some nice venison stew?”

Vinnie and I both sneaked another look at the pictures on the wall. “You don’t actually hunt deer around here, do you?” I said.

The man looked at us for a moment and then started laughing. “I thought you were serious.”

“How about a couple of cheeseburgers,” I said. “One Molson and one 7-Up.”

The two men playing the little bowling game had stopped to watch us come in. “Where are you boys from?” one of them said, the one with the Maple Leafs jersey. His nose was taped up, and there were purple bruises running under both eyes. His friend was wearing his orange hunting jacket, with the license still pinned to the back.

“Michigan,” I said.

“You up here hunting?”

“Nope, other business.”

“Other business,” the one with the taped-up face said to the one in the hunting jacket. “What the hell does that mean?”

The bartender brought our drinks over. We sat there and watched him grill up the cheeseburgers. The two men went back to their bowling game. The pins were attached to the machine from above, and you had to slide the puck over little sensors to make them flip up. They apparently thought you needed to slide the puck as hard as you possibly could, and that you needed to swear at it very loudly.