C Box: Blood Trail

The dispatcher said, “Mr. Urman, I understand. But please remain where you are and don’t pursue anyone on your own. We’ve got units on the way.”

“That’s easy for you to say, lady,” the man Joe assumed was Urman said with barely controlled fury, “you haven’t seen what happened to my uncle this morning. And whoever did it is still out there.”

“Mr. Urman-”

“Somebody shot him with a high-powered rifle,” Urman said, “like a goddamned elk!”

Joe swallowed hard.

“Like a goddamned elk,” Urman repeated in a near whisper, an auditory hitch in his voice.

AS HE FOLLOWED KINER, Joe did a quick inventory of his pickup. He’d been practically living in it for the past month and it showed. The carpeting on the floorboards showed mud from the clay draws and arroyos near Lusk, the Little Snake River bottomland of Baggs, the desert of Rawlins, the Wind River foothills out of Pinedale. There was a gritty covering of dust on his dashboard and over his instruments. The console was packed with maps, notes, citation books. The skinny space behind his seat was crammed with jackets and coats for every weather possibility, as well as his personal shotgun, his Remington WingMaster twelve-gauge, his third since he’d become a full-time game warden. An M-14 carbine with a peep sight was under the seat, a Winchester.270 rifle was secured in brackets behind his head. The large padlocked metal box in the bed of the vehicle held evidence kits, survival gear, necropsy kits, heavy winter clothing, tools, spare radios, a tent and sleeping bag. Single-cab pickups for game wardens with all this gear was proof that whoever it was in the department who purchased the vehicles had never been out in the field.

Since he’d lost his district and been assigned to work “without portfolio” for the governor, Joe filled in across the state whenever and wherever he was needed. Since there were only fifty-four game wardens covering the ninety-eight thousand square miles of the state, he was constantly in demand. If a warden was sick, injured, or had extended duty in court or on assignment, Joe was asked to substitute. Because he was moving around so much, agency biologists had asked him to gather samples from big-game animals across the state so they could monitor the spread of chronic wasting disease. CWD was a transmissible neurological disease that attacked the brains of deer and elk and was similar to mad cow disease. From a few isolated cases in the southwest of the state, the disease seemed to be moving north and was turning into a significant threat to the wild game population. Joe was concerned, as were many others. Too many animals were showing positive results for CWD, although not yet in crisis proportions.

He never knew what his schedule would be from week to week. The requests came via third party or from the wardens themselves. They never came straight from Director Pope, who had chosen not to communicate directly with Joe in any way. Joe liked it better that way as well, but he never forgot for a moment that Pope had fired him and would do so again in an instant if he could find justification. Joe’s relationship with the governor was vague, and after the case in Yellowstone Joe wasn’t sure he could trust him. But Rulon had not given Joe any reasons to doubt his sincerity since then, other than his generally erratic behavior, a sign of which was hiring Stella Ennis as his new chief of staff.

The two trucks raced up the state highway, wigwag lights flashing. A herd of pronghorn antelope raced them for a while before turning south in a flowing arc toward the breaklands. Cows looked up but didn’t stop grazing.

They passed the entrance to Nate Romanowski’s place. Nate was an outlaw falconer with a mysterious background who’d made a pledge to protect Joe and his family after Joe proved his innocence in a murder investigation. Currently, Nate was in federal custody involving the disappearance of two men-one being the former sheriff-two years before. He’d asked Joe to continue to feed his falcons, which Joe did every day he could. Sheridan filled in when Joe was out of town, getting a ride to Nate’s old stone house from Marybeth. Nate’s trial had been postponed twice already. Joe missed him.

Farther up the road, Joe saw Sheriff McLanahan’s GMC Blazer and two additional county vehicles waiting for them. The sheriff and his men let them pass before joining in. Joe caught a glimpse of McLanahan as they rocketed by. McLanahan had completed his physical and mental transformation from a hotheaded deputy to a western character who spoke in semiliterate cornball folkisms. The huge handlebar mustache he’d grown completed the metamorphosis.

“It looks like the posse is now complete,” McLanahan said over the radio. “Carry on, buckaroos.”

Joe rolled his eyes.

THE CARAVAN of law-enforcement vehicles was forced to ratchet down its collective speed as it entered the Big Horn National Forest. Kiner eased to the shoulder to let Joe overtake him and lead the way. The gravel road gave way to a rougher two-track that led through an empty campground and up the mountain in a series of switchbacks. Frank Urman’s camp was located over the top of the mountain through a long meadow.

The dispatcher called out his number and asked for a location.

“This is GF-52,” Joe said. “I’m with GF-36 and local law enforcement. We’re headed up the mountain now to the subject’s camp.”

“Hold for Director Pope.”

Joe grimaced.

“Joe?” It was Pope. Joe could hear the whine of the state airplane in the background.

“Yes, sir.”

“Joe, we’re about thirty minutes out. When we land we’ve got to get vehicles and get up there to the scene. About how long will it take for us to get there?”

“At least an hour, sir.”

“Damn it.”

After a beat, Pope said, “Do you know what happened yet? Is it as bad as we hear it might be?”

“We don’t know,” Joe said, “we’re not yet on the scene.”

“Who is the RP?”

“The reporting party is named Chris Urman,” the dispatcher broke in. “He’s the victim’s nephew.”

“How many people are involved?” Pope asked.

“Involved?” Joe asked. “As far as we know there is one victim.”

“No, I mean how many people know about this? How many have heard what happened to him?”

“I don’t know, sir,” Joe said.

“I’m issuing a direct order,” Pope said. “This is to you and Kiner. Don’t give any statements to anybody until I get there. Don’t talk with anyone or tell anybody what happened. Got that?”

As had happened many times before when Pope was on the radio, Joe held the mike away from him and looked at it for answers that never presented themselves.

“Affirmative,” Kiner finally said, “no public statements until you’re on the scene.”

“You got that, Joe?” Pope asked.

“I got it,” Joe said, “but we’ve got the sheriff behind us, and anybody listening to the scanner will know we’ve got a situation here.”

“Look,” Pope said, his voice rising, “I can only control my own people. I can’t control anything else. All I ask is that you follow my direct goddamned order, Joe. Can you do that?”

“Of course, sir,” Joe said, feeling his ears get hot.

“Good. I’ll call when we land. In the meantime, you two keep off the radio. And I’ll politely ask Sheriff McLanahan to do the same.”

McLanahan broke in. “Shit, I heard you. Everybody did.”

“Everybody?”

“We’re on SALECS-the State Assisted Law Enforcement Communications System,” McLanahan said. “If you want to go private you need to switch to another channel.”

Pope didn’t respond and Joe pictured him stammering and angrily hanging up. Joe waited awhile before cradling the mike. When he looked in his rearview mirror he could see Kiner signaling him with two fingers, meaning he wanted Joe to switch to the car-to-car band so no one could hear them. The frequency worked as long as the vehicles were in sight of each other, and not much farther than that.