Northwest Angle

  “If the wind gets bad out there, that little toothpick you call a boat could be in for a rough ride.”

  “We’ll be fine,” Kretsch said.

  Jenny was very glad that he sounded absolutely certain.

  “Aaron, Stephen, you guys all set?”

  “I’d still rather stay here,” Stephen said. “I want to help you track down Smalldog.”

  “I understand,” Cork said, and he did. “But, Stephen, I need you at Henry Meloux’s to make sure Jenny and the baby are safe there. And you and Henry, well, everybody knows how special you are to him. He won’t say no if you’re there.”

  “He wouldn’t say no anyway,” Stephen countered. “If he did, he wouldn’t be Henry.”

  “I’ll feel better about sending the baby if I know you’re helping at the other end, okay?” Cork said.

  Which was the truth, but not the whole truth. If things got bad on the Angle, Cork wanted as many of his children as possible out of harm’s way. For Mal’s plan to work, Anne had to stay on Oak Island. Stephen didn’t.

  “Don’t forget,” Aaron threw in helpfully. “I’ve never piloted a boat, Stephen. I need you to get us safely back to the mainland.”

  Stephen seemed to see the wisdom of that and, although not necessarily happy with it, nodded his agreement.

  They shook hands around and the family hugged and bid one another Godspeed and then it was time. Bascombe headed out first, Kretsch next, and finally Aaron and Stephen. Mal and Anne brought up the rear. Mal carried a rifle. Anne carried the basket, inside of which was a rolled-up bath towel swaddled in a blanket. While Mal helped the others cast off, Anne sat down on the bench with her back to the water, lifted the rolled-up towel in its blanket, and held it to her chest in what, from a distance, would certainly appear to be a loving embrace. Aaron and Stephen pulled away in the rental, motored out a short distance, and waited. Kretsch joined them, easing his little Lund Tyee alongside. Bascombe swung away last. As he came abreast of the other two crafts, they all throttled forward, headed into the channel, and curled north.

  From inside the cabin, Cork watched until they’d rounded a point of land three-quarters of a mile northwest and disappeared. He knew that as soon as they were out of sight they would split up. Bascombe would head toward Windigo Island. Aaron and Stephen would head toward Young’s Bay Landing on the mainland. And Kretsch would follow a circuitous route that would, eventually, bring him to the other side of Oak Island, where Jenny and the baby and Cork would be waiting.

  It was Mal’s three-card monte—which was the important boat?—but with a twist: Jenny and the baby still appeared to be on the dock.

  Cork turned from the window to Jenny, who stood holding the baby. Rose was next to her, and on the floor at their feet sat the ice chest, which Bascombe had stuffed with bedding. “It’s time,” he said. He saw the apprehension in his daughter’s eyes, and he smiled and said, “Everything’s going to be fine, Jenny.”

  She nodded, meaning that she’d heard him and, perhaps, meaning to convey as well that she believed him. But her eyes told a different story.

  “Let’s get our little guy settled in,” Rose suggested.

  Jenny laid the child in the soft bedding of the ice chest and covered him with a light blanket. He was awake and stared up at her as she leaned over him. Cork was relieved to see that he didn’t seem upset at all with his new carrier. He simply studied Jenny’s face with what seemed to be utter fascination.

  Cork took up the rifle Bascombe had left for him, then he hefted a pack filled with clean diapers, a canister of formula, and other items for the baby. “This way,” he said.

  He took them through the kitchen to the rear door of the lodge, which opened onto a small grassy apron between the log structure and the woods that backed the old resort. Hidden from the lake by the body of the lodge, they quickly crossed the grass and stepped onto a path that cut into the woods. Cork led the way, with Jenny in the middle and Rose bringing up the rear. Bascombe had given them a map of the island that showed the walking trails. He’d warned them that the trails could be a little difficult, muddy at times. He’d marked the route to a private cabin and dock owned by a couple from St. Cloud who’d left the Angle a week ago to visit their daughter in Orlando.

  In the woods, the bugs were fierce, and the trail, as Bascombe had warned, was often a bed of muck. They made their way quickly, the sounds of their passage masked by the rattle of leaves in the wind. They climbed a modest ridge for a while, then dropped again toward the lake. Half an hour after they started, they emerged at the cabin and walked into the blast of the wind out of the southwest.

  Kretsch was there, waiting for them at the dock. His boat rocked on the waves. Cork felt Jenny hesitate.

  “It’ll be all right,” he said.

  “Couldn’t we just take our chances driving out?”

  She said. Cork turned to his daughter and, for an important moment, held her eyes with his own. “We could. But that’s not what we’ve planned, and with good reason. We know that Smalldog’s after this kid, and we know the kind of cruelty he’s capable of. I think we have a good chance of confusing him, and anyone who’s helping him. But it depends on taking your boy out across the big water. Tom says he can do that. I believe him. We’ll be fine, Jenny, I give you my word. Okay?”

  He believed this or he wouldn’t have said it. But he also knew that the foundation of his belief was a matter less of the facts than of faith.

  “We should go,” Kretsch urged. “Before we’re spotted.”

  Rose said, “You’ll call us when you’ve reached the other shore?”

  “Count on it,” Cork said. “Just make sure Seth keeps his land line open.”

  Rose gave them all hugs, even Kretsch, who seemed a little embarrassed at the display of affection. The deputy got aboard and helped Jenny in. Cork handed over the ice chest with the baby inside and then the pack. Kretsch set the ice chest between the two rear seats and put the pack next to a couple of ten-gallon cans of extra fuel he’d secured near the engine. Cork cast off the lines and boarded, too. They donned life jackets, then Kretsch backed away from the dock. The flat stern pushed awkwardly against the roll of the waves until the deputy spun the wheel and put the nose of the bow into the wind. He nudged the throttle ahead, and they started south.

  Cork recalled that Bascombe had likened Kretsch’s modest Tyee to a toothpick. The comparison seemed to be more than a little apt as they bounced across the chop of waves toward the big water, which at that moment, appeared to be as broad and perilous as an ocean.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Rose, Mal, and Anne sat at the table in Bascombe’s lodge. Rose had made coffee, and the three of them sipped and listened to the wind and watched the clock set in the driftwood on the wall. Rose thought she’d never known time to pass so slowly. She wasn’t sure what the others were thinking, but she was praying.

  “I remember once when I was a kid and Dad was sheriff,” Anne said eventually. Despite the heat of the day, she had her hands wrapped around her coffee mug as if she were cold. “He had to go out to a cabin where a man was holding his wife hostage.”

  “Vernon Lucasta,” Rose said.

  “Right,” Anne said.

  The clock on the wall ticked away.

  “What happened?” Mal finally asked.

  “Dad got there and went inside, unarmed. He found Mrs. Lucasta—”

  “Bianca,” Rose said.

  Mal glanced at her.

  “She sang with me in the St. Agnes choir,” Rose explained.

  “Right. Bianca,” Anne said. “Anyway, she was tied to a chair in the bedroom, and Lucasta had a rifle and he told Dad he was going to kill her if someone didn’t get the damn bugs out of the cabin.”

  “Insects?” Mal asked.

  Anne shook her head. “Listening devices. Lucasta was convinced someone was spying on him, and his wife was somehow involved.”

  “Delusional?” Mal asked.

  “That’s what
Dad thought,” Anne said.

  “And with good reason,” Rose added, taking up the story. “Vernon was an odd duck.”

  Anne said, “Remember when he joined the kids in the Christmas pageant and he was dressed like an elephant?”

  “An elephant in Bethlehem?”

  “He wasn’t even supposed to be a part of the pageant, Uncle Mal,” Anne said. “He just showed up. I think he might have been drunk.”

  “He wasn’t,” Rose said.

  “Okay,” Mal said. “So he’s got his wife tied up and is threatening her. What did your father do?”

  “He told Lucasta he’d look for the bugs. He was thinking that, while he did that, he might be able to talk sense into the man or figure a way to surprise and disarm him.”

  “Did he?”

  “No. He found three bugs.”

  “What?”

  “One in the telephone. One in the bedroom, and one in the bathroom.”

  “Who put them there?”

  “Bianca,” Rose said. “She sold Tupperware and was convinced that, whenever she was away, Vernon had women there. She wanted proof.”

  “What did Cork do?”

  “He talked Lucasta into giving him the rifle, then talked them both into going into therapy that very day.”

  “He didn’t arrest the guy?”

  “No. In the end they divorced, but it was amicable, more or less.”

  Mal said, “And the point of your story?”

  Anne said, “I was just thinking that I’m afraid for Jenny, but if there’s any good thing about her situation, it’s that Dad’s with her.”

  Rose smiled and put her hand on Anne’s arm in a gesture of understanding and agreement. But she didn’t say what she herself was thinking. Which was that, even though Cork was a good, reliable man, if bad weather blew in across the big water, everyone in that little boat was in trouble.

  They heard the launch coming. Mal went to the window. “It’s Seth,” he said.

  Bascombe arrived and stood in the doorway with his arms crossed, eyeing them sternly. “Well?”

  “They got off,” Mal said.

  “Anyone see them?”

  “I’m pretty sure not,” Rose said.

  Bascombe nodded grimly. “I’ll feel better once we get the call that they’ve made it safe.”

  He’d given Kretsch the GPS coordinates for a cabin on the south shore of Lake of the Woods, northwest of Zippel Bay. The cabin was empty, he knew, because the man who’d owned it was in prison for smuggling cigarettes into Canada. The land was now forfeited property of the U.S. government, but nothing had been done with it, and the cabin sat abandoned. Bascombe had used the place himself for a weekend fishing rendezvous with a couple of his old pals from ATF. It had a good dock and was isolated and ought to work well for getting the baby onto the mainland without anyone seeing.

  The plan was for Aaron to drive his truck to the cabin, along with Stephen, pick up Jenny and the baby, and all of them head to Tamarack County and the safety they hoped Henry Meloux would offer. Kretsch and Cork would return across the big water and begin the hunt for Noah Smalldog.

  Bascombe plopped his big body down at the table. “That coffee smells good, Rose. Any left?”

  “Let me pour you a cup, then I’ll make a fresh pot,” she said.

  “How’s our baby?” Bascombe said, nodding toward the basket where the swaddled towel lay. “Did you show that guy plenty of affection out there on the dock?”

  “Don’t worry. She played her part well,” Mal answered. “Did anybody follow you to Windigo Island?”

  “Yep. Had a tail all the way.” Bascombe sounded quite pleased. “He kept his boat pretty far back, so I didn’t get a good look at him. But Indian I’d say.”

  “Smalldog?”

  Bascombe shook his head. “One of his cohorts, I figure.”

  Rose put a cup full of coffee down on the table in front of him. “What about Stephen and Aaron?”

  “Didn’t see anyone take off after them, so I think they’re in the clear. I’m guessing I was followed because I’ve got the best boat. Tom was right about that. I just hope to God he doesn’t run into any heavy weather in that little Tyee of his. The open water on that south section of the lake is so huge it generates its own unpredictable weather systems. Squalls can come up out of nowhere.”

  That put a damper on conversation for a little while. Rose busied herself making another pot of coffee. Mal stood up and limped to the wall where a map of the Lake of the Woods and the Angle hung. He studied it a moment.

  “I’ve been trying to figure out the Northwest Angle,” he said. “To get here, you’ve got to cross the border and drive through sixty miles of Canadian wilderness, or else cut across forty miles of open water on Lake of the Woods. What’s a piece of U.S. territory doing this far north?”

  “Northernmost point in the forty-eight contiguous states,” Bascombe said, with a note of pride. “The result of a misunderstanding during the negotiations for the treaty that set the border between us and Canada.”

  “What kind of misunderstanding?” Anne asked.

  Bascombe slurped his coffee, closed his eyes, and let the good brew trickle down his throat. “Where exactly the headwaters of the Mississippi River lay. Everybody thought they were much farther east than they ended up being. The result was a little northern jut of territory that cut across Lake of the Woods and included the Angle. Up here we call it ‘the chimney.’ ”

  Mal hobbled back to join the others at the table. “How long have you been on the Angle, Seth?”

  “Been coming here all my life. My aunt and uncle ran this little resort. When they passed, they left the property to me. I was working ATF then, so I couldn’t really do anything with it. I’d come here occasionally, try to see to things, but the old place pretty much went downhill. Finally, when I’d had one day too many of wearing a Kevlar vest at work, I retired, and moved here for good to reopen the place, try to make a go of it. Discovered real fast that I didn’t have the temperament for that kind of enterprise. I live here alone now. Suits me fine.”

  Rose finished putting the new pot of coffee together and turned back to the table, where Bascombe sat sprawled, looking worn.

  “How long before we hear from them?” she asked.

  Bascombe thought it over. “If they don’t run afoul of the weather, and if Tom has no engine problems, and if Smalldog didn’t somehow get wind of our ruse and is waiting for them out on the big water, I’d say three hours.”

  “Three hours of waiting,” Anne said.

  In her niece’s tone, Rose heard what they all probably felt: Three hours would seem like forever.

  “Mal, Seth,” she said, putting all the robustness she could muster into her voice, “you two should get back out on the dock and show a presence here. Annie, let’s bake some cookies.”

  THIRTY-SIX

  Cork had never been on water so huge. He was more than uncomfortable. He was seasick.

  The big water, as the folks on the Angle called it, was well named. It stretched away to the horizon in every direction, dazzling blue under the vast sky, shot with diamonds of reflected sunlight, alive with swells. Kretsch was intent at the helm, fighting to keep the Tyee on course against the sweep of waves and shove of wind. Jenny sat with the ice chest at her feet, her eyes darting between the baby nestled inside and the vast expanse of water on which they were the only human presence.

  Cork understood that it was going to be the longest and most miserable boat ride of his life.

  He’d always believed that particular distinction would belong to the dinner excursion he’d made on Lake Michigan the night he proposed to Jo. It should have been romantic but turned out to be comic tragedy. Although they were never out of sight of land, the wind had been strong and the cruise a little rough and Cork hadn’t been able to eat much. He’d managed near the end of dinner to pop his question. And then he promptly threw up.

  It had been a funny story to tell across the ye
ars. He was pretty sure that after this boat trip there would be nothing funny to tell.

  He moved to the seat next to the helm and spoke to Kretsch, mostly to take his mind off his rolling stomach.

  “How’re we doing, Tom?”

  Kretsch glanced at the GPS display on the unit attached to the dash. “On target,” he said.

  Cork eyed the great empty water around them. “No sign of any other boat. That’s good.”

  “Most other boats wouldn’t be out here on a day like this.”

  Cork leaned close to the deputy. “You’ll get us there, right?”

  Kretsch gave him a look of consummate confidence. “I’ll get us there.”

  Cork sat back, relieved. “You know Lake of the Woods pretty well?”

  “There are a lot of folks who know it better, folks who’ve lived here all their lives. But I know it pretty well.”

  “How long have you been here?”

  “I started coming up to fish walleye with my father and brothers when I was a kid. In college, I spent summers on the Angle, helping with one or another of the resorts. Started guiding eventually. Finally moved up here for good.”

  “What’s your law enforcement background?”

  Kretsch shook his head. “Don’t have any. I took the job because the sheriff couldn’t find anyone else willing. Everything I know is from experience.”

  The relief that Cork had felt in all of Kretsch’s assurances vanished in an instant. “No law enforcement training whatsoever?”

  “Ride-alongs with the deputies out of Baudette, and a bunch of seminars over time, but that’s about it. Up here, there’s not much breach of the law to worry about. It’s only a part-time job. The rest of the time I work for a barge company in Angle Inlet, helping deliver big items to the islands.”

  Jesus Christ, Cork wanted to say. He’d always thought of Tamarack County as a rural operation. This topped everything.

  “What if something really big happened?”

  “The sheriff comes up himself or sends one of his regular deputies to give a hand. I usually just hold down the fort until they arrive.”