Widowmaker (Mike Bowditch #7)(74)

“So that animal you called me about really was a hybrid?”

“Afraid so. I’ve been looking at the law book, and I think I have six days to find a home for him before he’s euthanized. Am I reading that right?”

“I never had to deal with that situation, but I’m guessing the language is vague enough that, unless the department formally transferred ownership to the shelter, you can take him around to people who might consider adopting him. It won’t be easy. Most of the wolf dogs I’ve met have been holy terrors, especially those with the higher wolf content. What’s your guess about this one?”

“I don’t have to guess. He came from Montana, and the state had him listed in its registry. He’s ninety percent wolf.”

“Ninety percent!” Kathy said. “That’s a wild animal, Mike. That’s not a pet.”

“I was hoping you might consider taking him.”

“No.”

“Please, Kathy. You have a permit, and you’re so good with dogs. Pluto has been gone nearly two years and—”

“Mike, you need to stop right there.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You should be.”

It had been rude of me to try to foist Shadow onto my friend. When Kathy was ready to adopt another dog, she would no doubt want an animal bred for search-and-rescue operations, one she could train. Wolf hybrids were probably the worst-possible animals for the work she did.

“What about some sort of sanctuary?” I asked.

She gave the question some thought. “Well, there’s nothing in Maine.”

“There used to be one in New Hampshire, but I heard it closed.”

“Fenris Unchained didn’t close,” she said. “That was just a rumor because the guy who runs the place had a heart attack, and they thought he was going to die. Somehow, he recovered and is back to taking wolf dogs. I don’t know if he’s accepting new animals, though. More and more states are banning wolf hybrids.”

“Where’s it located?”

“Just across the border in the White Mountains. I’ve never been there, but I heard it’s a funky place. Do you want me to make a call for you?”

“Yes! Thank you, Kathy.”

“What is it about this particular animal that’s gotten to you?”

“I feel responsible for him.”

“There’s got to be more to it than that.”

“I can’t explain it. If you saw him, you would understand, I think.”

After we’d signed off, I pondered the matter some more.

Being a game warden means dealing daily with dying and dead animals. In the course of a shift, you might be called upon to shoot a rabid fox or kill a moose whose brain has been turned into Swiss cheese by parasitic worms. The thrash-metal band Megadeth once put out an album titled Killing Is My Business … and Business Is Good. I hated the music but thought often of the title. In the course of your career, you see hundreds of dead deer, bears, moose, geese, ducks, turkeys, coyotes. The list goes on.

Game wardens couldn’t afford to be sentimental about wild animals. Those feelings were a luxury that belonged to first-world people who no longer had to think about the cycle of predator and prey—people who could afford to remain ignorant of how life actually played out on planet Earth.

*

One of the perks of being a warden is that the department allows you to use your patrol truck on your days off, provided you reimburse the state for your mileage.

I put on civilian clothes over my long underwear—L. L. Bean boots, jeans, wool shirt, and Carhartt coat—and went out into the freezing garage.

Most days, I lived out of my patrol truck. A warden’s pickup is the closest thing he or she has to an office and supply shed. Most of the gear I carried was standard from season to season: binoculars, an old-fashioned pager to receive messages when I was miles from the nearest cell tower, a camouflage jacket and pants, a spotting scope, a first-aid kit, a Mossberg 510A1 tactical shotgun, a Windham Weaponry AR-15 rifle, boxes of all kinds of ammo, evidence bags and body bags, a come-along, multiple thicknesses of rope, a sleeping bag, a GPS, a camera, crime-scene tape, flares, safety cones, et cetera.

I didn’t normally travel with an animal carrier or catch pole, but I knew I would need the carrier at least on this trip. The department had just given us new talonproof gloves that extended up the arm to the elbow. They were comparable to the bite sleeves worn by dogcatchers. I threw my new gloves onto the passenger seat.

As I got behind the wheel, I saw my father’s dog tags dangling from the rearview mirror. I’d forgotten that I had hung them there. I could hear Amber’s last words in my head as clearly as if I were back in that smoky room again. I thought you were a good person. I thought you were loyal. But you’re just as much of a heartless bastard as Jack was. What kind of * son doesn’t even claim his dead father’s ashes?

A son who had been utterly betrayed by his father?

I had no idea what had become of my father’s ashes. I assumed that the state of Maine had some protocol for dealing with the unwanted remains of the indigent and outcast. I figured there must be a twenty-first-century equivalent to the old potter’s field. But I wasn’t entirely sure where to begin looking for it.

I flicked the dog tags so that they jingled, then backed out of the garage.