The Island(73)

Her dad took off her backpack and helped her into a bivy bag.

He set down the Mossberg and the Winchester.

They didn’t talk. They communicated in signs. They were, she thought, like escaped prisoners of war in an enemy country not wishing to give themselves away.

She was warm enough in the bivy and her old coat, her dad’s army beanie, and the fox-fur mittens that her mother had made for her last winter.

She lay on her belly and watched the elk herd gradually work its way up the valley toward them. Her father offered her the binoculars, but she shook her head.

A hawk circled above, his wings the color of the red wagon she’d had when she was a very little girl.

Her father checked the weapons.

The Mossberg shotgun was for a bear attack. It was loaded with birdshot and buckshot and slugs in an ascending sequence of lethality.

The single-shot Winchester Model 70 had been in the family since before the Korean War.

The elk were close now. She took off the mittens and cradled the rifle.

She looked through the sight, and the animals became startlingly close.

She loaded the .257 round.

She leveled the weapon and waited. And waited.

They were upwind and so effectively hidden that the elk had no awareness of any danger. The animals smelled earthy and nutty and she could hear them snorting and snuffling as they tore at the ferns and mosses. They were talking to one another in low-frequency moans like elephants.

Her father and she were not talking.

There was nothing to say.

They understood each other perfectly.

They both knew that all this was theater. That she was not going to go through with it. This was the second time he had taken her after big game. She was as stubborn as he was.

When the big bull elk was only twenty-five yards away, she sighted him in the heart and lungs just to the right of his dark brown mane. She moved her finger to the trigger.

She held it there for a moment.

“Pow,” she whispered.

She safetied the Winchester and laid it on the snow.

Her dad picked it up and looked through the sight. “The bull?” he whispered.

“Yes.”

He swung back the bolt, removed the .257 round, and returned it to the Ziploc ammo bag.

The elks still had no clue that humans were fifty feet away.

Her father put a sleeve on the Winchester.

He looked like he was finally going to say something but in the end he didn’t quite know how.

He had been a staff sergeant. She assumed that that had entailed giving orders and barking commands, sometimes in extremis. But she had never even seen him yell at the dog. Her mother had also been a sergeant and she could certainly imagine her giving orders. But not him. He had left his articulation over there.

She had to be the one to speak. “I’m sorry if I let you down.”

“No!” he replied. “Lord, no. It’s OK. You’re a good girl. You did the right thing.”

On the walk back down she saw that the doe tracks by the river had been so effectively erased, it was as if they had never existed at all. Life, she supposed, was like that—a fleeting impression by a little stream in a big wood that was soon gone.

On the drive home they listened to Neil Young and Dolly and Willie.

It was dusk when they drove off the ferry.

Blue woodsmoke was coming from the cabins. All those little chimney tops in secret communication with the sky.

It was dark when they made it to the house.

The Sound was black. Seattle twinkled in the far distance.

Her dad had been thinking. Her mom had known she would pull this again. She’d said, “Leave the girl.”

“I’ll talk to your mother,” he said. “We can probably get meat just as cheap at Costco.”

“As cheap as free?”

“Nothing’s free.”

They went inside. Her mom had made chili from chuck meat. She already knew. She didn’t even say anything. She just smiled and gave Heather a hug. Moms.

Heather helped her father with the dishes.

He cleared his throat. “There are times when you have to take the fight to the enemy. But he wasn’t our enemy. It wasn’t his time.”

“No,” she agreed.

He ruffled her hair. She felt the hand.

She shivered.

Woke.

The fire was dying. It was cold.

She sat up.

Breathed deep.

“Heather, do you think Dad is in heaven?” Olivia asked.

“Yes,” she replied.

Heather’s dad said there was no one looking out for you—no God, no dead ancestors, no angels. Just medics and corpsmen. Her mother said she never thought about it, but her mother’s mother, Heather’s grandmother, had told her stories about the Great Spirit, about the mountain gods, about the old religion.

She’d try a prayer to all of them.

She grabbed the rifle and got to her feet.

“Where are you going?” Olivia asked.

“The dogs will find us tomorrow unless I take care of them,” she said.

Olivia took a second to process what that meant and then nodded. “Be careful,” she said.

Heather handed her the cigarette lighter. “Keep the fire going. That eucalyptus wood burns well.”

“Can you see if you can get more food?” Owen asked. “But no more wombat. I don’t think humans are supposed to eat that.”