Gone South (A Butterscotch Jones Mystery Book 3) (10 page)

From the
occasional cursing
, I could tell that others were still on our trail, but falling further behind all the time. Also, the voices seemed fewer and I wonder
ed
if they had split up, some going south along the stream. On my own, since the moon was full and the rain had stopped, I might have been tempted to travel by night, but not with Chuck.
We would need to make camp.

“This is a nice clearing,” the Mountie said. It was clear because bears had been using it.
Probably a mother and cubs.
The brambles that edged the glade were almost stripped but a few blackberries remained.

“Yes. I’m hoping our followers will choose to stay here for the night.”

“Why?” Chuck asked, stopping beside me.

“Because I’m going to leave them a present. Let me see your pack.”

Chuck handed it over without argument. I opened it up and took two of the sugar packets.
I chose sugar over my mints. Some herbs repel bears and I couldn’t recall if mint was one of them.

“Gather some berries.”

“They look pretty sorry,” Chuck objected.
“I saw better ones back a ways.”

“They aren’t for us. I’m making bear bait.”

The Mountie
blinked and then
smiled. It was the first lightening of expression I had seen in hours.

“They’ll smell the sugar and berries?”

“Yes.” And the blood.
Some people believe it is myth, but Big John had always warned me and
t
he Flowers to stay out of the woods while menstruating because bears are drawn to the smell of blood
and their noses are a
s
keen as any dog’s
.

Using a flat rock that had flaked away from its parent
boulder
,
I took the handful of berries C
huck offered and sprinkled them with sugar.
A smaller rock served as a muddler.
Then, taking a small folding knife out of
my
cross-body bag, I inserted the blade in my nose and made a small cut. I chose the nose because it bleeds easily and because I could contain the blood with a bunched
tissue
. I want
ed
the smell to stay in the clearing, not send bears after us.

“Butterscotch!” Poor Chuck
was horrified
.
I leaned over the stone and let the blood dribble on the berries. After a moment I stuffed a tissue in my nose and tilted my head back. Using my thumb I applied pressure to the wounded nostril.

“Take this gunk and smear it on the backside
s
of rocks and bushes,” I instructed. “Don’t put any where the thugs will see it. We don’t want them warned. Be quick. We need to get out before the bears arrive.”

“Will they come soon?” Chuck asked.

“I hope not. They’ve been nesting here at night. If we are lucky, they won’t come back until
full
dark. But I don’t want to chance it. It’s getting late and the cabin is a ways f
a
rther on.”

From his haste, I could see Chuck agreed about not being around when the bears returned.

We had perhaps an hour of daylight when I found the remains of the cabin.
It had deteriorated over the years.
The floor was covered in silt. Clearly the stream had flood
ed
the shack in the not so distant past. The builder had been crazy to choose a spot so near the
river
. You know what they say
—
location, location, location. But we were in no danger of floods that night and it put a roof over our head
s
and some walls between us and the wild. A determined bear could get inside, but Chuck probably didn’t know that.
And I wouldn’t tell him since he seemed to finally be relaxing.

I picked up a
dented aluminum pot that had cemented itself in the mud. There were some desiccated pinecones and broken limbs washed into the corner that were the right size for kindling.
There
was
also a fine selection of cobwebs, but they were filthy and their owners had moved on long ago.

“
Can you start a fire
?”

“Sure. In here?”

We looked up. No chimney vent.

“
No. B
etter do it outside
in case it smokes
. I’m going to go catch some dinner.
That stream should be good for something besides covering our tracks.
”

“What? You mean you’re going fishing?”
Chuck sounded a little panicked.

“Yes.”

“Without a rod?”

And without me?

“I don’t need one. And I know you don’t like drinking stream water, but we are going to boil up some coffee
first thing
and you are going to drink it. We have been working hard and we are both dehydrated.”

“Okay.” Chuck sounded dubious.
“You want the gun?”

“You keep it.
”
Then I repeated the same words I’d been saying all day. “It’s going to be okay.”

*  *  *

Jimmy Nine Toes walked at the tail end of a column of men
,
allowing the others ahead of him to clear a trail.
He wheezed heavily though he carried nothing but a small attaché case containing his personal belongings, depending upon his subordinates to pack in the camping gear and heavy equipment.
They stopped to take a much needed breather when his lead enforcer and right
-
hand man, Tony Scarlatti, called the column to a halt.
Jimmy had put Tony in charge of leading the pursuit since he knew that Tony had once been a Boy Scout.
Tony worked his way back along the line of men until he came to Jimmy, who was exhausted from the exertion of tromping through the forest for the last several hours.

“It’s almost nightfall, Mr. James,” Tony said.
“There’s a clearing up ahead that should be perfect for setting up our base camp.”

“Alright.
Have the men start unpacking the tents and camping gear and clearing the space of debris.
I’ll leave it to you to set
up the communications array.”

“Yes, sir.”

Jimmy
used a silk handkerchief he pulled from the pocket of his business coat to wipe the sweat from his brow.
His leather shoes were a mess but there hadn’t been time to order hiking boots that would fit his custom orthotic. Having nine toes was a bitch.

Tony worked his way back to the head of the column
,
issuing orders along the way as to who was to do what.
The exhausted men spread out when they reached the clearing, looking more like a well-organized group of soldiers than the rabble of street punks and murderers that they really were. It was too bad about that poison ivy they’d wandered into before Tony could stop them. Some of the guys were already scratching.

Jimmy tried his cell phone and, sure enough, received no signal.
He would have to wait for the satellite communications dish to be set
up and aligned to call in to his boss.
Meanwhile he took a seat on a rock and removed his coat and tie.
Watching as his men read instructions and tried to figure ou
t how to set
up the tents, Jimmy
realized that they were all out of their element in these woods and that things could get dicey if they didn’t pay attentio
n to their surroundings.
Jimmy
had become disgusted with the slow progress his team was making in setting up their base camp when Tony approached to inform him that the satellite link was up.

“This is Pursuit Force One calling HQ,” Jimmy said, using the preestablished call signals after having slipped on the radio headset.
He felt stupid, but his employer insisted.

“Jimmy
, where the hell are you?” his boss replied, completely ignoring the agreed upon communications protocol.

“Somewhere in the woods, miles
west
of Winnipeg.”

“You might as well say you’re somewhere in fucking Canada, dammit.
What the hell are you doing there?”

“We’re in pursuit of our target who has led us into the wilderness.”

“Then you failed in your mission?”

“Not yet,”
Jimmy
replied in annoyance.

“Well get it done and get back here as soon as possible.”

“As soon as possible.
Are the Feds nosing around?
”

“Yeah. And Jimmy
?”

“Yes.”

“I’m not happy.”

“I realize that, sir.”

The line went dead.
Jimmy slipped off the headset and set it aside.
He watched as one of his men nearly poked his eye out with a tent support.
Another man was crouched before a stack of wood holding the flame from a Bic lighter to the end of a stick.

Yes, they were definitely out of their element here.
The other team wa
s probably just as inept.
They’d get lost or eaten by bears.

Jimmy
was enraged
at the thought that this could possibly be the way that his career came to an end.
Someone was going to have to pay for this.

Chapter 9

Armed only with a small portable flashlight and a desperate need to relieve himself, the Mountie struck out on his own into the woods.
Almost immediately upon leaving Butterscotch’s side he felt as if he’d left planet Earth and set foot on some foreign, vegetation
-
choked landscape.
The silence of the dark woods around him, periodically punctuated by a howl, hoot, or scurrying amongst the leaves, set his nerves on edge.
Though he felt like returning right away to their makeshift camp, he knew he couldn’t, his need being too desperate.

Wanting his privacy but afraid to go any f
a
rther into the woods, Chuck made do with dropping his drawers behind a large tree.
He set the flashlight aside and it rolled away
,
turning itself off in the process.
Great
, he thought,
now I’ll need to crawl around through the bushes and probably get ticks.

Chuck tried to concentrate but found that he could make no progress.
Isn’t that always the way
, he thought.
Then he heard a loud howl from nearby and was instantly done faster than he thought possible.
He remained crouching quietly beside the tree but heard nothing more from the woods around him.
Scraping up some leaves, he cleaned himself off as best he could.

It took him some time to find the flashlight.
When he finally found it, he stood upright and realized that he didn’t know which way to go to return to Butterscotch.
Panic gripped him.
It was dark, he was alone in the woods, he was being tracked by hardened criminals, and he was lost.
He shined the flashlight this way and that, but all paths looked the same.

“Butterscotch,” he called in a mere whisper.
“Butterscotch,” he called louder as he walked forward.
“Butterscotch!” he yelled when he was sure he would never be found.

Chuck almost relieved himself a second time when he felt the hand grab his shoulder.
Spinning, he found Butterscotch standing before him.

“Chuck, not so loud,” she whispered.
“We can’t be too sure how far away
the thugs
have made camp.”

Chuck said nothing
,
though he wanted to cry out he was so happy to have been found.
Taking his hand, Butterscotch led him confidently through the trees to the camp she’d been working on in his absence.
It smelled of wood smoke, fish
,
and coffee.

*  *  *

“What will happen if they find your Rover?” The
“
they
”
I referred to was not our thuggish shadows but rather Chuck’s colleagues in law enforcement.

“I hope they don’t. There aren’t enough lies to stuff this genie back in the bottle if it ever gets out.” Clearly his optimism was
again
on life
support. I tried not to sigh. One crisis at a time.

I tucked the survival blanket around him and then used the car blanket as a shawl. Poor Chuck was asleep almost at once. I sat up in the dark, catnapping from time to time, but mostly keeping the midnight vigil so that Chuck would be safe.
He needed rest more than I did.